Total pages in book: 108
Estimated words: 105132 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 526(@200wpm)___ 421(@250wpm)___ 350(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 105132 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 526(@200wpm)___ 421(@250wpm)___ 350(@300wpm)
“I am.”
“Why?”
“It’s simple. She loves you.”
Dravic’s brow drew tight. “That did not stop her from leaving.”
“Nay,” Kaelan said. “But perhaps loving you was not the reason she left.”
Dravic was quiet for a moment. He had considered so many reasons why she left, but that was not one of them. He was confident she loved him and any other reason simply was not acceptable. Adira should not have left, and when he found her, he would lose no time in telling her just that.
He cast a glance at the fire. Nay, he would take her in his arms and never let her go.
The endless ache of her absence continued to prod at him, and he attempted to ease it with talk of something else.
“Tell me about Northland.”
Kaelan looked surprised by the question.
“My mother rarely spoke of it.”
“Perhaps because speaking of home made her miss it more.”
Dravic could understand that.
“Northland is different from Scotara,” Kaelan said. “Magic touches the land there as well, but not as it does in Driochmor. Ours is an earthly magic. We understand the land, the seas, the forests, the rivers, the animals, the changing seasons. We learn what they give us and what they warn us of. Our survival depends upon respecting them.”
Something stirred in Dravic’s memory: his mother taking his hand and leading him into the woods. Showing him which way moss grew upon a tree. Teaching him to watch the birds and how their sudden silence could be a warning. Telling him that the wind carried more than cold if one learned how to understand it.
He had forgotten so much.
“Nay,” Dravic said, recalling. “My mother did teach me some of it.”
Kaelan smiled. “I thought she might have.”
“She took me into the forest often when I was young. She showed me things. Explained things.” Dravic frowned, frustrated by how indistinct some of the memories had become. “Much of it has faded.”
“You were a child.”
Not so fond memories intruded on Dravic. “I remembered other lessons. Constant. Demanding ones.”
“Because you were forced to.” Kaelan shrugged. “You were being taught to be king. I imagine there was little time left for learning what a river or a tree wished to tell you.”
Dravic almost smiled.
“My mother told me that your da was beginning to understand before they died.”
Dravic’s attention sharpened. “Your mother, my aunt, spoke of my father?”
“Often. She had been pleased that though their marriage had been an arranged one, they had fallen in love. She said Edric became curious about the Northland ways. He asked questions. He wanted to understand what Ravina understood rather than simply dismissing it as magic.”
The little that he recalled about his da, he knew that sounded like him.
“He wanted to learn,” Kaelan continued. “My mother believed that given time, he would have.”
Dravic looked toward the fire again. Memories of his parents had always been painfully brief, preserved from the eyes of a child who had not understood how quickly they could be taken from him.
“My da and mum would have made a good king and queen.”
“Aye,” Kaelan said. “I believe they would have.”
Dravic remained silent.
“And you have more of both of them in you than you realize.”
Dravic glanced at him. “You have known me only a short time.”
“I know my family.” Kaelan smiled. “Besides, what Ravina taught you is not gone.”
Dravic disagreed. “It certainly feels gone.”
“It is part of you. You simply need to remember.”
“And how do you suggest I do that?”
“Adira will teach you,” Kaelan said as if it were a given.
Dravic’s expression changed at the sound of her name.
Kaelan seemed not to notice. “She instinctively knows the forest. She understands things you have forgotten. And with Morvane magic in her blood…” He shrugged. “Perhaps she understands things neither of us ever will.”
“She has much to explain when I find her,” Dravic said with the command of a king.
Kaelan laughed. “I don’t think that will be the first thing on your mind when you find her.”
He was right but Dravic would not admit it.
Kaelan scratched his chin. “I just thought of a way you might be able to find her.”
Dravic sprang forward in his chair. “Tell me.”
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Found at Last
A Love Reclaimed
Spring had finally arrived in Driochmor.
Dravic had expected the melting snow and warmer air. What he had not expected was the change it brought to the land itself.
Strange flowers grew in clusters along the forest floor, some with petals so pale they appeared almost white until the sunlight touched them and revealed streaks of violet and blue. Others curled around the trunks of trees, their vines thick with tiny blossoms unlike anything he had seen in Caerith.
Plants he could not name crowded the banks of streams swollen with melted snow, and everywhere new growth pushed through the dark earth.
He found himself studying it all as his stallion carried him along the narrow trail.