by Regina Watts
As the door shut behind us, Valeria threw her arms around my neck with a noise like a sob.
“Rorke,” she cried, holding me all the tighter as I embraced her, “oh, Rorke! My sweet hero—I am so sorry you were forced to risk your life for me again—”
“Oh, Madame, please—it’s my purpose in this place. My one and only duty. Seeing to your defense is an honor I would not exchange for any other.”
“But—oh—”
She pressed her weeping face to my neck, her eyes overflowing with tears that inspired a pang of adoration. While I drew her face back to wipe those lovely tears from her soft cheeks, she gazed up at me from beneath a furrowed brow.
“When I heard something had happened, I was so afraid—and now, to know that it was a spirit-thief—I ought to have relayed to you the truth of my dream. Oh! I dreamt a terrible thing, your death at the hands of just such a hateful beast. Now, knowing what occurred here, I’m terrified.”
Overwhelmed by this information, relieved to think I had avoided such a thing, I kissed her brow and swore to her, “I would never let such a thing happen—never permit such a demon to take me from you.”
“If it did—if Oppenhir claimed your life before I could tell you how I love you, how deeply I love you—I wouldn’t be able to live anymore, Rorke!” Her sobbing peaked in an emotional wail that moved me twice as much as her admission of love. Valeria buried her face in my chest amid her hiccups of narrowly-avoided grief and continued, “Oh, Rorke! I don’t know how I lived without you to begin with—I never want to do it again. Never want to awaken again if I can’t look upon your face as I do.”
“Valeria—you mustn’t say such things. How much longer elves live than humans! As deeply as I love you, my mistress”—her breath hitched to hear me say such a thing, and the very utterance proved a sweet relief to my own burdened heart—“I would not be able to look Weltyr in his face if I thought that your own vitality wilted because I had lost mine.”
Sobbing still, perhaps now in relief to be loved in return as much as to find me still alive in the wake of the battle, Valeria shook her head against me and managed after a moment to say, “We must not speak of such things now, Burningsoul—oh, Rorke. No: let us leave such grim conversations for the future, the distant future, when all this has passed us and you have been my companion for many more years.”
“As you wish,” I told her, kissing the tip of a lovely, dark ear and managing somewhat to ease her weeping through caresses of her back and shoulders. “Come now, Madame…perhaps you need to unwind even more than I do.”
My hand had been raising to the clasp of her dress, but at her cry of, “Wait,” I hesitated.
After briskly wiping her tears away, the Materna of the durrow gazed into my face. “Permit me to serve you as your slave, Burningsoul. Let me bathe you, let me see to your wounds and this aching body that would have so willingly sacrificed itself to maintain my own much too long life.”
“Just long enough,” I corrected her, pushing a lock of hair that had been stuck to her cheek back in place among its fellows. “Long enough to meet me, and fill my life with such unexpected joy. I would be honored were you to tend my wounds, Valeria.”
Her pained lips managing to find their way to the barest hint of a smile, Valeria’s eyes swept over me before focusing upon my belt. She removed this, reverently placing it aside along with Strife. In fact, to my greater love—and an odd trill, I admit—she stroked the scabbard and planted a tender kiss upon the pommel as though to thank it for its service in defending both her and me. Then, turning back to look me in the eye, my mistress reached behind her neck and unclasped her dress. The fabric pooled at her gold sandals, which she soon enough also removed. Then, naked before me but for her many jewels, Valeria stepped forward to undress me.
Each graze of her hand reminded me of the soreness of my muscles, the terrible tension provoked by the demon’s electrical shock even after I was blessed by the healing power of Weltyr. The mere removal of the tunic from my head was a relief second to none, and I closed my eyes with a hefty sigh only to open them again when Valera trailed her fingertips down my chest and stomach. Upon her knees, she slid away my breeches and smiled at the natural result of those gentle touches of hers. While her hand ran fondly over my straining member, she rose deftly to her feet and took me by my hands. Together, we entered the pool, and as she eased me down into the baths I sighed with hefty relief to shut my eyes in the warmth of the water.
