Tomas blinked at her, waiting for her to explain as they crept around the perimeter of the camp. “Do you have one of your fire bombs with you?” Tallis asked, peaking around the shrubbery and following the tendril of power to its source: a thinning spruce tree off to the side of the little clearing the casteless had made. It was tall and spindly; most of its lower branches had broken off with decay. Only a few of the evergreen, whorled limbs were still present; its needles drooped in a sickly fashion.

  “Yes. I’ve brought several powders with me. But I don’t understand. What’s happening, Tallis?” Tomas asked, paler than Tallis remembered seeing him that morning, as he began fishing in his pack.

  Tallis pointed at the wilting spruce. “Something’s corrupted that tree. It feels vaguely like the evil First Vanir in Selkirk. The one you destroyed so the monster couldn’t return. It’s not the same, but I recognize the sensation.” Tomas fumbled with the sack he had been attaching to the flight groove of his crossbow.

  “Tomas? Tomas, what’s wrong?”

  He took a deep breath and began reattaching the sack with slow precision. “It makes sense now,” he told her simply.

  “What does? We don’t have time for games, Tomas. What’s the matter?”

  “I had….I was starting to feel nauseous the farther we came into the forest. I dismissed it; so many factors were at play that could have caused me to feel ill. It was subtle, just a slight ache….I didn’t think it mattered.”

  Tallis’s breath caught, a sinking feeling overtaking her and dragging her down. “Shite….The elandili that Tethir said wasn’t here anymore.” She shook her head and looked at the casteless milling about the camp.

  They did not seem afflicted with the jerky movements she had witnessed in the Guldar Forest when Cullen had forced the demon Vanir to possess him, and she could not discern any yellow glow to their eyes from this distance.

  “The other half-elf must still be here. They must’ve done something to the tree. What else could it be?” Tallis shivered, taking out her dagger with her good arm as she counted the casteless, dreading having to slay so many people.

  “If that were true, then why aren’t you ill?” Tomas asked, gently putting a hand on her shoulder.

  “If I had to guess? It’s because I’ve already been infected. That monster was in me, Tomas. It might’ve just been for a heartbeat, but it was there, so now,” she shrugged. “I’m guessing I’m immune to such things.”

  Tomas looked troubled but nodded and turned to look at the scene around them before glancing at her wounded arm. “We must destroy the tree; that is a certainty. That doesn’t mean we must kill all these people. You’re wounded, love. We cannot risk such an encounter.”

  Tallis gritted her teeth, hoping he was right about needing to destroy the tree because she knew he was right about having to fight all those people. With only one good arm, she doubted she could fell enough of them to keep Colben and Tethir safe, even with Tomas’s flawless skill with the crossbow.

  Silently they moved in a wide circle around the camp, coming up on the back side of the spruce tree to ensure that the fire bomb would not miss, and putting them far enough away from where the people were. All the while, the tendrils of power grew stronger alongside the undercurrent of pulsating wrongness, and Tomas grew paler and paler as his nausea increased.

  They settled in a good spot. Tomas raised his crossbow to fire when a voice rang through Tallis’s head in a faraway soprano tone. Free me, it said, the voice slow and agonizing, and spoken with great difficulty.

  Tallis clapped her hand on Tomas’s arm and hissed, “Wait, it’s talking.”

  Before Tomas could ask what, the voice bloomed in its high, far off tone once more. The wrong one. It has come. It infects. It consumes. I cannot hold on. It helps? The girl…the little boy…the dinaerea. They can cure. You will free me?

  Tallis tried reaching out with her mind. She had never properly learned how to talk to the Vanir trees without either touching them or speaking aloud. She’d never wanted to learn, either. It’d always seemed like too much of a betrayal to her mother’s memory. But now, she wished she’d developed the skill when she had the chance with Ballinel.

  Focusing her mind, she whispered to the Vanir, “Tell me how. Tell me what happened.”

  I could not see. It is not mine. It was not there until it was. Too late. Too late….If the girl does not cure, it needs to run. I cannot hold on…hold on….

