‘Are we speaking of the same, polite elf?’ Celene teased.
‘Are we speaking of a polite elf?’ Melia cocked a brow at her.
Celene laughed and Melia joined her before the conversation regarding the Prince of Eden Halas deteriorated even further.
‘It is time we join the others for dinner,’ Celene prompted their departure. ‘Arianne thought you might prefer a friendly face to accompany you to the hall instead of a serving girl. We will talk more tonight.’
‘I am grateful for your company,’ Melia did not lie in admitting that Arianne was extremely correct about that assertion. She made a mental note to thank the Queen for the consideration when they had a moment alone. Hopefully the rest of the night would transpire as smoothly.
******
‘Did you miss me?’
A familiar voice spoke so closely to Melia’s ear she felt the hairs on the back of her neck stand on end. They were just about to enter the corridor leading to the great hall when they were intercepted by someone who knew how to approach them without giving any indication of his presence.
Melia sucked in her breath, perfectly aware of whom had asked the question and replied sweetly without turning around. ‘Like the pox.’
‘Are you saying you afflicted with me?’ Aeron asked as he rounded the two women and stood next to Melia, smirking.
Celene rolled her eyes, aware that Kyou’s description of the two had been quite accurate. ‘Prince Aeron, I take it you remember Melia?’
‘Vaguely,’ Aeron shrugged, a little smile crossing lips as his eyes continued to stare at Melia. ‘Though I am certain that it was a scruffy watch guard I travelled with, not this woman,’ his eyes moved over her form, showing his approval of her dress.
‘I remember you,’ Melia retorted, feeling uncomfortable enough in these clothes without this elven aristocrat making her feel more self-conscious about it ‘You were that annoying little puppy that kept tugging at my heels. I thought I had lost you in woods with the hopes you would not find your way home.’
‘It is good to see that Kyou was not exaggerating,’ Celene chuckled, shaking her head while she drew away from them both to keep being caught in their sparring match. ‘I leave you to your verbal jousting. If you can rest your bladed tongues for long enough, do join us in the hall. I believe the Queenies waiting.’
Neither spoke until Celene had gone and despite his earlier reminders to himself to keep from falling into old patterns around her, that resolve crumbled the instant Aeron laid eyes upon her. She was just as he remembered but the dress took his breath away even though he hid it well. It was her spirit he admired so when they first encountered each other. The lady was lovely too but it was secondary to her will and her wit which he found very similar to his own. However, this was the first time he realised how truly female she was and it had robbed him of the sense to curtail feelings he knew he should not be entertaining in the slightest.
‘Would you let me escort you?’ He asked offering her his arm.
‘Now you behave like a nobleman?’ She stared at him, wondering what was to be done with this impossible elf.
‘A moment ago I was pox,’ he pointed out. ‘It requires time to rise above that distinction.’
‘You are quite impossible,’ she said breaking into a smile as she took his arm and they started walking again. Despite herself, Melia found he was good company when he was not being quite so infuriating.
‘I can assure you, I am not alone,’ he grinned before his tone became more serious. ‘So how have you been?’
‘I think I preferred you impossible,’ Melia retorted and softened a little because his inquiry was sincere. ‘I have been well. I hear you are bound for home.’
He stiffened only slightly but enough for Melia to know he was not happy about it and wondered why a Prince would dislike returning to his realm?
‘Yes,’ he said with a resigned sigh. ‘My father requires me home and I have been away for far too long. It is time.’
‘Does that not make you happy?’ She asked pointedly. Subtlety was something neither seemed to have cultivated with each other. It made dealing with each other a good deal easier and more honest.
‘No,’ he admitted. ‘Not as much as I should be.’
A pregnant pause followed as she debated what she should say to him. It was far simpler dealing with the Prince of Eden Halas when they were trading barbs and insults. However, seeing him visibly unhappy bothered Melia more than it should have.
