I’m coming.
Gods, protect him from the Dark.
The world needs him.
I need him.
I—
AND THERE in the empty house, I bowed my head and cried.
Chapter 13: The Horn of the Unicorn
I JOINED Randall on the porch a short while later, blinking against the sunlight, the sounds of the bustling camp washing over me. I took in a deep breath of the crisp, clean air and scrubbed a hand over my face.
Randall was sitting on a wooden chair, watching the camp move around him, pack at his feet. “All right?”
I shrugged. “Did you read it? After he….”
“It wasn’t addressed to me.”
“He….” I shook my head. “I don’t know what I’m feeling right now.”
“I expect not. But I’ve learned sometimes it’s okay not to know. You’ll figure it out when you’re ready.”
“Ugh. Do I look puffy?”
He glanced at me. “Very much so. And your nose is running, and your eyes are red. You look terrible.”
“You don’t have to sound so pleased about it.”
“You’ve tested my patience today. I do believe I’m allowed.”
“You’re just jealous because I’m a twenty-two-year-old wizard and you had nothing to do with it. Well, aside from the whole helping Morgan to guide me from a very young age, challenging me at every turn, beating my ego to a bloody pulp, encouraging me to follow my heart with my cornerstone, and saving my life a time or two. So. Suck it.”
Randall looked at me warily. “If you try and hug me, I promise you the consequences will be severe.”
I took that into consideration.
I found the threat to be viable and kept my hands to myself, even though they were itching to reach for him.
“Besides,” he said, picking his pack up from the porch, “I would think you’d want to see what’s going to happen next.”
He had a point. “Have you ever seen a unicorn reunited with their horn before?”
; “No. Gary’s the only one who I’ve ever known to have had their horn removed at all. There are… stories about others before him, but I can’t attest to their validity. Unicorns are rare, and the fact that they’re protected—or rather, they were protected—under Veranian law makes the offense of taking a horn unconscionable.”
“So what you’re saying is that we have no idea what’s going to happen.”
“Precisely.”
“Nothing could happen.”
“I suppose.”
“It might not even reattach itself.”