A few moments later she lay her hand over mine, curling her fingers under my own, and looked up at me, ‘I’ll ask Jaron and Kenton to increase the security they’ve got in place for the engagement party,’ she smiled. ‘After all, if Kaldar is going to make a direct attempt on my father’s life, it’ll be at the party. He’ll want lots of people to witness it and spread the word, so he can become some sort of celebrity to fellow criminals.’
I smiled back at her, ‘thank you sweetheart, that eases my concerns and worry a little.’
‘That was my intention sweetie,’ she replied, still smiling. ‘I’m getting quite sleepy, so I think I’ll take my book up to bed with me. I’ll see you in the morning at breakfast.’
I stood up as she did, pulling her into me and hugging her and kissing her goodnight as I usually do, returning my attentions to my book after watching her leave.
***
Two weeks later, the day of the party arrived.
The final checks were being made on everything so that the party would go smoothly: everything from the decorations and the food, to the guards posted at every known entrance into the palace, and at the doors to – and within – the ballroom in which the party was being held.
‘The party should go smoothly tonight, with the extra security we’ve put in place’ Jaron announced as Oraelia and I walked with him and Kenton down the corridor to the ballroom, two hours or so before the engagement party.
‘That’s right. It’ll be next to impossible for someone to sneak into the palace unnoticed with, guards at every entrance into the building’ added Kenton.
‘But, what if someone does get into the palace undetected?’ I asked, because I had the distinct feeling that Kaldar had gotten to know the palace very well when he’d been an adviser here.
‘If that does happen, he – or she – will have a hard time getting past the guards stationed at every room door, and especially the extra guards in front of the ballroom, as well as inside’ he replied.
Oraelia rubbed my arm softly with her free hand, her other arm looped through mine. She smiled, a rather pained look on her face, at the other two. ‘He’s still worried about the party, about my father’s safety. Despite knowing that Kaldar may not know we’re immortal in every sense of the word, Zachary hasn’t been able to sleep most nights.’
‘I won’t tell you not to worry about it, but your future father-in-law will have plenty of protection if Kaldar is indeed after him and not another member of Oraelia’s family – including you’ Jaron replied as we entered the ballroom, which had been completely transformed into a starry, night-time wonderland.
Mixed garlands (of stars and moons) were hung across doorways and a few chandeliers. The thick pastel blue curtains in front of the garden doors had been replaced by curtains of black lace scattered with star constellations thin enough to see the garden through, and there were lanterns emitting a soft silvery glow scattered about the place – both on the floor and on stands. It looked amazing: exactly how we’d both imagined it.
‘Your words lighten the worry within my heart a little Jaron, thank you,’ I answered, giving him a small smile. ‘I guess now all there is left to do, is wait for the guests to arrive.’
A couple of hours later, the ballroom doors were closed with guards posted on both sides, and the party was in full swing.
‘I can’t congratulate you enough on your engagement, my dear,’ gushed Fiola, my first cousin once-removed on my father’s side. She’s here with my parents and Great-Uncle Fiachra, pulling me and Oraelia into a warm hug, ‘your father wasn’t exaggerating when he told your uncle and I she was a beautiful young woman’ she added, holding Oraelia at arms’ length and smiling.
‘Thank you, Lady Fiola’ Oraelia replied, blushing to the tips of her ears at the compliment.
‘You are most welcome, Your Highness. I hope I’ll see more of the two of you later’ Fiola smiled with a curtsy, before elegantly walking off to find her father for a waltz.
‘Well, my love, shall we dance? We haven’t had the chance to yet, having been greeting guests since the party started’ I asked Oraelia, and held out my left hand to her, the other held behind my back.
She smiled and slipped her hand into my palm. ‘I thought you would never ask.’
As we began to dance, Oraelia’s left hand clasped within my right, which I held against my chest where she had also lain her head, she pressed her other hand against the small of my back, and I wrapped my left arm loosely around her waist. Everyone else on the dance floor soon retreated to the edges and either sat or stood, watching us with smiles on their faces.
