Crown of Crystal Flame

by C. L. Wilson

  When the last despised manacle fell free, they were both exhausted and trembling. Rain gathered Ellysetta into his arms and simply held her, resting his head against hers, breathing when she breathed, clasping her hand and offering back what strength he had.

  “It is true then,” Farel murmured. “Rain Tairen Soul has found his truemate.”

  Rain looked at him. Farel and all of the other dahl’reisen, men who had long ago learned to bear suffering without emotion, stood there, their eyes reddened with the bottled tears dahl’reisen could not shed and their hands clenched tight. They stood witness to the love that would always be their deepest dream, and it still had the ability to touch them as nothing else could.

  “It is true,” Rain confirmed.

  He saw the woman Sheyl meet Farel’s gaze and saw the brief nod between them. Gods, how could I be such a trusting fool? He started to rise, reaching instinctively for his absent weapons’ belts. The weave came crashing down upon him like a killing wave. Darkness descended with brutal abruptness.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  The Fading Lands ~ Dharsa

  7th day of Seledos

  “Kieran!” Robed in green and white and shining like a star in Dharsa’s fragrant night, Marissya v’En Solande raced down the steps of the gold-and-white palace of the Fey king. Her truemate, Dax, followed close on her heels. Together, they rushed across the courtyard and rounded the great, Fire-lit tairen fountain, to greet the approaching band of weary travelers.

  “Mela.” A smile broke across Kieran’s face. He loped across the remaining distance and fell into his mother’s outstretched arms, savoring her flurry of hugs and kisses, and submitting with good nature to the thorough maternal inspection that followed. “I am well and unharmed, mela,” he assured her, lifting her hands to his mouth and kissing them before stepping into his father’s fierce embrace. “Gepa.”

  “You worried your mother and me.” Dax’s eyes were suspiciously bright when they broke apart. He cleared his throat and gripped his son’s forearms. “I wish I could ask you never to do so again.”

  Kieran ducked his head. His parents would never make such a request because he could never honor it. Worry was the burden of every Fey warrior’s parent.

  “Lillis, Lorelle. Master Baristani.” Marissya stepped past Kieran to greet Ellysetta’s family with calmer, but no less heartfelt, embraces. “Meiveli ti’Dharsa. Kiel.” Her smile turned solemn. She hugged the blond warrior, kissed him on both cheeks, and held his hands tightly. “Beylah vo, ajian. Thank you for bringing Kieran home safely.”

  Marissya waved everyone towards the palace. “Teska, come inside. Master Baristani, I will show you and the girls to your rooms. I’m sure you must be weary.”

  They were, Kieran knew. The girls hadn’t had the energy to do more than ooh and aah over the starlit beauty of Dharsa. Tomorrow, however, would be a different story. As soon as they were rested, they’d be bounding all over the city, getting into the Haven only knew what sorts of mischief. He grinned just thinking about it. Quiet, well-ordered Dharsa was about to get a much-overdue jolt of joyful chaos.

  As his mother led the Baristanis into the palace, Kieran’s brief humor turned solemn. He and Kiel followed Dax to one of the balconied terraces overlooking the city.

  “We passed Eimar v’En Arran on our way here,” Kieran said. After Tenn’s latest refusal to support Rain, Eimar v’En Arran, Air master of the Massan, had gathered several thousand like-minded Fey and headed for the Garreval to join the war. Kieran watched his father closely. “Is there no hope Tenn will admit he was wrong and repair the breach between himself and Rain? Does he not understand the evil of the Eld?”

  Dax sighed. “He understands, but he is convinced he’s doing what’s best for the Fading Lands.”

  “How? By tearing us apart? Dividing our people?”

  “By keeping us safe. By holding to the Light and living with honor, in accordance with the Scroll of Law.” Dax put his hands on the balustrade and leaned forward, watching the glowing lights of the fairy flies darting through the gardens and the Fire-lamps of the city flickering through the trees in the valley below and on the sides of the surrounding hills. “I’ve known Tenn a long time. I do not question his motives. I truly believe he’s doing what he thinks is right.”

  “Do you think he’s right, Gepa?”

