The Missing

by Jeremy Forsyth

  “You can read minds now?” I asked, dryly.

  The Son of the Father laughed, “Of course. I am a Highborn, if you recall.”

  “So I’ve been told.”

  The Elder’s tent could be seen now at the top of the slope. It was a great dome and torches surrounded it, making it a beacon. The amount of guards pacing about it was staggering.

  “What are you going to say when you enter your Elder’s tent?”

  I looked up at that, wanting to conceal my apprehension at the thought of kneeling before the ruler of the Moon Elves, for he had said that I was never to appear in his presence again. And yet, here I was, on my path of defiance, fuelled by a desperation to earn back his favour and to fight once more beneath his great banner.

  “I will give the Elder the honour due to him,” I said to the Son.

  “And if he does not appreciate that? Then what?”

  “Then I will ----"

  “Be fed to the lagones…”

  Recoiling slightly from such a statement, my forehead furrowed in an appalled expression, I looked at the elf with an intention to scorn him, but when I saw the warning in his gaze, as well as where they indicated, I became mute and obliging.

  There, circling in the night skies above the great looming tent of the Elder, were giant lagones, their wings flapping against the air, creating a sound that sent shivers down my spine, sapping all colour from my face.

  “W-w-when did those get there?” I stammered.

  “They have been there the entire time,” the Son told me. He laughed again. “Do not worry yourself. Word has it that the Elder intends to send them to your capital where the Lady of the Moon lives. Apparently, he wishes for those creatures to devour her. To get rid of her once and for all.”

  The Elder would never do that to his united-one!” I insisted.

  “No? Why do you think the Elder laid camp here then, in his own lands, when his campaign continues east on Athana?”

  “What harm has the Lady of the Moon done him?” I gasped. “Surely the Elder has avenged himself on her enough?”

  Hadn’t the Elder removed his united-one from the throne? Wasn’t that sufficient punishment for how she had defied him?

  “Your Elder was very angry at her.”

  I focused my attention ahead, eyes darting from the circling serpents to the great tent of the Elder. The closer I got, the greater my apprehension grew and when at last I stood at the threshold of the tent, I was trembling and could feel the warm wafting air from inside caress my cheeks while the commotion of activity enhanced the beating of my heart.

  “Good luck,” came the Son.

  I didn’t respond. Instead, I took in a deep breath and stepped forward and almost immediately silence fell upon the gathering where I realised that every eye was now fixated upon me. The expressions, I noticed, were solemn and teemed with as much judgement as those outside.

  I walked forward, perceiving mere warriors still clad in the green crescent armour and black cloaks until some discernment entered my mind and I realised that of the company gathered tonight, most were of high rank.

  First were some highers of Asher Rise; those who governed the city of Cavalera, the glades of Emention and Olian. The highers that followed were from the Trails; were the rulers of the Sunbare Glades, the cities Inomen and Olden. Afterwards came the highers of the Nunes. The Higher of Season Fall tilted his head at me when I passed him. The Higher of the Rale Glades narrowed his eyes and then, stepping out from amidst his close compacted company, came the Higher of Hillmallow.

  The Lemonstar did not disappoint the reputation that proceeded his Tree, for, like those who had ruled the great city of Hillmallow before him, this Lemonstar was tall and broad of shoulder; a burly beast with a long brown beard that reached his sternum, while draping passed the length of his square face and reaching his chest came dead-straight hair the colour of bark.

  “Puny crescent,” mocked the deep and gruff voice of the Lemonstar.

  I ignored him, determined to reach the end and kneel before the Elder without faltering. But when I got close enough, the prestigious ranks of Alepion’s most renowned servants only grew greater.

  Before the podium that exalted the highchair, the deacons of Alepion stood like bodyguards before the Elder, were watching me as suspiciously as they would a Stranger. In that moment, I felt no more than vermin. My desire was to flee and never return - to never again fall under such scrutiny. But to run now would only bolster my shame.

