by Nichelle Rae
I couldn’t help but grin widely. “No, I’m not hungry right now, thank you.” That was a lie. I was filthy and famished. I hadn’t eaten anything since breakfast yesterday. I picked up the hay and put it back in his stall. “I’m going to bathe, and then we will go. I’ll find a Salynn to saddle you up.”
When I turned around the kind Salynn I had spoken to was rounding the corner already with my saddle in his hands. “I figured your coming here meant you were not staying long,” he said with a smile.
I smiled back. “Thank you.”
“You can bathe behind the waterfall. There is a small rock cut out back there with plenty of room.”
I smiled again. “Thank you so much.” I picked up my bathing liquids and clothes and headed across the ankle-deep stream to the waterfall with only Triple Peaks and Candletars on my mind. I had to get there soon.
Chapter Nineteen
Ortheldo
“You haven’t seen her at all?” I asked the stable attendant in his language.
“No, Master Ortheldo.”
“Then where did her horse go?” I cried. The young Salynn flinched at my tone. I pressed the heels of my hands into my eyes. I was so tired. Obviously there was no sleep to be had last night and the sun was coming up. “I’m sorry,” I said more gently. “I’m not angry at you.”
“I just came on shift a little while ago, sir. Perhaps Sorna, the one I relieved, saw her. But he said he was going for a walk in the forest if anyone asked.”
I patted the Salynn’s shoulder. “Thank you. We’ll figure something out.”
“So she’s taken off again,” Rabryn said as I walked back up the hill to where he stood. I nodded. Rabryn sighed. “I knew she would.”
“We need to go,” I said. “We know she’s headed to Triple Peaks. We can catch her easily enough.” I glared at Reese. “Why don’t you go wake the others, since it was your little stunt that made Azrel take off like this.”
Reese’s eyes dropped closed. He had yet to look at me. “I was doing what I was told,” he said barely above a whisper.
“Yeah I got that. Just go get the others.”
Without a word Reese turned and left with his head still bowed.
“Ortheldo, take it easy on him,” Rabryn said. “This wasn’t entirely his fault.”
“Look! I don’t want to hear anything in Reese’s defense. He’s as much to blame as the White Warrior is for putting him up to that!”
Rabryn pushed himself away from the tree he’d been leaning against. “No, you look!” He fired. “I know you’re upset and worried about Azrel, I am too. But for a bloody second would you put yourself in Reese’s shoes? He was just following orders. As a warrior and a prince—” I shot him a dangerous look. Former prince,” he corrected, “I know you yourself understand the concept of obeying the orders of your commanding officer. That’s all Reese is guilty of.”
I looked away from him. I didn’t want to sympathize with someone who had just hurt Azrel so badly. I tried to walk away, but Rabryn caught my arm, stopping me. I looked at him over my shoulder to see him glaring at me stubbornly. I snatched my arm from his grip and walked a few paces to another tree and pressed my palm to it. It was all that was keeping me from falling to me knees. I replayed Reese’s explanation to us last night after Azrel had walked off. He was crying and wailing the entire time, saying over and over again, “I didn’t want to. I didn’t want to hurt her. I wish I didn’t have to. I was just doing what I was told.”
I sighed and my eyes dropped closed in defeat. “You’re right. I know you are.” Then my teeth clenched. “That’s a stupid lesson to want to teach Azrel. And who in the Light Gods’ Names gave the White Warrior the right to teach Azrel anything? If anything, the White Warrior could use a lesson or two from Azrel about love and gentleness and kindness and humanity.”
“I agree,” Rabryn replied venomously as he sunk down to sit on the ground against the tree trunk next to me. “I think I need to have another word with the White Warrior.”
“I think so, too. Only this time I won’t stand there idly silent.” I vowed that! If the White Warrior dared show me her face again, she was going to hear exactly what I thought of her, nice and loudly.
“I’m sorry the plans Acalith and I had for you and Azrel didn’t happen,” Rabryn said unexpectedly.
