Blue Moon (21 page)

"That might be cool,” she said as he put the boxes on the coffee table. “I'm going to go and get some things from the kitchen."

When she came back the boxes were open, the napkins lay in a pile to the side. She looked at the lids. He'd ripped them open, ignoring the tabs that held the lids shut. She would have laughed, but he was sitting on the floor near the fireplace staring at the food voraciously. Better feed him, she thought, handing him a plate, before he eats you.

"You're joking,” Sierra said a little later, once they'd settled down.

Zorovin picked up a slice of pizza carefully. The first piece had been the most fun to watch him eat, but now he was getting the hang of it and the entertainment of watching the oh-so-cool Zorovin make a mess of himself was fading.

"There really are elves left?"

He nodded and picked a slice of pepperoni off. He ate it meditatively, as if trying to figure out its components.

"But why didn't they go with everyone else?"

He arched his eyebrow at her, and she nodded.

"I mean, of course, after you're done.” She blushed and concentrated on eating. “You can have the last breadstick, if you like."

"Bread is said to be the staff of life,” he said. “But I am not overly found of it."

"You're silly!” She happily claimed it. She took the sauce cup and ripped the bread apart so she could get as much of the remaining sauce on it as possible. “It's the best part."

He swallowed. “It is convenient. It holds the...” He pointed at the topping, making a tapping motion as if trying to find the word. She kept her mind a blank, and he gave her a dirty look, as if knowing she was blatantly not helping him. “...stuff together.” He picked up a napkin and cleaned his hands. “Now, if you are through bandying words with me, I will tell you a tale. Actually, I will tell you a tale and a half."

"That would be wonderful,” she said sincerely. She couldn't remain blasé about his stories. Not now that she knew they were true.

He sat for a long moment, staring at the fire. She put the boxes and trash aside for later and studied him. There was a secret part of her that thought, perhaps, he was lying despite the proof he had shown her—that this was too good to be true. She thought she was falling in love with him, and she didn't know if it was because of him or because of what he was. She wasn't sure she cared.

"What are you thinking?"

"That you have beautiful hair,” she said. She wasn't lying. It was very fair, and reflective. It combined with the light from the fire, gave him a golden halo.

This seemed to stop him. “Oh. Well. The story.” He cleared his throat. “There was a group of elves—"

"Once upon a time."

"What?"

"You didn't say once upon a time."

He snapped his teeth at her, making a low growl in his throat. “Do you want to hear the story or not, wizard woman?"

"Please. I want to hear it."

"Once upon a time,” he began sarcastically, and she had to bite her tongue to keep from laughing, “the fair folk still roamed these lands. And they were called the fair folk not because they were kind, because they could be terrible, indeed, when the mood suited them.

"There were two elven sisters. One was named ... I cannot recall their names—the reason why I shall tell you later. I shall call one Isulde, after her mother. The other was Titania, who would someday become a queen. They were close as children, it is said, until the day it was declared that Titania would marry Oberon.

"No one knew that Isulde had fallen in love with Oberon before he met her sister, and that she still wanted him. She claimed it was not because of his power, but because she loved him more than her sister ever could. On his wedding day to her sister, she stood and declared before the whole of the Seelie court, “I swear unto you all that you will have wished you accepted me in benevolence, for the day will come when I will rise to rule and have my revenge upon you all."

"She turned and departed, and set up a castle in the hills far away from her sister and brother-in-law's court. There, in the mountains, she seduced a warrior of the mountain elves and bore him a son.

"And as she sat in occupation, whether it be with her latest lover or with her son—the only being she truly seemed to love—she thought of how to make her vow come to pass. The thought of her sister with the man she herself had desired was a constant sore inside her, giving her no rest. She did not want him now that he had rejected her and made himself filthy with that pig of a sister, but still, she wanted to make him pay.

"The people of the earth would not come to her. No matter how much she stirred their anger one against another, she could not get anyone willing to follow her into the Twilight Lands to seek conquest.

