Ailith nodded. “The commander there is a fool, much like the commander of the garrison by the Rift. Catra is a competent captain but hampered by him. Too many of these assignments have gone to second and third sons and daughters of the Kings, or as sinecures to children of Daran’s secretaries and such. It’s especially true in the north. That’s where the most incompetent were sent, to keep them far away from where they could do any real harm.”
“Will they fight?”
Jalila said, “Any will fight if they must to survive but those folk can barely hold a sword, much less a bow.”
“Of the Kingdoms that are free, most arm themselves and are securing their walls,” Ailith added. “Mornith will have to choose between conquering them or passing them by, with the hope they won’t fall upon his rear. Or Donkellen or the other could launch a conquest behind the lines while the army is occupied.”
She had a good head for this, mirroring his thoughts on it.
“Nor do we know if others have been suborned,” Elon said.
Jareth put in, “No way to safely test it, either. We were almost in the doors at Donkellen before we realized how much was amiss. I doubt Daran knows he has a new King there, a third son who should never wear a crown and doesn’t truly now.”
“We would have missed Riverford completely were it not for Ailith,” Colath pointed out.
With a slight frown, Ailith said, “I wonder if they learned from that mistake.”
“One should never underestimate Mornith, Ailith,” Talesin said.
Very dryly, Ailith said, “I’m learning these days not to underestimate anyone.”
“Wise,” Talesin said, “very wise. As it happens, I’m learning that lesson myself.”
His colorless eyes settled on her and warmth spread through her at the implied compliment.
“So,” Jareth said, curiosity driving him wild, “who exactly is Mornith?”
For a moment Talesin was silent, his eyes on the distant horizon.
In the last light of the setting sun, everything was bathed in a warm golden light but not one of them there didn’t know that wasn’t what he saw.
“We’re never exactly free of our past,” he said, quietly.
No one spoke at the sight of the shadows that moved in his pale eyes, the ghosts of old memories.
With a sigh, Talesin said, “Mornith is the only Elf ever exiled.”
Elon went still, glancing at Colath and Jalila.
Exile? An Elf?
Talesin saw the look and nodded. He took a long, slow breath, released it. “After it was done, no one spoke of it.”
Looking out across the distance, he shook his head. “It was in those dark days after the wizard wars. He was banished for the crime of killing another Elf.”
Elon was stunned. It shouldn’t have been possible for one Elf to kill another, if only for the agony they would feel. It was bad enough in battle, but cold murder such as men did?
It was clearly a painful memory for Talesin.
“After the wizard wars we thought we had done with all that. Mornith was a Halfling we took in toward the end of the wars. Unbeknownst to us, he’d taken up with one of the wizards who practiced dark magic. He killed that one once he learned everything that one had to teach him, and the trick of stealing magic. We truly thought he’d only killed a dark wizard, not that he had taken that magic on himself. Then he killed another Elf. His First among Equals. It was only luck that we caught him. We managed to overpower him and banished him from the Enclaves. He would be a little older than Elon here now. From the sounds of it he’s continued his habit of stealing magic from others. Few knew about it, the knowledge of it remained with the Firsts of that day and myself. It seems he’s decided to return.”
He shook his head.
Given all they’d been through lately, Elon thought, they should all put such grim things behind them for a time. He needed it for himself, as well.
“We should sleep, most of us have had difficult times lately,” he said. “Mornith, for now, is a problem for another day. And there’s little that can be done about him at the moment.”
The good night’s rest did everyone wonders.
After so much it was no surprise then when Colath and Elon brought out their swords, and Ailith’s with them.
The smile that lit her face when Elon handed them to her was nearly reward enough but he knew there would be more. He needed this, as did Colath and as did she.
They started with the forms, moving through them slowly and gracefully. With nothing demanding their attention there was no need to rush. Each fell in sync with the others. Their graceful movements soothed and relaxed. They had no need to think, simply to do and feel. Their expressions became tranquil as tension drained away, as they merged and the bond flowed easily from one to the other. Finding their balance again, strength to strength, one to the other.
As inevitable as the wind across the fields Elon stepped out, Colath and Ailith flanked him and their swords met. Each movement flowed, longsword to shortsword, shortsword to longsword. The swords rang again like bells, at first slow, and then faster and faster still, until they rang like a gentle carillon. It slowed, sped up, changed rhythm, each shift met by the other two. Slow breath by slow breath, lungs filling, exhaling. It was exhilarating and enthralling, a healing not merely of the body, but of the soul. Repairing the damage to spirits worn by pain, by need, by demand and command. They flowed one into the other.
And at last, as one, they stopped.
For three days they had peace, gathering on the green to sit and to talk, or sit and not talk as they repaired their weapons harness, honed their swords, repaired clothing. Each day the three paced through the forms, flexing muscles abused by demand, changing it now and then, finding their way back once again to each other. In its own way, it was another kind of healing. And not just for them, but those that watched.
On the fourth day, they’d just finished the forms when Ailith suddenly went. Like a compass her head swung north. There was a faraway look in her eyes.
Everyone went still.
