Free Fortune's Magic Farm by Suzanne Selfors

crust.
    Isabelle had never tasted fluffy bread. She tried to ignore her moaning stomach. “An elephant seal? Is that what the sea monster is called?”
    “Actually, his name is Neptune.”
    “He has a name?”
    The boy stared, bewildered. “Everyone has a name. Don’t you know that? My name is Sage. The raven’s name is Rolo and the cat’s name is Eve.”
    At the sound of her name, the cat began to purr. She raised her head and winked lazily at Isabelle.
    Sage held out one of the halves, offering it to Isabelle. “It’s not poisoned or anything. I’m not here to kill you. I’m here to collect you. Go on, eat this. You’ll need food in your belly.” He took a bite. “See. It’s good.”
    Her willpower dissolved. She grabbed the bread and sank her teeth into its airy center. She took another bite and another.
    Sage smiled. “Don’t they ever feed you in that boardinghouse?”
    “Not enough,” she replied with a full mouth. A crumb fell to her feet and was quickly pilfered by the raven.
    “I suppose you have a lot of questions,” Sage said, adding a piece of driftwood to the fire. The smoke trailed out the open doorway.
    Isabelle nodded, her stuffed cheeks bulging like two apples, but the questions could wait for just a few more bites, surely. She stuffed, chewed, and swallowed, eating as ravenously as Mama Lu and Gertrude after one of their failed diets.
    Sage drank the last of his tea. “I can’t explain everything because there isn’t much time. Dawn will be here soon and we need to leave on the morning tide. But I’ll tell you what I can.”
    As the fire flickered and the rain fell on the cabin’s roof, Sage spoke quickly. “As I told you, my name is Sage. I traveled down the mountains and across the ocean to find you. All I knew was that ten years ago a baby was left in this awful place but I didn’t know if the baby was a boy or a girl. So I sent Rolo to scout around. He learned that there were only three kids in Runny Cove who were ten years old. So I brought the three apples and Rolo, Eve, and Neptune helped me deliver them to the three kids. Then I waited to see which one of you was the tender.” He stopped, as if he had explained everything.
    Isabelle wiped her mouth, more confused than ever. “Was the what?”
    “The tender. Turned out to be you. You’re a tender.”
    “Me?”
    “Yes, you. One day, you might be the last tender in the whole world.”
    Nothing he had said made any sense. Maybe he was crazy like Mr. Morris, the man who sometimes danced naked in the rain.
    “I’m sorry but you’ve gotten me mixed up with someone else. I’m just Isabelle. I’m a box labeler. I work at the umbrella factory.”
    Sage shook his head, his expression somber. “There’s no mistake. The apple seed is living proof. Only a tender can make the apple seed grow. It’s an odd sort of apple.”
    Isabelle leaned forward. “What do you mean?”
    “It’s a Love Apple,” he said, stroking the cat’s back. “Onlysomeone with a pure heart can eat a Love Apple. That’s why it turned black when Mama Lu and Gertrude tried to eat one and when Mr. Hench tried to eat one. Love Apples know the difference.”
    “They do?” Isabelle leaned farther.
    “Sure. That’s their purpose. But the seed, well, that’s another story entirely. Only a tender can germinate a Love Apple’s seed. It has something to do with the fact that a tender’s hands are extra warm.”
    Isabelle held out her hands and looked at them as if she had never seen them before.
    Sage tucked the mug into his satchel. Then he stood and brushed sand off his cape. “Tenders grow things.”
    Isabelle frowned, lowering her hands. How disappointing. He had the wrong person after all. “Well, that proves that I’m not a tender because I don’t grow things.”
    He frowned. “Of course you grow things. Look at your room and your locker at work. And your body. You’ve got lichen growing in your hair and I bet you can grow mushrooms