Mira's Hope (18 page)

By the time he reached her door, he was
feeling positively alarmed and was desperately wishing he hadn’t
taken the time to clean up after all. Racing up to her door, he
burst through without the consideration of knocking first.
She
knew I was coming
, he reasoned to himself. Looking slightly
alarmed and a little dismayed, Amrick went back to kneading the
bread for their afternoon meal, but not before jerking her head in
the general direction of several of their messengers they’d sent
out several weeks ago. Other than looking extremely tired and in
need of a hot meal, they all looked no worse for wear.

“Safe journeys?” Tark asked as he put on his
calm and collect leader face. He didn’t want them to think he’d
sent himself into a panic with just his mere thoughts rousing
him.

One of the messengers, a slight female with
shoulder length, black hair and light blue eyes nodded in response
before looking at the others in turn. “We have some disturbing
news,” she stated, rubbing her eyes wearily.

The others were leaning back in their chairs,
nodding in unison at some of her statement.

The suspense was killing Tark as he nodded
for her to continue.

“They’re all gone.”

“Who are all gone? The elves?” Tark was
feeling extremely confused seeing how several elves from all over
Tomiro had come to join them just in the last couple of days.

“No, the torlics, narooks, even the mauks
have disappeared. All within the last few days. There were reports
of giant winged reptilian shaped creatures arriving at the
different villages and areas around Tomiro and then all the dark
creatures up and left. There are elf babies being born and no mauks
around to mark them. There have been reports of torlics or other
creatures heading southeast, in the direction of Blackwell, but
other than that, nothing. Elves have stopped going to the mines and
even the earagos have disappeared from the east. It’s like they’re
all being called away.”

Tark sat down heavily in the only remaining
chair as he thought of the implications this news brought. Was Rau
aware of what was going on? Could he be preparing for war himself?
Chills ran down his spine. He knew it wouldn’t be easy to get into
Blackwell with just the normal guards Rau placed all over the
island, but if Rau was sending for every dark creature, it would be
next to impossible to gain entry into the heavily guarded fortress.
What had he gotten himself into?

He brought his attention back to the
messengers, wanting to get back to his home so he could speak with
Morgo. “Thank you for all you’ve done. With your help, over five
hundred elves have been sent to train and many more to help with
everyday life. Please, go back to your homes and rest. I’m sure
we’ll need your services again if not for being a messenger once
more, but perhaps in other areas.”

The tired looking elves smiled gratefully as
one by one they got up and took their leave. Tark watched each of
them go, grasping their hands as they passed and shaking them in
thanks. Once the final one departed, Tark nodded briefly to Amrick
before strolling out the door and back into the cold.

Walking briskly back to his home, he wondered
vaguely if other elves would be making their way to the village
with the lack of narooks around to persuade them to stay. The idea
was appealing to Tark and put an extra spring in his step as he
bounded up the stairs to his front door. Stepping through, he
looked around the common room. He saw several of the underground
elves including Nina and Nigora, who were deep in conversation
concerning different magical ways that you could heal someone, but
no Morgo. Tark was sure one of these elves could help him, but it
was Morgo, as one of his commanders, that he wanted to elicited
advice from. He interrupted the two’s conversation to find out if
either of them knew of Morgo’s whereabouts, to which Nina pointed
vaguely in the direction up the stairs. Tark nodded in thanks and
bounded up the steps to Morgo’s room, which was above his own.

Tark raced up two flights of stairs. Reaching
the landing to Morgo’s room, he decided that knocking would be more
appropriate than simply barging in unannounced. Nothing like having
someone walk in while you were sleeping or worse, dressing or some
other embarrassing task.

“Come in,” he heard softly through the
door.

He pushed it open and quickly stepped in,
taking care to shut the door snuggly behind him. Morgo was laying
in his bed, on his side, with his head propped up on one his hands
and a book opened up in front of him.

