Elven Queen

by Bernhard Hennen

  Again, she felt the light trembling underfoot. She had to find out what was going on down there.

  OF FORGOTTEN HEROES

  Built to last centuries, lost in days.” Many today speak thus of Phylangan. But those who do are mainly proud young warriors who were not there in the days when the city fell. They have no idea of the lonely courage of those who fought with all their might against the inevitable.

  Ollowain, the keeper of the Shalyn Falah, is remembered. He was always to be found where the blades sang their lethal chorus. His calm humor gave strength to those whose sentry duty seemed endless.

  But there were so many others whose names today resound on nobody’s lips.

  There was Gondoran, the holde, and the master of waters from far-off Vahan Calyd, a friend of Prince Orimedes, who fought a solitary battle in the darkness and yet remained unknown though he gave the stone garden its final victory.

  Forgotten, too, is that human of honorable blood and rude tongue who, with his men, demolished tunnels and filled passageways with stones to deny the trolls a way to reach the Sky Harbor. And though they were so exhausted they could hardly raise their picks, not one of the humans shied from the fray when the superior enemy broke through yet again. No one will ever know where they found their courage, for the only recompense they could expect were the scars they carried on their mortal bodies.

  There were four large gold gates in the wide tunnel that led beyond the Skyhall to the remaining harbor. The tunnel had been built so that even the largest of our ice gliders, with its masts lowered, could pass through the mountain from one harbor to the other. Today, the final battles fought in Phylangan are named after those gates. They were the Gate of the Garden, which opened to the Skyhall; the Lily Gate at the necropolis, where those who had failed to find their way into the moonlight rested, enclosed in ice; the Old Gate, close to Landoran’s royal palace; and the Sky Gate, the last stronghold before the remaining harbor.

  Each of the gates cost the trolls a day to destroy with battering rams and axes. And when they had broken through a gate, each step of the path ahead had to be paid for with blood.

  The defenders fought from behind hastily built barricades or slipped away through narrow tunnels only to reappear through concealed drop-gates and surprise the attackers on their flanks. They drove the burning hulls of ice gliders down the sloping tunnel toward the trolls, and sent flames and smoke at them with enormous bellows brought from the forges in the blacksmiths’ halls.

  For twenty-two days they fought, those warriors. They had been given a week at best. Then the trolls at last destroyed the Sky Gate.

  A counterattack by riders, led by Orimedes and his centaurs, pushed the surprised enemy back a final time. But we all knew that the time had come to abandon the stone garden. The survivors drew lots to decide who would stay behind to buy a few precious hours for the rest to get away. A white stone meant a place on the last ice glider to leave the fortress. A black stone meant death.

  From The Eye of the Falcon, page 912

  The Memoirs of Fenryl,

  Count of Rosecarn

  GOLD AND STONES

  Don’t judge me by the nose, Dalla,” Lambi said, and he reached down and patted the flap of his trousers. “Everything down here’s still in perfect working order.”

  The king’s mistress knotted the bandage around Lambi’s head. Then she looked at him with her sky-blue eyes. Lambi had never had much time for red-haired women. They brought a man nothing but trouble, it was said.

  He thought of the stone he carried in his pocket. Whatever trouble he brought on himself, it would not last long. He grinned.

  “So how about it? You and me? I reckon we’ve got time enough before we have to march.”

  Dalla laid her hand on his chest, where his heart lay. “I know that everything in here’s in good order, Lambi. That is the only thing that interests me about a man.”

  The jarl could hardly believe his luck. “Then should we? I know a place. It’s just—”

  She shook her head. “I have to tend to the wounded. You know that.”

  “You’ve just wounded my heart. It’ll kill me, too, if you don’t treat it right away.”

  Dalla laughed, then stood up. “May Luth spin you a long thread.”

  “I’m never in luck with redheads,” Lambi murmured, loud enough for Dalla to hear. “They always run off.”

  She shook her head, and her red locks danced around her shoulders. “Maybe you just ask at the wrong time.” She gave him a captivating smile, then she walked out through the wide harbor gate and climbed onto one of the ice gliders where the wounded were convalescing.

