The tall tower was the crowning point of Hellorin’s palace, and as such it was also the only place in the Phaerie city from which both sides of the Forest Lord’s domain could be seen. D’arvan looked down from the southern window across the city, the symbol of Phaerie wealth and luxury, the tangible evidence of their supremacy and power. The northern window, looking up the deep green glen toward the mountains, showed a very different scene:
Hellorin’s quarries and mines half-concealed among the heavily wooded slopes, and his farmlands, all tilled and planted, burgeoning along the valley bottom.—The symbols, all of them of human slavery.
Peering through the northern window with the longsight that was his father’s legacy, D’arvan watched the captive Mortals, laboring like so many swarming ants while the Phaerie took their ease, or hunted in the surrounding woodland, or sailed in little boats upon the tarn. A faint sense of guilt writhed within him like a tiny serpent as he realized that before the Cataclysm, the Magefolk, his own people, had enslaved the Mortals in exactly the same way—and that even in his own time, most of the Mages had felt that this should still be the natural order of things.
Neither his mother’s race nor that of his father were blameless, and D’arvan’s heart was scalded with rage and shame that such iniquity could exist. Damn the Phaerie! Hellorin had already snuffed out the humanity of the Xandim like a candle, without a single qualm. Now he had subjugated yet another race in an equally callous fashion. And what had he done with Maya?
D’arvan shook and rattled the locked door, hammering on it with his fists for what seemed like the hundredth time. “Answer me, damn you—is anybody there?—How dare you lock me up like this—don’t you know who I am? Let me out of here, you slug-witted bastards! You fetch my father here—right now!”
A plague on all the bloody Phaerie! For all his protests, it was patently clear to D’arvan that he had been locked up here on Hellorin’s orders, and left in this luxurious chamber at the top of the highest tower in his father’s palace, to cool his heels until the Forest Lord was good and ready to deal with him. It was a power ploy on Hellorin’s part, to establish his dominance from the start. Well, if the idea was to humiliate D’arvan and make him feel helpless, it was beginning to work.
“I won’t let it,” D’arvan muttered savagely. “I won’t let him get to me like this!” He knew what Maya would have done, as clearly as if her voice had whispered it in his ear. The best way to keep up his courage was to fight back with anger. Scoring the mossy carpet with his boot heels, he paced the many-windowed room, stoking his rage like a great red blaze, kicking at chairs and tables in passing for want of a better target for his rage, and heaping muttered maledictions on his father’s head.
“Have a care for the furnishings—some day, they may be yours.”
D’arvan swung round to see Hellorin standing in the doorway, an obnoxious smirk on his face. “You!” he snarled, snatching up the first thing that came to hand.
The Forest Lord stepped easily to one side and the flung chair smashed to splinters on the edge of the door frame.
The Forest Lord’s smile of welcome froze as he saw the expression of scowling fury on the face of his long-lost son.
“You vile, unspeakable monster! Have you no conscience?” D’arvan spat. “Those are people out there—your laborers, your beasts of burden. People who had lives and families, dreams and plans. And what about the Xandim? Poor bastards—you’ve even gone so far as to strip them of their humanity forever!—How can you live with that?”
There was a cold, bleak, implacable look in D’arvan’s eye that somehow reminded the Phaerie Lord of that dratted Mage-woman, the last time he had crossed swords with her. Don’t you dare get in my way, it said.
Hellorin swallowed the cordial greeting that had leapt to his lips, and thought rapidly. His estrangement from Eilin had taught him to deal more carefully and considerately with the Magefolk than had been his wont—and D’arvan was half-Mage, after all. He had no wish to lose D’arvan as he had lost Eilin—but Mage blood or no, he was the heir to the Forest Lord’s realm, and must be made to recognize and understand his responsibilities to the Phaerie. Nonetheless, Hellorin was determined to begin in a conciliatory manner. Only if D’arvan should prove difficult would there be any need to deal with him harshly. “Will you at least have the courtesy to listen to what I have to say before you start throwing the furniture?” he asked in a mild and pleasant voice.
The young Mage’s expression darkened further. “Give me Maya back—then I might consider listening to you,” he retorted.
The Forest Lord shook his head. “Not yet, my son. First we will talk, and then, if the outcome is favorable, I will release your little Mortal to you.”
“And if it isn’t favorable?” D’arvan asked softly. His lips thinned into an obdurate line. “No, that’s not good enough. I want her here, with me. I want to be sure she’s safe, away from your damned tricks. Until you bring me Maya, I will not exchange another word with you.” He deliberately turned his back on his father and stared out of the northern window at the Mortal slaves who labored in the valley far below.
A plague on this impudent whelp and his pigheaded Mage-folk pride! Hellorin’s anger was nearing boiling point. He clenched his fists at his sides and breathed deeply, fighting back the rage. “So you will not talk—but you have no other choice than to listen. D’arvan, there is no need for this animosity between us. You are my son, and for the love I bore your mother, you are also my heir. Your true home is here, with us, your people. You could have great power here, and wield considerable authority among the Phaerie. All would defer to you. Would you let a handful of mere Mortals come between you and your own father? Your own true and splendid destiny? Mortals! Dull-witted, short-lived creatures with no magic—they are little more than animals. They were put here to serve us. It is their fate, their reason for existence.”
All the while that Hellorin had been speaking, D’arvan had not moved a muscle.—Now he turned, very slowly, and there was iron and granite in his face, and a look in his eyes that made the Forest Lord’s blood run cold. “And supposing I say that you are a foul, depraved despot, and that I am no son of yours,” he hissed in a thin, tight voice that was wound up with rage to its breaking point. “What if I tell you that I abhor and despise you, and I would hang myself, or drink poison, or put a dagger through my heart, rather than take any part in your revolting schemes?” D’arvan met him with an unblinking stare, and their gazes locked and clashed like two deadly swords. “I wish it could have been otherwise. But I can not and will not condone this slavery.”
The Forest Lord was struck to the heart by D’arvan’s words. His bitter disappointment crystallized into a twisted, misshapen core within him, cold as ice and hard as iron. So this craven-hearted, whining puppy had the temerity to repudiate his own father? Hellorin scowled. You’ve just made a grave mistake, my son, he thought grimly. I gave you some latitude, I tried to appeal to you, to persuade you—but now it’s time you were brought to heel.—Shrugging off his human guise like an unwanted cloak, he stood revealed before his son in the full might and majesty of the foremost Phaerie Lord, resplendent and terrifying, with the raw, wild elemental power of the Old Magic pulsing from him like the fierce energy of an exploding star. He had the hollow satisfaction of seeing D’arvan blanch, and take a furtive backward step.
Hellorin flung back his head and roared with laughter. “Spineless, witless young fool! How could I ever have fathered you? So you’d hang yourself, or drink poison, or put a dagger through your heart, would you?” His voice lifted in cruel mockery of D’arvan’s empty threats. “I wonder, my fine son, do you think that Maya would feel the same?”