I looked down at him and saw the return of some small innocence in his eyes as he looked at me with sincere apology, as if it was his fault they got ruined. In this very moment I was incredibly happy to see that innocence in him, to see in his face what the world looked like through vulnerability. His eyes had gotten harder since leaving The Pitt, which wasn’t a bad thing because the awareness and hardness would help keep him alive out here, but it made me sad to see the innocence go. He was learning the hard way that the world was not a big basket of dreams, and that hope was often depressing; hence the miracle of Azrel’s father being able to use such a fragile thing as hope to bring the world back from the depths of Shadow. The world was evil and cruel and would eat innocence like Rabryn’s for breakfast if Azrel and I weren’t with him on this journey.
I smiled at him and sat on the ground with my back to the tree trunk. “It’s okay. It wasn’t your fault.” The White Warrior had ruined that too.
Rabryn and Acalith had planned a surprise dinner for Azrel and me at the western falls for just the two of us. Acalith even had Isadith magically remove Azrel’s clothes to insure Azrel would only have a robe on during this dinner. But Acalith had come to us in a panic, telling us the link that told Acalith where Azrel was at all times was blocked, and that only the White Warrior herself was powerful enough to block that. She’d ordered us to search the eastern side of the island and then took off to order another search before Rabryn could tell her he still felt where Azrel was. So Rabryn and I had casually headed to the eastern bathing pools because that’s where he’d felt her presence. Rabryn had been hoping to salvage the date he and Acalith had planned for us, but then we saw what we saw and everything went to hell after that.
“What makes this whole thing worse,” I said out of the blue, “is that the horrid lesson the White Warrior wanted to teach Azrel was learned.”
Rabryn sighed in frustration and I saw him clench and unclenched his fists. “I know. Hopefully this is damage that can be repaired though.”
“I hope so too.”
The lesson was that Azrel couldn’t trust her heart. Her heart wanted Reese to be me in that pool, so she didn’t question why I didn’t quite look right. Because her heart wanted it to be me, she believed it was me, and she’d been hurt by what her heart wanted her to believe. “She said Azrel needs to start thinking with her brain and not her emotions,” Reese had explained.
I sighed. “The White Warrior is a miserable, heartless…thing!” I cried. “She’s a force of magic, not a shred of humanity about her. She doesn’t know what emotions are so of course she doesn’t see the value in them!”
“I know,” Rabryn agreed, “but Azrel is human and emotions are a part of humanity. I don’t think this lesson could ever fully be learned. Azrel will be okay.”
I rested my head back against the tree trunk. “I have to admit I’m hoping the other lesson the White Warrior wanted to teach her was learned.”
“I do too!” Rabryn agreed eagerly. “If she can see the bigger picture outside her own emotions, she will be more at peace.”
I nodded. “We’ll have to talk to her when we catch up with her. I think she did learn it, though, because she didn’t beat the snot out of Reese like she normally would have.” Rabryn nodded in agreement. I paused and I let my brows drop. “I think I’ve actually decided I don’t like the White Warrior.”
Rabryn and I both turned our heads to look at each other for a moment. He rested his head back against the tree and looked up at the sky. “I’m glad I’m not the only one.”
“Do you think that’s evil?”
Rabryn shrugged helplessly. “I don’t know. I still love
Goodness and the Light Gods and I bet I would have loved Azrel’s father, but this situation is so unique and screwed up I don’t know what it means.”
“I wish their two personalities would just join already, so things would make sense.”
“I agree. When they do become one person, I hope Azrel doesn’t change.”
“Me too. I wish the White Warrior personality would just disappear and Azrel could have access and control of her magic.”
“Exactly! Same here,” Rabryn said, then sighed. “Maybe we’ll get lucky.”
We stayed quiet for a moment and then Rabryn suddenly got to his feet. I jumped to my feet with him. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing. Someone’s coming.”
We waited a few moments and a saw a familiar small figure approaching us. The sight of him made me grin immediately and I walked up to meet him. “Hey, Cairikson.” He smiled and held his arms up to me. I picked him up and tucked him into my hip. “What are you doing over here?”
