Chapter 20
THE FACT THAT LORD ETHAN—the most awful quester of them all, the man who had brought back the corpse of a bat during the spider challenge—had somehow orchestrated the kidnapping of my brother and friends and had stolen the map to the Elder Beast was something I couldn’t stomach.
I was going to kill him. Or at least punch him in the chin.
At my appearance, he dropped the pilfered journal in the dirt, his face paling upon meeting my furious gaze.
Standing, he clasped his hands behind his back and strode forward until we were only a few feet from each other in the small clearing.
His white surcoat swished around his legs as he walked, his puffed-out chest displaying his coat of arms, which included a winged horse—a symbol of fame.
He wished. I held him at sword point, my arm as steady and solid as a rock.
“Ellinore,” he said evenly. “I thought you were trapped in a cave.”
“Oh, I was.” I smiled, cheerful and wide. “But I escaped. Because I’m Ellinore the Brave.”
He huffed a courtly laugh, the same one he used when the king made a bad joke. He peered over my shoulder. “Where’s Princet Aven?”
“Left them behind.” I shrugged. “They slowed me down.”
His mouth dropped open in surprise. Good. Let him be caught back on his heels. It gave me control of the situation.
“Anyway,” I said, flipping the tip of my sword toward his neck. “You’ve been following us for quite some time. You searched through our bags in the woods on the first night.”
He sniffed. “I would not deign to rifle through your belongings. I sent guards to do that.”
“Any particular reason?”
“I knew Princet Aven had information I didn’t.”
“Ah. Well, since you didn’t find what you were looking for, you’ve now kidnapped my brother and stolen my map. And I’m going to skewer you and your band of charlatans with my sword for daring to do so.”
Ethan coughed into his fist. He wiped his hand on a kerchief he pulled from the interior of his tunic, instead of on his trousers like an ordinary person.
He was nobility through and through. The other two of the band who were awake (squires, it looked like) stood on either side of Ethan with their own weapons drawn and aimed at me—a sword and a pike.
Yikes about the pike. I wasn’t a fan. But at least I had their focus.
“That’s not very honorable of you.” He sighed and shook his head. “But I should’ve expected that from a peasant.”
I scoffed. “Is that an insult? Because you’ll have to do better.
That’s so old news, friend. No one at court cares.
They only care that I win. And I have been winning since I killed that Ursa with your dropped sword when I was twelve.
I mean…,” I continued, glancing over his shoulder.
Zig, Farrah, and Rylan were free from their binds and slowly creeping toward the saddlebags.
And Aven was… retrieving the journal? They were prioritizing recovering their account for the king over finding the map?
“I have you to thank for even sparking my interest in questing. So thank you. So much.”
Aven shoved the journal down their tunic. Rylan threw two saddlebags over his broad shoulders. Farrah retrieved her quarterstaff, and Zig had his hands on at least three canteens. Okay. Great. But where was the map?
Lord Ethan chuckled demurely. “Funny you should mention the Ursa. Five years ago you stole prestige and acclaim from me. And now I plan to steal them back.”
I narrowed my eyes. “I was a child who got lucky with a sword. There was no intent to steal anything. It was merely good fortune we weren’t both mauled to death.”
“And since then? You’ve won almost every competition in the last several years.
You stole the right to rescue Princess Avriel from me.
You accumulate wealth far beyond your station.
You win favor from the king and queen, receiving gifts like that sword you’re wielding.
The Pointless Princet even likes you, despite the fact that you are so uncouth as to defeat them in their birthday competition. ”
Oh, and there was one of those consequences for my actions that I had been warned about. Zig was right. I had made a faux pas with that one. But whatever, I had to keep Lord Ethan and the two squires focused on me.
“At least I’m not so uncouth as to refer to a royal by that awful nickname,” I spat.
Lord Ethan smiled, realizing he’d struck a nerve.
Damn him. I plowed past the minor slip. “And Aven knows I’m sorry about their birthday.”
Aven snapped their head up from where they searched through Lord Ethan’s bedroll. They flashed a quick acknowledging smile before returning to picking through the campsite for the map. “I made a mistake,” I continued. “I’m big enough to admit it.”