Ailith struggled to make meaning of it, of what she saw inside her head, of the lights and the sudden darkness that swept across them.
She rubbed her arms briskly as a chill swept over her in time with the knowledge. Her breath caught.
“It’s begun. Eagles Peak falls.”
It was one of the Kingdoms high to the north that she’d thought was prepared. She swallowed, hard, against the sorrow.
Elon’s heart sank and yet it had been inevitable. Their idyll here was done.
Jareth asked, “How many?”
Letting a breath out, Ailith sighed. Sharp pain pierced her and yet it was heartache only.
It was like watching an eclipse as the shadow swallowed up the light.
She took another shuddering breath. Looked at him. She couldn’t speak. Tried again.
“It falls,” she said, evenly, with slight emphasis on the last word. Her eyes were solemn.
There were no survivors, at least not enough to light the darkness. What survivors there were would be fodder for dark wizards.
It hit them all then, what it was she meant. Folk were dying up there, behind the snow.
Jareth swore softly and pounded on one of pillars.
Colath looked away over the quiet green hills with their scattering of sheep and goats. It wouldn’t be quiet like this for long.
Without a word Jalila gathered up her fletching gear.
As Ailith remembered Eagles Peak it had seemed a pretty little town at the foot of the mountain, with the castle rising high above. All those lives. The lights going out in a flood, a tide. If there were survivors, they were lost in the darkness. Alone.
Elon took her by the shoulders, looked down at into her blue eyes.
“Stop looking, Ailith,” he said, evenly. “You must stop looking. Look away.”
“Elon,” she said, on a shaken breath.
She looked up into his dark eyes, at the compassion
there in them, sighed and let it go. She nodded.
A few more days of the forms, of that serene union, was all Elon had wanted. He’d hoped for more time, a few more days of peace. It wasn’t to be. There was no more time and no more peace.
“The army?” he asked.
Ailith turned her head southward and her eyes unfocussed as searching for lights in pattern, a flow like a stream.
“Moving,” she said.
Her blue-gray eyes lifted to meet Elon’s. “They move too slow, Elon. They’ll never reach the north in time.”
It was as he feared.
No one questioned it, like Jalila, they gathered their things.
Talesin turned his horse to face the west.
Elon looked at Jalila. “You can go with him. This isn’t part of our mission. Daran hasn’t called our people up yet.”
Calmly, Jalila looked back at him. She took a breath and thought of her son, riding with the Hunters.
“He will. In the end it doesn’t matter. I’ve been with this and you since the beginning. I’ll see it to the end. My blood-line is secure.”
Chapter Sixteen
From the height of a hill on the most likely path the army would take it was impossible to miss. Two days of steady riding later and it was clear as they watched that the army was indeed moving too slowly. Elon saw standards waver, not the ones of his dreams, the ones that turned, but the ones that didn’t move quickly enough.
How much was incompetence and how much deliberate delay? he wondered.
There was no way to know.
As they rode through the camped army, Elon studied who was picketed where while a guard ran ahead to announce them.
Far to one side Ailith saw her father’s standard, the castle regnant with the silvery river curled around it. So, he’d come. Not that he could have cried off if the High King summoned him. Still. It would make things interesting.
She caught Elon’s eye and pointed to the standard.
An eyebrow went up.
“I wonder how he does without Tolan?” Elon murmured. “Who controls him now?”
Colath looked to see where they looked and saw Riverford’s banner.
He looked at Ailith to hear her answer to Elon’s question.
She shook her head. “I don’t know. He seemed to become more independent as time went by but most likely Mornith does, or another like Tolan. Keep an eye on that standard, Elon. It could turn at any time.”
He nodded. No surprise. And which others? That was the question.
The High King’s banner sat with his tent as it should in the center of the army. Like much about Daran, it was oversized, far larger than necessary, a great expanse of deep purple Elven-silk topped by the swallow-tail flag. On that flag was the emblem of his rank, a great crown linking a number of lesser crowns. Gold thread winked and gleamed in the late afternoon sun.
Even in the cool of fall the dark color would render the interior nearly unbearably hot but Daran would have his trappings.
The Guard recognized Elon. He passed him and his party inside without question.
The tent was empty at the moment of all but Daran.
Within the stifling interior, his dark brooding presence only added to the sense of shadows.
It wasn’t the first time Ailith had seen the High King, she’d been properly presented as her father’s presumptive Heir, although never at such close quarters. As always and however trite it sounded, she was reminded of being in the presence of one of the great hunting birds. Like theirs his dark, cold eyes were never quite still, always alert for the nervous motion of potential prey. One had to be wary of that sharp beak.
At the moment, it wasn’t Daran that caught her eye but the great table before him.
As it did Elon.
Not that he needed such a thing. His people had inhabited these lands since before history was written and he knew it well. It was not for his folk that such a thing had been made but for Men.
Still, the memory of how it had been made was mostly a pleasant one.
Foresight had told him he’d stood, then, at that moment, at a pivot point but not that it would be so on so many levels. It had prepared him for Daran’s emissary, for that first offer of peace, the first chance of a real permanent and truly lasting peace between the elder races and Men.