‘Perhaps you should go home only to visit,’ Melia suggested.
‘I am considering other options,’ he confessed. ‘I am not certain what those are but I do not wish to disappear behind the Veil like the rest of my people. I enjoy being in the world too much.’
‘Good,’ she smiled, genuinely pleased to hear that he had alternatives. When her father died, she had none and never took for granted the right to choose one's destiny.
‘What of you Melia?’ Aeron looked at her, realising that he knew little about her. Obviously she had come from the lands of the east but they were not known to depart its borders unless it was to join Balfure in his conquest of the west. ‘How does an Easterling find her way so far from the lands of her birth?’
‘When she had even less choices than you,’ Melia replied without thinking.
His brow knotted not at all liking the sound of that. Was she driven from her home for some reason? ‘What do you mean?’
Melia frowned, rebuking herself inwardly at her lapse but decided she would tell him little for he would no doubt plague her until she revealed the meaning of her words or making because confiding in him was easy. ‘In Nadira, a woman has no choice in whom she is to wed. Marriage is arranged by the family as it was done with me. My father had died and his family believed that it was time that I was married. I was given no choice in who my husband was and as I had no wish for marriage, I fled.’
‘Could you have not simply refused?’ Aeron asked, finding the action of forcing a woman into marriage to some man she could not endure to be rather barbaric. He knew the marriages were arranged by the noble houses of men for political reasons but elves found the whole thing rather odious. Kingdoms came and went but marriage among elves lasted forever. If love was not part of that equation, then eternity was going to be a very long time.
‘In Nadira, a woman may not refuse a man or a proposal of marriage arranged by her family. It is dishonourable,’ Melia explained as it was explained to her at the time. ‘My father had spared me from such traditions because he did not wish me loveless marriage. Unfortunately, once he died there was no stopping such an arrangement from being made by well-meaning relatives. Leaving was the only course left to me.’
‘That is a sad tale,’ Aeron replied as they continued to the great hall. ‘But I supposed you ought to be grateful,’ he remarked, casting a sidelong glance as he spoke.
‘Grateful?’ she stopped walking and stared at him.
‘If you did not find this suitor so terribly unacceptable, you would never have left to meet me and where would we then?’ He winked at her wearing that damnable smile she found so hard to resist.
‘Deluded apparently,’ she retorted and started walking.
‘You say deluded but I know you like me.’ He said smugly.
‘I admit to nothing,’ Melia responded but did not resist when he pulled her arm closer to him.
Chapter Two:
Inquiries
Although the dinner took place in the great hall of the Keep, the proceedings were surprisingly informal with only the handful of people Arianne and Dare considered their good friends to be in attendance.
Aside from the King and Queen, also present were Ronen and Celene, along with Kyou, herself and her escort. Until she was seated at their table, Melia did not appreciate how much of an honour it was to be considered a part of their circle for she was in select company. It was the first time in too long that she was a part of any celebration where she was welcomed at t
he table.
‘Melia, are your accommodations suitable?’ Arianne, Queen of Carleon asked when she saw Melia and Aeron enter the room. She had recovered her bloom after the exhaustion of birth and now radiated with the glow of new motherhood. It was no wonder to anyone that the King could only look upon his wife with adoration.
‘Luxurious in comparison to what I am accustomed to,’ Melia confessed.
‘Come now, Arianne,’ Dare joined them. ‘Melia is a watch guard. Like any able adventurer, we spend most of our time in the wilderness. As long as it is dry and safe, we can sleep anywhere.’
‘And yet she manages to look less bedraggled than you,’ Arianne reminded him teasingly. ‘I remember your state when you returned to Eden Taryn from the wilderness.’
Dare gave his wife a wounded look, ‘it was because I was making haste to return to you Rian. If I stopped for even one moment to groom myself, it was one moment too long that I was kept away from you. I could not endure even that slightest delay.’ Dare flashed his wife a look of pure innocence that drew laughter from everyone present.
