Valdjan let out a low whistle. “You’re fifteen hundred years old?”
She smiled weakly. It was a very long time. “Sometimes I feel ancient, and other times, I feel that I don’t know anything. Like right now.” Her hands were trembling as she rubbed them together. “I still can’t believe we created magical creatures on so many planets, especially the angry ones like the Ardaks. It’s just such a shock.”
“It isn’t for me,” he said slowly. “Someone had to create them. And with their technology? I always assumed they were some kind of genetic manipulation. It seems funny that they are obsessed with technology given the fact that they are magical creatures.”
“We’ve always tried to use our magic for good.” She covered her face with her hands.
“The operative word there is tried,” he replied matter-of-factly. “Sometimes, even with the best intentions, things still go wrong.” Valdjan put his hands on her shaking shoulders. “I know how you feel, but you have to put me back in. If I don’t pass this test, I’m going to be eliminated. Literally.”
She nodded, aware of the fact that he was actually keeping her on task, rather than the other way around. She turned her attention to the crystal, but as she tried to summon her concentration, she was more keenly aware than ever the pain of putting him through these tests. His people had suffered—he had suffered—due to the creation of the Ardaks. And it wasn’t even their fault.
And right then, she was blocking his chances of succeeding. “I-I’ll try.” She raised her hands over the crystal, trying to activate the energy to continue the test.
“What are the rules of this test, anyway?”
“Solve the puzzle. And don’t die.” As she said it, she felt slightly less flippant about it. She really didn’t want him to die.
He clenched his fists. “That’s helpful.”
She let her gaze meet his face, allowing him to see the apology in her eyes. “I’m sorry. I didn’t get a list of rules when I took this position. That’s all I know, all I was allowed to know.”
“All right.” The muscles in his jaw tightened for a moment. “I’m ready.” He glanced up as the magic was building, his eyes narrowing at her expression. “It’s going to be okay, Ithyll. I’m going to figure this out.”
She was touched that he was trying to reassure her. But as she watched him disappear back into the crystal, she had a bad feeling that things were going to get much, much worse.
Chapter Seven
Valdjan
Elberos started when he reentered the test, looking up from his stack of papers. “Where did you go?”
“The personal room,” Valdjan answered after stalling for a moment.
The elf gave him a piercing glance. “You spend a lot of time in that personal room. How did you know the creatures were called Ardaks? They were just named yesterday.”
“Surprisingly, I know a lot about the Ardaks.” Valdjan rubbed the bridge of his nose. “But how they were created, I didn’t know.”
The elf’s gaze remained on him. “There is something really off about you tonight.”
“That’s what I get for drinking too much Volcano’s Breath.” Valdjan grinned. He’d only drunk the extremely strong elven liqueur once, but it nearly put him under the table with one shot.
“You drank Volcano’s Breath? But I thought it was banned on the station.”
“I have a bottle stashed. For scientific emergencies.” Valdjan tried to grin again but had a feeling he failed.
The elf opened his mouth as if to speak, then closed it and turned back to the files. “Since you left, I’ve been trying to sort these into some kind of pattern. Of the ninety-eight planets, fifty-nine had no magical creatures. Then twenty-three had benevolent magical creatures, and fifteen had malevolent magical creatures. I didn’t know where to put the Ardaks.”
“Where is the stack of malevolent creatures?” Valdjan asked.
When the elf pulled forward a stack, Valdjan set the other stacks on the floor. “Why are they considered malevolent?”
“They tend to be angry and exceedingly violent. Most of them have declared war on the elves or other races on their planet.”
Valdjan stroked his chin. “All right. Let’s put the Ardaks in this stack and see if we can find something in common between all of these beasts besides the fact that they’re monsters.”
They searched through the files one by one. Each of the files contained a different planet, and a different monster. Enormous death worms, sea serpents, humans, animals that began to drink blood, and animals that mutated into subspecies with two or three heads. There was no pattern. Reptiles, mammals, birds, fish—every single family was represented.
“Is there a pattern among species affected? I mean, were these the smartest species on their respective planets?”
“If you’re speaking only of IQ, no. There are several planets with dolphins and squids, both of which are far smarter than their human or other animal counterparts. Yet, they were unaffected.”
Valdjan scratched his head. “What about the planets themselves? Is there something special about them?”
The elf opened each of the files, until all sixteen were laid out in a row. “This first page of each is the specs on the planets.”
Valdjan looked them over. He couldn’t read the writing, but he could understand the graphics of their solar systems. “These all have binary systems.”
The elf frowned. “Yes, I noticed that. Every single planet with magical creatures has a binary system but not all binary systems support life.”
“Fuck!” Valdjan said, kicking the sofa. He thought about it for a moment. “How long will it take for us to get to one of these planets?”
“You want to visit one?”
“We need to figure out what’s wrong, don’t we?”
“Well, we can go there instantly if we have access to the portals and, with your clearance, I would assume we could go right now.”
Valdjan searched the room for supplies. “Do I need to bring anything?”
