Chapter 33
thirty-three
George is happy again.
George tried her best not to rush back to her apartment.
Gliding on hurried steps hidden beneath her stola, she whisked through the main levels of the palace, fabric rustling around her.
Despite being well past midnight, her father’s domain was still active, though blissfully less so than during the Great Assembly.
Amos, a little green-haired, green-winged pixie, one of Ean’s friends, perched delicately on a potted cypress beside the stairs. George tipped her chin in greeting, and the round-faced young man winked while plucking a minuscule seashell out of thin air and flipping it like a coin.
Seashells were a symbol of love, of the goddess Appia. Their beautiful protective exterior reminded someone, maybe the goddess herself, of true love’s embrace.
Her earl had returned.
Beaming at Amos, she cast out a mirage of haughtiness to mask her show of emotion from prying eyes. Her pulse sped from sheer excitement with every upward step she took.
Once George reached the all-but-deserted upper floors, she made a break for it, miraging her appearance to match the walls as best as she could while jogging. If spotted, someone might think they were seeing a ghost. That was fine. There were enough of them walking the palace halls.
“Where’s Ean?” George asked, concerned, when she found Ruairi, another of Eanraig’s friends, positioned outside her door.
“Within, Princess,” he replied calmly, bronze wings beating behind him as he slid sideways, clearing the doorway.
She rushed into her dining chamber to nothing but a disconcerting silence.
George tried to keep the warmth pulsing through her from cooling to something unpleasant.
But it couldn’t be helped. Icy needles of fear pricked her arms and the back of her neck as she shoved her way into the sitting room. Empty.
Low murmurs slipped through the door to her right. Isahn’s room.
She pushed in and stumbled back a step when she processed the scene before her.
Her arm shot out of its own volition, reaching for Isahn, who lay limp and lifeless in the middle of the bed.
Half her friends knelt on the mattress around his head.
Adda and Burke stood on the far side of the bed, and Dunstan was closest to George, leaning in and reaching around Wynnie to place his hand on Isahn’s hair. All of them were touching her earl.
Ean popped up from his position, somewhere in the middle of the group, and zipped over to George.
“What happened!?” she hissed, recognizing that mind magic was underway and trying to remain quiet, in spite of her panic.
“They’re almost done, P Georgie.”
“What happened? Was it the veil again?”
“Ach, no.” He waved away her concerns with a small hand. “They’re repairing the damage. Yer earl refused to wait any longer. He wanted to be whole for you.”
“You’re giving me palpitations, Georgie,” Wynnie whispered, not looking back as she spoke. “Please,” she begged.
“We’re nearly finished,” Hildy promised.
“It’ll be easier if ye wait in the sitting room.”
George huffed. Clearly, she was only getting in the way. “Fine. Get me the moment you’re done.”
She paced, back and forth between the door to her chamber and Isahn’s. In an attempt to calm her racing heart, she set her focus on taking measured steps, moving slower and slower with each pass of the room.
Finally, the door opened while her back was to it. George pivoted, her stola swishing around her ankles as Hildy emerged with Ean following close behind.
“Well?”
The faerie popped up above Hildy’s head just long enough to say, “We’re done.” Before disappearing behind her short curls.
Hil offered her a smile, brimming with hope, and George found it was difficult to remain frustrated with her friends for acting without her approval, for mindmolding Isahn without her there.
“He wanted us to get it over with,” Hildy reiterated what Ean said inside the bedroom, “demanded it, really. You’ve changed him.”
That placated her further.
“I need to see him.”
“Let’s go back in. He’s still fast asleep.
” Hildy moved to the side, and Ean buzzed backward into the bedroom, clear across to where Dunstan and Adda sat on the settee tucked beneath the window.
Burke had claimed the desk chair, and Wynnie perched on the edge of the dressing table, foregoing the stool.
George climbed on the bed beside Isahn and ran her fingers through his shaggy hair, noticeably longer than when she’d last seen him bound in the cell at Villa Senone, a complete stranger.
“How long will he sleep?”
Adda answered the question directed at him, “Maybe another three hours, tops. It was a strong dose, but he didn’t finish the cup.”
“Do you really think it worked?”
Hil nodded. “He was almost back, Georgie. Just a few missing pieces he wanted fixed.”
Georgie returned her attention to her earl, tracing his stubbled jawline, watching his eyes move rapidly behind his closed lids. “He’s dreaming.”
“Good, that means we probably didn’t break him.”
“Shut up, Burke.” Wynnie beat George to the scolding, so George slapped him on the arm with an invisible palm to express her frustration.
