Then Jeremy and Skya dropped the act and held each other for a long time. Not long enough to make up for fifteen years but close enough.

Chapter Thirty-Four

They arrived back at the palace late in the afternoon. Emilie gazed in awe at the towers, the turrets, the horses in the fields and paddocks, the endless beauty.

“Like it?” Skya asked.

“That’s your house?”

“Palace. The Moonstone Palace. And it’s not mine, it’s ours.”

Emilie liked the sound of that. Not the palace, though it was spectacular. Ours. She liked the sound of ours because ours sounded like she had a family again.

“Just please tell me it has hot running water. One of the Bright Boys coughed on me. It was like Satan’s gravy.”

“We have hot running water,” Skya promised. “And very, very soft towels.”

Emilie was taken to a large room, all marble and tile, with a pool that filled itself continually from a central fountain. The hot spring water soothed her sore muscles, and by the time she got out, she felt reborn. And the towels were, in fact, very, very soft, so soft that Fritz fell asleep in them.

After her bath, Winter gave her clothes to wear—a white linen tunic, a warm vest, soft brown leggings, and boots. They fit perfectly, like they were made for her. On the way up to her room, Winter pointed out the kitchens, the armory, the aviary, and the way to Rafe’s and Jeremy’s rooms.

“Where are they anyway?” Emilie asked Winter.

“The queen is punishing them for defying her orders and going to the Ghost Town after she told them to stay in the palace.”

“What’s the punishment?”

“She let them choose between beheading or being sent to their rooms without dinner.”

“Oh,” Emilie said. “Which one did they pick?”

Emilie’s bedroom was in the south turret. She knew it was hers because on the arched oak door someone had put up a sign that read The Princess Suite.

“You all just put this together for me?” Emilie asked.

“You’ve had a room here forever, Princess,” Winter said. “The day after our prince and our knight left us, she began making up this room for you. She wanted it perfect by the time you arrived.”

Emilie touched the sign, the white letters painted so carefully on the black wood.

“She missed me that much?”

“That much and more.”

Slowly, Emilie opened the door. The room was round because she was in the turret. She turned a circle to take it all in…the large canopy bed, a herd of leaping racing chasing unicorns carved into the wooden headboard…with pale blue and silver curtains surrounding it…a wide balcony that looked out on the faraway mountains…

“We have this for your friend, Princess.”

Winter whipped away a velvet cloth, revealing a gilded cage, five feet high and round as the castle tower. A spiral staircase led through tunnels. Ropes and toys and a silver food and water dish, rat-size.

“A rat palace,” Emilie said. “Look, Fritz. This is for you.” She took Fritz out of his fuzzy bath towel and let him loose in his new home. He immediately ran up and down the staircase, ate some berries, drank some water, used his litter, and collapsed into his nest to sleep.

“Good idea, buddy,” she said. “Let’s all eat, crap, and sleep. In that order.”

“All your clothes are in here,” Winter said, opening a wardrobe door. “Everything should fit you.”

“How?” Emilie asked. “I just got here. And Skya’s taller than me.”

“That’s how it works. It’s in our story.”

Something about that seemingly simple statement made Emilie’s heart skip and her blood turn a degree or two colder.

She faced Winter. “What story?”

Winter took her down to the first floor and through a long corridor to a set of enormous double doors. Emilie pushed one open and found herself in the most magnificent private library she’d ever seen in real life or pictures. Rows upon rows of books sat on rows upon rows of bookshelves, their spines making a thousand rainbows.

She glanced at a few of the books and recognized some of the titles—The Wind in the Willows and A Christmas Carol and The Princess and the Goblin…

“These are all books from…where I’m from.” She turned and looked at Winter. “What’s going on?”

The door rattled and opened. Emilie barely recognized Skya at first. Gone was her leather armor, her torn and dirty clothes. She wore a loose gown of forest green with long flowing sleeves and her blond hair in a braided crown.

“I thought I heard voices in here,” Skya said.

“Hello, Majesty.” Winter bowed. “The princess wanted to see our story.”

“I’ll show her,” Skya said. “Thank you.”

After another bow, Winter left them alone together.

“What story is she talking about?” Emilie asked her.

“Over here.” Skya crooked her finger and Emilie followed her to another door that led to a smaller room. “My private salon. Rafe and Jeremy and I would hang out in here on cold nights.”

A beautiful room, intimate and cozy with a pale blue fainting sofa and large armchairs, and tapestries on the walls. One armchair sat at the corner of the rug by the fireplace, a side table next to it stacked high with books.

One of them was The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, a bookmark with an emerald-green tassel between the pages.

“I never showed this to them,” Skya said as she pushed aside a tapestry to reveal a secret wall niche. On a bed of white velvet sat a golden box. “Don’t remember why. Maybe I didn’t know how to answer all the questions I knew they’d ask. I don’t even understand it all myself.”

With a key that hung on a cord at her waist, she unlocked the box.

Emilie looked inside and saw something she never dreamed she would see in this strange, magical kingdom.

“A Trapper Keeper?” Emilie asked, laughing in her surprise.

“Got it at the Goodwill on Hunters Way,” Skya said. “Down from the Arby’s.” She took out the Trapper Keeper—the picture on the front was of a neon sun setting into a neon sea. She opened the Velcro flap with a satisfying ssst.

Inside the binder lay dozens of pages of notebook paper, slightly yellowed, and covered in a girl’s looping cursive handwriting.