IT WAS delivered by a harried-looking page three days later.
I was eating with the others out in the stable Kevin had commandeered as his own. Shortly after he’d come to stay at Castle Lockes for good, he’d gone back and forth between the City and his old keep over the period of a few months, slowly transferring his hoard into the stable. There were piles of gold and jewels, stacks of books in languages long forgotten, and at least four hundred brooms. When asked about them, Kevin would get confused, saying they were just as precious to him as the gigantic emerald Gary licked every time he passed it by.
Tiggy had told me that Gary had been staying in their old rooms since returning to the castle, evidently taking this trial reconciliation thing very seriously. But none of his stuff had been moved out of the stables, so I thought it wouldn’t be much longer before Gary gave up and admitted what all the rest of us already knew.
We hadn’t heard from Randall, but I wasn’t yet worried about that. I figured it’d take more time to get someone as ridiculously obstinate as the Great White to change his mind, if he would at all.
The map in the King’s office remained still. The Darks, whatever their intentions, were not on the move. It made me uneasy not knowing what Myrin was planning. Morgan thought he would be lying low, licking his wounds after suffering the defeat in Mashallaha, having underestimated my power. I wanted to believe him, but something just felt… off.
But we were all here, we were all together, and we were happy and whole. Gary was snarking at Kevin, and Tiggy was grinning at the both of them, hands inching toward one of many brooms against the wall. Justin was doing that thing where he glared, but secretly he was thinking about how much he loved all of us and never wanted to be apart from anyone here, especially me, because we were best friends 5eva. Ryan and I sat side by side, Ryan’s hand on my knee, and for a moment, even with everything that had happened, even with everything that could still happen, I was content.
I was happy.
“And then I said, ‘Girl, you do not get to talk to me that way, do you know who I am?’” Gary huffed and flipped his mane dramatically. “Obviously she did not know who I was, because she looked at me with this look, this blank look, which did nothing to help her situation. So I said, ‘Girl, don’t you look at me like that,’ and she said, ‘Bitch, I don’t know you, bitch,’ and then I said, ‘Bitch, I’ll tell you who I am, bitch,’ and then I got up in her face, real close like, and said, ‘Bitch, I’m your motherfucking nightmare, bitch.’”
“Motherfucking nightmare,” Tiggy agreed. “This broom my broom now.”
“What happened next?” Kevin asked, sounding enraptured. “Did you become her nightmare as you foretold?”
“If you would let me finish the godsdamn story, you would learn that I did not in fact become her nightmare, because as it turned out, I was actually talking to my own reflection in a window of a shop that I’d just passed by. It was about that time that I realized that I should cut back on day drinking, because nobody likes a sloppy princess such as myself yelling at her reflection in the middle of a street.”
Justin frowned. “And what exactly does this have to do with negotiating tariff tax like we were talking about before?”
“Absolutely nothing,” Gary said. “But that was super boring, so I took over the conversation and turned it into something far more interesting by making it about me.”
“These are your people,” I said as I nudged Ryan.
“Don’t remind me,” he muttered as he cleaned his sword.
It was good.
It was good.
Then came the page.
He was a scrawny thing with big eyes and a nervous tremble in his lips. He squeaked a little as he announced his presence, bowing so low that I thought he’d fall face-first onto the sod that covered the ground in Kevin’s stable. He looked to be of age, no more than nineteen years old.
Gary, of course, found him precious and cooed at him while baring his teeth. It was adorable in a frighteningly aggressive sort of way.
“M-m-my lord wizard,” the page said, taking a stumbling step toward me.
“Apprentice,” Gary coughed.
I ignored him. “Hey, dude. Haven’t seen you around the castle before.”
“I-I’m new. I have. A. Um. Letter? For you. Sam of Wilds.”
“That’s me,” I said, pushing myself up.
He squeaked again, sounding like he was deflating. “Please don’t make my nipples explode,” he moaned.
“Man,” I breathed. “That is just awesome. It will go on forever.”
“He won’t do that,” Ryan said wryly as he came to stand beside me. “He actually can’t do that.”
“Hey! You don’t know. Maybe I’ve just been keeping it a secret this whole time.”
The page’s eyes bulged as his gaze snapped back and forth between Ryan and myself. “Oh my gods,” he said faintly. “It’s HaveHeart. HaveHeart is standing right in front of me.”
“So gross,” Justin muttered behind us.
“And look, everyone! There’s also DragonCorn here too. Everyone loves DragonCorn! Raaaah! Listen to all that applause for DragonCorn. Raaaaaaaahhhh!”
We all turned slowly to look up at Kevin.
He stared blankly down at us. “I don’t know who said that. It wasn’t me.”
“I’m a h-h-huge fan,” the page sputtered as we looked back at him. “Me and my sister. She’s eleven. She j-just l-l-loves you two so much.”
“She sounds very sweet,” Ryan said kindly. “What’s your name?”
“C-Caleb.”
“And hers?”
“C-C-Christie.”
“Does she work in the castle too?”
He shook his head furiously. “No, Knight C-Commander. She’s… sickly. She doesn’t l-leave her r-r-room much.”
Ryan stiffened beside me. “I’m… so sorry to hear that.”
Caleb smiled weakly. “It’s okay. Sh-sh-she has her good days. Sometimes. But sh-she loves you g-guys. Sh-she has all your posters in her r-room.” He blushed, looking down at his feet.
“And she’s here? In the City?”
Caleb nodded.
Ryan looked at me, arching an eyebrow, and I knew exactly what he was asking me without him having to say a single word.
I rolled my eyes and bumped his shoulder. My knight had the biggest heart.
“Tell you what,” Ryan said as he turned back to Caleb. “We could give you an autograph, if you’d like to take it to her.”
I thought Caleb would fall down. “You w-w-would?” he gasped.
“Or,” Ryan said, smiling quietly, “if it’s all right with you and she was feeling up to it, we could visit her. Do you think that would be all right with your parents?”
There was a possibility that Caleb shat himself, but I didn’t think it was a polite thing to ask, especially when it looked as if tears were welling in his eyes. “I-I-I-I-I—”
“Oh my gods,” Gary moaned behind us. “It’s like you just shot feelings all over my face. I just got a feelings facial and I feel so dirty.”