The elf stared down at the table. “Just these files, probably. And weapons.”
“Leave the files,” Valdjan ordered. “I have a photographic memory. Where can we get weapons?”
“The armory on the way.”
Valdjan let him pass, following him out the door and down the wide corridor. When they reached the end of the corridor, the elf pressed a button. A sliding door opened, and the elf stepped inside a small, very colorful compartment. Each wall was a different color: white, yellow, green, and black. And each one hosted an access panel of the same color. When the doors closed, it began to move.
He reached for the walls, steadying himself.
The elf looked at him strangely. “Sir?”
“Never mind.”
The ride up seemed to go on and on before the compartment began to rotate forward, the doors sliding downward. Valdjan started, unsure of what to do, but the elf simply stepped forward onto what used to be the doors. So, Valdjan followed suit, realizing that all sides of the elevator opened, as well as the top and bottom.
Elberos broke the silence. “Where would you like to go first?”
“Do you have any recommendations?” Valdjan asked.
“I was stationed on Amarth Aguhm for ten years, but I left there several months ago for a post on Duilwen Aguhm before being transferred to you. We should begin at Amarth since I’m most familiar with the command as well as the indigenous species.”
“All right. It sounds as good as any other place.”
They emerged onto a platform, which was at the very top of what looked to be an enormous space station. The reason he knew it was a space station was because the platform was enclosed by a bubble, which was made completely of glass, and just beyond it was the blue-green orb of a planet.
“Oh gods,” he muttered, grabbing for the side of the elevator, staring at the almost fluorescent blue of the atmospheric halo. Even though he’d flown in an Ardak ship before, being so
close to a planet and seeing the comparatively enormous orb in front of him was extremely disorienting.
“What’s wrong?” Elberos asked.
“Nothing,” Valdjan lied, trying to shake it off. He craned his head in a circle and saw the station was comprised of an enormous ring around the center bubble. The outside ring was connected to the center by four evenly spaced tunnels.
“Well, once we get through the portal, you’re going to have a bigger headache, so we might as well keep going.”
“Is that right?” Valdjan muttered, forcing himself to let go of the side of the elevator, and followed Elberos into another room, happy to look away from the spinning planet below.
When Elberos turned on the lights, Valdjan’s jaw dropped. They had entered the top floor of an enormous, circular hall of weapons. It easily descended ten floors beneath them, with wide, circular walkways around it at each of the levels, and a great spiral staircase coming up the middle, branching out to the walkways around the edges.
Each floor contained armor, swords, shields, bows, arrows of all kinds. But there were other weapons, too. Guns similar to the Ardaks’ ray guns and different types of devices that might be explosives. They passed blades he’d seen before and some he hadn’t and cabinets of crystals and velvet bags.
He shook his head in disbelief.
Elberos, who had been watching him, finally growled in anger. He shoved Valdjan back against the wall and pressed his forearm across his neck, pinning the man and cutting off his air at the same time. Valdjan struggled, but Lord Rilien obviously hadn’t used his muscles in a few centuries, because there was no way Valdjan could break Elberos’s grip.
“Look, I know you’re not Lord Rilien. He’s aged and eccentric, but he isn’t forgetful, and he isn’t afraid of elevators.” The elf’s golden eyes bored straight into him, and he took out his dagger, pressing it against Valdjan’s throat above his other arm. “Tell me who the vok you are before I slit your throat.”
“I . . . can’t—” Valdjan gasped.
“You can and you will. Now, tell me who you are!”
“I’m . . . here to help.” Valdjan started to see stars, not able to draw in enough air.
The elf’s grip loosened infinitesimally. “Here to help us what?”
“To figure out what’s going on with the magical creatures. Why they are turning bad.”
“Why do you care?”
Valdjan tried to suck in a breath, but the elf’s hold was still too tight. “Because those bad creatures are affecting my planet.”
“What do you mean? What planet are you from?”
“I’m from Aurora.”
“The mermen have been peaceful so far.”
“It isn’t them. We’ve been invaded by the Ardaks.”
“What?” Elberos’s expression grew worried.
“They killed many of my people, and we want to stop it. I was able to switch bodies with Lord Rilien.”
“Traako! He’s the best scientist we have. He has a better chance than either of us at figuring this out.”
“Yes, but . . . he wasn’t going to pursue it.”
“How do you know that?”
“Because when I was in the personal room earlier, I turned on his LINK device. The first heading was from someone named Tahlavel, telling him to close the investigation on the magical creatures.”
“What? Let me see that message.”
Valdjan hesitated for a moment.
“Now, impostor,” the elf ordered, letting him go and sheathing his knife.
Valdjan turned on the device while Elberos watched over his shoulder.
Elberos was completely silent as he read. When he was done, he handed the device back to Valdjan, turned away, and began to pace. “That must be why Rilien sent me to gather those files—it was to keep me busy while he was figuring out how to shut down the investigation.” Finally, Elberos stopped and faced him, holding his gaze for a good minute.
