Authors: Keith Baker
“So why haven’t we heard of you before now?” Thorn said.
“We made our pact with the dragons before humans had learned to speak, before the race of elves even existed. And we spent but a little time in this world, as you measure things. As the moons wax and wane, so it is with the planes. When all things were in proper alignment, our spires would fall from Thelanis to your world, and when the influence changed, we would return to the realm of our birth.”
“So you come and go,” Thorn said. “That still doesn’t explain how the Cyrans missed the enormous tree city shifting in and out of alignment.”
Tira nodded. “Trusting as we were, we had no fear of this world. And this cost us dearly. Seven cities came to this world. One was destroyed long ago, sacked and leveled by the giants who rose to power when the dragons fell
back to their lairs in Argonnessen. A second fell in battle. You see the representatives of the five surviving spires before you.”
“Only one fell in battle?” Cadrel said. “How did that happen? Surely you all fought to—”
He never finished the sentence. The Lady of the Silver Tree gazed at him, her eyes blazing, and his voice died in his throat. “I warned you once. I did not call you here, human.”
“But you called me here,” Thorn said, “and he is with me.”
“And for that reason I shall restore his voice when we are done here and not before.”
Thorn considered protesting, but a glance around the room changed her mind. It was clear that Cadrel had touched a nerve; all of the fey were watching him, eyes burning with anger. “Very well, then,” she said. “Two of the spires fell. And so …”
“Most of us realized that your world held nothing for us but danger and ill fortune,” Tira said. “And so we wove a great glamour, a cloak that spread out from the roots of the Silver Tree to conceal every branch. Your kingdoms rose around us, but the power of the glamour kept them from ever building too close to us or from seeing our spires when they fell back to your world. A few individuals found us, yes, and through these few, we formed bonds to your world. But we were content to watch from afar, seeing your kingdoms rise and fall.”
If this is true, the power is remarkable
, Steel whispered.
A spell channeled through a single focus, cloaking a half dozen cities for thousands of years. It seems improbable but we know the giants of Xen’drik possessed magic we have yet to replicate, and the power of Argonnessen is legendary. But what does this have to do with the Mourning?
“So what went wrong?” Thorn asked.
“He did.” Tira looked at Drix. “Just years ago as you measure time—a mere moment to us—my son was hunting with us. He drew ahead of us, but I had no fear; my sight is strong, and I’d seen no danger.” She looked at the ground. “My sight is strong, but the future is never certain. We found him dead on the ground. This man—little more than a child himself at that time—stood over him, a bloody blade in his hand. Fury overtook me, madness at seeing my nightmare made real. I seized the knife and stabbed the boy myself.
“The moment the blood of my child and this man of Cyre mingled on the ground, the earth trembled and shook. The glamour snapped and broke. I felt the land itself being torn apart, nature twisting on the most basic level.”
“The Mourning,” Thorn said. “But that’s just bad timing. A coincidence.”
“There is no coincidence,” Tira replied. “At that time, I didn’t know who this child was. You see the mingling of our blood in his features—human and fey.”
“He’s half-elf. So am I.”
“You carry debased blood in your veins. You are descended from the slaves of Xen’drik. Marudrix … he is of us. I told you that there were those who found us, even through the glamour. His ancestor was such a one, a brave warrior who won the heart of one of our own.”
Cadrel tapped her arm. He couldn’t speak but he mouthed a word:
Ma
-something …
Marusan
. Marusan. The knight in his tale. Marusan … and Marudrix.
“This was before I rose to wear the Circle of Leaves,” Tira continued. “Else I might have seen it in his features. But that man … he became a bridge between our worlds, as the Tree itself was. His descendants became the keepers of this forest. My predecessor even gave them
one of Ourelon’s shards, to preserve the memories of those who fell between our visits.”
The ice lord rose to his feet again. “The line of keepers was extinguished over five cycles ago, when the Preserving Shard was lost to us. This is impossible!”
“I can discipline you as easily as the human, Syraen.” Tira’s eyes blazed. “Yes, we thought the line of keepers destroyed. And once again we find that our sight is not so perfect. This boy was of that blood. I struck him in anger, struck him for a crime he did not commit, spilled that blood upon that of my own son. And in so doing, I unraveled the foundation of both our worlds and set the Mourning in motion.”