  Lambi’s hand played with the stone in his pocket. He would not have the chance to find the right time to ask, not now. “’Twas just a redhead,” he grumbled. “Should have tried my luck with a blond.” Then he crossed the hall to the sled with the red tarpaulin. It was the last one they had loaded that morning. Ragnar, one of his men, sat on the driver’s seat. In his old life, Ragnar had been a tree feller, but as long as Lambi could remember, Ragnar had never missed an opportunity to get into a fight. His scarred face and broad nose, broken numerous times, told more than all the stories.

  “Don’t even think about taking off, you old whoremonger. With what’s on that sled, you could buy every house of pleasure in Gonthabu and screw away the rest of your life for free.”

  Ragnar smiled conspiratorially. “That’s why we chose you to be jarl, Lambi. You always have the best ideas. I’d never have come up with this one.”

  From the corner of his eye, Lambi saw Alfadas hurrying toward the sled. That was all he needed! As much as he liked Alfadas, there were things that the elvenjarl would never understand, and things he didn’t have to know about in the first place.

  “Take off, Ragnar!”

  “But—”

  “Drive, damn it, if your jarl orders you to!”

  Alfadas was waving his arms at them.

  “Get going. Right now,” Lambi hissed, then turned to Alfadas, waved back, and smiled.

  “But he wants me to stay,” Ragnar objected.

  “And I want you to leave, you cretinous oaf!”

  Ragnar put down the reins. “The duke’s saved my hide twice. If he wants something from me, you can shove your orders up your ass!”

  Too late. Alfadas was at the sled. Lambi could see that he knew.

  The duke turned back the tarpaulin. He ran his hand over the gold as if that was the only way he could believe what he was looking at. “So it’s true,” he said softly. When he looked at Lambi, he had infinite disappointment in his eyes.

  Lambi would have understood if Alfadas had started yelling at him, or even better, if he had punched him in the face. He was used to things like that. But the look in his eyes . . . he could not bear that. He looked away, ashamed of himself.

  But I’m in the right, he thought angrily. “It’s one of the goddamned doors,” he finally said. “If you have gold doors, you shouldn’t be surprised if one of ’em goes missing occasionally.”

  “They’re our allies. Our hosts.”

  “Yeah. And we’re the nice kind of guests who stick out our necks for them, and what do we get for it? Almost half the men who came here to Albenmark with you are dead, and they still adore you. Alfadas, who lies in the muck with us. Alfadas, who saves our hides when we’re up to our necks in shit. Alfadas this. Alfadas that! I’m sick of it!”

  “So you decided to rob the Normirga of a few of their doors? What are you trying to tell me?” the duke said harshly.

  “What I have to say to you is not meant for Ragnar’s ears. Come with me!” Lambi pulled Alfadas away with him to an empty dock. He’d been stewing for weeks, and it was high time to clear the air.

  “You blind ’em with your fame, but in reality you don’t give a sweet shit about them. You’re the elvenjarl, the duke, guest at the tables of kings. They love you! And here you are, slogging through the mud and muck with ’em, risking your skin for
’em, and because such a fine gentleman as yourself does all that for ’em, they feel more important. Then your skald comes and writes pretty verses that turn all of them who’ve died into heroes. But truth be told: they don’t matter to you at all!”

  “You’re drunk, Lambi. You know I do anything and everything for my men.”

  Lambi laughed angrily. “Of course you do! And I also know what you don’t do. You never think how things will be for ’em when they get home again. Do you think a hero’s saga is going to fill a belly? Back in the Fjordlands, a few moons from now, they’ll be the same scum of the earth they were when they landed in your army. What are you going to do about that, Duke?”

  Alfadas looked at him, deeply hurt. Now it was his turn to avoid the other’s eyes.

  “You’re not even thinking about going back, are you? You’ve decided you’re going to perish here. That’s up to you. But don’t expect your men to do the same. Fine, call me a thief because I’ve pinched a few golden doors from passages nobody ever uses. We only took ’em off walls where nobody’s going to fight. In a few hours, the whole mountain’s going to belong to the trolls anyway, and then nobody’s going to miss the doors anymore. I don’t know who told you what we got up to while you were fighting beside the elves and they had us breaking rocks. Frankly, I don’t care. Everybody knew it. I’ve seen to it that everyone who makes it home to the Fjordlands goes back rich.”

