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Ashley didn’t know how to continue. “Would you like to give me a suggestion on how to word it?”
“Well, what are your goals?” she asked. She shot her husband a sly glance.
“I want Sophia.”
“Seems to me you already had her,” the gnome murmured, his hip hitched on a footstool as
he appraised his fingernails much too closely. His mouth twisted with his stare.
“Why you little…” Ashley said, bounding to his feet and grasping for the gnome.
“He’s goading you on purpose,” a voice said from the doorway. Ashley turned to see Sophia’s grandmother standing in the entry. “He’s hoping you’ll waste your wish.”
“That’s not going to happen.”
“So you say.” She laughed as she stepped into the room. “What’s your fondest desire, Your Grace? What do you want above all things?”
“I want to spend the rest of my life with Sophia.” He didn’t even have to think about that one.
“And what stands in your way?”
“She’s in the land of the fae. And didn’t leave a map for me to follow. Nor do I have an inkling of how to get to her.” He exhaled heavily, feeling like bellows that had just been exhausted.
“Can you swim, Your Grace?” she asked, her brows coming together as she glared at him intently.
“You can wish for Ronald to lead you to the door,” Ramsdale tossed out.
Ronald smirked. “Is that your wish?”
“No!” everyone in the room cried at once.
“Even if he gets to the door, he’ll need magic to open it.”
Everyone looked to Sophia’s grandmother. “I need my magic to get me back through the portal. Much less the rest of you.”
Ashley reached into his coat pocket and pulled forth several vials of shimmering dust. “How much magic will these buy for me?” he asked.
The room stilled. Sophia’s grandmother held out one shaky hand. “Don’t move, Your Grace,” she said. She reached for the vials but he jerked his arms back. She hissed at him. “They are highly volatile. In other words, just waiting for the right time to explode when in the hands of the nonfae. It’s a defense mechanism.” She beckoned him forward. “Give them to me, so no one will be harmed.”
He clutched them tighter in his palm, the vials slippery with sweat from his hands. “I think not,” he finally said. He turned to Ronald. “My wish is for you to take all of us to the portal.”
“The portal can only be opened at midnight,” the gnome said.
“Then we shall all meet at midnight?” Ashley asked the room at large. He needed to collect Anne. And secure the wayward Claire. Finn could help with that.
“Where?” Sophia’s mother asked.
Ashley looked from face to face but saw nothing.
“Portals are found in bodies of water. Such as the fish pond in His Grace’s garden,” the gnome said. He sauntered to the window and thrust it open. “See you at midnight,” he called out as he fled through the opening. He was gone after a brief rustle in the bushes.
The portal was in his very own garden? How the devil could that be?
Thirty
Ashley approached his daughter on quiet feet, content to look at her there in his garden as the sun played about her hair and she tilted her face up to the sunlight. She looked more content in that moment than he’d ever seen her. “I’m sorry I missed breakfast this morning, Anne,” he said, breaking the silence. She looked over at him, a small pout on her face.
“Where were you?” She put her hands on her slim little hips and did the best imitation he’d ever seen of her mother. Yet a look of contentment still played about her face.
