1 - The Inn #2
Laughter erupted almost immediately—crude and unrestrained.
“Did you hear that? The little lad sure can talk!” someone exclaimed loudly.
“Sounds like some king of jesters came to lecture us!”
“Jesters know more about women than he does, anyway!”
The room came alive as one, as if the provocation had served as a signal. Voices overlapped, mugs clattered against the wood, and the benches creaked under the weight of bodies leaning forward.
Tariel, for his part, did not reply. His gaze swept over them without lingering, then returned to the man in front of him—or rather, to what lay just beneath his skin: traces of energy, visible only to those who knew how to look. And on his full lips? A petty smile.
He can shove his smile up his ass, the elf thought. As he lifted his chin again, looking down at the man—who stood much taller than he did—the elf finally placed both fists on his hips before turning on his heel.
“Brynjar, we’re leaving.”
They began walking away, and the noise of the hall seemed to falter for a fraction of a second before resuming, as if it refused to let them leave the scene too quickly.
A smooth voice called after them.
“Do you plan to flee as quickly as you observe, elf?” Tariel stopped without turning around, but the voice continued, more measured now, less mocking. “You’re far from your highlands, Morgraves isn’t a fan of your kind.”
Footsteps sounded behind them, and Tariel finally turned around.
“Those of your people always end up standing out here,” the man added, now closer to him. “And not always for the right reasons.”
A silence fell, heavier than the insults that had come before, and Tariel let it linger a second too long, then broke it with a glance.
The elf lifted his chin, but he wasn’t a fool.
The brute’s tirade wasn’t a lecture—it was a warning.
However, even the most ignorant of boors could see that Tariel was hurt.
He didn’t belong there; he was well aware of that, and it was obvious that everyone present in the room had noticed it as well.
Tariel longed to return to his books in the silence of his home, with only the moon and a good cup of tea for company.
He was tired, annoyed, and the voice of that attention-seeking man only fanned the flame of his irritation, consuming his common sense until it was reduced to ashes.
“If they want to hurt me, let them try, then.”
Only those few words left the elf’s lips, which had a bitter taste.
He had confidence in his magic and wasn’t afraid to use it.
More than once had he narrowly escaped danger on his journey to this cursed inn, and a few drunk mercenaries no longer frightened him.
He was confident. A confidence that might be misplaced, he was aware, but he was no less certain.
Just as he was about to turn on his heel, eager to leave the shabby inn, the lout’s skin brushed against his own in a searing, stinging touch.
Tariel hissed through clenched teeth, wrenching his arm free from the brown-haired man’s surprisingly gentle grip, his gaze filled with rage.
The stranger’s eyebrows were furrowed in what appeared to be astonishment, but Tariel was in no mood for observation at the moment—he was furious.
His hands crackled with tiny sparks from his barely contained anger—the intensity of which surprised even him—and he pointed another accusing finger at the odious mercenary before spitting out his words with all his venom.
“Don’t you ever dare touch me again. Don’t you ever dare cross my path again, for I swear by the stars that I will reduce you, this inn, and every childish soul within its putrid walls to ashes. ”
With his finger buried in the boor’s chest, Tariel was practically smoking with rage.
He was well aware that he had just threatened a stranger whose magic he knew nothing about.
He was also perfectly aware that he had just threatened an entire inn as well, but he didn’t care.
He was terrified, and terrified people made stupid decisions.
Without another word—because he didn’t want to hear any more of those—the elf shot one last hateful glance at the handsome brute before striding furiously toward the door, his shoulders tense, with Brynjar hot on his heels.
He was suffocating, but he was finally able to breathe in the coolness of the night breeze as he slammed the door of the establishment he swore he would never set foot in again.
This kingdom is full of raving madmen.
In a beat, he called to his beautiful Friesian mare, as black as the night, into which he was galloping at full speed, his familiar carefully summoned back to him.
His ears were ringing, and the sound of his ragged breathing almost drowned out the clatter of the horse’s hooves, which were tearing up clods of earth and cracking the stone beneath their force.
Tariel was utterly mortified. He wanted to get away from that place as quickly as possible, and that was exactly what he did.
Cassian
Even the most arrogant beings had their egos put to the test when they decided to step outside their comfort zone, and the elf was about to learn this harsh reality the hard way.
Prince Drakensyl knew the elves. Their power was formidable, but they never ventured too far. They kept to themselves, jealously guarding their resources and power, viewing every relationship as a transaction, something to be exploited. They knew nothing of the concept of loyalty.
That thought plunged him back into a darker past. To the golems—ten times larger than the little stone creature accompanying the elf—that crushed, ground, and tore apart. To the screams, the cries, the desolation…
As he returned to the bar, Cassian motioned to order another beer. He downed it in one gulp. Liquid courage… He needed it to dull the screams that still echoed in his head, centuries later.
He thought back to his altercation with the elf; in the other’s gaze, there was fear—the weakness of every being. But then, he placed his hand on his chest, thinking back to the way the elf had touched his heart. To that warmth that had rushed through him; had the white-haired man felt it too?
Did he know...?
The very moment he had touched it with his finger, the Philosopher’s Stone—which had previously lain dormant deep within his chest—stirred. His pupils had dilated, and a warm shiver had run through his body, like a call.
The call of the Elven Crystal.
“Cassian?!” Cyrus stepped toward his companion, somewhat worried, before seeing the latter smile. The dragon had just had a most delightful vision.
He hadn’t been mistaken—the elven crystal still existed in this world, and this elf either had it on him or had simply touched it.
Yes… Finally… Finally, his years of solitude and torment were about to come to an end. If he could get his hands on this elf…
“How much do you think an elf is worth on the black market?”
Cyrus, Cassian’s second-in-command for several decades—a wolf shifter from Veylaris—raised his eyebrows before snickering as he placed two silver coins on the bar.
“Let’s give him a little head start.”
“He’s an elf, and judging by his appearance, he’s come straight from Caelendor…
something tells me he’ll be ridiculously easy to track down,” Cassian commented.
He couldn’t go against his very nature; he was still a dragon, and the idea of tracking, hunting, and then possessing filled him with pure delight.
A woman walked toward him, swaying her hips with practiced confidence.
She knew Cassian—or at least the man he claimed to be: that passing mercenary whose reputation as a womanizer was well-established from one tavern to the next.
It was said that he left behind as many broken hearts as empty purses, a lover for a single night, intense and elusive as molten metal.
But tonight, he brushed her off with an almost absent-minded gesture. He was too preoccupied with his latest discovery to be bothered by flesh.
“You mischievous little elf, do you even know what lies hidden within you?” he murmured before emptying his last mug.
In his mind, the plan was taking shape with cruel clarity.
It wasn’t about gold coins at all: this elf was the key, the catalyst for the Primordial Convergence he had been pursuing since his fall.
He could already picture him, chained and broken, dragged by force across the rugged mountain passes to the devastated lands of Drakensyl.
Cassian would have no qualms: if the ritual required this elf’s blood and the essence of the Crystal to awaken the ancient dragons, he would offer them up without batting an eye.