“Yes,” Mother Alma said, nodding. “I was the midwife who brought you into the world, sweet lass. And when you arrived, you were pretty as a picture, and the magic flowing through you was so powerful it made the hair on the back of my neck stand up. I’ve always been quite sensitive to magical ability, you see?”
Willow was confused, but she nodded, because she knew she was expected to.
“I praised your mother for your powers, told her you might be the most powerful Winter Fae in a generation,” Mother Alma said sadly. “But it wasn’t seen as the good news I thought it was. To this day, I curse myself for not keeping my fool mouth shut.”
Heath put his head in his hands, as if he had just learned something terrible. Willow tried her best to follow.
“You see, the Winter Court does not want peace,” Mother Alma said. “It never has. It was assumed that you were the princess in the prophecy, the one who would bring that dreadful peace, and so a bounty hunter was called in. He was told to bring back a changeling to stand in as princess. They named you Willow, for the tree that weeps by the rivers. They knew you would mourn for the life you had never known. But they hoped that you could live as a mortal, because in the mortal realms your powers would be like a light under a heavy shroud.”
Heath grabbed her hand and held it tightly.
Could it be true? Had she really been born in this magical place?
“The bounty hunter selected a family, waited until dark of night and performed the switch,” Mother Alma went on. “It was a simple spell that made you and the mortal child look exactly alike. Then you were left in your new home and the mortal child was taken to Faerie to become Ashe.”
Willow nodded, playing along, unable to take this in.
“But the bounty hunter made a mistake,” Mother Alma said. “He wanted to impress the queen, so he ignored her instruction to take you as far as possible and instead left you with a family whose child was already named Willow, so that you would be called by the name she had given you.”
Heath nodded, as if he understood something that she was clearly missing.
“His error was two-fold,” Mother Alma went on. “He left you in Rosethorn Valley, where the veil between the faerie and mortal worlds is thin. And of course, Rosethorn Valley is next to Tarker’s Hollow. When the portal in Tarker’s Hollow opened a few years ago, long-forgotten magic surged back into the mortal world. Your powers were likely awakened, even though you were on the wrong side of the veil.”
“So the frozen river was you?” Heath asked.
Willow nodded.
“I’ve never done anything that extreme before.”
“But you’ve never been on this side before,” Mother Alma noted.
“I’ve always had… quirks,” Willow explained. “My ice cream never melted at the pool when I was a kid, I never get cold enough to shiver, that kind of thing. But nothing big. Not until a few years ago, and even then, nothing like a frozen river.”
“Coming into your powers is a great gift,” Mother Alma said. “Here in Faerie, you will have the support of the people, and your prince, of course.”
“Of course,” Heath said. “But Mother Alma, if you were the royal midwife, what are you doing out here?”
She sighed and looked down at her hands. They were elegant, with long pale fingers covered in rings studded with strange stones. “I spoke with the queen, after the changeling was at court. I should not have done so. But as you know, keeping my thoughts to myself isn’t my strong suit.”
“What did you say?” Willow asked.
“I had not been sleeping for the guilt,” Mother Alma explained. “If I hadn’t spoken, they would not have known the extent of your powers, and you would not have been traded away, robbed of the life you deserved.”
The grief was clear in the old woman’s eyes, even all these years later.
“So I expressed my sorrow to the queen,” Mother Alma said. “I told her that I knew how she must long for her lost daughter, and that I was sorry for what I had said before her husband.”
Willow nodded.
“But I was wrong to think she would feel as I did about the matter,” Mother Alma went on. “That night, the royal guards ripped me from my bed. The queen told the court that it was my fault that the princess had no magic, that I had made some crucial mistake in my duties bringing her into this world. My reputation was ruined, and I was banished from Winter Court lands.”
“I’m sorry, Mother Alma,” Willow said softly.
“I was once a highly regarded woman of medicine,” she said. “Now I live at the indulgence of your prince, on lands that are not my own.”
“The land under this cottage will be yours the moment you swear fealty to the Autumn Court,” Heath said.
“I was born to the cold and to the cold I shall return,” Mother Alma said with a shrug.
“The Winter Court is stubborn,” Heath explained to Willow. “They love their silly idioms.”
“Would you swear fealty to us for a piece of land?” Mother Alma asked.
“Not for all the land in the world,” Heath said instantly.
“And there you have it,” Mother Alma smiled. “But we are forgetting ourselves. There is still urgent business here.”
“What urgent business?” Heath asked.
“Why the other girl,” Mother Alma said. “Where is Ashe? If the true princess is returned, then how will she receive this news of her parentage? We must find her, and tell her kindly, before she hears it elsewhere, or worse yet, spots her changeling for herself.”
“Oh,” Willow said suddenly as things began to click into place for her.
“What is it?” Heath asked.
“Yesterday, I thought I was dreaming,” Willow explained slowly. “What I saw, it… didn’t seem real.”
“What did you see?” Heath asked, moving to kneel in front of her.
“A woman came stumbling down the hillside, right before you did,” Willow said. “She fell when she hit the parking lot. I went to help her.”
“I saw you,” Heath said.
“But when she looked up at me, I was looking into my own eyes,” Willow said, shivering again at the memory. “She was me. Or the closest thing to me I’ve ever seen.”
“Ashe,” Mother Alma breathed.
“And the bounty hunter was there,” Heath said. “I thought I was saving the princess from him when I grabbed you.”
“You were,” Mother Alma told him. “Here she is. But that other poor girl in the mortal realm, with no magic, and no prince to help her.”
“We will get word to someone,” Heath said firmly.
“You’d better hurry,” Mother Alma said. “Something’s happening out there. Someone has sensed that the true princess is home.”
Willow glanced out the window.
The true princess.
Snow was falling harder now, covering the grass.
Heath stood, and she followed suit.
“Wait,” Mother Alma said. “I have something for the girl. Come with me, dear.”
Willow glanced at Heath and he nodded.
She followed the slender midwife into the dim of her small kitchen.