“I know that you are, child.” Lord Aiken reached for him. He slid his hand beneath the silk that Pialoron wore and wrapped it around the back of Pialoron’s head. His strong fingers entwined into Pialoron’s long, silver braid. Pialoron, despite his fear of the strange King, found comfort in this gesture. “I told you that I know. And Triyana is also pure and able to marry you intact. Which makes me proud to marry you to her and call you my son.” Pialoron melted beneath his smile. “Come to my home, my boy. Marry my daughter to appease the politics of your people.” He gave Pialoron another warm, very pointed smile. “Knowing, of course, in your heart, that I will protect your friend once I am looking upon the face of my first grandchild.”
Pialoron, who knew well and good the protection that had been afforded him and his friend, smiled.
He would give Lord Aiken all of the grandchildren that the strange King desired as long as the rumors which might damn Aminar would be buried in the sand that troubled his people and the rain that seemed to never stop, often times ruining their crops.
The rains that drown our children whist fishing for their dinner. And our Shitvas, who swim after those children to save them.
He would be happy to raise heathen children in a peaceful world where no one would judge them for the fact that a servant as loyal and true as Aminar stood faithfully at their father’s side.
-39-
Iykva stood at the end of the meadow, a grin crossing his handsome face as he reflected on the camp made on the other side.
I am near to enough to claim defeat!
He almost felt sorry for the damn baby Prince.
Almost.
Too much was at stake to find tender feelings now. He had his prize sitting in tents behind him. Even if, so far, their blood had afforded him only an hour in the rising sun, he meant to keep them for his own.
An hour, after all, was better than nothing.
Better than you’ve known in over three hundred of her cycles.
Distracted as he was, he didn’t see the young elf with the long brown hair rise with his bow, threaded with a silver tipped arrow, leveled at his heart.
Nor did he see the blonde elf reaching for the other and pulling him violently into the line of the trees.
Gregor, it would seem, had just saved Iykva’s life.
Which was a good thing for the elves and angels camping on the other side of the meadow.
If Iykva would have fallen in that moment, the band of demons surrounding the elves’ camp, who had just fed and could withstand that one hour within the light of the rising morning sun, would have destroyed them all.
-40-
“Centaurs.” Iladrul raised his gaze to meet Gregor’s. “And werewolves, just returned from rutting under the golden moon. Packs and packs of them. I believe that a benandanti leads them. And that even more benandanti have fallen in line.”
“How can you possibly know that?” Faunus growled. He had been in foul temper since he, Gregor and Haidar had returned from scouting the demon’s camp that morning while the elves and angels set up their own.
Iladrul, not having time for his complaints, ignored him.
“How many packs?” Is what he asked.
“Twenty?” Gregor turned to Haidar for confirmation.
“Twenty two.” Haidar shook his head. “If I have to guess. They don’t interact amongst one another, which is the only way I can tell. That the benandanti was able to bring so many packs to work together—and for vampires, no less—is unsettling.”
“Unsettling.” Iladrul agreed, absentmindedly. “Any word from the fairies?”
“None.” Gregor replied. “At least that we have heard. But that can be a good thing. If they are marching our way and the vampires don’t know about that—”
“The element of surprise.” Iladrul nodded. Though he wondered, secretly, if he had been duped. Did Emissary Lord Darklief truly intend to align his people with Iladrul’s? If so, where were they? “Keep your ear to the ground.”
“Yes, my Prince.” Gregor nodded.
Iladrul turned to Osete, who had been sitting in the shadows, waiting. “Get your father. We need to palaver.”
“Yes, my Prince.” Osete stood, bowed, and, as ever, then did as he was bid.
“What about my—?”
“I sent him to find more allies.” Iladrul waved a hand impatiently at Faunus. Balean had the better sense to know that Jeanir was the stronger of the pair of them. Why couldn’t Faunus make the same admission about Gregor? “He’ll be back by nightfall.”
