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The snow proved dense and deep as we trudged through it. When we reached a spot with a small clearing between trees, Roar waved a hand. Wind sprang to life, sweeping snow to the sides of the clearing so that we didn’t have snow up to our thighs.
“Best I can do with so much of it and after riding for hours.” He shrugged. “At least it’s not coming down at the moment.”
“A blessing from the stars,” Clemencia agreed.
“Whenever you’re ready, Neve.” Roar gestured to me.
I stretched out my wings and beat them. Almost immediately, a breeze caught my wings, and a thrill ran through me. Instinctively, I lifted onto my tiptoes.
“Harder,” Roar urged. “Today—”
Another gust of wind, saturated with glittering snow and frost, caught me. I gasped as my wings beat harder, and I rose.
It had finally happened. I was really and truly flying!
“My lady!” Clemencia clapped her hands. “Go higher!”
“Yes!” Roar came closer. “I’ll catch you if you fall.”
I knew he would. He had many times and tossed me into the air so I could try and catch myself even more. But for the first time, I felt certain I wouldn’t need him there. I felt strong, confident—like a real faerie for the first time in my life.
If only I had my magic. That’s the only thing that would make this better.
I pushed those thoughts away before they took root and spoiled my win. I might not have my magic yet, but that day would come once the potion I’d been given worked its way out of my system. And on that day, I’d finally know the powers inside me. For now, though, I’d savor this moment.
I looked down. My feet hung level with the top of Roar’s head, and if I extended my hand overhead, I could almost touch a tree branch. I urged myself higher, trying to touch it.
My wings strained, but in an act of solidarity, the wind gusted again. I surged up and my fingers brushed the barren branch.
“You did it!” Clemencia called out.
I beamed down at them and started to stretch myself further and maneuver to the right when a figure in the woods caught my attention. The figure wasn’t faerie, or anyone who could have traveled with us, but a tiny creature with a sack over its back. I watched the person running like he was being chased by a vampire. When a wild boar dashed up to it and the creature hopped on it and sprinted away from the road, I gasped.
A goblin tribe was lurking about in these woods, and I’d bet that it had already robbed us.
“Neve? Are you alright?” Roar asked, still below me, his arms now extended in case I lost control or grew too weak. “I’ve got you.”
“A goblin was just over there.” I pointed. “He mounted a boar and . . . Well, he’s already gone, but there might be more.”
“Blazing moon,” Roar swore. “And no one sounded the alarm. Come down. We need to get back and tell them.”
“How did no one see it?” I fluttered toward the ground slowly, with as much control as I could manage. As badly as I wanted to soar over to our escort and tell them what I’d seen, I didn’t trust myself to do so and not run into a tree. My wings might be able to support my weight now, but they still weren’t too skilled at navigation. That would be the next step in my training, I supposed.
“Goblins are very sneaky, my lady,” Clemencia explained. Sometimes I thought she couldn’t help but be the one with the answers. Roar had chosen well when he assigned her as my tutor. “Particularly those of the Eriking and Trasgu tribes. The latter have even robbed a leprechaun coinary, if you can imagine.”
I couldn’t. I’d read of leprechauns, and in all the tales, robbing one seemed impossible. It explained why they made the best coinmasters in all of Isila.
“Redcaps aren’t stealthy,” Roar added, “because they don’t want to be. They savor the fear in their opponents’ faces when they see the Redcap tribe coming.”
Finally, I touched down and repressed a shudder at the idea of a small army of squish-faced goblins with blood-soaked caps on their heads.
“But I suppose that if you saw a boar, it’s the Eriking tribe.” Roar took my hand as we rushed from the clearing.
“I’ll bet they’re the same ones that barkeep told us about,” I said, pushing a branch out of the way as I ran. As it swung, my nostrils filled with the delicious scent of pine.
Roar shot me a sidelong look. “I still can’t believe they’ve come this far from the deep woods and mountain ranges.”
Since we’d first heard of the goblin raids, Roar’s insistence that the goblin tribes would remain far away from the Queen’s Road had made me put the thieves from my mind. Now, however, it was obvious that he’d been wrong, and the barkeep had been right to warn us.
