Enchanted by Alethea Kontis Page A

would have seemed boulders and patches of violets whose petals he might have worn for a hat. He pondered the existence of these trifles, wondering how long it might be before they fell beneath his notice once again. If ever.
    He stumbled, and forced himself to stop thinking about his footsteps again.
    Rollins had suggested he ride, but Rumbold knew from walking through town the night before that horses did not yet trust him. Horses could smell enchantments. Nor did he trust himself to remember how to ride, for all that he had grown up in a saddle. Basic walking was hard enough. He stumbled again.
    A slight breeze ruffled the prince’s newly shorn hair. After his bath, he had asked Rollins to hack off the ridiculous length. The result was anything but refined. Even wet it simply refused to yield to the royal comb and be properly tamed. Rumbold decided this adamant wildness was a leftover side effect of his enchantment. He was surprised to find it one he rather welcomed.
    The trees lining his path were at the same time both massive and inadequate—they all towered above him but held none of the dignified majesty of the ancient sentinels of the Wood. All of the foliage here lacked personality and soul. The sky was overbright and bare of clouds, unframed by fat spring leaves. But the blue reminded him of Sunday’s eyes, the sun of her smile shining warmly down upon him. He hoped beyond hope that when she finally met him as a man she did not find him as pitiful as he felt. As much as he craved memories, he did not think he could want anything more than he wanted to see his Sunday again.
    The training ground was almost a mile behind the castle, on a hill that overlooked the forest. It doubled as an outpost. On a day like this he could see the river, a thin green line in the distance, and the silver-capped mountains beyond it to the north.
    Jack had walked this path every day, but Rumbold had trained with the Royal Guard only in the summers as a boy. The prince could not remember the last time he had practiced with the guard before other amusements had drawn his attention elsewhere. But this was the first place to which Jack had returned after his recovery; it made sense that Rumbold should follow. Perhaps the blazing ball in the pit of his stomach would find solace here. Perhaps his strength would return. If he could not remember the man he was then, he could take pride in the man he was now.
    Before him stood the small cottage that housed weapons and first-aid supplies. Off to the right, boys with long practice swords carried out synchronized formation drills. Behind them, a group of young men jogged the well-worn track around the field. To the left, a pair of men in their prime faced off with wooden staffs. One of the men was Erik.
    As Rumbold approached, the cheering, jeering assembly of men came to a halt. A score of heads with broken noses bowed, and pates were patted where there were no forelocks to be tugged. Their loose-fitting garb was dusty from the sparring ground.
    The prince clasped arms with Erik, who was coated in a healthy sheen of sweat that dampened his shirt and darkened his russet hair. There was more strength in the guard’s arm than in Rumbold’s entire body, but the unquenchable fire inside the prince maintained its stubborn defiance.
    “Good morning, Your Highness.” Erik did not seem surprised to see him. “You remember Cauchemar.”
    The prince’s eyes met those of Erik’s opponent. He did remember: Velius Morana, his own royal cousin and Duke of Cauchemar—though duke in name only. Seduced by immortality, Velius’s ailing father still clung to life by desperate means in Faerie, at the queen’s side. Unwilling to fill his father’s shoes until they were legally his own, Velius had let his very capable mother run the estates while he trained with the Royal Guard. The arrangement suited them both, and had done for the past few decades. Like the view from the hilltop, Velius’s lithe figure,