A War of Silver and Gold

by Minerva J. Kaelin

  She knew better than to run away from her terrors. She gritted her teeth and inhaled sharply.

  “The King is suspicious. Ethan, you know I was supposed to be here to spy on you. I think he knows I am helping you though.” Her voice trailing at the end. She tried to stifle the volume of her fear, but she failed miserably. She never knew that she would react in this way. She had handled the King for almost three hundred years with little to no casualties and yet...

  Yet, in that moment she could barely move, barely breathe, barely feel the flow of her blood. Ethan glanced at her, visibly disturbed by the idea that no matter the spells protecting the city; nothing could shield her from the King’s magic.

  “How?”

  She shook her head. “I was poisoned yesterday and my shields were not as strong as I thought they were.”

  “He can’t know, can he?” He moved closer to her, his hands slipping to hers. He tried to calm her down, but she was unable to relax, unable to do nothing but be anxious and worried.

  “Maybe someone betrayed us.” Her eyes wide as she shook her head. “I doubt, Ardan and Nadaon did, but maybe someone from your court.”

  He shook his head. “As much as some of us are suspicious of you, you are on our side and that’s enough for us. Enough to trust you.”

  He moved closer to her and let her hands against the warm planes of his chest above all those yards of expensive fabrics. She let out a long breath and bit the inside of her cheek, pain kept her grounded, pain made her return to the problems around her and find a way of solving them.

  She raised her eyes to Ethan’s and contemplated whether she should kiss him for his kindness and openness, or kill him right to the spot and return to her Citadel with his head on a golden platter for the King. The wretched, old elf would have loved her if she’d ever given him such a fine, unexpected present. She was almost certain that he would stuff her head and place it as a trophy on his desk in his private library.

  She reached, closer to Ethan, his warmth was far more welcoming and his breath was hot on her chilled skin. It felt good and... and normal to be held with such tenderness and she was nothing but tender in soul and mind, but it felt strange, something that she had never allowed herself the luxury of indulging into. She never let herself dip into a well of those softer feelings.

  “Perhaps you should find another room to grope on each other.”

  Cassia pulled away from Ethan so swiftly that she almost lost her footing. She raised her eyes from the floor and glanced at Griswold with so much hate, it would have made the King spoil himself.

  But of course, not Griswold Blackthorn.

  The elvish bastard paraded into the chamber with a smirk plastered on his face and a raised eyebrow. He came to stand before them, a hand promptly placed on the edge of his sword and the other hung from his side. She did want to step on his face just to pull the grin away. She forgot her worries over the hate she held for him and narrowed her glance at him.

  “It is inappropriate to run in the corridors.”

  Absurd! That elf was out of his mind, the King knew of her location and he was worried about running in the corridors. She shook her head; she knew he was trying to repay her for that night two days ago.

  Why had the bastard not left like the rest of the Lords had?

  She gritted her teeth and tilted her head in annoyance. Cassia cleared her throat and straightened her spine. If he wanted war, she could gladly give it to him.

  “It is also inappropriate to intrude in a Lady’s privacy, but that didn’t stop you.” She chuckled bitterly. “Obviously.”

  He smiled and took a step closer, his black robes touching the onyx floor. He was darkness, real and horrifying darkness.

  “You are not a Lady.” He growled. “If you were a Lady you would have been already married with a pack of elflings, but apparently you are...” He threw her an uninteresting glance. “An unfortunate situation.”

  She shook her head. “This is not about your damaged pride, Griswold.”

  He gritted his teeth, took a step closer and barked at her. “It’s Lord Griswold for you, scum.”

  Ethan stepped between the two hellcats, separating them from plugging at each other’s eyes. “How old are you, you two?” He shook his head. “I don’t believe I will let you two ruin what we are fighting with blood to keep alive.”

  Griswold’s face contorted. “If you dare command me around,” His glance fell on Ethan. “I will take your benevolent guest and gut her in the middle of your marvellous city.”