“You’ve left the camp unguarded?”
“He’s left the camp in the hands of my father.” Haidar spat. Iladrul felt his brow raise as he looked up at his doxy. Generally he found himself impatient with Haidar’s constant arguments, but, today, he was grateful for them. “And my father runs his commands based on strategy rather than impulse.”
“Haidar . . .” Gregor muttered, shaking his head.
“What?” Iladrul snapped. “What aren’t you telling me?”
“It’s nothing.” Gregor sighed. Iladrul didn’t believe him. “We’re all tired. That’s all.” He gave Faunus a guarded smile that Iladrul didn’t quite trust. “And hungry.” He turned his attention to Haidar. “Where’s your sister? Can she bring us something to eat?”
Haidar nodded and left the tent. It was then that Gregor looked at Faunus and then back to Iladrul. He bit his lip and then said, “Faunus nearly cost the whole damn war.”
“I did not!”
“There were demons and vampires surrounding your camp.” Gregor snapped, impatiently. “And he was ready to take out Iykva in front of them all!”
“Faunus.” Iladrul turned to him. “Is this true?”
“I had a perfect shot!” Faunus cried. “I could have ended the war!”
“With Prince Iladrul and the rest of our party dead.” Gregor seethed. “It was a childish, impulsive move.”
“Damn it.” Iladrul stood and spun around. Gregor was right. It was a childish move. He glared at Faunus. “You know better, Faun! You don’t take out one target when there are twenty threats!”
“There weren’t any threats!”
“Do you not have the nose the Gods planted on your face?” Gregor growled at him. “Or is it simply a bauble that is useless?”
“I don’t think—!”
“He’s right.” Iladrul snapped. “I can scent vampires all around us.” He shook his head and raised his finger to point at Faunus. “This isn’t about your ego. This is about saving the doxies.”
“I know that.” He pouted.
“Good.” Iladrul nodded at him. He returned his attention to Gregor. “What about the men? Are they ready?”
Gregor, his lips thinned, said only, “They’d sure as Loki’s beard better be.”
-41-
“Chaos.” I tell Charlie. “That’s what came next. To the point where there is no linear way for me to continue the story. All that I can do is to direct your attention here or there as the battle ensued and hope to make some semblance of sense from it.”
“If you believe Stephen King, this is, after all, the manner in which all battles, eventually, play out.”
I nod, understanding at once that he is speaking of the strike that Roland Deschaine and his Ka-Tet fought in the final battle to save the beams in King’s Dark Tower series.
“In this instance,” I advise Charlie, “and for once, Stephen King has the right of things.”
-42-
Iykva rose, found an elf and drained the child near to dry as the female that he had paired the boy with stared on in horror. Though he left enough of the would be corpse alive that he would regenerate more blood.
He did, after all, need these bags of bones.
Grinning at that thought, the demon stepped toward Thamores, who was leaning against a tree which gave him a clear view of the meadow. “Good moon, Tham.”
Thamores turned his wolfish eyes to Iykva, granting him the very slightest of gr
ins. “Good moon.”
“I’m glad your back.” Iykva admitted. “And in time for the battle.”
“You mean to wage war tonight, then?”
“Yes.” Iykva agreed. “They’re close. And less than aware that we know that they follow us.”
-43-
At the same time, Faunus was storming out of the tent toward his father. He meant to put an end to this foolish business of stable boys and doxies running Prince Iladrul and the war. It was not how things were meant to be done. His father, he knew, would agree with him.
This was his thought as the arrow shot over his left shoulder. He had time to mark its whistle and turn his gaze toward it. He watched, in horror, as the thing flew with nightmare precision to land in the center of Balean’s forehead.
His father took two steps back, his arms raising to pull the arrow from his brow, and then fell in a useless heap to the ground.
-44-
Chiron’s throat felt as if it were being ripped open as the tattered pain of his cry called his men to arms. They stormed across the meadow, toward the elves and angels, with their bows taut and arrows flying in the wind.
