Chapter 15
SAPPHIRE
Ifollowed the king, I meant, Elden, into the stable where his fair-haired bodyguard stood beside two tall horses.
Serrina’s eyes slid over me with barely veiled loathing.
I’d always thought of her as exquisite and efficient.
Now I could add “likely to remove one’s head from one’s body” on my list of descriptions for the female.
“Ah, Serrina. Well met.” Elden inclined his head to his bodyguard and now, steward?
“Well met,” Serrina said smoothly, eyes not leaving my face.
The king cleared his throat. “You have, no doubt, met our baker.”
Serrina nodded to me in an infinitesimal show of acknowledgement. “Well met.”
The words seem to cause her great pain. The knuckles on the hilt of her sword shone white with straining.
“Well met,” I said through trembling lips, though it was the last thing I truly meant. I’d hardly spent five minutes in this female’s presence. How could such loathing develop in such a small time?
“Thank you for gathering our horses and supplies,” the king said, nonplussed. “We travel for Winterthorn, and I have a special request for you to accomplish in my absence.”
I blinked at the two horses, brushed down and saddled. There were only two horses. One for me and one for the king. So, it would just be the king and me? Alone? On a two-week journey? My heart quickened, and I didn’t know if it was relief or despair coursing through me at the daunting thought.
“I am always happy to serve.” Serrina bowed.
“You know of the monster I imprisoned not two nights ago,” the king started.
Serrina’s eyes found mine and narrowed, flicking to my legs for a brief moment. So, she knew about my encounter with the beast. She nodded to the king.
“I wish you to treat it with…delicacy,” the king finished.
Serrina’s eyes widened, “Delicacy? For the beast that shredded your back? Attacked a human in your gardens?”
A pulse of pain stabbed through my leg at the mention of the beast, and I almost nodded in agreement with Serrina.
“Yes, well, we are on the hunt for a cure, and it just may be that we find it,” the king said. “In which case, I would prefer if my father were left from any further harm. Perhaps he can be saved.”
Serrina’s face betrayed nothing as she bowed low to the king. Blonde dreadlocks cascaded past her shoulders, brushing the hay-strewn floor of the stable. “I shall try, but if it proves impossible?”
“You must ensure the protection of my city, my people, above all else. Especially the protection and care of Aldaar.” The king nodded.
At the mention of the young elf, even the stony facade of the female’s face cracked. “I will protect him with my life.”
The King nodded in dismissal, placing a kind hand on her shoulder. “Thank you.”
Thank you? The words caught me off guard.
What kind of king thanked their guard for performing their duties?
Serrina left the stable in several long strides, not even deigning to shoot me an angry glare as she left.
Perhaps I was no longer worth the effort, seeing as she had bigger monsters to face—ones with long sharp pointy teeth that slinked around like shadows in the mist.
Elden brushed a hand down the black mare’s side and let out a deep breath. He already seemed so exhausted, and our journey had yet to begin.
“You think there is hope for your father?” I asked in the stillness of the stable, the nickering of the horses the only other sound.
“I must.” Elden’s deep voice all but cracked on the last word. “I seek the cure, not only for my people, but for my father as well. Perhaps he will get the redemption he deserves for his part.”
I didn’t quite understand what that meant, but I didn’t push any farther. Elden already knew I wasn’t his father’s biggest fan.
“This will be your mount.” Elden indicated the magnificent chestnut mare beside his great black horse. “Her name is Sapphire.”
I grimaced and ran a tentative hand down Sapphire’s mane, marveling at her brilliant blue eyes, no doubt the inspiration for her lovely name. Though my stomach dropped in surprise at the sheer enormity of her. “Are you sure there isn’t a nice, safe pony I could ride instead?”
“Sapphire and Braddock are the fastest in the kingdom, and where we are going, speed will be our greatest ally.”
“And what of safety?” My cheeks heated. “I’m not exactly comfortable on horseback.”
Elden cocked his head. “Surely you have ridden before?”
“Does a pony at the village fair count?” I winced.
Elden affixed my very full enchanted saddle bags onto Sapphire’s back and offered a hand.
“We will go slow at first, Little Baker. Sapphire knows the roads outside the castle gates. But be wary. We must ride through the night. I’ll not want any gossip about our little human baker sneaking off with a roguish figure in the night reaching the lips of my kingdom. ”
Elden smiled at that, “Or that the roguish figure could be the king in disguise.”
I raised an eyebrow even as warmth spread through my squirrelly stomach. “Probably a good idea.”
Elden held out a hand to assist me. I raised my head high, swatting his offered hand away. “I may not be a great rider, but I am perfectly capable of climbing into a saddle.”
I grunted and tugged at the beast’s reigns, struggling to reach my foot into the tall stirrup.
My enormous jacket and boots didn’t help, though I was thankful for the long pant-like stockings and tunic of my traveling clothes that allowed more freedom of movement.
I couldn’t imagine trying to straddle a horse in one of Saphronia’s gowns.
“But I am not used to horses the size of dragons.”
Sapphire was enormous, at least twenty-one hands tall, though Elden’s inky mount was easily taller than even Sapphire.
“Allow me,” Elden bit down on his smirk, which looked so at odds with his ethereal beauty.
Elden closed the distance between us in a few long strides, then his hands were on my waist. My breath caught in my throat as he looked down at me with his molten gold eyes. Then, Elden hoisted me into the saddle as easily as hauling a sack of flour.
“Woah!” I called out, but was in the saddle faster than I had time to let the squeal escape. My face burned as I looked down at where Elden stared up at me, almost the same height now that I was atop a great large animal.
“I was doing perfectly fine on my own.” I cleared my throat.