  She narrowed her mismatched eyes at the silver haired Lord. “I thought Lord Griswold was better than this.”

  He growled, indeed, he seemed out of character with her. The ever composed and silent Lord she had met that first time in the meeting seemed to have changed into a wild, wild beast.

  Ethan sighed. “I think there are more important things to take care instead of whining about some vendetta you two seem to share.”

  She clenched her jaw so hard, it almost made her teeth hurt. Ethan was right, there will be time to brawl, but at that moment clutching at each other and fighting mentally and physically was not an option. Not for them, not when the King lurked, powerful and infinite, on the other side of the continent.

  “I do not have a vendetta against him, he hates me. That’s all.” She cleared her throat and let her stubborn gaze fall onto the elf in question.

  “I don’t,” Griswold growled and then shook his head. “If Lord Beathan has more important things to talk about then it is time to bring those matters before us and forget for a moment that discord runs deep.”

  She kept her eyes fixated on Griswold and nodded as Beathan moved towards the table and sat down on his chair at the top of the magnanimous glass table. She followed his lead and took her place at his right, but Griswold remained standing. She heard the tapping of his shoes as he walked about the room, glancing on the ornate walls and pillars as if he hadn’t seen them before.

  She cleared her throat. “It wasn’t much, but I felt the King trying to tear down the walls around here. My shields.”

  A muffled chuckle made its way to her ears from where Griswold stood, his face turned away. She narrowed her eyes at him and shook her head.

  Ethan nodded. “Can you keep him out?”

  She looked at her hands before her, her glance hardening. “If your maids won’t poison me again.”

  Ethan shook his head. “That’s been taken care of.”

  “I hope so.” She raised her eyes and tilted her head, a small smile played over her lips. “I can keep him out, at least for a bit more time.”

  The infernal elf in the back of the room turned towards the table, his smile was much more sinister this time. He huffed and held his guard as he straightened his spine and tipped his chin up. “You are relying too much on borrowed powers.”

  Borrowed powers.

  She was suddenly alerted, her insides turning numb, her heart clenched and unclenched inside her chest. He knew. He knew of my past. It rang inside Cassia’s head, deep between the spaces of her mind’s caverns. She was afraid, terrified and for a moment her brain screamed at her with so much ferocity, it rendered her subconscious numb and dead. He knew and that made him her enemy, it made him the greatest opponent she had, greater than the King who was blind of how she had acquired her powers.

  How she had gained magic beyond every fantasy, and Griswold knew. He was far more lethal to her than anyone else and she had to eliminate him soon, or else... or else the only place that she would have been allowed to go; would be the Northern Islands of Frost, Neutral Lands that had no master. The Islands of outcasts, the lands of those with no fate.

  I had to eliminate him. Soon.

  “I am willing to use my powers for the good of our people.” She straightened her spine, her face wore that nonchalant mask.

  “A being, such as you, has no sense of morality. You should crawl back in whatever hole in the ground you came out of.”

 
She crossed her legs underneath the glass table. She was the Heir, what did she have to lose if she pestered him a tad more?

  She smiled back, just as maleficent as he smiled. “You need me, admit it. Without me, the King will pass through your lands, kill your warriors, rape your mates and sit upon a throne of iron wearing a crown of gold. You will all be forced to bow before him.” She narrowed her eyes on the snobbish elf as she tipped her chin upwards. “Do you have siblings, Lord Griswold?”

  His face untwisting. “None of your concern.”

  “Do you know what will happen to them if the King wins this war?” She chuckled bitterly and tapped the glass table with her silver, sharp nails. “He will take your sisters for his own twisted appetites, hurl your brothers’ bellies over his polished floor and he will let them there, dying slowly watching as he raped their mates into the next century.”