It was his arrow, he would later reflect, that hit the mark to fall General Balean.
-45-
Jeanir heard Balean cry, stumbled out of his tent, screaming after his brother, and fell to his knees. Had he bent his head but a moment sooner, things might have turned out differently.
As it was, the second arrow from Chiron’s quiver flew, hitting its mark in complete mimicry as the one that had felled Balean.
Jeanir unmindful of the arrow, twisted violently at his waist, screaming at his daughter to retreat into the tent.
Sezja obeyed without question, tears blinding her eyes and blocking out the horrific vision of her father’s face, which was streaming with rivers of blood.
Obeying her father saved her life. Which, in turn, saved the child growing within her womb.
-46-
The battle waged well into the night. Many men, on both sides, fell. It seemed, to Iladrul, who at this point was covered in blood and stumbling blindly with exhaustion, that he was losing this battle.
Which, I understood, all too well, he was.
With Haidar at his side, Iladrul stumbled forward, ready to take out a demon as she crossed his path. His swing was wide and off its mark. Enough so that, as the sword fell at his right hip, he knew that it was his time to die.
“Die proud.” He muttered to himself. “This time . . . die proud.”
An unnecessary prayer, as it turned out.
-47-
Pialoron saw the young elf fall to his knees. It bolstered him to kick the flanks of his horse to urge her forward into a mad run.
He didn’t have arrows—not like the centaurs—and he couldn’t change forms to become a wolf.
What he did have was fresh men who hadn’t been fighting all night in battle. And now, as both sides were ready to collapse, this small advantage meant much and more.
He saw Xylon and his men on the other side of the meadow and he smiled. To the right of the meadow came the desert tribes. And to the left came those of the northern snows. The fairies, for the first time in thousands upon thousands of cycles of the sun, were, in that moment, united as a single, solid tribe.
The demons, realizing that they were surrounded, didn’t stand a chance.
It was no surprise to Pialoron that the final cry he heard rising from the demons and vampires was one of bitter retreat.
-48-
Aiken stepped toward his son, raised his hand and set it, proudly, upon Xylon’s shoulder. Xylon, who had never before fought in battle, let alone led an army, turned toward him and smiled. “You came.”
“I came.” Aiken nodded. “I’m proud of you, child. You fought brave and you fought well.”
“Nonsense.” Xylon’s cheeks flushed with heat.
He wasn’t used to praise from his father. As such, he coveted these words.
Yet, he understood, the demons and vampires had taken one look at the fairy tribes surrounding them and retreated. Xylon, himself, had had little to do with winning this particular battle of the war.
“Not.” Aiken shook his head. “None of your men died needlessly. Nor did those of your enemy or ally. Which makes your attack as successful as it gets.”
“Thank you, Fete.” Xylon felt his cheeks blaze again. “I see Prince Pialoron. Does this mean that there will be a wedding soon?”
“Soon enough.” Aiken’s lips twitched at their corners. Xylon wondered what thoughts caused him either his amusement or displeasure. “But today is your day. So let us leave weddings and grandchildren to the side.”
Xylon’s lips thinned. There it was then. His father was displeased that Xylon, himself, had yet to marry and propagate. “As you say.”
It wasn’t that he didn’t want to take to wife. He did. But he had no interest in any of the fairies from his own tribe and his father seemed more intent on pairing his daughters than in pairing his sons.
“Perhaps you’re meant to take a different path.” Aiken sighed and looked swiftly away. “No one would judge you.”
“I’m not on a different path.” Xylon assured him, somewhat irritably. “I seek the softness of a woman. Same as you.”
“Same as me.” Aiken replied, his sudden smile oddly warm. “Well. Then. That’s settled.”
“Forgive me.” Xylon turned toward the voice and smiled as he realized he had to look up to see the face of the female centaur. “Emissary Lord Darklief, I come at Emissary Lord Dilthrop’s command.”