His hands had felt so strong, so sure on my waist. The echo of a burn remained through my heavy coat where his hands had been mere moments before.
Elden’s answering side-smile sent my heart soaring. “Of course.”
He then strode over to his own horse and hopped into the saddle in one smooth motion. “We have a long ride ahead of us. We will start slow. Follow me.”
I nodded and followed the Elf King out into the black of night.
We rode our horses through the city streets, slow and easy at first. But as I gained confidence in my ability to at least stay upright, it wasn’t long before we rode more like phantoms in the night.
The curved buildings and tall peaks were all but swallowed whole in the thick wood surrounding the alabaster city.
We rode through heavily wooded forests that seemed as endless and beautiful as a night sky full of stars.
We rode until I could no longer feel my legs and the first light of dawn crept through the morning mists in the underbrush.
The king stopped by an enormous field of sunflowers stretching toward the sky, just when my legs were starting to prickle. I fell from my horse, legs wobbling, and stretched. My back popped, my neck and legs screaming at me.
Five days of this? I didn’t know if I had it in me. The king didn’t seem to be bothered by the long ride. On the contrary, he looked bright. His entire countenance was lighter. As if a great weight lifted from him with every clomp of the hooves away from the kingdom.
“Now that we are outside the city, we can travel at an easier pace. All of my people know the white-haired king, they will not quite know me with this disguise, especially now that we are beyond the borders of my city.”
They might not know this raven-haired, ruggedly handsome elf, but he would still stop a village of humans in their tracks.
I could not think of anything to say, so I shut my mouth and nodded numbly.
We ate a breakfast of green apples, cheese, and thick walnut bread as the sun began its assent into the sky, beaming rays of fuchsia and gold over the blue mountains in the distance.
We sat in a field of tall yellow and auburn sunflowers, flanked by the crisp leaves of gold and brilliant crimson of the bordering forest.
The king’s eyes were on the horizon. “Sunflowers. Did you know they track the sun with their faces as it moves across the sky? And the arraignment of the seeds creates the same kind of spirals displayed in other living things in nature, like pinecones, pineapples, even certain seashells.”
I looked closer at the beautiful sunflowers facing the rising sun. The seeds were very ordered, almost mathematical. “I never noticed.”
The king cleared his throat, then glanced down at the grass he was crushing in his fingers. “I am sorry, I did not mean to bore you.”
“Bore me?” I blushed. “Of course not.”
Elden smiled a bit at that. “My tutors did not have a very agreeable reaction to my interest in botany. They much rather I showed more interest in politics.” He then squinted up at the horizon. “Do you see the tallest peak to the left of those small hills?”
My eyes fixed on a blue blur that must have been the peak. “I’m not sure. I think so.”
The king’s eyes softened toward me. “It may be hard to see, but that is the Mount of Winterthorn just there.”
“I don’t think human eyes see as well as your elvish ones do.”
“That may be.”
The early sounds of morning, the twittering of birds, and the soft hum of insects rushed in to fill the strange silence that followed.
Elden searched my face, where I sat only close enough to reach the food between us.
I tried my best not to make eye contact with the male, focusing instead on not chewing too loudly.
I was hyperaware of every move I made, not able to make out the king’s thoughts in the least.
Then Elden said most unexpectedly, “I am sorry.”
“Sorry?” I asked.
“Yes.” The king lowered his head, black braids falling across his shoulders.
His voice was as dark as night. “I am sorry that I took you away from everything you hold dear. That I threatened to take your sister. I am sorry for this plague, and most of all, I am sorry for the way I have been speaking to you.”
I blinked. This was too much. I didn’t know what to say, but a sliver of warmth touched my stone heart.
“And I will not use excuses,” Elden said firmly. “I will not blame anyone or anything but myself. I will strive to do better going forward, that I promise you.”
I lifted my gaze from the swaying grass to meet the Elf King’s brilliant gold eyes. “You promise?”
He nodded, his jaw set. Hope. That’s what I saw now as I looked into the king’s eyes.
Hope that we would find a cure.
Warmth spread from my heart out to my fingers to the tips of my toes. Bolstered by the openness of the king, I pressed, “if we do this, if we find the cure, will you promise me that I can see my family again?”
And there it was. I couldn’t believe I said the words aloud, but if he was being honest with me, that the only thing he needed me for was my magic, then once we discovered the cure—then maybe I could make it home for Christmas.
“It will be as you desire. I will not keep you if you wish to return home to your lands,” the king said with a tight grimace, then cleared his throat and stood.
He turned his back to me and adjusted the buckles on his saddle. But I sat, mouth agape, stunned at the king’s words. He said I could go home. That I could have my wish.
I closed my eyes and offered a quiet, “Thank you, Elden.”
Elden removed the saddle from his mare and mine as if he hadn’t heard me, but I was all too aware of him. Of how the muscles in his strong back strained as he worked. Of the lilting sounds of fat little bees buzzing about us, collecting nectar from the sunflowers.
I could be going home in as little as a fortnight.
“We should rest for a few hours,” Elden tied the horse’s reins to a log and made his way to a nice patch of grass. There he laid on his back, placing the hood of his jacket over his eyes.
I looked around the peaceful green grass, the sunflowers blowing in the small breeze. My eyelids were heavy after riding out all night and my back screamed at me to lay down. So, I laid in the grass, shielding my eyes from the rising sun with my jacket just as Elden had done.
But as I lay in the crisp breeze, my mind filled with visions of sugarplums. Holding my sister and mother again, laughing around a hot mug of cider as we play games late into the night. I fell asleep with the warm hope of finding a cure, and the chance of seeing my family rekindled in my heart.