Page 8 of A Kingdom's Heart
The fire had burned lower, its glow softer, shadows stretching across the floor. I reached for another log, meaning to add it to the
flames.
Before I could, the door behind me creaked open.
I turned, and there she was.
She had changed into the pale kirtle, the fabric falling neatly to her ankles. It was a little loose on her shoulders, yet somehow it suited her. The color caught the firelight and turned warm against her skin. Her hair was still damp, curling where it brushed her neck.
For a moment I could only look at her, struck by the quiet simplicity of the scene. She seemed almost unreal in the dim light, like a figure drawn from a fairytale or a dream.
She noticed me watching and looked down quickly. “I am sorry,” she said quietly. “I did not mean to disturb you.”
“What is it?” I asked.
She stepped closer, holding something against her chest. It took me a moment to recognize the worn leather cover of the book in her hands.
“I found this in your room,” she said. “It caught my eye.” She
hesitated, then looked up. “The Song of the Willow Bride.It’s my favorite tale.”
I blinked, taken off guard. “Mine too,” I said softly.
Her fingers brushed the book’s spine. “I was wondering,” she said, “if I might read it before bed. It’s been years since I last held a copy.”
“Of course,” I said. “You can read anything you find here.”
Her eyes brightened, the faintest smile curving her lips. “There is a line from it I always loved,” she said, her voice dropping to a whisper. “When the farmer’s son says to the queen,‘If exile is the price of loving you, then I will pay it gladly.’”
Without thinking, I finished the line for her. “And the queen answers,‘Then I will spend every breath mourning the debt I cannot repay.’”
Her gaze lifted to mine, startled at first, then soft. For a heartbeat, neither of us spoke. The firelight flickered between us, and it felt as though the whole house had gone still.
She held the book closer, her voice barely more than a breath. “It’s always the same,” she said. “No matter how many times I read it, that part never loses its ache.”
“No,” I said quietly. “It does not.”
For a moment, she simply looked at me, as though the silence itself carried the rest of what she wanted to say. Then she smiled again, gentle and fleeting. “Goodnight, William.”
“Goodnight, Elara,” I said back.
She turned back toward the bedroom, the book cradled carefully in her hands. The door closed softly behind her once more.
I stood there for a long while, listening to the quiet. The storm was still moving across the fields, its voice low and distant now. The fire had burned down to embers, glowing like small, steady
hearts in the dark.
It had been years since anyone else had slept under this roof. Yet the house no longer felt empty
CHAPTER FOUR
IRIS
I closed the door behind me, shutting out the sound of the rain. The room smelled faintly of woodsmoke and lavender. The bed looked warm and neatly made, and for the first time in hours, I let myself breathe.
I set the book on the small table beside the candle. My fingers lingered on its worn leather cover.The Song of the Willow Bride.It felt strange to find it here, in his home of all places. Stranger still that he had known the words, finishing the line as if he had read it beside me a hundred times before.
I moved my fingers around the kirtle he had given me. The fabric was soft, worn thin with age, but clean and warm. It smelled faintly of pine and dust. I thought of his mother, whoever she had been, and wondered if she could have imagined her son offering her dress to a stranger on a night like this.