Soon her hands were upon me, the lathers and oils that she applied second in their comfort to the touch of her hands. We barely spoke; I was too exhausted for it, and Valeria, clearly too shaken. Those caressing hands traversed every respectable inch of my body, and by the time she had finished, those most unrespectable nine inches throbbed with desire for her attention. Valeria slid into the water than and, gazing with adoration into my face, she stroked and pulled my present ache. I tenderly held her face and drew her close for my kiss, drinking love and gratitude from her mouth like the finest of wines. Soon, enamored with the tension that was so sensitive to her touch, Valeria climbed into my lap and impaled herself upon me.
How wet she was! And not with the waters of the baths. I groaned and held her in my arms, the pearlescent pools of hers eyes the source of my singular focus. Much to my amazement, these great white orbs filled with tears that soon spilled over. I kissed her, held her, drew her out of the baths with me and made love to her upon the cushions of a nearby bench.
By the time we were finished, it seemed that the banquet-goers were none the wiser to the events that had occurred so many floors above them. Their revels continued uninterrupted, and my mistress and I emerged from the baths to find, as she had commanded, Fiora. The patiently waiting guard stood at attention, asking, “Greetings again, Madame. I have been assigned to accompany you to the vizier’s quarters.”
Her face twisted by a look of displeasure that she simply couldn’t help, Valeria weakly nodded and permitted the guard to lead us to the lift. Her hand rested upon the central gem of her necklace, fingers worrying the setting of the stone and those of a few others. Only as we neared the lifts did I register how many more guards there were on this floor than on the average one: a full detail had been added to the existing staff, and I wagered a guess that many more had been placed upstairs, around the vizier’s chambers.
Valeria, also, took notice. While the lift doors shut, Fiora reached for the panel of ruins, intent on activating one. My mistress caught her hand and gazed into her eyes.
“Fiora,” she said, “bring us to the Palace entrance.”
Surprised, Fiora said, “But my orders were to take you directly to Trystera’s apartment for your own security, Madame.”
“Trystera thinks she knows what is in my best interest,” replied Valeria, doing an admirable job of keeping the terser notes from her calm voice, “but I am not a child. I am perfectly capable of making my own decisions, and of knowing when I am safe. Until that thing is captured, I am unsafe no matter where I am. I would see it killed myself. By my own hand, if need be. Until then, I will not be able to rest.”
With a concerned look, first into my lady’s face and then at the gem of Roserpine’s ring, Fiora said with a faintly pleading tone, “Madame, the other palace guards are already aware of what has happened. You saw them all as we were coming to the lift.”
“All the more reason you should help us leave now. Fiora. If the guards are already well-informed enough to be on the alert, think how much better-able they’ll be to identify and stop any attempt of mine to leave the Palace. If we leave now, it would be the last thing they expected.”
“But—they’ll see you. You can’t just walk out the front gates! Even servants’ exits are suspect.”
“Give me your armor, then,” said Valeria, no hint of jest in her expression or voice. “It’ll prove a bit big for me, from the looks of it, but—”
Balking, Fiora said, “I can’t give you my armor, Materna! I’ll
be dismissed from service!”
“Tell them I commanded you to do it and left you with no other choice. It was the will of Roserpine. Who are any of us to deny her desires, especially as they concern our fates and duties?”
With a miserable looked down at herself, Fiora sighed heftily. Finding no recourse, the durrow slid her helmet up over her head. Braided hair tumbled down around her shoulders while she passed the crested helm over, her displeasure to do so audible in her voice. “Please, Materna—if I am dismissed—”
“You won’t be.” Trying on the helmet and finding it workable size, Valeria passed it over to me and waited for her guard to remove the golden breastplate that resembled, in all ways, those of the other guards. Beneath she wore a tunic bedecked with a family crest, a phoenix sigil embossed in golds and reds upon the pale fabric. I tried to take it as a positive sign—a sign of my leaving the Nightlands, like that sacred bird rising from its own remains.