  “I think he is an honorable Fey.” After a brief pause, Dax met his son’s gaze, and added, “I also think there is a reason other than their link to the prides that our kings have always been Tairen Souls and not truemated Fey Lords.”

  Kieran nodded. Tairen Souls were born to defend the Fading Lands. Every one of them expected to die in battle, and except for the occasional accident, every one of them did. A Tairen Soul also knew, before binding himself in e’tanitsa, that his duty to the Fading Lands came before his duty to his mate. But Tenn was a truemated Fey Lord, and his strongest instinct was to keep his mate safe.

  “The girls are already asleep.” Dax, Kieran, and Kiel turned as Marissya joined them on the terrace. “I never realized how dear they had become to me until we thought they were lost. It is good to have them back.” Her expression turned somber. “They were asking for Ellysetta.”

  Kiel and Kieran shared an uncomfortable silence.

  “We thought it best to not tell them that Rain and Ellysetta had been banished,” Kiel admitted. “In fact, I think it’s best if we tell them she and Rain are away fighting the war and will return when they can. It’s true enough. If Rain and Ellysetta could return tomorrow, I’m sure they would.”

  “You haven’t heard then?” Dax said.

  “Heard what?” Kieran asked.

  “Bel sent word on a private weave this morning. Rain and Ellysetta were shot down over Eld yesterday. No one’s heard from them since.”

  Celieria ~ Dahl’reisen Village in the Verlaine Forest

  The dahl’reisen carried the unconscious bodies of the Tairen Soul and his mate to a small cabin not far from the smithy. There, Sheyl scrubbed their wounds clean of sel’dor powder before slowly and painstakingly removing each ragged shred of the black Elden metal from their bodies.

  She regretted the brutal but necessary weave that had robbed both Fey of their senses. She knew the Tairen Soul’s hesitant trust in his dahl’reisen rescuers would be gone when he woke, but after witnessing how difficult it had been for him and his mate to suffer the removal of their manacles, she’d suspected the surgery to remove their sel’dor shrapnel would have been beyond their capacity to endure. The Mages had engineered sel’dor to block Fey magic, cause immense pain, and resist efforts to remove it. Not even powerful Fey healers could coax sel’dor out of flesh using magic, and there was no magic—regardless of how powerful—that could completely weave away the pain. Neither she nor Farel was willing to risk having their village destroyed by a Tairen Soul driven mad by his truemate’s pain.

  She worked on the Tairen Soul and his mate for bells, opening wounds with a razor-sharp black Fey’cha, digging about with long steel pincers to remove the sel’dor fragments, then probing with bare fingers to make certain she’d gotten it all before healing the damage both she and the Eld weapons had caused. Two other village women with healing talents assisted her.

  By the time she was done, the small steel bowl beside the raised surgery cots was filled with bloody black metal ranging from small pea-size bits to long, dagger-length shards. Sheyl had seen more than her share of wounds filled with sel’dor shrapnel, and she was amazed that Rain Tairen Soul had even managed to survive, let alone retain his faculties, with that much of the poison metal in his body.

  It was a testament to his strength and endurance—and to his mate’s powerful magic. She’d probably been healing him from the moment he was first struck, though it was obvious neither of them was aware of it. Sheyl had seen it clearly the moment they rode into the village, the Light flowing from Ellysetta into her mate, the shadows of pain and death flowing out of him back into her. Without her, he
would almost certainly have died.

  Sheyl closed the last of the Tairen Soul’s wounds and laid another weave upon the matepair to guarantee they would sleep the night. Ellysetta’s Light was too dim for Sheyl’s liking, and she needed uninterrupted rest to recuperate. Only then did Sheyl open the door and admit the other village women waiting outside.

  The women bustled in and began the familiar task of making Sheyl’s patients comfortable after their surgery. They deftly stripped the remaining clothing from the unconscious Fey couple and washed them thoroughly with warm water and soap to cleanse away all traces of blood and grime.

  “Sheyl.” One of the women summoned her to Ellysetta’s side. “Look.”

  The woman was standing over Ellysetta, holding a curling black spiral of Azrahn in her palm. On Ellysetta’s left breast, just over her heart, four shadowy points lay like a ring of bruises against her pale, luminous flesh.

