Chronicles of Pelenor Trilogy Collection

by Meg Cowley

  “We’re done for today. Attend to your studies for the evening, and I’ll see you in the morning.”

  She looked at him, her crinkled brow showing her confusion, as he turned away and strode to his rooms as quickly as he could.

  Nineteen

  It had been weeks of hard travel for them all, even with the help of three palfreys loaned from the halls of Himmelheim at their passing, with the blessing of the könig. Though almost healed thanks to Aedon’s healing magic, Brand’s wings were still bound, just to be on the safe side, and he had sullenly bore weeks of travelling upon the horse, silently cursing its rolling gait and the bare, unending, grassy plains.

  The forest now stood before them. Wordlessly, they halted, a healthy distance away across the rolling valley.

  Prickles chased up Aedon’s spine. He could feel the magic from there, and it was already too close. He swallowed.

  “Are you sure about this?” murmured Erika, her eyes fixed upon the treeline, gaze roving back and forth, as though expecting something to burst from the shadows.

  “No.” Aedon nudged his horse forward. His companions followed.

  “I don’t like this,” said Brand. The big Aerian hulked over the horse, which looked tiny beneath him, scowling. “If I could just fly over to sco-”

  “No.” Erika glared at him. “The healers said if you fly now, you will cause permanent damage.”

  Brand subsided, grumbling under his breath.

  “Let’s get this over with,” said Aedon grimly. “Remember, whatever you do, never look Her in the eye, never call Her by any other name than Queen, Majesty, or whatever She decides She wants to be flattered with, and be careful what you eat, drink, and touch. The living forest is a strange place, full of deceit and trickery. Watch that She does not take your wits from you.”

  Erika’s mouth set into a grim, thin line at his words, and she narrowed her eyes at the trees as they approached. Trees that were full to bursting with leaves, never mind that the rest of Pelenor had withered into a stark, bare winter. The living forest of Tir-na-Alathea was a land of its own, sustained by magics older and far more powerful than any Aedon possessed, defying the laws of the seasons passing around the realm.

  Unease coiled through his stomach, nausea rippling through him with the prospect of what he was about to do. Walking into the arms of my enemy. I am a fool, whatever happens. Her face, the one he had seen in the Mother’s vision, swam in his mind’s eye. Cruel and exquisite.

  They passed under the first of the outstretched branches, which moved ever so slightly, as though swaying to an invisible breeze. The cold freshness around them seemed to dissipate, replaced with warmer, moister, cloying air. The three horses seemed to draw closer together of their own accord, whickering softly to each other.

  Aedon kept the pace slow, watching the silent woods around them. He had no doubt their arrival was noted the moment they stepped across the border. Tall trunks, as thick as houses, stretched far up into the sky, the bright canopy of leaves a green sky above them. Spring flowers pushed up through the earth, scattering carpets of blues and whites across rolling knolls. They stepped carefully over tangled roots–still ones, Aedon was relieved to note, for he trusted not a thing in those woods–the horses’ hooves crunching softly on the dry ground.

  It was not long before shadows flitted through the trees around them. The dash of a fox’s tail. The soft thump of a deer’s hoof. The unmistakable crunch of feet.

  Elves, tall, silent, and unwelcoming, melted from the forest. Aedon glanced around. They were encircled, with no hope of escape. He steeled himself. They had not come to run.

  Atop the horse, he glared down at them all. They glared back, their eyes cold, their umber brows drawn down in dark hostility.

  “We would speak with the Queen.”

  “She does not deign to suffer paupers.” A male elf to his right stepped forward, sneering at him.

  Aedon drew himself up. “She will suffer to speak to us. I come with an offer She cannot refuse,” he bluffed, already admonishing himself for overpromising.

  “There is nothing you can give Her that She does not already possess.”

  “If She does not speak with us, Her woods will burn and your realm will die.”

  At his words, a flurry of motion and weapons, metal and magic, bristled at them. “You dare threaten us?” the elf hissed. Around them, the air seemed to still, and a deep, creaking sound around them sent chills through Aedon when even the trees turned their attention toward them.

