Bonded Ever After (The Royal Gold Keepers #3)

Chapter 23

TWENTY-THREE

Elora

It’s been four days since we left the perfect little house behind, and this realm seems to stretch on forever. Part of me is relieved we haven’t had to go to some new awful realm, but another part of me is losing faith. Did I make a mistake in coming here? Should we turn back?

That nagging feeling inside me only grows stronger, whispering that it’s just a little further. That I just have to keep going a little longer. But I’m not sure I trust that feeling any longer.

“Callum?” I say.

He glances over at me.

“Should we go back?”

He frowns. “I thought you said we need to see this thing through? That we needed to see the end of the Phoenix Trail?”

I bite my lip. “I know I said that. I’m just starting to wonder. What if… what if I’m wrong?”

He turns to me and takes my hands, his gaze locking onto mine. “I don’t know if I’m crazy, or if it’s just because I love you so much, but I’ve started to feel that nagging sense that something is pulling us along too. We’ve come this far. I think we just need to keep going. To have faith.”

I smile. My heart aches. It’s like he knew exactly what I needed to hear.

Leaning up onto my tiptoes, I kiss him, and he melts against me, holding me tightly against him, until I have to break our kiss to breathe. “You always know just what to say.”

He smiles. “That’s because we’re made for each other.”

I return his smile, and we start walking again, hand in hand.

We start climbing up a hill, and I slow. Climbing has become more difficult for me, for some reason. Callum slows to meet my pace, and I place my free hand on my stomach. This baby, surprise that it was, is our whole world now. We just need to find a safe and wonderful place to raise them. Nothing else matters.

Reaching the top of the hill, we both freeze. My mouth drops open, and I stare. We’ve come to a large city of houses and shops that surrounds a stone castle. Below us, we can see people moving about the cobblestone streets, and the scent of cooking food comes to us.

And at the entrance to the city, our trail ends.

It seems we’ve reached our destination.

Callum squeezes my hand. “There’s no more path after this.”

“The trail ends here,” I say, the words sounding strange and foreign in my mind.

He turns to me, and I look at him as he speaks slowly. “Do we go to the town?”

My heart starts hammering. These people could be like the elves. We could be in danger if we go into the town. But… this is what we were looking for. This is the end of the trail. We’d be fools not to explore the place we’ve nearly died several times to reach.

“We should go. Carefully,” I say.

He nods. “The first sign of danger, we run.”

My legs feel tingly and wrong as we continue forward. We make our way closer and closer to the city, eyeing the large stone fence that encircles the city and its people. Every step of the way my nerves wind tighter and tighter until we’re approaching the gate.

I see the flash of movement on the wall. I flinch, expecting an attack. Maybe an arrow to our skull. But instead, the gate slowly opens in front of us.

On the other side of the gate, one guard stands with his back straight. He looks exactly like us, except his skin is slightly tinged with gold.

“You must see the queen,” he says, his voice loud, but his tone respectful. “Follow me.” Then he spins around and starts walking toward the castle.

Unsure about what else to do, we follow behind him.

There are golden people everywhere in the streets. Children run this way and that way. Every time they see us, they stop and stare, moving out of the way and smiling at us, like we’re long-lost friends.

I don’t know what to make of it, but I’m aware of the sword at my side. If we need to use it, we will. I’m just glad they haven’t given us a reason, because I’m not sure we could take down enough people to be able to escape.

We come to big doors that lead into the castle. The doors are promptly thrown wide open. Dozens of golden people line our path into the castle, all smiling at us in that same strange way.

We’re led to a throne room, where a beautiful woman with silver hair and deep golden skin sits in a silky golden dress. There’s a smile dancing over her lips, and she seems excited as her gaze falls on us. I’m not sure if it’s a good thing or bad thing.

Is she excited to make a new friend? Or does she plan to eat the skin off our bones? It could be either: we’re here in Neverwood, after all.

“Hello, children,” she greets. “It’s been a very long time.”

We stare at her, unsure.

“We’ve missed you.”

I find my voice, hoping I’m not making a mistake. “Actually, your highnesses, we’ve never been here before.”

She tilts her head, an amused smile on her lips. “Perhaps you’d like to hear the story. It’s one I’ve become used to telling.” Without hesitation, she says, “Once, a very long time ago, a group of mischievous young fae children decided that they wanted to explore beyond the safety of our realm. Unfortunately, those children stumbled far and wide, searching for their way back home, with no luck. Instead, they eventually found the Earth Realm, and a group of lost humans who would never survive the winter. They used their ability to step between worlds and collect our gold to build a world in which the humans could survive. But they were never forgotten by the fae people. For many generations, the fae waited for their lost children to return home. And now, they have.”

I don’t know what to say. I don’t know what to do. “You’re saying… we’re these fae children?” I ask, confused.

Her smile widens. “You are the descendants of our lost children. With each generation, the gold in your veins has been diluted by the human blood you’ve mixed it with. But the two of you have the purest blood of any of those children. With you in the human realm, none of the other fae children would be able to pass through to Neverwood. Now, however, they will be able to.”

I don’t know what to say. “So, we’re your… lost descendants?”

“Precisely,” she says. “And you two, in particular, come from two separate royal families. The loss of your lines was a great and terrible thing, as is the loss of any child.”

“All of this is hard to accept,” Callum says slowly.

She smiles over our heads. “Maybe they’ll be better at explaining it.”

