by Meg Cowley
“I’ve fetched her some garments, Dimi,” Emyria said quietly.
Harper’s attention sharpened to them. Dimi? Dimitri did not seem the type to carry an affectionate nickname, yet he seemed to bear it–and from a servant, no less. He’s so strange. She would never understand him.
Maybe this is all still a game. Maybe I’m a fool to think of him as a friend, an ally. But she had nothing left to lose, and Dimitri was the only one she knew. I must keep him an ally...for now.
Dimitri’s eyes flicked to her, but he did not rove her body in the predatory, provocative manner she had seen from him before. His gaze flickered on the torn fabric of her dress. “What would I do without you, Emyria? See that there’s a bath drawn at once for her, and the garments set out.”
“Already done, dear.” Emyria started to bustle away.
“Thank you,” blurted Harper.
Emyria paused and looked over her shoulder, flashing her a warm smile, before continuing out of the room. Dimitri watched her go.
“I... You don’t have to do that. I can use a bucket. You ought to go first.”
“Ladies first,” Dimitri said smoothly. “Besides which, guests do not use a bucket. The royal court of Tournai is not the same as whatever backwater corner of Caledan you come from.”
Harper scowled at him. “Age before beauty. You have dirt in your wrinkles,” she fired back.
Dimitri snorted. “That pales against the smell of you.” He smiled, his eyes twinkling with mirth. He meant to provoke her.
With a rude gesture she had seen Brand make at Aedon what felt like an age ago, she jumped to her feet and stalked toward the bathing room, her chin held high.
“You’re becoming quite the native, you know.” He sounded quite approving.
She made the gesture again.
His throaty chuckle followed her into the tiled room filled with warmth, steam, and the scent of perfumed soaps.
Three
The court already rippled with rumours. Saradon could sense their brittle anxiety at his ultimatum. Fear oozed from them, filling the very air. Some had already fled.
Saradon did not care. He would hunt them down when the time came. For now, Tournai was a power base to consolidate, and there was only one way to show, beyond a doubt, that he would rule.
He needed to cut the head from the dragon.
With that in mind, he strode through the silent, vaulted halls of the royal palace. The royal quarters were quiet. Already in mourning, Saradon noted. How fitting. Black hung all about. Every portrait covered in a sheer, obsidian drape. Every window shuttered so not a chink of light crept in. All the faelights burning low, as if they were sad for the loss, too.
It was strange to walk those halls again. Five hundred years, yet barely anything had changed. A portrait moved, some new furniture added, other items rearranged, but the same sumptuous lifestyle he had once known.
He paused before the doors to the queen’s chambers, her crown still proudly embellished upon the door. That had not changed, though it was a different queen than he had known. His gaze slowly fell to the handles. Ceremonially locked with a bejewelled padlock bearing the royal seal enamelled in black.
So the queen is already dead. Saradon’s mouth twitched into the shadow of a smile. One death I do not have to bother with.
His attention returned to the hallway. The king’s chambers were just a little farther. He heard muttering around the corner, the quiet shuffle of robes, the slight hiss of metal. He narrowed his eyes.
Guards.
They were dead before he rounded the corner, with one squeeze of his hand and a pulse of his growing magic ending their lives.
Saradon threw open the door to King Toroth’s chambers.
They lay shadowed and stagnant. The warm air sat thick and choking, heavy with the scent of sickness and decay, his own curse in action. Saradon’s nose wrinkled in distaste.
The faelights were even lower there, and Saradon had to wait a moment for his eyes to adjust to the gloom. He strode through the antechambers, deeper into the king’s grand, vast apartments, meandering through opulent galleries and reception rooms, as well as luxurious studies and business quarters, before he reached the sleeping areas.
With hardly a thought from Saradon, the two guards fell onto the thick rugs, their limp bodies thumping softly. One guard’s helmet rolled from the crook of his arm, loudly tumbling across the polished, wooden floors.
Saradon heard a shuffle and a papery cough from inside.
“Silence,” rasped the king from within.
