By this time the soldiers had been shaken out of their trance and were pinning their hopes on the superiority of their numbers.
The monstrous being thrashed around itself with a captured sword, bringing down one of the men. The rune-glow grew stronger, seeming to give the creature immense power. Picking up its victim by one leg, it screamed and hurled him against the attacking guards, who reeled back in horror to avoid the human cudgel. This provided the monster with the gap it needed to dash through and escape. It had what it had come for. The bloody cadaver of the unfortunate guard was dropped, horribly twisted and battered.
At the stairway Alvaro confronted the fleeing creature; crouched forward in readiness, he brandished his outstretched sword in the direction of the beast. “The face of an elf, the body of an orc and the magic runes of Dson Balsur on your armor; what are you?” he demanded to know.
Mallen raced after the monster, five guards in his wake. He was desperate to retrieve the stone. Alvaro knew he had no chance of vanquishing the beast on his own. He wanted to give his prince time to attack from behind.
But the monster had seen through the plan. It glanced back over its shoulder at its pursuers, bared its teeth, threw down its sword and dashed past Alvaro.
“Halt!” The officer raised his weapon to strike.
The ghastly thing touched him on the head with its left hand; runes flashed and a lightning bolt was released, incapacitating everyone in the room with the dazzling light.
When Mallen could see again it was clear that the intruder had disappeared. Rejalin was kneeling next to Alvaro cradling his head; blood gushed from his throat in a stream impossible to staunch.
The guards bolted up the steps to look outside for the escaped monster, while Mallen dropped on his haunches by the side of his mortally wounded comrade. “No, my friend. Do not let your soul depart.” He pulled off the false gnome mask, took the man’s hand in his own and pressed it hard. He tried to hide the depth of his concern at his friend’s condition so that Alvaro would not realize how close he was to death. Hope was essential. “I beseech you.”
Alvaro attempted to speak, his gaze sliding over to the elf maiden. But he was coughing blood and his croaking voice could not be understood; finally his body fell back and his eyes relinquished all signs of life.
Tears flowed down Mallen’s cheeks. He was not ashamed to weep. He had lost a man at whose side he had ridden and fought through countless battles, against enormous odds-and yet they had always survived. What no orc sword had ever achieved this monster had brought about with a single touch of the hand. “There, you see what has come of your longing for combat,” he murmured as he gently closed the dead man’s eyelids. “You shall not be forgotten. Your death shall not stay unavenged.” He nodded over to Rejalin, who was watching him, compassion in her gaze. “Is it true what he said?”
“What do you mean, Prince Mallen?” She carefully laid the officer’s head back on the ground, dismayed at the sight of the blood sticking to her fingers. Mallen thought this must be the first time in her sheltered existence that she had been confronted with violent and brutal death in such a way. She had lived among art and poetry, not warfare.
“Alvaro recognized the runes on the armor as being of alfar origin. I, too, found them familiar in some way. They were similar to those I saw on enemy armor at Porista. What can you tell me?”
The elf maiden avoided his eyes.
Mallen let go of the dead man’s hand. “Did I see elf runes on the armor?”
“You are mistaken.”
Contrary to all rules of respect and courtly conduct he took fast hold of her arm and gently forced her to look him in the eyes. “Rejalin! What do you know?”
“Nothing,” she said harshly, pulling free. “I was too far away to be able to recognize anything about the creature.”
“You are lying. Your eyes-”
“You dare to accuse me, Rejalin of Alandur, of speaking an untruth?” She sprang to her feet. “I should have known better. You are an uncultured yokel, no better than any other human I have ever met,” she said with disdain. “I fear your realm must undergo intense scrutiny before it can be judged worthy to receive the gifts of our knowledge.”
It seemed to Mallen that a mask concealing the elf’s real nature had fallen from her countenance; her anger revealed her true attitude toward himself and his kind. The admiration he had been feeling for her started to ebb away. “One of the diamonds has been stolen, but this is all you can think of now?”
“It is one of fourteen.”
“It is the second of fourteen,” Mallen corrected, standing up. “Rejalin, you will tell me what you…”
Rejalin turned on her heel and went over to King Nate.
The prince started to follow her but was prevented by the two guests dressed as orcs. “Rejalin has no wish to continue speaking to you, Prince Mallen of Idoslane,” came the voice from behind the papier-mache. The man lifted his hand to remove the mask; the face underneath was that of an elf. It bore a smile, but a cool one. “She prefers to attend to the care of her host and to see what the elves’ knowledge of healing can do to aid him.”
“This is knowledge which you have yet to earn. Go and seek the diamond,” said the other elf, slipping in his turn out of his disguise. “We shall inform you when Rejalin wishes to speak to you about what has occurred.”
Mallen pushed them to one side, but they overtook him and barred his way. He stopped short and was about to raise his sword arm in earnest when he recalled the words spoken so recently by the king. Harmony; the peoples united. “Tell Rejalin that I expect an explanation and that I shall inform all the other royal houses of Girdlegard about this event and the strange attitude an elf woman displayed. If she won’t speak to me she will have to account for herself when her own ruler, Prince Liutasil of Alandur, commands it.”
“Certainly, Prince Mallen,” the elf on the right nodded superciliously. “We shall pass on your words.”
Mallen sheathed his sword, called some of his soldiers and gave the order for them to carry the body of his friend out of the ballroom.
As they laid him on a stretcher and bore him away up the steps, a thought occurred: Alvaro had been touched on the head by the monster’s hand-not on the neck where the deadly wound had been. While all were blinded by the flash no one had been near him. No one save the elf woman.
An incredible idea came to him. Mallen stopped on the dais and turned to Rejalin, who was attending to the king. Was she exacting revenge for his insults, he wondered, or was Alavaro too close to the truth in what he said today at the feast?
The unique beauty of the elf woman had disappeared completely. From now on Mallen resolved to treat her with the strongest suspicion.
Her and all other elves.
III
Girdlegard,
The Mountains of the Gray Range on the Northern Border of the Fifthling Kingdom
Spring, 6241st Solar Cycle
Tungdil and Boindil were in one of Gandogar’s own chambers waiting impatiently for the high king to arrive. The dust of the Outer Lands was still chafing their skin and clinging to their beards, but nothing, not even the glimpse of a water trough, had kept them from the opportunity of an immediate meeting. There was simply too much to discuss.
“Did you see how she wept when we handed over her son’s helmet?” asked Boindil, filling a jug with water. For once he felt like quenching his thirst with water rather than beer-unlike Tungdil, who had already downed a tankard of the black stuff.
“It was better to let her assume that her son is dead,” insisted Tungdil.