Balec Milon

If I wasn’t sure before of Rueln’s true identity, then I was now. His reaction, or lack of one, told me all I needed to know. It was almost instantaneous that the shaken child beside me disappeared behind the veil of his past life. It was Vhal who stared up at me with eyes much older than the body she was in now, and they were full of distrust and unwavering calm in the face of an unknown enemy. I could feel her energy all around him, his soulforce merging both of his lives into one.

I knew that was how Rueln would see it if I spoke. He was keeping it a secret, and for good reason. He was an intelligent child and knew that if he spoke to anyone carelessly about who he was, there would be a target on his back and that of his family. They would silence Rueln before he could grow into the skills he needed to defend himself.

“You’re wrong,” he told me, as he climbed into the carriage after it came to a stop. I had to hold back a smile. There really wasn’t much of a point in denying it. I didn’t need his acknowledgment to know who I had been speaking with ever since the night I met him. It was the only reason I sponsored him, not because of any political advantage I might gain. Quite the opposite.

“You should learn to recognize an ally when you meet them,” I advised, taking my seat. The door shut firmly behind me so even the coachman couldn’t hear our conversation. “There is little need to deny it. I’ve known for a while and have told no one. I do not wish to use you in that way, Rueln.”

“Is that why you sponsored me, then?” Rueln demanded, piecing things together. “You thought I was Vhal? How stupid. She’s in there. I watched her recall myself.”

“I wasn’t aware you were a witness,” I said, leaning back, not trying to pressure him anymore than necessary. Whatever was wrong right now was still very much on his mind. Color hadn’t returned to his complexation since I saw him back in the ballroom. If I didn’t know he had already suffered recall, then I would have been concerned that was it. It was unmistakable that he feared something, though, and denied it.

He was the first to look away, recognizing he had revealed more than he wanted just now. “It doesn’t matter.”

“I suppose it’s been confusing for you,” I said, looking to the window to allow him as much of an illusion of space as I was able while we shared a carriage. “Someone pretending to be you.”

“I never said I was Vhal,” he argued venomously. The more I said, the more he lost his hold on Vhal’s calm. I was shaking him up, which wasn’t difficult considering his current state.

I pretended he hadn’t spoken and continued, “It isn’t the first time this has happened. Though it’s been more than a century since they caught someone. I’m sure there are more that go undiscovered.”

“How did you know?” He whispered, my sense of his soulforce fading away until I was speaking with the eight-year-old little boy again. I traced the months of confusion and fear in his every word. He couldn’t know who he could trust. I was sure that he hadn’t even told his master, though I wasn’t sure about Finnley. He was much more himself around the other boy than anyone else.

I couldn’t tell him everything, but I could at least tell him what I had observed just being around him. “There are mannerisms, habits, preferences, that are transferred from one life to another,” I explained, studying him again and not surprised at all to find his honey brown eyes watching me. “Even without you using the soulforce and relying on Vhal’s experiences, you share things with her. It is completely unconscious.”

“Like what?” he asked in a way that I was sure he wanted to correct the habit. I resisted the urge to frown at the idea of him trying to change that much of himself in order to better hide in plain sight.

“You dislike being touched,” I said, the first thing that came to my mind. His eyes widened, and he stared at me in shock. “Vhal was the same. She also adored her hair long. I’ve noticed since you cut yours that you keep touching it, you never look happy when you do.”

“Master made me cut it,” he admitted. “I hate it.”

“I thought that might be the case.”

“Is there something else?” He asked, pulling his feet up so he was huddled on the bench, pressing his back into the corner. He relaxed a little, but I couldn’t blame him for still feeling trapped.

“Many things,” I answered, then tilted my head. “I’m surprised you haven’t asked how I know.”

“I don’t think you’ll answer,” he said, the sharp observance pulling a chuckle from me.

“You’re right.”

“Then what’s the point of asking?”

“I suppose you have the right of it,” I admitted freely before I decided it was time to return to what I needed to know. “Rueln, will you please tell me what has you so frightened?”

“I’m not afraid,” he said, his denial falling flat as he hugged his knees, hiding his face. I let him have the moment, choosing to wait rather than push. In the end, he trusted me and lifted his head. “I think I have the answer I wanted to know,” he whispered.

“What answer is that?”

“I think Bria’s true identity is Vhal’s killer.”

My heart stopped. I think I stopped breathing as well. Nothing could have prepared me for that answer. I couldn’t show any reaction, however. I couldn’t dare risk him shutting down on me again. “Why do you believe that?”

