The Coming Storm (43 page)

“He protected you better than many. Ailith, don’t fear the madness, it doesn’t come to all. Taran was a good friend and trusted companion. He used Otherling magic, what he called wild magic, to great effect.”

It was a question that needed asking. “Why did they go mad?”

He shook his head sadly. “Foolishness and ignorance. It shouldn’t have happened. The first to be born after the wizard wars was raised among your people, who in general don’t understand magic well. They didn’t understand the limitations, or just how binding vows could be. At the time the Collegium was just starting, the races were only beginning to find common ground. It was still a very troubled time.”

“Like you, Caleah appeared much like the race of men and so they insisted she be raised among them. Some had heard tales of Taran, others felt he’d been too influenced by our kind. They knew she was different, though and so they treated her as such. They expected too much of her and too soon, she was young to use her magic even for those of the race of men, much less ours. All of them were. Which was part of it as well. I tried to warn them but they saw it as interfering. I was forced by the circumstances, by the time, to step back, despite grave doubts.”

“In truth, though, I didn’t know what a tragedy it would become. Foresight is Elon’s gift, not mine. I never thought to scry, not with Taran as example.”

“She went mad and so thousands died. Men and Elves. The fear of that madness was passed to the next generation. All Otherlings have the empathy our people and the Dwarves share, as you do. Palan. His parents hid him but not their fear. They wouldn’t let him use his magic, so it turned upon him and fed on their fears. The Dwarven Lore-Masters were certain they could do better. From knowing Taran, I tried to speak with them, to no avail. We know how that turned out.”

“So your father did better than he knew with that vow. Since you’re using magic now where others can see, I assume you’ve passed your majority?”

“A week or more ago.”

“You don’t know it well.”

“No, but I’m learning,” she said.

For a time they walked in silence.

After a moment, she said, “Talesin. Tolan tried to make me angry.”

“He would, strong emotion is a powerful component of any magic. Using those visions you saw, the memories?”

She nodded.

Looking out into the night he took a slow breath, remembering. “No one should see such terrible things.”

The blood and the chains, the terrible wounds. He shut away the memory.

“If you could look upon that and not go mad, with so much laid upon you already, you need not fear it. What happened?”

As with all Elves, his face was calm but in the depths of his eyes she could see the awful pain and horrific memories. Grief and a pain so deep it still wounded him.

She took a deep breath. “I saw the look in Tolan’s eyes. Then I remembered what Elon had said, that it wasn’t wrong to fear such power, only to fear misusing it.”

“It’s well you recognize that,” he said. “As for Elon’s advice, he is wise, is our Elon.”

A smile. “He thinks so, too.”

He gave her a quick glance and allowed himself a small smile in return.

“It’s well you recognize that, also.” A pause. “You fought it. And Tolan.”

“I will the next time as well.”

“Good. He’s trying to take advantage of your inexperience. Tolan may invade your dreams but he doesn’t control them completely. He terrifies you with these images because he enjoys hurting you and to keep you off balance. That’s part of his revenge for thwarting his plans.”

“He told me that if he takes me…”

She couldn’t say it.

He nodded and laid a hand on her shoulder. “You should know, it’s something  they’ve done before. Use one, turn one, against the other. The shame remained even where there was no blame. They turned our honor against us. You fear it,  that he’ll succeed.”

It was her turn to stare out into the darkness, holding those horrible visions at bay.

“Yes.”

“Oaths bind you, Ailith, as even honor can’t. Your father was a wise man. Think on that. In the meantime, I would show you a thing.”

With a turn of his wrist an elf-light appeared, with a wave it disappeared. “Lay your hand on my arm and I’ll do it again so you may sense it.”

She laid her hand on his arm and felt … something.

A ball of light appeared in the palm of his hand.

Her eyes, though, were caught by his hand, by the bare skin of his arm where his sleeve had fallen back.

She couldn’t miss what she saw there, scars on Elven skin. Elves didn’t scar, not easily, they healed too fast. Those wounds would have been open for a long time. With her hand on his arm, through it she could feel the thrum of memory of tearing pain and searing agony.

She went very still before she raised her eyes to his.

Those old eyes had seen far too much.

“An Elf and a wizard was a great prize for them,” he said, softly. “I hadn’t meant you to know that.”

Her heart went out to him.

Through that touch, through Elven empathy, he felt the rush of emotion. He inclined his head gravely.

“You are a better Elf than you know.” Then he nodded at the light. “Can you do that now?”

Ailith raised her eyes to his.

Turning her palm up, a small sphere of light appeared in the palm of her hand.

Talesin looked deep into her eyes, the pale blue light in her hand reflected within her darker blue eyes, cool, clear and sharp.

“Remember, Ailith, that even in the greatest darkness there can be light. You are one such, Elon another. Jareth, Colath, Jalila. All of them. There are others. Remember that and that you aren’t alone.”

She nodded.

“Have no fear of sleeping tonight,” Talesin said, “this place is warded so even one such as Tolan can’t trouble your dreams. We learned much from that time. He can’t reach you here.”

