One hour and fifteen minutes later, my trunks packed into one of two sleighs, the guys on horses all around (including Quincy and Balthazar, Apollo, of course, and Christophe on his own mount, like his dad), I got into the sleigh I’d be driving, my eyes on Élan who was bouncing on her bottom in the seat, the fur throw in her hands, crying, “Sit, Miss Madeleine. Sit. Sit! Let’s be away!”
I looked to the sleigh behind mine that held Loretta, Meeta and Bella, the children’s maid.
I then looked to Apollo who was talking to Remi.
Finally, I sat, Élan threw the throw over me and I took the reins.
“Miss Madeleine is in, Papa!” Christophe called.
“Excellent,” Apollo replied then ordered to the group of ten riders and two sleighs, “Proceed!”
I flicked the reins, the horses moved, the sleigh started gliding over the snow as fat, fluffy flakes of more drifted down, and the horses around us closed ranks.
But I looked back to the house to see Cristiana standing in the opened front door.
When I caught her eye, she waved. Then she winked.
I smiled and blew her a kiss.
Then I turned to facing front just as Élan asked, “Do you know how to make snow castles, Miss Madeleine?”
“No, honey,” I answered quietly.
“I’ll teach you,” she declared.
My lips curved up.
Hu…
Fucking…
Zah!
Chapter Eighteen
Brunskar
“Wake her, Maddie.”
I heard Apollo’s soft words and looked up at him standing beside the sleigh.
Élan was tucked to my side, sleeping.
From my experience, the days were always short in Lunwyn so it was dark. That said, it was also late.
And we’d made it to Brunskar, the Drakkar seat.
We’d been traveling for ten days through Lunwyn and I knew the distance was long and the errand important because our hours on the go were longer than when Apollo and I were away on our aborted journey to Bellebryn.
This meant we usually took lunch and dinner by stopping along the way. It also meant Christophe was near-on dropping from his horse (but he’d never do that, as his father would never do that and Chris, I’d learned, was keen to do everything like his dad).
And usually, at the end of the day, Élan was asleep at my side.
So when we stopped, it was to get a sleepy Élan and an exhausted Christophe to their baths (Bella oversaw this), take our own (Meeta and Loretta took care of mine) and hit the sack.
During our long journey I’d learned that Christophe liked studying math and also English (or the language of the Vale). He timidly shared that he liked to study the language of the Vale because he wrote stories (this timidity evaporated when Apollo straight up bragged about how great they were which meant I was able to talk Chris into letting me read one when we got back to Karsvall). Adding to his artistic bent, he liked to draw.
But best of all, he liked to shoot his bow and arrow (and that bulls-eye was no fluke, he practiced any chance he got, even in the midst of eating a sandwich, and I saw close up that he was good at it).