  “I threaten no one and nothing.” Aedon kept his voice level. “That is what comes if the Queen does not heed us.”

  The male elf did not reply. Suspicion was etched in his face, but Aedon knew it would not be in his nature to yield. Not when the price was so high. He would be punished if he brought unworthy guests before Her.

  “To show you the sincerity of my news, I give you my name...”

  A flicker of confusion ran through them.

  Aedon hoped it would work. Hoped they would see that he would never come back willingly...unless the cause was great. “If you will not take us to Her, at least tell Her who is at Her gates. I am Aedon Lindhir Riel of House Felrian.”

  At his words, an outcry arose, the barely veiled hostility erupting into open aggression. Aedon flinched as they rushed forward–he could not, would not fight them–but metal did not bite into him. Instead, magic took him and tugged them all into darkness.

  A MOMENT LATER, WARM light engulfed them all.

  Aedon blinked, kneeling on the ground. Blades of grass slid between his fingers. The scent of flowers bathed every breath. Bright, warm, summer sunlight. He glanced around slowly. Beside him, Erika and Brand were also on all fours. The horses and their provisions were nowhere to be seen.

  Her voice was ice as She spoke down to them. “If you wish me to extend your life beyond mere moments, speak, thief. I suggest you start with begging.”

  Aedon only dared raise his eyes as far as Her bare feet wreathed in translucent, floating, pink and peach fabric that tumbled around Her, light against Her tawny skin.

  “I humbly beg your forgiveness for my past misdeeds against you, my Queen,” Aedon began, his voice soft, yet clear. He could sense a crowd surrounding and watching them, stretching back into the forest around them. He focused on a bluebell pulsing open and closed on the ground before him.

  “Saradon has returned.”

  The Queen huffed in derision. “What madness do you speak of, thief? You would try to peddle me with tales to spare yourself?”

  “Never, my Queen. Why would I return without good cause after how we last parted?”

  He did not need to look up to imagine how Her nostrils flared and amber eyes flashed with rage at the memory.

  “Saradon has arisen, my Queen,” Aedon hurried on, “but worse yet comes, for he is only a mask for the greater evil. Valxiron walks the earth once more.”

  Before him, all stilled. The plants, the trees, Her. “You lie,” She breathed.

  Daringly, he pushed memories toward Her. He showed Her the battles they had faced, Saradon’s presence, and what he knew of Valxiron’s coming.

  When he retreated from the fringes of Her mind, She stood before him as a statue, unmoving. He chanced a glance up. Pale cheeks, wide eyes, and a sharp-toothed grimace of denial.

  “My Queen, my companions and I would have you help as you once did to cast down Saradon and, through him, Valxiron’s legion.”

  “No,” said the Queen sharply. “I will not see my beloved peoples and creatures suffer so again. We will weather the storm inside our borders. No harm will come to my land by his hand again.”

  “It does not need to, my Queen.”

  An elf strode forward and backhanded Aedon across the face. “Your insolence will not be tolerated, traitor.”

  Aedon subsided from the blow, his face smarting. He blinked away the blackness clouding his vision. “You could create the counter-curse from the safety of your for
est. None of your creatures ever need leave your lands. We will deliv–”

  A clear peal of disbelieving laughter tolled from Her. “You think I would trust you to do such a thing?”

  “There’s no choic–”

  “You have no say in my lands, thief,” the Queen hissed, stalking closer.

  Aedon looked up instinctively and was immediately caught in Her furious gaze, red colouring Her cheeks.

  “I will not be dictated to by the likes of you.”

  “Saradon has returned, and Valxiron will seize dominion over all,” Aedon said, putting every ounce of feeling he could into his words. “If we do not all act, we will all suffer ere long, Queen.”

  “Not on my lands.” She turned away dismissively.

  “You would be a coward? Hide away when lesser beings than you stand for freedom?”

  She whipped around to him, magic bubbling visibly around Her. “You overstep, thief.”

