Crown of Crystal Flame

by C. L. Wilson

  Rain was grateful for the dahl’reisen weave that kept Ellysetta unconscious. Between the sel’dor in her body, his own burning pain, and the presence of the dahl’reisen, she would have been screaming in torment. And with his arms around her—his body pressed against hers, their shared pain would have formed an agonizing harmonic.

  Rolling farmland ended at the edge of a deep wood, and the dahl’reisen came to a halt. Rain’s innate tairen sense of direction and long-forgotten memories pinpointed their location. This was Verlaine Forest, the deep, vast woods in northwest Celieria. Legally, the forest was part of King Dorian’s family holdings, but in reality Verlaine Forest belonged to no one. During the Mage Wars, Fey, Celierians, and Elves alike had found refuge here amongst the trees, using the forest as a base from which to launch attacks against Eld. Dark, bitter battles had been fought all around the forest’s edges, terrible magic released in and around its ancient borders, but the Eld had never conquered the dark Verlaine, nor penetrated its deepest interior.

  Farel approached and laid a hand on the neck of Rain’s mount. “You’ll have to run from here. Not even ba’houda will enter this wood. Do you have the strength to carry your shei’tani and still keep up?”

  Rain arched a brow. “You just lead us to safety. I’ll find whatever strength I need to follow.”

  The corner of Farel’s mouth lifted. “Then follow, Tairen Soul.” He turned and plunged into the dense, dark forest of the Verlaine.

  Rain adjusted Ellysetta in his arms, set his jaw, and ran.

  Eld ~ Boura Fell

  “Escaped? What do you mean my prizes have escaped?”

  Primage Vargus stood before Vadim Maur, shaking like a leaf in a hard wind. “The dahl’reisen were using their invisibility weave—the one that renders them completely undetectable. They came in such numbers, with no warning, and they destroyed all the chemar in the area so we couldn’t flank them. We searched for them, but found no sign of their tracks. We can only assume they’ve crossed the river and taken refuge in the Verlaine by now.”

  Vadim paced, the hem of his purple robes swirling around his feet with each brisk step and sharp pivot. He’d been waiting impatiently for the arrival of Ellysetta Baristani, and when she had not been delivered to him within one bell of her capture, he’d gone looking for an explanation—and found Vargus in the war room, sweating a river as he tried frantically to coordinate a doomed search for the missing captives.

  “We did at least recover the Tairen Soul’s blood, Most High.”

  Vadim stopped abruptly in a billow of purple velvet. “Did we?”

  Vargus nodded. “Quite a lot of it. Enough for Primage Grule to ensure that the next time the Tairen Soul flies near Eld will be his last.”

  “See it done.”

  Vargus bowed and exited the room.

  Vadim began to pace once more. The dahl’reisen. They’d been a thorn in his side for centuries, slaughtering his umagi, foiling the raids he sent to bring back the magical offspring from the breeders he’d released into Celieria in the hopes of creating a greater and more powerful pool of prospective breeders. He’d captured a number of the dahl’reisen over the years and added their gifts to the bloodlines he was creating. For that usefulness—and because he hadn’t wanted to tip his hand to the Celierians—he’d never sent a large enough force into Celieria to kill them.

  But now—incredibly—it seemed the dahl’reisen had joined forces with the Fey.

  And that was an alliance he could not allow.

  Vadim wrenched open the door to his office and barked a curt command to Zev.

  “Summon the Mharog.”

  Melliandra leaned close to the bars of Lord Death’s cell and spoke in a low voice. “Remember I once asked you if you could show me how to unravel a ward?”

  Lord Death’s head was bent over his bowl as he scooped hot stew into his mouth. At her question, his glowing green eyes looked up, pinning her. “I remember. I also remember telling you it takes magic to unweave magic.”

  “What if someone just recently discovered they have magic? Could you teach them how to use it?”

  His eyes narrowed. “I used to be a chatok… a teacher. But learning magic takes time.”

  “What if you don’t have much time?”

  “That would be unfortunate. Instruction cannot be rushed.”

  She took a breath. She couldn’t believe she was about to suggest this. “What if you didn’t exactly instruct?” She swallowed, and forced herself to spit it out. “Mages control people. They make them do things, even magical things.”