The two of us had barely been dancing five minutes however, when there was an almighty crash followed by the sound of shattered glass, hitting the hardwood floor of the ballroom.
Every pair of eyes whirled towards the double doors and glass-panelled wall looking out onto the gardens, one of the larger panels now a jagged shell of its former self and the beautiful curtains hanging in shreds beside it. Most of the glass that had once filled the wide window frame now lay shattered into thousands of pieces across the floor in front of it and standing amidst the broken glass, was a figure wrapped in a hooded cloak with the hood pulled up to conceal their face. As everyone watched, they lifted their distinctly male hands and removed the hood to reveal their identity.
Several scattered gasps, mostly from those who had known the man stood before us, broke the blanket of silence that had fallen on the engagement party the moment the glass panel had shattered, and yet every pair of eyes was fixed on this person – some fearful, others shocked, and a fair few (including my own) filled with intense hatred and anger – as they took a step forward.
‘Kaldar how dare you show your face in my palace – my kingdom, after what you did and attempted to do. How did you even get passed the guards? They are posted everywhere around the palace’s perimeter’ Thäro thundered, taking several long strides forward from where he stood, next to Pheonala, to stand beside Oraelia and me.
Kaldar chuckled maliciously, ‘well, I did try a few things like throwing rocks several meters away from me to make them think there was someone over there, but I’d neglected to remember that they are too well trained to be fooled by that sort of thing. Instead I decided to use the night and my dark cloak to my advantage, and sneaked up on them. Knocking them out, I used the pummel of my sword to brake the glass wall.’
We all glanced down and saw the blade, glinting evilly in the soft ray of moonlight shining through the now empty window-frame, in his right hand.
‘As to the answer of your first question, though it was unvoiced, I am here to do what I failed to do the first time around’ he continued, staring fixated at Oraelia.
Why would Kaldar have his attentions on Oraelia, when it was her father he had been planning to poison? Killing her would simply land him with a couple of weeks’ jail time and a death sentence – killing her father, however, would give him “celebrity status” among other criminals as The Man Who Assassinated the King of Ledoran even after he’d been executed. Of course, the fact that he had been planning to poison Thäro - and indeed tried to kill Oraelia as she flew over him at the edge of Kíer Inias Uaea Beiht’Kiana - means that he, despite being Thäro’s adviser for nearly three decades, is unaware of the family’s high immortality.
‘That girl!’ Kaldar shouted, jabbing his finger at Oraelia, ‘that meddlesome royal brat discovered my plans along with that fiancé of hers. I know, because I caught sight of them while I was in my secret room. And so I kidnapped her, taking her over to the island along with the Thraxin as payment for the Moredix poison, having heard that she was the one thing Ascevos needed to prevent some prophecy or other from coming true.
A win-win situation, I thought. With everyone away from the palace trying to find the princess, there’d be next to no security at the palace and I could make my move to take you Thäro, down unnoticed – but then she escaped from Ascevos’ castle and I knew, as she flew over me, t
hat my plan would never succeed unless I took care of her myself and even that didn’t work’ he continued, glaring intensely at Thäro and Oraelia in turn.
‘Which is why I’ve been biding my time, keeping hidden and keeping an ear open for information – and then I heard that there was going to be an engagement party with a lot of guests invited. I realised I didn’t need the Moredix, I could just kill Oraelia and then you, with my sword. After all, murder with an audience present is so much more appealing than a few drops of lethal poison, added to a goblet of water’ he growled, a malevolent gleam in his eyes.
‘Well, aren’t you smart, Kaldar; knowing that committing murder with, witnesses present is the better choice – but you’ve been rather stupid, and made a rather foolish mistake’ Oraelia reported, tilting her chin defiantly.
Kaldar’s eye twitched, his face contorting into an ugly sort of grimace. ‘And what mistake would that be?’ he asked, sounding impatient.
