“Stay here,” Lucius said, gently touching her shoulder as he passed. “I'll go inside and see if there's anything in there.”
Tavia gripped the grass and ripped it from the ground, crying because she absolutely knew that he was going to walk in there and find something.
The door was open, and half of the cottage, which they had built with stones, was still there. Lucius went in to the ruin.
After a few agonizing moments, he came out coughing.
“They're not in there,” Lucius in between coughs.
“What?” Tavia said.
“They're not there. No bodies. Even if they were burned, there would be remnants—bones. They weren't in there.”
Tavia scrambled to her feet, wiping her eyes. “That means they're alive.”
“Yes.” Lucius' eyes widened. “Oh my . . .”
Tavia turned around, looking at the large lilac tree, and there was a great comfort in seeing the dryad stepping out.
“Axelia!” she ran forward, wrapping her arms around the dryad.
“I've never seen one in real life,” Lucius said.
The dryad was taller than Tavia, her skin as green as the grass, with spindly legs made of a mixture of twigs and leaves.
With wide eyes, Tavia asked,My parents?
They are safe. I can take you to them. They have been waiting for you, worried that you would come and find this place gone.
Tavia looked back at Lucius.
He couldn't hear what Axelia was saying becausedryads only spoke telepathically and only to people they wanted to hear.
Are they in the dryad realm?Tavia asked.
No, but they relocated to a new home. When you're ready, I'll take you to them.
“Thank you. I... I need a moment.”
Certainly. I'll return.
Lucius continued to stare at the dryad, completely amazed.
Tavia walked over to him. “Will you come with me into the dryad realm?”
“Who would ever turn down that adventure?”
“We're just going to see my parents. We won't stay there. But you don't have to come if you don't want to,” she said.
Lucius eyed her, his brow furrowed in a serious expression–one she wasn’t used to from him. “Have you not realized it yet?”
“Realized what?”
“Do you not feel what I do?”
“Oh,” she said, her ears heating with emotion. “Ithought it was just because you were a good kisser.”
He laughed. “I'd like to think I am, but there is much more to what is happening between us. And if you think for a moment that I'm going back to that estate without you, you're wrong.”