  Tallis sighed, the Vanir was too far gone for it to give her anything useful. It was in pain and struggling to hold off whatever had tainted it so that it couldn’t even tell that there was only one silent one in the area. “You aren’t a First Vanir, are you? How is it I can help you?” Tallis said softly, ignoring Tomas’s concerned gaze.

  I am Third. The last, the oldest. Burn my shell. Free me, save my children. Save them all. Fire….I must burn.

  Tallis nodded and turned her gaze to Tomas. “We can’t save it. All we can do is finish what we came to do. It doesn’t have anything useful for us.”

  Tomas dipped his head in understanding and raised his crossbow again. He aimed it high on the spruce, beneath where its bare trunk met its drooping branches. He exhaled calmly and pulled the trigger. The white sack containing his special fire powder sailed through the air like a gliding bird. The sack connected with the tree, and a ball of fire raced up and down in a bright blaze, enveloping the Vanir almost instantly.

  Tallis felt a harrowing reverberation deep in her bones as the soprano-voiced Vanir was consumed. A heartbeat later, emptiness filled Tallis when the Vanir was no more.

  It always caught Tallis off guard how quickly the Vanir burned; it was so much quicker than a normal tree. Within seconds, the antediluvian being was reduced to nothing more than white ash and dead, green needles that floated to the ground like snow.

  She watched the scene for a moment before Tomas gave an involuntary lurch next to her. He clamped a hand over his mouth to keep others from hearing his dry heaving and shook his head.

  “It is passing,” he managed. “I’m feeling better, don’t fret.” Tomas turned away from her and pointed to the casteless camp with a shaky finger, observing several people retching. “They must have been under the effects much longer.”

  Tallis sighed. “Come on, then. Hopefully they’re too busy being sick and nervous about the tree that just burst into flames to give us any trouble while we ask them about the raid.”

  “I would not, if I were you,” a calm voice wafted up from behind them.

  Tallis whipped around, her dagger racing for the stranger’s throat, only to have it batted away as if it were no more than a stick.

  “Please,” the tremp said as he regarded Tallis and Tomas with ancient, copper-colored eyes. “I am not your enemy.” He looked past Tallis and Tomas to the pile of ash that had once been a Vanir. He nodded to himself and turned his gaze back on them. “You did right by it. I thank you for that.”

  “Who are you?” Tomas said, pointing his crossbow at the sinewy elf.

  He regarded Tomas’s weapon before grinning. “I am many things. At the moment, I am a friend—if you will allow it.”

  Tomas did not lower his crossbow, but the elf did not seem to mind.

  “The Vanir wasn’t hallucinating, then. It did know there were two silent ones in the area. She was talking about you, wasn’t she?” Tallis whispered.

  “I am Erlathan, and you,” he said looking Tallis square in the face with an expression of rapture, “remind me of my son.”

  Chapter 14

  Tomas swallowed the dry lump in his throat, marginally lowering his crossbow. He looked between Tallis and Erlathan; Tallis quivering with fear, or perhaps excitement, as she stared wide-eyed and open-mouthed at the copper-eyed, gray-haired elf. He studied the elf, his eyes settling on the wreckage that was his right ear.

  “You were casted,” he hissed.

  Erlathan glanced at Tomas, his gaze lingering on the six rings in his and Tallis’s own ears. “Briefly. It has made me a dinaer, but that is not important. It was a lifetime ago.” Erlathan tilted his head, his long hair flowing over his ruined ear as he looked at Tallis once more. He drank in her features as if he recognized her.

  When she remained silent, Tomas pressed, “Why does she remind you of your son?”

  “They have much in common, my friend. But there is no time for that in this moment. We must go; the unguerea will recover soon and look for answers. Or perhaps victims? Their kind is so hard to gauge.” He took a few steps away before turning back to them, smiling softly as neither Tomas nor Tallis moved to join him. “Trust is hard. It is something earned, not given quickly. I know this lesson all too well. I will earn your trust. But time is of tragically short supply. I mean neither of you harm; this I swear on my beloved wife’s soul. Please, let us be away so we all may resume our search for answers.”

  Erlathan outstretched a hand to them and Tomas flinched. His hand had the rough texture of tree bark and had begun to darken in spots to the color of acorns. Nightmarish images of the feral elves who stalked the forests like living trees came to his mind before he could stop them.

