69. Chapter 69
CHAPTER 69
Rawn
R awn called for Fair in the silence only to remember he wasn’t there anymore. At times, he thought he heard his neighs, others he heard Aerina call for him. His memories were drifting, tangling with images of faces and voices, filling him with a sense of regret. There was only darkness in that hole, and he only smelled death.
“How much did you torture him?” a female voice asked. “He’s stands before the Gates.”
Aerina’s blurry face rose above him, her features faintly lit by dim firelight, and Rawn was relieved. The God of Urn blessed him with a glimpse of her before he died. He tried to say her name, but it was a pained moan on his lips.
“He collapsed without my efforts,” another said. “The fever is taking him. Did you bring what I asked?”
“Yes.”
Aerina… Rawn’s fingers twitched. He reached out to her with a trembling hand. She took it but it didn’t feel like hers.
His vision waned and the darkness took him to the meadows of Sellav.
Rawn was at peace laying in the tall grass, listening to it gently rustling. The warm sun and cool breeze landed over him, and he breathed in her scent.
Soft fingers stroked his cheek, making him smile. “You have laid here a while. You must wake now, my love.”
No. That was the last thing he wanted.
He looked up at his wife smiling down at him, his head resting on her lap.
Her soft eyes saddened. “You can’t stay here.”
Rawn took Aerina’s soft hand and kissed her palm. “Grant me the wish of staying in this dream with you a little while longer.”
Her lips brushed his forehead. “Return to me.”
A passing growl shook Rawn awake.
It took a couple tries to fully open his swollen eyes but even that hurt. He found himself lying face down on a thin sheet in the cold dirt. The smell alone told him he was still in the Blood Keep. Rawn wanted to scream but he didn’t have the strength. His back felt stiff, hot, and wet. He tried to get up, but a hand pressed on his shoulder.
“Don’t move, Rawn. You’re still healing.” Elon came into view and held a waterskin to his mouth.
He took a sip. At the first touch of water, he desperately gulped more only to end up coughing violently.
“Easy. When you feel ready, eat this.” Elon placed something beside him then returned to his corner at the back of the cell.
Rawn almost couldn’t believe it when he caught the scent of bread. He grabbed the roll and ate it with eager bites. His stomach ached to at last have something solid to eat. He drank a little more water. That was all the strength he could muster before laying back down.
“You nearly succumbed to your wounds last night,” Elon said. “We’re fortunate my sister could bring what I needed to treat the infection.”
He attempted to thank him, but Rawn drifted away again. The next time he woke, he could finally sit up. But not for long, it made him dizzy. The best he could do was slump against the cold wall.
“Who is Aerina?” Elon asked him. “You say her name a lot when you sleep.”
“My wife…” Rawn stared at the backwall, seeing past it to the land of his home. “She is the one Anon came for…”
Elon made an incredulous sound. “The Princess of Greenwood?”
“I was never meant for her, yet that didn’t stop me from loving her all the same. I would have made an absolute fool of myself to spend just one more minute with her...”
Then Rawn weakly rambled on about the rest of the tale from how they were allowed to marry, to the birth of his son, to leaving home for twenty years until he was caught. They both fell silent, looking at their surroundings.
Rawn took a moment to work up the courage to ask. “Sylar?”
“Anon lied.” Elon leaned his head back against the wall. “He doesn’t have him. Only my sister.”
Rawn allowed himself to feel relief. “Did he harm her?”
Elon didn’t answer and his relief faded.
“I’m sorry … God of Urn knows I have no knowledge of the key. My memories were veiled somehow. The little I recollected came to me when they held me under water.”
Elon studied him thoughtfully. “Curious…”
From what Rawn knew of such spells, whoever placed it also locked it behind a trigger. Did he need to nearly die to remember what he’d forgotten?
He shook his head. “Regardless of who cast the spell, I will find no answers now. If only I had known what it meant when I took up the sword for the crown.”
“Do you regret it?”
