Chapter 15
The rest of the summer passed quickly, filled with morning lessons from Miss Groves and sunny afternoons spent with Mistress Ainya. Neeve and I continued to roam the Darkwood, and had another encounter with an ill-tempered hobnie in need of rescue.
We were sitting in the meadow where we’d seen the White Hart. My fingers were busy braiding stalks of yarrow into a flower crown. Ostensibly, Neeve was doing the same, but she’d set her flowers aside and was staring moodily at the tall cedars at the edge of the clearing.
“What is it?” I asked. “Is something there? Is it Thorne?”
Sometimes—not often enough for my liking—the Galadhir accompanied us on our rambles through the Darkwood. I loved those afternoons, when he would pluck handfuls of ripe berries for us, or point out the del
