“Idalia was my daughter. But I do not come today to praise her as a daughter. I never valued her as a daughter, and never knew her. For her entire life—every hour and day of it—I was her unswerving enemy, and when I discovered that she still lived, I sought her death with all the power at my command. But she … transcended all that she had been as a child of the City. All that she might have been as my daughter. She died, not as an Armethaliehan, but as a hero to all the land. And it is for that which I praise her to you here today.”
He bowed his head, and the young Mage came to help him away.
No more speakers came forward. The ceremony was finally over.
It had been a moving and honest speech, and Kellen was mildly surprised that Lycaelon had made it—though he was actually more surprised that Lycaelon had made the journey all the way here to the Elven Lands at all.
Did it make a difference to his feelings about his father?
Kellen wondered.
No. It had been something of a shock to see his father here today, but, seeing him again, Kellen realized that all feelings for the man who had given him life—whether they were feelings of hatred or love—were simply gone. Lycaelon had never given him a chance to love him, and all hatred had been burned away by the intense self-knowledge required of a Knight-Mage.
If Lycaelon had not been who he was, Kellen would not have become who he was.
And if Kellen had not been who he was, the Demons would have won.
All went as the Wild Magic willed—and as Idalia had told him once, the Wild Magic wasn’t a tame magic, and its workings weren’t always comfortable. In a way, it had needed Kellen and Idalia, so it had created them, by sending their mother Alance to Armethalieh in the first place.
He could live with that.
They truly had sent Idalia to rest, Kellen realized suddenly. For the first time since he had seen her body at the Standing Stones, he felt at peace. The ache of her loss was still there—and would be with him for a long time to come, he knew—but it no longer felt like a wound that would never heal.
Suddenly he felt a sense of Presence.
“When the time comes, you must… let go.”
In the Caverns at Halacira, a Price had been asked and granted. He had thought it would be a heavy one, as so many of the Prices of the Wild Magic were.
Now, here, today, he realized that paying it would free him, not burden him.
And that he had been paying it ever since the end of the Battle of Armethalieh.
Let go.
It was time to let go of all that the Wild Magic had made of him.
Not to let go of being a Knight-Mage … that was something he would be until the day he died. But to let go of being a Commander of Armies. A General. Someone who had learned to see other people as tools and weapons.
He must let go of war, and battles, and death.
Let go of the deaths of his friends and loved ones, and keep their lives instead.
Let go.
Yes, Kellen thought, with a sigh. I can do that.
The sense of Presence lifted.
He looked around, feeling, as he always did afterward, as if he’d just awakened from sleep. The world seemed somehow fresh-washed and new, as if it were a place he’d just now come back to.
He sought out Andoreniel.
“I See you, Andoreniel,” he said politely, when Andoreniel noticed him.
All around them, the people were returning to their homes, in the quiet graceful way that Elven ceremonies ended.
“I See you, Kellen,” Andoreniel said. “It pleases me to speak with you once more.”
“And I with you,” Kellen said. “It occurs to me that I have been … too long away from civilized things.”
“That is often the case, when one must do battle to keep those things safe,” Andoreniel said. “It would please me greatly were you to consent to dine with me tonight. It will be a quiet meal, and there are matters I would speak of with you afterward.”
A quiet dinner sounded just about right to Kellen. “It will be my pleasure,” he said, bowing.
HE moved out around the edges of the crowd that was still assembled there, thinking of nothing so much as going home and brewing up a nice pot of tea. He didn’t trust himself to make a drinkable pot of Elven Tea—well, not one he’d offer to one of the Elves, anyway—but Vertai had somehow seen to it that the larder was stocked with a fine assortment of Armethaliehan teas as well, and a large pot of Armethaliehan Black would be just the thing. Along with a good slice of the breakfast pie he hadn’t had any appetite for this morning.
“Kellen! Hey!”
There was just about only one person in the entire Elven Lands who would hail him in that fashion. He stopped and turned.
