by Brindi Quinn
Heart of Farellah: Book 3
By Brindi Quinn
~
Copyright 2011 B.E.L.
Cover Art by Ene Karels
Smashwords Edition
Smashwords Edition, License Notes
This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.
This book is dedicated to Parker, Carson, and Chelsey – for listening to my made-up stories about the bike-napper and going along with many a nonsense game.
Also By Brindi Quinn:
Heart of Farellah: Book 1
Heart of Farellah: Book 2
Seconds: The Shared Soul Chronicles
Sil in a Dark World
The World Remains
The Atto’s Tale Miniseries
EverDare
NeverSleep
The Death and Romancing of Marley Craw
The Ongoing Pursuit of Zillow Stone
Chapter 1: The Sky
“What do you mean we aren’t there yet?” whined Kantú. “This looks pretty misty to me!”
Scardo slithered up next to the pouting Squirrelean and swatted briskly at the air, which was, indeed, quite misty. “That may be,” he said, voice silky and low, “but we have yet to enter Nor. So we aren’t in the Mistlands.” Checking his map, he added, “We won’t be for another day or so either.”
“But then why’s there so much mist here? Grottsy, I don’t get it at all!”
We were on the edge of western Farrowel, making our way toward the realm of the angels. Two nights had passed since leaving Ms. Selrak’s cottage, but it felt like we’d been going on like this forever. The day was gray, as it usually was; the sky tired, shaded by the drifting and intruding vapor.
“ARRGH!” Rend let out a great, angry grunt. “Were you not listening to Elder Pietri?! The mist has now encroached upon the other regions as well! Why is it such a complex concept for you?! ”
“Oh.” Kantú thought about it a moment with drooped ears and then, “That’s right!” She nodded and happily hopped over to Ardette.
Rend reached after her with a clutching hand that was dangerously white-knuckled.
“Alright, Ardetto,” said Kantú, oblivious to the nearby Rend’s hazardous rage, “I’m ready.”
“Ready?” Ardette raised a brow at her terribly failed shrug of nonchalance.
“You know.”
“Know?”
“Ugh! Come on, already!” she persisted with a stomp. “Just let me blow into it one time!” With that, she lunged at the handsome Daem’s chest where the black whistle was hiding beneath his shirt.
But the lunge wouldn’t earn her any sort of triumph –
“Paws off!”
– because Ardette easily held her forehead at bay with one hand while lazily twisting his hair with the other.
Kantú whined and let out a huff and then returned to Grotts’ burly side, where she’d spent most of the day. It’d been another failed attempt at trying to play with the mysterious whistle Ms. Selrak had given Ardette just before departing her cottage. The curious girl had been lusting after it all morning.
In reference to ‘all morning’, Darch, on the other hand, had been happily humming the same loop of the Yes’lech Anthem over and over and over again, much to the perturbation of the rest of the guard. For the thousandth time – or maybe even more – the happy Magir reached the loop’s crescendo.
“Hmmm. Hmmm, HMMM, HM!”
But this time, he was interrupted by a growl.
“Dammit, Darch! Don’t ya know anything else?”
The words and tone of the annoyed grumble were very much alike something that would’ve left Ardette’s curled mouth in his most irritated of times, but surprisingly, on this occasion, the complaint, which was low and sort of rumbling, had actually come from Grotts. The massive man had been unusually agitated as of late. Maybe it was because of the way he’d once again been thrown around by one of the ‘revered’ officers of Yes’lech.
I’d have been upset too, had I not been preoccupied with other things . . . .
Other things, eh?
Yes, right now, that ‘other thing’ was taking up much of my focus, but the small portion of me that wasn’t concerned with it, was having second thoughts about this whole ‘heaven-infiltration’ plan we were presently undertaking. Though, to be more accurate, they might really have been ‘first thoughts’ since I hadn’t been given ample time to process everything until now. Either way:
A suicidal journey through the mist to trespass into another dimension?
It was something we were all struggling with. Even Scardo, who was by far the most dutiful of us, was having doubts.
“The realm of the angels?” he muttered to himself yet again while sidestepping around a mist-shrouded and unrecognizable piece of debris. “Is Pietri quite sure about this? Maybe we should ask the bird its opinion?”
The bird in question – the Spirit of In-between – was a short distance ahead, firmly planted on Darch’s shoulder. The pair of them had ‘made up’ now that everything was out in the open. Now that all of the feather man’s secrets had been divulged.
All of them? That’s what I’d pretended to accept, anyway, but there was a good chance there were still some secrets being kept. Rend and I had little in common, but at least we were in agreement when it came to things like that.
“Why, pray tell, would we ask that bird anything? It only seeks to create havoc!” spat the fuming Elf.
“My, my, dear Rend,” said Ardette mockingly, “I thought you were all about patronage to your brethren and whatnot.”
“That bird is not my brethren! It was a fool that sacrificed the well-being of the world because of an imbecilic Sape! In doing something so dishonorable, it lost the right to be part of our esteemed lineage! All for a Sape! Disgusting.”
“You’re so racist!” Kantú gave her a glare.
