Companion of Darkness_An Epic Fantasy Series

by CJ Rutherford

  Her guards strode toward me, but I held up my hands. “It’s okay. I’ll be okay.” I gave my family one last smile, and walked away from my life.

  At the bottom of the wide staircase, the queen stood at my side as I looked at the crystal doors that led to the throne room. Only those two huge clear panels separated me from my doom, from the fateful meeting with the eldar emissary, or so I thought until the queen took my elbow and gently guided me into flight.

  Her guards followed as we flew down, all the way to the floor of the clearing at the base of the Tree. I harrumphed, looking back up to the boughs above. I knew the eldar didn’t have wings, but I was still surprised. “I take it the emissary doesn’t like heights?” Yes, I was feeling bitter.

  The queen’s voice quivered. “The emissary has no problem with heights, child. The problem is the throne room is too small.”

  What?

  I had so many questions but they were blown away as the huge shadow engulfed us, hot wind spiced with the scent of cinnamon filling my nose. My time had run out.

  The queen turned to face the new arrival. “Keep her safe, Glyran. Fly straight and true.”

  I stood rooted to the spot, trying to convince myself that if I didn’t turn around, didn’t acknowledge the existence of whatever this was, I would wake up from this nightmare.

  The deep, booming voice took me by surprise, not just the sound, but the words it said. “I will, my old friend. For I know how precious the gift I will bear is to you and your people.”

  Friend? My stomach churned. I slowly turned to face . . . the most magnificent being I had ever seen.

  It was a dragon, but the tales of them I’d heard paled to insignificance. He was huge, over fifty feet high, with a head so big it wouldn’t have fit through the throne room doors. His golden scales glittered in the sunlight, but there were hues of silver and azure alongside colors of the sunrise. He was beautiful, but I took a sharp step back as the enormous head snaked down to stop inches from mine.

  “Greetings, Jesaela.” His warm breath flowed over me, sweet and rich with spices. “I’m sorry our meeting could not be under better circumstances.”

  I marveled at the way the foot-long teeth spread into a crooked grin. I should have been terrified. I’d be less than a morsel to this magnificent creature, but his eyes…oh, his eyes mesmerized me! They were like molten fire burning into my soul.

  My mouth opened, but no sound came out. I wasn’t worthy to address something so wonderful.

  A warm hand took mine, and I turned to gaze into my queen’s red-rimmed eyes. “Glyran and I have known each other for centuries. He will ensure you reach the Citadel swiftly and safely. After that…” She looked away.

  Were the eldar really that terrible?

  I reached out a hand, on reflex, before jerking it back. What was I doing? This was a dragon, not some kind of pet.

  A vibrating rumble came from deep in his chest. Was he laughing? “I have an itch, right behind my left horn. Would you mind?” The majestic head lowered to the ground.

  I glanced at the queen who nodded, smiling slightly. I couldn’t believe what I was doing as I reached out to scratch the area behind the six-foot length of barbed bone.

  “Ah, that’s better,” Glyran sighed. “Now, if you’d just go left a bit…oh, yes!”

  The dragon started to…purr. By the Maker, if I’d died that night I’d have died a happy faer. The emotions swimming in my mind banished the pain I felt at leaving my family. I wanted the moment to last forever, but eventually Glyran groaned and raised his head.

  “We must go, child. We are expected at the Citadel, and there will be repercussions if I deliver you past the allotted time.” He blinked, and suddenly I sat astride his back. I wanted to scream no, but I now understood we were all bound to the will of the eldar, so I raised a hand in farewell as a pair of wings that shone in the sunlight stretched out for a hundred feet on either side. I felt Glyran’s chest expand as he breathed in, igniting the air with his fire, breathing it deep within to swell his body. The ground dropped below me.

  “Farewell, Jesaela,” the queen shouted over the storm created by Glyran’s ascent. “You will be forever in our hearts, and your family will be honored as long as I live.”

  Glyran lunged upward, making my stomach plummet as we soared in a spiral around the Tree. The branches shone with a myriad of colors as my people flew out from the foliage to say goodbye.