Cilarnen was running after him, clutching his Staff of Office in one hand and attempting to hold onto his high-crowned Arch-Mage hat with the other. His long gray robes and ornately-embroidered tabard flapped wildly about his ankles as he ran.
Kellen grinned despite himself. That was a sight he’d never expected to see—a High Mage of Armethalieh—and not just any High Mage, but the Arch-Mage—running like a common servant.
Things had indeed changed.
“Kellen,” Cilarnen said, catching up to him. “Were you just going to leave without saying goodbye?”
“You looked busy,” Kellen said. Actually, Cilarnen had looked surrounded by High Mages, and that was somewhere Kellen didn’t really want to be. “I thought I might see you later.” Certainly Vertai would know where to find Cilarnen. The Elven penchant for gossip was one thing that the war hadn’t changed.
“See me now,” Cilarnen suggested. “We’ll be leaving in the morning. I can’t stay away from Armethalieh very long. Light alone knows what the Council will have done while I’m gone, even with Kardus there to tell them not to. I left him my seal.”
“In that case,” Kellen said, “they’re probably still paralyzed with shock. Come and drink tea with me.”
The two friends walked in silence for a while.
“I’ve never seen you dressed like this,” Cilarnen said doubtfully, regarding Kellen’s formal Elven finery.
“And I’ve never seen you dressed like that,” Kellen said.
“You just look—”
“Appropriate,” they finished together.
“It isn’t exactly the way I thought it would be,” Cilarnen said. “Being, well, Arch-Mage.”
“Worse?” Kellen asked.
“And better,” Cilarnen said. “Now that the people know that they’re a part of the High Magick—really a part, because we couldn’t cast our spells without what they give us—things are different in the City. They can choose to wear the Talisman and stay … or leave. Nearly everyone has decided to stay. Those who haven’t, well, they can go anywhere they want. Or that will have them. There’s an amnesty—they have until the end of the sailing season to make their arrangements to leave; I’m not just going to throw anyone out, no matter what the Council is urging. Next year … well, I’m going to start trying to get the Council to ease the restrictions on new goods. We’ll have to, because of the trade we need to do. But Father was right. I can’t do everything at once. I only wish I could.”
“You’ve made more changes in the last few moonturns than the City has seen in the last thousand years,” Kellen reminded him. “The rest will come in time.”
“It would come faster if you were there to help. Won’t you come back to Armethalieh, Kellen? We could use you there. And … you heard what Lord Lycaelon said today. Can’t you forgive him? He’s suffered greatly, you know.”
Kellen stopped walking, honestly stunned that Cilarnen couldn’t see what he himself saw so clearly.
“Truly, Cilarnen, there is nothing to forgive. You know Lycaelon’s wife—my mother, and Idalia’s—was Mountainborn. I think, you know, that she may have been a Wildmage as well. And the Wild Magic moves as it wills. I think that everything that happened between us was all part of that, to
make me what I needed to be.”
Cilarnen stared at him, obviously accepting Kellen’s truth but not understanding it. He shook his head ruefully. “I will never understand Wildmages. The Wild Magic is just too … messy.”
“But effective.”
“Oh yes. I do grant you that. But… will you come back?”
“No. I told you that already. Wherever I belong—and I don’t know where that is yet—it isn’t Armethalieh.”
They reached Kellen’s house, and went inside, and spoke of other things.
THAT night Kellen ate dinner at the House of Leaf and Star. As Andoreniel had promised, the evening was quiet and intimate. Besides Kellen and Andoreniel, the only others present were Morusil and Redhelwar.
The plague-scars on Morusil’s and Andoreniel’s faces had faded nearly to invisibility, though both Elves would carry the mark of the Shadow’s Kiss to the end of their lives, as would so many others throughout the land. But from the moment the power of Shadow Mountain had been broken, there had been no more deaths, and all who had been afflicted had recovered rapidly and well.