  Erlathan saw him recoil and, glancing down at his hand, gave a mournful smile. “My time on this earth grows short, my friends. Soon I will join the ranks of the Vanir you just claimed. I should be honored after being declared a dinaer but….” he trailed off, a faraway look claiming his gaze before he lowered his gnarled hand. “There is so much to say. More than might be spoken in several lifetimes, I fear.”

  He stalked back towards Tethir and Colben, as calm and graceful as a hunting lynx.

  Tomas watched the elf move, transfixed by his presence. It was Tallis who collected herself first, darting between Erlathan and the slightly trampled path they had taken from Colben and Tethir. “This is too well-timed to be some happy accident,” Tallis growled through the pain of using her bad arm to brandish both her daggers at Erlathan.

  “You surmise correctly, young lady,” Erlathan sighed. “I may be casteless, but I am neither deaf nor blind. You made quite the stir at your Mettling; rumors flew in your wake like birds reaching us forgotten souls in the countryside. I sought after you, pulled in, just another soul caught in your riptide. I would have been content with a passing glimpse of you. To look at someone who was—is—the same as my son before he…well, that will come in due time.

  “Then I find that you are not alone, that with you is an elandili child! You can distrust me all you like, my friend, but do not mistake my joy at meeting you for some other hidden treachery. I have lost much. I thought perhaps by sending you here, the Vanir were finally returning a piece of me before I was to join their ranks. What I found instead was this horribly poisoned Vanir. I see now that the tasks they have set for me are not yet done. I have more sins for which I need to atone. It is why I come bearing aid and offering peace.”

  “It was you following me earlier today, wasn’t it? After the raid? I swore someone was watching me, but never saw anyone. It was you, right?” Tallis challenged.

  Erlathan nodded. He did not raise a hand to Tallis in defense or hatred. He looked at her, expression calm, his old eyes wavering as with tears. Tomas was not sure what he was witnessing as Tallis and the old elf regarded each other. Their eyes flickered over every crevice of the other’s face; Tallis looked for lies and danger, Erlathan for hope and salvation.

  The silence continued to swell between them before something shifted in Tallis. The storm raging behind her eyes quieted until they became more aquamarine in hue than their normal sea-green. Her taut muscles eased and she put her bad arm back in its sling, all while keeping one dagger at the ready. “Fine,” she said tightly. “But one false move and I—”

  “You will strike me down? I suppose that would be fitting, if I were to betray you. I accept your terms, my friend. I have no intention of harming you or yours.” Erlathan smiled slowly, showing his crooked teeth. “May I know your names?”

  Tallis looked at Tomas and he nodded back at her. If this was the elf that started, or continued, Arcadia’s rumors of the elandili and could help them unearth who was responsible for attacking Lord Michal’s lands, then it would not hurt for them to at least be polite to the man.

  “I’m assuming you already know I’m Tallis, if you were following the Mettling,” she told him. “That’s Tomas behind you there. The other half-elf is Colben; he’s with our temporary servant, Tethir.” Erlathan glanced at Tomas as she introduced him and a look of heartbreak flitted across his wrinkled face. Before Tomas could say anything, she continued, “I’d say it was nice to meet you, Erlathan, but I haven’t decided yet. It’ll depend on what you can tell us about the raids and the thing that made the Vanir so sick.”

  “I am confident that you will be glad to know me, then, Tallis. I am already glad to have met you, so glad.”

  Tomas narrowed his eyes at him. “You don’t speak like someone who has only followed her travels since the Mettling, but like someone who knew of us, and of what Tallis is, well before now…before she came to Arcadia.” He kept his tone cold. Erlathan seemed wise, gentle, kind even, but Tomas had been fooled before as to the true nature of some of the people they had encountered on the road away from—and returning to—Selkirk. Tomas would rather die than allow another false friend to harm the woman he loved.

  Erlathan’s steps faltered as they inched closer to Colben and Tethir. A look of pain and remorse twisted the elf’s face into a mask of sorrow. Suddenly, all the puzzle pieces, all the little things Tomas had overlooked because he was too shocked and worried over Tallis’s safety, snapped into place.

