Page 166 of A Reign of Roses
Their voices weren’t consoling. Not broken, not hollow. No, they both sounded…overcome.
My eyes were nearly swollen shut, but I fought to pry them open.
I’d leveled the forest with my rage. The remaining gnarled tree trunks and spindly branches glowed an unearthly pale blue as the very first pools of sunlight filtered in from the east.
And through the valley of felled trees, we had a clear sight to the vision ahead.
Utter awe sang through my body at the glistening white glen before me. An iridescent sprawl rippling across the forest—one of soft, fresh snow and beads of morning dew bejeweling each branch and leaf. A pearly, eternal scene, bathed in morning light and night’s still, blue shadows.
And at the very center: Arwen.
Slumped over atop the powder—eyes closed, lashes dusted in snow. Lips violet and dark hair fanned around her, pale skin brushed with ash.
Serene, silent, wholly bare—
And breathing.
47
Arwen
My eyes blinked open toa warm swath of blue sky and a cluster of swaying autumn leaves. The air was as crisp as an apple and just as sweet. I inhaled it through my nostrils greedily—pumpkin seeds, damp leaves, chimney smoke.
And the ground—a grassy meadow, clean with morning dew beneath my head. Blades of grass tickling my cheeks and forearms. My eyelids fell closed amid gentle awareness.
I knew this place.
I knew the view of the small yet bustling town square that would greet me once I pushed myself up to sit. Knew the vibrant sunset colors that would paint the sky in subtle gradations. Yolky yellow, rosy pink, crystal blue.
“Is it just as you remembered it?”
The voice, though I’d never heard it before, didn’t frighten me. I moved from my back to sit comfortably atop the knoll, that view I’d been expecting to stretch below me even smaller, but somehow morecomforting than I’d remembered. Sleepy Abbington shone under the colorful clouds. Like ripped tufts of cotton backlit by liquid gold.
The man’s dark brown hair receded a bit up the crown of his head. His heart-shaped face and angular nose were handsome, kind. Inexplicably familiar.
“Do I know you?”
“A complicated question,” the man said ruefully. “Nois probably the simplest answer.”
White floppy butterflies floated by on a breeze.
“I owe you many thanks,” he continued, his eyes, too, on the fluttering wings, the watercolor sky, the rolling autumn hills, and the shepherds that tended to flocks grazing atop them. And then down to the town. The handful of shopkeepers and merchants closing up for the evening. Headed home to their families to sleep and eat and start anew tomorrow.
I turned to him once more. “You do?”
“I was not able to return home for a long time. I had done something foolish in the hopes of helping others. Had not used my power in the way it was meant to be used. Your bravery proved it had not been an error at all.” Something brimmed in his eyes. “You conquered a mighty force. Saved many lives. Spared realms.”
But I didn’t feel pride. I didn’t feel like a savior or a queen—I was born in this quiet, autumn town. I was just a girl. “My name is Arwen.”
“I have been looking forward to this day for some time, Arwen.”
Somewhere in my mind I remembered I had slain a mighty dragon. Had combusted in a hail of flame beside him. I looked down at my hands, clean, bare of dirt or blood. Pale in the violet light. “Because I killed him?”
“To meet again.”
“You said I didn’t know you.”
The man’s eyes crinkled. “You don’t.”
