Elara Silverleaf's Arc

Chapter 3 of 5

Elara reached her new shop at first light. A man stood outside the door. He leaned on the wall with his arms crossed, and he did not move when she came close. He was not there to buy tea. He turned each passerby away with a low word and a jerk of his head. "Elf paid in diamonds," he told a woman. "She'll pick your pocket next." The woman hurried on. The door was Elara's, but he owned the street in front of it. Elara did not argue. Arguing would prove his point. Instead she went inside and opened the carved elven crate she had carried from home. Firewood sat bundled inside, cut and dried, more than she could ever burn. She began stacking it in the doorway where all could see. "What are you doing?" the man asked. "Winter is coming," she said. "I have more wood than one hearth needs. Take what your family needs. Tell your neighbors to come." He stared at the wood. He did not touch it. But a boy across the street had already run to fetch his mother. By midmorning a small crowd stood at the door. They came for the wood, wary at first, then bolder. Elara handed out bundles and asked nothing back. The man who had guarded the door now stood at its edge, quiet, watching her give away what a hoarder would keep. Then a small voice cut through the crowd. "That crate is from home." Elara turned. A girl pushed to the front. Curly black hair, brown eyes, ears pointed like Elara's own. Sophia. Her daughter, who should have been three nights away behind castle walls. Sophia's dress was dusty from the road. She looked up with a flat, tired face. "Sophia." Elara's hands went cold. "How are you here?" "I followed the path," Sophia said. "Before it closed. I was looking for my father." She said it plainly, the way she said everything. "You always change the subject. So I stopped asking you." The crowd had gone still. A blonde, bearded man stood at the back, drawn by the gathering. Prince Charming. His eyes moved from Elara to the girl, then held. He read the black hair, the shape of the eyes that matched his own. He said nothing. He did not need to. His face had already done the counting. Elara looked at the man who had guarded her door. He was gone from it now. He carried a bundle of her wood home, and he had told no one to stay away. She had won the street. The villagers would come now. But her daughter stood in the doorway, and eleven years of silence stood with her, and the man across the crowd had just learned he was a father in front of half the village.