  I locked eyes first with the Deacon of Asher Rise, then the Deacon of the Trails. Lastly, I found myself staring at the Deacon of the Nunes; his expression being a scowl, the worst of them all and it said to me, how dare you offend a Great Servant? How dare you displease him?

  I bowed low before the podium, “My Elder,” I said, timidly.

  I looked up when I got no reply. What I saw left me amazed; the Elder was a giant behind his three deacons, a fierce and intimidating force that I had never once been able to fully comprehend, not until now.

  “Why are you here?” I heard the Elder ask.

  For a moment, a moment that felt like a lifetime, I did not know what to say, such was the state of my nerves. But at last, I found my tongue.

  “To honour you for your great victory.”

  “What victory?”

  Every word was ripe with brewing rage. I trembled. “The one against the Sun Elves. Today… today in the field… I watched…”

  “What victory against the Sun Elves does this fool speak of?” asked the Elder, this time to his entire audience.

  I dropped my head. When I looked up again, feeling as if I was expected to say something, I recoiled slightly to see another chair had appeared beside the one that my Elder sat in. The elf seated in it was the Father of the Sun.

  Just now, the Elder turned to the Highborn as if the two were long-time companions - friends and not hated rivals.

  “What victory have we won against you, Asharal?” asked the Elder casually, seeming oblivious to the bright light beaming from the Father’s person, like an eclipse in the sky. By now, I had become as rigid as stone.

  “None,” seethed the ruler of the Sun Elves, adding vehemently, “Your people could never defeat the Sun… The Moon could never defeat a Highborn.”

  Despite my fear, I found myself raising my hand, something clenched in my fist. It was as if I lacked all control of myself, for I would never out of my own volition, given the severity of my situation, do what I was about to do… which was to contradict the Father of the Sun!

  “Wrong,” I heard myself say. My raised hand was gripping the hair of a severed head. “Here is the head of the Son of the Father! I killed him! I defeated he who slew the Brave! I defeated an enemy of the Moon!”

  I looked at my Elder, desperate for his approval, appealing to him silently to see the great deed I had done - the great blow I had dealt our enemy.

  The Elder, very unexpectedly, smiled. I turned my head towards the Father and, as I feared, he too was smiling. All around the podium, I felt a distinct air of mockery. It was in that moment that I perceived that I had unwittingly stumbled upon some hidden ruse that had been designed exclusively for me.

  The Father leaped up from his chair, “Fool!” he cried. “Your fate is now sealed! The Son has played you false, just as we had planned! He has lured you into our hands! For now, your life is forfeit.”

  I didn’t understand. I was even more confused when I saw the Elder draw Flame from its scabbard. He recited something as if it were writing in some proverb that somehow, I had overlooked during my years of study:

  “He who sheds the blood of a Highborn, must in turn have his own blood shed.” The Elder then stomped down from his podium as I scrambled desperately to get away, pleading hysterically, “No! He is our enemy. I did it for you!”

  “Did you?” challenged the Elder, “Or was it for yourself?”

  Behind the Elder, the Father called out, “Did you not do it so that I might g
rant you an audience?” The Father, I noticed, was gliding malevolently forward, following inches behind the Elder with a look of devious triumph.

  “The Son promised!” I cried. “He promised that you would offer advice. He promised that you would….”

  “Have I not kept my promise?” the Son of the Father now asked.

  I looked to the side of the Father and there, seeming very pleased with himself, stood the Son, arms folded contently.

  “You have your audience,” he said to me.

  “You told me he would honour me! You told me that if I defeated you, the Father would advise me on how to return to the Elder’s favour!”

  “But you killed a Highborn!” roared the Elder, furiously.

  “I didn’t, he is there!” I shouted, “Right there!” pleading for the Elder to turn his head and see the Son.