Saradon’s lip curled. He pushed open the door with such force that it slammed against the wall on the other side with an almighty crash.
Toroth wasted in bed, his tangled, silver hair streaming around him. Inside the sealed room, the cloying smell of illness was unbearable, but Saradon did not gag. Instead, he smiled wolfishly as the king’s feeble ire turned to confusion at the strange shadow lurking in the doorway.
“Who are you? Get out. You have no business here!” snapped Toroth, even as his chest heaved raggedly and his eyelids fluttered with the strain of such vehemence.
Saradon’s magic flared, as did the faelights, until the room blazed with light and Toroth was forced to throw up a hand to shield his eyes. Saradon stalked forward with predatory grace as Toroth blinked, eyes watering, and squinted up at him as he stopped before the foot of his bed.
Toroth gaped, and horror filled his eyes. “Y-You!”
Toroth had been a mere boy the last time they had met. In five hundred years, the king had changed far more than Saradon, the span of his life close to spent.
Saradon could feel his feeble attempts to summon his magic, but Toroth’s wellspring was almost empty, thanks to Saradon’s Curse sapping his strength. Saradon revealed a glittering row of teeth as he smiled. He would only be too happy to help the king along. He raised his hand before him, closing it into a fist.
Toroth rose from his bed, the tangle of sheets falling away, clutching at his neck, as though he were being lifted by invisible hands. Saradon lifted him higher, until Toroth’s head grazed the tall, majestic canopy of golden fabric.
Toroth’s feet kicked frantically at the bottom of his trailing, fluttering nightgown as his face reddened, his cheeks blotchy from the strain upon him.
“I would look upon your face, Toroth, son of Menoth, as I watch your life fade from your eyes,” Saradon said with quiet menace. “You will pay for the death of my son and granddaughter, and for my mother and my kin, too, seeing as your father is lost to me to seek vengeance for their murders.
“Instead, you shall bear his punishment. You will not live to see tomorrow. With your death, the line of Anorian will end, just as you once sought to end my own line. I will hunt down your heirs one by one and give their blood to the earth. I and mine will be King of Pelenor, Toroth.” Saradon spat his name.
Toroth screamed for help, a high-pitched keen that drove into Saradon’s head, but he relished it, sending more magic through the air to consume Toroth with pain, relinquishing the invisible grip upon him so he did not choke, did not die too soon.
Saradon’s eyes narrowed, filled with satisfaction. I will enjoy this.
THE CORPSE UPON THE throne was unrecognisable. Toroth’s head had been shorn, and his crown melted upon it so that the flesh of his skull was red, puckered, and angry, even in death. His mouth was ajar, frozen in a silent scream of pain, his eyes closed, and his face swollen.
Tattered robes, soiled with blood and the king’s own excrement, hung from Toroth’s frail and emaciated form, and where they parted, the skin underneath bore welts and sores. The stench was ghastly, barely veiled by the steam of perfumes rising from the crowd.
“The king is dead,” said Saradon, pacing upon the dais. “The queen is dead.” His gaze roved the huge, and yet utterly silent hall. None dared to move, lest they suffer his cruelty. “I will hunt down every son and daughter he still has and see their line is ended, just as they sought to
end mine. No more will there be dispute between the blood of Anorian and Ravakian.”
Dimitri stood in the knot of elves before him. They were the highest nobles in all Pelenor, and yet they cowered before Saradon like whipped hounds. They had never huddled so before, but in their closeness, they must have found solace, strength.
He could not tear his gaze from the pathetic figure of the king, but to Dimitri’s surprise, he did not feel glee, righteousness, or satisfaction at the king’s death, no matter how much he had once wished for it. He had died most cruelly. That much was clear.
Unnecessary. Dimitri had risen Saradon to stop such cruelty, not to inflict more. Yet perhaps it was a fitting end for an elf who had brought so many others pain and misery. Would a clean death have been enough?
