Chapter Two #2
Mist swirled in ghostly eddies along the silent, lifeless shores of the lake, and in the scant moonlight the shifting vapors
looked like spectral maidens dancing forlorn pirouettes.
Ellysetta could hardly breathe as she regarded the wide expanse of what once had been the most infamous battlefield in the
history of Celieria. Here, a thousand years ago, Rain’s first mate, Sariel, had been slain by Elden Mages, and in grief-stricken
madness over her death, Rain had given himself to the Wilding Rage and scorched the world with tairen flame.
As they approached the southern shore of the glass lake, they passed a bronze statue set in a circle of carved stones.
Her throat grew tight as she realized the bronze was a life-size replica of the doomed couple immortalized by Fabrizio Chelan’s famous painting, Death of the Beloved: Rain Tairen Soul clutching his dead mate, Sariel, and crying out his despair to the heavens. The stones circling the statue
retold the fateful battle through scenes carved into diamondine granite. Millennia would pass, she realized, before weathering
finally laid to rest the story of Rain and Sariel.
Ellysetta traced the last of the etched slabs, reading the tragic conclusion of the tale she knew so well. “‘Some say if you
walk to the center of the lake, you can still see the Lady Sariel, beautiful as a sunrise, appearing merely to sleep beneath
the surface.’” Rain’s sudden stab of sorrow slapped her senses, and she gave a gasp of dismay. “Oh, Rain, I’m sorry.” She’d
told the tale so often to her sisters, the words had spilled out automatically. “I shouldn’t have read that aloud.”
“Nei, it’s all right,” he said. “I like that story much better than the truth.”
She bit her lip, hating her thoughtlessness. She knew the fanciful Fey tale couldn’t possibly be true. The Mages had severed
Sariel’s head and burned her with Fire.
“I killed millions that week,” Rain added. His voice was a low scrape of sound. “Thousands of them here. Eld and their allies
mostly, but even Fey and mortals and Elves and Danae who were not quick enough to flee my wrath.”
Ellie knew that too. Celieria had erected smaller memorials at various points around the site in memory of all the allies
of Celieria who had perished in a sea of tairen flame. The flame had rained down without cease, turning the very earth into
a lake of molten obsidian glass that swallowed every trace of the armies on the battlefield.
Ellysetta left the circle of stones and went to his side. “You must stop blaming yourself, Rain. You didn’t know what you
were doing.”
“I knew,” he corrected her. “I was simply beyond caring.”
The Wilding Rage had taken him: the terrible fury of the Fey, a sweeping, conscienceless wrath that knew no mercy, no remorse,
just the pitiless, relentless drive to destroy whichever enemy had spawned it.
From here, Ellie knew, Rain had flown northward, searching out the armies of the Eld and their allies, raining fire and death
upon all in his path. He’d blanketed the entire nation of Eld in scorching clouds of tairen fire, leaving naught but smoldering
ashlands in his wake. Even then, his Rage still shrieked for more blood, more death. He’d skimmed along Eld’s eastern coast,
boiling the seas with tairen flame and sinking fleets of enemy naval vessels. By the time the Fey and the tairen had finally
forced him from the sky, half the continent lay in ruin and millions had perished.
“You ended the Wars,” Ellysetta reminded him.
“I almost ended the world.”
“But you did not. Even in your Rage, you focused the bulk of your fury on the Eld.”
He would not let her cling to her illusions. “I was coming south to scorch Celieria off the map when Marissya and the others
stopped me.”
“Do you think you would truly have done that?”
“Aiyah. Gods help me, but I would have.”
Ellysetta clasped both of Rain’s hands in hers, feeling his self-loathing for the horrors he had wreaked upon the world. Countless
innocents had died here that day, as well as the hated enemy.
“I know their names,” he said. “Each and every one of them slain by my Rage—and there are so many. For centuries, I lived
with the sound of them shrieking in my mind. Over time, I learned how to quiet them, but they’re still there, still screaming.
Anytime I let my barriers fall, I see their faces and relive their memories of the lives and dreams I shattered.”
“Rain, you spent a thousand years in torment for one terrible act of madness. Haven’t you suffered enough? Let them go.”
He met her gaze, his Fey skin shining with a faint, silver luminescence, his eyes with their slightly elongated pupils glowing. “Ellysetta, I cannot. The torment of their lost lives is mine to bear. Only death or the completion of our bond can release me.”
