A Marriage of Friends (The Inner Seas Kingdoms Book 8) Page 6

  “How is it?” Kestrel paused, trying to grasp something obvious that had eluded him until then. “How is it that you have powers to travel around and change shape and do godly things, while our own gods are confined in what they can do right now?” he asked.

  “Confined? What do you mean? Are they under attack? I thought you told me while we were traveling in my world that you had gone to fight the Viathins and set captive gods free in that world. Are there more captives here?” she asked intently. She stared at him with eyes that seemed to drill into his mind.

  He felt trapped by her stare, and closed his eyes to set himself free. “No, not captive like that. In our land, our sun had a problem during the spring – it grew red spots, and it interrupted the imps and the gods,” he explained, and then talked about what the effects of the Rishiare Estelle had been.

  “This is fascinating,” Medeina said minutes later, as Kestrel’s story wore down. “Let’s go join your restive friends outside and get moving. You can tell me more as we travel.”

  Kestrel didn’t question how she knew about the state of his troop in the streets, but he led her out of the inn. “This is it,” he called hoarsely. “Let’s go to the human city, and arrange for supplies to be sent to the Marches. Tomorrow we can be on our way north and head back to the forest.”

  There was a wave of approving noises at his last words, and the column started traveling west towards Hydrotaz.

  Medeina ran alongside Kestrel as they left the confines of the village and began pacing through the open countryside. “I am not as strong here as I would be at home, because my strength comes from the wilderness of my land; but neither am I subject to the changes of your sun. I will suffer if I stay away from the wilderness too long, but not because your sun is throwing a tantrum.

  “And you, your powers here remain, despite the sun,” she pointed out.

  “I’m trying to learn how to use my powers,” Kestrel answered. “I don’t think I was using them very effectively before I went into the other world.” He had found Krusima’s brief instruction on the application of his energy to be instructive; he had thought about ways to make his energy usage more effective ever since. “I may have less power now than I did before, in the land of the Skyes, but I know how to use the power better,” he reflected.

  “I miss talking to the goddesses,” Kestrel admitted. “I’ll be glad when the Rishiare Estelle ends, and I can hear Kai and Kere again.”

  They ran on as the sunrise in the east occurred behind them, and early-rising residents of Hydrotaz were startled to see the column of elves passing through the countryside. By late morning they were nearing the more populated section of the country, approaching the capital city.

  There were more people starting to stare at them without running away, Kestrel observed, and he called a halt to the column’s advance just before they entered a small town.

  “Everyone try to stay calm and don’t do anything to provoke the humans in the town,” he warned. “Mulberry, would you put patrols up to watch for trouble? Let me know if it looks like there’s any danger of trouble or attack.”

  “Odare will give trouble to those who want to cause trouble,” the imp said combatively, making her companion raise her hands above her head in clinched fists.

  “No, we don’t need to give trouble,” Kestrel cautioned. “We just need to get to the capital so that I can talk to the princess, and let her know why we’re here.”

  “What if they do something to provoke us?” an elfin voice asked.

  “Tell me – immediately,” Kestrel instructed. “Don’t do anything else.”

  There were murmurs of unease, but no protests, so he started the column moving forward again.

  “You’re going to war, but you’re trying to be a person of peace,” Medeina commented as they trotted between the first buildings that lined the road. Kestrel heard her words, but he did not look at her as his head swiveled from side to side, looking for signs of trouble.

  They reached the center of the community, and Kestrel noted men standing atop the roofs of the shops and houses. He suddenly knew with certainty that there was going to be trouble, and he began to reach for his power. As he did, a man atop a building fired an arrow towards the center of confined mass of running elves.

  A shout arose from the trapped men and women of the column, just as Medeina raised her hand and pointed at the flying arrow. A burst of light traveled from her finger to the arrow, and the shaft of the projectile vanished in a bright flash, and then a cloud of fine ashes, while the arrow head dropped to the ground.

