The Dark Remains (67 page)

Then jogged. Then ran.

By the time she reached the other side of the hall her heart was pounding, her lungs were heaving, and there was absolutely no sign of either servant or wine. The others were small shadows in the distance. There was nothing to do but head toward them and hope she made it back before she expired.

Just take it slow, Grace. You’d think with all this dashing between worlds you’d be in better shape
.

She was halfway across the hall when she noticed a statue she must have passed in her vain attempt to get more wine. It was the statue of a man, half again larger than life. Grace wasn’t exactly certain what made her stop and gaze at it. The statue seemed out of place here. But perhaps that was what made it so compelling.

Unlike the smooth, white marble all around, this was hewn of rough, gray stone. All the same, there was a vividness to it that brought life to the subject. The man was clearly a warrior of some sort, dressed for battle, holding a massive sword in his hand. There was a crudeness to his garb—the stone cleverly carved to suggest leather, fur, bone, and beaten plates of steel—as well as a wildness to his sharp features and shaggy hair that lent him a rough, wolfish look. All the same, he was handsome. More than handsome—imposing. This was a man others would kneel before. Then Grace noticed the circlet resting on his brow, and she knew this man had been a king.

Except that didn’t make sense. Tarras had emperors, not kings, and Grace had a feeling none of them had ever looked this barbaric. The statue was chipped and worn; it was clearly very old.

“What have you found here, Grace?” a musical voice said behind her. “Well, look at that.”

Only as Falken spoke did Grace realize she had been staring at the statue. How long had she been standing there? She turned toward Falken. The others were drifting in her direction as well.

“What a king he must have been,” the bard said softly.

So Grace had been right. “Who was he, Falken?”

“It’s Lord Ulther, the king of Toringarth a thousand years ago. I think you know his story, Grace—how he and Elsara, Empress of Tarras, worked together to defeat the Pale King in the War of the Stones.” Falken stepped closer to the statue. “So that’s what Fellring looks like. I’ve always wondered. I had always believed its likeness was never recorded before it was shattered. But Elsara must have commissioned this statue of him when he came to Tarras to beg her aid.”

Grace felt strange, light. The warm, spicy air was suddenly stuffy and cloying. “Fellring?”

“Yes, that’s the name of Ulther’s sword. Do you see?” Falken pointed to the blade gripped in the statue’s hand. “It’s writ with runes of power.”

Grace’s attention had been on the statue’s face; she had hardly glanced at the sword. Now she did—

—and the floor fell away from her feet as the world went white.

When her vision finally cleared, she saw faces hovering above her. Falken, Melia, Travis, and the others as well. At last the ringing in her ears receded, and she could hear voices.

“—you all right, Grace?” Travis was saying.

“Please, dear,” Melia said, her amber eyes concerned. “Can you speak to us?”

Two more voices sounded in Grace’s mind, weaving together as one.
Sister, what is wrong?

All this attention made Grace acutely uncomfortable. She managed to disentangle herself and stand.

“I’m all right.” Except that wasn’t true. At the moment, she was anything but all right. She was … But she didn’t know anymore. Perhaps she never had.

“You’re the doctor, Grace,” Travis said, his gray eyes intent, “but even I know people don’t keel over when nothing’s wrong with them. What’s going on?”

There was no point in hiding. Besides, she wanted to see—had to see—if she was right. With shaking fingers, she drew a piece of paper from her pocket and unfolded it. It was the drawing Deirdre had given her before they stepped through the gate.

The drawing of a sword.

There could be no doubt about it—even she could see that the runes were identical—and by Falken’s oath he saw it as well.

The bard looked at Grace, blue eyes stunned. “I don’t understand, Grace. How can you have a drawing of Fellring?”

“Not … just a drawing, Falken.” Shaking now, she reached beneath the loose-fitting Mournish shirt and drew out her necklace.

Usually she kept it hidden, a secret relic of the childhood she had never known. She supposed, for all their time together, Melia and Falken had never seen her necklace before.

Falken actually staggered, his hand to his chest. “It can’t be. By the Seven, it can’t.”

