23. Chapter Twenty Three

Get up. Get up. Get up!

Gasping in pain, I roll on to my stomach. My heart pounds in my chest at the sound of paws sliding down the steep slope at my back. The odds of fighting a wolf single-handed without a weapon, injured, and with my magic depleted, are slim, but it is better than dying a coward. I spot a large rock and grapple for it. Flashbacks of the chimera come back to me. I can do this.

I've not come this far to die this way.

"You fool!" A sharp feminine voice reprimands. Turning around, my jaw drops as I view the female behind me. Her deep, curly auburn hair bounces wildly around her head as she purses her lips and crouches next to me.

"Where did you come fro–" I ask, dumbly. Wasn't there a wolf here just a second ago that was about to bite my head off?

"I've been looking for you." She grins wryly at me.

"Me?"

"Yeah." She glances down at my bruised ankle and silently requests permission to investigate. At my nod, she gingerly prods it.

"Ouch!" Wincing, I pull my foot closer to my body. "Who are you?"

"Didn't Nero tell you?" Her laughter echoes through the air like the gentle jingle of wind chimes. At the shake of my head, she continues on. "No matter, my name is Kela MacGregor. Let's get you to the safe house before the storm breaks." Her blue eyes twinkle with mischief as she sticks her hand forward with a wolfish grin.

I have found the rebels.

I glance between her proffered hand and the cloudless sky. Rays of light stream above the tree line. Storm? I look at the wolf shifter with inquisitive eyes. Once again, I am forced to trust a stranger. I only hope that Nero knew what he was doing sending me here.

"I'm Sybil. Sybil Vandeleur," I hesitantly reply, taking her hand.

"Oh good. I was afraid I had found the wrong unicorn shifter running around the forest." Kela grins at her humor. At my blank stare, she rolls her eyes at me.

"Well, you scared me shitless back there, Kela. Thanks for that!" I respond to her joke with a dose of sarcasm of my own as I clean my skirts from the snow. "I thought you were one of those lovely monsters roaming the woods. Back home in Bellevue–,"I pause as my voice cracks at the thought of my house. My forest. I clear my throat and continue, "There are wild beasts who will attack without a second thought if you're caught alone."

Kela laughs kindly, picks up my mother"s satchel from the ground and hands it to me. Who knows if there's anything left intact after the fall? She then slides an arm around my back to help me with my painful ankle. As I swing the bag over my shoulder. Lemon pops his head from the pocket he hid in.

"Well hello there, handsome," she crones as we slowly make our way up the opposite slope. "Nero did not tell me you had such a lovely ramidreju. They are incredible creatures who seek out those in need. The cutest little guardians and protectors. I've only read about them in books, but my mother tells me my great-great-grandfather had one."

"A ramidreju?" Laughter bubbles up my throat. "Lemon is just a simple ferret."

"He's more than just a simple ferret." She pauses, glancing sideways at me.

"That's impossible," I scoff, glancing down at him. "If he was more than just a ferret, I would have sensed it." Wouldn't I? I'm beginning to realize there is more to my world than I ever imagined.

"Does he have an obsession with shiny gold and silver objects?" she asks.

"Well, yes. He does like shiny things." I admit reluctantly. He always collects lost trinkets and hoards them in his nest. Absent-mindedly, I spin my family's ring around my finger. How did he know to grab it all those weeks ago?

She reaches over and runs her hand along his back, his eyes close as he lets out a rumbling sound of contentment. "You've never noticed the subtle green sheen when the sunlight hits his fur? And how long exactly have you had Lemon?"

Glancing at him, I bite my bottom lip as I see the barely visible hint of green shadows in his white fur. I always thought it was a residue from his love of rolling in the grass. "I've had him for about twelve years."

"The average ferret only lives six to ten years," Kela states simply. The judgment I expect to hear isn't there, and we continue walking. "It would make sense that he was drawn to you. It is said their fur has healing properties and everyone knows you unicorns know a thing or two about healing. Have you not noticed how his canine teeth protrude more like small tusks?"

