world, which needs her more than you do.” He glowed with light.
“I do love you, Kol,” Lara said quietly, “but I will not remain with you. Did you not hear what Kaliq told you? I have my memories once more. You cannot hold me by the force of your magic any longer. I cannot bear another day in your dark and dreary kingdom. I am faerie. I need the heat of the sun upon me, a warm breeze blowing my hair. I need color, and flowers and most of all I need Magnus Hauk and our children!
“Do you really believe that you could have succeeded in your nefarious scheme had not higher powers than yours permitted it? All my life I have moved toward a destiny that I neither knew nor understood. Now I do. It was my destiny to give twin sons to a Twilight Lord whose predecessors could sire only one son in a lifetime. Your laws will not permit you to kill one of your offspring, Kol. And besides, you cannot be certain which one is the true heir and meant to follow you. Until you can learn that secret the Dark Land will be kept in a turmoil by Kolbein and Kolgrim as they struggle for supremacy. They may even seek to destroy you, for you will learn that in their quest for power they will not be governed by the rule of law.
“You sought to loose the forces of darkness upon our worlds, Kol, but there must always be a balance between the dark and the light. That balance is now restored and will remain so for some time,” Lara told him. “You have great magic, my lord, but so do I and without my magic you will not succeed with your plans to conquer either Hetar or Terah. I suggest you consider what you will tell your lords now as I am certain that they have been planning for the riches these conquests would bring them. You will have to placate them in some fashion if you hope to retain their loyalty.” Lara turned to Kaliq. “I am ready now,” she said and reached for his hand.
“No!” the Twilight Lord said. “I will seek you out again, Lara. You will return to me or I will kill you, for no other shall have you.”
Kaliq shook his head. “Your reflecting bowls are gone, for I have taken them. You will make no others, for that knowledge was lost to your kind centuries ago. My brothers and I have sealed off your kingdom from the rest of the worlds for at least a hundred years. Until then, neither you nor your body servant can leave Kolbyr. You are trapped here where you can do little harm. Farewell!” Kaliq wrapped his golden brocade cloak about Lara and together they disappeared in a shadowy mist, Kol’s shriek of fury echoing in their ears.
As Kaliq removed his cloak from his companion Lara slowly collapsed against him. “The strength has gone out of me,” she said and she began to sob.
The Shadow Prince quickly scooped Lara up in his arms and carried her out to the great open corridor where there was morning sun and warm air. For months she had been penned within Kol’s dark castle in the chill and dank. Such an atmosphere was anathema to her faerie soul and it had slowly begun to shrivel. Back in her own realm, however, she would soon be revived. “Breathe,” he instructed her.
Lara drew a deep breath and the scent of flowers filled her nostrils. “Roses,” she murmured with a sigh and relaxed against him. She sniffed again. “And lilies, and woodbine and yellow primroses, which are the sweetest.” The sunlight seemed to revive her and she said, “Put me down now. I think I can stand. I want to see the horses.”
Kaliq set her gently upon her feet and helped her to the balustrade, but his arm remained about her waist.
Lara looked down into the great green valley where the Shadow Princes’ herds grazed. It never failed to amaze her that in the center of the desert this magical place existed. “Is Og here?” she asked Kaliq. “Does he know what happened?”
“Og is here and so is your son, Dillon,” Kaliq informed her.
“Dillon should not be here yet,” Lara cried, turning to look up into his handsome face. “I said you might have him when he was twelve but not before, my lord.”
“I brought him to Shunnar but a short while back, Lara, and I did because he suddenly knew that you were in the Dark Lands. I needed to distract Dillon before your husband took him too seriously, marshaled his army and marched north. Hetar is threatening Terah. Your old friend Gaius Prospero has disposed of Anora and is divorcing Lady Vilia so he may wed his lover, a creature of our creation. But he will, I fear, be disappointed for all of his plans will come to naught. We will retrieve the lady Shifra when she has served her purpose for us.”
“And what has her purpose been, my lord?” Lara asked him, curious.
“To distract Gaius Prospero from his nefarious plans to invade Terah, which he believes weakened by your absence,” Kaliq told her. “And to break his heart.”
“Will Jonah take Vilia to wife?” Lara wondered aloud.
“Aye, he will and while it will greatly discomfit the emperor to learn of the marriage, he will believe Jonah’s explanation. That he has wed the lady only to prevent her from falling into the hands of those who would depose Gaius Prospero and to prevent her from being shamed and seeking to wreak revenge upon her former husband. Her family is a prominent and conservative one.”
“And the emperor will be grateful to his good right hand,” Lara replied with a small smile. “And then the creature you have given Gaius Prospero will disappear. Not right away, I hope. He needs to be punished for all his wickedness. If the emperor is content with this female then you have removed the curse I placed upon him, Kaliq, so he might enjoy pleasures with her. It is the only reason he would revere her, for his tastes have long since been jaded.”
“It was necessary,” Kaliq said, “and you should really have never plagued him in such a manner, Lara.” He scolded her with a smile.
“Magical or mortal,” Lara replied dryly, “all men stick together when it comes to matters of pleasure.”
The prince laughed. “You are feeling a little better,” he said.
“Aye, but I am also very tired, Kaliq.”
“I know,” he replied sympathetically. “Being in the Dark Lands for so many months has drained you of your strength. You will remain with me until you are fully recovered, my love.” His elegant fingers caressed her face.
“May I see Dillon?” she asked him.
“I do not think it wise,” he told her. “I am going to return him to Magnus today with the message that you will soon be home again. He knows now that your disappearance had to do with fulfilling your destiny.”
She nodded. “And when I do go back to my husband and children?”
“Your memories of those months spent in the Dark Lands will be gone, my love,” he said quietly. “As for those affected by your disappearance, they, too, will not remember. It will be as if you had never been gone, Lara. Magnus will remember coming for you in the New Outlands and bringing you home. The past months for you all will be recalled as any year in your lives. Nothing special will have happened. In Hetar, the war that Gaius Prospero plans will be based solely upon his fears of Terah and his need to do
“You can do this?” she said.
“My brothers and I, working with the Munin, can do this,” he replied. “The Munin owe us one more favor for rescuing them from Kol and the Dark Lands.”
“But Kol will not forget what has happened,” Lara said.
“Nay, he will not,” Kaliq answered her. “It is a punishment for him that he will remember that once he possessed a most beautiful faerie woman called Lara. No other will ever please him again. But he will be too busy with the sons you gave him to spend much time grieving. He must hold on to the Dark Kingdom from within his prison and in the face of the growing threat Kolbein and Kolgrim will present to him. And without the presence of their lord to hold them in check, the giants, the dwarfs and the Wolfyn will run rampant throughout the Dark Lands,” Kaliq said.
“Then I am safe,” Lara murmured. She was growing very tired and slumped against Kaliq’s shoulders. “I need to sleep,” she told him.
“Come,” he said and led her to the magnificent apartment that had once been hers.
“We will eat our evening meal in your garden.” Then he left her.
She was truly alone for the first time in months. And she was in a familiar place. Slowly Lara looked about her. She stood in the little antechamber where he had first brought her all those years ago. And then Noss had come in, and they had been so glad to have found one another again. Lara smiled with the memory. Could either she or Noss have ever imagined the future before them then? She doubted it.
Everything seemed to be the same within her apartment. It was a spacious accommodation with a dining