  The Elder didn’t. Instead, he leaped to me in two quick strides, bearing over me with Flame raised high above his head. In one quick moment, I glimpsed the two Highborns standing together; both were grinning, the Father resting a proud hand on his son’s shoulder as both looked at me with laughing and triumphant eyes. It was maddening. I looked up as the Elder brought his magical blade down upon my face.

  Chapter 3

  Paraden awoke with a jolt, found that all around him it was dark, and he recalled that night had fallen when he had settled down against the stump. Absentmindedly, his eyes took in the campfire close by in which embers still burnt, gleaming a fierce red.

  While lapsed in a disoriented state, trying to discern dream from reality, Paraden’s surroundings were immaterial to him. The chill in the evening air did not seem of any consequence either; for while usually he would have put hands to his shoulders to stay away the cold, he found that he was more concerned with putting hands to his face, was relieved to find that it was still intact.

  “He awakes,” said a voice - a low scratchy one.

  If the smooth feeling of his face hadn’t told him that it was all a dream, the voice of his master now did and for a fleeting moment, Paraden wished with dismay that he was back on the Athana Island.

  Paraden turned his head and beyond the fire pit he saw two shining eyes watch him from the dark. Between the time of Andarken’s remark and Paraden’s pending response, the gloating laugh of the Son of the Father gradually faded from memory, disappearing entirely when Paraden’s reply at last broke the silence.

  “Fair night, Master,” Paraden greeted.

  The shining eyes of the Old Way Hunter disappeared then reappeared with every blink. “You twitch like a fool in your sleep,” his master informed him. The scorn in the old elf’s voice was as clear as the annoyance that shaped every syllable.

  “Apologies, my Master,” replied Paraden, shifting his posture so that he sat upright.

  “I do not want to ever find you twitching like that in your sleep again. Do you understand me?”

  “Yes, my Master,” said Paraden, meekly.

  With a slight grunt, Andarken fumbled in the dark for his cane. When he found it, he used it to get shakily onto his feet, dishing out an abrupt command that was as breathless as it was terse.

  “Get my stuff ready. We carry on to the Greathouse. I want to arrive before the Howling Hour.”

  Paraden was throwing fistfuls of sand over the embers while his master’s profile faded into the night. He shook his head in silent contempt while gathering up their luggage and once on his feet, he quickly beat off in the direction of the road in which they had varied from earlier. Until they reached the Greathouse of the Olian Glades, no more words were spoken between master and shadowa.

  Sentinels swarmed the grounds of the Greathouse when at last Paraden and his master stood before its gate, its metal entwined in such a way that a depiction of two elvesses could be recognised: one holding a harp while her hair was being braided by the other. Here, the two visitors were met by three wary sentinels, their quick grasps upon the hilt of their longblades making it very clear that there would be no credence for passing at this time of night.

  When the centre sentinel of the three impeded Andarken’s advance with a curt gesture, forcing both the Old Way Hunter and his shadowa to an instant halt, Paraden wasn’t offended, nor was he surprised. However, the same could not be said of his master.

  “Better get out of my way, sentinel,” warned Andarken, in a low, vehement growl.

  The sentinel was not about to be rebuffed, Paraden saw, catching the flicker of wrath in the sentinel’s shining eyes.

  “What was that?” he challenged, shifting to the side and exacting a position that declared his intention to draw his weapon.

  Paraden saw a smidgen of the sentinel’s steel revealed to the night time air. But before it was completely thrust from its sheath, Andarken too had changed his pose and with surprising swiftness, gripped and twisted the pommel of his cane, whipping out a long and thin slither of steel that gleamed beneath the moonlight. Its point was already at the throat of the aghast and underestimating sentinel.

  “I would not be threatened by the Elder himself,” proclaimed Andarken, passionately. “Let alone by the likes of you.”

  By now, the other two sentinels had their blades in hand, moved quickly to their leader’s side. Andarken took notice and in response, he altered his wrist, edged the tip of his blade deep enough into the sentinel’s throat that it caused the skin to break, encouraging a twist of expression on the sentinel’s face.