  Alfadas raised his hands in surrender. “Enough. I’ve understood, Jarl. Maybe I really am looking for death, but I shouldn’t take you and the others down with me.” He took a white stone from his pocket. “My stone. Take it. I saw what you drew. You can go back.”

  Lambi slapped the stone out of his hand. “D’you think I’m not good enough to die here with all the hero volunteers? When it comes to dying, we’re all the same, you . . . you puffed-up—”

  Alfadas’s punch came completely without warning. Lambi would never have thought the wiry son of a bitch could hit so hard. The fist to the gut was followed by a hook to his chin.

  “Come and get the jarl, Ragnar.” The duke looked sad, the goddamned bastard!

  Lambi shook his head, dazed. He could not believe that two punches could incapacitate him so badly. Must be the head wound, he thought. He felt hands lift him up. Ragnar laid him on the sled and wrapped a blanket around his shoulders.

  “Sorry.” Alfadas was at his side, pressing the white stone into his fist. “You’re right, Lambi. I’m no longer the right leader for you. Until now, it was good to have a duke who protected his men in battle whenever he could. Now they need a man to get them home in one piece. A man like you.”

  Lambi tried to get up but immediately collapsed again. He felt as sick as if he’d spent an entire night on cheap wine. “You can’t—”

  Alfadas gave Ragnar a sign. “Drive! Take him to Dalla. She should take another look at his head.”

  With a jerk, the sled began to move. Through the blanket, Lambi felt the cold gold of the stolen door.

  Alfadas remained behind, in the center of the harbor hall. He drew his sword and raised it in salute. “Good-bye, Lambi. May Luth spin you a long thread.”

  A high-pitched horn sounded from the last gate. The trolls were returning. Alfadas turned away and took his place among the host of the lost.

  WATER, AT LEAST

  Sweat trickled from Gondoran’s face and neck. He smoothed the wall of the tunnel, then wiped his hand nervously across his forehead. The heavy circlet pressed uncomfortably into his skin.

  Although the master of waters was wearing thick felt boots, he felt as if the soles of his feet were standing in an open fire. He was far too close! The air was stuffy down there, the small lantern dangling overhead woefully inadequate. Certain death lurked a few fingerbreadths below his feet. What better place from which to fight the trolls? he thought grimly. Right now, he would much rather be galloping across the wide plains of Windland on Orimedes’s back or taking part in one of the centaurs’ drinking orgies. He had not been able to say good-bye to Orimedes.

  He stooped forward inside the narrow pipe, which rose above him almost vertically through the rock. His fingers prodded at the hot floor. The white pumice should shield me from the heat better than this, he thought. I must be very close now. He had to be careful. He opened his mind to the power of the Stoneformer’s Eye. Then he swept a little of the pumice aside. The floor vibrated beneath his fingers, and somewhere far above, a crunching sound emanated from the rock. Dust and small splinters of stone rained down. Since morning, low tremors had been shaking the mountain every few heartbeats.

  I must be mad, Gondoran thought. No one crept through a narrow water pipe inside a mountain when a tremor could—would!—happen at any moment. But these hours of life were not really his. By rights, he should not have survived the caress of the prickly shroud. He should be lying with his dead comrades in the mangrove swamps of Vahan Calyd. No prince should ever abandon his people, but staying would have meant betraying his queen.

  Gondoran was certain that the only reason he had survived was because he still had something important to do, something to see through to its end, and when he’d seen the fountains of steam shooting from the high pillars of the Skyhall, he knew immediately where his task lay. Even with a weapon in his hand, he would be of little use in battle against the trolls. He was a poor shot with a crossbow, and the trolls would have laughed at the stones in his sling. But he knew something about water, in all its forms.

  “Hurry up, Gondoran!” Coming through the narrow pipe, the young elf woman’s voice sounded fractured and harsh. Fahlyn had been assisting him ever since the war council had allowed him to enter the system of pipes inside the mountain.

