Yelora

A splash of water in the face woke Yelora. She scrambled to her elbows, reaching instinctively for her staff. It snapped to full size and she pointed it at a cloaked figure, also wielding a staff, this one crowned with a blood-red crystal.

Yelora blinked away water droplets. A pinched Elven face with amber eyes came into focus.

Ronith!

Yelora turned her staff away. “Ronith,” she breathed, coughing and spitting out sand. “I was hoping I’d find you.”

Ronith leaned against a pile of shadowy mangrove roots by the river, the creature crouched at her feet. Their eyes were like four beacons, yellow and unblinking.

The creature! It was still alive, thank the Sprites. A loop of roughspun rope lay around its lumpy neck, Ronith holding the other end.

“You haven’t tamed it yet?” she asked.

“The rope is for his safety,” Ronith growled.

“His?” Yelora stood stiffly, brushing more sand off herself. “All Elves are female. You know that.” Something caught her eye. “It’s missing a finger. What happened?”

“We were captured by the Imperial and Dwarven forces.”

Yelora felt a shift in her chest. She’d been so focused on Creation Falls and fixing her problem that she hadn’t stopped to think. They were at war. Truly at war.

She was queen of what was now the Elf Faction of Terris. She could no longer put off getting involved. She would ally with the Wizards. Together they would hold the crash site with overpowering magic while Yelora figured out how to use the creature to overcome her people’s infertility.

Yelora glanced around at the moonlit riverbank. “I was with the Summoner,” she said. “Where is he?”

“The quicksand was a magical trap. It leads to the Wizards’ hideout.”

Her annoyance resurfaced. “Then why didn’t you let me fall through? I need to speak with the Alchemist.”

Ronith’s shoulders shifted. “Gorlo doesn’t like it on the barge.”

“Gorlo?” This was too much. First, she’d assigned the little monster a gender, then she’d named it? Ronith had gone too far. It was time to remind her of her place. “Come, Dark Elf, hand over the rope. I’ll take responsibility for the creature from here.”

Ronith pushed to her feet, giving the rope another turn over her hand. “I don’t go by that title anymore.”

Yelora snorted and wiped the sandy back of her palm across her forehead. Sprites, there was sand everywhere. And she was tiring of Ronith’s game. “And what title, pray tell, do you go by these days?”

“Blood Mage.”

Yelora’s annoyance transformed into true anger. “You’ve joined the Wizards?”

“I have.”

“You cannot do that—not without permission from the crown.”

“I have done it. The Alchemist has sworn me in and I have already begun my training in the Arcane Arts.”

Fire seared in Yelora’s veins. “You had no right,” she spat. “You are part of the royal guard. You are supposed to be loyal!”

“You and Sochee left me behind,” Ronith said coldly. “I didn’t think you’d miss me.”

Yelora scoffed. “Still a bratty child, are you? You know your way back to Elven lands. I shouldn’t have to babysit you.”

“I’m a Blood Mage now. You’ll show me the proper respect!” Ronith tapped her staff on the floor and the red crystal seated in it glowed.

“And what will you do if I don’t?”

She saw the rage boiling behind Ronith’s sneer. The Elf girl had always been this way. Full of anger. The speck of darkness in her poisoning her. She’d always been a liability. Always would be.

“Go on,” Yelora prodded, staff at the ready. “Make your betrayal complete, Dark Elf.”

The blast from the red staff surprised Yelora. She hadn’t thought Ronith would actually do it. Parrying the attack with a blast from her own staff, she tapped a purple crystal in her crown. Ronith’s mouth moved in a protection spell, but too late. The time lapse was already in place. Her dagger was at Ronith’s throat before the Dark Elf could stop her.

“That is the first and last time you threaten me,” Yelora purred in her ear. With the purple crystal powering her crown, the time lapse wouldn’t last long, but at least it wouldn’t falter. From the corner of her vision, Yelora saw the creature, teeth bared, coming to Ronith’s rescue in slow motion. She booted it away with a foot.

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“Stupid, short-sighted child,” Yelora went on, feeling the hate fuel every word. “I knew from the start you could never be trusted. You are and ever will be flawed. Poisoned by darkness. The opening word of an unforgivable curse. A mistake... just like that pet of yours.” She pressed the point into Ronith’s neck, felt the give of soft flesh. The sensation gave her pause. She had never killed another Elf. That was something that just wasn’t done.

Suddenly she was reminded of the day Ronith was welcomed into the royal guard beside her, when Fara was still queen. The youngest Elf, the one with a darkness no one knew about—not even Yelora at the time. They’d trained together. Taken meals together. They’d never actually been friends, but they were more than this.

More than enemies.

But Ronith was a liability now. She’d betrayed Yelora and by doing so had betrayed all of Elven Faire. As much as she did not want to kill one of her own, Ronith was not really one of her own.

Plus, the Dark Elf would protect the creature at all costs, and Yelora needed it. It was the key to saving her people. She wasn’t sure how, but she would figure it out.

Meanwhile, she had a throat to slit.

Ronith’s yellow eyes were wide with terror as Yelora adjusted her blade. “It brings me no pleasure to do this,” she said quietly, her disgust overwhelmed all at once by the heavy mantle of responsibility. “I wish there was another way.”