There had been offers before. Many of them. They’d been broken as often as they’d been made.
This his Foresight had predicted might be different. Daran was cut of a different cloth than the others. He seemed truly sincere, not simply looking for concessions of land as the others had, and been given, to the detriment of Elon’s people when those boundaries had been violated again and again. With Daran’s powerful personality there was the chance he might be able to hold his fractious, contentious race in hand long enough for peace to take and hold. It was too great an opportunity not to risk it.
So Elon had.
With that offer had come a thousand unforeseen complications and a hundred compromises. Save in only one area – the boundaries and borders of Elven and Dwarven lands. If they were to have peace, it would be for all three races – and Elon would bring his people and the Dwarves to the table only if Men promised one thing, to set borders and boundaries so that none among men could argue or dispute them.
That had nearly been the sticking point. Daran had debated and fought him on it but Elon had been adamant. And he’d won.
As with everything with Daran he’d gotten his own back by securing Elon’s promise he himself would help set those borders. Not that either the Elves or Dwarves would have accepted any less.
To set borders men would respect one must first have map.
Who could have known that journey would set the foundation for a friendship nearly as strong and binding as his true-friendship with Colath? For that was where and when they’d met Jareth for the first time. It had been an enlightening experience for all of them. Outside of the Kingdom of Marakis, long friends with Talaena Enclave, for the first time Elon met a man who had a concept of honor and duty nearly the like of Elves. That friendship had held true through the years and still did.
Jareth looked at the table before him with a great deal of satisfaction, smiling a little at the memories that came with it.
It was an amazing construction, a masterpiece of both carpentry and art that he was rightly proud of his part in creating.
Here before them lay the whole of the Kingdoms in deep relief.
There were gaps, to be sure.
To the north there was the barest suggestion of the great saw-toothed mountains that rose up so precipitously. On the east it fell away to the splintered, barren plateaus, the spindly spires that wore down to the great desert at the edge of the sea. Canyons and ravines were etched into the foothills of the western ranges that bordered the west as far south as the High King’s city of Doncerric and the sea again. In the center were the plains and green hills of the inner Kingdoms and the Heartlands, around the edges were the forests and fields that were the outer Kingdoms.
Great fingers of the borderlands pierced the Kingdoms, one below Riverford and another above Raven’s nest – the great maze of the plateau he now knew contained the Rift.
Another thrust below Aerilann, while ripples of others turned the border unknown.
Small markers showed where each part of the army was camped, tiny flags in the colors of that Kingdom.
It was something to see, and, seeing it, Ailith’s blood ran cold. She glanced at Elon, knowing he would see what she did.
Elon didn’t need to see it to know how desperate the situation was. Nor did he doubt that Daran hadn’t the least idea how bad things were.
They were far too far south still. Deep in the Heartlands, in the green fields that were the Kingdoms’ lifeblood. To the north were Aerilann and Lothliann – both vulnerable.
If Ailith’s vision, his vision, was correct and the borderlands creatures came through now, soon, they would sweep down out of the mountain
s and pour out upon the Heartlands in a flood. With nothing to stop it that torrent would wash up against the borders of both Elven Enclaves, isolating them as the creatures ravaged the green fields of men.
Even worse still, there was no place to stop them there, the battle would be fought in a thousand skirmishes across miles, spreading the army across with no hope of a front.
With an effort, he restrained himself from shaking his head in dismay, knowing it would only anger Daran if he saw it.
Daran looked up as they joined him with something like relief on his narrow strong-boned face.
“Elon, about time. Tell me now how to get this army moving? Never mind.”
He waved it away and with another gesture sent pages running before looking over the others in the party.
Unsurprised, Daran noted the wizard Jareth with still them. The damn wizard was with Elon almost as much as the ever-present Colath. Daran hadn’t decided yet whether he was pleased or displeased with that arrangement.
It also irritated Avila, which had its advantages. Advantages Daran had every intention of using.
Another Elf. This one female.
His eyes settled on the last of the party. Riverford’s wayward Heir. Another problem.
These then, were the ones for whom Elon had cut the High Council short and rushed north to find.
“I see you found them and safe.”
Elon watched him. Daran’s black eyes rested too long on Ailith. Something in his look didn’t bode well.
“I did,” he said, and eyed Daran warily in return.
“Lady Ailith,” Daran said.
Restraining a small frown at something she heard in his voice, Ailith bowed her head a little, “Your Highness.”
She didn’t like the way he looked at her, and something, some instinct warned her that whatever he was about to say wouldn’t be good. A chill went over her and her stomach knotted.
This would be difficult and uncomfortable. Daran disliked both emotions intensely.
Such a little thing she was, as forthright as his brief memory of her introduction at Court served. Her gaze was direct and clear. Without a doubt, by the look of her she was Riverford’s get. Whatever the cause of their problems – and he neither knew nor cared as it was the business of that lesser Kingdom – this part of it was his to do. There was no easy way to say it and he had no time or patience for it anyway. It was best to get it over with quickly and move on to more important matters. It would be the last time she heard that honorific.
The Coming Storm Page 53