The Green Thief: The Land in the Void, page 36
Edo made a mental note to continuously monitor the weight of the sword handle as it was stored at his back. Being tucked into the back of his belt, Edo could feel it shift against him with every step. Frankly, he wanted to keep it that way, for fear that it would somehow make its way into someone else’s hands, whether by chance or by some ill machination from the other side. And also, in the back of his mind he could see the chain of events, starting with someone seeing him at the battle, then relaying what had happened, and now suddenly half the kingdom was on the lookout for the Emerald Doe because he had killed the great Kaland and stolen his magic sword.
That realization made Edo pause before getting any closer. This was one of the instances where having a neutral identity could be beneficial. Edo groused at himself that he probably should have been doing this the entire journey from Tarello, but in his mind the comfort of being cloaked and having his face hidden outweighed the risk of being recognized out in the wilderness. He shed his cloak, removed the remains of the sword from his belt, and rolled them together into a green bundle that he could stick under his arm. Even if people were on the lookout for a man in the green cloak, with any luck they would just think it was a blanket or a bedroll. As he did this, his thoughts turned to everything else that might occur.
“I’m just passing through,” Edo said out loud to himself.
“I’m on my way to Hogsmar. I heard there’s work there. Yes I know. I wish. No, I can’t join the fight, I have a bad leg. It’s my knee. It...locks up...when I run? It locks up when I run. It makes it hard to keep up.”
Edo shook his leg and then stepped gingerly on it, taking his next few steps with a suddenly invented awkwardness.
“I need passage,” Edo said as he started to walk.
“I’m looking for passage. I have permission. The king won’t mind for me, I assure you.”
Edo spoke out loud to himself as he started walking again. He decided to stick to the coast on the north end of the village, entering and heading directly to the dock. Despite this, Edo passed several guards waiting at the outskirts of town. From the look of their clothing they were Eastwells guards, not Royal guards. Although, with the Lord of Eastwells having disappeared, and the rebellion happening everywhere, Edo wondered how much longer those wearing yellow garb with the blue boar sigil on the front would continue to hold their positions.
Two of them eyed Edo as he walked by, but neither said anything. For the moment, it seemed that Edo had outpaced whatever news of the battle there had been. He was curious as to the outcome. Had the city fallen completely? Or had the tide turned? Was Kaland even still alive? Or had the wound Edo given him been enough to kill him? Edo couldn’t see anyone surviving anything like that, not when the object that had made him so strong in the first place had been taken away.
Walking anywhere without his hood and his mask was something Edo did not enjoy doing, most of all near people. He was reminded why as he entered the village and began to walk towards the docks. One person passed by, glancing at Edo from the side of his eye.
What was he looking at?
Another went by Edo while carrying a large wicker basket, and didn’t look at Edo at all. After she had passed, Edo turned around and confirmed she still wasn’t looking at him. He had often encountered people that would avoid eye contact with him solely so they could turn around and look at him without him noticing. But Edo always noticed. Every gaze that passed over him, no matter how brief, sent his eyes darting back to the ground. He was always certain someone was quizzically eyeing his chin, or his nose, or when he was talking, his teeth.
Edo hurried through the town and reached the area of the shore that held the dock. It was an abrupt change of scenery. Going through the village, Edo passed by house after house that were all made of the same shoddy wood, and topped with thatched roofs made of long, woven strands of Eastwells’ unique grass. Then, in the center of the city and right up against the shore, as if they were trying to hide it, was a small cluster of buildings that were like something out of a dream. Elven craftsmanship and Elven architecture came together for this one small piece of city.
The buildings were not just designed differently. Instead of wood, they were all made of a special compound the elves created themselves. Edo had never seen anything actually being made from it in person, but from what he had read it was almost like clay. The elves would use large-scale tools to shape and put it all together, creating everything from the ground up. Walls, columns, floors, rooftops, etc. It was easy to shape, and easy to work with aside from one caveat. Whenever anything was being built, it needed to be kept out of the sun.
Elves would work either under cover of darkness, or employ various methods to ensure their works stayed in the shadows. When everything was laid out and construction was finished, they would then allow the sun to touch it. Until then the works remained malleable, but in the heat and light of the sun, it hardened into a material that most people would think at first glance was marble. The method allowed them to create intricate designs, leading to many buildings having abundant numbers of rounded edges, odd swirls, and overhangs that baffled most human craftsmen, and were considered by dwarven craftsmen to be an exquisite waste of time.
Edo looked around at the buildings themselves. In addition to being an entirely different color, a light bluish purple, they were taller than the rest of the village, yet were still only one floor. It looked like they were made out to be houses despite the intricate nature of each one. One of them was shaped like a sphere had been pressed into the ground, another like it had intersecting beams sticking out of the corners of the walls as if to mock the wooden log construction of human homes. Each one had tiny details on the outer walls. In the front of the homes there were numerous symbols carved into them, reminiscent of the token that Auben had given him. Edo didn’t bother trying to read them.