As if to prove her correct, Lemon bears a grin and flicks his tongue up, licking his nose. My mind drifts to his peculiar moments of intelligence. Memories of how his and my intuition were the same, and how, despite my lack of understanding, he always seems to know me better than I know myself.

"How did you know?" I ask in awe. The dull throb begins in my left ankle, and I lift it up for relief, tenderly circling it.

"I pride myself on being a bit of a mythical creature expert. That and there isn't a book you could keep away from me." Her arm supporting me tightens as we crest over the ridge. A small house—more like a shack—is barely visible through the thick copse of trees ahead. "Ah, here we are. Let's get you inside, cleaned up, and fed."

***

Kela stands in front of a small fireplace, stirring a pot. The aroma of boiling potatoes, onions, garlic and bacon fills the air. The safe house comprises a single room, jam-packed with an assortment of odds and ends. As I glance around, my eyes settle on a small table by the bed, where a stack of books is piled high. It feels like a lifetime ago since I last had warm soup in the comfort of my home, surrounded by my books.

"How long have you been with the rebels?" I ask as Kela makes her way towards a large wooden crate next to me. Dozens of rolls of fabric, bottles of tinctures, and other assortments fill the container to the brim.

"Well, that depends." She gently invites me to take a seat by the table and carefully pries the shoe from my foot. I flinch as pain radiates from the movement. I dare a glance down at the swollen purple and blue flesh. Hopefully, it is no longer broken. Bitter disappointment coats my tongue as I think of the ease with which my father would have mended it, were he here.

"Kela, I am going to need you to keep talking to me if you're going to try to fix my ankle. I need the distraction," I say through clenched teeth as she gently prods my ankle. She pauses, the air between us falling silent as she lifts her gaze, her piercing blue eyes locking onto mine. The intensity of her stare makes me feel as if all my defenses have been stripped away, leaving me exposed and vulnerable.

Almost as if she can see to the bottom of my soul and every unspoken fear and doubt about myself.

"My mother and father are the leaders of the rebels, although we don't call ourselves that. They were among the first to work with Evangeline after she uncovered Tricella's plans. So, you could say I've been with them my entire life." She makes fast work, rubbing a salve over my ankle, placing two stiff rods from the box and wrapping them tightly with a roll of fabric. She pinches my toe and we both watch as the color changes quickly from white back to rosy pink. At least she knows how to check if she has cut off circulation to my toes. I'd very much like to keep them. I wiggle them, then test moving my ankle. It barely budges from the tight wrapping, but I can hardly sense any discomfort.

"What do you call yourselves then, if not rebels?" I ask, the flood of questions falling from my mind to my mouth. Now that I know my ankle will be fine, I am not disconcerted in asking them. "How old are you? And what was in that salve?"

"Whoa there, girl." She gently pats me on the shoulder before propping my foot up on two stacked crates. "Let's eat first, then I'll answer all your questions."

Kela pours steaming stew into two bowls, handing one to me. She swaps the pot over the fire for a kettle of hot water before plopping herself down on the bed.

The buttery flavor of the soup soothes my aching body. As we eat quietly, I take the time to examine the contents of the room more closely. Shelves line one wall of the room. Stacks of clothes, books, and tools line the shelves and are shoved in every possible free space. The corner is a mess of cluttered piles of moth-eaten and patched blankets, and in the midst of it all is a small basket of worn toys. Strings of dried herbs and vegetables hang from the ceiling above baskets of root vegetables and dried meats. Next to the fireplace hangs an assortment of pots, pans, and utensils. Their surfaces are dented and scratched with use. The entire room has the atmosphere of a hodge-podge mixture of anything someone on the run would need, no matter how old or young.

Kela clears her throat before taking my empty bowl from my hands. "I'm sorry it's not much, but it's the best I could do, given the circumstances." She shrugs as she walks to the kitchen to drop off the bowls and then pads back to me. Kela picks up a tin, giving it a little shake with a grin. "But how about a little tea? Do you prefer honey? Sugar? I'm afraid we don't have any cream."

