She cooled the molten rock with whatever was left of him inside and walked over the smooth patch of stone to get to the door to the observatory tower, climbing the spiral staircase with determined steps and a fuming fury. When she reached the door at the top, she threw it open and burst into the room.
Browan stood with his broad back to her, looking out one of the many windows of the round room.
“I figured you would never make it,” he taunted as he turned toward her slowly toward her. “I mean, I had hoped you would, so I could kill you myself, but I was starting to think you had failed.”
“Momma?” Aleon's voice sounded from somewhere in the room, and Veria looked around the room frantically, finding him standing in a crib. She rushed toward him and gave him a hug.
“Let go of my son,” Browan snapped, and she did as he said, turning back toward him.
“I am not letting you get away with this, Browan,” she snarled.
“Sit down,” he smiled and pointed to a seat, taking the one across from it at the table. A familiar looking table...the Tactics table.
She crossed the room and slowly sat in the chair opposite him as he set up the pieces.
“Did you ever notice how hard it is to win a game of Tactics with the Mager's power?” he asked, cocking his head. Pure, icy hatred coursed through her veins as she watched him take a Mager piece into his large hands and snap its head off effortlessly. “If you kill me, there is an army out there, multiple armies in fact, that will kill you on sight, then hunt down your family and kill them, too.”
“I don't think they will,” she muttered, picking up an archer piece and lighting it on fire with a quick burst of crackling flame in her hand.
“I remember when we sat at this table years ago and you told me that people found you arrogant,” Browan smirked maliciously. “I used to like it. I probably still would if you weren't the biggest threat to my plan and a loathsome thorn in my side. But alas, it is already in motion, just as I envisioned, so really, you're no threat at all. You might as well be that delectable, coquettish little lady, with skills but no idea how to use them to her advantage...before I made you what you are, and you betrayed me.”
He snapped another Mager piece's head from its wooden body and rolled it across the table at her.
The tower swayed with a sickening lurch from the impact of another projectile boulder and Veria's first instinct was to grab her son, but she managed to refrain from making any panicked movements or facial expressions.
“How much of this castle are you going to let them destroy?” Veria asked as calmly as possible, though her stomach churned nervously thinking about Andon and her mother, Turqa, Pascha and Aslay on the lower levels.
“Let them? Ha!” Browan threw his head back and laughed. “They have precise instructions and you know damn well they get their instructions from me. They don't know it, but they will do exactly as they've been told to do, which is to do significant damage to the castle and kill as many of the allied troops as possible. I need justification for chasing them back into the Southern Pass of Govaland and taking military control of it...for everyone's safety,” he said with pride. “Thank you, by the way, for your wonderful Elemental Consortium idea. Having the High Council release their support for me to end the Separatist Army threat by whatever means necessary was a very nice touch, don't you think?”
“It must feel nice to control so many of the pieces on both sides of the board,” Veria snarled at him.
“It does feel rather empowering, indeed,” he sneered. “I wish you could have been by my side for it, as my real partner and Queen, embracing and enjoying the power I gave you instead of spending all this time and energy, and the lives of your friends and loved ones, trying to stop me.”
Veria winced when he said 'lives of your friends', and the picture of Strelzar back in the hallway flashed before her eyes, and she closed them briefly and swallowed hard.
“Oh, have I hit a nerve?” Browan taunted. “Oh, my—look at all that blood on your hands!” he remarked facetiously. “Who was it, hm? Pascha? Your stepfather, perhaps? Certainly not your common little servant-boy, no...you would be hysterical. But I see the rim of red around your eyes that means you have shed tears, but you came in here with resolve and arrogance, furious and fiery, wanting revenge...so it was Plazic.” He grinned a disgusting, satisfied grin and Veria had to clench the sides of the Tactics table to refrain from killing him on the spot. “Well, don't worry, Veria, you will join him in death soon if you attempt to kill me. Both of my armies have orders to kill you—well, not orders exactly...the Separatists just want you dead because they know you were one of the Twin Dragons that slaughtered two hundred of their men, including their beloved leader, Cadit Ohren.”
