Forgotten

Chapter Thirty Eight

When I woke up again, I was on a unicorn. Zane’s chest was flush against my back, keeping me firmly seated and letting my head rest against his shoulder. As I gained consciousness, I straightened up and Zane’s arms tightened around me.

“Don’t fall off.”

I turned around as far as I could to see his face. “Hi.”

“Hey,” he chuckled.

Aqua chimed in with, Princess, you are awake! We are almost back to Casoria.

Casoria. Where my family was. Suddenly I couldn’t wait to be back, bombarded with memories of my parents and little sister. My head was full of memories, an odd feeling after being devoid of them for so long.

Aqua, thank you for all you’ve done. This would have been impossible without you.

She neighed contentedly and I smiled before looking around. We were on a small path in the forest; to our right were two other unicorns, ridden by Kia and Blake. When they saw me looking, they both smiled. “Where are Jason and Missy?”

“They stayed behind to help out in Ceram and to give Drake a proper funeral. His family lives near there. That’s where he should be buried.” Kia’s voice wasn’t very loud, but I could hear her over the constant clacking of hooves.

“Oh, we could have stayed to help. I wanted to be there.”

Blake nodded once, his face impassive. “We need to get back to Casoria to tell everyone what happened. I know Drake would understand.”

I sighed and slumped against Zane. “You’re right.” Guilt still plagued me; he shouldn’t have died like that. I should have been able to save him.

After a couple silent moments, a huge wall came into view and behind it, a palace. I sighed in relief, recognizing it instantly. This was the castle where I had grown up. It was wonderful to finally return.

The unicorns came to a stop in front of the gate and someone called down from a tower. They sounded exhausted. “Who is it? What do you want?”

Kia gestured for me to explain. I nodded. “It’s me, Victoria Winters. I need to see my family. These are my friends.”

There was a pause. “Princess Victoria?”

“Yes.” My voice was confident. I sounded like the princess I was.

The gate opened and we rode in, crossing a bridge that stretched over a huge mote and coming to a stop in front of an unreasonably sized door. It was extremely rare to have giants visit a palace, but any friend of the species made arrangements just in case.

Zane helped me down and told the unicorns where the stables were. Aqua, Velvet and Kielce rushed off towards the sugar cubes that would be waiting. Kia led the rest of us inside.

Walking through the halls brought childhood memories to the front of my mind. It was weird to have so much inside my head all at once, but I loved it. Speaking of remembering…

I turned and practically jumped on Blake, looping my arms tightly around his neck as I hugged him. He hugged me back hesitantly. “Tori, are you okay?”

“I’m so sorry for how awful I was to you when I couldn’t remember! You deserve better friends.” I was close to crying, ashamed at my own behavior.

“Hey, I wasn’t acting like a friend should, I deserved it,” he consoled me.

I stepped away and really looked at him for the first time in over a year. “I’m still sorry for being so mean. I wish I had known.”

“I told you it’s fine- friends again?” He looked so hopeful that the guilt started creeping back in.

I nodded eagerly. “Of course.”

“Good, now let’s go find your family and Kia.”

 “Sure!”

It didn’t take long to find everyone, or rather for them to find us. Kia had run ahead and found my family, telling them where we were before going to find her own. Only minutes later, I was immersed in hugs.

My mother was the first to wrap her arms around me. “Victoria!”

“Hi,” I sighed, happy to be back.

“Where were you?” She cried, hugging me impossibly tighter.

I laughed once, without humor. “It’s a really long story.”

“You’ll have to tell us later then.” She finally let go of me and I took turns greeting everyone else. We were all crying by the time we finished hugging.

Eventually, I stepped back, towards Blake and Zane. Cassandra, my sister, was on my back, clinging to me like a monkey. She had been least infected by her curse and had moments of clarity, only to find that everything she knew was broken. It scared her so much she would fall back into the curse.

“Let’s talk in the other room, I just finished making tea,” Mom offered and we all agreed.

Once we’d sat down, Mom handed out little cups of tea and Dad looked over at me. “Is she gone for good, Tori?”

“I don’t know.”

Blake cleared his throat. “If I can interrupt for a moment, I have something to say.” My father, the king, nodded for him to continue. “I saw Victoria banish her, not kill her. The light that Victoria cast made her flee; it should be impossible for her to hurt any of us again, but she does still exist. I doubt she’ll ever want to return here.”

“Good. We will have warriors sent to the darkest parts of the world to be sure. We lost a year and many good people to her.”

Blake nodded. “I understand and I would be honored to be among those warriors. However, as of right now, I need to see my family.”

“Oh go ahead,” Mom waved him away. “We can manage without you for a few minutes.” He smiled gratefully, gave me a friendly wink and left down the hall. His parents worked here as well.

Dad glanced at Zane as if noticing him for the first time. “And who are you?”

“Dad, this is Zane, prince of Ridgewood. He came to one of my birthday parties.” My words were a little rushed. You would think after facing her nothing would scare me, but I wanted Dad’s approval of Zane.

“Why is he here?” His voice was suddenly ten degrees colder.

I gulped, this wasn’t good. “He helped me save the world, okay? He’s not a bad a guy.”

“What about the duke that he killed- his own sister’s fiancé?”

Frowning, I shifted closer to Zane. “He was protecting his sister.”

Dad looked like he wanted to argue, but Mom whispered something to him and he hesitated. “Zane, can I speak to you for a minute?”

“Of course sir,” he replied formally just when I wanted to complain. I didn’t have a chance to say anything as they got up and went into the hallway.

I leaned my head against the couch. “I thought things would get less complicated after we killed her.”