“I have no wish to be anywhere else,” he said.
Down three flights of stairs, out across the terrace, over the bridge, to the garden gate where they met Honey, Damion, Flor, and Toryn.
In the field beyond, a troupe of troubadours recounted the tales that Flor had fabricated about Magda’s return to the Lands, trading off every other line to whomever would give the sentiment its greatest impact, from the soaring soprano pitched high at the heights of fighting the manticore, to the bass when the mysterious Prince Kaelan died. Back and forth the voices bandied as precursor to her entrance.
Flor and Toryn stood before her, partially blocking her view. Flickers of fairies flitted above a sea of glittering, noble Pixie faces.
Kaelan’s hand touched the back of her neck. A soothing wave slipped under her skin, calming the prickles of anxiety and then pulling forth a firm surge of confidence from deep within her. Unsettled as she’d been by his ability to quell her in this way, as the threat of panicked sweat evaporated, she was grateful. She gave him a small smile over her shoulder. His fingers pressed a bit deeper and then slid away.
“And then upon the back of the great lion-semargl she returned,” the female tenor cried, with breathless awe that rang across the field, as though she were witnessing Gur emerging from the river of stars above, “the exiled daughter of our great departed Radiant, Vivanna, the Silver Star of Morning, come home to seize her claim.”
Flor and Toryn stepped aside.
With a deep breath, Magda stepped forward, through the gate to the curious, keen stares and an exuberant applause. Deep in the heart of the crowd, she sighted Lavana’s flashing aquamarine eyes, framed by coils of black hair trailing over her own silver coronet. Behind her, Riker, looking guiltily uncomfortable.
Lavana raised a perfectly arched brow and a silver goblet at Magda, a smile playing over her ruby lips.
Magda returned Lavana’s smile with a deadly one of her own and dropped into a low curtsy for the family.
The troubadours stepped into the crowd, breaking into a victory song that brought smiles to everyone’s faces.
The elders came forward to greet her again. Soon, she was in the thick of the game of fanged smiles and slantwise compliments.
Kaelan kept his hand on her waist, though many attempted to pull him away, he refused to be moved. Old friends broke from the throngs of the crowd, expectant. When Magda couldn’t murmur their names to him, Honey stood up on her toes and whispered in his ear, as though attempting to woo him. Yet, because of her and the mystery voice, Kaelan never failed to know a name or recall some minute detail about the old acquaintances who stepped forward to embrace or scrutinize him. Damion circled through the crowd, never straying too far out of sight, scowling at everyone as a warrior was privileged to do.
“I wouldn’t have believed it unless I was seeing it,” a silken smooth voice slid in as some distant cousins stepped aside.
A tall, sharp-faced young man with gleaming green eyes, like tender spring shoots encased in ice, emerged from the crowd. The straight width of his shoulders seemed to slice the air around him. On his fine vest, icy blue, gold threaded, were the twisting vines of the mountain orchid—the symbol of the Spire.
“Zuriel,” she said, forcing his gaze to her. “It’s been a very long time.”
His nose twitched a bit and her smile broadened, showing teeth.
Kaelan reached out and grasped Zuriel’s upper arms in a gesture of friendship.
Zuriel stiffened.
“Ivy-man,” Kaelan said with a charming smile that caught even Magda off-guard. “I owe you, as much as anyone, a great apology. I wish I could have warned you that day. I can only imagine how distressing it must have been to see me fall, to think me dead.” He clasped Zuriel’s stiff shoulder and leaned in. “But I had to submit to the wishes of my mistress, I know you understand. I can only hope you will forgive me for whatever tribulation I caused you that day.”
Zuriel’s gaze swept up and down Kaelan’s face—Caden’s face—obviously searching for any sign of deception.
“You appeared very dead,” Zuriel said coolly.
Kaelan leaned in even closer, confidently. “And do you remember the crystal wand of the fairy queen that our Mistress held on display in her gallery?”
A slight frown flickered over Zuriel’s face. “Yes.”
“And did you see it again, after I died?” he asked.
Zuriel’s head tilted, his eyes glittering like moonlight on hoarfrosted grass as his mind worked. “Mistress moved it to the vaults...”
Kaelan smiled and plucked at his nose, just as his mother did, just as Caden had always done. In that moment, because of that one small gesture, the frozen surface of Zuriel’s gaze melted.
“Yes, that is what our Mistressclaimedhappened,” Kaelan said in that same in-confidence voice. “But if you ever visit the witch on the Isle-Out-of-Current, perhaps you can find a way to bargain it back.”
Zuriel let out a breath. “I can’t believe it’s actually you.”
Kaelan squeezed Zuriel’s shoulder, giving it a good hearty shake.