"I would die for a cup of hot tea," I reply greedily. Saliva fills my mouth at the thought of fresh hot tea. "Sugar, please."

"Now don't go dying on me. I might be a wolf, but I'm not so feral as to not offer tea to a guest." She flashes me a wolfish grin while she measures a scoop of rich dried tea leaves into two chipped china cups, along with a heaping spoonful of sugar. As the tea steeps, I lean into the hard wood of the seat, trying to find a good place to let my ankle rest. Kela settles backwards into a chair next to mine, leaning her forearms across the back and cocks her head at me, her cup nearly overspilling at the movement.

"So, let's start with your first question. We aren't rebels so much as defenders of the people. From what I've been told, when Tricella married the king of Shadowvale about a hundred years ago, that's when the troubles began." Kela's history matches Aramis's timeline, at least. I muse on the thought as she takes a sip of her tea and continues. "People say that the problems between shifters and elementals started when Tricella became queen but the truth is they started long before, during the fifty year war between Kallistar and Shadowvale. It was a silly war if you ask me, fighting for a strip of land! The conflict eventually ended with a peace treaty, but what the war truly caused was a divide within the people of my kingdom."

I nod in understanding. "You see," Kela continues, and I bite my lips as I hardly blink, not wanting to miss a single detail. "Shifters have lived in Shadowvale for centuries. My family was born and raised here and we've always felt welcome, but things changed during the war. Since the kingdom of Kallistar has always been considered a safe-haven for the shifter community due to their long reigning line of shifter monarchs, elementals started thinking that the war over the territory separating the kingdoms was simply an excuse. A pretext brought forth by the shifters to overturn the crown here in Shadowvale. It did not matter that my ancestors fought side by side with elementals to defend Shadowvale during the war. Even after the conflict ended, many kept believing we were spies, secretly helping Kallistar, ready to backstab our neighbors to end the rule of elementals." I can hear Kela's frustration seeping through her words, but do not interrupt her. Aramis's prejudices against shifters is starting to make more and more sense.

"Things only got worse once Queen Rose was murdered and rumors started spreading that it happened by hand of a group of shifter rebels, attempting once again to put themselves on the throne and shape Shadowvale in the image of Kallistar. As you can imagine, it did not take much for elementals to blindly believe this lie and start pointing fingers."

"The war had had terrible consequences in Kallistar but nothing of this sort; neighbors at each other's throats. The towns and cities affected were rebuilt, and the crown had helped everyone get back on their feet. Every traveler passing through Bellevue often praised my kingdom for how welcoming it is to every species existing in Craeweth," I say.

Anger and sadness fill her voice and I can see her knuckles turn white as she clenches her fists. "When the King married Tricella things completely escalated. Entire clans of shifters were summoned to the castle to answer crimes of treason during the war and ties to these rebels. It was as if they all forgot we were there, that we fought next to them, and that we had lost our Queen too. Entire families were summoned and were never heard from again." She pushes over a stack of objects on the table before sitting down her empty cup.

The rage boils past my ears, my chest constricting as I think of the two tiger cubs locked in the dungeons with me. I have to find a way to free them. All of them.

"I am so sorry, Kela," I whisper, knowing it won't help make all these wrongdoings right but she gives me a faint smile in return. I think about my sheltered life at the cottage. How peaceful my life was in Bellevue, dictated by routine and the simplest pleasures in life. All the while, people like me had to fight for their right to live. "I imagine that's when Nero's mother came to find your people, to fight back?"

"Yes. The clan leaders all met and determined something was not right. We weren't the only ones. Some elementals of influence, including Nero's own mother, began questioning the trials. " She pulls a dagger from its sheath on her belt and I watch her wide-eyed as she starts tossing it up in the air, catching it by the tip of the blade.

