by Rex Jameson
He called over his middle son Gorsgogg and his eldest son Ogdorn. Gorsgogg was green and mighty like his father; only smaller and still growing. Ogdorn was the same seven-foot frame as his father but brown like his mother and with a great, shaggy brown beard, unlike the blond hair of his father. Bloodhand motioned for the shaman Wovtet to come over. As the three great orcs approached, he looked at his crimson fist, a gift of the Great Light at his birth: the mark of chief for life—a position challenged every year or two but never lost.
“Father,” Ogdorn said in acknowledgement.
“You lead charge,” Bloodhand commanded.
Ogdorn nodded once.
“Second,” Bloodhand said, placing his hand firmly on his middle son’s shoulder. He squeezed hard and patted him harder. “If Og fall, Gorsgogg there.”
Ogdorn licked the two small tusks that protruded from his bottom lips. “Yes, Chief.”
The shaman Wovtet swayed in place. He wet his finger and lifted it into the air.
“Strange air,” the shaman said. “Wind comes from the east.”
“Reinforce?” Bloodhand asked, hoping that the shaman had heard from the Great Light that the Oldrakh forces were still on their way.
Wovtet shook his head. “Sweet air. Wrong air. Elves…” He sniffed his finger. “Wood.”
Bloodhand clapped and rubbed his palms against each other. The berserkers would not be idle for much longer. “Good! Good death!”
Ogdorn banged his chest with a fist, and Gorsgogg circled the shaman and howled at the sun.
Wovtet waved off the younger son. He pushed aside Ogdorn as well. The old man had hidden strength beneath ancient muscles. The shaman held up three fingers. Bloodhand struggled to count them, but Wovtet had been blessed by the Great Light. He had patience and perseverance. Bloodhand knew he had neither of those traits, which was fine.
The shaman grabbed Bloodhand by the shoulders and pushed him backward toward the west. Bloodhand fought against him, as he should. No chief can be pushed around without resistance. Nature demands fight and spirit, but when he had resisted enough, he found himself in place staring at his middle son, whose back faced east.
“Wood,” Wovtet said firmly, indicating the wood elves coming from the east. “Wood.”
“Good death!” Gorsgogg replied with excitement.
Wovtet nodded vigorously. He then moved Ogdorn to the south.
“Big wind,” the shaman Wovtet said. “Sand. Fire.”
“Sandfire?” Bloodhand asked, confused.
“Creature,” Wovtet said, “very strange.”
He made a swooping motion with his hands like a bird. Bloodhand struggled to follow.
“Sandbird?” Bloodhand asked.
Wovtet shook his head vigorously. “Firebird.” He continued to make the motions of a bird flapping, and then his fingers opened like a mouth and the shaman made a hiss and whoosh of a river. He pushed his hands out toward Bloodhand. “Firebird.”
Bloodhand nodded as if he understood, but his eyes grew wide. “Good death.”
“Burn death,” Wovtet corrected him. “Bad death.”
“Big?” Bloodhand asked. “Fire? Big flame bird?”
“Long,” Wovtet said.
He opened his hand to indicate all fingers. It was the only large number Bloodhand could comprehend, being so marked by the Great Light with brute strength and dullness. It was five. It was always five. Anything less and he had trouble, unless there were no fingers or one. All orcs but shamans were similarly afflicted with dullness. The Great Light’s bargain. Strength and lust, for brains.
Five always meant five orc lengths. Not Bloodhand lengths. Those were unusual. Six feet. Medium orcs. The Sandfires were north of twenty-five feet long—not that an orc would ever understand a number that high.
Bloodhand began to walk over to embrace his oldest son, who represented the wind from the south, but Wovtet pushed back against his chest with a strong hand.
“More wind,” Wovtet said patiently. He pushed Bloodhand back into place, and the chief struggled mightily for a few feet until enough resistance had been given.
Wovtet pointed with his hand over Bloodhand’s shoulder, back toward the west. As Bloodhand fought to face the direction Wovtet pointed, the shaman patiently fought him until the chief stopped resisting.