In return, Rend smiled wickedly. “When dealing with you, hybrid, would not the correct term be speciest?”
“Arrrgh!” Grotts looked ready to burst at the insult of his treasured squirrel. “Shut yer mouth, ya foul-tempered-”
“Grotts!” I interrupted him with a shout, finally putting a stop to things before they could become even uglier.
“Er- right,” said Grotts. “Sorry.”
It had been like this all day. And all of yesterday. Ever since leaving Ms. Selrak’s cabin, things had been this way. Everyone was in a bad mood, and it was starting to wear on me.
Everyone? No, that wasn’t quite right. Everyone was in a bad mood . . . everyone except for Nyte, that is.
He wasn’t in a bad mood, per se, but he was in a mood, and it was unlike any mood I’d ever seen him in before.
No longer under the restraints of the emulator pendant, we were free to touch each other at heart’s content, and he hadn’t dropped my hand since leaving Ms. Selrak’s house – even now, my fingers were wound in his normal-level-of-warm, slightly-looser-than-I-would-have-liked grasp – but where he should have been content at the new freedom, or worried over the fact that he was expected to die in my place, or maybe anxious about entering the mist, he was just . . . different.
It would’ve been too much to say that he was like an emotionless Feirgh or brainless crypt-walker. It wasn’t quite that bad. He was only half-listening to the rest of us, sure, but he was kind of fidgety too. Or maybe jumpy would h
ave been a better way to put it. Preoccupied.
“Nyte?”
No response, so I tried again, this time with a nudge.
“Nyte?”
“Huh?! Oh, Miss Hav-”
“Mhm. How annoying. Can’t you think of a normal pet name for her? Maybe something not so depressing?”
“Shut up, Ardette.” I felt the need to be defensive. “I like it.” Besides, I really did.
“Yes,” was Nyte’s only response.
Ardette raised his brows again and shrugged at me before turning away to pester Rend some more.
I gave Nyte’s hand a grand shake.
“Ah!” He jumped.
“Nyte!” I laughed. “What’s with you?” Then in a whisper, “You’re acting more like Scardo. I mean, Scardo’s fine and all, but . . .”
“I am sorry, Aura. I am not myself.”
“Yeah, I can tell that much.”
But he didn’t appear amused or anything. Where there normally would have been a wink or mischievous smirk, there was only distant jumpiness.
“Nyte?”
This time, I stopped walking altogether.
“What is it, Aura?” asked Kantú.
“You guys go ahead; we’ll catch up.”
“Nice!” She gave me an approving wink.
Not because of anything like that, you perv.
“Well,” said Ardette, “that’s a relief, I suppose.” He gave me the smirk I’d wanted from Nyte, and with a wave, turned to leave. Even with my Elf there, holding me back with concern, I had to fight to keep my eyes from smiling.
You aren’t staying in here forever, Ardette. You know that, right?
So far, any attempts at trying to force the Daem to remove his lingering shadow from my head had only resulted in perverse remarks and casual brush-offs.
As soon as we stop for camp, you’re getting out.
“We shall see, won’t we?” he called behind him. Then he continued to walk off in a lazy saunter.
Nyte’s eyes were on the ground, kind of squinted, but with the others leaving behind the foot-thuds of those quickening pace to leave us to ourselves, his worried irises wasted no time in bolting up in a semi-panic. “Miss Havoc?! The others are leaving! We will be left-”
“I know!” I gave his hand a good yank to keep him from trotting away. “I know they are, so . . .” Bringing my hands to the jumpy Elf’s face, I allowed a moment of misty silence before mustering whatever seductiveness I could and finishing, “What are you going to do now that we’re alone?”
This finally managed to get his attention. He dropped his gaze from the fleeting backs of our fellow party members and brought his forest-like eyes to mine.
“I am sorry. Again, I am sorry. I am not all here.”
“Again, I know that,” I said. “Care to tell me why?”
With his eyes in mine like that, it was like he was free from whatever stupor he’d been in. When he answered, there was no hesitation, only direct intention.
“Very well,” he said. “But first, now that I have you alone . . .”
Finally, there was that smirk. That spirited glint. That cunning and impish charm. It finally arose and entered his bronze face. I was weak. I was taken. I was captivated. I was so many things, and that one expression made my heart pound in a belting fury in my chest.
“F-first?” I whispered.
“First, now that we are alone . . . may I kiss you? It has been days, has it not?”
But he didn’t wait for an answer, and it was unnecessary for me to give one. Of course that was one of the things I wanted the most. It was unspoken, but I’m sure he could feel that desire through my palm that was still against his.
Bending low to reach my height, he brought his lips to mine. Like usual, I melted upon soft contact.
I fought not to think of anything that might make Ardette uncomfortable. It was hard – it was really hard – but I managed to get by with letting only a few little things slip. Still, I’m sure those few things were torment for the eavesdropper, who still regarded me as his most important person no matter how many times I shoved him away.
I’d make him get out of my head. I had to. It was for his sake too.
