Lux [h.s]

eleven

Harry brought Cora back to Beilyn early in the morning. He didn't come with her to the hostel, and so he left her at the gates, and she had to make her way back by foot.

Despite the early hour, there were already people on the streets, sweeping up the previous night's celebrations from the front of their shops before opening time and setting up their stalls on the larger roads, careful not to cover with their crates the posters about the king's ninety-first birthday celebration, that would come up in a few weeks.

When Cora turned into the street where the Everett house had stood the night before, ashes were still covering most of the ground, despite a few people's attempts to clean up before the sun was high in the sky.

She frowned when she passed in front of what was left of the house. The entire structure had burnt down, leaving only a few beams blackened by the smoke that seemed to be seconds away from crashing to the ground.

"That's what happens, that's what happens," an old woman on the side of the street said. "Not the first I see."

"What do you mean?"

The woman whined and tugged at her hair furiously. "That's what happens, that's what happens," she repeated feverishly. Her head snapped up and she grabbed Cora's arms. "Stay away from the fairies."

Cora heart beat quicker as she stared into the woman's absent eyes, and she fought against her hold to be released. Even after she'd freed herself and scurried away, leaving the old woman behind, an unsettling fear rose up inside her chest, as if it'd been planted there while she wasn't looking.

She shook it away and went back to the hostel, halting on her way upstairs when she saw her aunt was sitting in the living room.

"You didn't come back home last night."

"I was out of the city," Cora explained. A lie had been ready on her tongue, but whether it was their familiarity or her belief she would not lie like her aunt had, she couldn't bring herself to let it out. "Harry thought it'd be better for us not to be around, since... you know. It's a big fire during a festival, they'll certainly pin it on the fay that was in the city. He was worried for me too even though nobody knows about my origins, so he brought me with him."

Her aunt gave her a nod.

Cora nodded as well, hesitating a bit before asking the next question. "Did anyone die in the fire?"

"Only the owner, from what I know."

Cora suddenly felt cold. She hadn't said a single name, but deep down, Cora could imagine. She could suppose, and she didn't like the answer her mind was giving her.

She went up the stairs and threw herself on her bed, letting out a hopeless sigh. Nothing made sense anymore.

In the span of a day, she'd retrieved the address of a house that had burnt down not long after, discovered that Harry's magic was actually broken, that his cat wasn't his cat, that the Fair was still close to the city despite having ended and that he kept a bunch of sweet-smelling plants in his wagon. Cora especially didn't know what to do with that last piece of information.

She was exhausted, she was drained, and all she wanted to do was to go to sleep.

• • •

Cora plucked another pear from the tree and put it in her basket. Her aunt wanted to make pear jam again and she'd agreed to help, eager to have something to do to keep her mind off the thousand thoughts swarming her.

Harry wanted her to go away with the Fair, with him. He wanted to let her travel Andar, he wanted her to say goodbye to everything she knew, and while a small, curious part of her was intrigued, her head and heart knew it couldn't happen. She couldn't leave the hostel and her aunt, she didn't want to. She couldn't leave the safety of a life already planned out. And yet—and yet.