“Well, then maybe you’ll be big enough to admit that I have the upper hand. I have a map to the beast you’re so desperately attempting to find. The Elder Beast, correct?”
I didn’t move a muscle, because he already knew. I wasn’t going to play his game.
“Excellent,” he said, taking my silence as an affirmation.
“That is wonderful to know, because I’m going to find it first. I will kill it, sell off its parts to the highest bidders, and watch as the mages harvest your brother’s heart.
And then I’ll locate the other primordials and kill them all as well and do the same.
” He smiled. “I think the king and queen would love to display the horn of the Elder Beast. It would look amazing next to the pelt of the Ursa in the great hall.”
“You are making a grave mistake, Lord Ethan.”
Lord Ethan smiled. “No. I think you’ll find that you have made the mistake.”
That was ominous. A chill swept down my spine. I cleared my throat, grabbed the hilt of my sword with my other hand as well, and readied myself. “Look, sir, I only want my brother, my friends, and the map. Hand them over and I will walk away without shoving this through your neck.”
“No.” He cleared his throat. “Guards!”
Ah. There was my mistake. The lumpy bedrolls we had assumed were Ethan’s sleeping entourage were actually…
empty. All the previous inhabitants had risen before dawn and had been lying in wait, hidden in the shadows cast by the pines.
I was surrounded. We were surrounded. And oh, there were more of them than we’d thought. Crap.
The squire to my right lunged, and I easily knocked the point of his pike away with the flat of my blade.
I crowded in against him, the end of the pike useless in such close quarters.
I swung my blade and sliced through the wooden handle like it was paper.
I quickly spun and dodged the other’s clumsy attack, then tripped her as she passed, her sword ending up wedged in between the twin pines.
There was a cry of “They’ve escaped!” obviously referring to the troublesome trio.
Lord Ethan stomped his foot. “Then capture them again!”
Before the guards had even moved, Farrah jumped into the fray with her staff, smashing heads and stomachs with surprising grace and speed.
Zig slashed out with his knife as he danced away from the guards.
Rylan pushed out with his palms, and a rush of wind swept over the campsite, kicking up sand and dirt and toppling two of the smaller trees, temporarily trapping several of Ethan’s guards.
What the ancients were they doing? They were supposed to be running away! Yet when Farrah smashed her staff into someone’s face, giving them a bloody nose, and Zig used trickery to steal a short sword from the hands of a guard, I couldn’t help but feel grateful they were with me.
But Aven? Where was Aven? Where had they gone?
I blocked another sword thrust, then another, making my way close to Lord Ethan as he fled toward the middle of the camp, picking up his own sword and brandishing it as I approached.
The whiz of an arrow flew by my ear, followed by a clang of metal on metal.
A grunt sounded behind me, and I whirled to find a squire I’d not noticed with their sword on the ground and an arrow sticking out of the tree behind them.
I kicked them in the stomach, then kneed them in the cheek. They fell like a sack of grain.
I blocked another weak strike from a guard who’d freed himself from the magically felled trees, and…
the guards weren’t really fighting us. I glanced around as they attacked but didn’t finish their strikes, pulled back when Farrah made a mistake or failed at her new disarming move, or when Zig tripped over a branch, or when Rylan’s magic was weak at best. They were corralling us, forcing us toward the middle of the camp.
Despite my friends’ best efforts, they’d been backed up close to the center of the encampment, unable to flee to the mounts.
And because of my pursuit of Lord Ethan, I too was surrounded by trees and weapons.
“Ellinore,” Lord Ethan sang.
I turned to face him. “What is this? What are you doing?”
“Enjoying my victory.”
He pulled a parchment from the inside of his tunic and flapped it in front of my face. My breath caught when I saw the flash of the drawing of the world and the colored dots that marked the locations of the primordials.
The map!
“So this is all to gloat? Great. Fine. You won. Hand over the map.”