Thorn looked at Cadrel. He couldn’t speak, but his expression mirrored her thoughts: She really thinks she caused the Mourning by stabbing Drix. We’re in the Tower of the Silver Madwomen.
Then she noticed that no one else was smiling or questioning it. The expressions of the fey were cold and grim.
“I’m sorry,” Thorn said. “I mean no disrespect, but you’re serious about this? Perhaps you didn’t realize it, but out beyond your woods, we’ve been fighting a war for the last century. The Mourning only targeted Cyre. Why would your curse do that?”
“You are mistaken,” Tira said. “The Mourning didn’t target Cyre.”
Thorn didn’t know what to say to that. She was even more surprised by what happened next.
She’s right
, Steel said.
But ask her what she means
.
But Tira continued on her own. “Trust me, we are aware of your wars and your kingdoms. Your Cyre was a changing beast. In days past, it was far larger than it was that day. So if the curse struck at Cyre, why didn’t it affect the nation of the goblins, or the elves to the east?”
Exactly
, Steel said.
And it wasn’t even tied perfectly to those borders; Darguun and Valenar were simply quick to seize what little land remained outside the mists
.
“What’s your explanation?” Thorn said.
“The curse should have spread across your world and ultimately through the bond into Thelanis as well. The moment I realized what was happening, I acted to save the boy. I bound the Shard of Life to him, the shard of the Silver Tree. And in doing so, I bound the curse to him. It is not your Cyre that holds the Mourning. It is Estara, the kingdom that stood here before your Galifar conquered it and gave it to his daughter. Marudrix is of the blood of the keepers of the wood and, through lost Marusan, a prince of Estara.”
Drix had been barely paying attention throughout all of that; perhaps he’d heard it before. But that snapped him back. “What? How am I a prince?”
“You are a prince of a lost kingdom. In the eyes of magic, you are that kingdom. In saving you, we stopped the advance of the mists, symbolically binding them to you.”
“This is ridiculous.” It was the ice lord again. “How dare you bind one of our greatest artifacts to an outsider?
That
is the source of our weakness. That is what drains the life of the tree. You have given its heart to a mortal.”
“You were not there, Syraen! I assure you, the glamour fell as the boy lay dying. Go outside and you’ll see the soil still tainted by his blood.”
The Lord of the Emerald Lights spoke, his sparks swirling around his head. “Either way,
you
are the one who brought this misfortune upon us.”
“And I am the one that can bring it to a close,” she said. “I have spent every moment since that day studying the matter. And I know what can be done.”
“And what’s that?” Thorn said.
“Keeping Marudrix alive holds the curse at bay, binding it to him. To bring it to a close, he must be healed completely. The unjust stroke must be undone. We must take Ourelon’s shard away from him and restore his heart again.”
The fey fell to arguing again. Next to her, Thorn heard Cadrel take a sudden sharp breath.
“Olladra smiles,” he said, his voice hoarse.
“What do you make of this?” she said quietly, rubbing her thumb against Steel’s hilt as she spoke.
“It seems most unlikely,” he replied. “But in my day, I’ve heard many stranger stories. We’re dealing with the fey, Thorn, with a woman who can hide a city from view or steal my voice with a glance. As unlikely as it seems, it is the sort of thing that would happen in one of the old tales.”
I have to agree
, Steel said.
It’s far more likely that it’s a vast coincidence. Yet as long as there is any chance that it is true, that this could somehow restore the Mournland or help us understand the true power behind it, we have to follow through. Getting the Cyran refugees out of Breland alone would be a tremendous boon to the nation. Beyond that … if she can remove that shard from Drix, that means it could be claimed for Breland. If it can be proven that the Mourning no longer poses a threat, the war will begin again; you know that as well as I do. Acquiring such a tool for Breland
—not
attached to a Cyran tinker—would be a great success
.
Good enough. Thorn drew Steel and rapped against the table with his pommel. “Enough!” she shouted. The others paused and looked at her with varying degrees of surprise and anger on their faces. “Say we believe you. What is this next step? What have you learned?”
