muster your troops and protect your people!”
“It will be a cold day in the Abyss before I let a man of orcish blood tell me how to run my lands,” Lord Sully said, standing. “I will remove the danger within my own house before turning to the danger without. This feast is done. Return to your rooms. I will send a servant for you before I march.”
Harruq stood, biting his tongue to keep himself from saying anything that might earn him a stay in a dungeon cell. Two soldiers led them away. Once back in their rooms, Harruq stripped off his clothes, glad to be done with them. He put on his own outfit, feeling far more comfortable.
“What I’d give to have my swords back,” he muttered as he collapsed atop the bed. He shifted about and grunted. “Huh. At least the bed’s comfy. What is in here, anyway? Goose feathers?”
Aurelia lay down beside him and covered her eyes with her wrist.
“This is all a waste of time,” she said. “The last thing we need is the few troops here slaughtering each other. When the orcs do arrive, they’ll find the land ripe for the taking.”
“We hurt the orcs pretty bad at Veldaren,” Harruq said. He wrapped his arms around his wife and held her close. “If Lord Sully’s seen orcs moving back and forth, it means they’re trying to get back to the Vile Wedge. They don’t have the numbers to siege any castles. However; if it was Velixar got them into Neldar, I doubt it was over a bridge.”
“A bridge!” Aurelia said, bolting upward.
The door opened, and in stepped Haern. He, too, had changed back to his normal attire.
“Did I startle you?” Haern asked as he shut the door.
“The orcs will need far greater numbers if they’re to take either Felwood or the Green Castle,” Aurelia said. “What if they’re trying to build a bridge across the Bone Ditch? That’s the only real way for them to get reinforcements. It’d take months for them to go south and over the Rigon River, then loop all the way back north.”
“Bridges tend to burn easily,” Haern said, grinning at Aurelia. “Think you can make us some fire?”
Aurelia winked.
“Let me get out of this dress,” she said. “For now, let’s enjoy the beds we have and leave tomorrow morning.”
“Richard won’t be happy,” Harruq warned.
“Since when did you care about pissing off others?” Haern asked.
Harruq shrugged.
“Just saying is all. But I prefer to have my swords with me when I piss someone off.”
Haern laughed and left the room.
“They won’t dare detain us if I demand our leave,” Aurelia said as she removed the elegant dress and laid it out across the bed. “Now stop staring and help me with the laces.”
Harruq helped tie the back, then kissed her neck when she was done.
“Least we get something useful out of you being an elf,” he said.
She turned around and kissed his lips.
“Don’t worry about what Lord Sully said. About orc blood.”
Harruq laughed.
“Trust me. I’ve been insulted far worse, and that’s just from Tarlak. I’ll be fine. But after good food, good wine, and needless argument, I’m aching for a bed. Tomorrow we can worry about bashing in some orc heads.”
T he next morning, Harruq awoke with a throbbing headache.
“Ugh,” he said, rolling over and mashing his head between pillows. “What’d they put in that wine, gut rot?”
He splayed out across the bed, then realized he had far too much room. Poking an eye open, he glanced about.
“Aurry?” he asked.
Their quarters were empty. Harruq startled out of bed, flailing drunkenly against the multitude of bed sheets.
“Aurry!” he shouted.
He was halfway finished buckling on his armor when a blue portal ripped open above their bed. Giggling like a young maiden, Aurelia fell straight down atop the mattress, bounced once, and then vanished in a massive tangle of sheets.
“Where the Abyss have you been?” Harruq asked as the portal closed.
In answer, Aurelia lifted one arm free and showed him his two swords. Harruq grinned.
“That’s my girl,” he said.
“Lord Sully’s forbidden us from leaving until his army marches for the chipped fields,” she said, freeing her face from the sheets.
“Where’s that?” Harruq asked as he reattached the swords to his belt.
“About ten miles southwest,” Aurelia said. “We flew over them on our way here. Really flat hills, with ground too rocky for farming. Evidently Sir Kull has camped there, and Richard hopes to have his battle before the sun sets.”
“I take it he doesn’t want us warning the renegade knight?”
Aurelia sat on the edge of the bed, her bare feet dangling.
“That appears to be the idea. They’ve got Seleven locked in their stables with three guards, along with yours and Haern’s weapons.”
“You get Haern’s sabers?” Harruq asked.
Aurelia snickered.
“Haern got them last night while we slept. You should have known he would.”
The half-orc bit his lip, then shrugged. Yeah, he probably should have.
“I take it our kindly Lord doesn’t realize you have certain magical abilities?” he asked.
“Nor does he know trying to keep Haern locked up is like trying to imprison a shadow. When I left Lord Sully, I pretended to be heading back here but…” She grinned.
“Let me guess,” Harruq said. “You made yourself invisible, snagged my weapons, freed Seleven, and then magically escaped your elven butt here to brag about it.”
She kissed his nose.
“Exactly. You ready to go?”
“Any chance I can eat first?”
Her eye roll was answer enough.
The door cracked open, and neither were surprised when Haern slipped inside.
“Their army numbers near five hundred,” the assassin said as he shut the door behind him. “Two hundred ride horses. They could do wonderful damage to some orcs if they found them on open fields, but I doubt they’d stand a chance against the legions of dead.”
“Or a winged army,” Harruq muttered.
Aurelia walked over to the window and pushed aside a thin white curtain. Outside she saw the gathering forces moving about the courtyard, carrying supplies, sharpening weapons and saddling up horses.
“As long as the threat here is just rumors and dreams, they won’t react,” she said. “We need to convince them of their danger. This isn’t some threat of a new conqueror or a change of ruling Lords. Your brother will destroy everything here, everything. We’ll live in a world of ash and bones.”
“Not Qurrah,” said Harruq. “Velixar.”
The elf sadly shook her head.
“They’re more similar than you’d prefer, Harruq. Their reasons might be different, but what they’ll achieve together is the same. Their threat may be far away, but the orcs are near. Perhaps we can twist this conflict to everyone’s best interest…”
“How?” asked Haern. “Think the orcs will send an envoy of their own? Their form of politics involves hammers and really loud shouting.”
“No,” Aurelia said, spinning about. “I mean by doing exactly what Lord Sully worries we might. Let’s go. Seleven should be waiting just outside the city walls.”
