“They’re here!” he shouted, leaping down the stairs the throne was set atop and sprinting toward us.
He reached Nilson first because Nilson had gone bounding forward, and they met in such an eager hug that it knocked them straight to the floor, where they lay in a giggling heap. Nira had started over too, leaving the robed people behind—and looking somewhat stressed about the delay—as she bypassed the boys to pace to us.
She threw her arms around Ava’s neck. “You’re here!” she said happily, giving Ava an overly enthusiastic kiss on the cheek and then squeezing her all over again. “You’re finally here!” After a long moment of hugging her sister, she let go and threw her arms around my neck. “It feels as though it’s been years.” She let me go, turning to my mother with outstretched arms. “Bibbey,” she grinned.
At the mention of my mother’s name, Akamar finally stopped giggling with Nilson and looked up, as if realizing for the first time that he’d not yet greeted the rest of us. “Bib!” he exclaimed, jumping into my mother’s arms not a moment after Nira let her go.
“Hello,” my mother laughed, smiling wide as she hugged him back. “You’re both looking so well,” she told Nira, so overjoyed about it that there were almost tears in her eyes. For those six months in the caves, she’d looked after Nira and Akamar as if they were her own children, and I could tell that she was as pleased to see them again as Ava and me.
“You’ve arrived on time,” Nira observed, setting one arm over Ava’s shoulders, leaning against her just to be near. “I take it your journey was fair.”
“Indeed,” Ava agreed. “It was…”
“Leisurely,” I provided, because a ride to Ronan was much more enjoyable when soldiers weren’t chasing us, and Nira laughed knowingly while Ava nodded her amused agreement.
“And the horses?” Nira prompted. “How are they? And your cottage, is it luxurious?”
After the war ended, Kingston took the throne in Guelder, and he and Nira had gifted Ava and me a sum enough to last us the rest of our lifetimes. They’d said it was for our services to the kingdoms, but we both knew it to be a generous result of their love. We didn’t use it to rebuild the burned down cottage I’d lived in with Mother and Nilson. We’d moved farther outside of Wicklin Moor instead, and bought a few hundred acres so we could make our living doing something simple, and fun, and safe. So we could raise horses.
“Our cottage is comfortable,” Ava answered, reaching out for my hand, and I knew the gesture to be a reassurance that she wouldn’t have it any other way. That not even being back in a castle could make her want anything other than the life we’d begun to build in our comfortable home.
Nilson, who’d come back over to stand at our mother’s side with Akamar, beamed up at Nira. “Kiena’s teaching me to train the horses.”
“Is she?” Nira asked, glancing between him, Ava, and me. “I’ll bet the three of you will turn out the best horses in the kingdom.”
“In the world!” Nilson exclaimed.
“Forgive me,” Nira laughed. She reached out to grab him, pulling him to her so she could ruffle his hair, because he hadn’t yet given her a hug hello. “Best in the world.”
We wouldn’t be doing it alone, however. It was a tremendous job looking after horses, and would only get bigger as our stable grew, and so we’d hired some help. One of these individuals was Silas. Most of the soldiers who’d survived the battle were now soldiers under Kingston’s rule, and some others were given punishments comparable to their status and crimes. Silas had been stripped of his knighthood and relieved of his service to the kingdom—a punishment he’d accepted readily and dutifully.
Though our relationship wasn’t what it used to be, I couldn’t leave him in his newfound situation to wander in search of work, or to potentially find none and be doomed to a life of homelessness. He’d always been a soldier, so he knew no other labor and thus wouldn’t have easily been hired by anyone but myself. So I allowed him to build a small cottage on our land and gave him a job. It was an offer he’d accepted as stoically as he could, but with revealing tears in his eyes. We’d left him behind to care for the horses when we’d left for Ronan, along with Haunt, who’d decided to stick around even after the war, but who’d have never survived staying in a castle for a month.
“Your Grace,” said a soft voice, and the robed woman gave Nira an apologetic smile for interrupting our reunion. “We still have so much to rehearse, and you’ll have hours to converse soon at their—”
Nira made a loud shushing noise, cutting off the rest of the woman’s sentence. Then she looked specifically at Ava and me, explaining, “We have a surprise for you tonight,” but she cast a look at the robed woman on the word ‘surprise,’ chuckling amicably when the woman blushed.
“We’re here for you,” Ava protested, and I nodded my agreement.
Nira waved it off with a flick of her wrist. “These last weeks have been more about me than I can stand.” She gestured toward the staff members that had brought us here, and who were still standing at the entrance of the throne room. “They’ll take you all for baths and refreshments.” She hugged us again, pressing another kiss to each of our cheeks. “I’ll see you soon.”
We turned to follow the staff members out of the throne room, but Nilson ran off after Akamar, both giggling mischievously and yelling about sweets, and my mother and another woman went chasing after them. Ava and I followed our own guide to the upstairs of another wing of the castle we’d never explored before, and were led into a bedchamber. We were assured that our bath was already being drawn, and told that someone would come and get us shortly. As Nira had promised, there were refreshments laid out on the table in our room, and I went over to have a look.
“Hungry?” I asked Ava, taking in the various fruits we’d been provided, grabbing a particular piece of green melon. “I do believe this is your favorite.”
Ava strode over, holding her mouth open so I could drop the fruit in it while she looked over the food too. “Ah,” she grinned, swallowing as she grabbed a specific red berry, “we’ve been provided your favorite as well.”
I laughed, narrowing my eyes at her because I remembered perfectly when she’d tricked me into eating that sour berry. Twice. While I reached for a cup to fill it with water, Ava wandered away from me to explore the room. She felt the covers on the large bed and examined the landscape painting on the wall, but it wasn’t until she’d reached the dresser and ran her hand over it that I recognized the wistfulness on her face.
Ava had been excited about returning, about seeing her brother and sister again after being apart for a couple of months, but she still had less fond memories attached to this castle. We were in an entirely different wing, and a different room than we’d been in on our first stay here, but everything was similar—the furniture, the colors, the smells. In our nights before leaving home to come here, she’d expressed an anxiety beneath her excitement, a fear that being back here would be too painful for her to enjoy herself as much as she wanted to.