Lux [h.s]

fourteen

When Cora woke up, she was alone.

The wagon was rumbling and trembling under her body and the blanket was carefully wrapped around her, as if there had never been another person next to her in the first place.

She sat up quickly, the memories from the night before rushing back to her mind and leaving her with red cheeks.

Harry had come to save her. She'd had no hope, she'd been sure it would be the end of her. But he'd come back for her. He'd fought for her and ran with her. Why would he do that, after she told him she wanted nothing to do with his Fair?

She thought of her aunt. She was surely wondering where she was, by now. She didn't need to look out of the window to know it was already well past dawn, the shard of yellow light illuminating the bookshelf at the other end of the wagon telling enough.

Harry's faint forest smell was still lingering in the air all around her; its presence had a calming quality on her.

Were people looking for her? Was she being hunted? Had she proved her own guilt by running away?

She shook her head. She hadn't made the situation worse. She'd already been damned in their eyes, well before they even caught her. Witch, that man had called her. It made her want to laugh. They'd supposed she was magical just like that. Would they have tortured her to force her to show powers she didn't have during the trial? Would they have sliced her hands, drowned her, or even threatened to set her alight?

Rage bubbled up in her chest. Harry was right, humans weren't good. Her own city, her own neighbours, those same people that were supposed to protect her had turned against her, just like that, not even asking for an explanation. They'd decided she was guilty and evil, and they would've made her pay for it.

Witch, he'd called her. Was having magic enough to be considered guilty of every crime? How many fays had been trapped because of that?

That wasn't the humanity she knew, the people she knew. They were ready to say magic didn't exist anymore, but were the first to believe someone to be guilty of it.

Did that mean the royal family had lied to them? Did it mean that, while they'd told them fays were nothing more than a legend used to scare people away, they were secretly hunting them?

Cora furrowed her eyebrows. Like every other person in Beilyn, her mind rarely went to the decrees bearing the word of the Moonvall family that came from the capital, Idais. They were far away from it, and their ruling king, Evander VI, had never bothered to establish his control over the distant cities of Andar. Still, this last betrayal stung particularly coming from the man that had sworn to protect the country and rule it in fairness before Luces's altar in Idais. Not that she believed in the ancient deities, but still.

The wheels of the wagon skipped over a pebble on the road, and it shook under Cora. The dried flowers hanging from the ceiling swung, and a leaf fell on her face.

She blew it away and stood up, wrapping her arms around her middle in an attempt to keep warm. Autumn was fading into winter, and she had nothing but her grey dress on, which didn't do much to keep her from freezing.

She glanced to the window and saw trees flash by. They were too close to the wagons for it to be a main road, no human would've travelled with the greenwood on either side. She slid the windowpane open and hovered over the small desk to look outside.

The wagon she was in—Harry's—was somewhere in the middle of a long column of carriages and horses of which she couldn't see the start or the end. A few people were riding along on horses, heavy coats and cloaks covering their bodies, chatting amicably and laughing.