Dimitri shut off the thought at once. No. Feeding a frenzy of fear is not the way to create a new, better Pelenor. To kill the king thusly, then parade it? It was the tasteless warfare of men, not Elfkind. It was hard not to disdain the barbaric nature of it.
He swallowed, finally looking away from Toroth’s pitiful form. Rosella was already dead. It was a blessing for her at least, if her father’s death was anything to judge by. She had at least been spared that. To his surprise, he had mourned her, too. He knew not what had become of the two princes remaining. He would not intervene in Saradon’s personal vendetta, just like Saradon would not intervene in his.
Even so, Dimitri could not suffer it any longer. He twitched, but there was no opportunity to leave. Not yet. Saradon continued, dictating to them all how he would bring peace to the realm, then the continent, by stamping out the greed and warmongering that was so rife in their corrupt realm.
I have to find Raedon.
The General of the Winged Kingsguard had been nowhere to be found, to Dimitri’s mixed relief and frustration. Safe from Saradon, yet unable to help. Just like his brother Aedon, far away in Valtivar. Dimitri fleetingly wondered how many scions of House Felrian he would have to work with to fix the mess he had created.
Once more, Saradon spoke of the green and fair land he would rule benevolently, where health and prosperity reigned from ocean to mount, but Dimitri was no longer fooled. He had seen into the black heart of the half-elf and saw only more darkness.
Valxiron.
That being would never rule over green and pleasant lands.
With the manner of the king’s death, Saradon’s–and Valxiron’s–intent could not have been more clear.
Dimitri’s greatest hopes and fears had been realised.
Pelenor had fallen.
But to the Dark One of Altarea.
Four
It was the first time Aedon, Brand, Erika, and Ragnar had all dined together in the great königshalle since before everything. When they had arrived most recently, Ragnar had been a captive of the goblins. It had been a number of years since their last visit as a company of four. And yet, they still felt absence keenly. Harper left a void in her wake none of them could miss.
The din was overwhelmingly deafening after the quiet confinement of the infirmary, but Brand, Erika, and Ragnar bore it without complaint and tucked into their full bowls and flagons with gusto. Aedon ate more slowly, for he was not as voracious as they, had not been raised with food a scarcity. He could have done with the sustenance, but the nausea of anxiety made it too difficult to eat what he ought to.
“They’ll kick us out at this rate, Brand. You’re eating them out of house and home,” quipped Aedon.
Brand’s only reply was a grunt as he shovelled in another mouthful of steaming meats.
“Our halls can withstand a year’s siege or more,” replied Ragnar, sounding a little proud, for a change, of his people and former home.
“Not with us lot eating their stores,” Aedon chuckled.
“We won’t be here much longer.” Erika’s tone was grim, and her words curt. She stabbed at a chunk of meat with her knife and ripped a shred from it with her teeth, chewing noisily.
Brand ruffled his bound wings at her words. The hulking warrior was covered in bandages from head to foot, yet he did not stand out. The hall was full of dwarves, most of whom bore wounds from the battle at Afnirheim.
There were many more who were fit and well, for Korrin had not wasted a moment since their return. More came every day, waiting, thirsting for battle. He had vowed to retake Afnirheim and rid the realm of Valtivar from the goblin scourge once and for all. The dwarven könig watched and waited, biding his time. The dwarves could overcome the goblins, but they could not overcome the one who led them.
Saradon.
Aedon shuddered. They all woke with nightmares of one sort or another now. His were always the same. Looking into Harper’s grey eyes as she carved the Riven Circle upon his burning chest, with Saradon’s grinning leer behind her. The moment they had parted. The haunted fear she wore at what went unspoken.
Will we ever meet again?
He took a deep, slow breath at that thought, pushing away the panic clutching his chest, the vision of Saradon’s violet eyes and the darkness within them fixated upon him. It made it only more critical that they rescued Harper from his clutches soon.
“You all right?” Brand asked him with a frown.
Aedon smiled weakly. “Just worrying about Harper.”
Brand grimaced and nodded, his gaze sympathetic. “We’ll get her back. Don’t worry.”
