“It seems far too precious to carry into battle, Amlaruil.”
“It is, Seiveril. But if you are to have any hope for victory, then I think you must have it. Guard it with all your care.”
“I will,” Seiveril promised.
“Good.” Amlaruil glanced over her shoulder at the setting moon. Its lower limb already touched the dark treetops across the lake. She sighed and looked back to him. “I must go now, Seiveril. I fear that we will not meet again.”
“That is not true,” he told her. “If we do not meet again in this world, then perhaps we will walk together in Arvandor.”
“In Arvandor.” The queen smiled again, and she leaned forward and kissed Seiveril’s cheek. She turned away and hurried back up to her ship. “Sweet water and light laughter for the rest of your days, Seiveril Miritar.”
“And to you,” he replied.
He watched as the white ship began to move away, its sails sighing as they caught a new breeze and filled out again. Dancing away across the silver moonpath, the shining hull rose higher and higher in the water until finally it broke clear altogether, speeding westward toward the moonset and far Evermeet beyond.
Seiveril watched the ship until it disappeared from sight. He looked down at the precious silver sapling, still in his cupped hands. So fragile a vessel for the hopes of our people, he mused. Then he carried it back into the warm shadows of the forest.
“Felael, send for Thilesin,” he said to his guard captain. “I have a task I cannot trust to anyone else.”
The wood elf gazed on the sapling, his eyes wide with wonder. “She is already here, Seiveril,” he finally said. “She arrived while you were speaking with Amlaruil. She said she has urgent tidings for you.”
Seiveril looked up, and found Thilesin waiting for him. A priestess of the Seldarine, she was a serious and quiet sun elf who had proved herself indispensable as Seiveril’s adjutant and secretary, helping him to keep track of the countless details and tasks necessary to wield the Crusade against the enemies of the People. He carried the young tree to her.
“I can think of no better steward for Amlaruil’s gift,” he told her. “You must see to it that this tree is well guarded at all times. Ask each of our companies for a true and faithful warrior to help you. This is an honor and a duty that all of our folk should have a hand in.”
Thilesin took the sapling, her eyes shining. “I will see to it,” she whispered.
“Now, what news did you have for me?”
The cleric lifted her gaze from the small sapling, the taut frown of worry returning to her face. “There has been an attempt on Ilsevele’s life, Lord Seiveril. She was not seriously injured, but several of our people died. No one knows more than that right now. There are whispers of drow assassins, Sembian conspiracies, and even treachery on the part of our own emissaries. In any event, Ilsevele and the others are now being held in the Sharburg under guard.”
Seiveril took a step back and threw out a hand to steady himself against the trunk of a shadowtop. Were the Sembians so full of hate that they could not abide the idea of sharing Cormanthor with elves? Or was this some machination of the daemonfey, an effort to make sure that Ilsevele’s mission failed? He felt his knees growing weak. Five years ago he had lost his wife, and he knew he did not have the strength to bear another loss. “Who died?” he managed.
“We do not know, my lord. But Lord Theremen’s people were certain that Ilsevele survived, if nothing else.”
Seiveril looked down at the silver sapling in Thilesin’s hands. There lies our hope, he mused. In Myth Drannor lies my destiny. But not yet, it seems.
“Call for the captains,” he said wearily. “We march on Tasseldale before the sun rises.”
CHAPTER TEN
10 Eleasias, the Year of Lightning Storms
Fflar opened his eyes in a small stone room, illuminated only by a single slitlike window. He hurt all over, and there was a febrile tremor in his arms and legs that left him feeling as weak as a kitten. Where am I? he wondered. What happened?
For a time he couldn’t put anything together, and simply stared up at the brilliant daylight pouring through the window. Then his brow furrowed in recollection. There was a fight, he remembered. A lonely manor house on a hill, arrows in the dark… the banquet! The dark elf assassins!
“Ilsevele!” he gasped.
“Peace, Starbrow. I am right here.”
Fflar turned his head and found Ilsevele sitting on a wooden chair by the head of the bed on which he lay. A rough abrasion scored one of her cheekbones, and she’d cut away some of her beautiful copper-red locks-most likely because they’d been singed beyond repair, he supposed. But she regarded him with a soft, shy smile and set one cool hand on his forehead. “I think the poison has run its course. We feared the worst, but Lord Selkirk sent a cleric of Tyr to tend to our wounded, and he spoke powerful healing prayers over you while you lay senseless. For that, at least, I am grateful.”
He looked past her shoulder, and saw several of their comrades waiting nearby-Aloiene, Deryth, and three others. But Seirye, Hasterien, and Jerien were not present. I saw Seirye die, he reminded himself. Did Hasterien and Jerien fall as well? He remembered other elves falling in the fury of the battle spells and swordplay.
“By the Seldarine, what a disaster,” he breathed. “Where are we now?”
“The Sharburg. We’re being held in one of the towers. The Sembians say it’s for our own protection.” Ilsevele grimaced. “I pointed out to Lord Selkirk that I would be quite well protected in the camp of my father’s army, but he hasn’t seen fit to allow us to leave yet. There are a number of guards just on the other side of that door.”
“We’ll leave any time you like,” Fflar promised her.
He started to throw off his blanket and rise, only to realize two things at the same time-first, he was still quite weak, and second, he was not wearing a stitch of clothing. While elves did not concern themselves quite as much as humans about that sort of thing, he suddenly found that he was not so willing to abandon his modesty with Ilsevele watching him.
He fell back into his covers, and he remembered everything. She knelt over me and wept when I was hurt. And she kissed me, and I kissed her too. All of the sudden, his heart was hammering in his chest, and he could feel his face flushing with embarrassment. He looked up suddenly in alarm. “Ilsevele, I think I-did we?”
She smiled down at him, and her eyes sparkled with delight. “Yes, we kissed,” she said, and she leaned close to kiss him softly again. “I knew what I was doing, and I meant what I said,” she whispered to him.
“I don’t know what to say,” he answered. In fact, he did, even if he did not want to admit it. Even as his heart danced with the words she breathed into his ear, a dark and ugly knot of guilt grew under his ribs. Seiveril had trusted him to guard Ilsevele, not to steal her heart. And he had dealt with Araevin in an even worse way, hadn’t he? Even if Ilsevele and her betrothed had quarreled lately, he hadn’t waited a day before stepping into his friend’s place. How could he ever look Araevin in the eye again?
“What is it?” Ilsevele asked.
He couldn’t bear to say what came next, but he had to. “Ilsevele… what about Araevin?”
“Do you think it is any easier for me?” A shadow flickered behind her eyes. “I wept for hours, Starbrow. But I came to realize that I have been growing apart from Araevin for years now. And lately he has been growing apart from me, much more so in the last few months. He has left me behind him, and I do not understand him anymore.”
“He is my friend.”
“I know. And I hope that somehow he still will be. But this is my choice, Starbrow, and it is my responsibility as well as yours. Who can tell their heart what to feel?”
“I didn’t mean for this to happen.”
Ilsevele laughed and said, “Perhaps that is exactly why it did.” Fflar started to respond, but she simply laid her fingers across his lips and drew back. “No more for now. You still need rest, and we have all the time in the
