Doomraga's Revenge (16 page)

Not bad
, he thought, feeling a surge of grudging admiration.

On one wall, a small fireplace sat inside a whalebone hearth. Behind a golden screen, fire burned vigorously, casting wavering light around the room. By the opposite wall sat a massive bed, whose frame and posts were decorated with colorful sea stars. On the bedpost nearest to the fire perched a small, silver-winged owlet. And under the mass of blue and green blankets, woven from the finest strands of deep sea kelp, lay Serella.

She was propped against several pillows, her silvery blond hair flowing past her pointed ears and down over her shoulders. Judging from the tray of food and drink on the table by her side, she had recently eaten. And judging from the sour expression on her face, she was not at all happy. Krystallus could tell that beyond any doubt. For she was, he suddenly realized, looking straight at him.

He started, nearly falling backward onto the balcony. She merely continued to gaze at him, firelight dancing in her deep green eyes.

“Well?” she asked hoarsely. “Are you going to come in or not?”

Krystallus stood, stepped over to a richly carved door, and turned the silver handle. He entered the queen’s room, keeping his gaze locked on hers. Serella didn’t budge, but as soon as he stepped inside, the owlet on the bed post clacked its beak loudly.

“Hush now, Clowella,” she said with a glance at the owlet. Then, in a casual tone, she added, “He’s just come here to kill me.”

Krystallus scowled. “If I wanted to kill you, I wouldn’t have taken the trouble of bringing you back from Lastrael. You were about to die when I found you.” He peered at her face; the shadowy lines had almost disappeared. “Looks like your healers have done their work well.”

Serella snorted disdainfully. “A likely story! My guards told me you were trying to strangle me when they arrived.”

Shaking his head, Krystallus walked over to the floating kite and flicked it with his finger. It rose higher into the air, and even though there was no wind, made a graceful circle around the room before coming back to float above its shelf.

“Actually,” he replied at last, “I was checking your pulse to see if you were still alive.” He glared at her. “I thought you were dead. My second mistake.”

Her eyebrows arched. “And what was your first?”

“Trying to save you,” he answered coolly. Then, furrowing his brow, he asked, “How did you know I was out there on your balcony?”

She curled the corner of her mouth in a grin. “The maroon amber. It changed color.”

Turning around, Krystallus saw that, indeed, the piece of amber on the shelf was no longer the maroon color he’d seen. Instead, it was an ominous shade of black, much like the landscape of Shadowroot.

“Impressive,” he said as he turned back to face her. “But while I hate to disappoint you, I didn’t come here to kill you. You may be an arrogant, ruthless tyrant and a treacherous competitor . . . but you didn’t deserve to die on the ground in some faraway realm. And you don’t deserve to die tonight.”

For the first time since he’d entered her room, Serella blinked. Firelight cast flickering shadows on her face. “Then why
did
you come here? Surely you could have escaped by now. And my guards will—”

“Want to kill me, I know.” He stepped calmly to the side of her bed. Ignoring the owlet, who was watching him closely, he bent closer to Serella. “You really want to know why I came?”

“Yes,” she declared, but without her usual imperiousness. Eyes wide, she peered up at him. “Why?”

He bent lower and kissed her on the lips. She flinched in surprise, but didn’t pull away. Instead, she placed her hands on the sides of his head and pulled him closer, kissing him passionately.

Finally, they separated. After a pause, Krystallus said, “That’s why.”

“You . . . you know . . .” She brushed back her hair, then cleared her throat. “That sort of impertinence could get you killed.”

“Add it to my list of crimes,” he said with a grin. He watched her for a few more seconds, then turned away, preparing to leave her chamber. He paused to glance at the piece of amber, whose color was now golden yellow.

“Wait,” she said—not in the commanding voice of a queen, but in the beseeching voice of a lover. “I have something to give you.” She almost smiled. “Something else, that is.”

He turned and cocked his head questioningly.

“Over there,” she said, pointing to an object on one of the shelves. “That compass. I want you to have it.”

He shook his head of white hair. “But you
need
that. For your explorations.”

“No,” she said a bit sadly, “I think you need it more. Deserve it more, at any rate.” She bit her lip, then continued. “Don’t you understand why I taunted you all those times? Why I humiliated you every chance I could?”

Krystallus said nothing. He merely continued to meet her gaze.