  I thought my heart would crack in two as my family emerged from the top-most branches. Their smiles lied to me as much as the emotions flowing through the spell that bound us. I turned away. I had to. I couldn’t bear it, the fact I had caused them so much pain, even if it wasn’t my fault.

  We were over the forest now, the lush canopy flashing in a blur beneath us. I couldn’t bring myself to look back, just ahead at the glittering jewel we flew toward. Looking down, I realized we were flying much faster than the slight breeze ruffling my hair suggested. It was magic at work, but there were none of the customary scents or sensations of faer magic. Dragon magic must be incredibly subtle.

  ‘They will miss you.’ I heard the words in my head, along with the sorrow accompanying them. I gasped. Until now I’d only been able to communicate with the forest creatures. I never dreamt I could sense a sentient being’s thoughts. ‘I am sorry for my part in this,’ he said to my mind.

  The dragon told the truth, I was certain of it, but I had questions. ‘Why? Why do you do this, when you so clearly hate it?’

  A mental sigh. ‘I have heard you talk to the creatures in the forest. I was not aware you could hear the thoughts of dragons.’ The wave of bitterness I felt from him threatened to overwhelm me and cast me to my death before Glyran gained control. The bitterness was followed by concern, and the dragon’s thoughts merged with mine. Regret and sadness mingled with the rage I’d felt earlier emanating from my queen. ‘I’m sorry, child. My anger is not directed toward you.’

  If not me, then who?

  The Citadel rapidly grew in size as we flew toward it at an impossible speed. I longed to take in every detail of our approach, but I couldn’t resist looking at the vast plain that surrounded it on all sides.

  To the north lay the glowing crimson peaks of the Mountains of Fire, home of the dragons. I’d seen the mountain range before, but now I was much higher and closer than the loftiest branches of the Tree, and the clear air revealed a myriad of different shades of scarlet, shimmering in the failing light of the day. The glow seemed to compete with the sunset. No…not compete, I realized. It was as if they sang different verses of the same song, and dusk and dawn were the bridges of the sonnet that joined them together.

  To the east, just high enough to peek over the Citadel, lay a dark grey smudge that crossed the entire eastern horizon. From the maps I’d seen in school I knew it to be the Kingdom of Grongarth. The mountains weren’t nearly as high as the dragons’ home, but unlike the volcanic tips of FireHolm, these were white tipped, even in summer. I knew from my lessons that the dwelves lived in Grongarth, beings who burrowed underground, into the very rock itself. The mountains were the roof the dwelves lived beneath. I shivered. How could they live without the sun on their faces and the wind in their hair?

  Over the centuries, our peoples had grown apart, and animosity had become the norm. Neither I nor any of my friends or siblings could remember a dwelvish visit to the faer court. My heart sank. Would I ever see the faer court again? Would my family even remember me, if by some slim chance I managed to escape in the future?

  Escape? Why did that word sit like a ball of lead at the base of my brain? Was I going to be a prisoner? The queen had said I could never return, but that wasn’t the same as being a prisoner…was it?

  Suddenly the glimmering isle sitting at the center of the green plain took on another aspect. It was as if a curtain parted, and the perfect vision painted on the outside gave way to reality.

  Smoke obscured the walls and towers of the Citadel, snaking up from
a thousand chimneys in the sprawling city that crawled out from the base of the plateau the Citadel capped.

  Something inside me broke, as if waking from a dream where everything was complete perfection, to confront an awful reality.

  I only had a few more moments to ask the questions I desperately needed to ask. The dragon stretched his long golden neck back to look at me with those eyes, deep pools like volcanoes, and spoke aloud. “There are things I cannot tell, of a curse bestowed upon the lands, eons ago.” His slitted eyes narrowed. “But within the Citadel lie many secrets, secrets that might be discovered by an inquisitive young imp.”

  My own eyes narrowed to match his. I hated being called an imp, and his chuckle in my mind told me he knew it. But what did he mean? I’d never heard of this curse, but then the queen’s earlier words came back to me: Even if we could stand against the eldar, they control the dragons.