  “Mages do many things Fey do not. Controlling others through magic is one of those.”

  “Yes, but could you if you had to?”

  Lord Death’s brows drew together. “What are you thinking, child? What are you asking me to do?”

  “There’s an important battle coming. The High Mage is planning to personally oversee it. He’ll be leaving Boura Fell. It would be the perfect time to get your things.”

  The Fey set down his bowl and gripped the cage bars.

  “When?”

  “In a few days. Like I said, there’s not much time. That’s why I need to know, if I can bring you someone with magic, and I show you the wards that need to be unraveled, can you—I don’t know—spin a weave of some kind to control their magic so they can unravel the wards?” “Who is this magic user? How do you know you can trust him?”

  She bit her lip. Once her secret was shared, it could never be unshared. But then, she’d already shared other secrets with this Fey, ones that would be far more perilous to her if he ever revealed them.

  “Her, not him. The magic user is a girl. And I know I can trust her, because she’s me.”

  Celieria ~ Orest

  “I am very glad to see you, my friend.” Teleos clasped Griffet Polwyr’s forearms. The neighboring Border Lord’s men had been deployed in lower Orest, while the nobleman himself had been escorted to the command center in Upper Orest.

  “And I you, my friend. I saw the signal and the fire in the sky”—he jerked his chin towards the tairen and dragon fighting claw and fang overhead—“and thought you could use a hand.”

  Despite the grim circumstances, Teleos laughed. “You thought right. I’ve never been happier to see your ugly face.” He and Griffet had been friends since they were lads. Griff’s second son bore Dev’s name.

  A sudden cry rang out over the Warrior’s Path. «Portal opening near the south gate! Fey to your posts! Sound the alarm!»

  The bells of Lower Orest began to ring. Teleos swore. A single portal had opened a mile east of Lower Orest, well out of cannon or weave range. A score of Eld soldiers emerged, racing north and south, and in their wake, dozens and dozens of other portals opened. Elden warriors and Mages poured out in a thick, black tide. Behind them, a second row of portals spewed batteries of bowcannon and siege weapons.

  “Looks like they mean to take her this time,” Dev said.

  Griffet moved to Dev’s side. “They do, my friend,” he said softly. “I’m sorry, but they do.”

  “Griff?” Dev turned in time to see his friend’s eyes turn to bloody black horror. The sickly sweet ice of Azrahn washed over him. “Ah, no.” Dev’s mournful whisper ended on a choked grunt. His breath fled his lungs in a sudden, agonized gasp and pain doubled him over as the blade in Grifet’s hand slid under the scales of Dev’s armor and sliced through his belly, driving up towards his heart.

  Celieria ~ The Verlaine Forest

  For most of the day, Rain and the dahl’reisen picked their way through the Verlaine’s heavy underbrush and dense stands of trees, pausing only a few times for brief rests. Progress was slow until the daunting thicket of the outer forest gave way to an older, deeper wood where small, persistent saplings and evergreen molia bushes vied for survival alongside great, densely needled conifers and thick, gnarled oaks. Twilight descended, and the forest gloom became an impenetrable darkness. Rain’s eyes adjusted automatically, his elongated
Fey pupils opening wide to let in every hint of light. Where mortals would be blinded by darkness, Rain and the dahl’reisen had the clear vision of cats hunting in the night.

  A loud scream rent the air. Rain jerked to attention.

  “Lyrant,” Farel said. “The forest is full of them… along with other vicious, Shadow-spawned creatures created and loosed upon it by the Mages.”

  They ran deeper into the forest, and Rain began to spot the shadows of dahl’reisen sentries perched high in the branches above. He knew there must be conversations flying over private Spirit weaves, but the dahl’reisen were too disciplined for him to detect the barest hint of it.

  They approached a deep thicket draped with thorny, flowering sago vines. Except for the faintest glow of a privacy weave and the fact that the dahl’reisen sentries now allowed themselves to be visible, Rain would not have given the thicket a second thought.

  “We’re here,” Farel said. The vines parted as Farel approached, and he ran through the resulting tunnel without slowing. The dahl’reisen guards watched silently, their faces inscrutable, as Rain and Ellysetta passed by them and followed Farel through the opening.

