Page 32 of The Abandoned Princess

He raised an eyebrow even while his eyes laughed at me. “Are you disappointed?”

“What? No! Of course not! I just can’t believe…” I trailed off.

“I definitely thought it was all over while I was falling through the air,” he said, relenting. “But it turns out someone was watching over me.”

He smiled over his shoulder, and I half expected a godmother to appear from the trees, wings glinting. He was a prince, after all.

But the figure that appeared was far more familiar.

“Lori!” I ran over and threw my arms around her.

She embraced me back briefly before picking up the bundle I had abandoned on the ground. “So you’ve finally left that place for good?”

I nodded. “There’s no reason to stay now. I assume Xander told you what happened with Eulalie?”

Lori nodded, and I frowned.

“How did he escape injury, though? Don’t try to tell me you caught him because I won’t believe it.”

“Naturally not,” Lori said in disapproving tones. “I’m not fool enough to try such a thing.”

“She was ready before I fell,” Xander said. “She got to work as soon as Eulalie climbed into the tower.”

“I always worried about that window,” Lori said. “I didn’t say anything in case you hadn’t thought of it, but it occurred to me early on that it would be an easy way for that woman to dispose of someone she no longer had a use for.” Her dark expression told me she hadn’t expected me to last in the tower so long.

“She had gathered a large pile of thin branches just inside the trees,” Xander explained. “Just in case. When Eulalie arrived so soon after we climbed up, Lori guessed we wouldn’t be ready for her and that everything would go wrong. So she dragged the branches out and piled them below the window.”

“It was the best I could do to cushion the fall,” Lori said. “I never thought it would be comfortable, but I’m pleased it prevented any broken bones.”

“I can assure you that I’m more than grateful to be left with nothing but bruises,” Xander said fervently.

“That explains all the twigs!” I cried. “But where are the branches now?”

“You noticed those, did you?” Lori nodded. “You were always observant. Thankfully Eulalie wasn’t so attentive and missed them in the moonlight.”

“She was well and truly shaken to come down and find no sign of me,” Xander said with a satisfied smile. “It was worth the effort we took dragging the branches away so quickly. I just wish I’d dared to attack her. But from her manner, she was afraid of exactly that, which meant she likely had the ring activated. If I’d realized she had that ability, I would have moved more quickly up in the tower!”

“I’m sorry I didn’t warn you,” I said miserably. “I didn’t know about it myself. But at least it’s not active all the time. She turned it off as soon as you fell so that she could pull me back. That’s part of the reason I lost my grip.”

“Thank you for trying,” he said. “Your efforts helped slow my fall and gave me the chance to position myself for landing.”

He paused, his face darkening as he considered my words. “If she’d turned the ring off, I should have arrested her the second she touched the ground,” he growled.

Lori shook her head. “She probably turned it back on the second she saw you were gone. And besides, we couldn’t risk provoking her before we knew what had happened to Daisy. What if she’d put her under a further enchantment? She might have been able to hurt her from the ground for all we knew.” She looked at me inquisitively. “She didn’t enchant you further, did she?”

I grimaced, examining my limbs. “Not as far as I can tell? She knocked me out like she did to us both on the road. I’ve never heard of a gas like the one she uses, but there’s no fighting it.”

“Gas?” Xander frowned. “It sounds like nayera.”

We both turned to stare at him.

“What’s that now?” Lori asked. “Neyara?”

“Nayera,” he repeated. “It’s a gas that can render someone unconscious. Back home its creation is highly controlled and only doctors are permitted to possess it. But I know some vials were secretly distributed in the Four Kingdoms. I don’t know how Eulalie got her hands on any of them, though. I thought Aurora tracked them all down.”

The last sentence had been murmured quietly, as if to himself. But as soon as he’d finished speaking, his expression froze, as if he’d realized his mistake. He looked at Lori, worried.

“Don’t worry,” I said breezily. “Lori already knows all about Aurora and her true identity. She was on the boat with us when Celine was telling stories about her sister.”

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