Page 81 of Oath of Rebellion

Knox blinked. This was too unbelievable. He wasn't a king. He'd told Olive as much. The forest didn't need a king. It only needed a protector, and that was a job he could do.

Eirwyn leaned her head on his bicep and held his arm with her other hand.

"Are you alright?" she asked softly.

He nodded slowly. "I will be once I get used to the idea of it all. I mean, I was just a lumberjack a week ago, and now there's a ghost calling me a king?"

He shook his head and walked with leaden feet to the front stairs of the castle. There was no need for a king. It'd just cause more political upheaval when the forest lay directly in between two warring countries.

He pushed the door open, creaking as he went. Eirwyn followed him down the hall to where a faint light shone under a door.

He pushed it open, and Leopol was leaning over a desk, reading an open book. He took a deep breath when Eirwyn's hand on his back gave him pause.

She smiled up at him and looked at Leopol. "I'm going to go explore the kitchens and check on Ryder. Yell if you need me, alright?"

He nodded and frowned. "Same. If you see some beast that I need to slay, yell for me."

Her eyes twinkled as she tilted her head. "Like an adder? Will do, big guy."

Some of the tension in his shoulders eased at her teasing tone. If she wasn't panicking over all this information, then he wouldn't either. He went through the door to dig through the king's records.

He paused just inside. His father's records. He shook his head in disbelief.

Chapter 28

EIRWYN HUMMED AS SHE found the kitchen. A thick layer of dust covered the petrified wooden table in the center of the room. One wall had nothing but a giant fireplace. Another wall had a door that went outside.

She explored, finding the empty pantry and sighing in relief. After a few hundred years, there were no more bugs feasting on rotten food. Even the shelves were nothing but dust.

She went outside and called to the birds to get a lay of the land around the castle as her stomach growled. The front of the castle held the oak grove and old road that led into the helroses. The side where they'd entered had the flower garden. The back of the house opened onto a beautiful but overgrown pond. The side where she'd exited the kitchen held what used to the be the herb and vegetable garden.

The birds directed her to the pond and several swooped down to hunt fish. A chirp led her to the back corner of the vegetable garden near the helrose hedge. She followed the bird and found a blackberry thicket.

With her cloak held by the bottom corners, she made a type of bag and loaded all the ripe berries she could find. They were delicious, and she might have eaten one for every two she put in her cloak.

When she turned, two blue birds were dancing near the wall of the castle. She walked over and found a few carrots and potatoes. She added those to her cloak and went back to the kitchen, leaving the door open to help get rid of the dust.

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