Chapter Sixteen
Etta’s people greeted her warmly as if she’d been gone for more than a few mere weeks. There was no hesitancy in their loyalty. They’d been so desperate to have someone to follow they had latched on and hadn’t let go.
Etta slid from Vérité’s back, her feet slamming into the ground. Her ground. Home. They were in the middle of the expanded part of the village. She could see the progress right away. They’d been working hard in her absence.
Matteo appeared, shaking the shaggy hair out of his eyes. He ran in a very un-Matteo like way toward them and she braced herself to be swept along in his relief, but he passed by her with barely a glance and stopped right in front of Edmund.
“You’re back,” he breathed. “We’ve been so worried.”
Edmund’s face danced with amusement. “You