Talk during the meal was idle, and mostly of inconsequential matters—crops to be planted, festivals to be held, new artworks planned by this Elven master or that. Redhelwar spoke of his desire to return to Windalorianan, to help with the rebuilding of the city, and to return to the care and breeding of his beloved horses. Morusil spoke of his garden, and how very well it was doing already. He confirmed what Kellen had suspected—that the Flower Forest was, indeed, expanding.
After the meal, they retired to Andoreniel’s private study, a place Kellen had never been. Like Ashaniel’s solar, the walls were made of many tiny panes of glass, and through them, Kellen could see the garden that surrounded the House of Leaf and Star filled, at this hour, with its hundreds of multicolored lanterns.
The study was filled with lanterns as well, tiny copies of the ones outside. It gave the effect of bringing the garden inside in an unbroken sweep of flickering rainbow light. The effect was deliberate, Kellen knew. The Elves rarely did anything by accident.
“There is only one last thing to be done to set all to rights,” Andoreniel said, once all of them were seated. “And it would ease my heart greatly to know that I might set this task into the hands of a friend.”
There was a moment of silence before Kellen realized that they were waiting for him to speak.
“It would please me greatly to know what this task might be,” he said.
“A convoy goes to the Fortress of the Crowned Horns to bear the glad tidings of their liberation to the Crowned Horns’ defenders, to tell Master Tyrvin his long task is at an end, and to begin to bear the inhabitants away to their homes. It has been much delayed by weather—something of which you and Redhelwar know as much as any, Kellen, for you have fought many battles through those mountains. And I know that you are weary and long for rest. Yet I would be grateful could you bring yourself to go into the north once more and bring my Queen and my son home to me.”
“Yes, I… of course. I would be honored to lead such a convoy,” Kellen said, after a short pause.
When Andoreniel had begun speaking, he’d thought it would be something difficult.
“I hope that Vestakia will accompany you on your journey. I know that the Enemy has been defeated, but…”
“It is still good to be sure,” Kellen finished. “I cannot speak for Vestakia, but I’ll ask her.” I’m sure that she’s really looking forward to spending another moonturn camping in the snow.
But to his surprise, she agreed.
THE preparations for the convoy had all been made while Kellen had still been leading his troops toward Sentarshadeen. Kellen suspected that Andoreniel had hoped all along that Kellen would be the one to lead it north.
He really didn’t mind. It was a simple easy task, after all that had gone before it. The land was at peace, and in the full bloom of Springtide. Though he rode armed and armored—but in a much lighter cloak and surcoat than he had worn for the winter fighting—he really didn’t expect trouble.
Though, as always, he rode prepared for it.
THE journey took them a fortnight. At the end of the first sennight, they reached the village of Girizethiel and reprovisioned. Girizethiel marked the point at which the convoy left the rolling open country and began to ascend into the mountains themselves. Another sennight would see them at the Fortress.
Though the Unicorn Knights themselves were gone, the party was not without unicorn companions, for a small band of unicorns had apparently decided to accompany Kellen’s party.
Including, of course, Shalkan.
“Why not?” Shalkan had said, when Kellen asked him about it on the first night of their journey. “Spring is a good time for traveling.”
Knowing he would get no better answer, Kellen had left it at that.
And spring was a good time for traveling, especially this spring. The mountain air was crisp and clean, the forest they rode through once they left Girizethiel was filled with radiant new life. There were times when Kellen could almost convince himself that the past several moonturns had been some horrible dream.
He was not the only Knight with the convoy, of course. Four Twelves rode with him, Elves with family members at the Crowned Horns, who would be escorting them back to their homes. It would take time to empty the Fortress completely, but Sentarshadeen was not the only Elven city that would be sending wagons, only the first.
On the fourteenth day of their journey, they left the forest and rode out onto the plain below the Fortress. It was no longer the ice-covered plain that it had been the last time Kellen had seen it, but a meadow; with spring, the snows had retreated to the mountain slopes. All sign of the terrible battle that had once taken place here was gone, ice and snow had been replaced by a field of flowers, pink and white and blue, stretching as far as the eye could see.