  They emerged from the long tunnel at the edge of a village. A remarkable, unexpected, secret village—large enough it could nearly be called a city—hidden in the heart of the Verlaine.

  Rain looked around with a mix of shock and admiration. He had not expected something so large, nor so impressive. Dahl’reisen Earth masters had done their work well. Cabins nestled amongst the trees, integrated with an almost Elvish flair so that they were scarcely distinguishable from the forest as they hugged the thick trunks and perched high in the heavy branches. Vine bridges draped from tree to tree. Rope ladders and hanging wooden stairs that could be raised or lowered at will granted access to the buildings overhead. Round, illuminated orbs hung from the tree branches, casting a golden glow upon the city in the trees and the forest floor below, where well-worn paths bordered carefully tended gardens.

  Villagers rushed out to meet the returning raiders. Among them were several dozen more dahl’reisen—some in full leather and steel, others looking incongruously like Celierian townsmen in tunics and breeches—numerous mortal men and women, even elders with wrinkled skin and whitening hair. And there were children, scores of them, varying in age from the smallest babe still suckling at its mother’s breast to tall, stripling youths on the cusp of adulthood. Rain stared at the children in wonder, seeing more than one Fey face among them. They all watched him with a mix of intense curiosity and deep-rooted wariness.

  As the dahl’reisen entered, the villagers moved forward. Women opened welcoming arms and clasped suddenly weary-looking dahl’reisen to their breasts. Small children cried “Gepa!” Father! Several women gave choked cries and rushed to clasp the hands of the wounded, while others waited and stood in grief-stricken silence as Farel’s warriors delivered unto them the steel and sorreisu’kiyrs of the fallen.

  Watching them, Rain’s throat grew tights. He remembered countless similar scenes from his own childhood. Happy homecomings when his father, Rajahl, had returned safely from battle. Bitter homecomings when Rain himself had brought the wounded and as many dead as he could carry back from a particularly bloody clash with the Mages.

  He had never dreamed to find such warmth… such love… in a dahl’reisen village.

  A tall woman in dark skirts approached Farel. She was young despite the wealth of startling white hair she wore tied back with a simple band. Her face was barely lined, her eyes large, clear pools of misty gray surrounded by thick black lashes. Rain estimated she had seen no more than thirty mortal years. She paused at Farel’s side and clasped his hands, staring up into his eyes. Though they did not embrace or speak aloud, Rain guessed this was Farel’s chosen companion.

  The white-haired woman released Farel’s hands and accompanied him back to Rain and Ellysetta.

  “This is Sheyl,” Farel said. “She will tend to you and your mate once we rid you both of the sel’dor.” He led Rain over to a smith’s forge built in a small clearing off to one side of the village. Six dahl’reisen followed—to guard the villagers from the Tairen Soul, Rain supposed—but the others dispersed, moving as far from Ellysetta as they could, some even leaving the village altogether.

  The smith was not dahl’reisen, but neither was he wholly mortal. His muscles were thick as a Celierian’s, but his eyes were pure Fey, pale, crystalline blue and glowing with latent magic. He turned to Rain, a folded wad of leather in his large hand. “If you will allow me, Feyreisen, I’ll remove that collar. You can lay your mate on that cot in the corner, then come sit on this bench.”

  Rain hesitated, searching the man’s gaze for any hint of treachery. When he found only sincere compassion, he nodded and laid Ellysetta gently on the clean bedding. A blanket had been folded neatly at the end of the cot, and he draped it over her before returning to straddle the bench near the forge.

  The smith tucked the wad of leather between the collar and Rain’s neck, then slipped a small steel plate between the leather and the collar.

  “Turn your head away.”

  Rain obeyed, and someone—he couldn’t tell if it was the smith or the dahl’reisen—summoned a five-fold weave. The dominant thread in the weave was Fire. He could feel the concentrated heat of it. Cooling Water and brisk Air kept the heat from penetrating through the leather or spreading through the rest of the collar. The five-fold weave went suddenly ice-cold, and a sharp blow made Rain flinch. After repeating the process another five times, the despised collar fell away.

