Crown of Crystal Flame

by C. L. Wilson

  At the opening to the short hallway, Gaelen paused for a final look back at the blocked passage where the girl accompanying Nicolene vol Oros had stood. Who was she? Not Fey or Elvish. Not Celierian, either, with that milky white skin that had clearly never seen the sun. And those eyes. Huge silver coins, framed by sooty lashes. They unsettled him in a way he could not explain.

  With a rumbling crack the rest of the nursery ceiling dissolved. Blinding light filled the room. Gaelen flung up a hand to shield his eyes.

  “General!”

  Farel’s shout spurred him to action. Whoever or whatever Nicolene vol Oros’s disconcerting companion might be made no difference now. Gaelen spun on his heel, hunched his body to protect the child in his arms from falling debris, and raced after his fellow lu’tan.

  The dahl’reisen guarding the gateway to the Well of Souls began herding all the rescued captives and refugees into the portal. “Into the Well!” they cried. “Everyone into the Well now!”

  “But the wounded,” one of the shei’dalins exclaimed.

  “Seal what you can’t heal! We’re out of time! Go! Go! Go!”

  Vadim Maur’s escape tunnel led up and away from Boura Fell. Melliandra and Nicolene ran as quickly as they could, the shei’dalin pausing every few seconds to bring down the ceiling behind them. Each time they came to a fork in the tunnel, Melliandra and Nicolene followed whichever path led up, towards the surface of Eld. Up was where the sky was. Up was where the Mages were least likely to be. And so, up they went.

  At last they arrived, out of breath, legs burning from the uphill run, at a winding stair that led to a closed door. Melliandra turned the knob and carefully pushed the door slightly ajar.

  She braced herself for a flood of bright white light coming from the burning ball called the Great Sun that traveled across the sky. Sunlight, Shia had called it. But there was no burning ball of light. And the roof of the world—the thing Shia called the sky—was not the bright, beautiful blue Shia had described. It was black and scattered with tiny silver flecks—like sel’dor ore sprinkled with tiny crystals of mirror stone.

  Melliandra’s hand began to shake, and her stomach did flips inside her belly.

  “Arast sha neida?” What’s wrong?

  The sound of the shei’dalin Nicolene’s voice made Melliandra jump. “Neitha,” she answered brusquely. Nothing. Maybe this was just another big room, like the garden room, and they were still inside Boura Fell. But when she forced herself to shove open the door and saw the immensity of the alien landscape stretched out before her, she knew the truth.

  This—this dark place—was the world. Tall, soaring spires of things Shia had called trees surrounded the doorway, but something was wrong with them. Half of the trees were gray, barren bones, like the skeletons of trees. At her feet, what should have been the soft, slender blades of the ground cover called grass were brown, brittle stalks that crackled when she poked them with a tentative toe.

  This world above was dead. And cold—as cold as when Mages spun their dark magic. Despair swamped her. Where was the warm, bright, green-and-blue world Shia had sung of? Had the Mages destroyed it?

  She turned to Nicolene. “I’m sorry,” she said. “This was a mistake. This is not what she told me it would be. The sun is gone. The world is dead. I think the Mages killed it.” To Melliandra’s horror, tears sprang to her eyes, and her voice cracked. She hugged Shia’s son to her chest. What were they going to do now?

  Nicolene smiled, but there was such compassion in her eyes, Melliandra couldn’t take offense. “Nei, kaishena,” the shei’dalin soothed. “Nei desrali. Nei Magia. De sha eilissei.” Not dead. Not Mages. It is eilissei.

  “I don’t know ‘eilissei.’ “

  “Sa Dol liath.” Nicolene tilted her head to one side with her hands beneath her cheek and pretended to sleep. “Cordai Sa Dol liath, de sha eilissei.”

  The Great Sun is sleeping, she’d said. When the Great Sun sleeps, it is eilissei. Melliandra hadn’t known that the Great Sun needed to sleep, but a little of her tension faded away. Although the world was so different than Shia had described, it was clear Nicolene was not alarmed—not by the dead trees nor the dark nor the coldness of this place.

