Analindë (The Chronicles of Lóresse) (54 page)

As quickly as it had come, the presence left her. She felt its loss and the comfort had brought her as it faded away. The stone encircling her parted to form an arch, giving her a tantalizing glimpse of a courtyard beyond. Unnerved, she darted forward.

The moment she stepped through, the stone sealed shut behind her, leaving no trace of where she had been. She sagged forward, gulping fresh air. She was free.

She brought a shaky hand up to brush loose hair away from her face; she felt crushed.

In front of her lay a great courtyard. Broken flagstones were partially covered with sand, but she couldn’t make out the pattern they formed. She found a large stone in the shade to sit upon. And there she waited.

Alone.

Trying not to think anything at all.

She didn’t want to think of fears. She didn’t want to think about worries. She definitely didn’t want to think about the future and what it might hold. She wanted to just sit quietly, try to enjoy the sunny morning, and breathe the fresh air. She wanted to think about the present, to have courage right here and now to act. To act without fear. To confront the Humans, and to see that they were stopped from doing more harm.

Analindë did her best to ignore the spot inside herself that now felt like it shimmered. She also tried to ignore the fact that the place that shimmered also happened to be the place that she’d ripped open when she’d scryed the fortress two days ago. She sighed. What had she done?

She ran through a few centering exercises, and when she finished with those, she opened her eyes and began to study the courtyard around her. It was a large gathering space, perhaps built for commerce or the movement of large numbers of people. There were balconies and some empty window boxes. The architecture was interesting. Clean lines, with beautiful finishing touches. But the lines were strong; they’d been designed to impress.

The sun rose fully, and still she was alone. There was no sound, barring the swirl of desert sand against stone and the rush of wind past windows and around corners. No birds had sung out at the sun’s rising; no animal scurried, great or small.

Abandoned. The great city lay abandoned by all.

Eventually, one by one the scouts arrived. They made their way out of the maze separately even though they had entered together; each of them had traversed the way alone.

Thalion was the last of the scouts to exit the maze; he ignored Arandur’s hail and stepped directly toward Analindë. Kneeling a respectful distance away from her, Thalion said, “When you come to this place again, I would come with you Analindë-ashantiel.” He spoke using the honorific title of great power. He bowed his head and swung his right arm forward, palm facing up to touch his shoulder, as one would swear fealty to an overlord.

“Thalion, no. Please do not do this . . . rise. I am not–” She scrambled backwards, away from the man kneeling in front of her. She was not a ruler; she had no desire to rule over anyone. She just wanted life to be normal.

“I have chosen as is my right. I would follow you and be at your service.” She wanted to step back further, but the fierceness in his eyes pinned her in place. Instead, she moved forward to tug upward on his shirt. He would not stand. She let go, her hand shaky, and skittered backward again.

She closed her eyes and took deep breaths to still the riotous feelings inside. She did not want this, but her actions were rude, ungrateful. It made her feel shame. Analindë pinned her frenetic mind on the scout, narrowing her thoughts to focus just on him, discarding all else. Quiet confidence sank deep within her, calming as it went. After a long moment she exhaled one last time, then opened her eyes with slight unease.

He yet waited.

She hesitated.

He continued to wait.

Analindë took a step toward him.

And then another.

Then strode the rest of the distance quickly. She reached out before her fears could resurface and touched his wrist with the third and fourth fingers of her right hand. Power pulsed between them, searing.

He was stalwart and would not betray her.

Ever.

He was a farspeaker with abilities to reach across the Realm; the strength of it was rare. No one but his father knew of his reach and he guarded it closely.

He had the latent abilities of a tracker, which would or would not ever develop. There were other abilities hidden slightly from her, but he had chosen not to pursue them.

The sensation disappeared, and a moment later she was standing in the deserted courtyard with the scout kneeling before her. She stepped back from him and a spot on her shoulder blazed hot, then cooled. She rubbed the spot absently, noticing that it seemed to be in the same place where Pedar’s bond had burned.

Thalion rose, then took his place with his friends. He stood tall and straight, face solid. He didn’t look at his companions, avoiding their questioning looks. He stood so strongly. No, valiantly. He was standing valiantly; he’d made a choice, and now he stood by that choice. If he could stand valiantly, then so could she. She would not cower in confusion and worry. She straitened her shoulders and also ignored the surprised and concerned faces of the other two scouts.

His pledge had shaken her, but she would not let it have sway with her fears. As she walked over toward the scouts she wondered what had happened to her new Friend while he’d picked his way through the maze. “Thalion,” his eyes flicked over to meet hers, confident and direct. “So we are bound. Should I turn and betray the trust placed in me, so shall you rise up and slay me. As likewise, it is my duty toward you should you turn.”

“So be it.” His voice spoke firmly, but his eyes said,
I will never turn
. And she believed him.

A long time later Andulmaion staggered out of a new opening in the large rock; it sealed shut behind him as quickly as he left.

He looked shaken, but said nothing.

When he joined them, Sintriel broke the silence. “The elven traps and defenses that lie ahead have been disarmed.” And then she said no more.

Arandur reached out to catch her arm. She turned to him as he asked, “Analindë, there is too much interference. I cannot track here. Can you sense where the humans are?”

She quickly looked to the void and found that they were in the same room that they’d been in the day before. “They are in a room filled with books on the second floor of a building on the southwest side of the fortress.” She opened her eyes and pointed the way.

“Good, then come,” said Arandur as he strode off through the courtyard, picking his way around the strewn rubble.

