"Hannah brought me to Valiant where I eventually joined the Council. I have spent the last few hundred years helping the Fates and my ruler with whatever task they needed. It has been a daunting but rewarding task." Zan finished his tale.

It felt good to tell someone what happened all those years ago. The Guardian was not even sure if Hanna knew everything that occurred. Zan believed he had put all of it behind him long ago, but seeing Lanassa again proved that he had never actually processed what happened. 'Better to work through it now than never to do it at all,' Zan reasoned.

"So you did not jilt the Queen?" Aurora asked, deep in thought.

Zan nearly choked on the question. "What? No! Of course not. If anything, she jilted me."

"Either one of you is lying or no one was jilted at all." Aurora scrunched her face at the word 'jilted'. Like any word said repeatedly, it now sounded strange.

"What are you thinking?" The Guardian looked at the young woman expectantly. It was clear she had come to a decision.

"I think we need to speak to the King and Queen…together. And soon." Aurora opened the door and emerged from the closet. There was no time to lose.

——————-

There was a reluctant knock at the King's suite of rooms. "Who could it be at this hour?" Lanassa asked. Although they usually slept separately, Zoltan had requested his wife stay with him after the day's events.

The King rubbed his eyes. "I have no idea…Enter!" He bellowed toward the door. "And it better be important!!"

Not one, but three servants barreled into the room and bowed low. They all began talking at once. The noise was overwhelming for the tired king.

"Enough!" He called to silence them. "You first," he indicated the elf on the left.

"Sire I have been sent from the dungeon. The man, Zan, has escaped!"

"What?!" Lanassa, who had been ignoring the scene with a pillow on her face, exclaimed as she sat up.

The second servant added to the problem. "The gnome and Empress are missing as well. They are not in their rooms and no one saw them leave."

Zoltan's face became so red that a tomato would have been jealous. "There is no excuse for this incompetence!"

The third servant, not to be outdone, stood straight and announced proudly, "Your Majesties, Empress Aurora awaits you in the throne room. She requires your presence, claiming it is urgent. I believe the man and gnome are with her."

The King and Queen exchanged a glance. Lanassa hopped out of bed. "Tell Her Majesty that I will be there in a moment," Lanassa ordered.

"You are not seriously thinking of going!" Zoltan could not believe his eyes. The queen never let anyone order her around, not even him.

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"I am going to change clothes first, but of course I am going. The Empress would never pull such a bold move if she were not sure that it were important. Are you coming?" The queen gazed fiercely at her husband.

"I…I do not think it is a good idea for you to be around Zan. Not after what he did to you." Zoltan argued.

"I appreciate your concern, my dear. I will be fine. I am going with or without you." Lanassa pulled her robe tightly around herself and headed to her quarters, leaving Zoltan to mutter angrily to himself.

------

Queen Lanassa, fully dressed and ready for action, entered the throne room on the arm of her husband. Zoltan would never let his wife be alone with Zan, so of course he had arisen from his comfortable bed to attend this meeting. The king's grim expression showed his displeasure.

The two monarchs walked slowly toward their thrones. Aurora stood patiently with Zan by her side at the base of the platform. Nearby Gandr and Alvar, who were only there as witnesses, stood together along a wall with the elven soldiers.

"Even you, Lord Alvar?!" Zoltan grumbled angrily as he passed the pair.

"This was entirely the Empress's idea, Your Majesty. She thought you might like to have another elf here for these proceedings," Alvar responded respectfully. "Empress Aurora wanted to follow protocol."

Zoltan wanted to reprimand the younger elf, but Lanassa urged him to their seats. When he was situated, he inclined his head dutifully to Aurora. "Greetings, young Empress. To what do we owe the pleasure of this midnight summons? I see you have freed your Councilman against my wishes."

"I appreciate you not making us wait until morning for your company, Your Majesty," Aurora began as she curtsied. "I have rescued Councilman Zan to save you from carrying out an injustice on him."

"What do you mean?" Lanassa asked, her hands already running nervously along her lacy gown.

"Perhaps it would be better if the soldiers were not present for this royal meeting. What do you think, King Zoltan?" the dark-haired woman whispered her concern as she gave him a pointed gaze.

The King unconsciously gulped. "It is too early in the morning to hold formal court. Perhaps we can move to a more private setting and settle these differences there," he suggested.

Aurora nodded her head with a gentle smile. "I thought you might see it that way. How gracious of you to show us your elven hospitality! I know together we can solve the mystery of what happened all those years ago."

The six members of the group situated themselves in the room made for clandestine meetings such as these. The chairs were placed in two semi-circles with the three elves on one half facing the three visitors on the other. Refreshments were brought and placed in the middle of the group.

"I still do not like that Zan is here," Zoltan repeated for at least the third time.

"Then order him removed if you must, my husband, but do stop your complaining. It is unbecoming of the king," Lanassa scolded him.

"If we remove Zan, we will never get his side of the story. Please hear him out," Aurora pleaded. "Surely you have always wanted to know what happened." The Empress stared at the Queen.

Lanassa pressed her lips together. "Speak," she ordered the silver-eyed man. He happily obliged.

"On the day of our wedding I was abducted, beaten and left for dead. Had not the Fates intervened and made me a Guardian, I would not have survived. I returned to find you already married to your husband. I assumed you did not want me, and I decided to respect your wishes and leave for good."

Lanassa's lips parted as her hand came to her mouth.

"Ha! What a crazy story! You were disloyal to my wife, and you want to pin the blame on her. What nonsense. Do you believe him?" Zoltan was incredulous. He crossed his arms defiantly across his chest.

The queen nodded slowly as she looked at Zan. There was not a trace of deception in the man.

Deep down, Lanassa knew she had agreed to marry Zoltan too quickly, but she had seen no other way out. Self-preservation had taken the place of trust.

"I wish you had come and told me what happened. Even if it was after the marriage," Lanassa said quietly. "All these years I thought that you abandoned me."

"I would never do such a thing! The elves told me that you did not want to marry me. I was merely respecting your wishes, or so I thought." The Guardian's eyes flashed silver.

"So you did love me?" The queen was trying to wrap her head around the news. The walls that Lanassa had spent years building to never be betrayed again were slowly crumbling.

Zan glanced briefly at the king before looking at the queen. "I still love you. Love is not a thing that can be stopped once truly started."

"That is quite enough! I will not have you spouting word of love to my wife." Zoltan was at his limit. This man was infuriating and even more so because it seemed that his wife was being fooled once again. "I am going to call the guards. This nonsense will not go unpunished."

Lanassa grabbed her husband's arm and stopped him. There was one more burning question that she needed answered. Her hands were trembling as she spoke. "So...so you did not run away with my sister?"

"What?! How could I ever do such a thing? Your sister is lovely, but I only have eyes for you. No wonder you despise me! Who told you that I had done such a hideous thing?" Zan's voice was laced with both pity and anger.

"Zoltan did." The queen turned to her husband. His golden face went pale, and he was visibly distraught by the turn of events. The king's anger dissipated.

Aurora's intuition had been right. There was more to this story, and as she suspected, it involved the king. "King Zoltan, you seem to be the missing piece of this puzzle. I think you have some explaining to do." The Empress's hands lay calmly in her lap, like an impartial judge. It was only then that Zoltan realized he was the one being put on trial. He could refuse to talk and risk losing his wife and the respect of his kingdom, or he could tell his side of the story. There was only one choice to make.

Zoltan sighed, "I did what I thought was best..."