scoffed.
“You don’t know anything. It was through their carriage window once, traveling through here when she was a wee child.”
“Probably wasn’t her.”
“It was too! I’ll bet ye two lizard tails…”
With effort, Lilac focused on Blitzrik and ignored the conversation at the back of the group. She folded her hands together, trying her hardest to project calmness. “I appreciate your hospitality, really. But I’m on my way to Paimpont to take care of important business. I really must go. I hope you understand.”
“Really,” Blitzrick said, scratching his silver beard. “At the castle, they send you off into the woods, alone? They are out of their—”
“Mum!” A shrill voice rang out from behind her.
Lilac’s stomach flipped. Her bag.
Forgetting her composure completely, she turned and leaped over one kneeling korrigan, scrambling around the tree. A very small korrigan, apparently the seventh, sat cross-legged on the riverbank while rummaging eagerly through Lilac’s belongings.
“Aife,” a female voice rasped. The korrigan Lilac had leaped over stumbled to her own feet, curtsying clumsily as she sprinted past the princess to reach the miniature korrigan, fast as her stout legs would carry her.
“Where in the heavens are your manners, child?” Aife squeaked in pain as the korrigan—her mother, Lilac gathered—grabbed her roughly by the ear. “What’ve you got there? Put it back, this instant!”
Everyone watched as the korrigan child writhed out of her mother’s grasp. She had two pastries and a dumpling tucked into her armpits, mouth full and dusted with brown crumbs. The expression on her mother’s face morphed from anger into mortified shock.
“The princess, she’s come to feed us, mama!” Aife did a wee jig in place, giggling exuberantly.
Helpless, Lilac turned to the other creatures. Most of their tiny faces scrunched in panic, as if expecting her to burst into a fit of rage. Blitzrik clutched his hat to his chest and gripped a tuft of white hair with his other hand.
The silence was nearly unbearable—almost as much as the tearful little korrigan’s stare. Suddenly, Lilac wanted nothing more than to scoop little Aife up into her arms. She certainly had not come to feed the korrigans, or anyone for that matter. The last time she’d agreed to help a Darkling had traumatized her.
“Please excuse her, Your Royal Highness,” Blitzrik whispered solemnly. He had silently sidled his way between her and Aife, as if worried she might attack the child. “She’s our youngest, and doesn’t quite know what she’s doing.”
She put her hand up. “Please, Blitzrik,” she said firmly, watching his ears perk up at his name flowing from the princess’s mouth. At this point, she assumed him to be their chief. “Are there many more of you?” she asked, glancing around.
The korrigan shook his head. “As far as I know—and I know a lot of things, Your Royal Highness—we are the only band of korrigans in Brocéliande. There are always a few strays, I suppose, who either haven’t found us or refuse to join us. Save about four or five others who basically live at the tavern just west of here.”
Lilac raised her eyebrows in feigned surprise, stifling a giggle as she recalled the memory of the musical korrigan trio with the mysteriously unending supply of instruments back at the tavern.
“It is fine, I promise,” she reassured Blitzrik. She then excused herself over to Aife and her mother, suddenly feeling everyone’s eyes continuing to bore into the back of her head.
“Greetings, my dear Aife,” she said, taking the little korrigan’s hand and winking knowingly at her mother, whose face paled.
“These are for you to share with all the others. I’m making it your job to feed your friends and family today.”
Aife nodded vigorously, chunks of red from the raspberry tart wedged between her teeth as she grinned ear to ear.
Lilac bent to peer into her sack and saw the other pastries had been smashed at some point along her journey. She sighed and pulled them out. “And look, here are a few more,” she said, forcing the disappointment out of her voice.
She handed the pastries to Aife’s mother in gooey pieces, contemplating how she would survive on the half loaf of bread she had remaining. Her trip would be at least one more sunrise and sundown if she pushed through the exhaustion, but the pastries wouldn’t have lasted in edible form much longer. Only when a hand clutched her finger did she glance up from her sack.
Aife’s mother stood there, tears brimming her large eyes. “Thank you, Your Royal Highness. This will feed us for