17
When the soil became so warm that sweat misted my skin, I moved on to the cabbage patch.
Tyressa followed, her eager eyes fastened to my fingers. “How does it work when you are not at ease?”
I curled my legs beneath me. “What makes you think I’m not?”
The youngling studied me with pursed lips, then shrugged. “Your eyes go wandering in a way that means you’re thinking a lot.”
That tugged a laugh from me.
The sound drew Paphin’s and Resenda’s gazes. The former scowled and rubbed a hand over his raven hair. Dirt sprinkled it, falling onto his nose and cheeks and even Resenda when he shook his head.
Resenda laughed and leaned away.
While bathing yesterday, I’d overheard Alixa and Plim discussing how it wasn’t right to keep the worst of the news from the younglings. Maybe it wasn’t right, but here, they could remain untouched by whatever lurked beyond their fears.
Here, their youth remained a little while longer.
“Sometimes you just…” I smiled as the soil stirred and warmed. “Need to imagine something that elicits good feelings.”
Tyressa cocked her head. “That’s why you look like you’re thinking so much.”
“Probably.” I hoped that she wouldn’t ask what I’d been thinking about. When it seemed like she might, I began to fabricate an answer.
Soft steps crushed the grass behind us.
Resenda and Paphin ceased bickering, and I looked up as they dipped their heads.
“What have we here?” Celestine asked. “Vegetables or a dirt patch?”
Tyressa giggled. “Vegetables, Princess. Some of them are just hiding until they grow bigger.” She then pointed at the soil. “But there are cabbages there, and carrots here, and…”
Celestine’s shifting feet lured my attention. Covering my eyes to shield them from the morning sun, I tilted back to catch the pinched state of Celestine’s lips.
She waited until Tyressa had finished explaining what she already knew, then asked her, “May I borrow your princess for a few minutes?”
Tyressa beamed. “Of course.”
As we walked into the clearing before the woods, I brushed dirt from my hands and tried to read Celestine’s worried expression. Only once we’d put enough distance between us and the gardens did I ask, “Has something happened with Darcen?”
Her head shook. She stopped me before the tree line. “It’s Sunspray.”
My heart fell into my stomach.
I needn’t have asked. Her watery blue eyes said it all.
“H-how?”
Taking my hand, Celestine stepped close and whispered throatily, “He was defending the valley villages, but as you know, Valadorn’s wyverns have been reared to see others as threats. To kill and—”
“How?” I asked again, knowing she was giving me time to reconsider learning the details.
Her shoulders slumped. “Valadorn beasts tore him apart, and many of our warriors were incinerated.”
An odd hum entered my ears, muting the sound of cicadas and the sea.
I walked into the trees, where I wouldn’t be seen by the younglings, and lowered to my knees on the grass.
Sunspray, who’d earned his name due to his orange-tinged scales, had been gifted to my mother when my parents had wed in the decade before my birth. He hadn’t taken to me for many moons after my mother’s passing.
His trust had been hard-won. I’d sometimes wondered if he’d stubbornly obliged because of my appearance and blood.
Because he’d scented and seen my mother in me.
I pulled up my sleeve to look at the small scar on my arm. Faeries healed quickly. Even the worst wounds seldom scarred, as many folk had been gifted the ability to heal others. I touched the scar that resided beneath the crease of my elbow.
I’d tried to touch Sunspray too soon, and he’d snapped at me. The wyvern had intended to warn me. But a tooth had accidentally caught my skin. I’d been careless, so I’d chosen to let the wound heal on its own.
When our mender had asked why, I’d simply said the gouge from his tooth reminded me of a half-moon. My favorite moon. Then I’d told her it was a sign we were meant to be friends. She’d thought me a delusional youngling, but had promised not to tell my father.
As I traced the silky piece of raised skin, I thought of all the scars adorning the Valadorn prince. Scratches filled with ink. Voran had been relentlessly slashed by claws, and he’d chosen not to have the wounds healed.
Or he hadn’t been allowed to have them healed.
His uncle and their wyverns had just murdered Sunspray, as well as so many of our people, and here I was…
Teaching him how to read.
Hot tears flooded my eyes. As they spilled, Celestine joined me on the grass.
Swiping my cheeks, I rasped, “They took the valley, then.”
“Their forces were on the move, but I suspect they have it held by now.” She rubbed my back. “Meront received word after breakfast. I found him pacing the west wing, unsure how he was going to tell you.”
So she’d offered to do it for him.
It didn’t matter.
“We killed one, though,” she said, her tone a touch lighter. “One of those poor murderous beasts was injured when it attacked…” She stopped. “Its injuries were such that our warriors managed to plunge blades through its eyes.”
I winced.
It wasn’t the wyvern’s fault.
The blame for the damage they’d done resided with Valadorn’s king.
Wyverns were volatile by nature, which would’ve aided Raxon’s training. Beasts who organically developed a bloodlust for their own kind and faeries were rare—and they were herded from the realms by riders until they ceased returning.
Many years ago, those wyverns were slain. Now, their numbers had become too few. The thought of two of them in scaled heaps caused my eyes to fill anew. If this war didn’t reach its inevitable end soon…
There would be no wyverns left to fight over.
I sniffed and pushed my hands through my hair. “Thank you for telling me.”
Though I wasn’t sure I was thankful at all. Wasn’t sure how I would return to the gardens and pretend I hadn’t learned this. Wasn’t sure how I would fulfill my debt to Voran when I mightn’t be able to stomach looking at him.
He didn’t kill Sunspray. I knew that.
But I also couldn’t forget who he was—what he stood to inherit from my kingdom’s wounds.