Elven Fury (Agents of the Crown Book 4)

by Lindsay Buroker

  He was only four paces from the door leading outside. He lunged toward it, hoping to open it so Zenia could sprint through the foyer and escape.

  But someone sprang into his path. A tangible person this time, not the shadow golem. A person with a green glowing longsword that highlighted the fine features of his elven face.

  Strange slender snakes writhed up and down the blade of that glowing sword. One flicked toward Jev. It didn’t have eyes or a mouth, and he realized it was a vine rather than a snake.

  Not that it mattered. When the elf swung his sword toward Jev’s face, the edge appeared as deadly as expected.

  Jev whipped his dagger up to parry. His smaller blade was inadequate, and he knew it, but he didn’t expect the magical sword to cleave right through it. But it did.

  Startled as his broken dagger clattered on the floor, Jev almost tripped over his own feet in his haste to get back. The elf lunged after him, his pale green eyes deadly cold. He raised his sword again, and Jev had no weapons left with which to defend himself.

  Unless the figurine counted. He hurled it at the elf’s feet, hoping it would explode with fiery magic.

  It bounced up and hit the elf in the shin. His eyebrows twitched, and he kicked it away without looking.

  An unearthly keening echoed through the foyer, the noise reverberating off the stone walls. That made the elf hesitate. He turned his head, his gaze latching onto Zenia.

  She had stepped out of the office, her hands raised, and a blue glow emanated from her fingers. It pulsed, pushing outward, and the light grew stronger in the room, the shadows fading slightly. Was the dragon tear battling the golem? Could it win?

  Jev had no idea, but he took advantage of his foe’s distraction. He kicked, trying to catch the elf in the hand to knock his sword away. He connected and had the satisfaction of hearing a startled gasp as the elf’s sword clanked against the stone wall. Unfortunately, he didn’t let go of it.

  Before his foe could bring it back to bear, Jev lunged in. He knew he couldn’t best a trained elf in a sword fight, especially when he didn’t have a sword, but the elf’s superior speed and agility might be less effective in a wrestling match.

  His adversary almost evaded him, but Jev caught him around the middle and bore him to the hard stone floor. The elf bucked like a spooked horse trying to fling its rider.

  Jev’s ribs ached from his old injuries, and his shoulder stung from the new one, but he didn’t let go. He managed to grasp the elf’s wrist and keep the sword from reaching him as he used his weight to his advantage, getting on top of his opponent and pinning him.

  Another wailing keen echoed through the foyer. Zenia gasped—in pain?—but turned it into a determined snarl.

  Maybe if Jev could keep the elf busy a little longer…

  Green light flashed in Jev’s eyes, and some magical energy flung him away. He went flying and smashed against the wall again, the blow knocking the air from his lungs and stunning him. For a moment, he couldn’t move; he could only crumple to his back.

  Something snaked around his leg. Another untouchable shadow from the golem?

  Jev cursed, fear giving his body what it needed to move again. He tried to yank his leg away before the tendril could fully grip him, but it was too late. The thing pulled him across the floor, his shirt rucking up and rough stone scouring his back.

  The elf stood over him, his glowing sword in hand, and a sneer on his aristocratic face. The tendril wrapped around Jev’s leg was green and came from the sword, not the golem. The magical extension was one of several sprouting from the blade. A second one wrapped around Jev’s arm and hefted him into the air.

  “I saw you in Taziira,” his enemy snarled. “You invaded my homeland and killed my people. For that, you will die.”

  Weaponless and dangling off the floor, Jev didn’t know how he could object—or keep the threat from coming to pass.

  “The war is over,” he blurted. “Your presence here is an act of—”

  Blue light flared, filling the tower with brightness that burned Jev’s eyes like the sun. The tendrils released him, and he tumbled to the floor again.

  He rolled away and scrambled to his feet, wishing he had a weapon. Founders’ teeth, where had his pistol gone? He couldn’t shoot an incorporeal golem, but he could shoot a damn elf.

  He patted around, hoping to find it, but all he brushed against was the stupid elephant figurine.

