Page 3 of The Kingdom Cursed By Iron

“What is it?”

“Did…did your mom leave you her notes when she passed?”

“Yes,” I say. “Why?”

She nods, as if this confirms something for her. “My mother left me hers. They’ve been a godsend. If there’s anything I haven’t seen before, she’s usually covered it in one of her notebooks.”

I shift on my feet, wishing she would get the point, and getting more nervous the longer she stalls.

“A little while ago, I came across something about Leah in there. My mother wrote about how your mom came to see her once, when you were a baby.”

She crosses to a cupboard in the corner. Out of it she lifts a stack of loose parchment held together with a leather cover and string. She pulls out a specific page, watching my face carefully as she hands it to me.

‘Leah Thorn, April 16th.’

The words are written in a looping, old-fashioned hand, and I have to squint to decipher it.

‘Infant, three months. Has been feeding but no weight gain. Sickly, thin. Mother has tried fennel and angelica extract.’

“This is about me?” I ask. Neither Mom nor Dad ever mentioned me being sick as a baby.

“Yes. I still remember it—I opened the door that day. Your mom looked frantic with worry. And you were such a tiny, sad looking thing.”

“But I got better?” I ask, looking back to the page to try to find the rest of the story. This doesn’t seem like enough to warrant Ruth’s nervousness. I wait for the other shoe to drop.

“Yes, look.” She taps the section of writing I should be reading.

‘Circumstances of pregnancy discussed. If none of the suggested remedies help, the child should be taken to the changeling. There she might get what she needs.’

The changeling? I frown, so confused that I have to re-read the sentence a few times.

“I didn’t think there were any changelings around here,” I say.

They’re so rare, in fact, that I’ve only heard about them in stories. Children like to tell tall tales about human babies getting snatched and replaced by horrible, bloodsucking fae who fed on their hosts at night, but Maidar set the record straight for me years ago. When I’d asked him about changelings, along with a hundred other questions about fae, he’d laughed and said that these were just horror stories to frighten children. The truth was that changelings were natural-born, part-human, part-fae offspring. They could seem a bit eerie, and were clearly not human, but they weren’t much of a threat, he assured me, telling me that any such creature I met in Styrland would have lost many of its fae powers from living in the human realm for too long.

Many…but not all. What kind of powers would a part fae have that my mother would need? That I would need when I was just a baby? Why have I never heard about this encounter before? I feel like I’ve just fled from a world of secrets and mystery, and yet here they are chasing me down again—questions crowding in on me until it’s hard to think of anything else.

“Why would I have needed to go to a changeling?”

Ruth watches me carefully. “I don’t know. Mom didn’t let me in the room that day when she and Leah talked. I do know who your mother would have gone to, though. There’s only one who lives nearby, in the Kilda. Most don’t know about her, but Mom did. When she was dying she told me. She said if ever someone came to me with a problem I thought was linked to the fae, I should send them to the changeling. There are some things even we can’t fix, but for the right price, she’d be willing to help.”

I stare at the writing and as Ruth’s words sink in, I feel the anger build again, the same bitter rage that flares when I think about him. What was Mom keeping from me? I hate this. All the riddles, every absent answer. I look over at Dad’s sleeping form, wondering if there’s secrets even he’s kept from me.

“When I read this, I thought about reaching out…but then I decided it was none of my business.” Ruth looks embarrassed. “When I’d heard you’d gotten mixed up with the fae, though, I wondered…”

“Can you tell me how to find this creature?” I ask abruptly. “I want to know why my mom went there.” I want to know everything. If I can’t trust those I hold dear to give me the truth, then I’ll just have to dig it up myself, even if it means going to strangers.

Ruth gives a reluctant nod and I remember she never wanted me here in the first place.

“I’ll go,” I say. “Dad can stay here for a little while, can’t he?”

Ruth dips her head. “Yes, I still need to do his stitches. I’m sorry, Eleanor. I was afraid before, but you were right to remind me of my oath. Your father will need some time before he travels again, so of course he can wait here with us.”

“Thank you,” I say. “I know you’re risking a lot, having us here.”

A thought occurs to me just then.

“This changeling, is she dangerous?”

---