Silver: The Lost Royal

19 | Joe & Christina

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Avnar ~ uhv-nahr
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A faint confirmation from inside the room was all she needed before she entered. She found Elowen lying on a wide bed with Marigold sitting beside her daughter and David standing by the window.

Three pairs of eyes settled on her before they registered shock. Elowen's lips morphed into a smile, which Karyn mirrored as she rushed to hug her best friend of many years.

Even in a recuperating state, Elowen's hugs never failed to bring some solace to Karyn as the tension in her shoulders dissolved at once.

Soft sobs broke out and Karyn pulled back to see beads of tears drop from Elowen's eyes. She could count the number of times she had seen Elowen cry on one hand, and it was as rare as finding a four-leaf clover in a field.

"No, no, don't cry."

"It's alright. I'm alright. I just thought I'd never see you again," Elowen said as she wiped her tears with a bandaged hand.

Elowen had bandages wrapped around her right hand, extending up to her shoulder. A roll of bandage encircled her head with a small smudge of blood, marking the area just above her ear. The rest of her body lay covered by the bedsheet, concealing the full extent of the damage from Karyn.

"I am here now. You're here now and you're safe," she consoled her best friend.

"But you're not safe," David said, and her eyes met his.

Aside from the recent stubble that was growing on his chin, the rough appearance of his hair, and the dark shades under his eyes, something else felt different. His shoulders sagged as if bearing an invisible burden.

"What?" she asked.

"You're not safe here, Karyn. I'm guessing you now know about your powers," he said, and her brows slanted inward.

Why was he also saying she wasn't safe here? If anyone wasn't safe, it was Elowen. She may be free now, but her captors were still out there. They could be searching for her at the moment and if—

'Wait, did he just say he's guessing?' The thought stopped her earlier train of thought.

"You're guessing..." she drawled, and then the realization hit her. They also knew she had powers. So far, everyone who knew she had powers had a reason to be around her. What was theirs?

David veered back to look out the window before he began.

"When Marigold and I got here, we had nothing. We thought of going back so many times, but we couldn't because we knew what we had left behind and what was waiting for us. We couldn't go back to that. Wlerden had cast us and people like us out."

Wlerden? People like them?

The questions raged in her head, but she kept shut as she stared at her best friend's father's back.

"We were no longer welcome, fugitives at a point due to the mistake—as they called it—of one of our kind. The only way we could save our lives was to run, and we did that until we found Emerfield. A small community in a small town, with no magic... or so we thought. It was no easy feat, but we found comfort. Along with that, our most precious gift," he paused and turned to flash Elowen a warm smile before he looked back out the window, his eyes not meeting Karyn's.

"Some years after she was born, three new people came to town. A man and two women. One woman already had a child about our daughter's age. They had nothing and needed help. We understood because we had been in a similar position, but once I saw the man, I knew there was more to it. The last time I had seen him, he was a young boy in his teens and I was only a few years older. We had to help them out. After all, it was King Driando and His Queen.