♕ A Crown of Lies ♕ (#Wattys2018)

Chapter 3: Darkness of Night

It was already late at night when the people of Westfall made their way back from Cahir. Owen had taken Elora away from the circus ground as soon as they had left the Seer's hut, but nothing had been able to take her mind off from the words the woman had spoken. Not the campfire stories that had been told until the clouds had obscured the stars, and not the mead she had downed until she thought she could see them again.

Everything kept repeating, pounding against the inside of her skull until she thought she couldn't take it anymore. Even though it seemed completely insane that she was able to channel Magic, something inside her told her it was true. The woman had spoken the Truth and Elora was a Seer. She shook her head again at the realization, rubbing her eyes.

The Mother wanted to tell her something with the visions that often awoke her in the middle of the night in cold sweat. Elora could see every detail of the dreams before her eyes. Yet, she still hadn't been able to figure out what they meant. So many questions still lingered in her mind. Old questions that had pushed her to go inside the Seer's hut, and new questions she hadn't even dared to say out loud yet--questions she had buried deep inside her but were now slowly burning a way out.

Why the Wizard King was looking for her was one of those questions.

She couldn't wrap her head around it. She had lived in Westfall her entire life. Her father had taken her to his family's farm after her mother had died. For her, there had never been anything but the hard life on the farm and the annual festival of Valmai. Apart from the Magic she now knew she could channel, she didn't know what she could offer the king--what she could offer that he didn't already have himself. She had nothing to her name but the farm that would fall to her if her father died.

She was nobody.

At least, not that she knew of.

When she and Owen had returned from the Seer, Sorcha and Mia had asked several times what had happened inside the hut. Neither Owen or Elora had been able to tell them. And Elora didn't know if she ever could. She had barely been able to look at Owen after what had happened and he had been there--he had heard everything. She couldn't even imagine what he might think.

They had grown up with the knowledge that Magic was dying and that having any kind of channeling power could be dangerous. Her father had urged her to stay away from anything that looked like Magic. He had even forbidden her to talk to strangers. Yet, tonight, it seemed she had ignored everything she had been told. Her father would be furious if he found out.

A sigh escaped her lips. It was better not to tell him. If she convinced Owen that the Seer had just been an old hag trying to steal their coins, like Sorcha had told them, maybe he would forget about what the woman had said and Elora could too. Her gaze wandered toward him and found him observing her. His eyes bore into hers, filled with unspoken thoughts. In that one look, she knew he wouldn't let it go.

Not in the slightest.

Mother help her.

She quickly evaded her eyes from him, feeling their mutual questions weigh down on her. Trying to forget what she had learned, she looked at the darkened road behind her. In the distance, she could still see the lights of Valmai coloring the black sky. A faint glow reached up towards the shadows of night, spreading a soft beacon of light over the horizon.

Even though it was only the first day of Spring, the air was still warm around her. It comforted her somehow. As the farms started to appear on her either side, she lost herself in the beauty of the landscape. A beauty that was still there in the dead of night while the moon stood high in the sky and watched over all those that were already asleep.