Duality (40 page)

“Praise be the Light,” Loren whispered in an awestruck tone. Dara turned to see Xavier staring back at her with his own two eyes, tears running down his cheeks.

“But I chose—” he stammered.

“Aye, thou chose wisely, and through Her grace are restored to both again,” Everett replied. “Use both for the good of your people and to Her greater glory.”

Pahn came up to stand aside Dara and Loren. “Good work.”

Dara hugged her, barely able to see through the sting of unshed tears. She swallowed down the lump in her throat. “We never would’ve managed without you and the star-stone.
I
never could’ve done this without you. Thanks aren’t near enough—”

Pahn grunted. “We were meant to meet, child. I can do no less than follow the Hand that leads me.”

Aletha beckoned to Dara. “Thou hast suffered much at the hands of the invader. The death of thy protector, the loss of thy home, the loss of thy powers, the branding, the trial and burning. Thou hast a new power, a new past and a new future. Come receive Her blessing, daughter of fire.”

Dara knelt at her feet. Light and peace seeped into her soul. Put to rest were the crushing weight of self-doubt, the bitterness, insecurities and fear. She opened her eyes. “Thank you, Lady.”

The groups broke up, the humans heading for the castle courtyard. Hengist and Moira came over to Dara and Loren. Dara bowed low to her king. “Welcome home, My Liege.”

Hengist embraced first her, then Loren, in fierce hugs. “My thanks to you both I have a home to return to. I am in your debt.”

“Not at all,” Loren denied. “What are friends for?”

“Not friends,” Hengist insisted. “Brothers.”

Loren nodded. “Aye.”

“Are ye stayin’?” Moira asked.

“There’s much to do,” Dara stated. She couldn’t leave her people in such need and misery. Once Loren helped her put everything right, they’d finally speak of the future.

“Aye, there is and that’s a fact,” Hengist growled. “But I understand you have your own duties to return home to, Your
Highness
.” This last was aimed at Loren.

“Who spoke?” Loren demanded.

“Lord Elio may have mentioned a word or two.”

They glanced over to where Lord Elio conferred with Cianan.

Lorelei joined them. “We must return home. There is no room for our army to stay here, and we mages need to rest and recover. We are not as young as we once were.” She eyed Loren. “Thou hast things to set right back home. Thou canst not leave things unfinished.”

“You’re coming with me,” Loren said.

“I thought you’d be staying here,” Hengist protested, looking at Dara. “This is your home. Your people need you, healer.”

Dara’s heart froze in her throat, and she looked from Loren to Hengist in a panic. “You’re leaving so soon?”

Loren’s gaze locked onto hers. “Walk with me,” he said.

Chapter Sixteen

Away from the sprawling carnage of the battlefield and out of earshot from the rest, Loren sat beneath the bare branches of a spreading elm tree and pulled Dara down onto the grass aside him.

Dara collapsed aside him, in a daze. “You’re leaving?” She fought down the knot of panic. Now that she had everything she’d fought for, she was losing the one thing she wanted most—Loren.

“This is not our place. We must go home.” Loren brushed a stray lock of hair from her eyes. “Come home with me. Your task here is finished. We belong together.”

Dara shook her head. “Look around you. My task isn’t finished. My people need me more than ever. No one else can do what I can. It’s a responsibility I can’t turn my back on.” She glared at him through burning tears. “This is your fault. ‘Guardian’. ‘
Vertenya
’. You showed me duty and honor. I can do no less.”

“And what of us?” he demanded. “What of our vow?”

“You are someday to be king of the elves, and I am a common peasant. I am half-human, half-dragon and mortal. You are immortal. You are dearer to me than any, but there can be no future betwixt us.”

“We are already bound together, you and I,” Loren argued. “I shall not let you go. I told you that. Stay with me. You cannot leave, now that we are free to be together.”

Dara’s heart shattered. “I’m not leaving, you are. I’m staying. I’m needed here. You’re needed there. That’s all there is to say.”

