The Revenge of the Elves

by Gary Alan Wassner

  “Can you tell what ails him?” Treestar asked, returning with the goblet.

  She reached out her hand again. It trembled and she couldn’t steady it. She touched his cheek. Her hand recoiled. “This is not my son! This is not Fallean!” Elsinestra staggered back.

  A black dagger appeared in his hand. He lunged at Treestar, but Liam was quicker. He stepped in front of the King and the blade sunk deep into his shoulder. The imposter released his grip and stood unmoving. Liam fell to his knees.

  “You’re sure Elsinestra? You’re sure?” Treestar yelled, his sword already pulled from his belt.

  “Yes,” she spit the words.

  Revulsion. Disgust. He knew it was true. He swung the blade in a broad arc and took the imposter’s head off with one stroke. Its body melted into a pool of liquid in the middle of the floor.

  Elsinestra was already on the carpet, drawing the dagger from Liam’s flesh.

  “Careful, my Lady,” Liam spoke through clenched teeth.

  She pressed the hem of her dress to his wound.

  “Call one of the women,” she yelled at the King. “I need my medicines.” The Chosen’s face was bloodless. His smile was crooked. Elsinestra stroked his forehead and eased him the rest of the way to the floor. He was burning up.

  “How ironic,” Liam said, his eyes glassy. “I shall die before Oleander after all.”

  “What are you talking about?” Elsinestra snapped. “This isn’t a fatal wound.” She pressed the cloth harder but his blood scarcely flowed. “See? The bleeding’s slowed.” The edges of the cut closed up as she watched. “Are you doing this, Liam?” she asked.

  “The imposter was sent to kill the King,” he spit blood. “There’s no remedy for the poison.” Liam’s lips were blue.

  “My medicines will be here soon. Surely…”

  “Trust me,” he lifted his head as much as he could, “I’m already dead.” His eyes clouded over. “Hold my hand, Elsinestra.”

  She took his hand in hers. It felt like ice. Like death.

  “How did we let this happen? Liam…” she sobbed.

  “Better me. I didn’t have a chance to tell you. Oleander… is… not… well,” he struggled with the words. He beckoned her closer. His strength was failing. “The bond. I promised Blodwyn…” He closed his eyes and opened them again. The lids fluttered but his pupils were fully dilated. His eyes were blind. “Are you here still?” his voice fluttered, hardly a whisper.

  “Yes, Chosen. I’m here.” She squeezed his fingers but he couldn’t feel it. “I won’t leave you.” She leaned in, her ear near his lips.

  “Oleander. I… must… tell… Olea…” His head fell back. She cradled it and stroked his hair.

  Terror engulfed her as she realized, “The other Kings! The armies of Crispen and Eleutheria are in Tamarand too!”

  Aliya saw him standing beside his horse. She knew it was him! The way he dipped his head, the way he tossed his hair. She dashed down the corridor and rushed out the door. My son. My son is home, was all she thought, all that mattered. It was such a joy to see him it didn’t even occur to her that he was alone, Maringar had also become like a son to her while at Crispen, but the sight of Beolan banished all other concerns from her mind. You’re safe.

  His touch was like a drug. She hugged him, stroked his arms, lay her head upon his chest. The smell, the feel of him. Her son was home. He brushed his finger across her cheek and she smiled. Now she could tell him. Soon, all the years of guilt would be gone. He’d forgive her. He loved her.

  She led him by the hand across the open space between the trees and the walls of the castle. There wasn’t anyone in sight. The sentry posts stood empty on both sides of the gates. Together they walked to Bristar’s study. He’ll be here soon, she thought. It’s almost dinner time, she remembered his promise to dine with her.

  She pushed the door open and Beolan followed her inside. She felt like a child again, so happy. His features were perfect, just as she remembered. There was nothing better than having a child return. Nothing. She worried so.

  They sat beside one another in the chairs she and Bristar used to gaze out onto the city. Silandre loomed in the distance, calm, quiet, as the sun streamed through the window. He was silent too and she allowed him his peace. Shadows streaked the floor behind them. She heard Bristar’s footsteps on the stones of the hallway. Her face was frozen in a smile and she watched the waters run down the sides of the mountain.