"'I am powerful,’ she said to the humans, the Dwarves, the Orcs, to those of the Unseelie Court.

"'Yes,’ they would always say, for she was.

"'I am strong! I deserve to be queen.'

"And again, they would agree.

"'Then why won't you follow me?'

"'Because,’ they would always say, ‘there is nothing in it for us. You have no people of your own to commit to such a task. We would die, and you would gain nothing.'

"So, she sat in the darkness, contemplating what they said to her, pausing only to play with her son. Even so, ideas simmered in the back of her mind.

"And this is what she did, that we no longer speak her name..."

Zorovin paused. “We do not know how she did it. I doubt anyone ever knew. She went to the graves of our dead. Of dragon dead, and human dead. She visited the burial mounds of her own people, she walked the deep caves of the Dwarves. She raised their decaying flesh. She made her army from the bones of our ancestors and beloved dead, she filled them with her hatred, and with her disgust for all that was happy and alive, and she sent them to feast on their own descendants, their own families. The world had refused to do her bidding, and so what was once a vow to make a few people pay for breaking her heart became a quest to destroy that world.

"I had not yet been born, and thus it was, truly, a long time ago, but the memory of that week of terror lives on in many hearts. My own great-grandfather's bones came back and murdered his mate. They found him feasting on her flesh. Her soul was not permitted to flee, and so the infection passed to her, and she murdered her own child. It was thus, all around the world—at least, the world we knew."

"My God,” Sierra whispered. “Everyone has ancestors."

Zorovin nodded. “And Isulde was thorough in her search of graves.

"It was thought that, when she felt her army had waxed strong enough, she would march against the Elven king and queen. We will never know for sure, because a fortunate thing happened that saved us all.

"The Black Queen's first lover and the father of her child had lingered, not to help her but to keep an eye on his son. He fell in love with a maid hired to keep watch over this child, and when they saw the horror Isulde had brought to the land, they knew they had to do something about it. So, one night, the warrior stole into the castle and received in his arms his only child. He passed this burden to his brother, for he himself did not have the courage to do what must be done."

"Kill him? But why?"

Zorovin nodded. “Sabin had spent nearly every moment of his life with his mother. What do you think she taught him? Did they dare allow him to live?"

"But it is of no import, as you will see, if you stop interrupting me.

"Shera, the maid, for some unknown reason, was loyal to Isulde despite Isulde's vow to destroy the Seelie court. It has been suggested Shera had been hurt by some political maneuver that Isulde had ultimately protected her from. What we do know is that Shera was the only other living being on this Earth Isulde trusted. Thus, when Shera made her some mulled wine, and served it to her as a thoughtful gift to her rightful queen, Isulde smiled and took it in her hands.

"'You love me, Shera?'

"'Always, Your Majesty.'

"Isulde smiled. ‘When I come to power, you will be well rewarded.’ She looked into her cup and took a deep drink. ‘Indeed, you will be the second most powerful woman in the world.'

"She finished the wine, the poison working fast. She blinked a few times, trying to shake its hold, then looked at her betrayer.

"'I know what you would have given me, my lady, but at what price?’ Shera said.

"They came and cut her body apart then embedded the corpse in crystal. They smashed and burned her things, cleansed her castle of magic and left it to smolder and crumble to naught. Finally, a group of warriors was chosen, the lover foremost, to take the body as far away as possible. Thus, Shera sacrificed all she had for the good of the world.

"And the sacrifice was accepted. The evil power that had brought the dead back disappeared, leaving piles of bones in its wake. Soon there was no more fighting, just the sound of shovels and axes as the living prepared to re-bury their dead. Most of the peoples decided to burn what was left of the bones and flesh, and it became so with many races that when a loved one died, they set him on a pyre and scattered his ashes to the winds, so none might call him back from his proper reward."

"But why doesn't anyone remember Isulde's name?"