  As he watched Medeina’s protective action, Kestrel pulled his energy into the world, and put it into action, creating a protective tunnel of blue light that arched up and over the elves in the roadway, blocking all threats from above. “Keep going, keep running!” he shouted. “You’re safe now.” He had provided instant protection for them, enough to get them out of the center of the town, and he felt proud of his accomplishment, as well as thankful for Medeina’s help.

  Medeina reached out and grabbed his hand. He felt her power enter him, a flood of overwhelming strength and control, a sensation that passed through him while subjugating him, as her power enhanced his own and flowed through him to bolster the protective canopy he projected. The blue tunnel suddenly stretched itself forward, extending in front of his eyes to reach the boundaries of the town, and then even going beyond that to assure that no elf would be harmed, anywhere along the passage.

  “Thank you, my lady,” he said warmly.

  “As I said, you seem to want to go to war, yet you go to lengths to protect the peace. It is most unusual, but I respect you for such actions," the goddess told him.

  They both turned as they heard harsh sounds behind them, and the view backward towards the center of the village revealed that a shower of arrows were being fired down at the elves from a half dozen locations. The arrows streaked downward, but as they hit the blue shield of Kestrel and Medeina’s energy, they disappeared in small, bright explosions, while the elves beneath looked cautiously upward at the noisy destruction taking place above their heads.

  Kestrel screeched to a stop, as he whirled around to face the attack taking place in the village.

  “Stop it!” he shouted, and his emotions ran so strongly that his energy amplified his voice, making his command thunder down the street, rattling the windows of the buildings in the settlement.

  He paused, surprised by the unexpected results.

  “Shall I help you?” Medeina asked. “I can kill the attackers for you.

  “I do not like this place; this is like the places Decimindion controls. I would much rather return to the wilderness, or help this place return to wilderness,” she stated emphatically.

  “No,” Kestrel said sharply. “We don’t have to kill them.”

  He thought of the maneuver he had used in his battle against the Kovell. The monster of mist in the land of the Skyes had attacked him in a cave; Kestrel had defended himself by erecting a dome of energy as a shield, just like the shield that was protecting the elves.

  The imps were plummeting downward towards the humans, coming to the rescue of their elven allies.

  “Mulberry, Killcen, Odare, Acanthus! Stop! Let me take care of this,” he shouted.

  There were six targets here instead of one – six human archers instead of one Kovell. But Kestrel felt he could control his power sufficiently to do what he intended. He closed his eyes, and flipped the energy shield, letting it splinter into six large sheets of glowing power that flew up, flipped around, and enveloped the six archers Kestrel had seen attacking his followers. The enclosures rose into the air, bubbles carrying their captives with them above the streets and houses, and causing the men inside to shout in alarm, as people watching from windows along the way started to scream.

  The bubbles with their fearful cargo floated down towards Kestrel, as the elves in his traveling column came to a halt, bunching up close to him, astonishment in their e
yes.

  “You will not attack my people,” Kestrel spoke in a voice that was no longer amplified, but still loud, as he addressed the six shocked men who he held in his power. “We are not here to attack you, or any people in Hydrotaz. Do not do my people any harm. Do you understand?” he asked.

  The men inside the blue globes gaped in silence.

  “Do you understand?” Kestrel repeated the question, bouncing the balls with the men inside, knocking them off their feet.

  “Yes, my lord,” all the men said in fearful tones.

  “Then you are released,” Kestrel said, as he allowed the demonstration of power to dissolve, leaving the men to tumble to the ground. “Move the column out and keep going. I’ll catch up,” Kestrel told the leaders of his squad, switching back to the elven language. He felt tired from his use of the energy, despite the assistance that Medeina had supplied.

  The astonished elves readily and silently complied, reforming into a column as they resumed their travel to the west, quickly leaving Kestrel and Medeina standing alone in the road, holding hands still, as they looked at the six humans who were paralyzed with fear and shock. Once Kestrel saw that his fellow elves and their accompanying imps were beyond the town, he spoke again.

