The mysterious girl waited for the guards, their hails and their lanterns to be completely out of sight to pull Mallory away from the cottage door. Mallory let out a big sigh of relief, then he fell on his ass. He was exhausted. Now that he fell safe, the adrenalin of the chase was slowly deserting his body and pain was taking over.

“My knees are so sore. And my feet. I don’t think I’ve ever ran so much in my life before.”

“Who are you?”

The girl, Mallory’s savior, towered over him, examining every inch of this face with her big green eyes. Her eyes were enormous, but not without appeal and charm. She was different than any other girl Mallory had ever seen before. She had a wide head with a tiny nose and even a tinier mouth. He could barely see her lips.

“Th-thank you for helping me. I’m pri… just Mallory. My name is Mallory.”

“Mallory?” She frowned and leaned back as if Mallory had insulted her. “That’s not a man’s name.”

“Pardon? It is. It’s my name. I was… p-prince, actually. That’s why I am here, but I don’t want to talk about this. It’s, huh, it’s complicated.”

“Mallory is not a man’s name. You’re a boy, right?”

“Yes.”

“Then your name should be Mallorus or Mallorius. Not Mallory.”

“What?”

“Male names end in -us. That’s the rule here at the village.”

“Oh. I see what you mean. And… who are you?”

“I’m Delys. Nice to meet you.”

Mallory spoke too quick for his own sake. “I thought you said names ended by -us, here.” Immediately, he realized his mistake and grimaced.

Delys’ cheeks turned bright red. “I am a woman. NOT A MAN!”

Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.

“Oh, excuse-me. Yes. You’re right, you said that. I’m so sorry. I’m just…” Mallory took a deep breath. “I sort of had a tough night.”

“Yeah. Why? These men chasing you?”

Only now that his mind was getting clearer and his breathing settling to a regular level, did Mallory noticed her the light accent. It was unusual. She slowed down at the beginning of each sentence and rounded up every word that had the ’s’ sound in them.

“Why were they chasing you?”

Something alerted Delys’ eyes toward the clearing. She waved at something Mallory couldn’t see because he had his back against the door and was facing the forest. He didn’t notice her waving either.

“I’m a… they wanted me to go back. They’re not bad people. On the contrary, they’re great. But they want me to be king… of Castle Bartack. And I don’t want to. I just want to live a simple life. I’m a simple person. I’m not fit to be king. I’ll be a terrible king, and I can’t do that to our people.”

“So who’s going to be king then?”

“Oh, maybe my brother, but… hum, he’s not really well. I think my sister will be king, or queen, sorry. Her name is Gardenia, like our mother the Queen Gardenia.”

“Queen Gardenia? Never heard of her.”

“Pardon? How is that… C-castle Bartack. You know the big castle at the edge of the forest?”

“Never been there. Never seen a castle before, at least not a real one.”

“How is it possible? I mean, the castle is right there, outside Cozy Forest. It didn’t take me more than an hour to get here, wherever we are.”

“The village.”

“Pardon?”

“The village.”

“It’s just called the village?”

Delys looked at him as if he had just said the dumbest thing in the world. “Yeah. The village is the village.”

“But it’s… okay, but it’s only one house. I can’t be a… one house is not a village.”

She giggled. “It’s not. Look.”

Delys pulled him by the sleeve and helped him up. Standing beside the girl, Mallory saw for the first time ‘the village’. Instead of the empty clearing, there were a dozen cottages, a little stream running through, cobbled streets linking every cottage, some were high up on a little clod, some were isolated further down. Every cottage was beautiful. They had white thick walls with thatched roofs. Some were bigger than others. One in particular was very big, and wide, it had a second and a third floor, with little blue windows under the hay rooftop.

Delys followed his gaze.“That’s the town hall.”

“You have a town hall?”

The sun was fully rising now and the villagers of Cozy Forest were coming out of their homes like flowers sprouting in the sun. They all wore similar clothes: white shirts with thick wool pants held by suspenders. Some wore a colorful vest, some didn’t. Most of them wore a hat, a small round-shape hat that Mallory found very stylish. Everyone was coming out of their home to stare at Mallory. They stared at what Delys had brought in.

“Come.” She dragged Mallory to meet the villagers, running with excitement. “Hey, everyone. This is Mallory. He is a boy, from a castle, somewhere.”

“Mallory?” a tall woman with dashing red hair said. “That’s not a boy’s name.”