Chapter Five #2
“Teryn, I am sure that whatever assistance you can offer would be appreciated,” Aelir said, his attention darting to his grandfather before coming back to us. Umeris looked to argue but could not due to his breathing troubles.
“Thank you, Your Majesty. I would ask that Pasil remain at my side?”
Aelir bobbed his head, fell to one knee beside his grandfather, and took the old elf’s wrinkled hand.
Teryn then whispered to his daughter to stay here with their people, to calm them with her words of prayer.
Ah, so the beautiful I’llra was a practitioner of their goddess Shamsira.
What powers that imbued her with I could not say.
We knew very little about the religion of our cousins, that knowledge deemed unholy by our church.
Only recently had the wood elves and their druid magicks been accepted—in a small way—here in Celear.
“Pasil, you shall go with Mahouk Nouradi.” Aelir then glanced at the visitors in our midst. “The rest of you shall remain here in the castle under guard for your own protection as well as ours. Until we can prove that none among you has taken my children, you are to remain under our watchful eye. You will be well fed and treated as the dignitaries that you are, but you are not to leave the suites you now sleep in. Please do not make me regret this offer of friendship given even as the gloom of suspicion envelopes us all.”
“By your command,” I replied softly, my words floating off into the ether as the envoy from the Black Sand Isles moved a hand—the same hand that had stroked my cock not that long ago—in a slow circle.
I stood torn between emotion and duty. The flash of pain when I’d placed myself in front of Aelir had been real, quickly covered, yes, but real.
Knowing that I had caused this man, who had given of himself so freely, suffering did not sit well.
But yet my oath of allegiance to keep my king safe was a solemn and holy responsibility.
I felt as if I sat on one of the human teeter-totter toys.
A small whirlwind of sand appeared, engulfing him, then settling.
Where once stood a man, now stood a short fawn-colored canine, thick tail, enormous ears, one with a long chain dangling from it, and a small, pointed snout with a black nose.
Those of us who were not used to the druidic ways of shaping their forms gasped as the fox trotted out from amid Teryn’s robes, shook its fur, and gazed up at me.
“He wishes you to lead the way,” I’llra explained. Clearing the surprise from my mind, I nodded at the king.
“Please find my children,” Aelir said, his voice shaky.
“I shall do my best,” I vowed, turned on my heel, and made for the side door on the right.
The fox darted ahead of me, placing its nose to the ground, its tail twitching as it sniffed the many footprints left behind.
I’d heard many tales of Kenton’s husband, Beirich, an arch druid, shifting into a stag but had yet to see the transformation.
Many of the wood elves could also take the form of animals.
Those of us who had left the woods or had driven others to the Black Sands had long ago given up on the study of magical ways to embrace science and book knowledge.
Talking to the fox now trotting along at my side seemed silly.
He could not reply. We passed several maids.
They gawked at the fox as we climbed stairwells that only the staff used.
The nursery was a great, airy space, with large, high windows to allow the sun and sea breeze to rush in as the children played.
As we entered it, the joy seemed to have withered.
The guards posted outside gave me a short nod before entering with us and closing the door with a melancholy snap.
“This is the nursery,” I told the fox. Teryn.
He yipped, head tipped. “Yes, well, that was easily ascertained, since there are children’s tables, beds, and toys, I agree.
” I threw the two young men in royal armor a dark look as if daring them to question why I was speaking to a Sandrayan fox with a bejeweled ear.
“He is trained to find children lost in the desert,” I lied to my underlings. Teryn made a disgruntled canine sound.
There was no sign of Tezen or Nanny Vilde as both were in the healing halls now.
I offered up a prayer for my dear small friend and the old woman who always had a smile for anyone she saw.
What vile person would offer up warmed milk laced with a paralytic?
If the prince and princess of Melowynn were in the hands of an enemy, this country could be launched into turmoil over such an egregious act.
I hoped it was not anyone of Sandrayan blood.
Umeris would surely call for an attack on the isles, his dislike for any elf with differing skin and religion well known.
Fylson and Aelir possessed calmer heads, but a father’s love would muddy a normally rational man.