The scale of the fortress amazed Analindë. Everything was large, from the doors and walkways to the courtyards and plazas. Elvish design tended to be open and uplifting, but none of it compared to the grandeur and scale of the fortress. Hallways were massive and the courtyards and passageways were even bigger. It was forceful and brutish, but yet beautiful. She wondered who had built this place.

There were spaces where flocks could be kept or small gardens grown. A desert spring surfaced in many of the courtyards, offering a peaceful and tranquil escape. One in particular caught her eye; its walls were tiled in blue, the pool was choked with sand, but the morning light shimmered off small hollows of water.

They cut through various residences and meeting halls where the ways were narrow and the buildings smaller, taking the most direct route to the south side of the city irrespective of roads or buildings. For who would mind their trespass?

They finally reached the far section of the city and Analindë stopped in front of an impressive building. Large stone columns graced the entrance; glyphs in old elvish were carved beneath the pediment. She couldn’t quite make out the relief, but the glyphs she easily translated. “Enter to learn, go forth and serve,” it read.

She motioned to her companions, “They’re in this one.”

They quietly entered the building and discovered the largest library any of them had ever seen or could have imagined. Room upon room was filled with books, study rooms, meeting rooms, and more books. And again, the scale of the rooms was unlike anything they’d ever seen before. Analindë stood staring at the high ceilings, her mouth agape, until she realized the others were waiting for her.

While she’d been staring at the graciously appointed central hall, the others had removed their packs and the scouts had drawn their weapons. She hastily followed suit, adding her pack to the pile. Arandur held a wicked looking dagger; both Sintriel and Thalion held long two-edged swords which looked at home in their hands. Sintriel’s blade was slightly curved at the end. Andulmaion left his sword sheathed; its green jewel winked wickedly in its hilt. Her hands felt awkwardly empty so she tucked them behind her.

She led them to a wide, double long flight of stairs. Upon reaching the landing, they crept silently down the hall toward the bookroom that the Humans had turned into a home.

A few windows dimly lit the passage; sunlight slanted across the hall, illuminating dust that hung in the air. The ceaseless desert wind stirred sand that pooled in neglected corners.

There was only one entrance to the bookroom. Light spilled through it into the hallway. Voices sounded from within.

«Analindë, move to the back.» Andulmaion spoke to her mind.

The rest of her party pulled forward in front of her as she slowed to let them pass. Her hands felt chilled. Blood rushed to her head, thudding loudly to her ears. She would not let her fears rule her. It was beautiful and surreal to watch the scouts move up the hallway from pillar to crumpled pile of furniture as they secured the hallway in front of her. They moved with the ease that comes with consistent practice over decades.

The scouts identified a few warning devices that the Humans had set out and circled them, leaving them intact. It was painstaking work. She carefully moved around the devices they’d marked, wary of making any sound. By now the cold stone of the floor had leeched the warmth from her feet, leaving her toes frozen. She almost expected to see her breath hang in the air. Except the winter air was not cold enough for that.

They were not twenty paces from the book room when a swoosh filled the air; everyone tensed looking around for the danger. A blade flashed out and sliced Thalion in the leg. He grunted and fell to the floor as blood spurted out around him. Arandur jumped back to disarm the device—which was hidden in a pile of rubbish—before it could swing again.

The babble of voices in the bookroom ceased. Time slowed and the world stopped spinning as Andulmaion sprinted to Thalion’s side, casting a spell to stop the bleeding as he went. She watched in shock as he tore a strip of cloth from his shirt and bound the wound. Then he dragged Thalion behind a large pillar to protect him from further harm.

A shout drew Analindë’s attention to Arandur and Sintriel; she sprinted toward them. They had pressed forward to keep the Humans from escaping down the hall.

She slowed down as she neared them and edged toward the wall. Sintriel had engaged the bear of a man named Henry. Arandur was wrestling a dagger from the woman; a moment later he threw something away from them. She saw a flash of metal. He’d disarmed the woman. They continued to fight, one graceful, the other brutish, but effective.

Something was wrong. There shouldn’t have been a struggle. The elven scouts should have been able to disarm the Humans within moments.

Keeping her back to the wall, she slowly crept closer. She studied the Humans with her magesight. Ah, there’s the problem. As Pedar had predicted, both of the Humans were wearing some sort of amulet about their necks. She saw how the amulet connected to them with a thread of Energy . . . that’s why they’re so agile and strong. She reached out with a tendril of Energy to disengage the necklaces or find a way to counteract the wards.

As she was about to touch the necklace, a large jet of gold light shot out of the amulet and raced up the tendril she’d sent out. Excruciating pain wracked her body. The only thoughts in her mind circled around fear and fascination of what would happen when that liquid gold light reached her.

She reached into herself and pulled. The strongest shield she’d ever cast slammed up between her and the golden bolt as it zipped toward her. The shield was as strong as the thickest granite she could imagine, rough-hewn and made to withstand the impact of a thousand blows.

The bolt exploded against her shield and reverberated through it, causing a low tone to echo within the safety inside. Relieved, Analindë dropped her shielding—as she’d been taught to do—and studied the amulets again, keeping her thread of Energy coiled nearby.

The wizard had yet to appear, but sounds of movement carried to her from the bookroom. The woman had broken free from Arandur and somehow produced yet another dagger; they were now involved in a vicious knife fight. They dodged, twirled and jumped around each other, each looking for the right time to strike a killing blow against the other.

Sintriel had drawn a second blade; they flashed in the light as she whirled around the man. Both wielded long swords, looking almost graceful as they danced across the floor, twisting and turning. It was beautiful, but wrong. It shouldn’t be happening.