Tira glanced at the other fey, her eyes still burning behind the veil. “I sacrificed one of Ourelon’s shards to
save the boy. The shards are bound together, just as our cities are bound together, just as the boy is bound to the soil. At this time, under these moons, if all the shards are brought together, like will call to like.”
“What are these shards?”
“Fragments of the gift the dragon Ourelon gave to the first lord of the Silver Tree, or so say the memories bound in the stone,” Tira replied. “Each tied to one of the spires, each holding great power. The strength of the spire is tied to the stone. So Syraen is correct; in surrendering my stone to Drix, I weakened the Silver Tree. Yet the alternative was far worse.”
Syraen spoke again. “You require all the shards for your mad plan, sister. But you know as well as I how many have been lost. The Preserving Shard. The Stone of Dreams. The Quiet Stone. Have you found them all?”
Tira looked at Thorn. “Show them, girl. Show them my prophecy made manifest.”
And this is where it all falls apart, Thorn thought. Might as well see it through. She turned around and shifted her uniform to simple peasant clothes. Pulling her blouse at neck and waist, she revealed the shrapnel in her spine.
A hush fell over the room. Then the voice of the Rose Queen broke the silence. “Impossible.”
There was a gust of cold air, and Lord Syraen was by her side. “Hold, woman,” he hissed.
Thorn wanted to punch the arrogant eladrin in the throat, but she resisted the urge and let him run cold fingers along her spine. In truth, she was as surprised as they were.
“Tira speaks the truth,” he said at last. “The Quiet Stone and the Preserving Shard, held in mortal flesh.” He drew a sword with a pale blade that steamed in the warm air of the council room. “At least these can be cut free.”
Thorn was moving even as he drew the sword. The words had barely left his mouth when she kicked him in the chest, calling on every ounce of her unnatural strength. The fey warlord staggered backward, gasping for air. The others got on their feet. Thorn rolled away just in time to evade the net of emerald lights that flashed through the air. The Rose Queen raised her hands, and bramble vines unfolded from her hair. Only one of the fey remained distant and uninvolved—a gnome dressed in robes that shimmered with the shifting colors of a rainbow.
Drix was at her side, his tiny crossbow in his hand. Cadrel was there as well, his rapier gleaming. It seemed impossible that they could stand against the eladrin and their retinues, but she was glad for the help.
The battle ended as quickly as it had begun. “Enough!” Tira roared and her voice had the force of a gale, slamming the combatants back. Once again she towered above them, her eyes blazing and her golden crown gleaming. “Her blood may be mixed with the soil, but this woman is a guest beneath my boughs, and you will not harm her here!”
Syraen’s warriors were standing at his side, blades of ice glistening in the silvery light. “Then perhaps we shall take our leave and await her beyond your gate. How can you allow this to occur? Two of the greatest treasures of our people, in the hands of a mortal? This is our chance to reclaim what we have lost!”
“You’re all mad,” Thorn said. “These are no treasures in my back. This is shrapnel from an explosion. I’m lucky I lived through it. I was struck by dozens of shards; these are just the ones they couldn’t remove.”
“Both of you know
nothing
,” Tira said. “Thorn, these are no common crystals in your spine. Syraen is correct. They are two of Ourelon’s shards. The Quiet Stone in
the base of your spine was the heartstone of our spire in Xen’drik, the city that fell to the giants. The Preserving Shard holds the spirits of our greatest leaders; it was placed in the care of Marusan’s line and lost when the vile wyrm laid waste to the woods.”
“Then how—?” Thorn began. She shut her mouth when Tira looked at her, before the fey queen turned to her magic to do the job.
“Syraen, I have devoted myself to the study of the shards. Once they are bound to mortal flesh, they cannot be removed by force. Aside from killing the bearer, the blood and anger would taint the shard forevermore. This curse began with an act of violence; you cannot end it with another. You shame our people with your behavior, and if I did not need you to bring this curse to an end, I would order you to return to the Winter Citadel immediately. Sheathe your weapons now. I remind you that though the walls may crumble around me, this is my seat of power, and you will show me due respect!”
Thorn was barely listening. Her thoughts were racing. What did she mean?
Vile wyrm … holds the spirits of our greatest leaders
.