Kerian glanced over at him, smiled. A single candle stood on the table between them. The candle’s flame was reflected in her brown eyes, shone warmly on smooth, brown skin, glinted in the burnished gold of her mane of hair. Kerian was a Kagonesti, a Wilder elf, a race of elves who, unlike their city-dwelling cousins, the Qualinesti and the Silvanesti, live with nature. Since they do not try to alter nature or shape it, the Wilder elves are looked upon as barbarians by their more sophisticated cousins, who have also gone so far as to enslave the Kagonesti and force them to serve in wealthy elven households—all for the Kagonesti’s own good, of course.
Kerian had been a slave in the household of Senator Rashas.
She had been present when Gilthas was first brought to that house, ostensibly as a guest, in reality a prisoner. The two had fallen in love the first moment they had seen each other, although it was months, even years, before they actually spoke of their feelings, exchanged their secret vows.
Only two other people, Planchet and Gilthas’s mother, Laurana, knew of the king’s marriage to the girl who had once been a slave and who was now known as the Lioness, fearless leader of the Khansari, the Night People.
Catching Kerian’s eye, Gilthas realized immediately what he was doing. He clenched the tapping fingers to a fist and crossed his booted feet to keep them quiet. “There,” he said ruefully. “Is that better?”
“You will fret yourself into a sickness if you’re not careful,” Kerian scolded, smiling. “The dwarf will come. He gave his word.”
“So much depends on this,” said Gilthas. He stretched out his legs to ease the kinks of the unaccustomed exercise “Perhaps our very survival as a—” He halted, stared down at the floor. “Did you feel that?”
“The shaking? Yes. I’ve felt it the last couple of hours. It’s probably just the gully dwarves adding to their tunnels. They love to dig in the dirt. As to what you were saying, there is no ‘perhaps’ about our ultimate destruction,” Kerian returned crisply.
Her voice with its accent that civilized elves considered uncouth was like the song of the sparrow, of piercing sweetness with a note of melancholy.
“The Qualinesti have given the dragon everything she has demanded. They have sacrificed their freedom, their pride, their honor. They have, in some instances, even sacrificed their own—all in return for the dragon’s permission to live. But the time will come when Beryl will make a demand your people will find impossible to fulfill. When that day comes and she finds her will thwarted, she will destroy the Qualinesti.”
“Sometimes I wonder why you care,” Gilthas said, looking gravely at his wife. “The Qualinesti enslaved you, took you from your family. You have every right to feel vengeful. You have every right to steal away into the wilderness and leave those who hurt you to the fate they so richly deserve. Yet you do not. You risk your life on a daily basis fighting to force our people to look at the truth, no matter how ugly, to hear it no matter how unpleasant.”
“That is the problem,” she returned. “We must stop thinking of the elven people as ‘yours’ and ‘mine.’ Such division and isolation is what has brought us to this pass. Such division gives strength to our enemies.”
“I don’t see it changing,” Gilthas said grimly. “Not unless some great calamity befalls us and forces us to change, and perhaps not even then. The Chaos War, which might have brought us closer, did nothing but further fragment our people. Not a day goes by but that some senator makes a speech telling of how our cousins the Silvanesti have shut us out of their safe haven beneath the shield, how they want us all to die so that they can take over our lands. Or someone starts a tirade against the Kagonesti, how their barbaric ways will bring down all that we have worked over the centuries to build. There are actually those who approve of the fact that the dragon has closed the roads. We will do better without contact with the humans, they say. The Knights of Neraka urge them on, of course. They love such rantings. It makes their task far easier.”
“From the rumors I hear, the Silvanesti may be finding that their vaunted magical shield is in reality a tomb.”
Gilthas looked startled, sat upright. “Where did you hear this? You have not told me.”
“I have not seen you in a month,” Kerian replied with a touch of bitterness. “I only heard this a few days ago, from the runner Kelevandros your mother sends regularly to keep in touch with your aunt Alhana Starbreeze. Alhana and her forces have settled on the border of Silvanesti, near the shield. They are allied with the humans who belong to the Legion of Steel. Alhana reports that the land around the shield is barren, trees sicken and die. A horrible gray dust settles over everything. She fears that this same malaise may be infecting all of Silvanesti.”
“Then why do our cousins maintain the shield?” Gilthas wondered.
“They are afraid of the world beyond. Unfortunately, they are right in some instances. Alhana and her forces fought a pitched battle with ogres only a short time ago, the night of that terrible thunderstorm. The Legion of Steel came to their rescue or they would have been wiped out. As it was, Alhana’s son Silvanoshei was captured by ogres, or so she believes. She could find no trace of him when the battle was ended. Alhana grieves for him as for the dead.”
“My mother has said nothing of this to me,” Gilthas stated, frowning.
“According to Kelevandros, Laurana fears Marshal Medan’s heightened watchfulness. She trusts only those in her household. She dare not trust anyone outside it. Whenever the two of you are together, she is certain that you are spied upon. She does not want the Dark Knights to find out that she is in constant contact with Alhana.”
“Mother is probably right,” Gilthas admitted. “My servant Planchet is the only person I trust and that is because he has proven his loyalty to me time and again. So Silvanoshei is dead, killed by ogres. Poor young man. His death must have been a cruel one. Let us hope he passed swiftly.”
“Did you ever meet him?”
Gilthas shook his head. “He was born in the Inn of the Last Home in Solace during the time Alhana was exiled. I never saw her after that. My mother told me that the boy favored my Uncle Porthios in looks.”
“His death makes you heir to both kingdoms,” Kerian observed. “The Speaker of the Sun and Stars.”
“Which Senator Rashas always wanted,” Gilthas said caustically. “In reality, it seems I will be nothing more than the Speaker of the Dead.”
“Speak no words of ill omen!” Kerian said and made the sign against evil with her hand, drawing a circle in the air to encompass the words and keep them trapped. “You—Yes, what is it, Silverwing?”
She turned to speak to an elf who had entered the secret room.
The elf started to say something but was interrupted by a gully dwarf, who appeared to be in a state of extreme excitement, to judge by the smell.
“Me tell!” the gully dwarf cried indignantly, jostling the elf.
“Me lookout! Her say so!” He pointed at Kerian.
“Your Majesty.” The elf made a hurried bow to Gilthas, before he turned to Kerian, his commander, with his information. “The high king of Thorbardin has arrived.”
“Him here,” the gully dwarf announced loudly. Although he did not speak elven, he could guess at what was being said. “Me bring in?”
“Thank you, Ponce.” Kerian rose to her feet, adjusted the sword she wore at her waist. “I will come to meet him. It would be better if you remained here, Your Majesty,” she added. Their marriage was a secret, even from the elves under Kerian’s command.
“Big muckity-muck dwarf. Him wear hat!” Ponce was impressed. “Him wear shoes!” The gully dwarf was doubly impressed. “Me never see dwarf wear shoes.”