Ryell didn’t wait for an answer anyway. Seeking outlets to vent his fury, he turned on the guards.
“And what of you two?” he scolded. “You were supposed to be guarding them!”
“We remained at their door throughout the night,” replied one of the unfortunate elves with strained conviction.
“Ha!” Ryell scoffed. “If I discover that you fell asleep, I shall—”
“Oh, hush hush! Hush up, I say!” came a voice from behind the guards, and Ardaz stepped out onto the terrace, Desdemona the cat wrapped in peaceful slumber like a boneless stole about his neck. “I, too, had eyes posted to watch the ancient ones: Desdemona here.” He lifted the limp cat off his shoulder and held her close to his face. “And she wouldn’t let me down, would she? No, she wouldn’t!
“She kept watch on your house from just outside and saw no one leave, no one at all, not a one,” Ardaz assured Arien with complete confidence. “Never sleeps, either. Not at night anyway. Sleep all day, bother everyone at night; rule of cats, you know.” He gave an amused snort and turned his attention back to the cat, petting her affectionately to make up for his last comment.
“But they are gone,” Ryell insisted, the simple fact challenging the wizard’s reasoning.
“I know that, of course I know that!” a flustered Ardaz replied. “Sylvia told me just a moment ago out in the hall.”
Ryell shook with frustration. “If they are not here,” he asked with deliberate sarcasm, “and that cat assures you that they did not leave, then where are they? Might it be that they simply disappeared?”
“Oh, yes, I see your point,” Ardaz replied, enlightened and confounded all at once. “And a very good point it is!” He again pulled the cat from his shoulder and shook her awake. “Des, did you fall asleep, you nasty little kitty!” He gave her another shake and eyed her suspiciously, then, as if talking to her in her own tongue, he uttered a series of varying “meows,” and Desdemona replied with an emphatic “Meow!”
The wizard flopped her back over his shoulder and seemed appeased.
“Says that she didn’t fall asleep,” he explained to the astounded onlookers. “Doubt that she did, too.” His gaze drifted absently out across the gorge. “Couldn’t have disappeared, no no,” he continued, talking more to himself than the others. “There are ways, of course, but they were just, ordinary men. Certainly not wizards, after all!” He paused to scratch his bearded chin. “Unless …”
Arien and Ryell waited for him to let them in on his apparent revelation, but as the moments slipped by and an expression of dark worry crossed the wizard’s face, Arien’s patience ran thin.
“What is it?” he demanded.
“I am not sure,” Ardaz replied, his voice suddenly sobered. Shaken from his contemplative trance, he looked back at the Eldar. “Not sure. But I shall find out!” he asserted, and headed for the door.
“Wait!” Arien called. “You cannot leave now.”
But Ardaz kept moving.
“Things to do,” he called. “Things to do!” And he scurried away.
“Why do you allow him to stay in Illuma?” Ryell groaned. “He is of no use to us at all.”
Arien knew better than that. He knew the side of Ardaz that was the wise and kind Glendower, savior to the elves at the dawn of their race, when Ben-rin ruled Pallendara and Umpleby would have had them killed. Arien recognized that the compassion and power of the wizard remained, hidden beneath a bumbling facade, but ready to come forth as a shining light of hope in their darkest moments.
“Blame not Ardaz for our troubles,” he warned Ryell.
“But what are we to do?” Ryell asked softly, the cutting edge of his anger diminishing with the growing realization of their potentially disastrous position.
“We wait,” Arien replied grimly. “And hope.”
The Eldar sent the guards away to join in the search, and he, Ryell, and Billy remained on the balcony, staring out at the towering mountains, seeking refuge from their worldly concerns in the profound contemplations so glorious a landscape oft inspired. They spoke little, each of them finding solace in his private meditation, and a semblance of hope budded among them as the initial shock of the escape faded. Though they did not track the time, it seemed like hours later when Sylvia and Erinel finally returned.
Then their hopes were dashed.
“They are not in the city,” Sylvia said.
