She covered her mouth with her hand, staring at him incredulously.
“He wasn’t supposed to come up here,” she said apologetically.
Rand cut his eyes toward her, the grin still in place. “He’s keeping the mice down some. Never thought about keeping one in the hold before. Just hope one of my crew doesn’t step on him.”
“I’ll make sure he understands and is more careful about being seen,” she said, worried the little fox might come to harm. “Thank you.”
Storm winds began to blow stronger, throwing balls of ice at the ship and blowing into the wheelhouse. The ship was tossed hard, allowing giant waves to wash onto the deck. The crew minding the bilge pump was overworked from the onslaught of seawater. The first mate had gone to other duties, leaving the captain minding the wheel during the storm. Sean tied a rope around his waist and attached it to one of the masts. His job was to carry buckets of water from the pump back to the sea, but more spilled on deck faster than he could empty his containers overboard.
“Will he be a’right, getting so close to the edge?” Breanna asked, concerned about the boy even as she admired his stoutheartedness. “Sean is a worker for sure. I’ve known him since his mam and poppa took me in. Sometimes he whines a little, but I think we all do some now and then.”
“Aye, if he keeps the tether on, he should be fine—that is, if the ship doesn’t sink.”
“Is there a chance it might?” she asked, more curious than concerned.
“Some. Are you scared?” the captain asked, watching her face for telltale signs of panic.
“Maybe, as much a reasonable person ought to be, but no more. I trust you to keep us afloat,” she said, keeping eyes on Sean as he slipped on the watery deck.
“You seem older than fifteen summers,” Captain Rand said conversationally as the lightning strikes slowed. The rain still continued to beat on the deck and the wind blew, but the worst had blown over them.
“It’s the elven part of me. It doesn’t know time as you might. My seasons build one on another, not passing as fast as your sundials move. I’m told it’s impossible to tell an elf’s age. Young like I am now, I have memories from my ancestors. Maybe it’s the reason I appear older.”
“You’re serious aren’t you? This isn’t a story you’re making up?” he asked.
“No,” she whispered. “Sometimes I wish it was a story, and then I could make my own ending. I’d best go see about Tom.”
Wrapping the shawl again, Breanna stepped carefully onto the water-slick deck. After the intimate conversation with the captain, she felt shy and needed to think about the secrets she might have given away. He was a man grown, but seemed to draw words from her as easily as a childhood playmate sharing secrets, making her say too much. Telling the captain her story made her vulnerable to attack from others who might be listening.
Elida’s life depended upon Breanna’s ability to present herself as an innocent girl unaware of the powers she possessed. As long as the witch believed Mathena’s daughter was walking into a trap, there was still a chance Elida could be rescued, even though, as more days passed, there was less hope for good results.
Inside the cabin, Tom was abed, still retching into the bucket every so often, his face pale and drained. Breanna watched him for a moment, making certain it was only seasickness bothering his normal good health. Grabbing her bedding quickly, she headed for the hold, where a bale of cloth appeared more comfortable than her bed in the smelly room. The last thought on her mind before sleep took her was of the captain’s green eyes holding their own storm when he was angry.
20.
Far away from the Qadra Sea, beyond the Darth of Qayborn, a hamlet called Perce had grown up over many years. Several odd-sized buildings protected the cattle and goat herds and the harvested grain crops, and one tightly built smokehouse provided the community with a place for curing pork. Smoked pork was a standard for the hamlet, a staple that made meals of biscuits, turnips, and potatoes into tastier fare.
When the witch Yahmara and her followers moved in, they took over the township, and sent the souls who had previously lived there in search of other shelter. The witches hated the odor of smoked pork, for it was rumored in many places a burning witch and smoked pork smelled alike. When all of Yahmara’s followers arrived, they destroyed most of the buildings, but left the remaining residents unharmed because their labor was needed to construct a witches’ retreat.