The buildings were the first thing Edo noticed, but after that he saw those around them. At first he saw just one male elf, sitting in the grass and leaning against the wall of a house. He wasn’t moving, and he didn’t even bother to turn his eyes up to Edo. One might’ve thought he was dead, particularly when a small bug flew by and landed squarely on his forehead, eliciting no response. It was only when another elf walked by and said something to him that Edo didn’t understand, that he rose off the ground and walked into the house.
He wasn’t the only one. Another elf was standing in the doorway of another house. Not moving, not carrying anything, and the door was wide open so he didn’t seem intent on guarding the house. Inside the house, standing at a window, was another. This one was female, and staring out blankly. Edo passed by, and thought the eyes were locked on him, but as soon as he continued on he saw that she was fixed on a random point on a house across the street.
He continued on, and saw the dock waiting for him at the edge of everything. To get there he passed one more building, which looked like a small shop. That door was also open, and Edo saw an elf seated within, surrounded by fanciful looking pots and vases, none of which had been touched in ages based on the dust coating them. The shopkeeper sat in the center of the room in a chair, his eyes fixed squarely on the floor.
It was the sickness they all had, their defeat having broken something in their minds and left them aimless. The curse of a long-life. When someone had a way of living that lasted for so long, their reaction to it being taken away left them broken. That was why it wasn’t a perplexing sight for Edo to see an elf drinking themselves to a stupor in a tavern, or wandering aimlessly through the wilderness. There were elves whose minds just couldn’t properly find their way into a new society.
On the other side of the coin were those that did. When elves were given the choice between settling into the kingdom or being exiled back to their own, there were those that joined to find a new purpose. But again, the single-mindedness of their species made it so there was a specific type of elf that wanted to. Mainly, elves that were once soldiers who now turned sword for hire. If fighting was all you knew for half a millenia, and suddenly your people had no more fight left in them, why not turn it elsewhere? The idea was sound. The elves’ martial prowess was, despite them losing the war, still something to behold.
None of the elves in this place were that. Edo passed by those few houses and continued onto a short dock where three ships were kept. Two of them were small sailboats, and the third a larger galley. The dock itself was made of regular wood, which contrasted sharply with the boats, all of which had been painted a dark blue trimmed with silver. All of the ships were occupied, with one or more elven sailors visible on the decks, and another standing at the end of the gangway on the docks. They all looked almost frozen in place, ready to sail at a moment’s notice. Although attention was certainly already on him, Edo wanted less of it, and approached the first small ship.
“I’m looking for passage,” Edo said, clutching the bundle under his arm tightly.
“Your human king prohibits any human interaction with the kingdom,” the elf said in a quiet voice, not making eye contact.
“He won’t mind for me, I assure you,” Edo said, just like he had rehearsed.
“Passage is forbidden to humans,” the elf added, still not turning his eyes.
“I’ve been granted passage by Elven nobility,” Edo added quietly.
That was when the elf lifted his head to properly look Edo in the eye.
“That’s impossible, all remaining Elven nobility is within the kingdom itself.”
“My passage was granted by Auben,” Edo spoke plainly.
At the mention of the name, there came a twitch in the elf’s eye, and the sailors on the ship turned their heads.
“Auben...is a traitor,” the elf said, the slightest bit of malice creeping into his voice.
“That may be, but as he still lives, he is still considered nobility,” Edo spoke quietly as he handed over the parchment upon which Auben had written his passage.
The Elves on the Backwater did not have a system in place to delegitimize their nobility, perhaps as a reaction to them being exiled from the Eastern Empires. This made Auben’s betrayal a unique instance, and something that had never been dealt with before. As such, he was still considered a noble, and retained all the benefits that title carried in terms of power, even if he wasn’t in the kingdom. The only way to remove a noble Elven bloodline was to destroy it, and from what Edo knew of the Elven King, he wouldn’t raise arms against his own people, traitor or not.
The elf on the dock slowly scanned his eyes over the scroll, and then carefully rolled it back up. He eyed Edo for a brief moment, and then gestured for him to board the ship. Edo carefully hurried up the gangway, stepping onto the scrubbed, polished deck of the small ship. There were four others on board, all standing by. There was no below deck, so Edo just picked an area by the railing of the bow and stayed out of the way.
Once he was on board, the elf on the dock boarded and retrieved the gangway himself. It fit snugly into a curved shelf that held it along the side of the ship, and then was tied down. Once that was complete the others worked in hurried unison. The ship was untied from the dock at the same moment its one large sail was dropped. There was a sudden but smooth jolt as the ship began to move through the water, instantly grabbing the breeze whipping past the coast. With that they were underway. Edo heaved a sigh of relief as he watched the mainland shrink away, and clutched the bundle under his arm tighter still.
The sun went down as they crossed the narrow channel between the mainland of Tassic’s Kingdom, and the island that held the remains of the Elven Kingdom. The sky had turned red as dusk continued, giving everything a soft, golden glow. One would have expected it to feel warmer than it was, but the wind over the waves was chilled. Then, the rays of sun on the horizon disappeared, and only the light of the moons remained. But as they continued sailing, that seemed enough. The night sky was vibrant, both with the stars, and the dull blue glow of the moons. The ship continued to sail in a straight line, until the dark horizon began to show tiny dots of light.
