Cora had come to the realisation that horse riding wasn't nearly as enjoyable as it seemed. She was tired and her bones were hurting, and she was starting to regret choosing not to stay inside that day. She'd been sure she would go mad if she confined herself in that small space for hours again, but now even that seemed preferable to the past four hours she'd spent riding Saiph.

Harry was somewhere in front of her, she could see the blue of his coat time and time again as he zigzagged between the row of wagons to talk to someone or get a good look of the road ahead. Moving was always dangerous when it came to the Fair—hunters and guards were on the loose, and it wouldn't have taken them long to figure out who they were if they'd caught them by surprise. Magic was in the air, and while she would've usually found it intriguing, now it worried her a bit.

A white-cloaked figure riding a white horse was following Harry like a shadow, and Cora didn't need them to pull down their hood to know it was Aster. Harry exchanged some words with him before riding ahead. Aster's hood fell, and he ran a finger through his light blonde hair. His horse slowed.

Cora kept riding at the same pace to keep up with the others, and soon she was right behind him. She bit the inside of her cheek, considering her possibilities. She could keep to his pace and stay behind him, and soon they would be together at the end of the line. Or she could ride past him quickly and go with the others. After a moment's deliberation, the second option seemed the best one.

Saiph trotted past Aster. Cora kept her gaze straight ahead, pretending not to have noticed him.

"Hey, blondie."

Cora turned her head. Aster was next to her, riding at her pace. He'd been waiting for her to try surpassing him. "You're calling me blondie?"

Aster laughed. His drop earrings dangled on either side of his throat. The irony clearly wasn't lost on him either. "Oh come on now, my hair is nearly silver."

"You're that old?"

"That pretend aunt of yours didn't teach you any manners, did she?" He shrugged. "Besides, I'm not old. I'm in my twenties, if you must know."

"I don't believe you."

"Okay, I'm closer to my thirties."

"I still don't believe you."

"Surprisingly enough, I'm not eaten away by the knowledge of that." The sarcasm in Aster's voice was heavy, and Cora's hands tightened around the bridles. She had the sudden thought of drenching him in water, then frowned. What was wrong with her?

She looked away into the distance, hoping to spot Harry. Near the front of the line was the short man, Eames, a hat on his head, riding in a way that Cora could only define as grumpy. Oden and a few other children were chatting away in the food cart; their laughs reached her even though she was near the end.

"Little fay runs away when the conversation turns awry." Aster frowned. "No, that doesn't rhyme. When the conversation goes astray? When her mood turns grey? When her sense of humour is lacking, which happens everyday?"

Cora sent him a glare. "Will you stop with the wordplay?"

He raised an eyebrow. "Now, why did you steal my rhyme? I was doing something worthwhile with it."

She hadn't even realised her sentence rhymed with Aster's, and she turned away and crossed her arms. Then she got scared Saiph would act out and got hold of her bridle again. She looked ahead again, and this time around she was able to spot Harry's blue coat next to Eames. She stared at his back, hoping he'd sense her gaze and save her from the situation she'd accidentally thrown herself in.

"In the least offensive way possible, I thought you'd be different," Aster commented, giving her a curious glance. "Considering..."

"Boy problems?"

Cora jumped. Iris had just ridden up to her other side, the hood of a cloak she recognised as Thalia's covering her light hair. The silvery sunlight hit the strands falling out, nearly blinding Cora. She felt like she was in the middle of a petite universe—the sun on one side of her, the moon on the other, both bright enough to paint glowing spots in her vision if she accidentally stared too long. What a day the sun had decided to come out.

Iris was riding Thalia's brown palfrey, that she'd lent her the day before while claiming that the spare ones they had were too stubborn for an inexperienced rider.

Aster sent a quick look to the other fay and spurred his horse to go faster, taking off towards the front of the line without another word.

Cora unstuck her gaze from Harry's back and turned to Iris, feeling a little less on edge. "What do you mean?"

"Don't you like him?" She glanced straight ahead, at the figure in blue in front of them. "You look at him all the time."

Cora looked away, her cheeks red. Was it that obvious?

"There's nothing wrong with that, you know," Iris continued. "Does he know?"

"It's complicated."

Iris chuckled. "We have enough time."

Cora glanced ahead again. Harry was riding next to Arnold, recognisable thanks to his dark red hair. Aster was closing in on them, a white spot against the earthy tones of the landscape. Harry's position was tense—he was so different from how he was around her. When they were together he was playful and easygoing, but his smile was nowhere to be found when he stepped into the shoes of the owner of the Fair. He was quiet, reflective, mature. He made people want to follow his orders, he made them believe in him and what he could do. What right could she ever hope to claim over him?

"I can never seem to understand what he wants," Cora shared quietly. "Sometimes I think he likes me, but others..." She paused when Harry disappeared on the other side of the column, and lowered her voice to make sure he wouldn't hear her in case he came closer. "We haven't talked since he kissed me yesterday, while we were in the river. I hate when he does this."

Was it really her place to dislike his actions, though? If at times she thought they were getting closer, others he seemed so far away, and it wasn't hard to remember that he was a busy man living an incredibly complex life. How could she ever hope to fit into a puzzle that was completed long before she came along?

"Oh, I see," Iris replied, "that's kind of how it works for us, though."

"What do you mean?"

"You grew up in the city, didn't you? Thinking you were human," Iris said, earning a nod from her. "You were lucky. Not everyone has the same luck. Even when we live in villages, we aren't safe. We never are. We are taught not to trust others easily from a very young age. It's the only way to make sure nothing bad will happen to us. We can never know who will betray us— a stranger, a friend or family. It isn't easy to get close to others. Even when we try and believe we're okay with it, we end up regretting it. It's nobody's fault, though."