Hildy snorted, and Dunstan chortled, likely at Burke’s reaction. George wasn’t looking; solely focused on Isahn’s peaceful face, she ran her fingertip over his luscious lips.
Wake up, she pleaded.
“Georgie,” Hildy began, in a clear attempt to distract her, “how did you know which inn we were going to stay at on our way south?”
George glanced over and laughed. Isahn twitched, and her eyes snapped back to his face. Still asleep. She may as well give in to the distraction her friends offered. “Every single inn in eastern Gramenia is sitting on a copy of an identical note from Mira to Melody.”
“Tenacity,” Hildy complimented, her eyes alight.
“So, um,” Burke began, “where’s the tapestry?”
Hildy held up a finger before ducking from the room. When she returned a breath later, she was unwrapping a rather padded package in her arms. “It’s a book. There was an actual tapestry on the wall, but it turns out this is what we needed. Also, the wall hanging burned.”
Wynnie blinked, waiting for more information.
“We’ll explain that later.” Hil pointed to Isahn, then lifted the unwrapped text. “This is more interesting. Trust me.”
“Let me see,” George demanded.
Hildy passed it off with alacrity, her shoulders relaxing with it out of her hands.
George forced her focus onto the ancient book.
Hil mentioned it wasn’t a wall hanging in her letter, but the actual artifact was gorgeous.
It was bound in thick dark leather, embossed, and inlaid with an array of tiny stones.
She spotted heartstone, diamond, lapis lazuli, a tiger’s eye, ruby, onyx, tourmaline, and so many more.
It was expertly crafted and very, very old.
“That looks pixie-made,” Ean commented as he settled down on George’s shoulder.
“Are you going to open it?” Burke grumbled.
A glance confirmed that all her friends had crowded around the bed. She snorted as she looked from face to face. They all eyed her expectantly, aside from Isahn, who slept on, and Hildy, whose tan face bore a smirk.
George flipped open the book.
Burke crowded over the pages like a child picking through a bowl of candied fruits for the cherries.
Wynnie shoved his head out of the way.
Dunstan and Adda, the tallest of the group, had gone to the other side of the bed and leaned over Isahn for a glimpse of the book.
“I can’t read a single word,” Dunstan proclaimed.
“Terrible penmanship,” Burke added.
“It’s Old Selwassan,” Hildy explained, “according to Isahn and his sister.”
Burke huffed and retreated a smidge.
“Could they make sense of it?” Wynnie asked, peering over George’s right shoulder.
“Only a bit, enough to learn something critical.”
“What?” George barked, not willing to play games. She wanted information.
“Isahn poked through it every night on our journey north, looking for any old words he could translate. It’s hers, the ancient queen’s, we think. A journal. And it seems to go from Selwas to Domos with the owner.”
Wynnie gasped excitedly, and Hildy grinned.
“Whose?”
Wynnie and George both looked at Burke like he was an idiot.
“Oh! The one who put up the veil.”
“If I may...” Hildy reached for the book, and George lifted her hands away while Hil turned to a page not far from the end. “This is the start of the final entry.”
“It’s in a different hand.” George noticed immediately, despite the weathered pages.
“Look, right here.” Hildy pointed to the middle of the right side.
“This whole part is in Old Domossan,” Wynnie breathed.
“It’s what my father was looking for. It’s the full prophecy.” George grinned.
“Can I study the book, Princess?” Bouncing on her shoulder, Ean slipped excitedly and deeply into his elven brogue. He even called her by her proper title, a sure sign of his desire to get his hands on the critical relic.
She assented while her focus returned to the rise and fall of Isahn’s chest.
The book vanished in a tinkle, and George pulled her knees back up to her chest since they were no longer needed as a pedestal.
Ean zipped from the room, and Wynnie closed the door after him before returning to the bedside.
“Ah, ah.” George held up a hand, stilling Wynnie’s path. “What are you doing?”
“We’re keeping you company,” Hildy replied.
George shook her head. “I have all the company I need right here.” She patted Isahn’s forearm.
Burke snickered.
“He needs to rest. Everybody out.” Her tone was pure princess, pure command.
Adda and Dunstan rounded the end of the bed as they made for the door, Burke following along.
“I can stay, help keep you distracted,” Hildy offered.
“Me too,” Wynnie agreed from where she stood by the door, a few feet to George’s right.
“We’re fine.”
“We can wait in the sitting room.” Wynnie shrugged.
“We’re fine! Clear out.”
Hildy still hesitated, though Wynnie left.
“You said he remembered me before?”