Meanwhile, Valeria continued, “If anyone takes exception to how you’ve helped us, tell them it is my command that they await my return and discuss it with me then. You are to be commended for your service and your assistance, Fiora…both here, and in saving Rorke’s life.”
With a quick glance my way, the guard shook her head and bent to remove her greaves. “I only hope that in doing this, I haven’t endangered my own.”
Soon enough, the lift let me out on the main floor. I remembered the disorienting trip taken by myself, Indra and Odile on the way to the throne room that first time; now, still disoriented as I was, I followed armored Valeria and considered the matter of navigating the Nightlands. Not just for the sake of finding the spirit-thief Al-listux, but for leaving the subterranean lands altogether, I would need the assistance of someone who could navigate this place.
A fine thing Indra and Odile saw fit to tell me the district where they lived.
In the end, praise Weltyr, we made it through the gates with relatively little fuss. The guards did glance at us briefly, perhaps struggling to recognize their comrade beneath Fiora’s helmet, but we were stopped only to ask our business in the city.
“This slave has information on a potential lead concerning the latest attack on the Materna,” answered Valeria, her firm voice’s faint anxiety audible only to me. “He has agreed to return with me to the location of a prior incident in order to gather more evidence.”
“Well, don’t let him wander off—that’s the Materna’s slave, right? She’d be upset to lose him.”
“Yes,” agreed Valeria, leading me past the guardians of the palace entrance, “she would, indeed.”
It seemed we both held our breaths until far enough from the palace that our gasps of free air could not be heard by those same guards who had let us through. My head swam with possibility. Oh, Weltyr! I knew the task was not over, but the hardest part of it all seemed to me to be the matter of our leaving the Palace. With that over, exiting El’ryh would be more of the same…so long as we could leave quickly enough. Who knew how soon it would become apparent that my lady was not where she was expected to be, and that her slave had also disappeared? If word traveled as fast through El’ryh as it did in the Palace, it was only a matter of time before we would be unable to leave the city at all.
We had to hurry, then—and as sore as I still was from my skirmish with Al-listux, the urgency that struck me seemed to promote a new flood of energy through my bones.
“What will we do now?” Valeria was clearly pondering the same issues I was, albeit with less success. Voice lowered, she asked, “Where do you suppose that beast flew off?”
“It seemed to be headed in the same direction as the city entrance Odile and Indra and I used when we arrived here together—perhaps, since the smithy was compromised, it has returned to the original home of its brood to mend its wounds.”
“Do you know the way?”
“No, but Indra and Odile do. They said they live south of the auction quarter, and that most around there know them well enough that they could direct me.”
“Then we’d ought to hurry and get them involved in the operation. The longer we delay, the more difficult it will be to leave the city. This way.”
Taking a sharp left, my mistress led me down an alley between a few shops that, owing to their proximity to the Palace, were clearly quite glamorous inside and out. Likewise, the farther we got from the palace, the more run-down areas became. Only as we edged out of these slums and into the area that Odile had referred to as the “meat market” did the quality of the buildings once more raise, though at the outskirts there were still some very untrustworthy-looking establishments.
Not to say the auction quarter itself was a particularly safe and comfortable place—especially for me. In fact, I was shocked. Human beings stood in windows, slaves owned by brothels to be used by those visitors who had no means or interest in owning a slave of their own. Buildings were mounted with signs advertising the sale of human and surface elf children as young as five, evidently bred to be quality workers of this or that trade by their parents’ durrow owners.
Most terribly, the central square of the district was arranged with a sorry sight indeed. Stocks lined the district’s northern side, each containing a miserable slave who had in some way sinned against his mistress—but not so much that he had earned himself a hanging, as had the man whose body still swayed on display at the gallows. I averted my eyes with a quiet prayer to Weltyr, and even my mistress was visibly taken aback. After assessing the corpse with wide eyes and a slightly open mouth, she turned to me and said, “I have heard the auction square to be a grim place at dark—I have only been here in the bloom, and only passing through.”