"So does that mean I'm doomed?"

Iris laughed. "No way. you just have to find the right balance. You'll learn when to wait for him to reach out and when to give him a little push with time." She sighed. "Fays are complicated. And people are too. Don't you think it'd be much better if everyone was just a little more open?"

"I don't know what to do with him," Cora admitted. "Sometimes I think I should talk to him about this, but at the same time... I feel like I don't have a right to? We've only known each other for some months, after all."

"Talking to him about it wouldn't hurt. He has to like you at least a bit, I'm sure he wouldn't keep chasing you otherwise."

"He makes a move one day and runs away the other..."

Thalia joined them all of a sudden, and Cora's voice died down. "What are you two talking about?"

Cora gave her a suspicious look. Did she actually not know, or was she just pretending not to?

"Boys," Iris said with a little shrug. "Do you have any suggestions?"

"Suggestions?"

"On how to deal with stubborn men that don't know what they want."

Thalia let out a sour chuckle. "Does it look like I have any?"

"You have to have some good boy advice at your age," Iris insisted, way more daring than Cora would've expected her to be. The other didn't seem to mind, though.

"I don't like men," she replied. "They're too stubborn and childish, I could never waste my precious time like that. Women are better." She gave the moonlight-haired a side-glance, a daring look in her violet eyes, and left before she could say a word.

Iris blushed and focused her gaze on the ground. "Oh."

Cora gave her a curious look. Was something going on between them that she wasn't aware of? "How are you finding the Fair?"

"It's quite chaotic, but I like it. Thalia has been very nice to me as well."

Cora observed her as she started playing with the hem of her black cloak. She'd already seen it before. "Oh, she has?" Thalia wasn't rude, but she also wasn't sociable. She liked to have her own space and didn't like to be around people for more than a few hours per day, which meant that she could appear cold at times.

"She gave me one of her cloaks," Iris told her, "and we always talk in the evening."

"That sounds like her," Cora replied, even though it left her with even more questions than before. Did it really?

Iris glanced away to hide the redness that had painted her cheeks. "Yes, well—" Her head suddenly snapped up when something caught her attention. "Oh, he seems to be alone now. You should go to him."

"Are you sure?" Cora tilted her head, staring at the figure in front of them. Harry had reappeared sometime during their conversation and was now riding alone not too far away from them.

"It's a good opportunity to get him to talk to you. It isn't like he can run away."

Cora chuckled, but decided to follow her suggestion.

Harry turned to look at her in the moment she reached him. "Cora," he said, faint surprise in his voice. "I was about to come to you."

"You were?" She couldn't help but feel a little skeptical—after all, he'd done his best to avoid any kind of conversation with her for the past day or so.

"I'll make a detour tomorrow. I was wondering if you'd like to come with me."

Cora closed her eyes for a second to hide her disappointment. Of course it was work related. What else could it have been? "Where are you going?"

"I placed an order a while ago and I'm going to pick it up. It'll take some hours." The tone of his voice was low and practical, the warm, cheerful one of the day before nowhere to be found. What had she even done? What had happened that had made him act that way? She was starting to grow weary of him kissing her and then regretting it over and over again.

"I will, then."

He gave her a nod and made to leave, but she called out to him, remembering the reason she'd come to him in the first place.

"Harry! Can we talk?"

He let out a sigh. "Is it about yesterday?"

Cora didn't reply, confirming his thought, and he sighed again.

"Listen. I've been thinking about it." He ran a hand through his brunette curls in a display of nervousness. "I like you. But I can't tell if I like you because of who you are or because of this... thing that brings us together. It feels like manipulation, and I don't like that." His words were kind, but their meaning hit her heart just as hard. "While I do care for you, I also can't ignore my duties to the Fair. I'm sorry."

I'm sorry.

The day before he'd kissed her in the river, and now he was telling her he was sorry. If that was what romance was like, Cora was starting to think she didn't want anything to do with it at all. How could someone be so hot and cold at the same time?

She'd figured she'd do anything just to get closer to him, but now she was starting to understand that those same monsters she'd promised to fight were hiding in his own thoughts, a land she could never access. There was nothing she could do if he didn't tell her what was going on. She'd never had a chance in the first place.

He didn't want to let her in and she could understand that, but that meant that they'd reached an impasse. And while she wanted to believe that the issues he'd brought up were the reason he didn't want to get closer to her, she was also aware that they sounded a little too much like a rational justification of a very irrational thought process that had taken place sometime the day before. That was just what he did. He did something, thought about it afterwards and ended up making up reasons to regret it. But she was never part of that ordeal—he communicated his decisions to her when it was too late.

What hope could she ever have to win both his heart and mind?

"Does that mean that you don't want to spend time with me anymore?" The simple thought hurt more than Cora could admit. She'd got so used to being around him. She didn't want it to stop. He made her feel safe.

"I'll continue trying to help you, but..." He frowned. "But you have to promise me you won't do it again."

Cora gave him a confused look. "Do what?"

"The thing you did the other night."

She frowned. "What thing?"

He let out a faint sigh and looked ahead. "Never mind."

"Harry."

"Just promise me you won't touch me while trying to use your magic again until we find out what it means for us."

She nearly stopped her horse. "Did I do something to you?"

"Don't worry about it," he replied, and then his horse trotted forward, leaving her alone again.

She watched him as he went away, the sadness she'd tried her best not to feel in the past day rushing back to her all at once.

That actually hurt.

I hope you enjoyed this chapter x
Miki