‘Nicely evaded,’ Arianne laughed, not believing him for a second but impressed by the sly weaving of words he produced to extricate himself from any real explanation.
Appearing completely unrepentant, the King smiled proudly at his wife before responding, ‘diplomacy has taught me much.’
‘In any case I thank you for your hospitality,’ Melia remarked once husband and wife had completed their private joke. ‘My room is a luxury I shall enjoy until I have to return to the Range.’
‘How goes it there?’ Dare asked, always interested in how things were transpiring in the rest of his kingdom. As one who travelled Carleon quite extensively, he knew the observations of the watch guards were the most accurate intelligence he could receive about was going on in his kingdom.
‘It goes well. The Berserkers have decreased in numbers and their raiding parties are sporadic,’ she answered, remembering now that he was not Dare but King Dare and behaved accordingly. ‘They are being driven further north by the soldiers at Cereine as well as the watch guards. I do not think it will be that long before we are no longer troubled by them at all.’
‘That is good to know,’ Dare nodded. ‘Avalyne has been blighted long enough by their evil. I think there will be pockets of their race emerging from time to time but it pleases me that we are making some headway.’
‘Which is more than I can say of the south,’ Ronen added his voice in the discussion. ‘There are Berserkers there in greater numbers.’
‘As long as Tor Ardhen stands, they will consider it theirs to occupy even with the death of Balfure. Those woods are formidable and they know you do not have the resources to fully scout it and drive them out,’ Aeron pointed out. ‘It is a shame that Lylea’s former home is despoiled in this way. I am told those forests are vast and ancient. They deserve better.’
‘What is needed there is settlement,’ Dare remarked. ‘If more people were willing to dwell there, the Berserkers could be driven away. Unfortunately, they cannot do that until we empty Tor Ardhen.’
‘It is a difficult situation,’ Celene sighed, having ridden out with Ronen on the expeditions to clean out the territory.
‘I doubt there is anything left after we were done with it,’ Kyou said enthusiastically. ‘The Shadow War decided Balfure's fate once and for all.’
‘I would not be so quick to dismiss the dark powers that were once of that land,’ Arianne replied. ‘Evil of such power is extremely hard to kill. For all we know, our future progeny may suffer for something we did not finish.’
No one could argue with her on that point after what they had experienced with Syphia. If anything had reminded them that not all evils had been vanquished with Balfure, it was the presence of the Primordial that had emerged straight from the pits of Sanhael when Mael still warred with the Celestial Gods. No doubt there were other threats beyond the Berserkers that were lying hidden, waiting for the right moment to wreak mischief upon them all. However, none of them were too eager to dampen the evening with such talk.
Aeron did not speak for a time but he thought on the subject of Tor Ardhen and the woods of surrounding it. It suddenly provided him with the first grains of an idea and the more he thought of it, the more inspired it seemed to be. This needed further investigation, he told himself silently. To his chagrin, even he was a great deal older than Dare, the elf had to admit that Dare was correct about his situation.
Aeron had to be the master of his own fate.
******
The evening transpired with much merriment by the time the meal was served.
It was the first opportunity for Melia to observe the people she had met only briefly during their adventure in Sanhael. While she had gotten to know Arianne and Celene closely during the quest and had travelled with Kyou and the Prince on their return, this was the first time Melia really got to know the King and Celene’s husband, Ronen.
It was easy to forget that Dare was the leader of Carleon when he had such a dry wit, a love of life and more intelligence than was usually customary for a man of his station. It also warmed her heart to see how much the couple adored each other if it had not been already clear by how far he had travelled to find Arianne in Sanhael. It was clear every time he looked at Arianne just how much he loved his wife.