  “Beylah vo,” Rain said, rubbing at his throat. He took a deep breath and winced as the shrapnel still buried in his chest reminded him sharply of its presence.

  “Sha vel’mei,” the smith replied. And in perfect Feyan, he added, “Removing the manacles will be quite painful, I’m afraid. There’s no way to break open the bonds without driving the spikes farther in, and they leave thorns we must then cut out.”

  “It can’t hurt more than it already does, but see to my mate first,” Rain ordered. Now that he knew what the removal procedure entailed, he would not allow Ellysetta to suffer her bonds a moment more than necessary.

  “As you wish,” the smith agreed, “but I’ll need you to hold her. As I said, the procedure will not be pleasant.”

  Rain returned to Ellysetta and knelt at her side, gathering her against his chest as the smith first removed Ellysetta’s collar then the manacles binding her wrists and ankles. Even with the weave keeping her unconscious, the pain of the procedure roused Ellysetta enough that she sobbed and fought Rain’s grip until the smith had removed the last of her bonds.

  Then it was Rain’s turn again. He hissed through gritted teeth as the smith worked on the barbed shackles piercing his wrists. When the first shackle fell free and the sharp pain of the thorned spikes ripping out of his bone almost wrenched a cry from his throat, Ellysetta roused once more.

  “Rain?” Her eyes fluttered opened, dazed and filled with empathetic pain. Now free of her sel’dor manacles, enough of her power must have returned that she was able to fight off the weave meant to keep her unconscious. She reached for him, groping blindly, and when her fingers grasped nothing but air, she pushed herself off the cot and crawled across the dirt floor to reach him. The dahl’reisen made no attempt to stop her. Instead, they carefully backed out of her way so that she could not accidentally touch them.

  “Ellysetta, nei.” Rain tried to push her away when she grasped his hand. “Do not touch me while they are removing the shackles. You will feel it too clearly.”

  Though barely conscious, she would not be dissuaded. Instinct, pure and Fey, drove her. Her long fingers curled around his bleeding wrist. She murmured his name over and over, weeping, as a featherlight weave of healing Earth and soothing Spirit penetrated his abused flesh. He felt her pain as the despised sel’dor buried in her flesh rebelled against her use of magic, but she persevered, ignoring her own torment as she tende
d his.

  “Stop,” Rain pleaded, pulling away again. Even if she could ignore what she felt, he could not. “Enough, shei’tani—” The word he’d so carefully avoided using slipped from his lips. He glanced up in time to see Farel’s eyes narrow.

  “Leave her.” The white-haired Sheyl stared at Ellysetta, her eyes sympathetic. “Can you not see she feels it anyway? Let her find what comfort she can in trying to heal you. Lian, finish quickly. She will try to bear the brunt of his pain for him.”

  Rain kicked up a leg, halting the smith. “Nei, do not.”

  Sheyl’s pale eyes flashed with sudden fire. “You Fey are fools,” she snapped. “Always trying to protect your women from their own nature. It hurts them more, do you not understand? Worse, you make them weak, when they need to be strong!”

  The accusation took him aback as much as the woman’s fearless attack.

  “Don’t scold him for what he does out of love.” It was Ellysetta who spoke, surprising them all. Her eyes were closed, but her voice, though quiet, was lucid. “If it is my nature to ease his pain, it is his nature to protect me from it.” Her lips curved in a wan smile. “He knows I am a coward at heart.”

  “That you are not,” he denied. He drew her up into his arms and whispered his vulnerability for her ears alone. “My sun rises in your eyes, shei’tani. I cannot bear for you to be hurt.”

  Her eyes opened, and she lifted her hand to his face, stroking her fingers against his skin. “Then let me heal you.”

  Tears pricked his eyes. He kissed her once with great tenderness and released her. “Tend me if you must, Ellysetta, but do not try to take all the pain upon yourself.”

  Rain nodded his permission for the smith to continue. Ellysetta knelt at his side. She flinched when he did as the second wrist shackle fell free, and cried out with him when Lian pulled off the first of the manacles piercing his ankles. Despite his command, she absorbed the worst of his torments into herself and muted them. Her tears and fingers and soft lips brushed over the deep puncture wounds at his wrist and each ankle.