“Foul wind,” Wovtet said, laying a palm on the chief’s chest.
His youngest son Gorsgogg giggled. “Fsorda!”
Ogdorn also laughed at the joke, and Bloodhand pointed at him. He loved the boy, but he would not be ridiculed by his sons.
Wovtet slapped away at Bloodhand’s arm, and Bloodhand huffed in defiance.
“Big wind,” Wovtet said seriously.
He pointed at the east, toward Gorsgogg, and raised his hand from the ground to Bloodhand’s knees. He sniffed at the air and said “Wood.” He then raised a hand to the bottom of Bloodhand’s chest. The chief flexed his abdomen and struck his muscles with his fist to show their firmness. Wovtet made a motion with his head toward Ogdorn and said “Firebird.” He struck the leader’s chest again at the same height with the side of his hand to affirm what he said.
Bloodhand nodded. He pointed toward the east and said “Good death. Wood.” He pointed toward the south. “Good death. Sandfire.” He then pointed toward the Keep to the north. “Bad death. Human. Fsorda.”
His sons giggled and he laughed with them. Wovtet grabbed him by the jaw, shaking his head. He waved off the north. The shaman clearly said it wasn’t an option. He turned the chief toward the west. Bloodhand began to fight it, but he gave up faster than usual, too curious to resist.
The shaman raised his hand to the top of the chief’s head.
“Foul wind,” he said and then pointed toward the west with his chin. “Best death. Strong challenge. Great Light demands. You lead.”
And that settled that. The orcs would be heading west. The Great Light demanded it.
15
The Court of Nomintaur
The wood elf Nessamela knelt before King Calenanna. Around him were a host of wood elves who dangled from trees and eyed her with interest. She kept her head down and assumed they watched her with disdain. These were nobles, from excellent families, and she was from a hunting clan—about as low as you can be in the wood elven class tree.
She had cleaned herself up. No blood from deer or orcs. She even dressed in more ceremonial green leathers to show her respect. She wanted the King to approve her request. She wanted it so badly that she could taste the orcish blood on her lips.
The lithe, long-limbed blond king sat on a chair of twisted fae, stroking the owl that had arrived from Croft Keep. It hooted softly, closing its eyes in pleasure with each pat of the royal hand. With his free hand, the King stroked his beard and only casually looked at her—as if she weren’t waiting on his reply. He looked just as quickly and nonchalantly at his wife Vanitari. Calenanna, which meant “Green Gift” in the old tongues, was ancient. He had ascended the throne tens of thousands of years ago, without any real challenge.
This seemed unnatural to Captain Liritmear. Nothing in nature ascended without challenge forever. The elves needed to be tempered by battle, especially if the prophecies concerning the demon lords and orcs were to be believed. A king without war could only know peace, and peace made men fat and weak.
The King’s legendary, ancient brother Aredhel had been a magnificent man, and there were carvings inside of the sacred fae trees that depicted his greatest feats. Wrestling matches with whole families of adult bears. An arrow shot over 1,000 yards that pierced the eye of a mad human king. The stuff of legend, but he had left the Nomintaur Forest over 10,000 years ago—never to be seen or heard from again. If the undead were attacking Croft Keep from the west and the orcs were besieging it from the south, then there was no time to contemplate the beauty of an owl—as the King was doing now.
“Calm yourself young one,” the King said, apparently sensing her agitation and focusing on her and not th
e hundreds of elves hanging from or leaning against the massive, twisting, and gnarled fae roots. “Have you not seen plenty of death in your short 500 years? Must you be so eager to see our own people die to orcs and the unnaturally reborn?”
She postured herself more demurely, hanging her head slightly lower and awaiting his command.
“Forgive me, Oh Great One,” she said. “I fear what might happen should we arrive too late to reinforce the humans. Should the men fall, the damned would no doubt infest our forests as they do the western woods.”
She motioned with her chin toward his children: the princes Haloisi and Mavar and the sorceress princess Ista.