Valdjan could feel a bead of sweat dripping down his spine.
“I’m willing to go along because I also want to know what’s happening with the magical creatures and I need your authority to get through the portals. And also, you seem . . . harmless.”
Valdjan didn’t know whether to be relieved or insulted. He had been called harmless fewer times than he’d been called a hero, which was to say he’d never been referred to as such.
Elberos pushed him again, forcing him to focus.
“If you do anything that harms anyone, I will end you.” The elf scoffed. “And you’d better start acting like a normal elf. You can’t gape at everything or you’re going to draw suspicion. And on these dangerous planets, your idiocy could get us killed.”
Valdjan straightened. “You’re right. I apologize.” He paused. “I’m actually known as a fair warrior where I’m from. Don’t worry about danger. I’ll have your back.”
Elberos stared at him hard for a few more seconds, then slowly eased away. “What do you usually fight with?” he asked grudgingly.
“A sword and knife. No shield.”
The elf eyed him and tossed him some armor. “Aurora is a primitive planet.” He grunted. “You have to have a shield. But you don’t have to use it.”
“Fair enough.” The elf showed Valdjan how to put the armor on and then grabbed a set of his own. Then he tossed Valdjan a sword before selecting two shields and two knives. He gave one of each to Valdjan, attaching the other two to his armor.
After careful examination, Elberos selected a bow and then a quiver, which he loaded with various types of arrows, some of which looked magical.
Last, he took several crystals and a bag for each of them, stowing them in his pouch and showing Valdjan how to do the same. “These are the last resort,” he said. “Ready?”
Valdjan nodded.
“Walk behind me, stop staring at everything, and let me do all the talking. Traako.” The elf shook his head and brushed past Valdjan on his way back to the door.
Elberos might not be a warrior, but Valdjan had seen him load up his armor. He would fight well enough in a pinch. In fact, he might be a better warrior better than Valdjan in this body.
When they exited, Valdjan once again had to steady himself and remember to breathe. The planet through the glass shield in front of them really was disorienting.
“Jaffete! What did I tell you?” Elberos hissed, stepping in front of him and heading to the enormous circular device on the opposite end of the bubble. The portal was slightly raised and had a ramp leading to it. In front of it stood four guards, two to each side.
Valdjan clenched his jaw so he didn’t gape at the device as they approached it.
When they reached the four guards, Elberos walked directly between them, and Valdjan waited for them to challenge him, but they didn’t.
“Where are you going?”
“Amarth Aguhm.”
The guard looked down at the computer screen and frowned. “That isn’t on the list of approved planets.”
“Right,” Elberos replied. “But Lord Rilien wants to investigate the creatures there.”
“Oh!” The elf looked over Elberos’s shoulder at him, and his face cleared. “Let me start her up and send you through.”
He pressed a button, and a small sphere of energy about the size of his head appeared in the center of the ring. Then he took a sack of powder and threw a pinch of it into the center of the sphere. It flashed a dark, murky green and grew to encompass the entire ring.
“All right, you’re free to go.” The elf spoke through gritted teeth, his concentration almost entirely focused on keeping the portal open.
“Thank you, Palath,” Elberos said, striding forward and stepping into the sphere.
Valdjan followed without thinking too much about it. A warmth encompassed him before the feeling of being sucked rapidly through a long tube stole his breath. Before he could panic, he was out on the other side.
“Are you all right?” Elberos stood in front of him.
He was dizzy and nauseous, but he shook it off. “I’m fine.”
The place was dark, but there was enough light for Valdjan to see Elberos crack a smile for the first time. “If you think that’s bad, wait until you try a long distance.”
Valdjan tried to see where they were, but all he could make out was the circular device just like the one they had left at the space station.
“That wasn’t far?” He frowned.
“No, my primitive friend, we’re still in the same star system.” Elberos clapped him on the back and led him toward the door.
“No guards?” Valdjan rubbed his temples to ease the ache while looking at the deserted room. The walls were made of enormous stone blocks.
“Not all the outposts staff the portals, which means we’ll have to get someone to operate it when we go back.” He stood in front of the door for a moment, then looked down at the door handle. “Right. On the space station, the doors are automatic. I have to remember where we are.” Taking the handle, he turned it and pushed the door open.
Valdjan noted a code panel on the outside of the door as he went through. “We’ll need the code, too.”
“Traako, that’s right. But don’t worry about it, I have one. Rilien will have one, too, but it’ll be buried somewhere in his LINK files. The codes were added as security to ensure only elves could get back through to Melamar.” Elberos sighed. “That’s the elven homeworld, if you didn’t know. It’s where the empire began. Well, let’s find General Certh and see what’s going on here.”
They were about to step out into the hallway when a horrible noise came from down the corridor. It sounded like a mass of yelling, growling, and howling at the same time.
“What the fuck is that?” Valdjan asked, reaching for his sword.
“I have no idea.”
“What did you say these creatures were again?”
Valdjan Page 4