It was there, beneath an old barn spared from the burning, where they kept young Elida. Her exposure to life and light were restricted to the Bad One and the Not-So-Bad Ones who had become her keepers. The little girl had managed to survive by thinking ahead to the time she would be released, when Bree and Sean would break through and kill all the w———, especially the Bad One who took her kitten back after the others gave it to her. Elida wanted to kill the w—— by pinching away tiny parts of her, leaving only the w——-’s small finger, then Elida would feed that finger to her pet mouse. She dreamed of other terrible ends for her captors, but the one with the mouse was her favorite.
Yahmara knew something about the yellow-haired snit. She had information hidden from the witches’ probing mind, and the child was above bribery and coercion. Fierce loyalty such as the girl possessed would make her an excellent follower, and Yahmara intended to keep her alive until the witches’ celebration. It would be the perfect time for indoctrination and taking revenge.
After she was through destroying the mind of the Qay brat, Yahmara’s planned to boil the useless girl in a large pot and serve her to the pork-hungry hamlet dwellers. Each would fill its own purpose. Eliandor had become too mighty, strutting himself, holding that he and his pure-strain elves were superior to all other beings. It was past time to bring him back to his roots.
Yahmara’s fury knew no bounds, for the girl Breanna was the progeny of her greatest enemy, Mathena Pentara Ascroft. When they were girls of the same season, Mathena had scarred Yahmara, damaging her knee bone with elfish magic that would not allow healing. The flesh seared over, but the bone was ruined for all eternity.
Her oldest enemy was en route to Haven Pentara, searching for her precious grandpoppa, the saintly Eliandor, who’d turned out his granddaughter because she chose a mate that conflicted with his principles. Yahmara’s mind picture of the starchy elf made her want to hurl the raven she had eaten at the midday meal. She could hardly wait to turn Eliandor into a mouse—yes, a mouse, forever to eat the garbage left by other beings. That would be a worthy comedown for him.
The Not-So-Bad W——-s, said to be born without hearts, had little emotion, or feeling, and were subject to their leader. Little Elida was wrong about the severity of their evil, for in truth, they were worse than their boss. They told the little girl they had never felt emotion, whereas Yahmara had pulled her own heart from its cage, and when the deed was done (her minions lied and said they ate it with onions and turnips), the witch followed a strict regimen to remove any feelings that might have remained within her now empty chest. This part of the indoctrination was a requirement set forth by the Spectre himself, and it was supposed to be adhered to without deviation. But secretly, the young, proud witch left the tiniest bit of emotion alive, and from that bit came her desires for revenge. She would have it her way or die trying.
Elida fought the w——-s’ presence by pretending she remembered nothing before the bird took her. “Yes,” she said to the Not-So-Bad Ones, “I remember Sean, Willum, and Alane, they were my neighbors, but who is Breanna Ascroft?” At this dark juncture of loneliness and fear, her mind games were all that stood between her and insanity.
Memories of her life before the cellar were dim; Elida knew she had been traveling somewhere, but she couldn’t remember where she was going. No one ever talked to her anymore—just the mice came and went in the cellar, looking for food, sometimes thinking she was food. They had bitten her feet and fingers many times.
When any of her captors entered the cellar, Elida slobbered at the mouth a
nd let her spit hang from the bottom lip in a parody of a rabid animal. Sometimes she pretended her teeth had fallen from her mouth and gummed her words in the ways of infants. The w———es refused to look at her as Elida tried her hardest to entertain them.
Sometimes she cried at night, wishing she could go to sleep and not wake up in the same cellar, but then she would hear her mam’s voice.
“Lida, get out and enjoy the sunshine. It’s a good day to be alive.” Her mam wouldn’t want her go to sleep and not wake up.
She wished Kit would visit her; he was so soft and tiny. She thought for a minute maybe he had grown some, but she couldn’t be sure how long she had been in the cellar.
