“But if you had, that wouldn’t have stopped you, would it?” It was Moreen who spoke now.
“No, because… because I had to have… I needed…”
Moreen gave Kerrick a look at once so fierce and compassionate that he was taken aback.
“Take off your ring,” she said quietly, and in that instant she understood.
He was like his father: seduced by the urge. He moved his right hand over his left, as if he was about to ease the circlet off of his finger. Touching his skin, he toyed with the metal circle, considered removing it.
He couldn’t.
“You had better see to the door,” said Dimorian, gesturing vaguely. The words barely penetrated Kerrick’s consciousness, but Moreen responded. She stepped to the entry and pushed the door shut, turning the latch to lock it. Spotting a heavy beam, the chiefwoman picked it up and dropped it across the portal, securing it in place.
They heard ogres rush onto the landing, roaring in rage. They were outside now, pounding against the door. Kerrick turned back to his father.
“You were their puppet. You did so much for them! Grimwar Bane’s ship, the Hornet-that was your design too, wasn’t it? That’s how the ogres were able to make another galley!”
Dimorian nodded. “There were certain flaws, mainly because of the absence of any hardwood. Her hull was weak. I have an idea how to make the next one stronger.”
Kerrick stared at him accusingly. Dimorian found Moreen with his watery eyes.
“I suppose that ship will never be built, now, will it?”
“We came to stop you,” she replied. “Not from building ships, but from making another golden orb.”
The elder elf offered a smile of immeasurable sadness. “You are too late to stop its creation, as you can see. I fear that this is a weapon even more terrible than the one Grimwar Bane used against your fortress. It is larger, heavier, more powerful in every respect.”
A great boom echoed from the door as the ogres brought massive force to bear. The portal bulged inward, cracking, splinters flying loose. Kerrick turned to look, confused, his mind and heart were spinning wildly.
“My son… please believe me, I never expected to see you again, to see any elf. I am grateful that you are here, and we must talk about everything that has happened to me… and you… over the years. But now you must flee!” declared Dimorian Fallabrine, with a trace of the authority that once captained a mighty warship.
“We aren’t going anywhere!” Moreen retorted. “Not while that orb exists and can be used against my homeland.”
“I assure you,” said Dimorian in a new, more serious tone, “I can address both of your concerns immediately. The orb will never be used against you, nor will my work continue to aid the king of Suderhold.”
The Alchemist suddenly stood straight, his eyes clear, as if years or even decades had fallen away from him. He met Kerrick’s gaze with an expression combining pride and a plea for forgiveness.
“What-what are you saying?” asked the chief-woman. Then she understood. Moreen turned to Kerrick. “Can we trust him… your father?” she asked the younger elf.
“Yes,” said the son softly, studying his father’s resolute expression. “I believe we can.”
The quivering door showed cracks and splinters. The din was powerful, as if a hundred ogres were breaking it down. “Is that the only way out of here?” asked Kerrick.
“There is another way. Here, you must drink this to take advantage of it,” said the Alchemist, lifting up a small bottle and removing the stopper. He handed it to Moreen. “It is a powerful elixir, too powerful for me, but for you, it can have a profound use. It will allow you to escape, to live.”
“What is it?” the chiefwoman asked suspiciously.
“A treasure, in its own right,” replied the Alchemist, allowing himself a wry smile. “Ironically, it is a gift from the Dowager Queen herself.”
Moreen stepped forward, warily took the proffered bottle. The Alchemist went to the window and threw open the heavy shutter. Sunlight spilled into the room, pure and bright and wholesome.
The chiefwoman lifted the neck of the vial to her lips and drank from it.
Instantly her image began to wave, the black of her hair, the tawny buckskin of her shirt fading into a misty gray even as she set the bottle down on the bench. The rays of sunlight passed through her as she grew incorporeal, until finally she grew barely visible, floating in the air, a cohesive but gaseous cloud the color of pale steam.
A heavy blow struck the door, an axe blade plunging through, twisting and ripping as its wielder pulled it back for another strike. Kerrick stepped forward, reached for the bottle but spoke pleadingly to his father.
“Come with us,” the Messenger said. “We can destroy the orb, and without you they’ll never be able to make another one. You can return with us to Brackenrock. Someday I could take you back across the ocean, to Silvanesti…”
His father shook his head, a slight gesture, dashing Kerrick’s hopes. “I have no home there anymore,” he said regretfully. “I turned my back on my people, my birthright, long ago when I made the choice to serve the ogre king in return for release from his dungeon. It was a choice your mother resisted. She died in that dungeon, her pride still intact. For that, I reproach myself above all. But when she was gone, I’m afraid I weakened. The lure of magic, the taste of power… I am ashamed to admit that I lacked the strength to resist. I must do something to atone….”
“Yes,” Kerrick said quietly, feeling that same warm pulse of magic in his own blood, the sensation of power emanating from the golden ring on his finger.
Dimorian gestured to the ring on his son’s hand. “I see my ring on your hand. You must take it off now. I pray that you will recognize its danger and throw it away!”
There was such a stark terror in his father’s voice that this time Kerrick did as he was told and slid the ring off of his finger. Immediately he staggered with the onset of weakness and despair, the familiar sensation of bleak hopelessness, as he held the little band of metal in his hand. Every nerve in his body, every ounce of his desire, urged him, begged him to put the ring back on. He swayed.
Then he surprised himself by reaching forward and dropping the ring it into Dimorian’s trembling, outstretched hand. Quickly Kerrick took the last swallow of the drink, the liquid searing his throat and the warmth spreading through his body as he grew light and immaterial.
Moreen was already drifting away, slipping out through the window, and he turned to follow her, flying free, sweeping outward to the sunlit sky. The two of them swirled into the air beyond Castle Dracoheim as the Alchemist’s door burst, and the hinges broke free.
The Dowager Queen could not believe her eyes-six of her finest ogre guards mangled and bleeding, most of them dead. Blood everywhere, while three of her burliest guards continued to hack and chop at the resistant door.
“An elf did this?” grunted one of her attendants, biting back any further questions as she flashed him a murderous look.
“Break it down!” she cried. “Out of my way!” She raised her iron cudgel and swung a mighty blow.
With her help the splintering barrier finally gave way, cracking down the middle and collapsing in two halves. The first three ogres charged through with vengeful roars, and Queen Hannareit pushed behind them-then they all froze, paralyzed by fear.
“What are you doing?” she gasped, trying to comprehend the scene.
The Alchemist was alone in the room, the window wide open. If the Messenger had been here, he was gone.
Somehow the craven and feeble elf who had been her pet, her slave for all these years, had found the strength to lift the golden orb. He had hoisted it in his two hands, balancing it on the windowsill above the hundred-foot drop to the courtyard below. The elder queen and her ogre guards stood aghast, then began to back away.
“I had a chance to talk to my son,” he said, “I found strength I didn’t even know I possessed.”
“Put that down-carefully,” Hanna said, her voice like an iceberg grating against the hull of a ship. “Put it down, and I will forgive you… for this… for everything. You shall have… everything you want… need.”
“I think that for the first time in a very long time, I have everything I need,” said the Alchemist.
He seemed strangely content-happy, Hanna would have said, if she had time to say anything. Dimorian Fallabrine leaned out the window and let go of the golden orb.