  “We’ll leave now. When we return, we won’t be your enemy, so don’t try to attack again, for if you do, there will be consequences,” Kestrel warned the human attackers, and the townspeople who watched.

  He and Medeina began jogging out of the town to the sounds of shouting people and running boots clattering upon the cobblestones echoed loudly in the town.

  “You handled that well, you think?” Medeina asked as they left the turmoil behind.

  “As well as I could, I guess,” Kestrel replied, looking at the distant tail of the running line of elves.

  “I thought that having different races and different deities would make for excitement and engagement and stimulation,” the goddess said thoughtfully, “since you all live side-by-side and share this world anyway. I did not think it would lead to conflict and hostility that is so unnecessary,” she said sadly.

  “I believe that it does not have to lead to conflict,” Kestrel assured her. He squeezed her hand, then released his grip on her. “I hope we can change that, if we learn more about one another.”

  Chapter 5

  Two hours later the column approached the walls of Hydrotaz.

  “Let’s stop here, and see if they come out to us,” Kestrel mused. He had originally planned to simply enter the city, to the extent that he had thought at all about his arrival in Hydrotaz’s eponymous capital city, but the elves’ experience in the nameless small town had changed his mind. Some humans weren’t as open-minded as he had lured himself into believing they all would be, and he didn’t want to fight his way through the city to reach the palace.

  “Can I leave you here to protect the troops while I go into the city alone?” he asked Medeina.

  “Hey, don’t step in that!” he suddenly shouted to one of the troops, who was walking about in the roadside pasture where the elves were awaiting Kestrel’s next set of orders. “That’s horse manure,” he explained.

  “My word! Horses make that much? Was it a sick animal? How big are those things?” his elven follower asked, as he held his foot in midair over the pile of droppings that were directly in front of him.

  “Shall I protect your troops from stepping in scat?” Medeina asked archly. “I’m just a simple female elf; how can I protect these people?” she asked.

  “Sir, we’re being approached,” one of the guards reported.

  Kestrel looked up the road, and saw that a large platoon of soldiers were issuing forth from the city gate.

  “It looks like Ferris is leading the troops,” Kestrel spoke to himself.

  “That is someone you know?” one of the other elves asked.

  “He is. He is a human, but a good man. I will explain our mission to him, and all will be well,” Kestrel answered.

  “You did not tell all that you know about Ferris,” Medeina said softly. “He has not always done things that were good for elves,” she said, as she sorted through the memories she had seen in Kestrel’s soul.

  “No,” he agreed. “But that was a different time, under different circumstances, before he ever met an elf. Things are different now,” he said confidently.

  Killcen,” he called loudly, and waited for the imp to descend from where the small blue beings had been floating above.

  “Yes General Kestrel sir?” the imp addressed him.

  “Would you invite the members of your party to come down close, so that they may be seen by the humans?” Kestrel asked.

  “Do you think there will be trouble? I do not recollect that we have ever been around the humans of this city,” Killcen queried. Nonetheless he looked upward, and waved, so that the troop in the sky dropped down to communicate.

  “Kestrel friend wishes for us to be seen,” he said when his fellows were gathered around.

  “For our great beauty?” Odare asked. “He wishes for us to dazzle these humans?”

  “It’s because of our tremendous wit. We will charm and sooth these hostile humans with our words alone,” Acanthus suggested.

  “No, it must because of our fierce, warlike disposition,” Mulberry asserted.

  “He has not told me what purpose he expects us to fulfill,” Killcen replied.

  “I want you to be seen,” Kestrel tried to calm the situation. He knew that he had never traveled with the imps to Hydrotaz, and the appearance of his allies would be a wonder to those Hydrotaz soldiers and citizens who had never seen the flighty beings. “The only humans from Hydrotaz who have seen you are the merchants who saw you at the mushroom market, correct?” he asked, knowing that reminding the imps of the mushroom market would distract their attention.

