Fandom: Secret Garden
Written for: Gabihime in the Yuletide 2004 Challenge
by RhiannonRevolts
Mary Lennox was fourteen when she first experienced winter on the moors. That
first fall, the fall she turned eleven, she had gotten ill, and been sent to
London to recuperate and gain her strength back. The next two winters had been
spent at school there, where she was instructed in the fine art of being a
lady.
Mary had been dragged kicking and screaming from Misselthwaite that first
autumn (or rather, she would have protested far more had she been in her right
mind), and the next two she suffered of her own accord, having been reassured
that she would only have to spend two years at school, not the usual four. She
was, after all, skilled at striking deals and getting her way, and promised
that she would learn what she could on her own time.
Now, as the fall began to fade, she began to doubt her decision. If the winds
blew hard across the moors in springtime, they at least brought healing rain to
the land and gardens that were the first things Mary had ever loved. The fall
gales blew the variegated leaves from the trees, leaving branches barren and
dull. At least the trees remained alive in some way, Mary thought. The flowers
were far worse, wrinkling and browning and eventually falling to rot.
One evening, in the sitting room, Colin, with a touch of adolescent morbidity,
began to state that eventually they would all rot, before Mary told him to hush
up. Dickon, who was visiting, just smiled enigmatically. He had been doing
quite a bit of that lately.
Such was life at Misselthwaite that winter. They were all playactors, all
repeating the same role night after night, while the winds blew harder and
harder. The next day Ben Weatherstaff would gather up the fallen branches and
cut them up for firewood. And the next night, the three young people (for they
were not exactly children any longer) would warm themselves by it and banter,
trying to keep the cold away from their hearts.
The winds, of course, blew change, as they always do.
Occasionally, Mary Lennox found herself wishing that Dickon would do more than
smile. Though, really, she liked that smile quite a bit. But she said nothing,
only kept on with her stitching by the fire and occasionally threatened to grab
Colin and feed him to the wolves if he didn't close his mouth.
Wolves haven't been seen in Yorkshire since the fifteenth century, Dickon would
point out, and Mary would retort, Oh, you and your book-learning. She failed to
notice that Dickon's smile became strained.
For really, Dickon had changed with the tutoring he had received (courtesy of
Archibald Craven) in horticulture and geography and biology, and Mary had
changed with the endless stitching and bowing that she had learned along with
maths, and Colin had changed with his learning to ride and to read fine poetry.
And it became January and the winds blew even harder, so hard that you could
not imagine them blowing any more than they could, until the next day they
surprised you. The first real snow fell, causing Ben Weatherstaff to bank up
the fire in the red sitting room. Mary took a cold, but was eventually up and
moving again. Colin insisted upon riding in the snow, though Mrs. Medlock swore
right and left that he would break his neck, and Martha fretted, wringing her
hands, and Mary snapped at him when he came in.
Dickon wandered the moors, particularly as the snow thawed. He had spent years
doing it before, he said to Mary, and the limits of education would not put it
upon him now. This time, Mary caught the sarcasm in his voice, and she was
troubled, but she said nothing, which made Dickon troubled, and he left the
sitting room without another word. Mary sat in an armchair and read Jane
Austen, but her heart was not in it. Her heart was out in the melting snow, in
the water drops that she could hear through the window, hitting the ground.
When Dickon returned, she said that perhaps that was the sound of the moors
crying, for they knew the spring was still long in coming. And Dickon looked at
her curiously and said aye, perhaps, and went out again.
The next day it froze, and Colin was busy cleaning his tack, and Dickon did not
come. Mary spent the morning looking out the window of the red sitting room,
waiting, and still Dickon did not come. The trees were covered with ice,
cracking in the wind. They were so beautiful and yet so in danger of dying that
Mary felt tears roll down her cheeks, chill in the draft from the window. Chill
as the cold in her bones.
In a moment, she made her decision, and quietly wrapped herself up in warm
breeches and two coats and a muff and all sorts of other things to keep the
cold out, before she stole away from the house.
The ice hit her face, and the wind tossed her about, but Mary did not care, and
kept walking through the gardens, hunched over herself like an old woman. She
got to the door of the secret garden, which was never locked any longer, and
pushed against it. It opened smoothly, as if someone had broken off the ice on
the hinges, and Mary saw footprints in the snow.
Dickon didn't look up as she entered. He was sitting in the snow, under the
tree, holding a piece of rose vine, covered in ice, turning it over and over in
his gloved hands.
Mary, he said, some trees will die tonight.
Yes, I know, she said.
Thee should be back in t'house.
I don't wish to be, Mary said. She was confused at his accent-Dickon had not
spoken plain Yorkshire for nearly two years. I wish to be out here. You cannot
tell Mistress Mary Lennox to go inside if she does not wish to go.
I didna order thee, he said, looking up, his eyes dark. His gaze was boring
straight into her, and despite her layers of clothing, Mary felt as if she were
wearing almost nothing, as if he could see straight into her. Thee 's harsh,
Mistress Lennox. His lips curved in a strange smile. Perhaps I could find
meself a better mistress elsewhere.
Dickon. Please.
I want t' know, he said, accent growing thicker as his voice grew louder, I
want t' know why thee must keep throwin' meself in m'face. Why I canna be good
enough or lerned enough t' sit with Mistress Mary.
Mary said nothing. She could feel the blush move across her face, a burst of
heat in the cold. Despite her feet feeling frozen, she did not dare to move
them, move a muscle. Then she spoke.
Thou call'st me unkind, Dickon Sowerby, and mayhap I be unkind. But 'tis the
only way I know t'love. So thou must forgive me.
Dickon set the ice-covered vine down in the snow, then rose and came to her,
and Mary could swear that he was the most beautiful sight she had seen in all
her years, against the ice crusted branches. Thou daren't love. Not for a
Yorkshire boy, t' son of a labourer. Thou daren't.
Mary leaned towards him, tears down. I dare'st. On the morrow, mayhap I
daren't, but today, I dares't. And yesterday, I dares't, and the day afore.
I shall make it so thee dares't tomorrow. And for a moment, there was silence
in the garden, as their lips met.
That night, the fire crackled, and Dickon laughed, and Colin smiled when he
found out why, and Mary was warm for the first time in months.
Spring didn't have to be so long in coming.
FIN