  “She’s more powerful than it is,” someone yelled in Elvish.

  It wasn’t the elf Jev had been facing. He cursed again, realizing the second one Zenia had mentioned was in there too. Fighting her?

  A blur of white came from across the foyer. The second elf. He also wielded a glowing sword, this one with the appearance of a frosty icicle, and he hefted it as he raced toward Zenia.

  She still stood with her arms raised, blue light flowing from her fingers and creating tendrils that wrapped around the shadowy entity in the center of the foyer. She’d caged it, but the elf…

  He roared and lunged toward her with his glowing white sword. Jev hurled the figurine at him.

  It struck the elf in the temple, almost startling him into dropping his blade.

  Before Jev could feel any satisfaction, the elf with the green tendril sword jumped at him from the side. Fear for Zenia gave Jev strength and speed. He ducked the blade slashing toward his head, tendrils writhing, and lunged in, leading with his elbow. He slammed it into the elf’s solar plexus.

  A rush of air knocked Jev’s hair into his eyes, and a thunderous crack sounded. He had no idea what was going on, but his opponent seemed even more startled than he was, so Jev hammered his chest again and again. Finally, the elf kicked him, knocking him back, and sprinted out the door.

  Jev looked toward Zenia, but a cloud of dust filled the room. Light shone in from one of the walls. It was daylight, not some magical glow. Someone had knocked a huge hole in the side of the tower.

  More snaps and cracks sounded, this time from above. Jev envisioned the entire structure collapsing.

  “Zenia!” he shouted, rushing through the foyer, batting at the dusty air and hoping he wouldn’t rush right into the shadow golem’s grip.

  But it seemed to be gone. He made it across the foyer without encountering opposition and finally spotted Zenia, slumped against the wall by the office door. It looked like her legs would buckle at any second and she would end up on the floor.

  He snatched her up in his arms, lifting her so he could carry her outside. Her dragon tear dangled from its chain, no longer glowing. Zenia’s eyes were glassy, her limbs limp.

  “Zenia, are you with me?” Jev ran toward the hole in the wall, watching for the second elf. Where had he gone?

  Pieces of mortar and stone clunked to the floor. Jev almost tripped over a fallen bookcase as he drew close to the tower’s new exit. He ran around it and out into the afternoon light.

  “I’m all right,” Zenia whispered. She gripped his shoulders, then let go. “I can walk. I just—that took a lot out of me, even though my dragon tear did all the work.”

  “I will happily carry you all the way back to the castle if you wish.” His ribs groaned and his shoulder throbbed, but he meant what he said.

  “I think it’ll be faster if we both walk. Or better yet, find our horses.”

  Reluctantly, Jev set her on her feet, but he kept a hand on the small of her back in case she needed support.

  Rubble clacked to the floor of the tower behind them. Jev thought he saw a figure dart through the charred trees near the back wall of the courtyard.

  “We better go,” he said over the ominous snaps. He hoped the tower didn’t collapse. It was bad enough he was the reason the gardens had burned. “Especially if that golem—I can’t believe you just called it a presence—is still around. Do you know if it is?”

  “I’m not sure.” Zenia jogged wobbly toward the front gate, her dress flapping around her legs.

  “I was hoping you would say yo
u nobly vanquished it and it would never set foot in our world again.” Jev stuck close, glancing all about as they hurried away. He no longer sensed the magical creature, but he knew those two elves were still around, and he feared they were not that injured.

  Would they follow him and Zenia through the city? Or stay here, near their people’s compound?

  The wrought-iron gate was open, as they had left it. Jev and Zenia darted through, and he swung it shut behind them with a booming clang and peered warily between the bars.

  But there was nothing chasing them. The mist had been replaced by a more natural stone dust wafting out of the hole in the tower. The structure itself had not collapsed—yet. Darkness lay beyond the gaping hole in the side, but Jev no longer saw shadows stirring in it.

  “The dragon tear defeated it.” Zenia stopped and leaned her hand against the courtyard wall. “I’m not sure if it’s incapable of returning, but I no longer sense it nearby.”