  It required some courage to crawl through the narrow tunnels while the mountain quaked. Fahlyn was extraordinarily brave. Gondoran had not understood what Ollowain had against her. He would not accept her among the defenders of Phylangan, although she was part of his father’s bodyguard and was no doubt a good fighter. She was one of the ancient Farangel clan.

  The holde recalled his childhood, the wonderful days spent with his uncle. The old man had often talked for hours as they poled their way through the peaceful darkness of the cisterns of Vahan Calyd. His stories had been about the Normirga, and how, in their years as refugees, they had lived with the holdes. When those elves from the far north came, the mangrove swamps had been a place that none but the holdes, among the races of the Albenkin, truly knew or appreciated. It was the Normirga who had wrested that magnificent city from the dark coastal swamp—the city where, every twenty-eight years, the Albenkin came as pilgrims from every corner of their world to witness Emerelle, most eminent of the Normirga, once again being chosen as their queen.

  Since the days in which the foundations of Vahan Calyd had been laid, the Farangel clan had been close allies of the holdes. From the Farangel had come many of those who built the canals and cisterns. Gondoran was proud, after all these centuries, to be the first master of waters to work with the Farangel again. The circle closes, he thought.

  Together, he and Fahlyn had studied the plans of the hidden waterways. They both knew Landoran’s secret, knew what was happening deep beneath their feet. They had used some of the large main pipes to channel scalding fumes out to the mountain flanks, thus saving the Skyhall from filling with boiling steam. Their work had also eased the work of the magic weavers in the Hall of Fire because they had been able to relieve some of the pressure that was building up constantly inside the rock.

  Again, Gondoran ran his hand over his sweaty brow. He knew what the defenders above him were going through. Sometimes, he heard far-off echoes of battle, although there at the bottom of the riser, he was almost a mile from the Skyhall. The evening before, until late in the night, while the defenders had been engaged in a desperate battle farther south, he had worked at the pale rock of the final section of the main connecting tunnel. He had softened the stone, then pushed his long rod up through it until it reached th
e large pipe hidden above. Days before, he had isolated the pipe from the water network and connected it instead to other pipes that led deep into the earth. Now the hour had come for him to fight! He had pushed more than a hundred holes through the stone that connected to the main pipe.

  The rock quaked around him. A shower of stone fragments rattled down through the riser.

  “Come, Gondoran! It’s time,” Fahlyn called from far above. Faintly, he heard the echo of the single blast from a horn.

  The holde reached for the safety rope and jerked on it. Fahlyn would believe that he had begun his ascent. “Go ahead to the well shaft. I’ll join you soon,” he shouted back.

  He was sorry that their work together had to end with a lie, but today was the day on which his hourglass ran out. The time he had borrowed was due for repayment. The holde blew out the flame of the lantern. He was glad he’d survived the shroud. Looking at the situation most generously, at least it was his element that killed him. For the master of waters, that was only right.

  He leaned forward. The power of the ruby flowed in his hands. The pumice beneath his feet softened. He reached for the long staff leaning beside him. For a heartbeat, he waited and listened. Then he heard it. Three blasts of a horn. The signal he’d agreed with Ollowain.

  Gondoran stabbed the staff downward, thrusting it through the soft stone. Searing steam rose to meet him.

  THE OTHER SIDE OF CHILDHOOD

  Ollowain touched his wounded cheek. Blood ran down his neck. He was getting tired. The day before, the blow would not have grazed him. He thought of the enormous troll with his club studded with splinters of obsidian. The bastard had almost knocked his head off, but he’d managed to duck clear just in time.

  Two hundred paces away, the trolls gathered behind the protection offered by their large wooden shields. One more charge, and they would be victorious. Ollowain mustered those still standing, the final line of defense, among them: Alfadas, Mag, and two more humans. One kobold, whose name he did not know, was leaning, exhausted, on his crossbow. Beside him stood Silwyna. She had set a new arrow on her bowstring and was waiting for a gap to appear in the trolls’ wall of shields. One of the swordsmen from Landoran’s bodyguard also remained. They were too few to continue the fight.