  “Oh,” he breathed out in understanding. “That’s what you meant. Your son is a…he is the half-elf? You know of the old prophecies, too, then. Don’t you? But you were so happy to see Tallis, to know what she was. If you knew what she had originally…I mean what that evil Vanir had intended….”

  Erlathan’s expression was so heartrending that Tomas felt a hollowness well up inside of him, quickly replacing his suspicion. Tallis had stopped walking by then to gaze at them. Her eyebrow quirked in a silent question, but her hand trembled slightly as if she did not want to know the answer at the same time.

  The elf glanced down at his bare feet, at the threadbare, black trousers he wore, and tugged at the fraying charcoal and yellow plaid shirt denoting Kacper’s Household colors that hung loosely on his wiry frame. Tomas did not need Colben’s talents to see that it was not sadness that caused him to look away, but a mixture of embarrassment and shame.

  “Seeing her…finally meeting you, Tallis, it gives me hope for my boy. That perhaps if you may escape your destiny, that he may as well.” Erlathan slowly met Tomas’s eyes. “I know well what the elandili were meant to do when captive in disreputable hands, my friend, but my hope is that perhaps destiny is not so unconquerable a force after all.” Erlathan glanced between them. His sad eyes beseeched them to believe him and, for reasons Tomas could not explain, he did.

  Tallis’s brow furrowed, her face scrunched in the familiar look it took on when she was assailed with too much information during the course of trying to finish a separate task. “We’ll have to wait and see on that one,” she grumbled. “For now, we have other matters to take care of.”

  Erlathan nodded and followed them back from the outskirts of the casteless camp to where Tethir and Colben waited. Tethir backed away in revulsion when he saw Erlathan’s mangled ear, but Colben peered around the shrubbery, transfixed by the elf and his slow descent into becoming a tree.

  Erlathan blinked slowly as he regarded Colben and clutched a hand to his chest as if some happier memory overwhelmed him. “Oh my, he looks so much like Urban did as a child. You must be Colben, then? I am Erlathan, child, you need not fear me.”

  “I don’t,” Colben answered, tilting his head to study Erlathan and then looking at Tallis. He watched her for a time before looking Erlathan up and down once more. “You don’t mean us harm, but you are sad, very sad. Tallis and I make you sad? Happy? Both? How can it be both?”

  “Because of his son,” Tomas said as Tallis glared at Tethir until he composed himself.

  Colben looked up at him, and Tomas smiled. “He fathered an elandili too, and he has assured us he will share what he knows. Lucky for us, Erlathan has been looking for Tallis since the Mettling and revealed himself just as we cured the Vanir of the sickness that gripped it.”

  “You killed it; is that not what you mean, Sir Tomas?” Tethir said with a note of challenge to his soft voice. It was the first time the servant had been anything other than obedient, and it left Tomas wondering if he was upset at the Vanir’s passing or if he was trying to illicit a violent reaction from Erlathan.

  Tomas looked at Tallis; she had been the one who’d spoken to the tree, and he was not sure what it had said to warrant it being destroyed. Tallis merely sighed as if exhausted.

  “It was very sick; you knew that. It was too far gone to be saved so it asked—” Tallis paused, shaking her head as if she were trying to dislodge the memory. “We did what had to be done. What it begged us to do, Tethir. Look, you wanted to help us find the source of those half-elf rumors while we finished Lord Michal’s errands. Well, here he is. You don’t need to worry anymore about anything you do or say getting back to a voronwer, so cheer up, will you? You knew Erlathan would be casteless, so just, I don’t know…get over it? We don’t have the luxury of you two not getting along right now.”

  Tethir pursed his lips, bowing low to Tallis and standing at attention with his hands behind his back. Tallis rolled her eyes at him before flopping down on the hard ground. She rubbed her forehead with the palm of her hand, still in the throes of processing everything.

  Tomas did not know how she did it. It seemed as if ever since Kincardine was sacked by tremps, Tallis had uncovered one secret after another that shifted her world, and changed what she thought she knew of herself in the process. It was enough to make anyone go mad and yet…and yet she persisted.

 

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