Edo put his cloak back on, and slid the sword back into his belt. In the distance was land, but more so than that, there were shapes. The shadows of enormous towers sticking out in the distance, difficult to see clearly but more difficult to ignore. As the small ship began to get nearer, the Elven Kingdom began to take shape before Edo’s eyes. The moonslight seemed to catch on the marble-like material of the construction, giving everything a soft, light-blue glow. Towers rising up from the ground had odd segments and chambers jutting out in every direction, seemingly defying their own weight by hanging in mid-air and only connected by short pieces. As they closed in on the dock, Edo began to see homes and other buildings, more grand than those back in the village. Most were three or four stories tall, easily. All of them looked pristine, preserved and protected by the rocky material from which they were made.
Then, as the ship began to approach a white stone dock, Edo saw it. In the distance was a massive stronghold. Towers taller than any of the others that Edo could see lined it, along with walls that sloped up and out with great curves and no semblance of bricks, making them impossible to scale. This was where the war was decided by the ultimate statemate.
After they had been routed from every corner of the kingdom, the elves retreated back here. The humans couldn’t just attack the stronghold. It was too well fortified for a direct attack without massive loss of life on their end. They couldn’t lay siege to it either. The island made it too difficult for supply lines to sustain an occupying force, and elves were known for both their patience and their ability to maintain over time. Had it happened, it would have been the only multi-generation siege in history. Nevertheless, the war ended in a treaty, and the elves that returned to this island never again left.
The ship slowly eased its way in place along the dock, and was met by several crew waiting. Ropes were tossed from up on the ship to the dock, where they were deftly and expertly tied off. The elves retrieved the gangway from the side of the ship, set it up, and then stepped aside to allow Edo to disembark. Edo’s movements were slow as he took in the scenery. Aside from the moons above, most of the light on the dock came from ornately made lanterns. The panes of glass in them were blue, casting an additional eerie glow onto the stone walkway. Edo stepped onto the dock, and listened in more ways than one.
Not only was the dock quiet, there was a different kind of stillness to the air. Edo turned his head, actively searching for something, anything, that sounded or felt like it came from the Void. He put a hand to his back, feeling the hilt of the sword through his cloak. There was nothing. No crackle in the air, no voices on the wind, and no sign of the Shade anywhere. Edo would have been relieved, but it was not what he was hoping for. This was not the silence he encountered at the Sapphire Anchor. It was difficult to describe. Edo felt it was the difference between plugging your ears in a crowded room so no sound got in, and there being no sound in that crowded room at all.
The air felt dead.
Chapter 20:
The Elven Kingdom
“Rarely is an uncompleted defeat as total as it was there. The seat of a kingdom all but destroyed, but not wholly. Left standing, but broken.”
-Ladahl Vernos, Royal Scholar
Edo was met on the dock by a small group of soldiers. Seven of them, each fully equipped in a suit of plate mail, and holding weapons. Six of them were walking in pairs in two columns, equipped with gleaming shields in a diamond shape, and swords that were much longer than anything most humans would use. The six were wearing full helms with interlocked plates that covered everything but their eyes, detailed with metallic feathers that swooped back at the sides and the top. With their faces covered, Edo would have felt right at home if not for the leader.
At the front of the group was an elf with a particularly broad frame. He wore the same armor as the others, shining silver plate inlaid with various detailing, and disc-shaped pauldrons protruding from his shoulders, but he was not wearing a helmet at all. He had long black hair combed and draped down behind his head, leaving his face fully exposed and showing off a collection of scars.
“Edo the Green,” he called in a gruff voice Edo rarely heard from elves.
“Yes,” Edo nodded as he approached.
“I am Tandryl. We have been told of your coming. Come with us. You will be escorted to the king.”
Edo was taken aback as the column of six elves marched forward and moved to flank him on either side.
“I’m to see the king?” Edo asked, confused.
“He has requested your presence,” Tandryl said.
Edo stood in thought for a moment, wondering how the king knew it was him coming. Perhaps Auben had sent a message to the kingdom. After Edo’s insult at his home he had seemed angry enough, and also seemed petty enough to try to revoke the permission he had just given. But he was a traitor to their people, so why would they listen to him one way or another? No, it had to be someone else who notified them of Edo’s coming, but who? Edo looked at Tandryl, who was standing there stiffly as if to wait for an answer.
“Um, yes, of course I will go,” Edo said.
Tandryl spun on his heels and began to walk. Edo stepped to follow, and only afterward did the other six move as well.
The group began to walk up a central road that led from the dock directly toward the stronghold. As they did, the silence remained. The elves' movements were careful and quiet, and the only real noise made by them was the light clinking of their armor moving with each step. Instead of boots they wore soft, black footwraps that were silent as they stepped on the stone walkways. Edo walked softly as he always did, but it was disconcerting to realize that everyone else was doing the same. He watched Tandryl walk in front of him, and also noted the state of the stone walkway between them. Even though they were outside, adjacent to a coast, and surrounded by trees, it had no scuffs, dirt, leaves, or marks of any kind.