  “Good,” Jev said, then grimaced. He was still in front of the gate, and he spotted a cloaked figure climbing over the rear courtyard wall with a sword on his back. A faint white glow seeped out of the scabbard.

  If Jev had possessed a weapon, he might have given chase, but he didn’t even have an elephant to throw. He decided he would leave his pistol and get another one from the castle armory. He’d spent enough time in that tower today.

  As the sounds of stones tumbling down faded, Jev grew aware of voices. He turned, expecting to find dozens of tavern goers outside, peering at the elven compound.

  There were a lot of people outside, but they were up on the roof rather than in the street. And they were looking down the hill toward the harbor instead of at the tower.

  “Something else going on?” Jev wondered what else could have commanded their attention, especially with what had seemed to him monstrous noise and destruction going on inside the tower.

  “Maybe we should take advantage of our luck and go back to the castle.” Zenia touched her temple, and her finger came away bloody.

  “Or to a hospital.” Jev frowned, tempted to reach up to stroke her face. Now that he had time to examine her in the daylight, he spotted other cuts. He feared they would both be covered with bruises before long. “Are you badly hurt?”

  “No.” Zenia lowered her hand. “I’ll be fine. Are you all right? You were the one…”

  “Heroically distracting the golem so you could use your magic on it?”

  “Is that what you were doing when it flung you into the wall?”

  “Wasn’t it obvious?”

  “Hm.”

  An appreciative whistle came from the rooftop, followed by numerous low murmurs.

  “I’m going up to take a quick look,” Jev said after glancing toward the tower again to make sure the elves had truly departed. Not wanting to leave Zenia behind, just in case, he added, “Will you humor me and come along?”

  “You just want the barkeeper to see you with a woman so he doesn’t whistle at you,” Zenia grumbled.

  “Precisely.”

  Jev led the way into the dimly lit tavern and headed for the back stairs that he knew from past experience led to the roof. The barkeeper wasn’t around. Maybe he’d gone upstairs with everyone else.

  Jev wondered if another great dwarven steamship had arrived. The one that had sunk in the harbor had been massive and absolutely magnificent. He wished he’d had the opportunity to truly explore it—and that it was still upright and steaming across the seas. What a loss that must have been to the dwarven people.

  A crowd filled the rooftop deck, with people standing on chairs and tables to see better. Jev still couldn’t tell what anyone was looking at. Something in the harbor? Or down the slope on the way to the waterfront?

  Behind him, Zenia made an irritated sound when someone bumped her with an elbow. Jev used his own elbows, trying to protect her and make some room. Then, inexplicably, the crowd parted around them. A bubble of space appeared, and they were able to walk to the edge of the rooftop where they had a view of the harbor.

  Jev noticed Zenia’s dragon tear glowing and an expression on her face somewhere between bemusement and concern. Had the gem chosen to help of its own accord?

  Zenia’s expression changed to one of awe as she gazed toward the harbor. “That’s a beautiful ship.”

  Jev pulled his gaze from her dragon tear, then halted abruptly. “That’s a Taziir ship.”

  He supposed that was a statement of the obvious. The craft that was sailing into the harbor looked more like the limbs and foliage of a great deciduous tree than a ship. Branches and vines were twined together, forming the frame and somehow making a waterproof vessel. Leaves sprouted from the branches as if they were attached to a tree growing in the earth instead of a ship sailing across the sea.

  All the greenery obscured the deck, such as it was, and Jev couldn’t see any elves moving around on it, but a raised platform rose from the bow, reminiscent of the platforms in the treetops where the Taziir had their villages. He could see people out on it.

  Wishing for a spyglass, Jev raised his hand to shield his eyes from the sun and squinted. There was a woman in a rich green dress almost the same shade as the foliage. She had blonde hair, and he immediately thought of the elven princess who’d come for the artifact. Yesleva. He didn’t think she had ever shared her name with them, but he knew it from the intelligence reports.

  The elf woman was too far away for him to make out her face and be certain of her identity. It was unlikely this was the princess. Why would she travel in the open when she’d come in secret before?