Beltan groaned. “Enough mysteriousness, Falken. Would you please be kind enough to explain to the rest of us exactly what it
isn’t
supposed to be? I think we’d all like to be shocked, too.”

Vani’s gaze was half-lidded, curious. “It is a shard of the sword, is it not? The blade the statue holds.”

“The shard of Fellring,” Falken murmured. “But how can it be?”

Grace was struggling for understanding herself. The air seemed to throb around her, and her mind was buzzing.

“I’ve always had this,” she said, gripping the pendant. “I was wearing the necklace when the people from the orphanage found me. I don’t remember it, but I couldn’t have been more than three years old at the time.”

“But that’s impossible. I know it is. The only person who could possess that necklace as a child would be—”

“Would be Ulther’s last descendant and heir,” Melia said.

Falken and the others stared at Grace as if she had suddenly sprouted wings. Grace struggled for words but found she had none, so she struggled for understanding instead. According to Melia, the man in the statue—King Ulther of Toringarth—was her great-thirty-something-times-over-grandfather. Which meant, all this time, she was not from Earth at all. She was from …

Travis’s voice was soft with wonder. “You’re from Eldh, Grace.”

No, it couldn’t be true.

Except it was, and she knew it. Three years old, alone on the side of a mountain, and all she had was a piece of his sword. That and a fragment of a song she had heard as an infant. A song from another world. Her world.

And farewell words too often part …

“With Fellring sword of Elfin art,” Grace murmured aloud.

Melia caught Grace’s hands in her own, beaming with joy.

“Welcome home, Ralena.”

Grace listened, utterly numb, as Falken and Melia told a tale—
her
tale—describing how for centuries they had, in secret, kept watch over the heirs of the lost kingdom of Malachor. At some point Lirith must have come from the throne room, although Grace didn’t see when. All at once she was simply aware that Lirith was there, eyes shining as she gazed at Grace.

“I don’t understand, Falken,” Beltan said when at last the bard paused in his telling. “All the old stories
I’ve ever heard say that the royal line of Malachor was completely wiped out when Malachor fell, that no heirs survived.”

“You’re right, Beltan,” Falken said, gazing at his black-gloved hand. “That
is
what the stories say. That’s what I wanted the stories to say when I wrote them down seven centuries ago.”

His words seemed important, but Grace’s brain was too dull to comprehend what the bard was saying.

“I think maybe I understand,” Travis said. “One member of the royal line of Malachor
did
survive, only you and Melia didn’t want anyone to know about it.”

Falken’s wolfish visage was haggard, as if the centuries suddenly weighed heavy upon him. “It was the king and queen’s only child, their infant son. With a knife I cut him crying from her womb where she lay dead—only a day after the king himself was slain.”

Lirith moved closer. “You were afraid those who had murdered the king and queen would kill their child as well.”

“But how did it all happen?” Aryn said, blue eyes questioning. “The stories say that Malachor fell, but they never really say how. Only that you—”

Melia cast a sharp glance at the young baroness, and Aryn hastily bit her tongue. However, Grace knew what she had been about to say.

That you were the reason the kingdom fell
.

“No, my lady, that is not a tale I will tell today.” The bard looked up, and his wolfish visage brightened. “Nor does it matter, not now. Not when you’ve come back to us, Ralena.”

At last Grace managed to find her voice. “Why do you keep calling me Ralena?”

Melia smiled. “Because it’s your name, dear. At least, it’s the name your parents gave you.”

These words were like a blow to the center of Grace’s chest. “My parents? You knew them?”

“Yes, dear, quite well in fact.” Melia sighed. “They were so young, so bright—sometimes around them I felt as if I were still only a thousand years old.”

Durge’s eyes bulged, and even Grace felt a mad impulse to laugh. But the feeling passed as sorrow filled Melia’s gaze.

“What happened?” she whispered.

It was Falken who answered. “Raiff and Anilena—your parents, Grace—were married young. Too young, Melia and I both thought at the time, but I believe they felt some urgency in the matter. You see, Anilena was at the time the sole living heir to Malachor—the direct descendant of the last king and queen. Her parents had died young, her mother while giving birth to her, and her father while out boar hunting only a year after.”