  Sheyl recognized the Marks instantly. Memory—premonition—flashed. A cry of denial rose up in her heart, but her expression remained carefully blank.

  “What are we going to do? Four Marks. Her presence puts us in terrible danger.”

  “Calm yourself. She’s been unconscious almost the entire time. Even if the Mage was watching through her eyes, he couldn’t have seen much.”

  “Farel will still want to know.”

  “And I will tell him,” Sheyl assured her. “Now finish drying them, and have the men carry them to the top room. Tell Imrion and his brothers to spin a weave around the cabin to block what they can of the dahl’reisen’s pain from the Feyreisa. Shutter the windows and post guards at the door. I will take their armor and leathers to be cleaned and mended.” She gathered up the discarded pile of golden armor and studded red leather and let herself out of the cabin.

  Farel was waiting for her across the yard. His face was as blank as hers. She wasn’t ready to face him yet, so she turned away and carried the armor and leathers to a small cabin farther down the main village thoroughfare. She gave them to another of the village women and stayed to chat. He waited, patient as time itself, until she abandoned her attempt at procrastination and went to him.

  When she reached his side, he held out his hand, uncurling his fingers to reveal a black Fey’cha.

  “When we recovered the Tairen Soul’s steel from the Eld, Rythiel found this.” In a swift, practiced motion, Farel flipped the blade to show her the Fey markings emblazoned in the pommel.

  Sheyl recognized the name symbol instantly. “That’s Gaelen’s mark.”

  “I found it with several others, all bloodsworn. They are hers. The Tairen Soul allowed a dahl’reisen—and not just any dahl’reisen but Gaelen vel Serranis—to bloodswear to his truemate. How can that be, Sheyl?”

  “Have you asked Gaelen?”

  “He will not answer. I told him they were safe, that I had brought them here as he commanded. All he would say was that we must protect her from the Eld even if it costs the life of every man, woman, and child in this village.”

  Because of that, she almost didn’t tell him about the Mage Marks on Ellysetta’s chest. Though she had loved him all her life and told him more than she ever revealed to another living being, there were still many things she kept from him. Some things no person should have to know. But another woman had seen the Marks first, and Sheyl knew it would not remain secret for long.

  “She bears Mage Marks.”

  Farel was rarely caught off guard, but this time his mouth almost fell open. “What?” “Four of them.”

  His brows snapped together. “Then why would Gaelen command us to bring her here? Her mere presence endangers us all.”

  “I don’t know.”

  Did the Tairen Soul know about his mate’s Marks? Was that why he allowed a dahl’reisen to bloodswear himself to the Feyreisa? Did he perhaps think Gaelen, who was at least a fourth-level talent in Azrahn, could use his forbidden skills to help protect the Feyreisa from Eld Mages? Sheyl’s mind whirled with questions and possibilities, but she cut them off quickly. If she allowed her mind to ask the questions, her second talent might provide the answer, and she could not do what she must in the coming days if the outcome would be in vain.

  Her second talent was premonition. Unfortunately, she always saw true, and it was rarely something pleasant. The gods had not given her the vision of possibilities, only of unalterable destiny.

  “At least she can’t have seen much,” Sheyl said to ease the guilt and recrimination she knew Farel was feeling for having brought such a danger into their village. “You told me she was unconscious most of the way.”

  “She was.”

  “Then I’m right. She can’t have seen much—which means the Mages can’t have either. I’ve put them in the top room, shuttered the windows, and posted guards. They will both sleep until dawn.”

  He began to pace, a sure sign of overwhelming agitation and distress. “They can’t stay here.”

  “Nei,” she agreed. “You must take them away tomorrow, at first light.”

  “We should kill them both now, while they sleep.”

  She shook her head. “Don’t talk foolishness. Any dahl’reisen who killed her would become Mharog.”

  He whirled on her. A muscle ticked in his clenched jaw. “Then we get one of the mortals to do it—one of the old men—and we feed him to the lyrant when it’s done so the Dark deed dies with him.”

  “Nei.” Sheyl’s voice was calm and even but as unyielding as stone. “You will not harm her. You will take her away in the morning. And you will grant her and the Tairen Soul safe passage out of the Verlaine.”