"Ah,” Zorovin said. “They did not deem it enough punishment that she failed in her plottings, that she was betrayed by those she trusted. One of the things that Isulde loved was fame. They stripped that fame away from her by burning her memory from the minds of the living. Only a few people were cursed to retain it—the warriors who bore her corpse away and the rulers of the people. I remember her story only because dragons pass memory from parent to child, yet even I do not remember her name. They wiped that away completely, so that we recall her deeds and the fear that came from them, but we know not who did those deeds.

"It would suit me not to remember at all, save that Sabin, her son, escaped death. Eventually, he enraged a wizard—I believe he reneged on a bet he made with the man—and the wizard captured Sabin's soul in a stone.” He sat back in his chair. “No one knew about this for years. Pity. I would have been happy to shatter the stone, or throw it in a volcano."

"So, he got out,” Sierra said. “And he's been out at least...” She counted on her fingers. “Eight years, I guess."

"That long? How do you know?"

She gaped at him for a moment. “I guess I don't. I mean, there was a reason I thought so, but I must be wrong, because, like you say, I have no reason to know."

He frowned at her a long time but did not gainsay her.

Two days before the blue moon

Who are you?” Libby sang as she fixed herself a snack in the kitchen. Her favorite show was on, and it always put her in a good mood. “I really wanna know!” she sang, and Dashiel joined in. She laughed, threw him a treat to shush him and went to her bedroom. She had some freshly nuked egg rolls, soda, and a pillowcase that needed the crossstitch pattern finished. In short, she was good to go for an hour. Maybe even two, if she decided to watch
Mystery
.

"Okay, Grissom. What's the case tonight?” She was definitely a
CSI
addict.

The earthquake hit after that, and didn't even have the courtesy to wait until the half-hour commercial break. Books trembled and fell, china clattered. Libby bounced off the bed's edge. The lights went out, first the bathroom then the one by the bed, the TV, and so on across the room.

With the darkness, something passed through her, shimmering and cold. She now had a complete understanding of what ice water would feel like in her veins and heart.

"Dashiel?” she called. “Dashiel, sweetie, are you okay?” She stood up and went into the living room. A pile of paperbacks shuddered, and Dashiel emerged. He shook himself then turned towards her, eyes reflecting in the blue light.

"Boy,” he said in a pleasantly rough voice. “That was a bad one."

Alex was reading Libby's book when the quake came. He'd gaped a couple of times, surprised at the ingenuity of the two sex scenes he'd encountered. It was easy, pleasant reading, but not much his thing. Well, the parts where the woman was trying to escape by ship were pretty pageturning.

The quake plunged him into blackness, and when the cold washed over him he knew who he really was. All his memories returned to him in a flood—his mother and father, his life before.

He leaned up against the headboard, waiting for the lights to come back on.

Oh, was he in for it now.

When the waves hit Sierra, they hurt. She trembled and wept, and Zorovin held her awkwardly in his arms, trying to soothe some of the pain. He knew who she was to her core. He had tried not to find out, because it was uncalled-for, rude, but those things screamed inside of her.

He felt something for her, and wondered what it was. Sympathy? Pity? It disquieted him more than the odd pinches of lust he'd experienced. The latter was instinct, for beings always desired to reproduce, no matter what form they are in. This other was danger.

"It will be alright,” he said, because it was what humans said to one another, whether they believed it or not.

Libby nodded. “I'll go check the defenses. Hopefully, the circuit breaker's just popped."

She was still shocked that her dog was speaking to her, and mortified, recalling the things she had done, not realizing she was doing them in front of a sentient creature. But she didn't have time for that. Sabin could be mounting an assault, and she didn't want to fight in the dark if she didn't have to.

Dashiel padded after her.

"It's because reality's thinning,” he explained. “That's why I can talk to you. The coming blue moon pulls reality like a regular moon pulls the tides.” He stopped to lap some water while she opened the cellar door. “Not that most dogs can talk. I'm special. You lucked out."

"I'm so glad."

"You're not much shaken up by this, are you."

"A little. It's quite a surprise. But, well, you wake up one night and find out your sister's dead and your eyes glow in the dark—minor stuff like this fails to affect you much."