  “I will overstep it a thousand times, my Queen, if it makes you act. Would you have all die for your cowardice until your woods and your people are the last with no one left to defend you? Would you let the world spend itself so you may buy some extra years of peace before the inevitable end, all for the price of one counter-curse?”

  She narrowed Her eyes and bared Her teeth at him in a feral snarl. Her mahogany hair lashed around Her, caught in a wind of its own, and the crown of flowers atop Her head pulsed with life, the flowers opening and closing so fast it were as if they would chew him up.

  “I have heard enough of your lies and trickery, thief. You were foolish to return here, but I am glad, for now I do not have to hunt you.” Her snarl widened into a grin, Her pointed teeth gleaming in the sun.

  She has to listen, Aedon thought frantically. He had not returned just to die. There had to be a way. “Wait, Solanaceae–”

  Her power seized Aedon, wrenching him into the air before Her, constricting him so much he could not breathe. Stars crossed his vision as the woods faded.

  “Do not dare speak my name!” She thundered at him.

  Twenty

  With trepidation, Dimitri looked into Saradon’s scrying mirror and the wall of smoke within it. It stretched as far as the eye could see, reaching up into the heavens. The Indis slowly burned and killed their way across the eastfolds by Saradon’s orders.

  Dimitri felt sickened by it, but he pursed his lips and said nothing, for it would do no good. He had already tried to convince Saradon that he did not need to burn a kingdom that was already his, but Saradon would hear none of it.

  “I hear the dragon riders mass at their stronghold,” Saradon said, idly glancing at Dimitri as he circled the mirror.

  “Yes, sire.” Dimitri had no choice but to confirm what Saradon already knew. “The contingent that flew to Valtivar to help the dwarves defeat the goblin scourge may return.” Would return, he thought, but he would furnish Saradon with as little as he could. As little as he dared.

  Saradon nodded. The scene in the mirror rippled and faded to blackness before dull, fog-covered mountain peaks emerged. “Would that I could find their pathetic hiding place and wipe it from the face of Altarea,” he growled.

  Dimitri suppressed a tight-lipped smile of relief that the home of the dragon masters was hidden by magics far greater than either he or Saradon possessed, but he knew Valxiron, lurking deep within, would be able to break them at his full power. Dimitri only hoped he could be stopped before then.

  “How fares my great-granddaughter?” Saradon asked, taking Dimitri by surprise.

  “Very well, sire,” he replied as smoothly as he could, resisting the urge to fiddle with his sleeve. “She is learning the courtly arts most proficiently.”

  They had danced, dined, and debated together every night for weeks, and though she would never be a trueborn heir, her grace offset by an unquellable fire in her nature, he was pleased. Harper could pass, for now. It would be enough to save them both from further scrutiny.

  “And her tutelage under the Order?”

  “Lord Khyrion and the Grandmasters oversee such things, but I understand her proficiency and skill there is also pleasing. The strength of her blood gives her advantages over the other Initiates in her cohort.”

  Dimitri neglected to mention that her aversion to the Order’s dark powers and perverted corruptions frustrated Khyrion beyond measure. With any luck, the First Grandmaster would not dare mention it to Saradon for fear of eliciting his ire at any insinuation Harper was sub-par–the torment that had haunted Saradon’s own footsteps his entire life.

  “Hmm... Good.”

  “What plans do you have for her, sire?”

  Saradon met his gaze. “Why do you ask?”

  It was a veiled question. Dimitri was under no illusions as to the importance of her as a pawn.

  “She is a valuable asset to you, sire. I only wonder how you wish to use her,” he replied evenly.

  “I have no plans for now,” Saradon said eventually. “She secures my position. In time, she will secure further alliances for me. But as my sole heir, I will never allow her to debase herself. She will not be sold to the highest bidder. My blood will rule. She, and no others, will rule after me.” His tone held a warning.

  Dimitri inclined his head, but his heart hammered. Harper was safe for now, but not forever. “I will ensure she continues to better herself in all areas that benefit her,” he promised.