“Nor in the tunnels,” Erinel added. “I traveled as far down as the lower trails above Mountaingate.” He looked over at Billy and gave a sympathetic shrug, for he knew that what he was about to say would reflect badly on his new friend. “I found two sets of footprints in several places—less than a day old.”
“And were these tracks known to you?” Ryell growled, intent on tearing from reluctant Erinel confirmation that his own mistrust of the humans had been justified.
“They matched the strange boots of our visitors,” replied Erinel.
Ryell eyed Arien smugly, confident that the Eldar could no longer reprimand him, then turned his fury on Billy. “What have you to say of this?” he snapped.
“They’ve gone to Calva,” Billy declared firmly, in a voice that trembled just a little from embarrassment.
“How do you know this?” Ryell shouted accusingly before benevolent Arien could react. “And why did you keep it from us?”
“I didn’t keep anything from you,” Billy replied. “I just now figured it out from Erinel’s findings.” He pointedly turned back to the Eldar, turning away from Ryell. “I admit that I feared this—feared Mitchell. He lives for glory and power and will do anything to get it. That night of council on the mountain shelf, he tried to persuade you to grant him an army. You refused, so he seeks it elsewhere. My guess is the court of Ungden.”
“Bah!” Ryell said. “It seems more to the truth that you were a part of the whole deception!”
“You’re wrong,” Billy said.
“I am right!” Ryell insisted. “And what of DelGiudice? An emissary sent ahead to prepare the way for his Captain? And you were left behind to cover their escape, to keep us from suspecting the worst until it was too late for us to prevent it!”
“No,” Billy said, but he saw the strength of his argument slipping away. How could he hold credibility with Arien and the others in light of Mitchell’s terrible deception? His empathy for Ryell and the elves’ desperate situation put him on the defensive, for he knew that Ryell’s rage was founded on the very plausible fears that all of Illuma had been placed in mortal danger. “Del and I had no part of this.”
“You lie!” Ryell screamed.
“Enough of this,” Arien demanded, and Ryell turned away, biting back curses and accusations through gritted teeth. Then Billy was truly wounded, for the look Arien gave him revealed doubts and suspicion. “Pray tell us all that you know,” he asked. “It is important.”
“There isn’t much I can add,” Billy answered. “Mitchell will do what he has to do to get what he wants, and you’re right to be concerned. But I’ll do anything I can to help you, and I guarantee that Del had nothing to do with this. He hates Mitchell even more than I do. Those two have been at each other’s throats since the first day they met, and that fight has only become worse since we landed on the shores of Ynis Aielle.”
“And what of the other one, Martin Reinheiser?” Arien asked.
Billy shrugged and shook his head. “I don’t really know. He and the captain stick together, but I can’t figure out why. They’re nothing alike. Maybe it’s just because they have nobody else to get close to, or maybe each of them needs the other to make up for what he lacks himself. Either way, I wouldn’t trust Reinheiser any more than Mitchell. He might not be as openly dangerous as the captain, but he’s sneaky, and smart enough to manipulate things the way he wants them.” He paused then and all of them went silent, digesting the information.
“I am satisfied,” Arien assured him, but the declaration of renewed trust in Billy did not relieve the pai
ned look from the Eldar’s face.
Again despair smoothed the edge of Ryell’s anger. “Then we are lost,” he stated with hopeless resignation.
“Not yet,” Arien declared, but despite his determination, his voice seemed clearly strained, and a vein of deep worry stood out clearly on his temple. “Caer Tuatha is many miles to the south, and the two have no horses. We do not know if they will ever reach the city, or how Ungden will receive them if they should.”
“But if they do get there,” Ryell said grimly, “the humans can muster ten thousand spears.”
“That would take weeks, even months,” Arien replied.
“We must know for certain,” Erinel cut in. “Eldar, allow me to go down to the Calvan fields. Among the farmers, I may be able to discern the destination or even the intentions of the two men. Surely it is folly for us to sit back blindly and wait for whatever is to befall us.”