“Not hardly.” He pulled her across his lap. “There is one thing left to say to you,
elingrena
.”

“What’s that?” she choked out.

“I love you,
elingrena
, queen of my heart.” Loren’s fingers knotted in her hair, and he tilted her head up for a burning kiss. “For me there is no other,” he whispered against her lips.

Despair cleared the haze of passion. “Don’t talk to me of what we dream but can’t have.”

“This is no dream.” His lips captured hers again.

Dara clung to his heat and his strength with all her heart, for a moment yielded to the temptation that was Loren. Only Loren held her heart. Only Loren ever would.

He pulled back. “What shall you do?”

“I can never go back to the way things were,” she realized. “I’ve changed too much, but this is still my home and these are still my people.”

He brushed her cheek with the back of his hand. “Stay here for a bit. Speak to Hengist, set things right. Come to me later. I shall be waiting.”

Dara rose and helped him to his feet. Hani`ena and Gloreriell met them.

“What do you think you are doing?”
the stallion demanded.

“Staying,” Dara replied. “I am needed here. I can’t just drop everything and abandon my people.”

“We need you,”
Hani`ena retorted.
“He needs you.”

Loren swung up onto her back. “Enough,” he ordered, bitterness in his voice. “The choice is made. We go.” He wheeled Hani`ena about and galloped back to the reforming elven legion. “
Remember who you are,
elingrena
, queen of my heart
,” Loren thought back at her. “
Come home to me when you are ready. I shall be waiting
.”

Dara had never been so miserable. “
For how long
?”

“Forever.”
Loren was adamant.

Aletha and Anika reopened the gate. Anika stepped through to hold the other side. Lord Elio and Cianan were the first across, leading their victorious army. Gloreriell galloped to catch up. Pahn, Gwendolyn and Everett went next, with Lorelei following. Dara saw Pari embrace his wife on the other side.

Hengist saluted Loren. “Until we meet again, brother.”

Loren nodded. His eyes held Dara’s for a long moment, and then Hani`ena plunged through the shimmering gate.

Aletha smiled at Dara. “Her Hand is not done with thee yet, child. Thou art meant to be with him. Have faith, and when the time comes, make that leap.” She disappeared into the rainbow, and a moment later the gate collapsed.

Dara’s heart ripped in two. Never had she felt so alone.

***

She lost herself in an orgy of work. Conscious of disease, they burned the dead on funerary pyres with songs and prayers. Jalad’s pikes were pulled down, their grisly trophies laid to rest with their comrades. Jalad’s head, preserved by Gwendolyn’s spell, was sent south to Sezeny to be displayed in Traitor’s Hall.

Dara moved into the castle, into a small guest suite in the east wing. True to their promise, the clan shamans and healers came to help. Dara was kept busy in the stillroom and the hospital.

Moira flat out refused to sleep in Hengist’s old bed or his old room. Those rooms were closed off and the best guest quarters refurbished as the new master suite. The queen supervised the cleaning of the castle, tower to cellars. All of Jalad’s new additions were removed and destroyed. Moira replaced the torches with candles, the rushes with carpets. Her hunting tapestries returned. The dais and throne both vanished.

Sezeny granted the entire county of Westmarche to Hengist as compensation. A contingent of men, a dozen workmen led by Xavier and Conn, guarded by Sezeny’s surviving volunteers, set off to inspect the Westmarche holdings.

Slowly, in the next few weeks, life returned to normal. As normal as could be, considering the irreplaceable losses they’d all suffered. Dara sensed the eyes on her, the whispers behind her back. She worked with the blood torque. The voices were silent, content to let her wallow to her heart’s content for as long as she liked.

Hengist, however, was of a different mindset. One evening, when all chores were done and people were resting in the main hall, reading or playing cards afore the fires, he called Dara to his side. “Come with me into my private study,” he ordered.

She followed him into the room and dropped to her knees at Hengist’s feet. “Your orders, My Liege?”