The wind picked up as I stood outside my carriage watching Rueln hurry inside his home. He paused just inside the door to look back at me, nodding once, then disappeared inside. Our conversation had been long and quite insightful. I couldn’t say I trusted his observations as absolute truth, but I couldn’t deny that they had merit. Enough merit that I took a risk.

Once Rueln was inside, I told my coachman to take a walk. Only when he was gone did I pull a small piece of embroidered cloth from my inner coat pocket and unfolded it. I kept it at hand ever since I discovered Rueln, just in case. Stepping onto Esra’s property, I walked over to her tree and reached up to tie the cloth to the closest branch with a small metal emblem within its folds of my house. After checking to make sure it was secure and the rising gusts of wind wouldn’t blow it away, I returned to the carriage to wait.

Ten minutes passed, then thirty with no sign my message had been received. I decided I would leave it there and wait. My emblem would be enough of a signature on who they should contact. When my coachman knocked on the door, telling me he was back, I ordered him to return to the estate and went home.

The drive was far too brief a time to organize my thoughts. Alexan greeted me as soon as the carriage pulled up to a stop in front of the house and caught me up on things regarding the estate and my business affairs. In the end, however, I saved most of the work for the next day and ordered tea to be brought up to my study. Alexan bowed and promised he would see to it himself before hurrying away.

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Opening the door to my study, I pulled my coat off of my shoulders and turned to hang it up on the coat rack only to see a figure leaning against my desk. Crying out in alarm, I dropped it, and reached for my sword instinctively, only to freeze when the cloaked figure held up the fabric I had hung on Esra’s tree not two hours before.

“How did you get in here?” I asked, looking out the door to make sure I had gone unheard and closing it behind me. For good measure, I locked it so even Alexan would have to knock before he could enter.

“Do you think those enchantments can keep me out of anywhere I wished to go?” my guest said.

“You make me question how well the mage enchanted this room in the first place,” I sighed, bending to pick my coat up and return it to where it belonged.

“It was well enough for human work,” she said, giving me at least a measure of comfort. “What is this?” She asked, holding up the cloth with the Molak’ev emblem embroidered on its face. She threw it and the emblem of my house onto my desk. “I didn’t expect to see this again. What do you want?”

I glanced down at them, remembering how I had done something similar in my past life to get this woman’s attention. It had worked then as it worked now. From the moment I repeated the action, she knew my identity. It was enough for her to reveal herself, at least.

“There are many things I want,” I admitted, moving to my desk and lowering myself into my chair. “But there are few things that I could ever dare ask you to help me with.”

“We had an agreement before,” she said, her tone practically a growl. “That does not extend beyond one lifetime into the next.”

“Then perhaps it’s time we speak of a new one,” I said and gestured for her to please take a seat. “If I could have a moment of your time. It is of grave importance.”

“Nothing you have to say is important enough for me to waste my time here.”

“Rueln is in danger,” I countered, and she stiffened. Reaching up, she pulled back her dark hood and revealed the face I knew to be beneath.

Her every feature was exotic and wild, her dark skin rich with color. Black horns curved up from her head, helping to make her look taller than she was from beneath the hood. Black hair, darker than night, cascaded down her shoulders and back in an untamed mess.

There was an unmistakable sense of danger in her gaze that I couldn’t help but be in awe of. She was just as beautiful in the distant memories of my past life as she was now, as ageless as the night. It made me question if every el’denura was like this in their presence. The draconic people were beings of legends to the rest of the continent. Hardly anyone could even describe what they looked like. I didn’t even know this one’s name. She had always refused to speak it, and I was in no position to insist upon it.

Glowing, slitted orange eyes met mine, her lips curving back into a snarl. “Say that again, mortal,” she spat at me.

“Have a seat, please,” I repeated, trying not to let my unease show. Despite the years of training and my sword, this woman could kill me in a matter of seconds. There would be no fight. “I need to explain things to you.”

“Then speak before I rip out your throat,” she growled, then lowered herself into the seat that I offered her.

I tried to hide the shiver that went through me, taking a moment to maintain my composure. She was as terrifying as I remembered. “I ask for your patience. This is quite a long story.” One clawed finger tapped on the arm of her chair, encouraging me to continue. “Three years ago, the empire celebrated Vhal Aairith’s return. Everyone believed she had returned, but after observing her for only a short while, I had my reservations.”

“You mortals are usually quite obtuse about such things,” she snorted, crossing her legs as if resigning herself to listen. “Why were you any different?”