Melia touched Falken’s arm. “He let the beast take him, Falken. You know it’s true. He could not bear to live without his beloved.”

The bard laid his hand over hers. “It fell to Melia and me to raise Anilena as best we could. It was not the first time, over the centuries, we had seen a child of the line of Malachor to adulthood, but never had we raised one from such a tender age, and so Anilena was special to us.

“Of course, we did have help. Gevriel Warden dwelled with us, along with his two sons. Gevriel was of the family of wardens who had served the kings of Malachor, for the line endured after the kingdom fell. Always there was at least one warden to keep watch over the current heir. At the time when Anilena was a child, we were all living in southern Calavan, in a small manor near the banks of the River Goldwine.”

“It was so beautiful there,” Melia said quietly. “I shall never forget the light on the river at sunset.”

Grace forced herself to breathe. “Did she … did Anilena know who she was?”

“Not at first, dear,” Melia said. “We wanted her to grow up as any child might. She did know her parents had
died, and she thought of us as her aunt and uncle. Then, on her eighteenth birthday, we gave her the necklace you wear now, and we told her the truth. At first she was angry, but in a short time she was able to accept the burden that had been placed upon her.” Melia reached out and touched Grace’s hand. “Ever were the women of your line strong, dear.”

Grace had to resist the urge to pull back.

“And don’t forget willful,” Falken added. “Not a month after we told her of her heritage, Anilena ran off and married Raiff, the elder of Gevriel Warden’s two sons. In truth, I’m surprised it took that long before the two lines were united. Regardless, Anilena loved him, and it seemed she was determined to produce an heir as soon as possible. In case something dire happened.”

“And it did,” Durge said in a grim voice.

Now it was Falken who seemed to lose his tongue.

“Black knights,” Melia said. “It was four years later. Anilena and Raiff were so happy together, and happy with their daughter Ralena—with you, Grace. Then one day, Falken and I took a short journey to Gendarra, to pay a visit to our old friend Tome, who was there at the time. We took you with us, for Tome had never seen you, and Raiff and Anilena had promised him they would let you visit him. You were just three winters old. To be certain we were safe, Anilena and Raiff sent Merric Warden with us—he was Gevriel’s other son, and Raiff’s young brother.”

“As it turned out,” Falken said, “we weren’t the ones who needed protection. After visiting Tome, we returned to the manor and found it burned. There were few left alive, but we discovered Gevriel in the wreckage, although he was gravely wounded. He told us what had happened, how a band of knights in black armor had ridden up to the manor on black horses. Without even stopping to speak, the knights had attacked and set the manor afire. They slew Raiff while he tried to protect Anilena. She took up his sword, but they …”

Falken squeezed his eyes shut, then opened them again. “They murdered Anilena where she stood. Then, without another word, the knights turned and rode away as quickly as they had come. Gevriel told us these things, then he died as well in Merric’s arms.”

Grace listened to these words in horror. In the space of a few minutes Falken and Melia had given her the parents she had never known, then as quickly had taken them away again.

“Who?” she finally managed to say. “Who were they? The black knights who killed my parents?”

“I’m afraid we were never sure,” Melia said.

Falken gazed at her, eyes fierce. “I am. It was the Pale King who sent them. Only Fellring ever had the power to harm Berash, and only one of Ulther’s heirs could wield the sword were it ever reforged. He wanted to make certain that never happened. And we know now he was stirring again at the time, preparing to break the Rune Gate as he nearly did last Midwinter.”

Melia looked at the bard but said nothing.

“That’s a dark tale, Falken,” Beltan said. He looked at Grace, his usually jovial face somber. “And I’m sorry you lost your parents. I know what that’s like. But this still doesn’t explain how Grace ended up on Travis’s world.”

“That was my doing,” Melia said.

Travis gaped. “You mean you have the power to send people between worlds?”

The amber-eyed lady smoothed her robe. “Not precisely. I had a little help in the matter.”

Falken folded his arms and raised an eyebrow.

“Oh, very well, so I had a great deal of help. But the New Gods owed me—I had saved up quite a few favors over the millennia.”

“So you and the other New Gods sent Grace to Earth,” Travis said.

Now it was Grace’s turn to stare. “Why?”