“Cadit Ohren is alive,” Veria said. “He was the lone 'scout' who escaped. He is here today. With us. He was not as loyal to your cause as you thought—he never has been.”
Browan's face contorted into a vile, twisted smile and intimidating glare as he leaned across the table toward her. “Do you think that matters? Do you think there's anything any of you can do to stop me now? What is Cadit Ohren going to do—stand there and announce to the entire Separatist Army that I created them and controlled them all along? They will never believe him! No one will believe your sorry little band of well dressed traitors, Veria. It's over.”
“You are right,” Veria grinned. “You are right about all of it.”
Browan's face dropped slightly, a crack in the confident, intimidating facade. “Why are you grinning?” Browan snapped. “If I am right about all of it then you have lost! You're as crazy as Plazic if that amuses you.”
“You are right—they won't believe Cadit, or me, or any of us alone...but they will believe you,” Veria explained, leaning back in her chair and crossing her arms casually.
“What in the world are you on about, Veria?” Browan spat.
“My goodness, it has been awhile since I've heard any crumbling stone or clashing swords,” Veria drawled facetiously, propping her feet up on the Tactics table.
Browan jumped from his seat and rushed to the window overlooking the battlefield. Veria didn't have to watch his reaction to know what he was seeing, and she snorted through her nose as she heard him slam his fist into the nearest bookcase and roar in his throat.
“What's the matter, Browan, did they all stop fighting or something?” she asked with playful pouting lips, feigning ignorance.
“What have you done?!” he shouted. He whipped around and started to charge at her.
She held out her hand, latching onto the coursing Fire energy that burned inside her, preparing to manipulate his desires. “I don't think you really want to do that,” she said nonchalantly, and he stopped. “I think you really want to stand there and listen to me tell you how right you are that this is over.”
His body went stock still, his spine rigid and muscles tense, and he didn't move a muscle. She pulled her feet from the Tactics table and slowly stood and turned toward him.
“Did you ever notice how hard it is to win a game of Tactic's with the Mager's power?” she mocked his earlier question to her, striding around his statue-still body like a predator stalking prey. “Well, I'll tell you why that is—it's because that ridiculous old game doesn't take into account that Magers have more skills than hard elementals. It doesn't take into account that Magers create new skills regularly. It doesn't take into account that some Magers...are invisible.”
On either side of her, Virro and Sureven dropped their invisibility.
“It is much easier to win with Magers in real life, Browan,” Veria said. “Virro and Sureven have had the entire year to create a new skill—you couldn't find them to stop them because they spent a majority of their time invisible. This skill was something that our leader, Strelzar Plazic, knew would be the only way to get our message out. We knew nobody would believe us. We would sound crazy if we spouted off the details of this plan with only the word of an exiled Fire Mager, a d
eceased Diamond Mager hermit, and a treasonous Queen. So, we needed you to confess—and not just to me again—to everyone. At the same time.
“When Virro and Sureven combine their energy, they can send your voice out over a huge area around them,” Veria continued. “Pretty useful skill, right? One you couldn't see and had no idea existed. All I had to do was get you to elaborate, and everyone in the vicinity of the castle, everyone on both sides of that battlefield heard you, in your voice and words, confess. Thank you for gathering everyone here today,” she teased him with his own words from the balcony. “It was so much easier to turn everyone against you.”
She closed the distance between them with confident, intimidating strides, then pointed to the floor.
“Drop to your knees,” she said, and planted the desire in him to do as she said, taking profound pleasure in the earthen thud and crack of bone that sounded out as his knees hit the stone floor.
He roared at her but did not move. “You can't kill me,” he snarled. “I have taken all the remaining dragonskin—a whole trunk of it! Claryain said it could make me invincible for months!”
“Virro, Sureven, take my son out of this forsaken castle, please,” she said softly. “I don’t want him to see this. His father is down in the infirmary.”