She pressed the blade into Ronith’s flesh, saw the bright bloom of blood just as pain exploded behind her eye.

“Aargh!” Yelora cried, losing her grip on the blade. The time lapse halted, realtime crashing in on her. The creature sunk its teeth into her leg. Ronith pushed her down on the ground, pinning her, mouth stretched into a furious grin.

Yelora tried to fight back, but she couldn’t move. Ronith had paralyzed her—clearly part of her new Blood Mage powers. Yelora’s blade was in her hand.

“Congratulations!” Spittle rained on Yelora’s face as Ronith hissed the word. “You’ll be the Elf Queen with the shortest reign in history.”

“And you’ll be hanged for it!” Yelora spat back.

“Let your Elves try!”

“You’re an Elf!”

“Are you sure about that? I thought I was a mistake? A monster!”

Ronith leaned on Yelora’s chest, pressing the breath out of her. She still felt the tugging of the little monster’s teeth on her numbed leg. How badly was it injuring her? Did it even matter, at this point?

“Well now I am a Wizard!” Ronith cried. “And your opinion of me will no longer matter.”

“But your opinion of yourself will,” She couldn’t move to reach her staff or even to make the token of a petty spell. The only weapon she had was her words. “The shame you carry for what you are. That won’t go away when I do.”

Yelora fought the paralysis, forced her fingers to crawl to the staff that lay next to her.

“Shut your cursed mouth!” Ronith shrieked.

“Your self-hatred won’t go away,” Yelora retorted. She had to keep Ronith talking. Distracted. Angry enough to make a mistake, but not angry enough to kill Yelora. “It’ll never go away!”

Her fingers found the staff, curled around it. The creature yelped a warning, but it was too late. With the flick of a wrist, Yelora blasted Ronith in the side. The Dark Elf cried out and rolled off her.

The paralysis spell vanished and Yelora staggered to her feet, hissing a protection spell in place. The creature leapt at her, and she launched a bolt from her staff at it, knocking it out cold. It was just enough of a distraction for Ronith to recover and grab her own staff. The two Elves stood, face to face, in a standoff.

“If we both die, there will be no one to take care of the creature,” Yelora said.

“You wouldn’t care for him! You want to kill him!”

Ronith’s free hand moved in the cloth at her side, but Yelora was prepared for the knives cartwheeling at her one by one, lightning fast, but not fast enough. She clamshelled one hand, and they fell to the ground. “I see there’s still some Dark Elf left in you, yet.”

Yelora launched a fireball from her staff, but Ronith ducked, a rippling protection bubble closing over her like a lily blossom.

“We can’t fight like this, out in the open!” Ronith cried. “They’ll see us! We’ll lead them right to the hideout.”

“It wasn’t my idea to fight!” Yelora sent another blast Ronith’s way. “And how do I even know you were telling the truth about a hideout?”

The knives zoomed up from the ground and began to spin in a dizzying dance. Yelora brandished her staff, ready to bat them away as they zinged toward her. But they never made an attempt to hit their mark as Ronith’s attention was drawn by the unthinkable thing rising over the hill, dwarfing the tiny metal weapons with the sheer enormity of its shiny bulk.

A machine marched into view, uncanny in its size, horrifying in the strange beauty of its design. Like a great metal Elemental, it stomped across the dark plain toward them, lantern-eyes shining with unholy light in the darkness.

“What is that thing?” Yelora gasped.

“Ah, look who it is!” A voice with a Dwarven accent spoke, but Yelora couldn’t tell where it was coming from. “The little Elf who gave us our advantage and her queen.”

The voice was coming from inside the machine. Peering past the metal ribcage, Yelora spotted the dark-haired Dwarf inside. She aimed her staff and sent an energy blast at him. The blast struck the metal, then danced around the outside of the machine, dissipating into nothing. The Dwarf inside guffawed.

“Magic doesn’t work on our golems, don’t ye know?”

It took another huge step toward them, and another, and another.

Sprites! Yelora whirled in a panic. The creature was still unconscious on the ground. She scooped it under her arm and ran for the river.

“We’re coming for ye Elves, ye know! We’ve already found yer stronghold at the crash site. It’s only a matter o’ time before we break down yer walls and take it fer ourselves!”

A battery of arrows exploded from a bush on her right. With a swoop of her arm, she knocked them astray, her boot digging into the sand as she changed direction. The mangroves! She could hide in there. But the golem had cut off her escape in that direction. A red blast from Ronith lit up the night, and she saw the Dark Elf fighting off a contingent of soldiers. She sent a blast of her own at the archers, then made for the only escape route, out into the open.

The creature was heavy, and her leg was weak where it had bitten her, but she cast a protection spell over them and blasted at any movement she saw. Up ahead was something she recognized. The quicksand!

If Ronith was telling the truth, it would lead to the Wizards’ hideout. But if she’d been lying, Yelora would be cutting her life short and the creature’s, too, ending any possibility of saving the Elven people.

There was no time even to consult the oracle of her soul. She ran for the quicksand, wrapped two arms tightly around the creature, and leapt.