“It was to prod you to be your own self! To step out of your father’s shadow.”

After a long pause, she added in a whisper, “You have started to do that. And now . . . you will be the greatest explorer Avalon has ever known.” She grinned. “Except, of course, for me.”

“Of course,” he replied, grinning back. “But the compass—”

“Is yours. You saved my life—and besides, I want you to have it.” Her eyes gleamed knowingly. “You’ll find some uses for it, I’m sure.”

Krystallus swallowed. He wanted to stride over and kiss her again, but resisting the impulse, he walked to the shelf and carefully removed the compass. Expertly crafted, it was shaped like a glass globe inside a leather strap. Within the globe, held in place by hair-thin wires, were a pair of silver arrows. Tilting the globe slightly, he gasped. For he’d just realized what this instrument could really do.

“One arrow points westward, as with all compasses,” he observed. “To the heart of El Urien, first home of the elves.” He glanced up at her. “Appropriately.”

Looking back at the globe, he went on, “But the other arrow, the additional one—that spins on a vertical axis. So it always points
starward
.”

Serella gave a nod. “So no matter where you are—under the root-realms, inside the trunk of the Great Tree, or anywhere else—you can always find your way.”

Gratitude filled his heart, but he couldn’t find the words to express it.

“Now,” she said, “you can be the first explorer to climb all the way to the stars.” With a mischievous gleam, she added, “Unless I get there first.”

“Your challenge is accepted.” More quietly, he said, “And so is your gift.”

“Good. I wouldn’t want anything bad to happen to you. You’re my . . . favorite competitor.”

Reminded of how he’d found her in Shadowroot, Krystallus grew suddenly serious. “You shouldn’t go back to Lastrael. Something is very wrong about that place. What it did to you, and the elves with you, I’ve never seen anything like it.”

Her expression turned somber. “I know. Something attacked us, all at once. The chief healer told me she thought it was a kind of plague—
darkdeath
, she called it.”

“Darkdeath?”

“Right. But if that’s true, it raises more questions than it answers. How does this plague spread? Who is susceptible—only elves, or everybody? How can it be prevented? I need to go back there to find out.”

“No,” he pleaded, waving his arm. “Don’t risk it. Don’t go back there.”

Teasingly, she shot back, “Why? So you can discover all the wonders of that realm by yourself?”

“No,” he answered, his voice gentle. “So nothing will harm my”—he paused, choosing his words—“favorite competitor.”

She beamed at him. “All right, then. I won’t go. That is, until I change my mind.”

“The right of every queen.” He gave her a mock bow. “But first, I—”

Bootsteps, growing louder by the second, interrupted him. They were pounding up the stairs that led to the top of the turret.

“My guards,” said Serella, heaving a sigh. “They are coming to tell me you’ve escaped.”

“It won’t please them to find me here with you.” Looking over at the amber, he saw the golden color darkening swiftly. “They might think I’m here to murder you.”

“Or to steal a kiss.”

Krystallus almost grinned, but the pounding grew louder. Now the guards were only seconds away. He started toward the balcony, then paused and glanced back at her. “I’m glad I didn’t kill you.”

Her voice a whisper, she replied, “So am I.”

Krystallus ran to the door and climbed over the balcony railing, just as three armed guards burst into the queen’s chamber. Although he couldn’t hear all their jumbled, breathless words, he couldn’t help but chuckle when he heard Serella’s harsh reprimand: “You
what
? You let him escape?”

Stealthily, he climbed back down the building wall, pressing his toes into the gaps between stones. The compass, safe in his tunic’s breast pocket, almost seemed to touch his heart.

24:
A
P
ROMISE

Sometimes a victory has the look and smell of a total loss.

Basilgarrad flew swiftly, shearing the tops of high, bulbous clouds with his wings. Spread wide, those wings glistened, each of their thousands of green scales covered with mist from the clouds, each of their powerful muscles rimmed with rivers of vapor. With every rhythmic beat, sheets of droplets poured off the wings’ rear edges, forming trailing veils that shimmered with rainbows.

But the dragon wasn’t enjoying this flight back to Woodroot. Not at all. Not even the feeling of Merlin atop his head, leaning into the wind with an arm around his great friend’s ear, gave Basilgarrad any comfort.