My eyes cast down into my empty cup. I examine the pattern the dregs created at the bottom. I'm at a loss for words with which his story was told. Nero's eyes, full of pain, explaining with a plea to tell the story of his mother, and my peevish and petty demands of expectation for him to reveal his heart and pain, because I was too angry at his role in my kidnapping. My disgust at myself roils in my stomach, and the wave of anger is washed away. I could have been kinder. I could have been more generous and patient. How was I so wrapped up in my own selfish concerns and needs?

"So, ironically, the so-called "rebels" didn't exist until the decree of the shifter rebellion came to be. We know Queen Tricella is behind all of this but we don't know her motivation, and we don't know what exactly she does with those she takes. All evidence shows it's not good. To say the least." Kela concludes and I shiver as memories of the queen's chamber with the dark stains surface come back to my mind. The fleeting hope of gaining my power full strength, only to have it wiped out by her touch.

"She wants our power," I say, voice cracking from the painful flashbacks. "Tricella drained me of my magic as soon as I arrived at the castle. I am not entirely sure but I think it helps her stay young. She said something about needing time." Kela's brows furrow in concentration. This must be new information to her and I hope it can help with the mission.

"We know she uses dark magic, although it is very difficult to prove. Dark magic is extremely dangerous as it drains one's lifeforce, maybe she is using our powers to replenish what she loses." Kela's gaze takes on a faraway look as she formulates a new theory.

"Suffice to say that regardless of what she wants, we will not give it to her," she says softly after a moment. "We are the defenders of the people," she adds, and the brush of bravery that swells in my heart brings emotion to my eyes. "We do what we can. Mostly it involves moving those that the queen plans to capture and house them with someone safe in our order. We thwart her plans wherever we can, but sometimes we can't get there in time. And the bitch of it all, is that she always seems to get one step ahead of us."

"I think I can answer that question too," I reply, grateful that I can be of such help to the cause. "The queen employs a seer whom she uses to hunt your people." When my eyelids grow too heavy, I blink multiple times. The stew is like a sedative to my exhausted body. A familiar warm tug wraps around my torso. I cast my eyes to the snow falling out the window but the sensation leaves as quickly as it came.

"Our people." She confirms, and I am grateful that she is including me as much as I've welcomed the plight of shifters and the cause into my own heart. It doesn't matter that I hail from Kallistar; shifters are family, no matter the kind. "We've long suspected as such. Nero even hinted that a seer was involved. He has to be cautious, but he tries to warn us where he can." She takes the empty cup from my hands, stacking it on top of hers before offering me a hand.

"As for my age, I'm a young shifter, barely 32.' She continues on steadily, happy to share news as much as I am to receive. She glances down at my ankle. "The salve is one that my grandmother taught me. Willowbark and ginger for numbing, calendula to speed healing and comfrey to decrease bruising. I'm not officially a healer, but knowledge is power. You never know when new skills will come in handy." I like her.

A yawn takes over my body in a shuttering inhale, and I gather my wits about me to exhale it out slowly. My ankle throbs, and I blink sleepily at her.

Kela grins. "Enough talk for now. You can barely keep your eyes open. I'll go wash these down in the stream and restock us on wa–-"

I watch as her eyes take on a cloudy, faraway look, her arms limp at her side.

"Kela?" I ask, my voice squeaking on the last syllable. My heart beats frantically when she doesn't respond, worry pushing past my exhaustion. I reach out and grab at her wrist, but she continues standing, her body swaying slightly. Goddess help me, what can I do? I study her body, but overall she seems to be in good health. I snap my fingers over her foggy eyes, but get no response.

"Kela!" I call again, louder. I snap my fingers at her face one more time, and Kela shakes her head. Her clear blue eyes refocus on me.

"What in the name of the goddess, was that!?" I demand, standing. All pain in my ankle is forgotten as I curl my arms around my chest. I raise my brows, tapping my fingers on my thigh–

"Well, that's one more secret for you to keep." Kela interrupts my inquisition, grinning at me sheepishly. "I'm the clan's secret weapon."