Ronen was no different in his adoration of Celene though his manner was quite different than Dare’s. A captain of Sandrine during the occupation, he appeared to have as much difficulty becoming accustomed to his station as the Bân of Carleon. He would always be a soldier at heart, even though he was now a lord with his own city to rule. His manner though not as charismatic as Dare's, revealed a quiet strength. In comparison to Celene's headstrong and often fiery disposition, he was the perfect foil to her heated temperament. They suited each other well.
Of the men, it was perhaps Kyou she knew the best. He was the first dwarf she had ever met and during the journey to the Baffin when the urge to strangle Aeron was so intense she needed to stay well away from the elf, there had been time to know the head of Clan Atrayo.
She found that she liked Kyou a great deal for the dwarf was astonishingly practical and when he examined her crossbow, suggesting all sorts of interesting ideas on how she might hone the shape of its bolts to perfect her aim. He spoke of Iridia and the hopes of rebuilding the dwarf kingdom after its rorting. He spoke something of the lady who had been waiting for him for years at the Jagged Teeth when he was travelling with Dare. Melia was pleased to hear that he was finally able to marry her after their paths had diverged when she continued onto the Range.
She did learn something of the Prince as well.
She knew from experience that elves did not like to leave the Veil. The elves preferred to remain in seclusion within their forests, leaving the world to the younger races. That Aeron had emerged from Eden Halas to travel with Dare and the Circle was unusual. Aeron, it appeared, was something of an aberration when it came to elves. He enjoyed travelling with his companions and was loyal beyond all measure to them. He considered Dare his family and Kyou believed that Aeron was a remnant of the elves who used to explore Avalyne extensively before the Primordial Wars had changed them so.
******
When the party had disbanded, Melia found that she could not sleep.
Being a watch guard ensured she could exist on little sleep and so far, the day had not been so taxing that she was exhausted. The business of dining with friends in a great hall was far less work than roaming the wilderness, keeping watch for every sound and movement because to do otherwise was to court death. As a result she was restless and took herself to the gardens, where she wandered aimlessly, enjoying the sight of greenery beneath the pale moonlight of the twilight sky. She had become so accustomed to sleeping under the stars that being surrounded by walls made her uncomfortable and the walk outdoors settle her.
Her mood was good because for the first time in too long, she had
friends who were noble and kind, who knew what she was and had no words of reproach for her manner. Not since her father's passing had she felt such acceptance. Even though she would soon have to return to the wilderness, it was good to know that for awhile at least she would have these people in her life. Following the path of blue stones, she reached the marble fountain with its ornate sculptures and was lost in the reflection of the full moon upon the water when a voice slipped out of the darkness and spoke.
‘You should not be wandering the grounds alone,’ Aeron declared from behind her.
Melia let out an exasperated sigh, folding her arms in impatience as she turned around to see Aeron standing up from a stone bench next to a high hedge. It appeared as if he had been there for some time and Melia wondered what reason he would have to sit in the darkness like this. During the night, he showed none of the melancholy she saw when he confessed his reluctance to return home. In fact, the seating arrangement at the King’s table had seen them placed side by side and he was surprisingly pleasant company.
‘Please tell me you have not followed me,’ she teased knowing full well he had not but insults were the way they greeted each other and provided a good segue into why he was sitting out here alone.
‘Oh yes, I sat here in the vain hopes that you would happen to walk this way instead of a dozen different paths that crisscross these gardens,’ he retorted with exaggerated dramatics as he reached her.
He stood at arm's length from her all too aware that they were far too familiar with each other. More so than might be considered proper. There were some lines of propriety that Aeron would not cross out of respect for her especially when they now alone, enjoying each other’s company in the moonlight.
‘Well then you are fortunate,’ she rewarded him with a laugh before looking at him with affection. ‘Really, why are you out here?’
There was real concern in her voice, Aeron noticed.
‘I could not sleep and I think better with the stars above me.’ He answered after a moment and glanced briefly at the canvas above them before meeting her gaze again. ‘But always in my heart was the thought that maybe you would be here as well.’ He teased.
Avalyne Series 02: The Easterling Page 3