Kellen and Vestakia were riding at the head of the convoy. It was peaceful to ride beside Vestakia. She was the last of his comrades who remained, the one who had been with him almost from the beginning. And while Kellen knew that she missed Idalia as much as he did, he also took delight in her constant wonder in everything new—and everything about the lushness of spring in the Elven Lands was new to Vestakia, since she had grown up in the harsh and nearly-barren Lost-lands.
Suddenly she stiffened and leaned forward in her saddle.
Kellen put a hand on his sword.
“No! Kellen—look! It’s Ancaladar!”
Kellen stared where she was pointing.
At the foot of the causeway that led up to the entrance to the Fortress of the Crowned Horns, there was a familiar black shape.
Ancaladar.
Kellen turned to Ornentuile, one of the Elven Knights who rode just behind them. “We’re riding on ahead. You have command.”
He spurred Firareth forward, racing across the meadow.
Vestakia followed.
“IT is good to see you again, Kellen, Vestakia,” Ancaladar said politely.
The dragon lay basking in the sunlight, his great wings spread.
“What are you doing here?” Kellen demanded. “Didn’t you know we were all worried about you?”
“We’ve been busy,” Ancaladar said calmly, not at all distressed by Kellen’s exasperation and anger. “You should go and see Jermayan. You’ll understand.”
Kellen glanced up the causeway. Master Tyrvin stood at the bronze gates that guarded the entrance to the Fortress—open now—waiting for them.
Kellen gestured to Vestakia.
“Oh, I’ll go,” she said, sounding exasperated, “but be sure that when I come back, Ancaladar, I’m going to give you the scolding of your life!”
“Oh, I don’t think so,” the dragon said, sounding amused.
“WELL met,” Master Tyrvin said, when Kellen and Vestakia reached the top of the causeway.
“We’ve come to bring you news,” Kellen said. “But I think you may already have gotten it.”
He nodded back to where Ancaladar lay.
“That Their power has been swept from the land is word that has perhaps come to us indeed.” Tyrvin smiled. “But come. There is news you will wish to have as well, perhaps equally joyous, and I shall bring you to Ashaniel so that she may deliver it to you.”
He led Kellen and Vestakia inside, and through a maze of corridors down a path Kellen had not taken on his previous visit to the Fortress. Though he heard the sound of scurrying feet many times—indicating that the corridor was being hastily vacated—Kellen saw none of what must, by now, be the many inhabitants of the Fortress.
Tyrvin paused before a door and knocked.
Sandalon opened it.
The boy seemed to have grown at least a head taller in the moonturns that had passed since Kellen had seen him last. He flung himself into Kellen’s arms with a glad cry of joy.
“Kellen! You’ve come back for us! And Vestakia is here, too! Mother! Kellen and Vestakia are here! Oh!” Suddenly the boy remembered his manners. He stepped back and bowed. “Please be welcome—in our home and at our hearth, Kellen Wildmage, Lady Vestakia.”
Kellen reached down and ruffled the boy’s hair. “And I See you too, Sandalon,” he teased, stepping inside.
The first thing his eyes went to in the room was Jermayan.
The Elven Knight was sitting beneath a window—it wasn’t a real window, for there were no windows anywhere in the Fortress of the Crowned Horns—but Ashaniel’s chamber had been painted in the likeness of a tower room, with mock paintings of windows upon all four walls.
He was sitting beside a cradle, a look of utter peace upon his face.
Ashaniel sat at the other side of the cradle, gazing down into it with a fond smile upon her face.
“I have a new sister,” Sandalon announced importantly. “She is very special.”
Kellen and Vestakia walked over to the cradle and looked down.
The baby was very tiny indeed. She lay beneath her blankets, regarding the world with calm curiosity.
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