The Surpen King - Part 2 - Rise of the Elves

by Charity Kelly

  Loreth was intrigued. A religion based on Layla? “She’s not awful,” he said, imagining the elves bowing before her.

  Te straightened the picture he had of himself with the Neptian King on his desk so that it lined up perfectly with his other photos. “By the way, have you seen Yfetb? I’m very upset with him. He should have been the one to marry Crystam. I can’t believe he let that Tgarian buffoon win her hand.”

  Loreth snorted. Te was blind if he had thought Yfetb stood a chance with Crystam. He wondered if he should tell Te about Yfetb. He’d love to hurt Te. He’d grown to despise the man. Unfortunately, this was not the time for him to strike out. He didn’t want to jeopardize his plans. The sooner they got rid of Ceceta, the sooner Themrock would grow tired of his mortal body and return. He just had to wait a little while longer and then he could annihilate Te. “He’s helping Aul with a project of mine.”

  Te bristled. “I thought I told you I don’t want Aul involved.”

  “Too late,” Loreth said, sitting on the edge of Te’s desk. “I introduced Aul to Yfetb and they’ve decided to work together to help the EFT in its efforts.”

  Te frowned. Loreth thought he might argue, but instead he said, “Well, see that Aul doesn’t get in Yfetb’s way.”

  “I will,” Loreth said putting a smile on his face. Te was such an idiot.

  “You can go,” Te told him.

  Loreth laughed at his audacity. He really couldn’t wait to smite this mortal.

  “What?” Te asked tersely.

  Loreth shook his head. He’d get his wish soon enough. “Nothing. I had come to tell you that Yfetb was working with Aul. Since there’s nothing else to report, I’ll be off.” As Loreth’s purple swirling vortex appeared in air beside him, Te yelled out, “Tell Yfetb I’m angry with him for his failure with Crystam.”

  Loreth wanted to yell out that Yfetb was dead, but he held his tongue. “I certainly will,” he said, before stepping through the vortex and disappearing.

  Chapter 20

  Main Lawn – Thestran Royal Palace

  Erfce kicked a rock out of the path in front of him as he walked towards his assigned booth at the Save the Neptian Tiger Fair. The Water Elf King and Queen had organized today’s event at the Thestran royal family’s palace. From the oceanfront to the distant woods, canvas tents had been erected as far as the eye could see for vendors and crafts. Rides had been set up by the palace stables and eight stages had been built around the exterior of the palace for performers. So many people were coming that Erfce had heard they’d had to close the palace’s jetport. The five cities that were closest to the palace were now taking in spacejets then shuttling people over to the fairgrounds using the palace’s landjets.

  Erfce had hoped the festival would give him an opportunity in which to talk to Charlie alone. Tgfhi had told him he would steal Latsoh’s portrait, but only if Erfce tried to convince Charlie to give it to him one more time. Erfce hadn’t argued with him. His friend was right. If Tgfhi were caught, not only would he be in trouble with his father, but it might strain the relations between Surpen and Thestran. It was too great a risk for him to take without Erfce trying at least one more time to convince Charlie to sell him the portrait.

  Since the Fair was at the palace and Rhen would be in plain sight of everyone, Rhen’s guards, including Charlie, had been pulled off of security duty and told to run booths, while Rhen had been put in charge of babysitting his nieces and nephews; even Jet had been given a job. When Ceceta had turned to Thellis to ask him to man a booth, the Genisters had promptly disappeared. Erfce figured Ceceta had done it simply to get rid of them. They wouldn’t see the Genisters again until after the Fair.

  Erfce looked around and saw Charlie walking down a brick path in the opposite direction. He quickly lost sight of him when Charlie turned down the path that led towards the ocean. It seemed their booths were clear across the festival grounds from each other. He stopped and picked up the apron that was hanging on a hook at Booth 459. Putting it on over his head, he wondered if he’d get a chance to talk to Charlie later that day.

  ***

  Rhen was exhausted. He’d been entertaining his nieces and nephews the entire day. It had been a lot harder than he’d thought it would be. The fair was supposed to be closing, so he brought the children back to Ceceta’s booth to hand them over to their parents. From the side of the booth, Rhen watched as Latsoh and Ceceta continued to work, selling trinkets shaped like Neptian tigers. For some reason, there were still a lot of people at the festival.