We turn, and I stop short. Our fathers are standing together in matching golden outfits. Their skin is tan, and their hair has less gray than there was before. They look like themselves, only younger and happy.

My dad… he’s alive.

Without thinking, I run to him. He catches me and pulls me into his arms, and before I know it, I’m sobbing, clinging to him like I did when I was a child, murmuring things that make no sense, while he reassures me.

“It’s okay, honey, I’m here now. Everything is okay. All of your traveling, all of your sacrifices, they’re done. You’re home. You’re safe.”

I pull back to him, tears rolling down my face, then see Callum, standing still. Staring at his father.

Giving my dad an apologetic look, I go to Callum and wrap myself around him, not sure what to say. I know he loves his dad. I also know his dad doesn’t deserve any of that love, not with the way he’s treated him all his life.

“Son…” Archer begins, looking to my dad like he’s lost.

“Just be honest with him. Say what’s in your heart,” my dad tells him.

Archer clears his throat, running a hand through his long white hair. “I was never a good dad to you. I was never there for you the way you needed. I was cruel with my words. I was awful. There are no excuses for that, but I want to try to explain. You know I wasn’t happy. I hated going to Neverwood. I hated being in Paradise Falls. But more than that,” he hesitates and looks at my dad again, “I was in love with someone I could never be with, and it killed me each and every day.”

My dad nods at him.

I stare, not quite comprehending. What is he saying?

Archer continues. “I’m sorry for everything, and I know you won’t forgive me now. I don’t expect you to. But we’re going to have a whole life together in this beautiful place, so I hope one day you’ll find a way to at least understand me.”

I look at Callum, then squeeze his hand.

Callum shifts awkwardly. “Maybe.” Then he looks back at me. “But we have a lot more pressing things to figure out.”

After an awkward moment, I say, “I don’t understand what she’s talking about. She said there are lost fae and we’re them?”

My dad nods. “See, the fae are magical human-like beings who can go between realms, but they never do. It’s one of their hard and fast rules, so when they had teens disappear, they didn’t go after them. Those teens ended up in Paradise Falls and met the humans who had wandered into the valley between the mountains. The fae, didn’t have paths in the other realms then. They made a life on earth. Only their kids, and their kids’ descendants, were able to make it back through to Neverwood. We actually learned that there are more than two families that can make it through, but their blood was so diluted that by some weird trick the ones with less fae blood in their veins couldn’t come through while we were on earth.”

“So we’re fae ?” I ask.

My father nods.

“And there may be more people in Paradise Falls who can go into Neverwood?”

“Yes. Neat, huh?” He smiles.

My head feels like it’s spinning. “And can we actually make a home here? Are we safe?”

Archer answers this time, taking my father’s hand. “We’re absolutely safe here. More than that, we are all fae royalty. We’ll be able to help to lead the fae, and our lives will be spent in this castle, comfortable and happy.”

I look at where they’re holding hands. “Why–?”

“They’re together, like Teth and Serrill,” Callum says, very matter-of-factly.

Archer tenses, his eyes locked on his son. “Is that… is that okay?”

“But you like women,” I say to my dad, feeling dumb.

He gives me a soft smile. “When I had your mother, I could never love another soul, and I never thought I would. But then, something changed between Archer and I, and I realized that that part of me hadn’t entirely died.”

“That’s why we had to leave Paradise Falls,” Archer says. “They found out. They had the two of you as Gold Keepers, so they were planning something awful for us.”

“Not nearly as awful as what they planned for us,” Callum says angrily.

He’s right.

My father looks confused. “How could they do anything to you? You were the only Gold Keepers.”

Callum answers readily. “They planned to imprison us in a building made of goldarium, so they could steal her eggs and my sperm and grow our babies in test tubes, to build an army of Gold Keepers.”

“What the fuck?” Archer says.

My dad shakes his head in disbelief and some small part of me eases. They didn’t know. They didn’t leave us there to be tortured.

“It’s how mom died,” I tell him gently. “She found out their plans when I was a baby and went in and burned down the building made of goldarium. They realized she knew the truth and they didn’t want you to find out, so they staged it to look like she died in the fire.”

“Those bastards,” my father says, and there are tears in his eyes.

Archer wraps an arm around my dad, and I squeeze Callum’s hand tighter, feeling lost and confused. This is the end of the Phoenix Trail. We’ve found our dads, and now we know that we’re fae, fae royalty. Is this… is this the end?

“Elora?” my father asks.

Callum wipes tears from my cheeks that I didn’t even know were there.

“Yes?”

“Are you and Callum…?”

I realize he doesn’t know and smile. “Callum and I are together.” Then I glance at Callum. He smiles and nods. “And we’re expecting a baby.”

Smiles break out on my dad’s and Archer’s faces, and they come to us, hugging me eagerly, and then Callum more awkwardly. My dad keeps repeating, “I’m going to be a grandpa,” over and over again, looking happier than I can ever remember him looking.

“A baby?” the queen says behind me.

We spin around.

“A baby from the two royal families. This is a rare and wonderful thing!” And she looks as happy as our fathers.

Coming off her throne, she comes to me and combs my hair back behind my ear, smiling tenderly. “I know that you’ve been through a lot and that your journey here was impossibly difficult. I know that everything we’ve told you is a lot for you to take and that you’ll need time to wrap your head around it. But I want you to know, we will do everything in our power to make you happy here. To make you feel glad to call this your home.”

I smile, already feeling loved. “Thank you.”

Her gaze moves between us. “This is the end. The end of your journey. Elora and Callum, you are home.”