  What did that even mean? I couldn’t imagine anyone being able to control something as mighty as the being I sat astride. Was this the curse he meant?

  Glyran’s head snapped forward as we approached the city of my dreams and my dread. I followed his gaze.

  Thousands of buildings were packed tightly together around a network of glistening…rivers? No, they were too regular to be rivers.

  ‘They’re called canals.’

  I blinked. It appeared Glyran could read my thoughts, as I could his. “Canals.” I rolled the unfamiliar word over my tongue, but even from this height I could appreciate their beauty. Graceful bridges spanned their shining surfaces, and I saw hundreds of upturned faces as we flew overhead.

  “What is that place, Glyran?” As far as I knew, and anyone I’d ever talked to, the Citadel was the Citadel. There wasn’t anything else, so what was this whole other city?

  ‘This is Civit Infiri, what most of us call the Lower City. The low elves live here, and from here the eldar select their servants and receive the supplies and luxuries they expect.’

  Again, his reply held an edge of bitterness. I felt he had an affinity with the people below, far beyond anything he felt for the eldar.

  He banked low over one of the wider canals, and as his wingtips brushed some of the higher rooftops, I heard cheers erupt from the crowds lining the canal, even as I saw his glowing golden reflection on the surface of the water. The wave of emotion, of love and admiration, that rose up was staggering, but it instantly vanished as Glyran passed up and over the periphery of the Citadel proper.

  Gloom descended. The glittering spires I’d seen as we approached the Citadel stood like muted pillars. The light I’d seen from a distance was gone. My heart sank. This wasn’t the jewel I’d seen from afar. Yes, it was still magnificent, but its beauty was diminished by something, and whatever the something was, it settled over me like a cloak of icy dread. Goose bumps rose on my arms and I gave an involuntary shudder.

  Glyran’s shining scales dulled, and even his joy of flying I’d felt seemed to desert him. He coasted around a wide courtyard, the floor set with tiles of multi-hued crystal. He stretched his neck back so he faced me. His shining orbs darted back and forth, before they narrowed, piecing mine.

  ‘Can I trust you, little faerie?’

  I was about to issue a sharp retort when I realized this wasn’t a barbed comment, not this time, at least. I was a little faerie, to him. But was he asking if he could trust me? What could an insignificant youngling, late of the faerie court, do for him? I felt the intensity of his mind as it held mine. This was a somber moment. It wasn’t a simple question.

  “You can trust me…big dragon.” I cringed as the words I’d meant as a respectful reply fizzled out on my lips, and I felt a blush ride up the back of my neck.

  Glyran snorted, his grimly bitter laughter causing flames to shoot out from his wide nostrils as he banked hard and landed in the courtyard.

  The fire flowed over me, caressing me, but even as part of me wanted to recoil, something made me reach out to touch the tongues dancing around my skin. I took a breath in and the fire followed as my fingers made contact, the embers separating to flow between them.

  A voice, oh so quiet so as not to be overheard, a tiny whisper, sounded in my head, and I gripped Glyran’s shoulder ridges.

  ‘A gift I give to you now, little faerie. Keep it hidden. Keep it safe.’

  Heat scorched my skin before settling, sinking into me. I panicked for a second then a calm settled over me as the warmth flowed into my heart, slowing the racing beat of it, and banishing the ice threatening to freeze the blood in my veins. What is this?

  Another blink of his eyes and I stood alone on the solid marble surface of the wide courtyard, spinning in a wisp of cinnamon-scented air as the dragon’s glistening form flew north.

  Chapter Two

  The Citadel

  I don’t know how long I stood in the courtyard. It could have been minutes or hours, but I was too bewitched by the grim starkness of the city surrounding me to notice.

  Where were the eldar? At the edge of my vision a wave of dust spiraled upward before the scant breeze that caused it was itself smothered by the stillness of this place.

  The courtyard sat just inside the walls of the Citadel, a huge iron gate set into the crystal barrier. A metal door looked odd and out of place in this palace of glass, but I shrugged the thought away and turned to take in my surroundings.