“We must protect our people,” she said, “our princes and princesses.”
“You leave our forest to protect our princes and princesses?” Calenanna asked coolly. “Funny… I thought you might want to leave to protect another prince.”
She looked up to find him smiling down at her, still stroking the brown-speckled owl. To him, the grin may not have been mocking, but to her, it was like a dagger through her heart. She let out a hiss, and she hoped it was low enough that no one else heard.
“Careful,” Belegcam said from behind her right shoulder.
“Shut up,” she told him, followed by a short, low growl.
“If we want to protect these forests,” the King continued mercilessly, “then all of our people must be fruitful. Our children take so long to take root in the womb. Daily practice, for however long it takes. Not so different from your hobbies in the forest with the deer and on the plains to the south with the orcs. Everyday. Practice. We are practitioners of nature. Do you not wish to take part in the fruits of the next generation?”
He smiled good-naturedly.
“Are you asking me to be a housewife?” Nessamela asked through clenched teeth.
A giggle tittered amongst the young girls in the forest. Nessamela didn’t give them the satisfaction of her acknowledging their jibes.
“Never,” the King said, “but as woman a strong as you? How long would we remain strong, if we denied those natural processes that pass down strong traits to offspring? We need more children like you—from you. That’s how the forest works. When you come back from this expedition to save the humans, one last time, might you consider taking on a mate?”
She thought of her humiliation once more, back when she had been a doe-eyed youngling. That beautiful face. The white hair. Those damned red eyes watching her, pitying her.
King Calenanna tapped his slippered foot lightly against the fae root. To an outsider, it may have sounded like a soft rustling, but from Calenanna, it might as well have been thunder. That act was frustration. It was completely unlike him. She panicked and looked up at him. All eyes in the court were on her, eagerly watching her every move.
When she locked eyes with him, his brow was furrowed, but after she looked up, his face relaxed to the serenity he usually had. She gulped hard. She knew who everyone wanted her to be with. Belegcam. He had asked her to be his mate many times over the past 400 years. She had rebuffed him each time with some new excuse—anything to lessen the blow that she didn’t want him like that. Maybe when he finally beat her in a tournament. Maybe when he killed more orcs than she did. Maybe some other time.
She steeled her jaw. Tears began to form at the corners of her eyes. She knew she could not rebuff a direct order from Calenanna. She looked to the dark-haired, beautiful Queen Vanitari who sat demurely with crossed legs in an outcrop of the fae roots to his right. The Queen stared back at Nessamela but was entirely unreadable.
“If you, oh Great One,” Nessamela said carefully.
She bowed her head lower and pushed her hands out, grasping the grass as if she expected lashes to strike her back. She choked on a cough.
“Order me to be a strong mare for our people, then—”
Queen Vanitari chuckled and covered her mouth, but Calenanna stood up so quickly that the messenger owl flapped and hopped to a low-hanging branch, protesting its treatment. She could have sworn she heard the king cursing in a low voice. A murmur went through the crowd as Nessamela struggled to look up at him. She could not help but be defiant, and the giggle of the Queen made her reaction even worse. This was not the first time she had been mocked by royalty. It just had never happened by wood elves—not to her face.
She froze, not in fear but in anger. She did not like being ridiculed—not at all. Had she brought her arrows, she might have drawn them. Thankfully, she had not.
“Whatever you’re doing,” Belegcam whispered strongly. “Whatever you’re thinking… stop it.”
Her nose and cheeks began to twitch as she struggled again to look up from her low position.
“Relax,” Belegcam said.
She turned toward her lieutenant, breaking protocol for someone making a request to the King.
“Tell me to relax or stop one more time,” she said. “I dare you.”
She turned back to the King, who was now staring at his wife Vanitari, who was still laughing but more heartily.
“My King,” Nessamela said, “I apologize for any offense I may have caused. In my eagerness to lead my battalion, our strongest soldiers, against the undead and the orcs, I have spoken out of turn and—”
The King waved her off.
