Page 15 of Where Shadows Bloom

I shook my head furiously, my hands trembling against her ice-cold cheek. “Don’t say that. I need you. I’ll always need you.” Tears made my eyelashes clump together. “I won’t leave you behind. We must find help. Can you stand?”

She furrowed her brow and bobbed her head in a sluggish nod. “It’s perfectly normal to be tired after... after one of those attacks. I’ll just need to rest for a bit once we find shelter.”

Taking both her hands, I pulled her onto her feet. She abruptly slumped against my shoulder, her breath loud in my ear.

“Forgive me, my lady,” she mumbled.

She had nearly died saving me from those creatures, and still she apologized; still she maintained decorum and treated me like I was the most important girl in the world. I sighedeven as my heart ached, wrapping my arm around her middle to let her use me as a crutch.

A few paces from us, our horses lay on their sides in the grass, their eyes glassy, the breath stolen from their lungs.

I led her to the toppled wagon and let her sit beside it for a moment. Our belongings had fallen from the wagon, but not too far. I found my trunk and ignored the pretty gown I’d packed. We needed to survive. We needed only what was necessary. I dug my velvet coin purse from where I’d buried it beneath my gown. I found Lope’s knapsack and slung it about me. I swept up the traveling cloak and settled it around Lope’s shoulders. A few feet from where she lay with her head tipped back against the bottom of the wagon, Lope’s sword still rested in the grass. I fetched it, carefully placing it across her lap.

“I won’t ask you to fight,” I said. “Never again. No matter what you say your duty to me is.” I nodded to her, to the sword. “But I scarcely recognize you without that blade, so it’s only right that it should be returned to its mistress.”

Lope showed me a meager smile as she fit the blade back into its scabbard.

“Can you walk very far?” I asked softly.

She nodded and slowly, achingly, pulled herself to her feet. Her head drooped in a sort-of bow. “Yes, my lady.”

“Call me Ofelia,” I said. “Always Ofelia.”

I slipped my arm around her, holding her up. Side by side,we began to amble down the winding road before us.

Then, as we passed through the edge of the forest, parting like a curtain before us, we saw it. A collection of lights hovering in the distance. A city. My shoulders slumped with relief. Even in her exhaustion, Lope managed a smile.

“We’re almost safe,” I said.

She bobbed her head. “Just a few more steps.”

The farther we walked, the harder it became. My shoes squelched as I pulled them out of the slick earth with every step. The air was thick and eerily still, eerily quiet. All the same, I did not let my gaze waver from the lights, starlike beacons calling us home.

I defeated monsters and lived. I fought beside her. I did not perish. And I will not stop here.

As we neared the lights, they became more defined. They were not simply flames hanging in midair, but dozens of lamps lighting up walls of brick and limestone. They seemed to stretch the whole horizon, but the walls they illuminated were all connected, like arms attached to the body of a marble-columned hall in the middle.

My heart stopped.

This wasn’t a city. It was one building. A palace.

“Lope,” I whispered. “Lope, Lope, it’s Le Château Enchanté!”

The lights looked even lovelier reflected in her eyes. Her arm loosened around my waist. “It’s beautiful,” she said.

A long paved road led us closer to Le Château. We stumbled faster and faster toward it. Behind it, the sun was rising, magnificent and splendid, illuminating the palace and its entrance. Every bit of the gates, from the bars to the decorative suns crowning the top, was aglow, covered in pure gold. As we finally stood before them, I understood all the stories that said this place had been crafted by the gods.

Mother had to be inside. Who would want to leave such a place?

“Who goes there?” came a voice, low and rumbling like thunder.

I yelped and held tight to Lope as a man in a golden breastplate appeared behind the gate. He glared at us, but his look softened after a moment.

“Gods above,” he muttered. “You’re just children.”

I curled my hand around one of the bars of the gate. “I’ve come looking for my mother,” I said softly. “My name is Ofelia, and I—”

As I spoke, his thick brows pushed together. He pointed to Lope—her bloodied face and throat and the way she could hardly stand on her own. “What happened?”

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