  “Bas arrisi atha legan.” Green Earth spun in powerful waves that sent tingles across Melliandra’s skin, and the tattered threadbare rags of her clothes thickened to dense, warm fabric, so plush she could barely feel the cold. Something equally warm encased her bare feet and ankles. Shoes. The first she’d ever worn. When the green weave faded, all seven of them, Melliandra, Nicolene, the four babies, and the little girl, were bundled warmly against the cold.

  The shei’dalin gave a gentle push. “Va, kaishena. Nei siad.” Go, young one. Don’t be afraid.

  With Shia’s child and one other cradled against her chest and a little girl with eyes the color of a not-eilissei sky clinging tight to her hand, Melliandra Maureva, descendant and slave of the High Mage of Eld, drew a shaky breath and took her first, hesitant step into freedom.

  As Nicolene and Melliandra began their trek towards the Mandolay Mountains in the north and the refugees from Boura Fell made their way through the Well of Souls, the ground over Boura Fell began to shift and bulge. It rose upward, slowly swelling into a large dome of earth and rock and toppling forest.

  Then, abruptly, the dome burst, and a brilliant tower of white light shot into the sky.

  All across Eld, the tattered remnants of Vadim Maur’s great Army of Darkness turned in surprise as the sky over the dark forests of Eld flared ultrabright. Hundreds of miles away, on the battlements of Orest, and all along the mighty Heras River and the northern provinces of Celieria, the world fell into awed silence. All activity ceased. Fey, Celierian, and Elvish faces alike turned to the north.

  The tower of light burned for a full chime, turning darkest night to brilliant day, before it collapsed in upon itself with a soundless boom that shook the core Eld. In the wake of that brightness, a great, glowing light shot up and streaked westward across the Elden sky.

  From a distance, the streak of light looked like a giant shooting star racing across the night sky. But for years to come, those close enough to see what lay at the heart of the brightness would speak of a magnificent tairen made completely of light that flew across the skies of Eld. It dipped down and breathed the fire of the gods upon Koderas and Boura Maur, turning both into smoking craters, before continuing westward to disappear high in the Rhakis mountains. What became of that Light tairen, none could say, but soon after its disappearance into the Rhakis, the waters of the Heras once more ran rich with the magical power of faerilas.

  And in the place that had been Boura Fell, where the Light tairen first appeared, what remained was a great monument of shining crystal, shaped like a enormous, six-pointed crown—a beacon of Light in the dark heart of Eld. And within the haven of the crystal crown’s radiant golden white light, no Darkness would ever again endure.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  Blazing radiance to the Plains of Corunn

  Fly high, flame strong; roar far, reign long

  Feyreisa, Feyreisen; magic and might

  Two Souls, side by side, in tairen flight

  Majestic Flight,

  a poem by Belliard vel Jelani of the Fey

  19th day of Seledos

  The Fading Lands ~ Wingshadow,

  Shellabah of the Daris Line

  Purple silk caressed creamy marble columns, fluttering on a gentle breeze redolent with the aromas of burning fireoak and cinnabar. Outside, a light snow blanketed the northern fields of the Fading Lands, but within the magic-warmed luxury of Rain’s palatial shellabah, the only chill came from the cone of packed snow melting down Ellysetta’s naked stomach.

  She closed her eyes and stretched like a cat as the heat of Rain’s tongue followed the path of the ice, drowning in sensation as Rain’s lips and hands slid across her skin, stroking, caressing, worshipping with humbling reverence. There was nothing like this feelin
g, this wholeness. This completeness. His mind and hers, one. He touched her, and she felt the caress with both her senses and his. An overload of emotion, of sensation. A harmonic that built upon itself again and again with each shift of his silken skin, each flex of corded muscle, each warm breath and stir of flesh.

  Her hands tightened, fingers digging into the hard blades of his shoulders, holding him close.

  He lifted his head, burning lavender eyes gleaming through a tangle of silky black hair. His mouth curved, and he held her gaze as he licked and kissed his way down her body.

  She was him, all burning stone and heady desire, on fire with want, dizzy with the sweet aroma of her scent and the taste of her flesh on his tongue. She knew what he saw, what he felt, when he held her, when he kissed and caressed her.

  She arched her back, thrusting her breasts upwards, glorying in the hot rush that consumed him at the sight. Everything about her gave him pleasure. Her helpless abandon to his tender assault made the blood pound in his veins and the tairen in his soul roar with possession and triumph.

