Chapter 15
Chapter Fifteen
Ravanel led her in their usual silence to the meeting hall the next morning after a mildly successful training, and Alvara’s stomach sank. A meeting being called only meant terrible things.
Boden stood outside the door, still in the same damaged clothes from the day before, and deep rings of purple hung under his eyes. Ravanel clasped a hand on his friend’s shoulder, whispering in his ear as he helped him into the building.
Alvara once again tried to sneak to a quiet corner of the room, but Boden caught her eye from the main table and shook his head.
Something heavy in his gaze twisted her insides until they threatened to split.
It was Dalvi. It had to be. He pulled out a chair next to him, and she accepted it, trying not to focus on the bloodstains all over his shirt.
King Ulivar smiled tightly. “Take your time. Whenever you’re ready.”
Boden heaved a long breath, his gaze trained on the map lying before them.
“Due to”—he paused and swallowed—“unforeseen circumstances, I was unable to gather as much information as I had hoped about the king’s movements.
But what I do know is that if Dalvi refuses to give in to his demands for loyalty, he will move on the capital soon.
The Dalvian monarchs have been taking care of the orchestrated human attacks on their own and ignoring any communication from Ela, which has only served to anger King Einar.
He has grown even more impatient and erratic over the past few weeks, and I doubt he will wait long before taking the power he desires.
He will send his forces to invade Dalvi. ”
Ice glittered on Alvara’s fingertips, but she melted it with a series of steady inhales and exhales. King Einar was coming for her city. Her people. Her home. Or what was left of it.
“That makes no sense. It’s mid-dalvi. This is when their powers are at their strongest,” another elf at the table said.
“It does,” Alvara said, ignoring the instinct that told her this wasn’t her place to speak, especially not in the presence of a king.
“Jolval is in a few weeks. It’s the most important time of the year for us, and it lasts twelve days.
Everyone will be too busy preparing to worry about anything else. ”
“What do you think the best course of action is?” Boden’s voice was rough, like someone had scraped away its smooth outer layer to reveal jagged pieces underneath.
“We have to warn them,” Alvara said. “I know the queen won’t want to ally with Malva, but if my kingdom is willing to try, we may stand a chance of surviving this.
If Vorianta falls, what’s to stop the king from taking Ilmanir and crowning himself High King?
Once that happens, there’s no hope left. ”
Another elf scoffed—Kaurald, if she remembered correctly.
The male focused on the city’s defenses at the first meeting she had attended in Ilmanir.
“The effort would be futile. Dalvi has held a grudge against Malva for over three thousand years for something our ancestors did. They will never ally with us. We are better off spending our efforts preparing to defend our own city than wasting anything on theirs.”
“No effort spent trying to gain allies is ever futile,” Ravanel said. He avoided Kaurald’s gaze that might as well have hurled daggers through his forehead.
“And tell me, son, what experience do you have in war? Defending a kingdom?”
Well, that was one way to be introduced to Ravanel’s father. Ravanel stared ahead, his jaw clenched as his eyes bored a hole into the door.
Alvara knew nothing of war or strategy, but she couldn’t just sit by while her city fell.
“I’ll go. I don’t know the royal family, but if I can speak as a Dalvian and someone who’s lived in Vorianta her whole life, maybe it will help.
Even a little. Without any Dalvians present, the queen probably wouldn’t even let you into the palace. ”
Ravanel’s father opened his mouth to speak, but Boden was quicker. “Alvara has a point. And what harm can it do to send a few council members with her to at least inform the queen, if nothing else?”
“We will spare three members from the council,” King Ulivar said, “and you will accompany them. The rest will stay here to prepare for inevitable war.”
Boden shook his head. “But my family—”
“Will be fine.” King Ulivar’s voice softened.
“I know you have already given up much for the Silver Blight. But of all of us, you know King Einar and his plans in detail. You have the most information at your disposal, which may sway Queen Myrithal. You will leave the day after tomorrow.” He gestured to Alvara.
“Teach the Dalvian as much as you can in her magic before you go, she’ll need it if she’s to survive.
Who knows who or what you may encounter on your journey. Katalen?”
“Yes?” Kat stood up from where she had been seated at the back of the room.
“I will draft a letter with the official seal to be sent today to the queen. I am entrusting you with it,” the king said.
“Of course.” Kat flopped back in her chair and muttered under her breath, “I’m a falcon, not a pigeon.”
Alvara caught her eye, and Kat leaned her head back, letting her tongue hang out in a dramatic fashion that almost made Alvara giggle. But Boden’s voice reached her first.
“Training. Tomorrow at dawn.”
The wind nipped at Alvara’s face, ripping her hair around despite the braids she had put in place to keep it contained. Dawn had arrived almost a half an hour ago, and Boden was nowhere to be seen. Maybe he had convinced the council that he wasn’t needed for the journey after all.
