Aunt Bee Listens
You tell her everything — the Pearl, the Thorn Queen, the grey — over breakfast, talking so fast your eggs go cold. Aunt Bee doesn't interrupt once. When you finish, she stirs her tea and says, “Well. That's more or less what I figured, give or take a queen.”
“You knew?”
“I knew storms remember.” She gets up, disappears into the pantry, and comes back with a jar of dark honey and a bundle of dried leaves. “Comfrey and thunder-honey. We'll poultice that poor creature's side — it won't cure what's wrong, that grey is beyond my craft, but it'll slow it and ease the ache.” She looks out the window at the too-big pumpkins, and something old and young at once crosses her face. “Fifty years ago there was a light in that orchard, Madison. I'll tell you the whole of it someday soon. Today, we've a patient.”
Down in the cellar, Sera submits to being poulticed with the dignity of a duchess at the dentist. Aunt Bee's hands are sure and gentle, and when she's done she pats Sera's neck and says, “There, your highness,” and Sera decides, visibly and forever, that Aunt Bee is her favorite.