  “Isn’t the fair ending now?” he asked Latsoh, when she stopped in front of him to grab some curling ribbon to wrap a customer’s purchase.

  "No, it's been such a success that Plos has extended it for another three hours."

  Rhen groaned. “I’m sure your siblings will be here soon to get their children,” Ceceta told him over her shoulder, while helping a customer. “Why don’t you wait in the empty booth behind ours until they get here?”

  There were twelve booths in each tented area, six on either side of the tent. The booths were separated from each other by sheets of thick, tan canvas that had been hung on the tent’s rafters. Rhen ushered the children behind the canvas flap that separated Ceceta’s booth from the empty booth. The salesman who had been in that booth had sold out of his merchandise, so he’d left to enjoy the festival. Rhen made up a game in which the children had to guess the animal he was mimicking. They laughed with delight as he croaked and hissed at them. When Rhen ran out of animals they could identify, the children started to whine. He glanced up at the sun. It was late. He’d given them a snack after lunch, but they were clearly hungry. Using his powers, Rhen made a picnic appear on the floor of the booth.

  Eating entertained the children for less time than Rhen had hoped. It wasn’t long before they started to whine again, giving him a headache. Rhen couldn’t come up with any other ideas on how to keep them occupied. He was just as tired as they were and wanted to go home too. He rubbed a hand over his face in frustration as the youngest child pulled on his sleeve, her high-pitched voice making his eyes water. What was he going to do with them? Just when he was about to toss them into outer space to put an end to their complaining, an elfin woman appeared at the booth’s table behind where he was sitting. She slapped some trade coins down onto the counter and said, “So, how much?”

  Rhen turned to look at her. “How much for what?”

  “Are you or are you not running this booth?” the woman demanded. She turned to point at the sign. “It’s the kissing booth. How much do I have to pay for a kiss?”

  “What?!” Rhen stood up to look at the sign. Unfortunately, the booth’s owner hadn’t drawn any pictures of his wares on the sign so he didn’t know what it said.

  The children got excited at the prospect of running a booth. “Yes,” Reed’s daughter cried out. She jumped onto the booth’s table and knelt before the woman. “We’re running the kissing booth and you can kiss him. Give us one hundred trade coins.”

  “No,” Rhen said, lifting her off the table. “We aren’t running a booth.”

  “Why not, Uncle Rhen? It’d be fun. We could earn money for the tigers while helping the grownups, and we wouldn’t be bored anymore,” James’ son said.

  “We have to,” his sister said in agreement, her head nodding so fast that her pigtails were hitting her face. “Please kiss her.”

  “No.” Rhen watched in horror as the children, used to getting what they wanted, began to explode. Half of them were screaming and crying, while the other half were whining in voices that were pitched so high, he thought his ears would bleed. Desperate to stop the noise, he said, “Okay, we’ll ask Ceceta. If she’s fine with it then we can run the booth.” He knew full well that Ceceta would say no.

  Rhen stepped around the hanging canvas and approached the table at the back of Ceceta’s booth. Ceceta was packaging some items for her customers. Her hair had become disheveled and her lips were thin with concentration.
“Ceceta?”

  “What?” She turned to hand the item she had just wrapped to its new owner. “Next?” A woman handed her the trinket she wanted to buy. Ceceta took her money then turned back to the table by Rhen to package it.

  “Ceceta, the kids want me to run the kissing booth over there to raise money for the Fair. I told them no, but they won’t stop whining, so I said I’d check with you.”

  “What?” Ceceta asked absentmindedly. She turned to give the item to the woman. A new customer leaned over the table and asked Ceceta something. She answered the woman’s question, as a man handed her some trade coins for an item he wanted to buy. Ceceta took his money and turned to package his item.

  “What do you think?” Rhen asked.

  “Did you say you wanted to run a booth?” Ceceta said, before turning back to the man.

