Margarita was terrified. She had been closest to the window when that woman pounded on it. Margarita had originally been the one meant to stay behind at the castle today, but she had switched with Matilda. Layla was comparatively calmer, though she still looked badly shaken.
Georgiana gave them both some hot cocoa mixed with a calming draught, then asked Matilda to look after them while she went to see how things were with Fiegel.
When she had been teaching, she had encountered several children who were especially afraid of forests. At first, she thought they were pretending to be sick to skip class.
Many people suffered from nightmares. In all kinds of fairy tales, forests were always terrifying places: Little Red Riding Hood's grandmother, Snow White and the hunter, and so on. After hearing these stories that adults found full of childish charm, children would uncontrollably imagine themselves running barefoot through a pitch-black forest in their dreams, fleeing from wolves, hunters, and the like. Gradually, a psychological illness known as forest phobia emerged.
Others worried greatly about getting lost in the forest. Even without Albus warning them, they would never go near the Forbidden Forest.
Most people outgrew this fear after becoming adults. They no longer mistook shadows cast by branches for the fingers of some monster. Yet some could never shake it for the rest of their lives. Especially when television news and films featured "real monsters," the fear of forests became even more deeply ingrained.
The woman had been placed in a servants' room on the first floor. The castle servants stood outside the door, whispering about the room.
Compared with the male cavalrymen, she trusted Fiegel, another woman, more. From the very beginning, she had clung to the female dragon rider without letting go. But before