With a quick touch to her shoulder, he left, an elf-light bobbing over his shoulder to light his way.

The night was quiet.

With a wave of her hand, Ailith banished the elf-light she’d created.

Looking up at the spangled sky, with its river of light, she found the Loom.

Peace for a night.

Tomorrow would come soon enough.

Oaths bind you. Her father had bound her with a promise, to protect her.

Magic.

She cupped her hand and a tiny elf-light appeared within it.

Even in the greatest darkness there can be light. Looking inward, she saw the stars that spread across her heart and mind and soul, thousands and thousands of them.

Lives.

The scars on Talesin’s arm. They’d been terrible wounds. Chains and blood.

A light in the darkness. Her father’s face, her father’s voice. Promise me, Ailith. A different binding. Her mother’s face, from the time before, with a serenity in it that Ailith now knew as Elven. Delae. All gone. That grievous pain had grown more bearable. She couldn’t save them, she couldn’t help them. Those lights were gone. All the magic in the world couldn’t change that. There were lights here she would help if she could. Oaths bind you as even honor cannot, Talesin had said.

She walked slowly back, not so much thinking as clearing her mind.

The gallery was empty, her feet made barely a whisper of sound on the slates of the floor. What would it be like among a city of these? She couldn’t imagine it. Ascending the steps, she was passing the fourth balcony when a familiar deep voice called to her softly.

“Ailith.”

Elon, standing in the darkness. With his dark hair and dark eyes, the dark robe and the vines and such, he nearly blended into the night.

In the palm of her hand appeared a small light, small so as not to awaken the others.

“I’ve learned a new thing,” she said, with a small smile as she joined him.

“So I see. Talesin?”

She waved the elf-light away. She could see him well enough in the starlight.

“Yes.”

There was that stillness to her that was also very Elven, Elon noted.

“I need to ask you a thing,” he said.

“Ask.”

That, too, was Elven, that directness.

“Why did you come to me, when you fled?”

The question surprised her, clearly.

“In truth, Elon, I never considered anything else. Where else would I go? Oh, I well know I could’ve lost myself in the heartlands. As Geric’s daughter I could have claimed sanctuary anywhere. I could’ve taken my chances and gone to the King. Knowing what I knew?”

She shook her head.

“I couldn’t. You knew there was something wrong. I could see you knew, even if Tolan and Geric couldn’t. They couldn’t, though they feared what you might find. You were acting on what you knew, what your Foresight and your wisdom told you was true. I’d been helpless for so long and I don’t like being helpless. Hemmed in on all sides. I wanted, needed to do something. If I’d gone elsewhere, who could I have told, who would have believed me? I would’ve had to stay silent with what I knew or have folk think me mad even while knowing I wasn’t. Waiting for the darkness to come. I couldn’t do that, stand aside and do nothing. There was truly and ever only one place to go.”

Elon stared out into the darkness, remembering the war that had gone on within him and the weight he’d carried since, now lifted.

“You couldn’t have known what I would do, knowing the truth of you.”

Tilting her head, she looked at him.

“Couldn’t I? I doubted, that’s true. I might have misjudged the sense I had of your honor and integrity. I knew the things my father had told me of you. I also knew that when I rode into your camp that night you trusted me. All reason said otherwise.” She smiled a little. “As Colath said, I didn’t look like a king’s daughter. You’d been told I was elsewhere by those you had as yet no reason to mistrust. Yet you believed me and acted on it.”

“You’re a King’s daughter, yet you follow me.”

She waved that away. “So I am and raised to lead but I’m not foolish. I can rule and I know it, I learned it at my father’s knee. When or if the time comes give me an army and I can lead it. I know tactics and strategy. I know these things. None of that applies here. I also know what I don’t know. This is a different kind of war. More than that, not all leaders wear crowns. There are leaders and there are Leaders. You are one of those last. I follow you because I choose to and because I must if we’re to win here.”

“Why didn’t you tell me all you saw in that dream?”

Her breath caught and her heart. “Elon.”

Those terrible images. Chains and blood. Not visions, memories. Tolan’s memories. Once, they’d been real. Somehow even then she thought she’d known that. They’d seemed too true, too immediate. They had been real, once, those terrible visions. She had seen the scars on Talesin.

In the starlight Elon could see her face plainly enough, see the look in her eyes, the horror. What had she seen?

Very gently, he said, “Tell me.”

“I can’t,” she said and the terrible pain in her voice was clear.

It pained him to hear it.

“How can I say that with you standing before me? Have those pictures in my mind? How could I tell you of that? I can’t. I won’t. It won’t happen.”

“What won’t happen? Tell me, Ailith.”

His dark eyes compelled her, not through magic but through trust.

“He showed me what he’ll do to you, to Colath, to Jareth, Jalila if we’re captured.”

Ailith leaned on the rail and looked away from him. She couldn’t bear to look at him with those visions in her mind. Not and speak of it. She couldn’t.

“Chains. Chains and blood.”

He laid a hand on her shoulder. He could feel the tension, the tear in her heart, the shame, horror and aching agony.