“I find these books about the olden days
fascinating. I simply can’t read enough of them,” he said almost
apologetically.

As elves from villages had arrived, they had
brought books with them. Some of these books described the past war
with Rau, while others were filled with information from the past
in general. Tark asked the messengers to have the elves bring these
books as a way to glean information and perhaps forgotten knowledge
that could help them with the coming war. They’d gathered so many
books that the common room at the top of Galena’s tree house was
becoming as small library like the one they’d seen in Gora. It was
there that Morgo could often be found and would have been the next
area Tark searched for his friend.

“I can imagine,” Tark replied, smiling down
at Morgo. It was times like these that Tark was reminded of how
much Morgo longed to learn of the world above his own.

“What brings you so early to my humble
dwellings,” he said, sitting up and pushing his book aside.

Tark relayed everything that the messenger
elves told him just a few short minutes ago, finishing with his own
thoughts and perspectives on the matter before coming to the reason
for his visit. “Can you bring up Blackwell in the mirror waters?”
he asked, a hint of desperation in his voice.

“I don’t think so, but I can bring up torlics
and narooks since I have had experiences with both of those
creatures. If they’re at Blackwell, then we’ll be able to see.”

He brought out a bowl he used for the mirror
waters and filled it. Thinking of the torlics that they had seen
along the way, he brought up their images in the water. What they
saw made both of them gasp. Surrounding the torlics were many, many
more of the foul beast, as well as narooks, earagos, mauks, even
tookoos, the fortress guards of Blackwell. These creatures were
black and shadowy looking, almost as if they were created as mirror
images of Rau himself. They seemed to have more substance than Rau
supposedly did though. Their rippling muscles and razor sharp claws
made the torlics the elves had been dealing with, appear tiny in
comparison. Tark cringed at the prospect of taking them on in a
battle. That was a thought he’d managed to suppress, though now, he
was unsure how it hadn’t crossed his mind. How could he have
forgotten such a formidable creature until now?

“It doesn’t look good, does it?” Tark asked,
still looking into the bowl of water.

Morgo shook his head in response, his eyes
still fixed on the images below. “You realize this is probably just
a small fraction of what Rau has waiting for us.”

Tark didn’t reply. In truth, he didn’t know
what to say. He found some of his newfound courage dwindling,
before he remembered Galena and her incredible power. Even then, he
almost baulked at the responsibility he’d taken upon himself when
he realized that even if Galena didn’t survive her ordeal with
Mira’s magical cave, he and his army would still have to contend
with this massive horde of dark creatures. The thought left his
hands shaking and his stomach felt queasy. Not for the first time
that day had he wondered what he’d gotten himself into.

“Do you think more elves will travel here now
that their slave drivers have taken temporary leave of their
stations?” Tark asked, wanting some type of confirmation to build
some hope upon.

Morgo continued to gaze into the mirror water
before shrugging. “I am unfamiliar with this world and the elves
above, but if I had to guess, I would venture a yes. All of the
villages are aware of what’s going on, because of the messengers
you’ve sent out. With no one to prevent their coming, I feel the
best choice would be for them to join us. Whether the villages see
this as wise also, is a completely different matter. It seems to me
that sending out small groups of elves took quite a bit of
discussion and debate. I hate to think of the amount of time it
will take for them to decide to send a whole village. The war would
be over before then.”

Tark had to smile at his friend’s response,
but thought he’d made a fair point. As hopeful as Tark was that
entire villages would show up in the upcoming days and weeks, he
didn’t plan to hold his breath either. Sighing, he sent out a quick
prayer to Mira in hopes that for once, it wouldn’t take the elders
of all the villages’ decades to make a decision.

Just this once,
he thought,
let
them make a sudden decision, because it looks like we’re going to
need all the help we can get. Lamiria believed he had a battle on
his hands, but that’s going to seem like child’s play compared to
what we have to do this time around.
Standing, he felt the
great weight that had been lifted in his dream a couple nights
before, return to his shoulders. The war would be starting
soon.