  By the time her words had reached to a halt the silence in the room had turned disturbing. The father clock’s pendulum in the west side of the chamber clicked from right to left. Her keen ears couldn’t even catch the sounds of their beating hearts. They were afraid, both of them, but Griswold showed less emotion over his face than Beathan.

  Beathan was bent over the table, hands stuffing in his hair as he kept his eyes on the black floor. Griswold stood there watching her in the eyes, but as she smiled at him, he didn’t move or twitched, not even his eyes blinked.

  She clenched her jaw and continued. “But you see, I will survive because I am the One and I could save you all.”

  It was bitter and it reached her stomach, Griswold’s chuckle. “And now you think that I’ll bow to you, make you the deity I believe in and hope for. That is not the equality you speak of, this was not as polished as the lies you were feeding us the other day.” He shook his head. “I refuse to partake in this madness, Beathan.”

  He strode for the door, his hands furiously touching the handles. His shoulder rose as he took in a deep breath. “Control your own monsters, Beathan because you wouldn’t want me to unleash mine.”

  He stormed out of the room, slamming the door shut as he disappeared. He was her enemy then, her enemy because he knew what she was, knew the atrocities she had committed to become the powerful being she was.

  “Are you with us?” Beathan asked, his head hanging low.

  She cleared her throat and stood; she went to him and placed a hand on his shoulder, comforting him. “I am.”

  He merely nodded before he looked away from her.

  She left the room in a hurry because she didn’t want to meet Beathan’s weary eyes, eyes that had shown her only the Adanei’s extent for kindness and civility, family and strength and hope.

  She went up the stairs, passed through the magnificent corridors and entered her chamber. She closed the door and pressed her back on it. Her eyes went to her shimmering armour and glittering sword that lay on the corner across her.

  Griswold was a lethal plant and from where she hailed carnivorous plants were burned to ashes and that was exactly what she intended to do with Griswold.

  He could wait, though for later. Cassia had other things to take care of. The swords of Leondir.

  32

  Cassia had found little trouble on directing herself to the library of the Onyx Castle. There had been a constant nudging in her mind. The King wanted to have an update on her whereabouts concerning the Sword. She chastised herself with a groan. It was foolish to have forgotten about her real mission. She wasn’t there to play chess with Beathan and throw mud at Griswold silver hair.

  Much to her dismay, she needed to do something about the King, or else everything would crumble and shatter like breaking crystals.

  She slammed the books she held onto the desk before her and sighed, before earning a glare from the brooding librarian. She ignored the female and sat on the chair before a desk.

  It was an awfully quiet place. Countless bookshelves and desks sprawled all over the vast chamber. The books were strictly organised and categorised, completely dust-free and the yellow elven lights loomed over them. The ceiling was tall, tall and enchanted to enlarge and host more bookshelves, magically bound to their places. It was more terrifying than relaxing and with the unnerving silence; Cassia could barely keep her eyes on the book before her and not throw suspicious glances over her shoulder.

  She bit her bottom lip anxiously and scratched the back of her left hand many times. It felt like someone was constantly waiting to stab a dagger in her back. She huffed silently and opened the book before her.

  She had practically nothing to start with, nothing to begin researching from and her magic was of no use, the sword was warded against anything with a magical core. And Cassia’s was bursting full.

  She hadn’t found much about the Swords, in the entire library, they must have been about four leather bound books concerning Leondir himself and the swords. She had read the three of them back in the Citadel’s library, but the fourth. She shook her head. The fourth was Leondir’s personal diary, coated in magic to prevent decay from ever reaching the valuable diary.

  She took a look around her and mumbled some incoherent spell under her breath, creating a transparent cocoon of magic around her.

  Cassia chose to ignore rereading the other three mundane books and instead she focused on reading the diary. She turned to a random page in the book. Her eyes skimming through the words, silence grasping over her mind save from the echoing of the words she read.

  “Three will come, but do not go, stay till it lasts and see the forging of the one.”