  The King opened the door. Aliya’s arm hung by the side of her chair. He walked up behind her and laid his hand on her slender shoulder. She turned but her eyes were not her own. They were glazed and stuporous and her smile…

  A figure rose up from the chair beside her. “Beolan!” he exclaimed, but Bristar wasn’t happy. He wasn’t overjoyed as she was. “Aliya!” he yelled.

  The imposter lunged toward him brandishing a long, slender knife. Aliya was confused. She stood and stared at Bristar. She didn’t see the knife behind her. Why are you angry? His face was contorted, his eyes were wild. How can you be upset? How? Beolan’s back. Her arms out, she turned to embrace her son. The poisoned blade sliced through her robe and her blouse, piercing the skin. Her eyes dropped to the wound on her chest, but still, she didn’t understand. Her blood pooled on the thick carpet.

  Bristar drew his blade and jabbed it deep into the monster’s heart. Its body crumbled upon itself at the touch of the elfin blade and fell to the floor.

  Bristar caught Aliya as she collapsed. He laid her on the rug. Her skin was already black and the stench of death was in the air. With his face buried in the crook of her neck, he lay down beside her and sobbed.

  Whitestar swung around at the sound of the door opening. Emerial stood in front of him, smiling.

  “Joyous news, my husband,” she said, her face lit with excitement, her eyes wide. She led Kalon into the room.

  Whitestar staggered. His mind lurched. Kalon was dead! This was impossible. But it was him. The dead marched with Alemar. Maybe. Maybe. Maybe he didn’t die. They hadn’t seen him leave. His body was never returned to them. Could it be? The King stumbled across the room to greet them.

  Arms spread wide, he embraced his son. The pretender lunged and buried the blade in Whitestar’s heart, then its body collapsed upon itself in a puff of gray smoke. King Whitestar of Eleutheria fell dead upon the study floor.

  Emerial was stunned. Kalon! He was gone. Where? Where? Whitestar? What did you do to him? My son! She didn’t understand. Kalon! her mind screamed again. She dropped to the floor. Where are you? She was crazed. Blood was everywhere. “Kalon!” She seized the dagger buried in her husband’s chest. The studded hilt pricked her fingers and the poison entered her body. She stiffened as it raced to her heart.

  Chapter Sixty-one

  Violet descended the steps from the bell tower. Her eye was drawn to the window as she turned the bend. Three figures stood on the edge of the woods surrounding Parth. The shield protecting the Tower blurred her vision, but the gait of one of the travelers was familiar. She leaned closer and stared. Tamara! You’re back! She looked again. But different.

  A wave of bright light burst from Tamara’s hand as Violet watched. She ducked behind the stone wall of the tower until it subsided. When she looked out again, the barrier enshrouding Parth was gone!

  Two men stood with Tamara, not Angeline. Maybe it wasn’t her after all. This woman was so thin. With the barrier gone, the heir was vulnerable. She dashed back up the steps in case she needed to ring the warning bell. At the very top, she grabbed the scope hanging from the bell-tower wall and looked through it. Tamara! It is you. She was holding the hand of one of the men she walked with and the other, larger man followed behind them. Angeline? Where’s Angeline?

  Violet grabbed the longest of the three ropes and yanked on it six times, the number assigned to Tamara, then ran back down to Bethany’s chamber.

  Everyone in the Tower heard the high pitched welcome bell. Tamara was back.

&n
bsp; “One of us departs and one returns,” Gretchen muttered through the din of activity. “Circumstances can be so strangely coincident.” She and Emmeline raced across the hall to the steps.

  “The fabric weaves of its own will,” Emmeline replied. She hurried behind her. “Only one bell. Only Tamara,” she said what Gretchen was thinking. There should have been two returning.

  “She has two others with her,” Violet joined them in the stairwell. She was panting, out of breath from running all the way down. “Two men.”

  Emmeline stepped into the darkened stairs and pointed her finger at the wicks that lined the walls. They lit one by one as she passed them.

  Davmiran stood by Bethany’s room. He saw them disappear through the doorway and followed.

  “Dav!” Filaree shouted. “I’ve been looking for you. Wait. We’ll go together.” They raced down the steps and into the front hall.

  Tamara stood thirty feet in front of them, hand in hand with one of the men who accompanied her. The other shuffled around nervously as if he was searching for something among the loose pebbles beneath his feet.