  “Would you now expect me to be threatened by your two associates?”

  “State your service in these parts,” the sentinel sneered, relaxing his grip upon his blade hilt.

  “The better question,” came Andarken, “more appropriate I would say, would be to ask your service in these parts?”

  “We are sentinels,” blurted out one of the others, his tone incredulous. “Sworn to guard, protect and maintain order.”

  “And perhaps safeguard baby elvesses?” queried Andarken insolently and with a purposeful tinge of condescension.

  That silenced any pending retort that was ready to shoot forth from either one of the three guards and so noticing this, Andarken expressed a soft sound of satisfaction, did remove his blade before promptly turning it back into a walking cane. He then straightened, girded himself for introductions, unfussed by the look of contempt issuing out from each of the three sentinels’ dark expressions.

  “My name is Andarken Sourleaf,” Paraden’s master declared. “I have been summoned by the higher of this land to rectify all these wrongs that, on principle, should have been thwarted by guards such as yourselves.”

  Here we go, thought Paraden, catching the subtle change in his master’s voice; an intonation that was filled with mounting indignation.

  “And so. Listen to me, you poor saps of skin. Wasting no more of my time, I would heed you most imperatively not to hinder me further, but to rather and with good graces…” Andarken paused, took in a deep breath and cried, “GET THE FORSKER OUT OF MY WAY!”

  To their credit, none of the sentinels flinched at the brunt of Andarken’s wrath, which was surprising to Paraden seeing as he had never once met anyone who hadn’t. However, what wasn’t surprising was that they did not attempt to bar Andarken when the old elf bombarded his way forward.

  Paraden and his master were permitted inside the gate of the Greathouse; the floor beneath their feet becoming methodically paved gravel, their surrounding being a garden full of hedges, tall trees and dark ponds. When they entered the inner courtyard, the fluttering torches that were hanging upon the walls revealed a great fountain, whose figurehead Paraden knew to be a replica of the Loved.

  Paraden and his master stood in front of the main door of the House and while they awaited someone to let them inside, Paraden could feel his master’s edginess begin to grow, was not surprised when he suddenly spoke with a focused sternness.

  “Get your board out, shadowa.”

  Quickly, Paraden did as bade, the old elf now adding in the same tone of d
eliberate concentration,

  “The investigation starts now.”

  He regarded his shadowa with a familiar composure, reminding Paraden that despite his unpleasantness, Andarken Sourleaf took his service very seriously. His devotion to the downfall of the Old Way was as stout as any Paraden had seen in anyone else living in Olian.

  “When this door opens, record what is said. As well as the names of the players.”

  “Yes, my master.”

  Paraden had been with Andarken long enough to understand the different terms he used when out in the field. Those Andarken referred to as ‘the players,’ were suspects in an investigation and so without delay, Paraden took out some chalk and at the top of the small blackboard that he had pulled out from its threadbare compartment that was slung over his shoulder, he wrote at the top:

  Player One.

  At last the door was opened to them and an elvess appeared to usher them inside, did close the door once the two new guests crossed the threshold. There, Paraden waited in a large foyer while his master looked around, seemingly displeased.

  “Is no one awake to welcome me?”

  The elvess, who stood quietly behind Paraden, emitted softly, “the House sleeps, Master Hunter, but the Master Steward has been awakened with news of your arrival. He shall arrive short---”

  Commotion at the stairs directly in front of them lured both Paraden and his master’s gaze. They saw an elf descending hurriedly while donning a dark robe rimmed in fur. When that elf stood before Andarken, his tact in concealing his annoyance at being woken at this hour failed him miserably. Luckily Andarken wouldn’t take offence, for Paraden always suspected his master’s pleasure in inconveniencing others.

  “Master Steward, I assume?” came Andarken, briskly.

  “Yes,” came the elf, sliding one hand behind his back, erecting himself towards a more refined poise that, to Paraden, didn’t comply well with the elf’s current somnolent state.