and the marksman.”
“I’m no strategist!” I spluttered.
“But you are. You would make a great one. The way you problem solve, it’s very uncommon. And you’ve made sure our jobs got done. Now Theseus can’t back out of our deals.”
My heart sang as he spoke of me with such pride. Next moment, it felt like a bird shot out of the sky as it plummeted. I’d forgotten all about the Summer King, and what had brought us here.
This unsavory truth brought more on its heels. I exhaled. “Even if you’re right, a princess would never make battle tactics.”
“Then perhaps you shouldn’t be a princess.”
Whatever good mood had lingered was extinguished under a wave of confusion. “What do you mean?”
He looked up, his gaze suddenly earnest. “You have a great mind, a passion for music, and the drive to participate in solving problems, even if it began with the need to solve your own. You have the potential to be so much more than some king’s wife, and I wish you could get the chance to be all you can be.”
I was again struck mute with the onslaught of emotions I’d never before experienced. For someone else. And for myself.
Before everything had gone wrong in Cahraman, the idea of abandoning everything to chase my true desires was unthinkable. Impossible. I was, like my mother always reminded me, the daughter of a king, the granddaughter of two kings, and would be the wife and mother of kings as well. That had always been my purpose.
But even if I contemplated another path now, another destiny, I couldn’t pursue it. I couldn’t be a singer or the head of organizations of any sort, nor could I participate in his adventures like Marian had. No matter what I felt towards him, or what he made me feel about myself, my life would end if I didn’t do what was expected of me—both by birth, and by the curse.
Unable to say any of that, I diverted the conversation towards him. “Speaking of what I can be, how did you know who I am?”
Awkwardness tensed his movements, though the good humor remained dominant in his tone. “I know your brother well, and saw him go through his curse. When we met in that castle, I thought you looked familiar, but I couldn’t pinpoint the similarity until Theseus mentioned Meira being sent to bless an infant, and she said she amended the curse of the Spring Queen. It all made sense after that—that you were Leander’s sister and were cursed by the same person.”
He knew Leander. Not just as the Crown Prince, but personally.
And all the unplaceable pieces, however I’d avoided trying to place them or rejected them as impossible, fit together perfectly now.
I brought Amabel to a halt, finally voicing the truth I’d always known somewhere deep in my heart.
“Reynard.”
Chapter Twenty-Four
All remaining ease vanished from every line of Robin’s body.
Teeth clenching, and eyes widening, he mirrored my cascade of reactions when I was gripped by the certainty of recognition.
Then he finally squeezed his eyes shut and groaned, “Zafira.”
After long, long moments of silence, I whispered, “Robin Hood. Reynard. Any other names you go by that I should be aware of?”
“None that matter,” he said quietly. “At least this explains another reason why I felt like I knew you.”
“I looked for you everywhere that night, and the weeks after. I had only those days left before the curse overtook me, and I still thought—”
I couldn’t say it, not to his face. How I’d been so certain he was the one.
“Let’s go,” I finally said tightly. “If your theory about a time limit to my sleeping curse is true, I can’t afford to waste any more.”
He seemed about to argue, but I faced forwards, letting him know I couldn’t talk anymore. With a dejected exhalation, he pulled his hood up and took over steering Amabel.
Silence reigned all the way back to the Summer Palace. Within its oppressiveness, my mind churned in bitterness and futility.
Fate had thrown him in my path once, making me believe he was the one. Then it had once more, so I would feel all those impossible feelings for him again, even when I didn’t know, wouldn’t let myself know, he was the same person. It was as if it was making certain I’d feel this way about him, no matter what. And that it would never matter.
It was irony at its cruelest. That the man who’d appeared out of nowhere to save me once, the one