  Cassia jumped from her seat, her eyes widening, hands dropping the book before her on the desk as she twisted around and narrowed her eyes on the infuriating Lord Griswold.

  She rolled her eyes, clenching her jaw. “What are you doing here?”

  He shrugged and quirked an eyebrow. “It’s a library, people tend to read books in here.”

  “Oh,” she pouted. “You can read?”

  Griswold rolled his eyes as he crossed his arms over his chest. “What are you doing with Leondir’s Diary?”

  Cassia tried to speak, but something snapped in her brain, an epiphany, a thought. She had thrown magical shields around her. How could he have reached so close to her, reading over her shoulder, without being nudged away by the magic?

  She blinked, the muscle in her neck twitched. What was he playing at? What was going on? Cassia blinked again, that was wrong, everything was wrong. She shook her head. She had read it once in a book... She had... She shook her head again, Griswold’s eyes glittered with an unrelenting question.

  “That is apparently,” she glared at him. “None of your business.”

  He chuckled softly, distaste written all over his features. “I find myself,” he tilted his head slightly to the side and narrowed those terrifying eyes. “Unable to trust you.”

  “The feeling is mutual.”

  “Insolent, little-”

  “Silence!”

  Griswold turned to glare at the librarian. The she-elf directed her gaze back to the book in her hands and ignored the Lord. It felt like a small triumph for Cassia, at least the librarian was not intimidated by the terrifyingly, brooding Lord of Kypriantha. What a dreadful place, if it was anything like the sovereign Lord.

  Griswold trained his gaze back at Cassia. “Leondir had a thing for lakes.” He turned on his heels and stormed out of the library, leaving a confused Cassia back in the library.

  She huffed and turned away from the library’s entrance.

  What an utter rutting-little-arse he was!

  She opened the diary at the beginning and concentrated on reading the few first pages of the diary.

  12th day of Spalio, 56 days after the war

  We are still in hiding. The stars are still dark and still gone. The gods’ wrath is still upon us all. The Lords are gone, too. The rest of them at least. I am here, in Wonfare. Fighting with everything I have left, fighting with my dying breath to extinguish those foul creatures th
at dare call themselves our brothers. Can flowers be compared to monsters?

  My mate died today and I lost my other diary. So much information gone. But my heart is dreadfully alone. My soul, I am afraid will not remain untouched for long. To say I am fading would be an overestimation of what I feel.

  I have so many things to fight for, but still without my fair Elaine... My immortal life means nothing, nothing at all. I want to burn anything, every good and bad memory I had with my mate, burn everything, so the pain would leave me and I would be able to save my people and what is left of my dignity.

  The sun is still not showing at the edge of the horizon, so it must be still too early in the morning. I am thankful to still be alive, I am thankful, but...

  But the last sword I have left is impending, suspicious and grows warm every time I touch it like it doesn’t want my presence. I cannot fully explain the sentiment, but it feels like my heart is ripped from my chest every time I touch the cursed blade.

  There is only one thing left for me to do. One thing left.

  But the sword has grown on me. Sometimes, I feel myself yearning to touch it, to let myself be consumed by the feeling of it, of the soul burning need.

  It screams to me, it screams to its brothers too.

  When Elaine was still here, she helped with that new found thirst for power nurturing in my soul. She kept the fires of my spirit low. But, now...now I can’t.

  I must hide it.

  Cassia’s eyes travelled through the next few pages. She shook her head. There was nothing at the rest twenty entries. Leondir had a tendency for pitying himself. That was all he did at the next few pages, but still. Still, there must be something in there. Oh! If she could find the other diary!

  She turned to the next few pages, the entries were scarce, smaller, rougher and the letters were smudged, clumsy. His writing voice was altered. He no longer rumbled about his feelings, only of what he should do. He used one page for each entry, the words in perfect alignment with the previous and the next pages, always stopping at the middle of the page, the last word of each entry placed at the edge of the paper.