After a fulfilling kiss, Nyte released me slightly, but didn’t take his face very far from mine. I waited, basking in his cherry tree scent and knowing that the answer was coming. The answer to his strange, half-hearted, on-edge behavior. It was coming, and I braced myself.
I gave him a nod to show that I was ready, and the confession at last crossed his teeth:
“I can hear them,” he said. Quietly. Somberly.
Them? What did that mean?
“Hear . . . them?” I asked. “Who’re ‘them’?”
“Those crossing the Mistlands. I can . . . I can hear their cries.”
“What?” I pulled my face away to get a better read on him. I didn’t know what he was talking about, but whatever it was, it sounded disturbing. “Their cries? As in the cries of the dead!? But we haven’t even entered the mist yet!”
“They are a constant buzz in the air. I believe that Darch can also hear them, which is why he has been singing that song without end.”
I didn’t know what to say, so I muttered, “Without end is right,” while trying to gather my thoughts, and then, “But what do they sound like? And why can you hear them? I get why Darch would be able to, but why can you?”
“I do not know, but they are mourning themselves. And some of them are searching for a way back. Some of them are malevolent with a jealous hatred of the living. And those that are strongest with such emotions – emotions of anger and odium – theirs are the cries that . . .”
I waited, but he just squinted as if to analyze the ongoing phenomenon, so I prodded,
“That what?”
He fanned the air over his left shoulder. “Sound closest.”
“Eh?! Seriously?!”
He nodded. “The strongest, most rancorous sound as though they are right over my shoulder.” Seeing my blatant alarm, he smiled and added, “It is not that large of an issue, Aura. It is just that it is difficult for me to maintain focus with that constant overhead buzz. Their cries continue to drown out the talk of the guard. Your voices are minute by comparison. Even now it is hard to think with all of that going on.”
“Not a ‘large issue’?! Of course it’s a large issue! Why the heck can you hear them? Is it because of your ears?” I eyed them. Pointy and long, they’d always been able to pick up more than the rest of ours.
“Rend does not hear them. I have not asked her, but I can tell. She is very superstitious, and if she were to hear them as I have . . .”
“She’d freak out.” I could see it. Vividly.
“Right.” The grin he gave conveyed that he too could see it.
But I wasn’t ready to be so lighthearted, and he could tell.
“Are you worried?” he asked, patting my head. “Do not be.” He looked at the sky with played whimsy. “I will survive . . . probably.”
I shook him away.
“In all seriousness, though, that’s really, really disconcerting,” I said. “Aren’t you even a little creeped out?”
“Me? Frightened?” He gave me an amused half-grin. “Not at all. It is just a little bothersome. I do not like being distracted.”
‘A little bothersome’? But it was more than that. It had to be.
“Well, – I pulled him in for a tighter and possibly obnoxious squeeze – “good thing your girlfriend’s a songstress, then.”
“Good thing.” He rested his face in my neck and sighed. My heart palpitated in response.
There was just one thing to be done.
I put my mouth close to his ear and proceeded to hum him a song. It was a song that wasn’t meant to be an ariando. It was supposed to be nonsense. Just distracting, covering nonsense, but in the midst of that ‘nonsense’ something happened that I didn’t expect.
Not more than a half-minute in, the entirety of t
he gray sky shook. Or rather, it vibrated. At first I thought it was my imagination, so I continued in gibberish melodium until it vibrated again, this time in a much more unmistakable manner.
“What was that?” I whispered, dropping the hum. “Did you see it?”
Nyte pulled me into him defensively and glared up at the sky as though it were openly challenging us. “I do not know! Some sort of fluctuation?”
“Yeah . . . the sky trembled?”
But with my song capped, the ‘fluctuating’ had ceased. In the absence of distraction, too, Nyte stiffened and stared at the space ahead of him.
“Should I try again?” I asked.
But Nyte put his hand to his temple and gritted his teeth.
“Nyte?”
“Ah! I am sorry. There is a loud one nearby.”
Eyes locked on the sky, I started to hum some more, and in instant response, the vibrating began again. With new clarity, Nyte removed his hand from his head and peered at the clouds.
“Yes,” he mumbled, “it is responding to you.”
But why? This isn’t an ariando. There was no magical wind, no tingling power.
“Hmmm, hm, hmmmm. Hm, hm, hmmm-”
“Aura! Stop singing!” came a sudden stern order. From the mist before us, Darch bolted into view, followed swiftly by the others.
“What?” I said. “Why?”
But he threw a finger at my lips, shushing away any cries for elaboration.
“Please, please, please, don’t sing or hum or even sigh!”
“Darch!” Grotts panted a roar. “Ya mind tellin’ us what this is abou-”
But it was Ardette who answered.
“Shh! Shut it, would you? And watch the sky.”
But though I’d stopped singing, the sky’s trembling had only lessened somewhat.
“Damn,” said Ardette after a moment. “Darch, it’s him.”
Him?
Darch wrinkled his nose in disfavor. “Lusafael.”
At the name, everyone’s faces read disbelief. Even so, they all responded in their own ways, stepping back into a tighter group and readying various weapons.