Chapter
Twenty-Four

The western woods, as its name implied,
covered the entire western edge of Tomiro. It had once covered more
than half of Tomiro, but after a fit of rage Rau had when he
originally begun to battle Lamiria and all the elves; he had his
torlics burn and cut down almost three fourths of it. It had been a
sad day for the entire elven nation when they’d first come across
the mass destruction of their beloved trees. This act enraged the
elves so much it seemed for a while they might defeat Rau, but it
was in vain. Their anger caused them to be rash; being rash and
prideful brought around their downfall.

It was on the edge of these woods that Galena
and Elenio decided to make camp for the night. She wanted to get a
decent night’s sleep and to clean up seeing how she hadn’t taken a
proper bath since they had left Corista. She also wanted to check
up on Tark and see why they’d experienced no trouble with Rau or
his evil creatures for almost a week now. She knew she’d put up a
good battle before, but that never stopped the brainless creatures
from attacking in the past.

She decided to try something new with her
treehouse. Instead of making a home with several levels, she wanted
to stick with something simple, like Pangoro’s home. It had been a
single room dwelling. The common area, bedroom, and washroom had
all been contained in that single large room. It was simple, but
elegant. Galena remembered thinking it looked like there were
multiple trees that made up this room, because of its width. Taking
this into consideration, she stuck three different sticks into the
frozen ground after whittling away at tiny holes each ten feet
apart. Now came the tricky part. She was used to growing one tree
rapidly and forming it as she went, but she was unsure if she
should grow one tree at a time and then connect them, or grow all
three together, connecting them as she went. She asked Elenio what
he thought, but he just shrugged saying he had no clue.

Helpful as always,
Galena thought
sarcastically.

Sitting down a fair distance away from the
small branches, Galena leaned back on Elenio who’d chosen to sit
down behind her while she worked. She leaned her head back and
smiled at him for which he took the moment to kiss the tip of her
nose lovingly.

“Have you decided how you’re going to do
this?” he asked, brushing some stray hairs that had come out of her
long braid, from her face.

“Nope. I think I’m just going to wing
it.”

“How do you just ‘wing’ it?” he asked,
laughing quietly.

“True. I guess I do have to make a decision
in order to form it. In that case, let’s try it with all three. I’m
freezing, tired, and looking forward to soaking or dying in the
washing basin and that seems the quickest way to achieve my
goals.”

Elenio nodded, still smiling at her.

She was amazed with him. Ever since she
energized him, for a lack of a better term, he had been relentless.
They’d traveled at such a pace that Galena was thoroughly looking
forward to a short reprieve from their journey. Not only had he
been walking at a break neck pace, but he had also cooked every
night, cleaned up camp, found campfire wood, and anything else they
needed without complaint or growing very tired. Even at night, he
went to bed much later than Galena and arose several hours earlier.
This fact alone was so startling to Galena; she was seriously
starting to contemplate reversing what she’d done. The only problem
with that was she was unsure how to go about it without killing
him. Although, after traveling for over fourteen hours straight one
day, she came close to trying anyway.

Readjusting herself so that she was
comfortable once more, she began to think of the trees growing, but
stopped suddenly. “Where is Twoit?” she asked. She’d discovered two
nights ago that Twoit didn’t always seem to have the sense Galena
originally thought when the ferret had gotten in the way of her
growing a bed, almost becoming encased in the mat part. Luckily,
Elenio had been watching and called a halt to Galena’s process
before it was too late.

Elenio indicated with a nod of his head
toward the direction of the forest. “She went that way more than
five minutes ago. I imagine she’s out looking for some small
helpless creature for her dinner.”

He brought his knees up on either side of
Galena and she rested her arms on them comfortably as he wrapped
his arms around her waist. He placed his chin on her shoulder and
waited for her to continue.