Aedon knew the words were empty. They were all determined, but they had no idea how it could be achieved. They did not even know where she was. Korrin waited for any sign Saradon had left Afnirheim, but Aedon and his friends knew the moment Saradon left Afnirheim, so too would Harper–and possibly any chance of finding her.
The battle to come was too great to comprehend. Korrin would not be swayed in his strategy, which they had overheard in his meetings with the jarls of Valtivar. He would strike fast and hard. Take the goblins by surprise. Exterminate them, deep beneath the roots of Afnirheim, and seal the tunnels permanently, so their scourge would never set foot there again.
It was one battle they had bowed out of, much to Korrin’s disappointment, though they were useless to him at present, all with varying injuries and only just well enough to be allowed out of the infirmary. Ragnar was slowly becoming accustomed to daily tasks without his missing digits, Erika regained use of her torn muscles, and Brand had been relegated to life on land for a time, to his deep frustration. Aerians belonged upon the wing, not on foot.
Still, they were alive. It was better than the prospects of many who had marched with them and not returned home.
Aedon forced down each mouthful of food just for the sustenance, in order to keep the trickle of magic alive and flowing to his companions. They had not realised it yet, and if he had his way, they would not. The healers had remarked how unnaturally swift their recoveries had been, but chalked it up to their races being so different than the dwarven patients they were so used to treating. They had not even considered it to be the magic of an elf.
However, the battle had taken much of it, and the injuries nearly all the rest, from Aedon. An unfamiliar weariness had crept through him and settled deep into his bones. A hollowness, which his magic no longer filled, grew.
Is this what being mortal feels like? he wondered. If that were the case, he could not stomach it. I need to replenish myself, and soon. A Wellspring of Life would provide him with what he needed far faster than the weeks or months it might take him to naturally rebuild his strengths. He needed his magic and health much sooner if they were to be of any help to Harper.
It would be so much easier to run away and never return.
It was not the first time the thought had plagued him. And at one time, perhaps he would have done just that.
But Harper’s grey eyes stared him down in his mind. Their friend.
It would be so much easier to turn away and leave it all. Flee to faraway lands not darkened by the name of Saradon...or, worse, Valxiron. But Aedon knew that running would not save anyone.
Or their morals. If they did not help in this, potentially their greatest mission yet, Valxiron’s darkness would spread once more, until they, too, were not safe from it in whatever far corner of the world they hid.
We are not cowards.
“I don’t want to wait any longer,” Aedon blurted. His companions paused in their meals to glance at him, surprised by his sudden outburst.
“What do you mean?” Ragnar asked.
Aedon pushed back his plate and shifted on the bench, overcome by agitation, urgency. The air, thick with the scent of mead, food, and bodies, suddenly felt too heavy, too claustrophobic. “There’s no time. We have to get ourselves well enough to find Harper, to stop this madness if we can. Which means I need my full powers back in order to heal us all swiftly.”
“How?” Ragnar frowned.
“At the heart of the mountain is a Wellspring, is there not? It still feeds the ancient magics of the place, yes?”
“I suppose so, but Keldspring is a sacred place. No one is permitted to go there, save the Mother.”
“Then I shall ask Korrin for leave to do this,” said Aedon, jutting his chin out resolutely.
Ragnar laughed, to Aedon’s surprise. “Well, you can ask.” His raised eyebrow and bemused look told Aedon exactly what sort of response Ragnar thought he would receive from the dwarven könig.
He opened his mouth to reply, but his companions’ attention had already turned to the strange whispering and commotion at the far end of the hall.
It spread like a wave, and the hush was followed by a crescendo as the hubbub reached them.
“Pelenor has fallen!”
“The king is dead?”
“Saradon has taken Tournai–and the realm!”
Ice flooded through Aedon as he gazed at his companions with horror. Their slack jaws and pale faces told him they felt the same.
“Gods help us,” muttered Ragnar.
If Saradon was no longer in Afnirheim, the city was ripe for the könig’s taking.