Aiken nodded. “I’m surprised he’d bring a mare.”
Her thick, equine lips thinned. “Against his better judgment, I can assure you.”
Aiken laughed at that. “Yet, smart.” He pointed to the ground, indicating the soft grass. “Rest yourself, Lady. If you please.”
She did as she was bid. As she did so, Xylon’s eyes were drawn to the large blossoms which she used to cover her small breasts. He found it odd that other races insisted upon covering themselves. Yet, as he looked upon her, he also found it intriguing. There was a curiosity that dawned within his mind which never existed when looking at the females of his own people.
“How fares Lord Loki.” She asked, her tones thickening. This caused an unwanted stab of jealousy to run through Xylon’s veins. No one ever asked his father how he fared.
“Loki fares well.” Aiken replied, chuckling slightly. “Shall I tell him you asked after him?”
“If you please.” She nearly purred, causing another flush of jealousy to run through Xylon’s veins. “Shall I make my report?”
“Ta.” Aiken replied. His eyes, Xylon noted, flicked swiftly to his son before returning to the centaur. This only served to further embarrass the boy. “If you please.”
“Emissary Lord Dilthrop believes that the benandanti, Thamores, can be trusted.” She said, her eyes following Aiken’s before returning to meet the God’s gaze. Xylon felt his cheeks flush, once again, with heat. She was a damn pretty thing to look at. Especially when she was looking at him. “But not his pack.”
“Does Tham feel the same?”
“He does, my Lord.” She replied, nodding. “He’s aligned with Jamiason, from what I understand.”
“Good.” Lord Aiken muttered, somewhat distractedly.
“My people fought the elves because it was what was expected.” Her brow, which was chestnut, like her hair and coat, rose. “Yet, we want our alliance to be with Raystlyn and his people.” Her tone was guarded. “Not with Iykva.”
“Let me speak with Raystlyn.” He advised her. “And explain to him the meaning of your stand.”
Rising, she grinned. “Thank you, my Lord.” She said. “Chiron will appreciate the assistance.”
“As I appreciate his.” Aiken stood as well and held out his hand. She took it, raised it to her lips and kissed his knuckles. He pulled hers back and repeated the gesture. Xylon, watching all of this with qui
et fascination, smiled. “Please tell him that I shall pass his tidings to his two legged son.”
“I will.” She replied, lowering her gaze. “Good Sun, my Lord.”
“And to you.”
-49-
Iladrul lowered himself beside Osete, laying his hand upon his shoulder.
Jeanir was laid out before him on the ground, wrapped from head to toe in white, cotton cloth. Osete had a sponge in his hand which he had been repeatedly dipping into a bowl of water so that he might wipe his father’s brow.
“Are you alright?” Iladrul asked, almost hesitantly.
The other boy nodded, but made no response other than this.
Iladrul, understanding, squeezed his shoulder. “May I bring comfort to you?”
Osete shook his head, sat upright and settled his buttocks on his heels. “But, thank you.”
Iladrul nodded, leaned toward him and kissed his cheek. He felt Osete’s skin grow hot against his lips, causing him to smile slightly as he pulled away. “He was a good man.”
“Thank you.” Osete whispered.
“I’ll find your brothers and sister.” Iladrul rose, sat his hand upon the crown of Osete’s head and ran it downward over his soft, brown hair. “Tell them to come help you build his pyre.”
Osete nodded and turned his gold ringed eyes toward Iladrul. “Faunus needs help as well.”
Iladrul’s brow furrowed. He raised his gaze, saw Faunus bent over his father, weeping, and let out a tired sigh. He was still too young and unfamiliar with real grief to know how to deal with it.
Forcing a smile, he gave Osete another kiss on his crown and then made his way to his friend. When he reached Faunus, he did not reach for him. This relationship was much different than that he shared with Osete. He did, however, lower himself to Faunus’ side.
“Faunus.” He said, trying desperately to keep his own grief from the tone of his voice.
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