Arien looked questioningly at Ryell, granting his friend, as Erinel’s guardian, the final authority to permit or reject his nephew’s proposal. Both of them knew well the risk that Erinel would be taking if he walked among the Calvans, for both of them had done the same thing many, many years before. But that was when the heirs of Ben-rin sat on the southern throne, and the Calvans, though not openly acknowledging the existence of the elves, tolerated them with winks of promised secrecy and spoke of them only in exaggerated tavern tales. With wicked Ungden in power and all of Calva on alert for the mutants hiding in the mountains, Erinel’s journey would indeed be much more dangerous.
Ryell sighed helplessly. “We have no choice.”
Arien put a comforting hand on his friend’s shoulder. “Be ever cautious,” he said to Erinel. “Remember that the shadows of the night have always been a friend to your people. I expect and await your safe return.”
Erinel nodded his assurance and left the terrace with Sylvia.
“I wish to post a watch at the trees above Mountaingate,” Ryell said, and Arien agreed.
In his tower home of Brisen-ballas, high above Illuma Vale, Ardaz sat staring out the highest window of his tower.
“You watch over this place while I’m away,” he told Desdemona, the cat curled comfortably on his lap. “Not that I really want to go, you know. Who would, after all?” An involuntary shudder ran up his back as he thought of what awaited him; Talas-dun, the fortress wrought of Morgan Thalasi’s black heart. Castel Angfagdt it was called in the enchantish tongue, the castle of utter darkness.
A title Ardaz knew to be well earned.
The wizard rose and shook off his fit of trembling, setting himself with firm resolution to do what he must. “Still, we have to know for certain!” he explained to Des, lifting her seemingly boneless form from his lap, but keeping her in the same curled position as he placed her on the ground beside him. “I’ll be back as soon as I can be back!” He grimaced away a second shudder and, chanting in trancelike monotone and rhythmically dancing through a few twists and turns, robes floating all about him, he became an eagle and flew off.
He soared out of the tower, riding the updrafts of the sun-warmed air rising up the cliff facings, and was soon gliding high along the southern ridge of the Crystals. Ardaz truly enjoyed the effortless freedom of this wind riding, but time was pressing, he knew, so he tilted out away from the cliffs, beyond the reach of the lifting currents, and plummeted into a swoop down toward Blackemara, leveling off just above the swamp and riding the tremendous rush of gathered momentum far out into the desolate land of Brogg.
Unfaltering, the wizard sped on toward the distant shadows of the Kored-dul range and the waiting blackness of Talas-dun, where he hoped to find some answers.
The passing days were agony to the elves and Billy as they awaited Erinel’s return. The wait became even worse for Arien when he found that Ardaz, too, was gone.
Chapter 21
The Lines Are Drawn
THE TREES CLOSED behind Del when he emerged from Avalon as if Brielle slammed her door at his back. And though Del told himself that it didn’t bother him, that right now all he cared about was putting as much distance between himself and Avalon as possible, his heart sank even lower at the sound of the forest shutting him out. He tried in vain to blank the thoughts and images of the witch from his mind, for he had witnessed a terrible and unexpected side of Brielle that had wrenched away his fantasy and broken his heart. Head down, he walked with slow and sullen steps across Mountaingate.
He took no notice of his surroundings as he approached and passed under the silver telvensils at the end of the field. His thoughts remained inward in recollections of stately groves of swaying pines and starlit fields and the woman who gave them meaning, and with a resigned sigh he accepted that he would not be so easily rid of his memories of the Emerald Witch.
Even had he been wary, on his best guard, Del would not have seen the three elves, silent as death, slipping down from the concealing branches of the arched trees behind him.
He continued on a few yards up the mountain path, then realized that he could go no farther until an escort arrived. “Damn!” he spat. Even if Ardaz had seen him on the road in Avalon and went right to Arien with the news, it would be hours before any elves arrived to guide him back to Illuma. He punched at the air in frustration and turned back to the archway, seeking a shady place to sit and wait.