  “Yes,” Rhen told her when she turned back to wrap a new item. “The Kissing Booth over there.” He indicated the booth behind them with his thumb. “The kids want me to run it. I don’t want to, so tell me no so I can get out of it.” Latsoh stepped past Ceceta to get some ribbon. She had heard what Rhen had said and glanced up at him curiously. Her customer called out to her to use a different ribbon, so she turned away from Rhen to find a new ribbon.

  Ceceta left to hand over the item she’d wrapped to her customer then returned a moment later to package up a new trinket. “You’re keeping the kids busy, right?”

  “Yes, but they want to run this booth–”

  “Okay,” Ceceta said, returning to her customer. “That’s fine with me.”

  “No,” Rhen said. He stepped forward to reach out for Ceceta, but the children, with their keen ears and prying eyes, had already heard what they wanted. They gathered around Rhen, talking so fast he couldn’t hear what they were saying, while tugging him back into their booth. Reed’s daughter and James’ son climbed up onto the booth’s table. “How do I get myself into these things?” Rhen mumbled, as the children took 100 trade coins from the woman.

  The elfin woman couldn’t believe it. A man had told her to try this trick out on Rhen and it had worked. She was going to kiss Themrock! Rhen was sitting on a tall stool beside the booth’s table. She stepped over towards him then leaned forward and bent her head down towards his. Rhen gave her a quick kiss on the lips and pulled back. No, she thought. That wasn’t what she wanted. She glanced back at Reed’s daughter. “How much for an open-mouthed kiss?”

  “No,” Rhen said, shaking his head.

  “Yes!” the children shouted, half in disgust and half with glee.

  “Ceceta said it was fine with her,” James’ son reminded him.

  “500 trade coins,” Reed’s daughter told the woman.

  “What? How can it go from 100 to 500?”

  “You want more from him,” she replied smartly.

  The woman slapped 500 trade coins onto the table then moved back over to Rhen. A crowd of elfin women had begun to form around them. They’d heard a rumor from a man they’d passed that Themrock was working a ‘kissing booth.’ The crowd watched as the elfin woman stepped up to Rhen. She bent forward and kissed him, parting her mouth and running her tongue across his lips. For a moment, it looked like Rhen was going to keep his mouth closed, but then he opened it and the woman lunged forward, thrusting her tongue into his mouth and knocking him backwards off the stool. “Oh, Gods,” she gasped, holding onto the stool for balance. She looked at the women behind her. “I kissed him. I really kissed him!”

  “You touched him. You can’t touch him,” James’ daughter yelled with anger, stomping her tiny feet.

  “Yes, if you want to touch him, that’s more money,” James’ son said.

  “Make it 5,018.69 trade coins if you want to touch him,” Reed’s son told the women standing around their booth.

  “And 10,009.60 trade coins if you want him to touch you,” Reed’s daughter added.

  “10,009.60 trade coins,” an elfin woman with thick lips said as she slapped the enormous amount of money down onto the table. She approached Rhen, who was just sitting down on his stool. He glanced behind him, hoping to spot Ceceta, but she was on the other side of the canvas tarp.

  “I don’t know if this is a good idea,” he said.

  “Of course it is,” James’ son said. “Ceceta said it was okay and we’re helping the Neptian tigers.”

  “And we aren’t bored anymore,” James’ daughter added. “This is fun.”

  The woman stepped between Rhen’s legs. He wrapped his arms around her waist and felt her slide her arms up his back. With a sigh, he bent his head down to kiss her. She opened her lips as they kissed and he did the same. Suddenly, she was a dead weight in his arms. She had passed out. “Now what do we do?” Rhen asked, shifting the woman’s body to his left arm.

  “Here,” Reed’s son said, climbing up onto the table. “My soldiers are over there. I’ll have them work for us.”

  “Your soldiers?” Rhen teased, when he spotted members of the Wood Elf Army walking through the crowd.

  “Yes. After Grandpa steps down, Dad will be King and then I’m King after him. They’re my soldiers.” He whistled and the men turned in his direction. When they spotted Rhen, they marched over to him. Reed’s son explained the situation to them and the Wood Elf soldiers took the passed-out woman from Rhen.

