Somehow, the lack of visible hocus pocus made Elaine's reappearance even more uncanny. Being told she would be gone weeks to his hours was one thing; seeing her step casually through the wardrobe door, visibly more sun-kissed and dye-stained than she'd been when she'd stepped in, was entirely another.
But Will scarcely had time to wonder at that, because a rolled tapestry, the fruit of Elaine's labour, was being pressed into his hands. Unfurled, it revealed an achingly familiar scene, picked out in such vivid, lifelike detail that for a moment he could scarcely summon the words to react. Somehow, between the magic and the thread, she had conjured the Sherwood of his heart and committed it to canvas in all its tricky, rough-edged beauty, and it took his breath away.
"This... this is incredible, Elaine," he said at last. "And it's... it worked? What you were trying for, with the..." He hesitated to ask, as though saying the words at the last would jinx it. "The happy ever after?"