A misty breeze blew across the lake, cool from the night air sweeping down off the Rhakis mountains and rich with the scent
of magic from the Mists. Rain looked up at the bright glow of rainbow lights that danced in undulating flows along the mountaintops.
“So many lives lost on my account. Here at Eadmond’s Field and there as well.” He gestured to the Faering Mists. “Twelve thousand
of the oldest, strongest Fey and all the tairen prides but one gave their lives to build the Mists.”
“You cannot blame yourself for their deaths too.”
A look came over his face that made her heart ache. “Can I not?” he said softly. “All the Tairen Souls but me were dead. I
was the last, and I was wild with madness. But as the last, I was also the Tairen Soul, Defender of the Fey. Had I perceived
a threat to the Fey, I would have flown again. So they built the Mists. I’m sure, in part, they meant to save the world from
me, but mostly, they died to save me from the world. To give me peace for as long as they could in the hope that I would live
and regain my sanity.”
She felt his guilt, his silent horror. “Oh, Rain.”
“How does a Fey repay such sacrifice? How can he ever be worthy? How does he atone for all the lives lost because of him?”
She captured his face between her hands. “By doing exactly what you’re doing now,” she assured him. “By living the best you
can. By trying to save the people and the land those Fey loved. By honoring them, as you’ve done every day since I first met
you.”
“I think you look upon this Fey more favorably than he deserves, kem’san.”
“Nei, I see him plainly enough.” She laid her palm against his chest. “And I love the Fey I see.”
When she gazed at Rain with such unwavering surety, he always saw a different reflection of himself shining from her eyes.
A stronger Rain Tairen Soul, so much better and brighter than he truly was.
As if, when she looked at him, she saw only the Rain he might have been if he’d never scorched the world, a good and worthy king.
He longed to be that noble Fey, if only because he could not bear to diminish himself in her eyes.
“I cannot restore the lives I took or repair the dreams I shattered, but I can at least ensure that the brave friends and
allies who fell here will never be forgotten. Will you walk with me while I do that, shei’tani?”
“Of course I will.”
He led her to the shore of the lake and lit a globe of bright Fire over their heads to light the way, but when he stepped
onto the dark glass, she hesitated to follow. In the Fire-light, the glass was smooth and glossy, untouched by dirt, animal
tracks, or even a speck of dust. It was as if nothing of the living dared invade this sacred site of the dead.
“Perhaps we shouldn’t walk on it,” she suggested. “It seems a little like walking across a grave.”
“Nothing of those who died here yet remains,” Rain assured her. “My tairen flame saw to that. But I will spin a weave of Air
beneath our feet as we walk so that we do not touch the glass.”
Silvery white tendrils spun out from his fingertips, and when Ellysetta stepped out onto the glass, she slid several handspans,
as if the lake were a frozen pond and her shoes were ice skimmers instead of embroidered silk ankle boots.
Barely half a manlength from the shore, Rain stopped. “An Elvish bowmaster fell beneath my flame on this spot. His name was
Pallas Sparhawk, of the Deep Woods clan. He had a mate named Celia and a son who’d seen only three winters.” His head bowed.
“I did not meet him in life, but I will never forget his death.”
Lavender Spirit gathered in Rain’s hand, spinning into a three-dimensional image of a handsome, stern-eyed Elf with nut-brown hair hanging in plaits around his pointed ears.
Red-orange Fire spun out in a searing weave, etching the Elf’s name into the glass on the spot where he died, and below that the fallen man’s clan name and country.
He held his hand over the etching of the name and said, “Las, Pallas Sparhawk. May the world be a kinder place when next you return.” The Elf’s name flashed, and the Spirit weave of
the Elf’s image sank into the glass lake.
“I have tied the weave to the etching of Sparhawk’s name,” he said. “Those who draw near will see his name and his face and
share a few of his memories. Perhaps they will find it in their hearts to mourn him a little.”
“It is a fine tribute to him, Rain,” Ellysetta said.
“Is it? There is another reason I brought you here. When you complete our bond, my memories of these folk will become yours
as well. You should know, before that happens, some small portion of what that entails. You should know—” He broke off. His
jaw worked for a moment, and when he spoke again, his voice was gravelly with tightly checked emotion. “You should know what
really happened here that day. It wasn’t the romantic Fey tale Celierians have made of it. These were good people, with lives
and loves of their own. If I could spin time, I would take this day back.”
She could feel the weight of his sorrow and his guilt. He knew, better than any creature alive, exactly what he’d done, the