“Bree, if you can see me, talk to me.” One day she had said the words to herself so many times that she had to say them out loud. She even screamed them to the walls and the mice. It felt good to talk, even if only to herself.
The next time she woke from sleeping, she lay on her mat, wondering if it was morning or night, not sure anymore if she had become someone else or if she was still Elida. She didn’t get up, but continued lying on the mat, talking to Bree. And then she heard it.
Elida, we’re coming.
Still as one of her mice friends, the little girl refused to move for fear she would lose the voice in her head.
“It’s all in my head, isn’t it, Bree? You’re not here, are you?”
Elida, Breanna said, I can do this for only a minute; my head aches so badly I will have to stop soon. Did they hurt you?
“Yes, but no,” Elida said, her heart skipping with joy.
They don’t hurt you anymore?
“No,” she said, wanting to touch, holding out her thin arms.
Have…go…love…
Bree was gone, but she had been there!
“No, don’t leave me,” Elida screamed. “Take me with you.” She lay down on her dirty mat, and let rage take her as she filled the underground room with sounds only she understood.
21.
The Farqells had grown weary some time back, and Mathena, with the help of Sheela and Anola, convinced them to continue pulling the wagons for just a few more days. Those days came and went, and the large four-legged grass eaters left the seven sisters in a wide clearing with their carts stilled. Mathena suggested they find a farmer with oxen and buy them at any price. They were so close to their destination, and the trip could not be cut short by the lack of beasts in the traces.
Sheela searched the countryside and returned to the carts with four thin oxen, their years of toil showing in their weariness. Anola spoke to them and they told her the farmer didn’t feed them well, and at night they had no straw to lie on. Their lives had been nothing but work.
Anola gave the oxen a heavy meal of straw and grain, and told them they could rest, but their trip must begin the day after. She told them Mara would spell their feet and legs, making travel faster, with less effort on their part. The next morning, as they pulled the wagons the last leg of the journey to Pentara Haven, the oxen’s hooves barely touched dust and the wheels seemed to fly. Content with her work, Mara smiled as leagues of distance were put behind them.
As best she could, Mathena calculated their arrival at the opening in the wood to be within two days’ travel, giving them little time in between to remove road weariness from their bodies. She knew the elves would eye them closely, watching for signs of damage done to their race by the infusion of the blood of men. Pride was not something easily discarded, and the seven sisters had their share.
For two days, the carts traveled through unfamiliar forests where old, gnarly trees showed the advanced age of the enchanted woods. The trail was a lead-in to Pentara, the oldest of all forests, and the haven for elves in the western part of the world. The seven from Nore Mountain had never been children who played on those old trees. They’d never heard them groaning as their little feet stepped on knots and burls. Sadly, each knew regret that her life had taken such a turn.
Together, they saw the Mist River, a deep, narrow waterway that flowed into Illene’s Arc. Its nourishing waters fed Pentara Forest before traveling further west. Mathena remembered her grandfather speaking of the falls and of his desire to return to them.
She had known him as Mer Eliandor, never Grandpoppa, or even Grandfather. She thought later he had chosen the formality to distance her from him, to make the parting easier. Her mam had told and retold the story of the men who traveled to the Darth of Qayborn, weary men injured from war with the Orbels and other creatures farther south. The men stayed for healing, and then some returned to their village afterward, but others stayed.
Young elven females had admired the vibrant men, for much of the elfish blood had grown stale and stagnant, as there were no new marriages. At that time, there were no more havens in that part of the world where they might find mates; thus they turned to those mortals for love and companionship. The revived energy within the whole of tribe was remarkable, but Eliandor forbade the mating, putting his foot down, insisting that those who married into the family of men would be on their own.
Mathena reflected on the day that the elves left the darth for Pentara Haven, for it was not long after her battle with Yahmara. It was the saddest of times. Their family connections within the haven were eons old, but the Qay children and their parents were shut out and forbidden to enter through the portals. Now she was there, determined to ask Eliandor to take up arms and fight alongside the seven Qays to destroy the black witches. The task of convincing him seemed monumental, and had there been another way, she would have gladly chosen it.