  “Ah, that’s right; I saw some of them when I bought a large gray plate with speckles on the bottom. Do you remember that one?” Killcen asked Odare as the humans marched nearer.

  “I remember when Kestrel had a special omelet prepared for me for breakfast,” Mulberry said in a tone that was mock solicitously, causing the others to look back and forth from her to Kestrel with slitted, suspicious eyes.

  The imps were an engaging and energetic group, friends, allies, and confidantes who he trusted and loved, yet at that moment Kestrel particularly wished they had their traveling abilities intact so that he could travel with them all to the healing spring, and lay them in the waters for an enjoyable, silent soaking.

  Ferris and his squad were reaching the area of the elves and imps, slowing as they stepped onto the road surface nearest the elves’ location. Kestrel waved at his own folks, then turned and walked towards the human squad. The soldiers there were fewer in number than Kestrel’s own squad, but far more than Ferris truly needed if he was simply coming out to visit Kestrel socially. And there were undoubtedly many others watching from the walls of the city.

  “My lord Kestrel, it’s good to see you. It’s been too long,” Ferris told Kestrel, accents of genuine friendliness in his voice.

  “I’ve missed seeing you, and Greysen, and her highness,” Kestrel replied with a smile. Medeina was walking beside him, he belatedly realized.

  “My lord!” another voice among the humans spoke, and Kestrel realized that it was Mitchell, one of the guardsmen he had met – been chased by before the man’s conversion from the Viathin influence. “My lord,” Mitchell repeated. “That’s her! That’s the woman that turned into a monster, a Viathin! I’ll never forget that. She was a great beauty, and suddenly and right in Kai’s own temple, the goddess changed her from a beauty to a monster, a horror!”

  Kestrel recollected the terrible day, the moment when he had felt his stomach turn with fear and pain and loathing. He had traveled hundreds of miles with Moorin, rescuing her from kidnapping, only to see Kai reveal that the figure he had protected and loved had actually been a Viathin in disguise.

  “This is the sam
e beauty, Moorin, the daughter of a nobleman from the Northern Forest,” Kestrel explained awkwardly.

  “The real one?” Mitchell asked unnecessarily.

  Kestrel hesitated to answer, knowing that the Moorin beside was not the real one, but was only another impostor, another traveling companion to remind him that the hundreds of miles and months he had spent traveling with, in pursuit of, or longing for Moorin were time that had been futilely invested. Moorin had followed her own heart, not his. The companion he was with, Medeina, was not Moorin, though she looked like her, but on this occasion, he knew the goddess was at least an imposter from the very beginning, and she was friendly, or at least seemed to be.

  “I’m no Viathin, if that’s what you’re asking,” Medeina spoke for herself, using the deep, throaty voice of Moorin, a sound that sent warm chills down Kestrel’s spine. “My blood’s not that dark oily vile liquid that’s poisoned the world; I’ve got good, red elven blood in my veins.” There was a trace of heat in her voice as she spoke her piece.

  “My man Mitchell’s not doubting you, my lady; he’s just commenting, speaking up, when perhaps he could have left the speaking parts to his officers and betters,” Ferris said, before he turned and gave Mitchell a withering look that made the guardsman lower his chin to his chest.

  “You’ve brought quite an entourage,” Ferris said, speaking to the point of concern.

  “We wish to pass through Hydrotaz, on our way from one part of the Eastern Forest to another,” Kestrel explained. “With her highness’s permission, we’ll spend the night here, then head north tomorrow, and enter the mountains north of Trace as quickly as our legs allow.”

  Ferris smiled broadly, and stretched his hand forth to grip Kestrel’s. “I knew there’ll be no trouble, once I saw it was you, but some folks were a bit concerned about a large force of elves showing up in the middle of the principality. Old ways of thinking die hard.”

  “We noticed,” Kestrel said wryly. “You’ll probably hear reports trailing behind us about some of our encounters along the way to get this far.