She gave a short laugh, which was echoed by myself and several others including Kenton and Jaron, ‘you just admitted to over a hundred people, that you planned to assassinate the king – not to mention that you kidnapped the princess, and stole from the Thraxin caves, to pay for the poison that would allow you to do so.’
All colour drained from Kaldar’s face as what he had just done sank in. The grimace then contorted into an expression of such fury, he went a deep shade of pink. Holding his sword up in front of him, he let out a great cry and ran at Oraelia – who remained totally calm – head on.
There was a flash of rose-gold, a grunt of pain and Oraelia spoke loud enough for not just Kaldar to hear, but everyone in the ballroom and the garden porch outside.
‘You are as uninformed as Ascevos and his followers were, Kaldar. Even if your blade had pierced my skin, this wouldn’t have ended any differently for you. My family and I are impervious to all weapons and cannot die,’ she hissed, as the light – not that there was much of it to begin with – began to fade from Kaldar’s eyes. Just before they went completely dark, she added ‘our attackers always die attempting murder, no matter how they try it. You would have died either way.’
She finally pulled the rose-gold dagger – a “congratulations on the engagement!” gift from Oraelia’s Uncle Midir which she always kept with her, for the safety of her elfin kin (like myself, Jaron and Kenton) and the several humans working within the palace, usually in a sheath secured to her thigh out of sight – free of Kaldar’s midriff: stepping back as his limp body slumped to the ballroom floor.
Once the body had been removed, and the small amount of blood that had been spilt cleaned up, the engagement party – though slowly, and shakily – gradually regained the happy carefree atmosphere and mood that had been there before the deceased had crashed through the glass.
Taking Oraelia into my arms again (she had since cleaned her dagger and replaced it in its sheath) I whispered into her ear. ‘Well that was quite the disturbance, wasn’t it sweetheart?’
I felt her answering nod against my chest, and whispered, ‘I’m going to be marrying the most amazing woman in all the worlds in the galaxy soon, and I love you more than anything.’
She lifted her head now and looked up at me, eyes sparkling in the flickering light of the giant chandelier we danced under, ‘and I love you: the most wonderful, selfless, and caring man I’ve ever known’ she replied.
I smiled contentedly, and gently pulled Oraelia closer to me by the waist, brought my hand up to the back of her neck, tilted her down a little bit, and planted a passionate kiss onto her soft, waiting lips.
Part Five: Ellie
Forever Bonded
It’s been ten months since Zachary surprised me with a proposal in Ancient Elandrean, and I happily accepted. Zachary had had my parents from the human world escorted into Elandrea with my father’s permission as a surprise, so they would be able to see the young woman they had raised as their own daughter get married. There was a lot of planning and decision making on the cake and flowers, and what type of wedding Zachary and I wanted, until we decided on a wedding on the beach so that the dracoria – including Kalo, who was now twice the size of a young stallion, and the dracor who saved me when I fell from the sky, whose name I discovered a few months ago is Sanol – could be present, and I’m now in a turquoise silk tent getting ready to marry the man I love.
‘I can’t believe I’m getting married to my oldest friend – and at nineteen! I’m so nervous!’ I told Eila, the princess of Feldar, and my Maid of Honour.
‘I’m so happy for the two of you Princess Oraelia; you’ve known each other for so long, and love each other so dearly…it’s like a fairy tale’ squealed one of my three bridesmaids, Aiori, a friend of Eila’s with whom I’d become quite close to after Elia introduced us on my first trip to Feldar as their ambassador, clapping her hands together excitedly.
‘Back in the human world fairy tales are made up by authors, and now I’m living one’ I replied, just as my father poked his head into the tent.
‘Okay girls, everyone is ready out here – oh Oraelia, you look beautiful’ he informed us, his eyes coming to rest upon me, in my ankle length wedding dress.
The dress is a gift from Aunt Seraia, Uncle Midir’s wife, and a stark contrast to the traditional white worn by brides in the human world. It is a violet-grey fading gradually to a deep purple half-way below the waist-line, small polished Thraxin jewel shards half the size of a thumbnail scattered about the sweetheart neckline and the dress’s hem.