His relief at seeing the elves was short-lived, lasting only the second it took him to understand that the two bowmen holding their weapons taut and level had their arrows trained on his heart. And the third elf, standing grim-faced between them, held his slender sword ready in hand, although he obviously recognized Del.
“What’s going on?” Del asked with caution, though he still didn’t quite believe that the elves meant to harm him.
“Silence!” the swordsman commanded. “Throw your weapon to the ground in front of you.”
“Didn’t we already play out this scenario, just a couple of weeks ago?” Del offered with a strained smile, inviting the elves to end their game and admit the joke.
On a nod from the leader, one of the bowmen loosed his arrow. Del whitened in shock at the thrum of the bowstring, and jerked involuntarily, expecting to be struck, as the arrow drove itself deep into the ground between his feet.
“I ask you one last time to throw down your weapon,” the swordsman said in a calm, steady voice, and from the grim tone, Del had no doubt that the next arrow would indeed find his heart.
Anger welled in him, but against the dizzying swirl of his emotional turmoil, it could not gain a focus or a purpose. Confusion dictated to Del, and he had no heart for any argument, much less a fight. He drew his sword and dropped it to the ground, dropping his gaze as well, for he had no desire to view the elves in their deadly mood. Were these the Children of the Moon, the same joyful people whose very existence was based in dance and song, in community and friendship? Or had he, perhaps, in his longings for utopia, misperceived this land and its peoples? His whole image of Aielle suddenly seemed to be closing in around him, suffocating him in the same grim visages of reality he thought he had left far behind on the shores of a distant world.
He offered no resistance as an elf came up to bind his hands.
Erinel trotted across Mountaingate, hugging the eastern cliff face for the little cover it offered. He didn’t like moving openly in broad daylight, but the urgency of his news demanded the risk. He crouched low and slowed, though, when he neared the telvensils and heard the voices beyond.
“Blindfold him,” one of the bowmen said.
“It is not necessary,” the elf with Del replied. “It would only slow us, and Ryell is anxious to speak with this one. You remain here to keep the watch,” he instructed one of the bowmen. “We shall escort the prisoner back to the city.”
“By the Colonnae!” Erinel cried as he stepped through the archway. “Release him, and be quick about it.”
“Erinel!” the elves cried in unison, the swordsman rushing over to warmly clasp Erinel’s arm.
>
“It is good that you have returned, my friend,” the swordsman said sincerely. “The days of our watch for you have been long indeed in passing, and all of the city is stilled in anticipation of your findings.”
“Untie him!” Erinel demanded, and stormed up the path toward Del.
“But it is by the order of your uncle that he is bound,” the swordsman pleaded, obviously torn between his loyalties. Fearful of a confrontation, yet obedient to the commands of the Eldar, he rushed ahead to intercept Erinel.
“Then my uncle is a fool!” Erinel snapped, brushing the swordsman aside and continuing on to Del without missing a step.
The three elves looked at each other with uncertainty, and slowly began closing on Erinel and Del, weapons still at the ready.
“It’s all right, Erinel,” Del said, trying to soothe his friend’s ire and avoid any further confrontation with the other three. “I really don’t mind. Let’s just get back to the city. And do blindfold me, whatever they might think. Better for all that I remain ignorant of the way to Lochsilinilume.”
Erinel hesitated for a moment. He hated seeing his friend bound, despite Del’s assurances, but he, too, understood the futility of arguing. He pulled a hood from the swordsman’s belt and popped it over Del’s head, offering a last smile to assure the man that he would be there, every step. “Very well, then,” he told his fellow elves. “Let us be off at once. Arien must be told of the stirring in the south.”
Leaving the two bowmen behind to keep watch, Erinel led Del and the swordsman at a swift pace up the mountain. Still struggling with the torment of Brielle’s darker side, Del asked no questions and paid no attention to the secret paths. Eventually, though, when they had entered the tunnels and left Avalon far behind and hidden from sight, he was able to focus on the events at hand, and he realized that something terribly important and grave must be going on. All of the signs moved him in the direction of one horrible suspicion: that one of his companions must have done something awful to rile the elves so. And Del had a good idea who that might be.