“To rise and look me in the eye.” He held out a hand to her. For a big man, and a king, he was unprepossessing. “I see the sadness that all the work in the world won’t remove. What ails you, daughter?”

Daughter? What did he mean by that? Dara stood on trembling knees. “It’s Loren, My Liege. I…I love him, but he’s gone away.”

“He spurned you?” Hengist looked outraged.

Dara flushed with shame. “Nay, My Liege. He asked me to go with him, but I told him I had to stay here. I told him there was no future betwixt a mortal peasant, half-dragon fire witch or no, and an immortal elven king. It was a pretty dream, naught more.” Her eyes welled with tears.

“Come, daughter, and sit down by me. The elven priestess released me from my vow of silence, so I have another sad tale of love lost to share with you.”

She sat, her mind swimming with questions. Daughter? Did he mean…? Heart pounding, she met his eyes.

He nodded. “Aye. Daughter of my blood, and my heart. Your mother was the most hypnotic woman I’ve ever met. Jewel eyes like topaz. They glowed, like yours. You look very much like her. But you’re tough, like me.”

Dara swallowed hard. “What happened?”

“I loved your mother, do not doubt that. I loved her with all the passions and rashness of youth. I wanted to make her my queen, the laws be damned.”

Dara blinked. “Why didn’t you? Her blood was older and more royal than yours.”

Hengist did not take offense. “You’re just as blunt as she was. I asked—repeatedly. She valued her freedom over power, much like someone else we both know and love.”

“And they chained him anyway.”

“Only a dragon would consider personal power as chains,” he muttered. “Well, no one chains a dragon. Even when we found out about you, she wouldn’t marry. She told me dragon daughters belong to dragon mothers and that was the end of it, as far as she was concerned. She wouldn’t let me acknowledge you. Threatened to take you away if I tried.”

“I was a bastard anyway.” Dara’s voice was harsh, and she felt a dark satisfaction when he flinched. “As a royal bastard, I would have had an easier time of it. Royal bastards are so commonplace they’re almost respectable.”

“Not in Riverhead. You are my child and shall always be my eldest daughter.”

“You let us be used, ostracized, harassed and insulted. Good enough when the people wanted or needed something, but not good enough to be a true part of the community.”

“Rufus and Fanny knew everything. They loved you. They were the ones I trusted to raise you right.” Hengist frowned. “I did the best I could when your mother died. I didn’t know of any other guardians, they had already disappeared from Moira’s lands, and I couldn’t bear to send you away. You were given the best education—”

“In secret.”

“Well, your mother’s not here to protest this time, and you are a woman grown. You will be a secret no more.”

Dara narrowed her eyes. “What do you mean?”

“You would make any father proud. I intend to fully acknowledge you as my daughter.”

A gasp sounded behind him. They turned to see Moira standing in the doorway. “Ye can’t,” the queen cried.

Dara’s heart sank.

“Moira, Sheena was afore I ever met you,” Hengist said. “We owe our lives to Dara. She has been wronged through no fault of her own, and I am done with the lies.”

“What of me son, your heir?” Moira demanded.

“Lord and Lady, woman, I now have two kingdoms to divide up,” he roared.

“Stop it, both of you. I don’t
want
a kingdom.” Dara turned to Moira. “I did all this for your son. So he could grow up happy and secure in a stable home with two loving parents.”

Moira flushed and stared at the floor.

Dara turned to Hengist. “And all I ever wanted was to know
who
my father was. I am glad to know he is a kind and honorable man who did what he did with the best of intentions. Rufus and Fanny were the best parents a girl could wish for. I already have an island I don’t know what to do with and more treasure than I can spend in a lifetime.”

“Your dowry,” Hengist said. “With two royal parents and a royal dowry, I dare them to find fault with you now.”

Her eyes were sad. “All the royalty in the world does not change the fact I am neither an elf nor immortal. A queen of the elves must be an elf, and I am at best a fleeting romance for Loren. I’ll be long dead afore Hani`ena gets her first silver hair.”