  I was standing on a surface of pale blue crystal that flowed upward, smoothly and organically, to seamlessly become walls that shifted from blue into a muted rainbow of hues and shades. Dwelvish craftsmanship, it had to be. The dwelves could sing to the earth and make it do their bidding, but this was the first time I’d seen their craftsmanship outside a story book. The books hadn’t done it justice.

  I turned around, taking it all in. The jewel I’d glimpsed from a distance was gone. Where before, towers of all shapes, sizes, and colors rose into the sapphire of the evening sky, alive with inner light, now I saw only shards of darkened glass, like long-dead claws grasping into the sky.

  The spires stretched as far as I could see, hundreds of them. The Citadel was huge, dwarfing the Tree, larger even than the clearing the Tree lay in, but a morbid hopelessness blanketed the place. Surely, I’d arrived in the lair of monsters, for no being could exist in this place and stay sane for long.

  “Well, she’s a pretty enough little thing, at least.”

  I jumped and jerked around to face the direction the female voice came from. A group of figures, over a dozen, were standing a few feet away. I took a step back, wondering if my mind was playing tricks on me. They hadn’t been there before, but then I picked up a faint scent, unfamiliar but not unpleasant. Magic.

  A tall eldar woman laughed, and I shivered. On the surface the sound had a lovely tinkling quality, but the emotions coming from her gave it an undercurrent as sharp as shattering glass. Indeed, most of the group gave off an overpowering wave of disgust, as if having to suffer my presence soiled them.

  “Oh dear, we seem to have startled it,” the woman said. She had long silver hair and ice blue eyes that, although she smiled, remained hard. She scrutinized me.

  The male at her side didn’t even pretend to smile. His pointed ears poked up through a long dark mane of hair, and his emerald-green eyes inspected me as his lip curled.

  “I suppose she’ll do.” He turned and held his hand out. A small child with long, strawberry-blonde hair and hazel eyes took it. “What do you think, Lyssa?”

  The child disengaged from him and walked closer to me, actually completing a full circle, her eyes roving up and down me, inspecting me. Inspecting me like some sort of pet, I thought, before noticing something else, something that put her apart from the others in the group. She appeared cheerful, actually pleased to meet me. She stopped circling me and a smile lit her face. She was lovely already, but the happy look she gave me lifted my heart. Maybe, just maybe, we could actually be friends?

  “What do they call you?” she asked.

  Was e
very sound the eldar emitted musical?

  I bowed my head in what I hoped was an appropriate gesture. “My name is Jesaela, princess, but…but my friends sometimes call me Jes.”

  The princess’s grin intensified, and she clapped her hands together with glee. “How simply wonderful. I’m sure we shall be friends, Jesaela…sorry, Jes.” She turned around to her parents. “Might I take Jes to her quarters, Father? I’m sure she must be tired and hungry after the journey.”

  “In a moment, Lyssa.” Her father beckoned to me. I really didn’t want to go closer, but after a moment I forced my limbs to obey. My stomach clenched as his eyes bored into mine. “You know why you are here, child?”

  I nodded, even though I wasn’t entirely sure, trying my best to suppress the shiver I felt going up my spine.

  His eyes narrowed. “Fulfill the terms of the agreement and your time here will be a happy one. My daughter has been without companionship since her friend’s accident last year, but the period of mourning is over, and I’m sure you will soon be raising merry havoc around the Citadel.” A collective laugh came from the assembled advisors, but it sounded forced to me. “But disobey, go places not permitted, and you will be punished. Do you understand?”

  I bowed my head. “Yes, Majesty.” Then a thought occurred to me. “Um…how will I know where I am permitted and where I’m not? Sorry, but your home is vast, and I’m certain to get lost at some point, and—” I cut off as an expression of annoyance crossed his handsome features.

  He seemed to mentally struggle with something before speaking, as if what he were about to say was important, and I had the sense he was considering how much to reveal to me. “You will know when you approach an area where you should not be. When this happens, simply turn around and walk a different way.” His voice grew even colder. “We will always be able to find you, and besides, you will spend most of your time with my daughter, won’t you?”