Perhaps Maret will look back on this moment as her first true test, her first lesson that adventure can be as dangerous as it is exciting. Later she will find herself looking back on this day, and comparing it to her adventures with Leonidas; later, when she makes the decision to leave home, she will carry this memory tucked away into her heart like a warning.

The world was not always as friendly as it appeared.

Her legs are trembling when the color drains back into them. They still feel unsteady, unstable, like at any moment she might collapse back into the mist, torn apart by the wind, carried off and forgotten. She shudders to think of it (and it will take her many sleepless nights before she is able to finally write about the experience in a way that does not leave her staring blankly at the walls, frozen in her reliving of it.)

It is Maeve’s voice that breaks her out of her trance now. She throws herself against the younger girl, relieved by the solidity of her, the permanence, the warmth. Her heart beats sparrow quick in her chest, painful as it leaps and stutters and jumps again and again and again. She forgets the breathing exercises her father has taught her, forgets all of his lessons — she only stands there petrified, clinging to Maeve like she is the only thing left (and in a way, she is, after what they have experienced.)

“We did it,” she whispers. It is too hard to say anything more than that.

Were she alone, or with anyone else, she might have ignored the flowers. She might have pretended to not see them, or denounced them as another trick from the ghosts (and she has had plenty of tricks for one night.) As it is she only steps cautiously forward alongside Maeve, reluctant to get too close.

But when Maeve plucks the flower and offers it to her, she smiles shyly and accepts it. “I’m not sure I need another reminder,” she confesses. “I certainly will never forget this night.”

And again she is thinking of the stranger’s words, and the stories the other girls in the court had told her about this path. Her heart clenches again, and she wonders if she is different now like the old man had suggested she would be. She is not sure she wants to find out how different she is, or in which ways.

When Maeve offers to race her back to the Court, it is a relief. ”Wait up!” she calls after her friend, the forest echoing her voice back to her. The repetitive movements of her legs steadies her heart into an almost-smooth rhythm; each step brings her closer to home. Faster and faster she runs until she is shoulder to shoulder with Maeve, crashing recklessly through the undergrowth, uncaring now for the trail.

And each scratch on her shoulder from a branch or a bramble is only a reminder that she is whole, and she is real, and she is very much alive.

And oh, it is the greatest relief.