“It’s not that, my child,” the King said. He tilted his head at his wife. “Would you stop that?”
The Queen swallowed hard. She looked at the King with obvious effort, and then like a stone statue, she turned toward Nessamela. Vanitari sat motionless, legs crossed, and once more with complete lack of emotion. Her hair was in an updo. Her dress a light blue. To the King’s left were his oldest son, the strong-jawed Haloisi, then the agile poet Mavar. Princess Ista moved between her father and Haloisi and leaned against the fae throne.
Nessamela finally realized that in her haste to request immediate forces and leave the forest, she had neglected to truly survey her surroundings. This was supposed to be a war council. There was no reason for all of these noble elves to be here. She thought they had been anxious and dressed in normal finery. But they were not dressed like a war council. They wore simple, understated gold-trims—which may have been normal in human capitals or maybe in the dark elven courts that she had never seen. But these were wood elves—people of the trees and nature. The message from Croft Keep really had interrupted something, and so had Nessamela, obviously charging once more into a place she was unexpected.
“Captain Liritmear,” Calenanna said, to the chuckles of nobles.
No one had ever heard him acknowledge her folk name. She stopped breathing.
“Champion of every archery tournament of the past 250 years,” he said. “Longer, if we would have changed our rules and let you enter sooner. Leader of my finest battalion of archers, our sacred troop, for almost as many years. You are an inspiration to our youth and an example to us all. You have shown us what the future looks like—what we lost when my brother left the forest.”
She inhaled sharply but didn’t exhale. Her eyes moved from one hanging elf to another in the fae roots and limbs.
“Many years ago,” Calenanna continued, “my daughter came to me with a request. Instead of forest magic, she wished to learn archery.”
Laughter tittered amongst the leaves from the nobles.
“At the time, I refused her,” he said. “It was unbecoming of my daughters, I thought. She had a gift for healing and for speaking to the fae, and after all that we’ve lost—my sons and daughters—to orcs and time. Her request I could not agree to, though I am a doting father and I would do anything in my power to—”
He looked to his wife, but she remained stone cold. Nessamela might have found humor in the exchange some other time, but this was perhaps the most ineloquent, unmeasured speech she had ever seen from the King. Princess Ista squeezed her father’s shoulder.
“When my sons both came to me with a separate but very related request,” the King stumbled on, “I did not hesitate,
as I had before with Ista. Where she had admired you, I had seen a different path, but for this—”
Queen Vanitari cleared her throat, and the King’s blond eyebrows raised. He opened his palms and bowed his head with a smile.
“If you so please,” he beckoned.
The Queen tilted her head and continued to stare at Nessamela.
“The King wishes to know,” she said, “which of his two royal sons you will marry and bear children with.”
There were gasps everywhere, but none as loud as the one from Belegcam behind her. Her face flushed, and she felt her cheeks growing hotter.
“The Crimson Poet reddens once more!” the Queen said with obvious mirth but still maintaining the stoic face that her husband had ordered her to.
“My King and Queen,” Nessamela stammered, “and my princes, I am but a daughter of hunters. I am not worthy of—”
Two little girls darted in between the fae trees. They giggled as they ran between their noble parents’ legs and under the fae limbs near the highborn families. It was only when a mother caught her daughter and held her firmly beneath that Nessamela saw the red paint on the little girls’ faces. Nessamela’s face became wet along the sides of her nose, but she didn’t wipe the tears away. She was in shock. The child was painted to resemble her after her blood ritual. She wondered if this was a new trend or one that she had missed all these years, thinking only of her shame and killing orcs.
“We are a backward people to many,” the King said. “We live in woods and shun the cities. We practice those ancient arts and customs that no longer make sense to the people outside of the fae. But if you ask me… the dark elves are the backward ones. For where they see classes and nobility, we see only nature. Where they shun and humiliate those outside of their caste, we embrace what keeps us apart as that which may bring us together.”
Belegcam’s warm hand on her back steadied her.
“You are worthy of this,” he said, though his voice broke.