I smiled at him, ‘thank you, Father.’
‘Are you ready?’ he asked, coming over and offering me his arm as I held a bouquet of purple Alstroemeria and White Asian Lilies in my other hand as Eila, Aiori and the other bridesmaids got into position for leaving our tent.
‘As ready as I’ll ever be’ I replied, and looped my arm through his and we followed the others outside…
‘And, do you, Lord Zachary Kovah of Emohn take Princess Oraelia Teranis of Ledoran to be your lawfully wedded wife?’ Ledoran’s wedding minister asked Zachary after first asking me.
‘I do’ Zachary replied without looking away from me.
‘I now pronounce you man and wife. Lord Zachary you may now kiss the bride.’
Zachary and I grinned at each other and leant in, him bringing his hand up to cup my cheek as I braced my hands against his waist.
It had finally happened. I was married to the one boy I’d been in love with since I was in my preteen years, even when we were miles apart. Granted we were still quite young, but we’ve known and loved each other for so long, that it didn’t matter.
***
Five and a half hours later, the wedding ceremony and reception were over, all the guests had retired to their own rooms, and Zachary and I were alone in the room my parents had prepared for our wedding night away from the others, so we would have some privacy.
For the past few moments, we’ve been lying under the covers leaning against the pillows, Zacahary with his arms around me, and me with my head on his chest and my hand on his stomach, chatting about the future, when Zachary cupped my cheek in his large hand and tilted my face so that I was looking up at him, his eyes unchanged even after his gifts had developed, and gazed at me as he spoke in an unusually deep, husky voice.
‘Oraelia, I have held back since we started dating last August, because of the respect I have for your father and your kingdom’s customs and traditions, but I’m at my limit.’
And then he pressed his lips to mine in a tender kiss.
We lay like this for a few minutes, kissing each other softly until Zachary adjusted his angle and deepened the kiss, his warm tongue seeking entry to my mouth, and I gave it as he rolled over so that he was on top of me. Propping himself up on his forearms, he broke off the kiss to run his lips over my chin and down my neck; leaving a trail of soft kisses in his wake.
I gave a small jolt, and gasped at the unfamiliar and ticklish sensation, making Zachary stop and lift his head.
‘Do you want me to slow down?’ he asked in a soft whisper.
I shook my head. ‘No, I’m fine…just not used to the feeling is all – I haven’t done this before.’
‘Look at me’ he murmured gently, touching my cheek, the softness of his voice making it impossible not to do so. I
‘We’re on the same page, this sort of thing is new to me too.’
As he spoke, his eyes quivered in the light of the candle-lit lamps on either side of the bed.
I smiled, feeling myself flush under his soft yet heated gaze, and looped my arms around his neck, pulling him closer so that our breaths mingled with each other.
‘I love you.’
His eyes narrowed happily as he looked upon me.
‘And I you’ he murmured, running his thumb delicately over my lips before leaning down and capturing my mouth in another deep, loving kiss.
Beginning of a Family
It was early Asaro (the equivalent of April in the human world), the flowers in the palace gardens were in full bloom, and I was going over some paperwork in my study while Zachary helped train the new knights and palace guards, when one of our messengers appeared in the doorway and bowed.
‘Pardon the intrusion Majesty, but Princess Eila has arrived for the tea party.’
‘Half an hour early as always,’ I chuckled. ‘Terrance, please take her out to where we’re having the tea party, and let her know I’ll be down in a few minutes.’
Terrence bowed again and then left to see to Eila and give her my message.
Placing my eagle feather quill back in its holder - I had started practising with a quill in the months leading up to my marriage to Zachary, in preparation for signing official documents as a queen as well as simply wanting to learn how to write with one of history’s oldest writing utensils – pressed the kingdom’s seal to the top piece of paperwork below my signature, and looked out of one of the room’s large window at the kingdom Zachary and I had built together around the palace my parents had constructed while we were preparing for the wedding, as their wedding gift to us.
Descendants of Erodis Page 14