“Sorry isn’t enough,” she snapped. “Elator and I were worried sick about you all day. He had to help me with the baking. It’s not something he likes to do or is good at, either.”
Snow almost snickered at that, but managed to keep it at bay. Yirrie was angry and she had a right to be after Snow’s disappearing act all day.
At their door, Yirrie pushed it open. She didn’t release her until she was at her bedroom.
“You’ll stay here tonight while we’re at festival. No sneaking out any more.” She gave a nod toward her room.
Snow turned to see her window was boarded up from the outside. She stared at it in abject horror with the awful realization her connection to the outside world was forever closed. She would never see the sunrise again from her window.
“You boarded up the window?”
“I had Elator do it to keep him from burning more of the bread,” Yirrie said. “I also have someone watching the front of the house. If you leave again, I will know.”
“So, I’m to be a prisoner here in my own home?” she asked.
“It’s for your own good.” Yirrie softened then, releasing her elbow. Shimmering tears stood in her eyes, the worry lines deep around her mouth. “It’s the only way to keep you safe. If the Elders know you were out of the village…” Her words trailed off.
“I understand,” Snow said.
The underlying meaning was there. If they knew, they would want her gone. She would be banished from the village. Just as she had been banished from her true home. The home Seraphina stole from her.
“Good night, Yirrie.”
Snow stepped inside her room and closed the door. For a long moment, there was silence and then Yirrie’s footsteps. The front door opened and closed, leaving Snow alone in the house.
She stumbled to the bed and collapsed, exhausted and defeated.
Chapter 14
Whenthemysteriouswomanwho commissioned the enchanted blade left his forge, Roderick consulted a map. He quickly made the calculations that it would take him nearly four days to ride from Bridgefort to the queen’s castle in the far north of the Mystic Vale. The quickest way was to go through the Wyldwood Forest, something he was not too keen to do. There were stories the forest was enchanted or haunted or both.
Thinking of that, he snickered. Here he was worried about an enchanted forest, when he would have an enchanted blade at his side. He needn’t worry about the forest.
If he was going to personally hand deliver the queen’s dagger, he needed to start right away. He closed his forge, shuttering the front of it. He took his horse and rode to the edge of town, where there was a copse of trees. It was here he discovered the willow tree with the lustrous, rainbowlike bark. He had never seen anything like it before.
He dismounted outside the thicket, patting the horse’s neck. The willow tree stood tall in the center, the top of it just visible over the other trees. He ducked and stepped under the willow’s elongated branches with their pale green leaves and paused there. The other trees blocked out the afternoon light to the willow tree, but even so, the iridescence of the bark was visible.
He placed his palm on the smooth trunk of the tree and closed his eyes.
“Mystical forces that dwell,” he said, “grant me your favor for the forging of this spell.”
Through his connection with the tree, he sensed it come alive.
“Allow me to create this enchanted blade,” he continued, “from the tree where dreams and rainbows cascade.”
The tree’s branches shuddered, rippling around him.
I grant you the favor to forge this blade, through whispered secrets here in the shade.
The tree said this in his mind, granting him the permission to once more the use its bark to forge the blade.
Tell me, dear one,it said in its mellifluous, soft voice.Who will wield this blade?
Whenever he decided to forge an enchanted blade, he received consent from the tree. It wanted to know who would be the one to wield the blade.
“I’m to take it to the queen of the Mystic Vale,” he replied.
Silence descended. He didn’t know much about the tree. He had stumbled upon the copse of trees by accident. The foliage around the willow formed a circle and stood like tall sentries, hiding it from any passing visitor who would only give it but a glance. But Roderick, with his connection to the elements, sensed there was something different about these particular trees. He’d stepped through them and found the willow, its long branches swaying slightly in the breeze.