“I wanted to come say goodbye to you before you left.”
I smiled, “Well, I’m glad you did.”
“Azrel already left, didn’t she?” I nodded and he sighed. “I’m going to miss her.”
“She will miss you too, no doubt.”
“I’m going to miss all of you.”
I smiled. “Well you can say goodbye to everyone else when they get here.”
His brows dropped in confusion, “But everyone else left already.”
Now my brows dropped. “What do you mean?”
“I saw them. Addredoc made the horses appear near Acalith’s room and they left a few minutes ago.”
I spun around and met Rabryn’s eyes. Rabryn’s face turned red and then a look of utter rage contorted his beautiful features into something I’d never seen before. He spun around and ran down the hill to go saddle our horses, his cloak flying out behind him from the speed he was running at.
“I was wondering why you weren’t with them. I figured you were getting your horses and came here so I could say goodbye.”
I could practically read Rabryn’s thoughts: How dare they go after Azrel without us! Not only were we the closest to her out of anyone in the company and had known her the longest, but Rabryn was her only invincible protector! What were they thinking leaving without him?
I quickly put Cairikson down and kissed his cheek. “We have to go, buddy. I love you.”
Cairikson looked up at me with his big blue-green eyes filled with unshed tears. “I love you too. Please don’t die in this war, Ortheldo.”
I grinned. “I will try, but”—I sighed—“you know I can’t promise that.”
He nodded. “I understand.”
I petted his hair. “You be safe.”
He nodded again and then I ran down the hill after Rabryn.
Rabryn shocked me by already having both horses out of the stables and saddled. He was already mounted on his. “Let’s go!” He barked in a voice I barely recognized.
I threw myself over the saddle and we bolted to the right towards one of the main Galad Kas roads. “The bridge should be on the west side of the island at this hour,” I cried over the thunder of hooves.
Rabryn looked at me with detached interest. “It should be.” I looked at him, confused. “I already moved it,” he said as he looked out ahead of him again. “It’s waiting for us as soon as we get to the east side of Galad Kas.”
“You…” I narrowed my eyes in confusion. “You moved the Galad Kasians’ bridge? A bridge sustained and controlled by their magic for the past three thousand years? You…moved it?”
Rabryn looked over at me again. “My magic works by instinct, emotion and need. I’m pretty emotional right now, my instincts say Azrel is in trouble without us, and we need to get to her—so that makes me very powerful at the moment. In fact, I’m pretty sure I could defeat Addredoc in a wizard duel right now!”
I smiled at him. “Let’s go! Ha!” We both kicked out horses up to full speed, ducking our heads low against the wind, and headed for Azrel.
She would be heading for Triple Peaks, which lay to the east of Galad Kas. We’d get to her before the others did–unless they realized too quickly that the bridge they’d need to cross the lake wasn’t where it was supposed to be, and Addredoc transported them across the lake to the east. I had a feeling that was what was going to happen. We’d see them soon. I was still debating if I was going to run any of them through or not.
Chapter Twenty
Azrel
I took a bite of my apple as I sat against a tree and gazed out over the clearing towards Triple Peaks. The three giant mountains stood tall and proud against the light grey sky. I felt myself getting slightly nostalgic as I looked at them. While I’d never actually been there before, technically the memory of when my father claimed it back from the Shadow was mine. Or it should have been mine. It was in the memory of my magical alter ego, though, which was probably the cause for the nostalgia.
Triple Peaks had been the last stronghold of Goodness to be overrun by the Shadow in ancient times. I was looking at the very first place that my father had penetrated and freed as the White Warrior. I sighed as I thought about what could have been going through my father’s mind when he did that. Had he been scared? I doubted it.
I couldn’t wait to see Triple Peaks, but at the same time I felt ashamed to go there because I was not my father. The memory those people had of him had survived ten thousand years. I would not leave an impression like he did, that was for sure. I couldn’t even fully control my magic, and even when I did use it, I became exhausted from doing so. Furthermore, my magic, the White Warrior, couldn’t even reach her full potential right now because she was limited without us having earned the diamond crown back from The Light Gods.
