Episode 9 + 1 - I Can Save The King! Part Four
528 Words
"Then she proves it," Elowyn said. Her voice didn’t rise. It didn’t need to.
She turned to Ayla. The crown caught torchlight and threw it across the girl’s face. Mud. Fear. Defiance.
"Pass the medicine in your hand."
Ayla hesitated.
Her fingers curled around nothing. Marucus was gone, given to the healer. But her hand remembered the weight. The green. The glow. Her knuckles were scraped. Her palm was still faintly stained, like the leaf had left a mark on her skin.
I could see doubt on her face. Fear. Hope. All of it at once.
Fear, because if she failed, the hall would eat her. Ralph would smile. Icelynn would speak.
Hope, because Father was dying, and the forest had put something in her hand that should not exist. Hope, because the necklace under my cloak had burned three times since she walked in, and I didn’t think it burned for nothing.
Her eyes found mine. Just for a second.
What if I’m wrong? They said.
What if I’m right? They said louder.
The healer took a step back. The hall waited. Levi stopped leaning. Oliver stopped breathing loud. Flora stopped pretending to be brave.
I could only hope it worked out.
His hood shifted back a fraction from the movement. Torchlight caught the edge of his face. His eyes widened. Not polite surprise. Shock. The kind that steals breath.
He was greatly taken aback.
"This," he said. Voice shaking. Not from age. From awe. "This is indeed the herb of Marucus. Fresh."
He held it to the torch. The flame leaned toward the leaf like it recognized it. The green didn’t wilt. It glowed. Veins in the leaf ran bright, like river water in moonlight.
"Fresh even," he murmured. Almost to himself. "Like she knew the exact time it bloomed."
The room went still.
The healer looked at Ayla. Really looked at her. Past the mud. Past the forest girl.
"Only the Time Echo could pull this off," he said. Quiet. But the stone carried it. "A being with the ability to manipulate time. To pluck a thing at the second it peaks, before decay sets in."
He took another step toward her. The herb between them like a tether.
"Marucus only blooms for a breath," he said. "At midnight, under a waning moon, in soil that has not been touched by steel. By dawn it blackens. Useless. This…" He lifted it higher. "This was picked minutes ago."
Then he turned to her fully. Hood fell back completely now. He was older than I thought. Scarred. Eyes too sharp for a court healer.
"Who are you?"
The question hit harder than Oliver’s fist would have.
Ayla forced calm. Chin up. Shoulders back. Mud still on her boots. Wheat hair stuck to her cheek. She looked nothing like court. She looked like the forest had spat her out and dared it to claim her.
"I’m…" Her voice cracked once. She steadied it. "Ayla."
Silence again. Heavier this time.
The healer’s gaze didn’t leave hers. "Ayla of where? Ayla of what blood? Because Time Echo isn’t taught. It’s born. It’s cursed. It’s..abominable. Who are you?"
Ayla swallowed hard.
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