“Because,” I said, smirking, “I never saw you.” That seemed to surprise her. She frowned at me, but waited for me to continue without bothering to ask the questions I knew were on her tongue. “From my last life to this one, I didn’t believe your habits would change. I mean no disrespect. I simply recognize that you would not let something as insignificant as reincarnation stop you. You were Vhal’s shadow. I had little doubt I would see you again when we found her.”

“What does a human know of the el’denura?” She said, offense in her tone at the assumption.

“Nothing,” I assured her, willing to say anything to placate her pride so we could continue speaking in as friendly a manner as possible. “These were only guesses. I couldn’t hope to believe myself to know you beyond the few observations I made in my past life. Does your desire to protect them still hold true?” Of course it was, but she didn’t like that. It sounded as if I were deciding for her.

Her answer was much softer than I expected. She had taken my question seriously, as I hoped she would. “Always,” she answered, and I knew she meant it. As el’denura, she was as close to immortal as was possible to be. Always and forever' was a very long time, and my lifetime was only a drop in the ocean in comparison.

“Then there are a few things you should know,” I said, wondering if what I was about to say would be what got me killed. It would certainly anger her. “I’ve been investigating the Gracy girl ever since I suspected she was lying about being Vhal. I’ve been trying to figure out who was pulling her strings and gathering potential allies around her. Rueln agreed to help me after I sponsored him. I believe he wanted to find out who she was and how she knew Vhal so well. Until now, everything has been progressing well, although neither of us had the answers we wanted.”

“Until now?” She demanded. “What do you mean?”

“Rueln discovered the dagger that Gracy used in her recall,” I said, speaking slowly, studying the woman’s expression as if my life depended on it. It very well might depend on how she was going to take this. “It was the same weapon that killed Vhal in her chambers that night. Rueln believes Gracy is his killer reborn.”

Silence greeted me. Despite what I expected, the woman didn’t react at all. There wasn’t even a hint of surprise in her burning eyes as she watched me realize that she already knew.

“How did you know?” I breathed, feeling as if I was the one who had the world tilted on its head. She must have been following Rulen for years now, but she only watched as Bria Gracy approached him in this life, knowing what it would mean if she found him to be a threat to her.

“That night I was the one who found Vhal,” she answered, the first hint of emotion flickering on her face. She still grieved even after all these centuries, but with that grief was a rage so deep that I couldn’t guess where it ended. “Do you think I wouldn’t recognize the one who held that blade?”

I jumped to my feet, unable to hold myself back. “You know who killed them? They murdered Vhal and Ara that night. You knew who did it and yet you didn’t come forward?! I spent my life trying to find the hand who killed my Empress!”

“Do not raise your voice at me,” she warned me, the threatening growl trickling back into her voice. “Vengeance was mine to take. You wasted your life searching if that is the excuse you give.”

“Who was it!?!” I demanded, refusing to back down, not on this. “They can easily choose to kill Rueln again, I must know!”

“The past will not repeat,” she answered me cryptically, refusing to answer my question.

“You don’t know that! I can’t lose him again!”

“Watch your tongue,” she snarled, her lips pulling back to reveal her canines. They seemed larger than moments before, but that might just be because of the threatening aura coming off her. “I will not let history repeat itself. He will not die again by that hand, but I cannot interfere with the course his life takes. His fate is his own. I must honor that.”

“What do you know of honor?! You were supposed to protect him!”

“So were you!” She snarled, then in the next second threw me backwards away from my desk and slammed my back into the bookshelf behind me. Trinkets fell to the floor, shattering, while her clawed hand dug into the flesh of my throat. “Do not speak to me of honor. I have given up everything for him. My life. My people. Do not speak to me of honor as if you know it. You don’t.”

She shoved me again as she released her hold on my throat, leaving me leaning over and coughing while air filled my lungs again. When I looked up, she was pulling her hood up to cover her face again, careful to not snag on her horns.

“You’r-You’re leaving? What about Rueln?”

“I will do as I have always done,” she answered, opening the door. “I suggest you work harder. Your information on the movements of the dangers in this lifetime is lacking.” She shut the door behind her, leaving me stunned in my study for a moment while I processed what she said. When it finally clicked, I ran to the door and threw it open, bolting into the hall only to find it empty.

She was gone.

Sighing, I closed my eyes and turned about to go back into my study when I stepped on something. Pausing, I lifted my boot to reveal what looked like an enchanted pendant. I could sense magic about it, but not what kind. It was like nothing I’ve ever seen before. Picking it up, I twisted it, amazed at the craftsmanship of the ten-pointed star design, and the crystal centerpiece where it contained magic.