The Healer ✔

Chapter Eighteen

"What can you tell me?" Princess Monne asked when they sat down at the tiny table in the middle of the room. The maid that opened the door for them placed down small plates of food and Elora watched as the three men struggled not to devour it in a second.

"A lot, your highness," she said.

"Just call me Monne, Keeper," the Princess replied with exasperation. "How many times do I have to tell you?"

Elora frowned. "In that case," she said before she could change her mind. "You may call me Elora. It is my name after all." She watched Monne's face, the frown that formed and the way her eyebrows furrowed in confusion. Monne had only been a teenager the last time Elora had seen her, when she had brought the Key to Maheem. The young Princess had tried desperately to become friends with her and by the time she left, Elora had found that she actually liked the girl.

"Alright, Elora," the young princess tested out the name on her tongue. She looked over at the three men and their vain attempts to eat politely. "Please, go crazy. I would assume you haven't had all that much to eat on the way here." Ragen only shook his head in response before digging into his food with enthusiasm. Mikhail let out an embarrassed grunt and Monne laughed.

"Apologies, your highness," Nyal started. "It's been a long journey."

"I can imagine," Monne said. "Where did you come from?"

"We've been travelling from the basin of the Fiume River," Elora answered, ignoring Monne's shocked look. "We went down through the south, to Riba, then we came here."

"By the Gods," Monne muttered. "How did you survive? Those monsters are everywhere. They've killed so many of us already and we don't even know what they are." Elora picked at her food, finding that she wasn't as hungry as she expected to be.

"It's been difficult, but we've been fighting them along the way," she explained. "They're hard to kill, but with some training and a lot of effort I'm sure your soldiers will be able to fight them off."

"Do you think we'll be able to win?"

Elora fell silent, not wanting to promise anything by saying yes or bring them down by saying no. "No," another voice, Ragen's, said. "Not against that dragon. He ripped my bloody arm off like it was nothing. I can't imagine what he'd do with your army."

"Ragen," Mikhail scolded.

"What? It's true. Look at me!" he gestured at the stump of his arm, so perfectly healed it didn't look like it had been a recent injury.

"Wait, you said it was a dragon," Monne interrupted. "So, it is the Ancient Ones? We had been thinking it was, but we weren't sure. It wasn't like there was much else it could be."

"It is," Nyal said. Monne cursed, dropping her head into her hands. At the movement, the maid rushed forward, wrapping her arms around the stressed Princess.

"Thank you, Minerva," the Princess said, patting at the woman's hands. She looked over at Elora's confused face. "She's a good hugger. I always keep her around at times like this."

The demigod shook her head, trying to get rid of her confusion. "We should get back to the matter at hand," she muttered, more to herself than anyone else.

Minerva the maid moved away, allowing Monne to continue talking. "How did they escape?" she asked, and Elora felt her stomach clench tightly. "They were meant to be stuck behind the Gate. Did someone open it?"

"Yes," Elora said. She took a deep breath, not looking the Princess in the face, and began to tell her everything that had happened with Darren, the hybrid dragon. Nyal jumped in to tell details of what happened in Fiume and at the Gate itself. She could feel shame washing over her at every mention of their failure, wishing that she could have been a better Gate Keeper, someone all of Veridun could trust.