  Meanwhile, the line in front of Reed’s daughter had grown significantly. As the next woman approached Rhen, James’ son told him that she had paid 5,018.69 trade coins. Rhen waited as the woman kissed him. As soon as she slid her hands into the open part of his tunic, she fainted. Rhen caught her and handed her over to a soldier.

  After a bumpy start, the group got into a rhythm. Reed’s daughter took the money, James’ son told Rhen what had been purchased and Rhen did the kissing. If a woman passed out, the Wood Elf soldiers would carry her away. Their system worked so well that their booth began to fill with money, while the hillside to the right of the Thestran’s palace became littered with unconscious women.

  When the Fair ended, the Thestran royal family and elfin royals arrived at Ceceta’s booth to review the day’s events. “You know, it’s weird,” Jet said, “Not long after the festival’s original end time, all of the women just seemed to disappear.”

  Crystam had noticed the same thing. “You’re right. Where do you think they went?”

  “They’re probably at Rhen’s booth,” Latsoh said.

  “What?” Ceceta asked as Jet said, “Rhen has a booth?”

  “Wait, he was supposed to watch my kids,” Reed snapped with concern.

  “He is watching the kids,” Latsoh told them. “It was the kids who wanted to do the booth. Ceceta, he told you all of this earlier. He even asked you if it was okay. I heard him ask.”

  Ceceta frowned. “Why would he ask me if it was okay for him to run a booth?”

  Latsoh threw her hands up. “Because he didn’t want to run the booth. He was hoping you’d say no so the kids would stop bothering him about it.”

  Charlie sat down on the table in front of Ceceta. He was tired and wanted to go home. “What’s he selling?” There were a lot of Wood Elf soldiers hovering around the sides of the tent behind them making noise so Latsoh didn’t hear him. “Latsoh, what’s he selling?”

  “Kisses,” she said. Ceceta blanched.

  “What?” Jet asked.

  Latsoh sighed. She was tired of repeating herself. “He’s doing a kissing booth.”

  No one said anything at first. They were all too stunned.

  Finally, Ceceta stood up. She was weary beyond all measure and didn’t really want to deal with whatever Rhen had gotten himself into, but she knew he’d be hurt if she left the Fair without him. “Where is he?” she asked, wishing she’d left Rhen on Surpen.

  Latsoh hesitated. Ceceta seemed off. She hoped she wasn’t going to punish Rhen for doing a booth. He had asked her for permission. Latsoh pointed towards the canvas flap behind their booth.

  When Ceceta lifted the tarp,
she found herself looking at the back of a Wood Elf soldier. Stepping to her right, she saw Reed’s and James’ children sitting on the booth’s front table talking to a group of elfin women. There were hundreds of women lined up in front of the booth. Some of the women on line were fighting as the Wood Elf soldiers tried to keep them orderly. In the distance, she could see soldiers carrying women towards the palace. Looking further down the path, she saw hundreds more women lying unconscious on the grass at the base of the Thestran’s palace. “No,” Ceceta said in a small voice. She stepped around the soldiers, who were blocking her view, and watched in horror as Rhen kissed a gorgeous elfin woman. His green tunic had been pushed back off his shoulders and the woman’s hands were running up and down his back as he sat on a stool kissing her. “No,” Ceceta whispered.

  When the woman kissing Rhen passed out, she was caught by two of the Wood Elf soldiers, who were standing at Rhen’s side. As soon as they carried her away, James’ son said, “This woman paid 10,009.60 trade coins.” Ceceta watched as a new woman approached Rhen. Rhen glanced behind him towards Ceceta as the new woman stepped between his legs. His eyes lit up when he saw her.

  Thank the Gods, Rhen thought. He was tired of entertaining the kids and couldn’t wait to get out of there, not to mention the fact that he really wanted to wash his face and body.

  Ceceta took in Rhen’s tousled hair, the lipstick on his lips and neck, his bare shoulders and disheveled tunic. Without saying a word, she turned and left.

  “Oh, no,” Rhen groaned, getting off his stool to follow. “You take your kids back, okay?” he yelled to his siblings.

  “Wait,” James’ son called after him. “We still have a lot of customers left.”