  Robyn and Cairn were already there.

  “You were with her at the end?” Robyn asked Davmiran as soon as he got close enough.

  “No. I was too late,” he replied. “Sevilla told me what she said, what she wanted me to hear. At least as much as Bethany was able to tell her before she died.” He looked at the forest in the distance. The barrier was gone.

  “Be careful,” Robyn warned. His wards bristled as Tamara approached.

  Filaree stepped closer to Davmiran. “She took Sidra’s shield down easily.”

  “It was the shard,” Davmiran said. “She’s has it. I feel it.” His face was pained. Something wasn’t right. A shadow followed the two men.

  “Yes,” Robyn agreed. “The 11th.” He sensed the imbalance too and probed it.

  “The shard? You expected this?” Emmeline overhead them. He hadn’t mentioned this before.

  “It was unsafe to discuss it. Unsafe for her. It’s the 11th. If word spread that she was headed here with such an object, it could have endangered her even more,” Cairn explained as Calyx bounded out of the gardens and crouched beside him.

  “The 11th shard? How different is it from the others that the boy already has?” Emmeline sensed their reverence as they spoke of it.

  “Sister!” she heard Tamara’s voice ring out before anyone could answer.

  Tamara broke from the men and ran across the cobbled yard. “Conrad, Harlan, come! Join us,” she waved to her companions. Conrad caught up to her and she slid her arm through the crook of his elbow. Harlan lumbered over and stood a few feet from her side, eyeing the Moulant.

  “Emmeline!” Tamara’s breast heaved. “Gretchen, Jocasta…” She looked at each of them, one by one. There was so much she had to tell them. Angeline. Conrad. The map. The shard. The Darkening… “It’s good to be back,” she said.

  The stone of the walls was a luminescent amber. They rose around them, forming a pentagonal funnel that culminated in a glistening dome high above. The room had no windows. Hundreds of candles in the recesses of the walls illuminated the space. The light of the new moon shone down through the translucent quartz skylight at the tower’s apex. A simple table of unadorned Noban surrounded by straight backed chairs was the only furniture in the chamber. Their shoes clicked on the marble floor as they entered the Tower room.

  A few of the sisters were already seated when Tamara walked in with her companions. Not all had greeted her yet. Some were with Bethany until now. Her eyes circled the room and found each person she hadn’t yet seen.

  “Welcome home, sister. You look well,” Dahlia complimented her. She glanced at Conrad and at Harlan. Angeline’s absence was marked by her empty chair.

  “I heard the bell toll for Bethany,” Tamara said. “I pray her final moments were peaceful.” I leave darkness. I come home to death.

  “As peaceful as these times allow,” Emmeline said. She sat down at the table opposite Gretchen. “Please, everyone. Take a seat. There are enough chairs for all of you.”

  “We had almost grown accustomed to the vacant spaces,” Gretchen allowed a wry smile. “We thought them temporary. Now we will have to adjust to the permanence of these absences. Tell us, sister. Tell us of Angeline.”

  Tamara pushed herself to her feet. The blood rushed through her head. “She chose to remain with the Drue.” Her memory’s eye was clear.

  “The Drue?” Rose gasped. They’d heard of them only in legend, in the Tomes.

  “It was her choice. They guided us through the forbidden places and allowed me to find Mintar. Angeline stayed with them.” Her voice was distant.

  “The Drue find, the Drue keep,” Jocasta repeated the words from the Tomes.

  “The heir advised us of your entry into the hollows. The shards spoke to him,” Emmeline said.

  “We were attacked along the way. One of Colton’s Possessed followed us and we were forced to seek shelter underground.” It seemed so long ago. “When the Drue found us, they were not surprised. They told me I was there for a reason. They told us we’d been betrayed and that the betrayal was what drove us into their realm.” The sisters shifted in their seats and Davmiran sat silent. Robyn tilted his head. “I was never sure what Etuah meant. She was the eldest of the Drue, the one Angeline replaced.”

  “We have spoken of betrayal,” Gretchen pursed her lips. “Bethany believed that what seemed like a betrayal on at least one occasion was not necessarily so.” She sat stiff in her chair.