Ever since they had left the scene of the blight and returned Rhia, Lleu, and Nuic to their home at the Society’s compound, he’d felt an ominous weight swelling inside of him. It dragged on his wings, just as it weighed heavily on every thought, crushing his hopes like a blight of the mind.

That shadow beast!
he raged silently. From the very moment he’d seen its writhing shape in Bendegeit’s sphere, he couldn’t dispel the feeling that it was growing stronger by the day. That it was behind all Avalon’s troubles. And that it was laughing at him—raucously laughing—for his failure to stop its plans.

I don’t even know what it is
, he grumbled,
let alone where it is. We’re no better off than before I went to Bendegeit’s lair!

“Not true,” replied Merlin, who had overheard his thoughts. Speaking directly into the dragon’s ear, he said, “We know now, thanks to you, that there is one central source of all this wickedness. We don’t know what, or where, it is—that’s true. But we will find it! That’s certain.”

Yet even the wizard’s encouraging words didn’t lift Basilgarrad’s mood. As he sailed through another bank of clouds, scattering luminous mist in his wake, he ground his massive jaws together, scraping hundreds of titanic teeth.

All I know is that beast is evil. Wholly evil.
The phrase that had come to him when he’d seen it returned, echoing in his mind:
Darker than dark.

He banked to one side, tilting from the tip of his snout to the club of his tail, to avoid an especially dark cloud. Lightning sizzled and sparked inside of it. Rumbling thunder filled the air, resounding like the shadow beast’s laughter.

Why can’t I shake the feeling I’ve met that beast before?

“Try thinking about something else, old sport,” counseled the voice in his ear. “Something more pleasant. How about that irrepressible dragon maiden you met in Waterroot? The one who wanted to fly?”

Basilgarrad shook his head, nearly knocking Merlin over. Not even the memory of Marnya could distract him right now from his worries. For those worries concerned something much greater than himself: Avalon, this unique and fragile world.

Merlin sighed, making a somber wind that filled the dragon’s ear. “I understand, my friend. I’m just as worried! When I saw Rhia’s suit of vines restored to its old vitality, that lifted my spirits—as did her yelp of joy when I asked her to keep the crystal of élano. But those brief moments didn’t last long. My mood’s been as dark as could be. As dark as that
thing
you saw.”

Beneath him, the dragon shuddered. Merlin wondered aloud, “Maybe this visit with Hallia will help! And maybe the sight of your favorite forest will do the same.”

The first glimpse of Woodroot’s groves appeared, a patchwork quilt of greenery threaded with mist. As they burst out of the clouds, Basilgarrad caught the scent of lilac from the purple-hued trees of the Fairlyn Valley. Without thinking about it, he created his own smell of lilacs, magnifying the aroma from below. Yet even this experience couldn’t banish the lingering shadows from his mind.

“There!” cried Merlin. “Down on that meadow.”

Instantly, Basilgarrad veered left, knowing just what the wizard had seen. A herd of deer bounded gracefully through the grass of an open meadow. He glided steadily lower. Even before he landed at the meadow’s edge, one of the deer—a long-limbed doe with unusually large eyes—broke away from the herd and started running toward them, her hooves practically flying over the grass.

Merlin quickly climbed down from his perch, using Basil’s ear as a bendable ladder. The doe, meanwhile, bounded closer. As they watched, she began to metamorphose. Graceful forelegs shortened into arms, hind legs pulled upright, and the deer’s torso lifted vertically. At the same time, her neck and chin shortened, her ears shrank, her head sprouted an auburn braid, while her tan fur melted into a brown tunic. As the doe, now fully transformed into Hallia, strode toward them, only her wide brown eyes remained unchanged.

The wizard opened his arms to embrace her. To his own surprise, Basilgarrad watched them with uncommon interest. His heart beat faster; his long neck bent their way. Why, he couldn’t explain. Certainly, it had nothing to do with that water dragon Marnya! Whatever the reason, he watched the reunited couple hug and kiss, then amble over to a bubbling stream that coursed through the meadow.

The celebratory mood swiftly vanished as Merlin told Hallia about all their struggles. The troubles in Fireroot—with greedy dragons as well as dwarves as stubborn as Zorgat, who had broken his obsidian arrow. The violent dispute of the birds on the cloud bridge. The frightful journey to the secret lake of élano—and their victory, temporarily at least, over the blight. And Basilgarrad’s ominous discovery in the lair of the highlord of the water dragons.