I sighed and looked away from Triple Peaks. I couldn’t worry about leaving a fantastic impression on them. I just knew I had to go. Candletars would have the best idea about who the owner of this necklace was, and then I could finally cast off that burden and figure out what to do about this Second Shadow coming into the world. I still had questions that needed answering before I could know what my next, and first, move was going to be in this coming war. Hopefully Candletars would be able to help me with these answers too.
I had to stay hidden for now, though. Triple Peaks was not overly brutal when it came to the White Warrior’s history like some realms, but they were not fully loyal either. They were the most neutral territory in Casdanarus as far as my father’s history goes. If I was going to sway them to not hate me, I had to be careful.
I took another bite of my apple and turned my mind to other things, like my clothes. I chuckled gently at what had been provided for me and wondered how Isadith would react if she actually saw me wearing these. The top was a beautiful dark blue color with crisscrossing thick pieces of material that went from the neck down my chest, revealing a little more cleavage than I was used to showing. The sleeves were cinched at my wrists, leaving small ruffles that grazed my hands. The pants were just plain tan with floral embroidery going up the entire outside of the seams. It was something I wasn’t used to wearing, and it had gotten a little filthy after two days travel, but I couldn’t bring myself to take it off yet. I felt closer to Isadith wearing this.
I sighed and rested my head against the tree. I started debating again whether I should wait there for my companions. I knew they weren’t far behind me. I sighed again and decided to just leave. If Triple Peaks weren’t in my sights right then, I’d probably have waited, but it was only a one day ride across the clearing.
I got to my feet, brushing the leaves and dirt off my pants, and went to Forfirith. “Ready to go?” He nudged my cheek with his mouth and I smiled. “Alright then.” I mounted him. “Let’s go.”
We had been riding for a couple of hours when I heard the horse hooves. Well, they had caught up with me, finally. I smiled and turned to greet my friends riding up behind me, but no one was there. My brows dropped. I looked
around the clearing, seeing no one, and I could see at least thirty miles in every direction. My brows dropped deeper as I listened to the horse hooves still coming towards me. I pulled back on Forfirith’s reins, stopping him, and continued to swivel my head, looking for the source of the sound.
In slight desperation I looked at Forfirith, who was looking to the left. “Please tell me you hear that too.” He nodded. I followed his gaze to the left, but even as I did his head jerked forward to look out in front of him. I followed his gaze again. Nothing. He then looked to the left and I did too. Suddenly and cautiously, Forfirith started to back up. Something was wrong.
The minute I thought that, the shadow in my mind exploded and in the same instant a small army of Legan’dirs burst out of some invisible wall in front on me. Too shocked to think, I couldn’t even direct Forfirith, but he knew to turn and run back towards the woods. I looked over my shoulder at them in wide-eyed shock.
This wasn’t happening. This wasn’t happening! This wasn’t happening again!
I suddenly gritted my teeth and took hold of my sword, pulling it out of the sheath. I would not allow myself to have to be rescued by my friends again! I would not! I could take care of my own damn self! Time to prove it. This was going to hurt.
I let Forfirith run a few more paces, then I violently turned him to the side and in the same instant summoned my magic to my sword. I arched it out horizontally towards the fifty monsters, and with a scream of exertion, sent shafts of white fire straight into their black faces. I used so much magic that each shaft of fire that hit a Legan’dir went straight through its head to hit the Legan’dir behind it. I felt my ears pop and start to bleed from their unified scream of agony, but I didn’t even have the strength to bring my hands up to cover them.
My entire body went limp and I fell off Forfirith, lacking the energy to even put my hands out and brace myself against the fall. My shoulder and head just cracked onto the ground, and I could only lie there limp and panting, on the verge of passing out. Apparently, however, I hadn’t used enough magic to actually pass out.