  “Etuah said that as well,” Tamara’s brow furrowed. Betrayal. Betrayal “She said if we hadn’t been pursued by the Possessed we would never have descended into the forbidden places, something we needed to do, as it turned out. She said that Oleander had informed the Dark One I was traveling with the map, and had he not done so, the shard might have been lost to us later.” Betrayal. Betrayal. The word swirled in her head.

  Robyn clenched and unclenched his fists. “Where is the map now, Tamara?” he asked.

  “She lowered her eyes and hesitated. “I gave it to someone else. I never made it to Odelot. Their chances of getting there were better than mine at the time and I thought…” She looked up at Emmeline. “I couldn’t travel to Odelot with the shard. I had to come back here,” she apologized.

  “Whom did you give it to?” Filaree’s eyes narrowed on Tamara.

  “To my daughter, Caroline,” Conrad answered for her. “To her and Prince Dalloway of Seramour.”

  A small commotion ensued. Chairs scraped the floor and clothing rustled. Fingers tapped the table anxiously.

  “Prince Elion’s brother,” Filaree stated.

  “We left them after Mintar died. They saved my life. Caroline killed the wretched elf who tried to stop me from retrieving the shard.” Betrayal. Betrayal. “That’s when I met Conrad.” She reached for his hand in plain sight of everyone.

  “The elf who almost killed Queen Elsinestra in the Chamber of the Stars,” Robyn suspected.

  “We should have killed him then,” Filaree muttered, fingering her sword.

  “When we left the Forbidden Places, Caroline and Dalloway went off in one direction and we headed here,” Tamara said.

  “So the map may still be in their possession?” Robyn asked.

  “I hope they’ve reached Odelot by now,” Tamara started. She hoped. If something happened to them, to Caroline, because of her… “I told them to find the well. I told them to destroy it.”

  Tamara looked around the room. Silence. Eyes were darkened, heads were bent. Why do they all look so glum? I should never have given it to them. It was my responsibility. I failed everyone. A great weight descended upon her and she sunk down in her chair.

  Robyn and Cairn exchanged glances but no one spoke.

  Gretchen cleared her throat and Tamara’s eyes shot to her. “Bethany believed it was not in our interests or the heir’s to dispose of the map.” Tamara recoiled. Her bac
k hit the chair hard. “She believed Oleander was ‘lost in a moment of need’ when he requested you to go to Odelot, and that it was a grave mistake.” Her voice was monotone, her lips barely moving. “Those were her final concerns.” She steepled her fingers in front of her.

  Mistake? Oleander? “I see,” she said, her mind in turmoil. Conrad brushed his hand across his brow. His skin was white. She repeated Gretchen’s words to herself. Oleander? Wrong? “I never questioned the Lalas,” she stammered. “I never thought…” Betrayal. Betrayal.

  “And well you didn’t!” Robyn’s body arched forward. “If you did, everything would have turned out differently. You’ve brought the shard back to the heir. You kept the map safe until it was prudent to entrust it to others.”

  For them to destroy! Tamara listened, but the fate of the map preoccupied her. The fate of Caroline and Dalloway. Where were they? How would they know? Her body chilled. The Darkening. When should I tell them? Maybe I shouldn’t. Maybe I’m wrong. I’ll go back to the woods. I’ll find out the truth first. “But I told them to destroy it.” Choices. So many choices. Oleander? Who can I trust?

  Conrad drew his shoulders back. “My daughter and Dalloway are going to Odelot. It’s the most dangerous thing she’s ever done. And she’s doing it for nothing?” His voice was stone.

  “You’re daughter’s a warrior. She killed the renegade in the Hollows,” Filaree said, but it was of little comfort here.

  “She’s more than courageous,” Tamara added. “She has power. She’s an empath.” Whom should I tell? The Chosen? Emmeline? Gretchen? Her mind raced. Her face was strained. “Maybe they…” Betrayal. Betrayal. Have I sent them to their doom? Have I ruined everything? She pressed Conrad’s fingers.

  “It’s not your fault,” he said into her ear. He felt her pain. “You didn’t know.”

  I won’t tell them of the Darkening. It may seem a betrayal. It may seem that way… “Wait!” she sat up straight. A light flashed in her head. She’d forgotten all about it until now. “Where did you plant the silver seed Oleander gave us?” She looked around the table. The thought of it brightened her vision, pushed the darkness back. Tell me you have it still? Tell me?