Virro placed a comforting hand on her shoulder and she looked at him. His eyes were sympathetic and rimmed with tears. They had been in the hall for Strelzar's death, as well, unable to do anything but watch in invisible silence, lest they give themselves away. Veria grabbed his hand and squeezed it, and he turned and trudged toward the door, where Sureven held Aleon and waited for his Master.
Once they were gone, Veria turned back to Browan, and her face went from the momentary soft back to a hardened, hateful glare.
“It's so interesting to me how so many things are clues that are right in front of your face, but you don't understand until the other pieces are on the table,” she drawled tauntingly. “Do you remember how they found Ellory Mielyr? After the Twin Dragons assassinated him?”
Browan gulped and his eyes went wide.
“I remember Strelzar specifically telling me that he would suffocate slowly, trapped in that gold encasement, if I didn't do something more quick and immediate. But unfortunately for you, with all that dragonskin in you, I guess a long, slow, painful death by suffocation is the only option,” she said with a shrug.
“Veria, I beg of you, don't do this,” Browan whimpered, quivering and trembling, his eyes wide with terror.
“Oh, yes, you should beg,” she snarled. “Beg me.”
He slumped forward and clasped his hands together, his head dropping to his chest as he hysterically and unintelligibly muttered his entreaties.
She crouched to one knee in front of him and angled her face toward his as she began to pull the floor behind him up in a stream of boiling orange magma. Her voice full of fury and Fire, she spoke:
“Elanza lis cabarus ali forgeo.”
Everyone parted and dropped to their knees, bowing deeply as Veria emerged from the castle gate, clad in her feathered dress of blue and white, the statue of Browan begging on his knees trailing in the air behind her.
She let the statue—the encasement of the loathsome King who would die slowly inside the thick, suffocating stone when his dragonskin wore off—drop to the ground in the middle of the body-strewn battlefield with a heavy, booming thud. Without a word, she turned and made her way back into the castle.
Cheers and applause erupted behind her, but she did not stop or turn back to acknowledge, drifting effortlessly into the castle and through its halls, everyone moving quickly out of her way and thanking her as she passed. Finally, she reached her destination and steeled her nerves as she entered the infirmary.
“Veria!” her mother cried out and rushed to her, wrapping her up in her arms.
Veria's eyes darted around the room, surveying the beds—Turqa lay in one, his eyes batting groggily; Cadit in another, eyes closed and not moving; several other Magers in cloaks she did not recognize littered the room and Pascha and Claryain scurried all over the infirmary trying to tend to them. Virro and Sureven stood in the corner, Aleon now in Virro's arms, playing with his long, white beard.
“Where's Andon?” Veria asked. “Did he go to the children?”
Tanisca pulled away, bit her lip and shook her head. Veria's heart pounded and panic overtook her.
“Veria, don't be upset—” her mother started, but Veria interjected hysterically.
“Don't be upset?! What happened to him?!”
“Nothing, vina,” his voice sounded behind her. “I am right here.”
She whipped around, relief flooding her like cool, refreshing water when she saw him standing in the doorway, cradling a limp, cloaked body in his arms.
“I thought you would be angry that I didn't go to the children, but I couldn't leave everyone out in that field,” he said, crossing the infirmary to an empty cot and laying the body down gently. “Many of them have treatable injuries, but some of them...I was too late.”
Veria looked at Cadit again, motionless on the cot, Aslay at his side with tears streaming down her red, splotchy face. Her heart sank. Andon crossed back to her and pulled her into his arms, squeezing her tightly and securely.
“You changed clothes,” he chuckled in her ear.
“One must look one's best when making lesser men cower,” she replied, choking on a sudden hot lump in her throat on the last few words.
Andon pulled away and surveyed her face. “Veria...” he murmured, and her lips started to quiver as she fought against the sobs. “Oh, Veria, no...”
