Free Poison Princess by Kresley Cole

Like last night, when the cane had caged me in protectively?
    Now the monkey grass had nearly felled my foe, saving my sketchbook.
    I started to laugh. Helped a girl out, did you?
    Jackson again thought I was laughing at him. A flush spread over those chiseled cheekbones of his. He straightened to his full height, gave me a threatening scowl, then stalked off.
    Once he was gone, I knelt in front of the grass, wanting to fan my fingers over it, but still too scared to. I stared at the daisies, then the roses.
    Because I was round the bend again, I could ask myself some truly bizarre questions.
    What did the monkey grass want in return for helping me? Did the ivy have an agenda? Roses: friend or foe?
    One way or another, I needed to figure out what was happening to me.
    I decided that once I got home, where no one could see me, I was going to test out the cane.

    When Brand dropped me off at my house after school, he parked out of view of the kitchen window. “Is everything all right, Eves?” He drummed his fingers on the stick shift. “You’ve been acting weird ever since you got back.”
    â€œEverything’s fine,” I said, impatient to get to our field.
    â€œGood deal,” he said simply, taking me at my word, though my demeanor screamed, Everything’s futhermucked!
    He rested his hand on my thigh, high enough to make me frown up at him. He had a smile on his face, but it was strained. He traced circles above my knee.
    â€œSo have you thought about us going to Spencer’s next weekend?”
    â€œProbably not as much as you have.”
    â€œMy brain’s on shuffle,” he said, tapping his temple. “Evie, football, Evie, football.”
    â€œAt least I come first.”
    â€œAlways,” he said easily, flashing me his movie-star grin.
    â€œI’ll tell you my answer sometime this weekend, I promise.” Giving myself less than forty-eight hours to decide?
    Once he’d driven off to get ready for the game tonight, I headed toward the cane before I lost my nerve. I was determined to get to the bottom of this. Two equally catastrophic results awaited me. Either I was delusional. Or . . .
    I didn’t even want to go there.
    Squaring my shoulders, I swallowed, and reached for the cane.
    And damn if it didn’t reach back.
    I staggered away a few steps. Deep breath in. Deep breath out. You’re focused. Centered.
    I forced myself to reach for it again. Once more, it stretched toward my hand. This time it gently closed around my palm.
    That curling leaf hadn’t already been curved. It was moving . Like an infant grasping a parent’s finger.
    Oh, shit.
    I hadn’t experienced that tingly feeling in my head during any of the plant interactions because I hadn’t been hallucinating. This was no vision—no delusion; this was real.
    Right?
    Straightening my shoulders, I stepped into the field, among all the cane. At once, the crop seemed to sigh , the leaves whispering around me.
    I followed a row, deeper and deeper, those leaves ghosting over my face. My lids went heavy, as if a friend were brushing my hair.
    The cane arched and danced toward me, and I went dizzy from pleasure, from the staggering sense of unity.
    If they truly were my soldiers at attention, then I had the largest army in the world—six million stalks strong.
    I could picture them moving in certain ways, and immediately they would respond. Bend, shimmy, sway. Left, right, up, back. Because we were utterly connected.
    Among this number, I was safe, a chessboard queen surrounded by her pawns. And with this easing of tension, memories started trickling over the mental levee that CLC had helped me construct. I recalled more snippets of stuff my grandmother had told me.
    On that last day I’d spent with her, as she’d driven us out on the big highway toward Texas, she’d said, “I’m a Tarasova , Evie, a chronicler of the Tarot. I know things that