  «Aiyah, fellana, you do make me roar.» He was touching her, skin to skin, and their bond was at last complete. Her thoughts were as open and accessible to him as her emotions had been, as her body was now. There was no part of her he did not know as well as he knew himself. No Shadow, no Light, no thought, or hope that he could not share.

  Once, that would have alarmed her. To be so… naked. So utterly vulnerable, even to him. Now, it filled her with joy, a warm, radiant happiness like a sun shining forever in her soul.

  She smiled into his eyes, loving him with a completeness she’d never dreamed possible. There was no part of her that did not belong to him, no part of him that did not belong to her. They were now one soul, shared between two bodies. One soul existing in a state of grace so perfect, so complete, it was as close to feeling the hand of the gods as a living creature could experience.

  Her fingers traced the smooth, proud lines of his face and neck, caressed the breadth of his shoulders, marveling at the softness of the Fey skin that covered such indomitable strength. “You are my strength, shei’tan.”

  “And so I will be for all eternity, Ellysetta shei’tani.” He caught her hand and pressed a smiling kiss into her palm. The tip of his tongue touched her skin in a small, catlike lick. The glow kindling in his eyes turned the tiny, feline caress into an erotic promise. “Wilt thou join thy beloved, shei’tani?”

  Her lips curved, lashes lowering in a simmering look. “Always, shei’tan.”

  His mouth touched hers, and heat bloomed in instantaneous response. She arched against him, purring in her throat as his hands smoothed down the sides of her body and tracked trails of fire and longing in their wake.

  “Mrowr?”

  A rush of cold air swept into the protected warmth of the shellabah. Ellysetta’s eyes flashed open, as a familiar voice sang, «No, no, kitling. When the Feyreisa and Feyreisen are mating they like ‘privacy.’ You must knock before entering their lair.»

  She and Rain groaned together and turned towards the purple silk drapes—one of which now sported the face of an inquisitive tairen kitling poking through at the bottom. “Mrowr?” Hallah said again, twitching her black ears.

  «Knocking! Knocking!» three kitling voices chimed with delighted exuberance. Hallah squawked as the silk drape over her head ripped from its moorings and three kitlings tumbled into the shellabah on top of her. Fuzzy and adorable, their wings still sporting downy fur, Letah, Sharrah, and Miauren clambered to their feet, and promptly lost all interest in Steli’s lessons about knocking in favor of chasing the pretty, fluttery purple thing now tangled in their wings and tails.

  Watching them, Steli purred in maternal contentment then told Ellysetta and Rain, “Steli is teaching the kitlings to do knocking.”

  “So we see,” Rain said drily. “Thank you so much, Stelichakai”

  Steli snickered, twitched her nose, then gave a great, feline yawn and fluttered her wings. «Hunting tomorrow.»

  “Somewhere other than here, I hope.” Ellysetta sat up, spinning a gown to cover herself.

  «Hunting?» The kitlings stopped chasing the silk drape and perked up. «Pouncing!»

  Pouncing was apparently a lesson Steli had already taught, because all four kitlings immediately began hunkering down, growling in their throat, then leaping at one another, crying. «Pounce! Pounce! Pounce!»

  Ellysetta squealed and leaped out of the way as Sharra came tumbling past, crashing into the chaise and sending it skittering across the shellabah’s warmed marble floors.

  «Very good pouncing, kitlings,» Steli purred in approval. «But be careful of the pride-kin. In this form, they break.»

  «Sorry, sorry,» Sharra mumbled, then she growled and threw herself on her siblings again.

  As Ellysetta laughed and rolled her eyes, a second interruption ended any hope of shooing out the tairen and returning to the peace and privacy she and Rain had been enjoying since returning to the Fading Lands.

  A private Spirit weave arrived from Dharsa. «Rain? Ellysetta?»

  «Marissya?» Rain answered instantly, all humor wiped away by concern. Marissya would not have intruded except for good reason. «What is it? What’s wrong?»

  «Neitha,» she assured him. «Nothing is wrong. But we have found something in the Hall of Scrolls. I think you both should come.»