Boots stomped at the edge of the clearing, and soon enough, Boden entered. He had finally changed into a fresh set of clothes, his damp hair and tan skin clean of his recent tragedy, though his lengthy yawn and the heavy tread of his feet told her enough about how he had slept.
Steam twisted and curled from the small mug he carried, and his eyes dropped to the drink in his hand. “The world could be falling apart, and a cup of tea reminds me that there’s still good to be had.”
Alvara said nothing, but her lack of response only pulled more words from his mouth.
“I’m not fond of mornings, so I need it to get through the day,” he said, lifting his mug into the cold air. She bit back a sigh as he still continued. “Do you not know what tea is? Well, I know you have that pine needle madness you claim is tea. But you’re looking at me like I’ve lost my mind.”
“Boden,” she said slowly. “Enough about the tea. I’m waiting for you to tell me what to do.”
One side of his lips twitched. “Right. How has your training been going? I see Rav hasn’t killed you, so that must be a good sign.”
“Hardly. I can access my magic and extinguish it, but using it precisely the way I want when it’s active? Not so easy.”
“Wielding can be easier for some elves, especially those who feel things”—he took a long sip of his drink—“less intensely. But by grounding your power in your emotions, your magic is stronger than those who shut them out. Though learning control can be much more difficult, which is part of the reason many elves cut themselves off from their emotions. You’ve accessed your magic so far with anger, which is powerful but short-lived, and controlling it can feel impossible. ”
“If you tell me I’m going to have to summon my magic with love, I’m going to vomit.”
Boden shrugged. “It’s the steadiest of emotions and quite strong. It will keep you calm and give you power that lasts longer and is easier to control.” His eyes glazed over, and his white breath churned in the air.
“How do you do it?” she asked. She could tell his mind had left the training grounds, and she wished they had time for him to process what he had just gone through, but Vorianta’s fate lay in their hands. “Boden?”
“Sorry. It was a long night.” His fingers tapped the side of his mug as he spoke.
“When I first started with magic, mine was chaotic. I’d always experienced stronger emotions than others my age, and it made things difficult, to say the least. I learned to keep a happy memory near when I needed to anchor myself. ”
A happy memory. Eloisa. Alvara closed her eyes and tried her hardest to let her mind walk through the feelings freely. But as her sister’s face surfaced, grief reared its ugly head and dug its claws into her heart. “It’s hard to think of them without…pain.”
“I understand.” Of course he did. How could he not, when he had lost his father just days ago? “But they were alive too, and if you only remember them as gone, isn’t that more painful? If you let the pain win, you let the good they did be forgotten. Like it meant nothing.”
They weren’t speaking about her anymore, but either way, he was right.
Eloisa, chatting about the new paints she had received for her birthday, while Alvara weaved her sister’s beautiful golden locks into a cascade of braids down her back. Her laugh. Alvara used to do anything she could to hear it echo through the halls of their home.
She let the sweet essence of her sister wash over her, even though it meant her sorrow circled her once again, waiting for her to break. The ice inside of her began to grow, less volatile than before, and she continued to feed her power, even as her hands tingled with cold.
“Now imagine forming a shield.” Boden’s voice sounded distant, as if he was no longer standing next to her.
Alvara did just that, envisioning a perfectly crafted shield of ice floating in front of her body. An object collided with her chest, and she jumped.
“It’s no use—” Her fingers grazed something cool and smooth. Whatever the projectile was had thudded into a rough block of ice floating in front of her, not nearly as honed as the one in her mind, but it fulfilled its purpose.
“See?”
She cobbled together a snowball and hurled it at his face. “You didn’t warn me you were going to start throwing things!”
A clump of snow landed in his tea, and he frowned. “The enemy isn’t going to warn you either.”
Right. They were about to leave on a dangerous mission and risk not only their lives but possibly the lives of an entire city, an entire kingdom. It felt too large, too looming. She needed to do anything she could to stop King Einar.
“As much as it pains me to say it, I think it would be best if you cut your hair.”
Anything but that. “Why?” Cutting her hair meant losing her morning braiding ritual, her fleeting connection with her mother.
“You’ll be too easily recognized. When we travel to Vorianta, you won’t be able to speak to the people you know. It’s safer for them and for you to keep your distance.” Not even letting Jalomir and Pyry know she was all right…the idea hurt even more than she had expected.
Alvara patted the braids on her head. “Cutting my hair short would make me stick out. I’ve only ever seen a few elves with shorter hair, and you’re one of them.”
Boden mussed his chestnut hair as if reminding himself how long it was.
“I’ll leave it up to you. I really do think it would transform you from the Alvara they know into someone different enough that they might assume you were someone else, and it may save us trouble down the line.
” He tipped his head to one side. “You could try dyeing it, though it would be a shame to hide such a striking color.”
A small current of logic ran through his words, but she wasn’t willing to let go of that piece of her mother either—not yet. Little did he know, she had tried countless times to dye her hair, but it never stayed for more than a few minutes.
And striking? That was not a word she had ever heard associated with her or her hair.
“Throw another snowball.”