  “Sheyl—“

  “Nei. Dahl’reisen you may be, but your soul remembers what it is to be Fey—even when it is inconvenient. She is a shei’dalin, and you are pledged to protect her from harm. And he is the last Tairen Soul. If you kill him, the Eld win, and you know it. Now, it is late, and I am tired. Come, take me to bed.”

  “Sheyl, every moment she spends in this village puts all our lives in danger. You think I can just forget that and go to bed?”

  “Aiyah, you can. We are safe enough for now. They will leave tomorrow. You and the dahl’reisen will go with them. I want tonight.” She took his hand and tugged him towards their cabin.

  “The Tairen Soul is healed. He would never allow dahl’reisen to escort his shei —” He broke off, eyes narrowing slightly. “You’ve seen this? That they would leave, and I would accompany them?”

  “Aiyah,” she lied. He’d not been in her vision, and that meant there was a chance to save him. “Now come, Farel vel Torras. Your hearth witch needs your attention.”

  He allowed her to pull him towards their cabin. And when the doors closed behind them, her hands helped him to shed his weapons and leathers.

  Eld ~ Boura Fell

  Steel clattered outside the High Mage’s library door, the sound reverberating in the stone chasm of his chambers. Vadim glanced up.

  “Come in,” he commanded. “And refrain from terrifying my soldiers.”

  Six tall, dark figures entered on booted feet that made no sound as they walked, and with them they brought an icy chill that prickled even the High Mage’s flesh. Behind them, the Eld soldiers who had accompanied them were trembling so hard their armor rattled.

  With a wave of his hand, Vadim dismissed the soldiers and turned his attention to the six creatures standing before him. They had been Fey once, then dahl’reisen. He had captured them centuries ago, and unlike so many of their brethren who had died in his untender care, they had crossed that final bridge, leaving the Shadowed Path and descending into total Darkness.

  They were the Mharog, Fey who had given themselves utterly to evil. Immensely powerful. Utterly merciless. With skin as pale as snow and pure black eyes like bottomless chasms, they were frightening creatures, and even Vadim Maur, who owned their souls, harbored a carefully hidden terror of them.

  “You summoned us to serve?” The tallest of the six asked the question. His voice w
as a whispered song of power, mesmerizing and deadly. Azurel he was called now, though once he’d claimed another name that had been celebrated in the Fading Lands.

  “Your old friend Rain Tairen Soul has a truemate.”

  A dangerous light sparked in Azurel’s black eyes. During the Mage Wars, he’d been sent by Rain Tairen Soul to fight in the desperate, bloody battle that had delivered him into Mage hands and ultimately drove him down the Dark Path. Over the centuries, Vadim had used that event to batter down the dahl’reisen’s defenses and breed hatred in his heart for the Fey and for Rain Tairen Soul in particular.

  “One of my Mages had captured them, but the dahl’reisen who’ve harried us for so many years along the borders rescued them. The dahl’reisen harbor them now.” He’d never sent a force capable of defeating the dahl’reisen into Celieria before, afraid of tipping his hand, but the need for discretion was over. It was time to release the hunters and let them pursue their prey. “You will track them down, destroy the dahl’reisen village, and bring the girl and any survivors to me. The Tairen Soul is yours to kill.”

  He gestured to a shadowy corner of his office, where a hard-eyed Mage in rich blue robes stood in silence. A sash heavily laden with jewels of achievement circled his waist several times and hung down to the floor. “This is Primage Dur. He will accompany you, along with two hundred of my Mages and a garrison of my best men into Celieria.”

  “Your men will hinder us.”

  “Don’t be a fool and don’t take me for one,” Vadim snapped. “Six Mharog, even ones as powerful as you, aren’t strong enough to confront the Tairen Soul and hundreds of dahl’reisen on your own. Besides, the Feyreisen’s mate is Fey born. Your touch would kill her. My men accompany you so that she will be returned to me alive. If she is not, rest assured you will continue your service to me in demon form.”

  Azurel hesitated long enough to make Vadim gather his power, then he gave a lingeringly insolent bow. “It will be as you command.”