  HARPER SMILED AT TRISTAN as he picked up the papers that had fallen from her desk. Thank you, she mouthed. He hesitantly smiled back, but it was gone in a second as he focused once more on his own writing–a discussion on how alchemy and transfiguration could be used to further the Order.

  She was glad to have at least one soul to smile at in the dark halls, though they had not dared speak, other than to exchange names. She felt a strange protectiveness toward him. He was the youngest of their cohort, and the most timid.

  Tristan had no place there. Not that it made a difference. Neither of them were there by choice, after all, unlike some of their other peers, who delighted in basking in their masters’ teachings. He was the only one who did not look at her with horror when learning who she was related to.

  It made Harper nauseous to regurgitate the corruption of the Order. They had begun to learn a cursed tongue, and Harper felt the wrongness of it every time the words left her mouth, filling it with the tang of darkness, forcing the pure magic within her to twist against its very nature.

  Just that morning, they had pulled magic from the world. The Grandmaster had them shape it with dark words in the way of the Eldarkind, not the elves, forcing it to their will and calling power far greater than they would have otherwise been able to control. Harper still felt nauseous with the strain and taint of it.

  The raw power coursed through her, but in a far darker, polluting manner than the pure, joyous energy of the Wellspring she and Aedon had visited what felt like an age ago. Harper held no illusions. This power was wrong, though she could not explain how. Her entire body seemed to reject it. She shuddered. The Order held little chance of corrupting her if this was their allure. If their promises of power and glory were based on nothing but sorcery and evil magics.

  However, she continued to write, dipping the quill into the dark ink, tapping off the excess, and scrawling and scratching each word onto the parchment in her slanting hand. She would have been pleased with her writing ability had it not been on content so dark. Not that Khyrion appreciated any of it. Despite his promise that the Third Grandmaster would oversee their lessons after the first week, he had kept a close eye on her, hovering during their lessons, seeming to mysteriously melt away when Dimitri arrived to collect her.

  Dimitri spirited her back to his quarters in silence, watching as, dull-eyed, she removed the detestable cloak she had to wear among the Order ranks. Every time she returned, it felt as though she needed to bathe to remove the taint from her body, but no amount of water ever seemed to cleanse the dark stain creeping through her. />
  “Are you all right?” Dimitri asked gently, herding her to the dining room for a brief lunch before their own affairs began anew.

  She sighed in response, and he pressed his lips together in silent sympathy. He knew precisely what she felt without ever really having to ask.

  “Come on. Change of plans.”

  She looked up, but he was already gone, returning a few moments later with both their cloaks and a wicker basket. He swept her cloak about her shoulders, fastened it deftly, then attended to his own, before sweeping her arm into his.

  “Where are we going?” She fingered the soft, fine, clean wool–a more welcome mantle by far.

  “I’ve had enough of this damned place,” Dimitri said with a scowl that was not aimed at her.

  A few moments later, they alighted in a small dell of evergreens overlooking a deep lake, far above Tournai, in the peaks soaring behind the city. Harper gasped momentarily on the thin air before her breathing settled and she looked around in wonder.

  The winter snows had not made it so far down the mountain as of yet, though the white line marched in the valley just above them. The cold, deep blue sank into black depths with no sun to reflect on the water. It was cold and hostile, yet beautiful nonetheless. A carpet of emerald moss was their blanket as Dimitri set down the basket and invited her to sit, before pulling out some small rolls stuffed with meats and cheeses, as well as a skin of something to drink.

  Harper raised an eyebrow. “No army of cutlery today?”

  “No.”

  “Why here?” She bit into the rich offering as she surveyed their surroundings. Silent pines with not even a breeze to ruffle them, but the cold, clear air filled her lungs in a way the city air could not. Each breath seemed to brush away just a little bit more of the clogging darkness.

  “I thought we both needed some fresh air to blow away the cobwebs.” His smile was thin, and he quickly looked away, down the steep-sided valley and to the cloudy skies beyond.