  The Fading Lands ~ Dharsa

  The Hall of Scrolls had been badly damaged in the attack on Dharsa, but its Keeper, Tealah vol Jianas, had insisted that all homes and the palace be restored before the Fey diverted any of their efforts to repairing the Hall. Consequently, it was only now, a full week after the battle, that the rubble was cleared. And in doing so, the Fey had uncovered a secret stair that had been hidden behind a thick, solid wall of stone.

  At the sight of the broken rock and the gaping, jagged edges of the dark hole that led down below the Hall, the hairs on the back of Ellysetta’s neck stood up. Her hand reached for Rain’s.

  “There is a mirror down there,” she said. “Like the Mirrors of Inquiry here in the Hall.” All but a few of those Mirrors now lay smashed and shattered in the rubble.

  Marissya looked at her in surprise. “Aiyah, there is a mirror. But how did you know? “

  “I have seen it before. In my dreams.” She released Rain’s hand and ducked into the jagged doorway, summoning a ball of Fire to light her way. The stair curved down into a small, windowless stone chamber beneath the Hall of Scrolls, and there, in the center of the room, just like her dreams, sat the dark, oval mirror perched on a stone column.

  As she approached it, the mirror began to glow a phosphorescent blue, and a face appeared in the center of the glowing light. Blond hair billowed gently around the stern, Fey-beautiful masculine face from her dreams. Green eyes shone like stars. The mouth opened, and a voice spoke, deep and resonant.

  “I am the Mirror of Knowledge. I wait for the one foretold to restore all that was lost.”

  “That’s all it’s been saying since we found it,” Marissya said. “We’ve asked it every question we could think of, it won’t tell us who the one foretold is, what it will restore, or how to restore it.”

  Ellysetta remembered her last dream of the mirror, the intricate weave of shei’dalin’s love and Azrahn that had spun from her hand. “I think I know.” She glanced at Rain. “I think I am the one foretold, and I think this is the key.” She showed the others the weave in Spirit. She no longer feared Azrahn—with her soul now joined to Rain’s, Darkness would never again threaten her—but she didn’t want to just impulsively start spinning.

  He nodded. He knew every dream she’d ever had as intimately as she did. “Go ahead, shei’tani. Though perhaps, to be safe, the other fellanas should leave the room?”

  “Are you joking?” Tealah sputtered. “This room has been hiding beneath the Hall of Scrolls for who knows how long. Whatever happens, I’m not going to miss it.”

  Marissya didn’t wa
nt to leave, but as she carried the only other Tairen Soul in the Fading Lands beside Ellysetta and Rain, she chose caution over curiosity.

  When she was gone, Rain and Ellysetta wove protective weaves around the stone chamber and then Ellysetta spun the weave from her dream. Azrahn and shei’dalin’s love poured from her fingertips, looping and twining in a perfect reproduction of the weave from her dream. The blue glow behind the mirror’s face began to swirl and brighten, and the mirror man’s eyes flashed with sudden green sparks that flew out of the glass.

  Rain shoved Ellysetta and Tealah behind him. Magic flared to life in his hands, but the green sparks had already stopped and begun to swirl in a cone of light that became the figure of a Fey king standing tall and proud before them in the golden war armor of the Fey. He had gold-shot chestnut hair and eyes like burning flame. When he spoke, his voice shimmered with gold and silver sparkles, like tairen speech. “I am Tevan, called Fire Eyes, born of the Fey king Sevander and his queen Fellana the Bright, Lady of Light, she who was once tairen and makai of the Fey’Bahren pride.”

  “Oh. My. Gods.” Tealah covered her mouth with her hands, her eyes huge as saucers. “He was real. The legend is true.”

  “I offer greeting to the one who was foretold, the daughter of my line—the line of Fellana the Bright—who carries within her the magic of Fey and Elfkind, tairen and Mage. May the memories I once erased from the world to save it, now be yours to use for the good of all, in keeping with the will of the gods. May the Light always shine on your Path, daughter of Fellana, and may you be as bright a beacon for our people as she who gave me life.”

  “Rain,” Ellysetta breathed, reaching for his hand.

  “I know,” he murmured, equally as dazed.

  The image of Tevan disappeared, and the face in the mirror began to speak. “I am the Mirror of Knowledge, created by command of the Fey King Tevan Fire Eyes, to hold all knowledge that was removed from the world so that it could one day be restored.”