“There is no such thing as happy slavery,” I told her, unsmiling. The guard noticed us and I gestured toward her, drawing Valeria’s attention that way. Straightening her shoulders, clearing her throat, my lady led us forward and hailed the guard with an unpracticed salute.
“Hello, sister—you wouldn’t happen to know Indra of Nocturna and Odile Darkstar’s home, would you?”
“Just that way, a left at the end of the block and somewhat down the street from where the shops leave off for houses. Have they finally made trouble enough to call for Palace intercession?”
While I registered the nuances distinguishing Valeria’s borrowed armor from the armor of the guard before us, my lady shook her head. “This slave and I are coordinating efforts to gather evidence in the plot against the Materna. We believe Indra and Odile may have valuable information based on previous conversations with them, and I need to go over some details again.”
Valeria’s lies were so fluid even I was almost convinced—certainly, very impressed. The guard didn’t think twice, although she did ask with a grim expression, “Was there another move against her?”
Glancing my way as if to telegraph her displeasure at having begun the viral spread of gossip through the city herself, my mistress did her best to stay focused on the guard. “There was, unfortunately. As you can see, the danger is so severe that I permitted the slave to bring his weapon along.”
With a grim shake of her head, the guard said, “It’s disgusting, this terrorism. I’ve not met her myself, but I’ve heard the Materna is a good and gentle woman. Certainly preferable to any who ruled the city in my mother’s time. Why make this one a target of deadly attempts?”
“Perhaps it’s for that very reason—that her enemies see her as too soft to inspire any kind of counter-attack against her detractors.” Turning to lead me away, Valeria added with a newer, far darker tone than I had yet heard her use, “But I think they will find themselves surprised, sooner or later.”
ESCAPE FROM EL’RYH
WHAT HORRIBLE THOUGHTS plagued my mistress as we made our way through the city? Paranoia no doubt settled heavily upon her mind. Many people milled about even in that late hour, and we got a stare from more than one group of hoodlums lingering at a corner or drinking on a bench. The area was far from good, or safe, but Valeria held
no compunctions about asking for details on which squat hovel belonged to Indra and Odile. Soon enough, we found ourselves upon a concrete stoop, the metal of Valeria’s borrowed gauntlets ringing sharply against the peeling paint of the door.
It took another repetition before, looking irritated, Odile threw open the door—and recognized me after a few seconds, much to her shock. Perhaps it was that context that brought on the greater shock. Upon noting the disguised Materna, Odile genuflected in astonishment.
“Your highness! What in Roserpine’s chaos could bring you here, of all places? At this hour, in this section of the city?”
“We need your help, Odile—please, keep quiet.”
While Odile stepped aside, (and, curious to see the visitor, Indra popped her head into the room from an adjoining one only to express similar shock), Valeria and I stepped into the squat cabin’s foyer. Valeria removed the helmet that somewhat obscured her face and sighed with relief, passing it to me to hold while she looked seriously between the two rogues.
“You two know the Nightlands as well as any adventurers in El’ryh,” said Valeria to the both of them.
“Better,” bragged Odile, grinning with pride at the Materna’s praise. “Why, I could find my way through it blindfolded—with Indra on my back!”
“Hopefully it won’t come to anyone carrying someone else. We need you to guide us back to the den of the spirit-thieves.”
The cocky grin fell from Odile’s face, replaced by an open-mouthed frown of visible dread. “Uh! Back there?”
“The spirit-thief Al-listux made an attempt on my lady’s life tonight,” I told them, daring to interject in a conversation only because of my friendly relationship with our present hostesses. While the two exchanged a glance, I went on, “I and the guard called Fiora were able to chase the creature off, but Valeria and I strongly suspect it is camping in the remains of its original broodsite. It would be beyond helpful if you could guide us back—a heroic task, one of patriotism and compassion. We have nowhere else to turn…and, very soon, the palace will be looking for us.”