He tsked. “Have a little imagination, Ellinore. My plan isn’t just to gloat. My plan is to capture you, tie you up, and throw you in the ocean. Maybe the Lady in the Sea will rescue you. Who knows? But for certain you’ll be out of my way.”
“You are sorely mistaken,” I said through gritted teeth, “if you think I won’t stick the pointy end of this weapon right into your ribs and watch you bleed out.”
“That doesn’t sound honorable at all.”
“Just trying to fit in with the crowd.”
“Well then. So should I.” He jerked his chin to another guard.
They walked over, holding a lit torch, which he accepted.
He pinched the map at the edge, allowing it to unroll fully, the longest point dangling only a few inches from the ground.
He waved the flames closer to its surface.
Smoke caressed the face of the map, curling around the frayed edges.
One ember, one errant flame, one spark, and the entire parchment would light.
Fear seized my limbs. My heart pounded harder than it had during the brief fight. I trembled as sweat rolled down my spine, gathered in the hollow of my knees. That was the only clue we had to the Elder Beast. The only way to save Zig. The one tangible item that could help my brother.
Lord Ethan then nodded to someone behind me, but I didn’t dare look away.
There was a scuffle, followed by a yell from Farrah and an indignant “Hey!” from Zig.
“Let me go!” Rylan yelled, his boots scuffing in the sandy soil, grunting as he fought.
A tall, beefy guard dragged Rylan in front of me, right next to Lord Ethan’s side, a knife blade pressed against his neck.
“You light that,” I said, voice thick, gaze locked on the map and the flicker of the flames, “you kill my brother.”
“Oh no! Well, that would be an unfortunate side effect.”
My pulse raced, and it felt like my heart had migrated to my mouth. “Listen to me. Defeating a primordial is nearly impossible. They are more powerful than the ancients. They exist outside of time. They are gods.”
Lord Ethan smiled, oily and insincere. I was going to pummel him as soon as I had a chance. Come on, Aven. Where are you? An arrow would not go amiss at this point.
“I’ll give you a choice, Ellinore the Brave.” That name had never sounded so ugly. “You can choose to save your friends, and I’ll allow them to go on their merry way back to their homes. Or you save yourself, and yourself only, and the map.”
“That’s not a choice. Either way my brother dies.”
“Well, you can’t win all the time, Ellinore.”
“Neither, then. Fight me.” I flexed my fingers around the hilt of my sword. “A fair fight. If I win, we go free and get the map. If you win, you keep the map and we’ll back off.”
He laughed. “What do you take me for? I’m not a gullible creature.
And I’ve grown weary of your attempts to stall.
” He cleared his throat. “The mage,” he said, gesturing to Rylan.
The guard holding him pushed the edge of the knife against the thin skin of Rylan’s throat, blood welling along the blade. “Or the map.”
Ethan wiggled the parchment in a sinister tease.
“You wouldn’t,” I breathed. “Then you wouldn’t know the locations either.”
Ethan chuckled. “So you think.”
I froze. I didn’t know what to do. I’d tried my way—to talk and bargain—but Lord Ethan hadn’t budged.
If I were the Ellinore the Brave of the stories, I’d choose the mage.
Right? But that would doom Zig, and I couldn’t…
I couldn’t do that. I was Ellinore the sister first. The twin.
And I had promised Zig I would release him from the mages’ wager.
I’d promised him I would do everything to save him.
“Come on,” Lord Ethan said, waving the map closer to the torch with an airy laugh. “Make a choice, Ellinore. Or lose both.”
I licked my lips. “The m—”
An arrow sank deep into the forearm of the guard holding Rylan.
She yelped, dropping the knife and clutching at the wound.
Rylan rammed his head backward, colliding with her nose, and blood spurted from her nostrils.
He ran. She shouted and stumbled, careening right into Lord Ethan.
Another arrow burrowed into the handle of the torch, knocking it from the surprised noble’s grip.
Chaos erupted as more arrows flew. Shouts rang out. Guards dived to the ground to avoid being hit.
An arrow buzzed right in front of Lord Ethan’s face. He staggered, tripped on a fallen log, and fell on his backside next to the campfire.
He dropped the map… directly into the flames.