Standing near the portals overlooking the falls, Eliandor waited for them, his traveling bags packed and ready, his bow strung as though it had been only a day since his last battle. He nodded, motioning them toward the portal, inviting them to enter the previously forbidden doors where all their elven relatives resided. Mathena could stand it no longer: she jumped from the cart, discarding the dignity of her age to the wind, and threw herself at Eliandor, wrapping her arms around him in the old way.
“We have waited for you these long days and now you are here. Little Mathena! My how you have grown!”
“Mer Eliandor…Grandfather, you know why we are here? Will you call the faeries and send them ahead of us? Yahmara is going to kill my daughter, and I can’t bear it,” she said with tears in her eyes.
“Rest yourselves and hear these words. No longer will the faeries come forth at my bidding. Their great numbers have dwindled to only a few, and those left are creatures without loyalty to us. These are times of calamities, Granddaughter, and one of our greatest losses was Mother Pinera of the wood sprites. She led the faeries until a dark force destroyed most of her kin with poisoned waterfalls. Afterward she retired into Starnight with many of the survivors. These are truly sad days, for much beauty diminished with their departure.”
“I am sorry, Grandfather, I did not know. Through our fears, we chose a place of sanctuary away from the news of the world,” Mathena replied bitterly.
“It is I who needs forgiveness for the dreadful thing I did. I turned you away those many years ago,” the lord of Pentara said. “Forgive me for my foolishness.”
“We are together now, Grandfather, and I suppose it’s enough,” Mathena replied. She wished she could be angry with him, but instead, she felt compassion. How terrible it must have been for him to make such a decision.
“Then we must fight to hold what is ours,” he replied. “We shall rescue your daughter, for she is the hope of all gentle people. Rest tonight, for tomorrow we gallop toward war.”
They left at daybreak the next morning on horses, creatures none of the Qays had seen in all their many years on Nore Mountain. Illene waved them off with an unwrinkled brow, hiding her fears. The way to reach the hamlet where Yahmara’s presence had last been reported was long and dangerous. But destiny called, and Eliandor was determined to obey the command. Illene had been a part of many such battles in her time, but her duty now was to keep Penta
ra Wood safe until her mate returned.
Eliandor lead the way, his stallion black and beautiful, taking old trails through the wood with great gallops. Much would be dangerous on their journey, but none were frightened. That would come later, but for the present, the quest to save the girl with the old memories was greater than any fears.
22.
In the middle of the night, Breanna awakened with a picture in her mind of Elida in a very dark room, repeating “Bree” over and over. She sat up, searching the darkness. Who had awakened her? No one else was in the hold. She had hidden herself well under the White, concerned one of the crew members might enter the storage area and see her. But most of the sailors settled quickly after the storm. Only the mate in the wheelhouse and his helpers were still awake. Sean had been so tired that Tom’s retching didn’t bother him; the boy fell into bed and was asleep when his head hit the pillow.
The picture in Breanna’s head persisted, even after she was awake. Elida desperate, locked away from other people, suffering feelings of sadness, but alive! Sean had carried hope in his heart every day his sister would survive whatever the witches sent her way.
If I can see her in my thoughts, why can’t I go there in my mind? The dream picture was so real; surely Elida had been reaching across the distance, and there must be a way to speak with her. Breanna remembered Anola and her ability to understand all language, to hear the sound of someone’s thoughts and communicate with them. Perhaps there is a way to reach across the unknown.
Anola, she whispered in the recesses of her mind, I must help Elida. She’s scared and alone, punished by witches for her connection to me. Anola, let me speak to her, give her hope.
Child, you ask more than I can do alone. Reach inside, find the power. The soft voice of her mother’s friend sounded anxious, as though unaccustomed to such an idea as thought travel.
The Gantlet Page 16