  Two male elves in the greens and browns of wardens stood behind her, and Jev shivered, having all too recently seen similar clothing. And were those swords sheathed at their sides? Swords like the magical one that had almost lopped off his head?

  “I’ve never seen an elven ship before,” Zenia said. “Except for pictures in books. They’re far more impressive in person.”

  “Yes.” Jev had seen their vessels before, though not often. For the most part, the war had been fought on the soil of Taziira, the elves allowing—or luring—the humans into their forests before striking.

  “Do you think that’s the new ambassador?”

  “Uh.” Jev hadn’t been thinking that, but Targyon had sent a request for one, so it was possible. If it was…

  He grimaced and looked toward the tower. With the people in the way, he couldn’t see much of the destruction, but he had no trouble remembering that huge hole in the wall. And he remembered that Targyon had wanted, among other things, for him to spearhead a cleaning operation. Jev had definitely not done that.

  “We better get back to the castle and report everything to Targyon,” he said.

  And hope we’re not in trouble for knocking a hole in the wall of the elven tower, he added silently.

  Zenia had to jog to keep up with Jev after they left their horses with the stablehands and headed into Alderoth Castle. The grounds were busy with other people riding into and out of the stable at top speed, and she suspected Targyon had already heard about the arrival of the elven ship.

  As they ran in through their usual back entrance, the one that led to the Crown Agents’ basement office and also to the kitchen, laundry, and working area of the castle, they heard shouts and the clattering of pots and pans. Servants rushed to the kitchen, trays tucked under their arms as they adjusted their uniforms.

  “Looks like an impromptu feast is being prepared,” Zenia said, as Jev charged not toward their office but toward the stairs that led up to Targyon’s office and suite.

  “Elves arriving is a big deal,” Jev said over his shoulder.

  They passed more servants on the stairs, butlers heading to duty stations. Here and there, maids stuck freshly cut flowers in vases and removed any that were old and withered.

  “Did the dwarves get a feast and this much attention?” Zenia wondered.

  “I’m not sure. I was busy being blown across the harbor at the tim
e.”

  She patted him on the back when they reached the landing, but she only had time for a few pats before he was off again, heading toward Targyon’s office.

  “His Majesty is in his suite,” the secretary said as soon as they entered the outer office. “But he said he’s not to be disturbed. He’s bathing and dressing for our guest.”

  “Does he know who our guest is?” Jev asked.

  Zenia hadn’t been able to guess from their distant perch on top of the tavern, but she assumed the ship carried a contingent of important people. Or was it just one important person?

  She thought of the warning she’d received to avoid the elf. Not elves. Elf. Which one? She couldn’t help but wonder again if it was Lornysh. Maybe he wasn’t a danger to her or Jev specifically, but what if this was another group of his kind who wanted him dead? Or what if this group had sent the other group? Simply standing next to Lornysh might be enough to get her or Jev killed by friendly—or indifferent—crossfire.

  “An elven emissary,” the secretary said.

  “How unspecific,” Zenia murmured.

  “I bet it’s our new ambassador.” Jev grimaced. “I need to talk to Tar—the king—and warn him about the embassy’s state of disrepair. It will only take a minute.”

  The secretary opened his mouth in protest, but Jev, hurrying back into the hallway, did not see it. He strode toward the door to Targyon’s suite—and toward the two bodyguards blocking it.

  “You’re going to interrupt him in the bath?” Zenia whispered, trailing after him. “Surely, it can wait twenty minutes.”

  “I want to report what we found and let him know, in case he intends to send the elves to their new embassy. You know what the tower looks like right now.” He faced the guards as he spoke, the words as much for them as for her.

  Zenia didn’t usually ask her dragon tear to allow her to see his thoughts, but she sensed his urgency was only partially about the tower. He also wanted to report that letter they’d found about Lornysh. He believed things had gotten worse for his friend.

  “Zyndar Dharrow,” one of the guards said respectfully but also warily. He doubtless hoped Jev wasn’t going to demand to be let in.