What the queen would do was unknown. Raewyn was normally levelheaded, but as with Aelir, she was a mother first and foremost. Wars had been fought for far less…
The fox—Teryn—worked his pointed snout into the coverings on the small beds. His nose remained in the bedding for some time, his plush tail upright. The three mainlanders—and yes, the knowledge that I was now referring to myself and my people as such did not go unnoticed to me—waited silently.
He then left the beds, jumping off with a pounce, then pressed his nose to the floor.
Moving gracefully between small shoes, a tiny rag doll that the princess would be terribly upset to have left behind, and a wooden circus playset, Teryn sniffed about.
Moving in circles, he padded this way and that.
One of the younger guards began to whisper to his partner.
I threw a dark look at him. His lips compacted instantly.
A brisk yip pulled me from glowering at my men. Teryn stood by the far wall, his head pushed under an armoire of yellow moss oak, the doors ornately carved to show a crane fishing in a pond. He lay on his side to begin digging.
“Come, help me move that wardrobe,” I said, jogging over to place my shoulder to the massive console.
My guards came to my aid as Teryn skittered back, his plump tail lashing.
The armoire moved slowly across the floor.
Looking down, I saw small bits of toys—a tiny doll’s dress, a broken wooden warrior’s sword, an old, half-eaten plum tart.
“If you have made us move that monstrosity over a mouse-chewed tart…”
Teryn kicked the tart aside with his back leg and began digging frantically at the stone wall.
“Captain, may we ask why we are following the dictates of a fox?” the young man with brown curls tentatively asked. I had not the time or the patience to explain.
“No,” I said as Teryn curled back a lip to begin chewing on an irregular bit of stonework.
I knelt down to run my fingers over the off-colored block.
The limestone was indeed out of place, rough and not as pure white as the rest of the stonework.
My fingertips found a small divot on the top.
I pressed on the indentation. The door slid open without a sound to reveal a dark doorway large enough for one thin elf.
I sat back on my heels, trying to puzzle out how a door this heavy could come open with such ease when it took a duo of guards to move a simple wardrobe.
“Magicks,” I whispered as the only explanation popped into my head.
Teryn bolted into the darkness. The sandy tip of his tail disappeared into the inky nothingness.
I got to my feet to speak to the guards.
“One of you is to return to the throne room to enquire of the grand advisors and the king if they know of this secret passage in the nursery. One of you shall post guard outside the door. Allow no one but the king or his advisors into this room. Am I understood?”
“Yes, Captain!” One tore off. The other closed the door and placed his back to it. Nodding, I picked up a small lamp from the windowsill, lit the squat candle, and closed the engraved door. Tiny dancing horses appeared on the walls, the shadows moving along as I did.
Stepping into the darkness, the lantern cast a small circle of light.
The air was not musty as one would assume if this passage had been sealed off for ages.
So, someone must have come through recently.
Looking above me, lantern held high, I saw no stairs leading upward, nor any webbing.
Again, another sign of recent use. Taking one step and then another, I saw a winding stairwell leading down.
Small paw prints mingled with larger footprints. Soft-soled, not armored, for stealth.
“Teryn,” I called out and caught myself. “Mahouk Nouradi?” A small bark echoed up the musty flight of steps. “If only these druids would shift into a creature that possessed the ability to speak.”
Heading down the narrow passageway, I kept a hand on the cool wall while circling downward.
The sound of the ocean grew louder as I neared the bottom.
The smell of brine and fish met me at the bottom.
As did a sandy-red fox. Teryn sat primly on the lowest step, tail tucked around his body, as water rolled in and then out, lapping at the smooth stairway.
“The tide is low now,” I commented, using the lantern to illuminate the mossy walls of the cavern we had discovered. “You sit while I go see if I can find where this takes us.”
He nipped my calf. I thought to call him a snitty little shit, but he was a dignitary. Who I had slept with not long ago. Giving in to my desires was complicating things just as I knew it would.
“Fine, you may come, but if you get washed out to sea, I will not be responsible.”