She nodded and bit her lip, trying to stay strong, but tears found their way out even though she had clamped down on the weeps and cries that formed in her chest. Andon pulled her back into his arms and stroked her hair. She caught her mother's eye behind Andon, and tears and sorrow overtook her, as well.
“Did he say anything?” came a squeaking, shaking whimper from the corner.
Veria and Andon turned to see Pascha, frozen and unmoving, like a porcelain doll, staring at them gravely.
“He...he told me to tell you he loves you,” she lied, something that was easier now than it ever had been before, with his energy filling her to the brim. “And he said he'd never leave us. Any of us.”
Sniffles and coughs sounded around the infirmary, and a tear rolled down Pascha's pale cheek.
“Did he kiss you?” she asked, pursing her lips in an attempt not to cry. “He said he was going to have to kiss you—did he do it?”
Veria nodded, but did not speak.
Turqa sat up slowly, and Tanisca gasped and rushed back to his side at his cot. “The Kiss of Death,” he groaned. “The Kiss of Death...”
“What is that?” Andon asked.
“It is said, but not widely documented, that in their final breath, a Mager can impart all of their energy to another Mager who has connected with it before,” Turqa explained, his voice feeble and strained. “Did it work?”
“Yes,” Veria answered. “It did.”
The room went silent, and Andon reached out and squeezed her hand, and gave her a warm smile.
“Then he was right,” he murmured. “He is with us. Alis termertu ar departu.”
Veria sighed and let the warmth of Strelzar's Fire comfort her. “To the end and after.”
-XXI-
The Ceremony Hall of the Elemental Shrine buzzed and thrummed with anticipation. A large crowd had gathered to see the next High Council named. Andon and Veria held hands in the wings, waiting for their names to be called, listening to the others announced before them to booming fanfare.
Tanisca Pyer-Coriant, Fire!
Aslay Livida, Fire!
Turqa Coriant, Water!
Pascha Pasrect, Water!
Sureven Sotar, Wind!
Andon squeezed her hand in his. “We're next,” he murmured. “Are you ready?”
She nodded and smiled at him. “Of course I
'm ready.”
Andon Villicrey, Earth!
Veria Laurelgate-Villicrey, Earth and Fire!
At the announcement of their names, they strode down the carpeted aisle through the middle of the cheering crowd, joining the others at the front of the hall. In the audience, Veria spotted Virro, Willis and Sarco with Irea, Aleon and Ava. A single happy tear rolled down her cheek.
It had been four months since the Battle of the Almost War, as it had come to be named. Veria passed on her claim to the throne, and passed on Aleon's claim, as well. Browan's next relative, Lord Borlys, had taken the throne and begun rebuilding the castle immediately. Borlys had promised he would rule peacefully, disbanding the Elemental Guard as his first proclamation.
Veria had never been happier in her entire life, and the overwhelming joy at being named to the High Council kept her in a state of pure bliss all through the reception that followed the announcement. Everyone at the gathering came to congratulate and praise her, thanking her for everything she had done to protect them.
“Tarddiad, loved by all—or do you think they are just picking up on that steamy Strelzar energy?” Andon purred in her ear as she scurried up next to him at the refreshment table, away from a throng of elderly Ladies who insisted she petition to have Andon reinstated as the Lord of the Guyler Estate.
She cackled and grabbed a glass of bubbly from the table, prepared to down it in as few gulps as possible. Someone tapped her on the shoulder before she put the glass to her lips, and she turned around slowly, expecting one of the women to have followed her with more advice, but was shocked to see a strikingly handsome man with tan skin and a copper mustache. He held out a silver tray.
“Please, Masters Villicrey, I have a special refreshment for the High Council,” the man said, his voice deep and smooth as coacoa. “It is more hydrating than the bubbly.”
Veria and Andon exchanged wide-eyed glances. Could it be the same mysterious man that had gifted the Ageless Council with their long lives? Veria wondered, and Andon's face told her he was wondering the same.
Queen of the Earth: Book V in the Elementals Series Page 18