Rawn leaned up against the wall with his shoulder, careful not to disturb the salve on his back. “I had spent many years regretting my oath. I never intended to leave my family this long but fighting for the future of Greenwood had been a noble choice. I must believe that is worth something.”
“Noble…” Elon retorted, staring blankly at the ground. “I have never understood the meaning of that word. Was it noble to torture elves not born of my country? Was it noble to serve my father’s commands blindly no matter the depravity of my deeds? I was one of many bastards vying for a place in his halls until I realized that wasn’t what I wanted. But I left these sands soaked in the blood I spilled. If rotting here is the price of my sins … then may it be the first and last of my noble deeds.”
Rawn’s hands were also soaked with the blood of elves. It colored his cloak and gave him a moniker by which he was ashamed. “Why did you save my life again when you believe this place will be our tomb?”
“ Sooner be ,” Elon corrected. “I was not waiting here to die. I was only waiting for you.”
He lifted a tiny leather pouch in his fingers.
Rawn recognized it as the same one Dyna had tucked to the inside his cloak.
“I found it on you when we left Dwarf Show and I tended to your wounds,” Elon told him. “I knew it may give us chance, so I assured they wouldn’t find it.”
Rawn touched his chest where he had been shot by arrows over a week ago and found a fresh bandage.
Elon handed him the pouch. Rawn turned it over in his palm and out fell the dried four-leaf clover. Then came an amber bead with a black clover inside.
“A gift from Graeae.” A slight smile tugged at Elon’s mouth.
Rawn’s heart hammered at the sudden spark of hope. “Will it work?” he whispered. “Can you break the wards?”
Elon nodded. “The black clover will absorb the magic embedded in the cells.”
That would give them the ability to cast magic to defend themselves.
“The matter will be staying alive. We only need wait for the right opportunity to make our escape.”
Growls echoed through the dark tunnels. The guards and Bloodhounds were constantly patrolling. It would be near impossible to fight their way out in his state, let alone without weapons.
A sinical thought suggested that even if they could somehow escape the Blood Keep, there were miles of sand between here and the wall. They would be hunted down before they ever reached it.
But he had fought to survive all these years, and he didn’t intent to make it easy for others to kill him.
Rawn returned the items to the pouch. “I take it you have a plan?”
Elon waited for a guard to pass by before saying very faintly under his breath, “Geraea has been spying on Altham’s negotiations, and she made contact with your king to make negotiations of our own.”
Rawn straightened. “What do you mean?”
“It was your suggestion we seek sanctuary in Greenwood. She’s made it her task to persuade him.”
“How?”
“By offering something valuable enough to allow two red elves past his borders.”
Rawn sat back on his heels, attempting to guess what it could be. But the answer came easily. He shook his head. “Altham would never let him have it.”
“If your king is daring enough to come here, Altham would never let him leave this place alive, Rawn.”
Lief would be walking into a trap.
“When is he coming?”
“Tomorrow.”
Rawn’s pulse jumped. Then tomorrow was their day to escape.
He locked eyes with Elon.
“What say you, Norrlen?”
Faith was like a sword. Loyal to those who could wield it and cut the reckless who left too much to chance. But they both had a reason to fight their way out of here. He understood now why the prisoners attempted to run even when it was hopeless. Staying was never a choice.
He would attempt it now too, even if it meant failing.
Rawn’s split lip stung when he cracked a smile as he repeated what Nisa used to always say. “We all die one day. A warrior’s wish is to die well.”
Elon grunted at that.
He moved away from the wall crouched in the middle of the cell. For a moment he seemed to study the ground then he began drawing shapes in the dirt.
“What are you doing?” Rawn asked as he came over to him.
By the low torch light, he could barely distinguish the runes Elon quickly formed within the rings of a hexagon. “How well versed are you in spell casting?”
“Enough to summon my Essence.”
“Good. To fight our way out of here, I must teach you a spell. It is a last resort if we are caught. It is not one I have dared to use myself.”
“What spell is that?”
“The Blood Scythe.”