Salinda’s jaw shifted side to side. “Fine.”
Ailan gave her a tight smile, then faced Cora and Mareleau again. “Go to my wagon. I’ll be with you shortly.”
Cora was happy enough to oblige. With her mind still reeling, she could use a few quiet moments to collect her thoughts. Cora led Mareleau to the center of camp toward the High Elder’s wagon. In the winter months, Nalia spent her nights in an enclosed living wagon as opposed to a tent like most of the others. Cora kept her head down, and Mareleau shuffled close at her side, but most of the commune was too distracted to pay them much heed, especially under the blanket of night.
Soon they reached the wagon and climbed up the short steps to the ornate door, painted in a green, yellow, and red floral motif. The inside glowed with lantern light, illuminating the rounded ceiling, the brightly painted walls, the ornate blankets, the cramped furniture. The tiny space somehow managed to host a bed built atop a cabinet, a small nightstand, two long benches, and even a stove and countertop. More of Bernice’s herbs clouded the air, so it must be true that the witch had been tending to the High Elder. But why? The woman hadn’t been dying like everyone thought.
Cora and Mareleau sat on one of the cushioned benches. Noah hadn’t stopped fussing since he’d let out his attention-drawing cry, so Mareleau set about undoing the top of her nursing gown to feed him. Cora nestled into the corner of the bench and drew her knees to her chest. That was when she realized she was still clutching the collar. Thanks to whatever Ailan had said to the dragons, she no longer needed to use it on Mareleau. For now, at least. She stuffed it back in her pocket.
“Well, this certainly could have gone better,” Mareleau said. Her dry tone gave Cora some sense of normalcy to cling to. “You truly had no idea?”
“That our High Elder, who we all assumed was a Faeryn descendent, was living a double life as a legendary Elvyn royal? Not a clue.”
Mareleau huffed a cold laugh. “I can’t tell if the whole name reversal is utter brilliance or the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard.”
Cora heartily agreed.
Mareleau’s eyes wandered the inside of the wagon as she nursed her son. “So…this is how you lived for six years?”
“No, this is luxury,” Cora said. “I lived in a tent.”
“A tent? Like the first one we entered, with the messy furs and lack of furniture?”
“Salinda is renowned for her disorderliness. But yes, I lived in a tent like that. With Salinda’s daughter, Maiya.” Her chest squeezed at the name. She hadn’t seen Maiya in the crowd earlier, but it would have been nearly impossible to notice her in the chaos anyway.
“How did you do it? How did you go from being a princess to a runaway living in the woods without losing your mind?”
Cora shook her head. “I didn’t have much of a choice. Morkai released me from Ridine’s dungeon and sent his Roizan after me. The woods were my only option. I’m lucky the Forest People found me, otherwise…” She shuddered to think of what might have happened. She’d have starved or perhaps been eaten by some wild creature. She’d always been grateful that the Forest People had happened upon her when she’d been aimlessly wandering, but only now did she grasp just how miraculous it was. At twelve, she hadn’t known how large her kingdom was, or how vast and unpopulated the forests. She’d had no reason to believe there weren’t dozens of communes like the one that had found her.
Yet now she knew there was only one. And it had found her before any dangers had.
Another shudder ripped through her, but this time it carried a feeling that was somehow both heavy and light at the same time. It prickled her skin like a thousand tiny threads brushing over her, radiating with some potent energy—
“Did you like it here?” Mareleau’s question pulled Cora from her thoughts.
She shook the strange feeling away. “I did. I loved it. No matter how much I love my kingdom, my castle, and Teryn, the Forest People will always feel like another home to me.”
They sat in silence for a while longer. Or something like silence. Outside the camp, voices could still be heard. Footsteps. Commotion. She was glad not to be part of it, not because she didn’t want to help, but because it wouldn’t be welcomed or needed. The Forest People may be her second home, but very few considered her family anymore.
The door finally opened and Ailan marched up the steps into the wagon, followed by Salinda and Bernice. “Thank you for waiting for me,” Ailan said to Cora and Mareleau as she settled upon her bed. Salinda and Bernice claimed the other long bench, both wearing disgruntled expressions.
Mareleau had finished nursing Noah—who was now awake yet content—and shifted closer to Cora as if she wanted to be as far away from the Elvyn woman as possible.
“I still think this conversation should happen in the presence of the elders,” Bernice said.
“And I insist that I speak separately with them,” Ailan said. “Otherwise, we’ll spend an hour arguing over whether Cora should be here. Besides, we’ll have a much fuller picture to share once we address the reason she and her friend have come.”
“They came here to find you,Ailan.” Salinda said the name with no small amount of ire. She shook her head. “I don’t even know what to call you.”
“Call me Ailan or Nalia. The latter has been my name for five hundred years. Longer than I was called Ailan.”
“Why did you choose that name anyway?” Cora said, her voice coming out smaller than she wanted.
“If you know who I am, then I take it you know about my history? The battle with my brother? The Veil my mother wove to lock him out of El’Ara?”
Cora nodded.
“Then you know that Lela was once a piece of El’Ara,” Ailan said. “When Satsara sealed off her unfinished Veil, it pushed the remaining, unwarded land into the human world. My brother and I were henceforth trapped here. Darius used his worldwalking abilities to return to his father’s island kingdom, Syrus, while I remained here. Yet soon I realized the Veil was affecting my memories. I began to lose them. This was a good thing where my brother was concerned, for it seemed he’d forgotten even sooner than I had, losing even his memory of Lela’s existence.
