Vankara (Book 1) (31 page)

Inara shrugged and
walked over to me.

“So how are you
holding up?” She asked.

“I miss Dena,” I
confided.  The little princess had not been far from my thoughts the entire trip. 
It felt good to be able to share my feelings with someone who might understand
a mother’s longing to be with her child.

“I’m sure she’s
fine,” Inara consoled.  “Besides, you’ll be able to see her the day after
tomorrow.  It’s not like you abandoned her, Em.  I’m sure she’s being spoiled
rotten as we speak.”

I couldn’t help
but smile.  Inara was more than likely right.  I was just feeling guilty for no
substantial reason.

Over half an hour
passed and Gabriel didn’t seem to be any closer to coming out to get us.

“I don’t know
about the three of you,” Aleksander said in an irritable voice.  “But I’ve
waited long enough.”

Before any of us
could stop him, Aleksander barged out of the cabin, making his way towards the
rock.

“I think I’m with
Chromis on this one.” Fallon stood from his seat and made his way to the door
of the cabin.

“Gabriel said we
couldn’t make the passageway appear,” I reminded him. 

“Maybe if we bang
on it enough, Gabriel will remember we’re out here.”  And with that Fallon
exited the cabin of the airship.

“Well I’m not
about to leave those two alone,” Inara told me, securing her cap snuggly on her
head.  “There’s enough bad blood between them without adding in the frustration
of waiting.”

I could only agree
with Inara, leaving Fallon and Aleksander alone was not the wisest idea.

When I stepped out
of the airship, I had a feeling of déjà vu.  It was just like the dream I had
the night before.  The sun was shining brightly against the whiter than white
snow forcing me to shield my eyes.  The landscape of the mountain range was
almost identical.  When had the Queen been here before?  And with who?

Inara helped me
trudge through the snow as Fallon and Aleksander both beat their fist on the
rock and yelled at the top of their lungs for Gabriel to open the passageway. 
Once we stood beside them, they ceased their yelling and looked at me like two
school boys who had been caught doing something wrong by their teacher.  On
closer inspection of the rock, I realized it wasn’t a rock at all but a large
piece of gray marble with spider web veins made of gold running through it.

Inara ran one of
her gloved hands against the smooth stone.  “Guess no one is home.  Or they’re
choosing to ignore the two idiots banging on the door.”

“Damn thing won’t
open up,” Fallon said, ignoring Inara’s jibe and striking the surface of the
marble with his fist one last time.

I sighed.  “I told
you it would be pointless.  Now we’re all cold and my dress is completely
soaked.  We should just go back to the ship and wait for Gabriel to come and
get us.”

“Emma’s right,”
Aleksander said in a resigned voice.  “There’s no reason for us stand out here
in the cold if all they’re going to do is ignore us.”

As I turned to go
back to the ship, the skirt of my dress became twisted around my legs and I
almost fell over backwards but was able to steady myself by placing a hand
against the large marble behind me.

A faint popping
sound drew our attention back to the stone.  The gold veins running haphazardly
through the marble seemed to magically coalesce in front of us into one
vertical line which then split in two revealing the passageway.  The passage
angled downward towards the interior of the mountain in a corkscrew fashion. 
The grooves of whatever had made the hole acted as steps leading into Dracen’s
sanctuary.  Small glowing orbs of incandescent light floated in the air with no
visible means of attachment. 

“How did you do
that?” Inara asked in a mix of confusion and amazement.

I simply shook my
head, not knowing what to say.  Had the spell recognized me from the Queen’s
previous visit? 

“Maybe Dracen made
it so anyone of Vankar blood could enter when they needed his help,” Fallon
said, coming up with a reasonable explanation.

As we descending
down into the mountain, I made a mental note to ask Gabriel why and when the Queen
had come to see Dracen and who had accompanied her.  If the Queen had truly
loved someone, perhaps that person was also the father of her child.

Chapter 21

“Let me go in
first,” Fallon said, his hand gripping the hilt of his sword tightly as he
stepped through the entrance of Dracen’s home.

I followed Fallon
inside with Inara behind me and Aleksander bringing up the rear.  After
Aleksander stepped through the entryway, the opening to the cave disappeared
causing me to wonder how exactly we were supposed to get back out.

Being careful of
our steps, we reached the bottom of the tunnel a few minutes later and entered
a large cavernous space deep within the mountain.  The floating orbs which lit
our way down through the tunnel were ubiquitous within the cavern which housed
a small lake.  Their light reflected in the pool of water like stars in a dark
sky.  There were numerous tunnels drilled into the walls of the mountain
leading out from the lake patterned like the spokes of a wheel.

If it hadn’t been
for the voices of argument echoing against the stone walls, one of them
recognizable to us as belonging to Gabriel, we wouldn’t have known which tunnel
to explore first.

With Fallon in the
lead, we made our way towards the voices.  The closer we got the clearer the
words of the argument became.

“You promised you
would never bring her here!”

“Like I said
before, we had no choice,” Gabriel’s voice tried to reason.  “Please, just
listen to what she has to say.”

“If she comes in
here, everything that was sacrificed will have been for nothing!”

Dracen’s voice was
loud and irate.  I was having second thoughts about speaking with him.  If I
hadn’t been with my other three companions, I wasn’t sure I would have had the
nerve to go much further.

We finally came
into the room where Gabriel and Dracen were.  Dracen’s appearance was far more
normal than I had expected.  For some reason, I had this grand vision of him
being an elderly gentleman with wrinkles lining his face and having long wavy white
hair down to his ankles.  The reality of him was quite surprising.  He was
fairly young, no older than forty, and handsome with a kind face.  His light
brown hair was cut in a short fashion but it was long enough to detect a trace
of natural curl.

I was surprised to
find Dracen’s chambers so…ordinary.  The large interior looked like any other
drawing room in a well tended home.  There were even windows on the outer walls
which let in what looked like sunlight.  The scene outside the windows was one
of a lake view with a dense forest behind the water.  The illusion was
stunningly real.  You could even hear the faint chirping of birds in the
phantom wilderness.

Dracen saw us
first.  His pain stricken eyes immediately fell on me and widened in a moment
of unguarded surprise.  He immediately turned his back to us and raised a
trembling hand to his temples.

Gabriel turned
towards us when he realized we were in the room.  The look of surprise on his
face worried me.  If anyone should have known I could open the passageway it
should have been him.  Yet, he looked stunned to see us.

“I wish you would
have waited,” Gabriel said, glancing behind him to a distressed Dracen.

“I’m sorry,
Gabriel,” now I understood why Gabriel had wanted to come in first.  It appeared
having lived alone for so long in his mountain made Dracen unable to deal with
strangers.

“We grew tired of
waiting,” Aleksander explained, though he didn’t sound as agitated as he had
been outside.  Dracen’s odd behavior seemed to take some of the ire out of him.

“Have you found
out anything?” Fallon asked Gabriel in a low voice as we came to stand in front
of him.

“He didn’t do it,”
Gabriel replied with certainty.  “It’s what I expected to find out.”

“Then let him tell
us himself,” Aleksander suggested.

Gabriel looked
apprehensively over at Dracen who seemed to be refusing to turn around to face
us.

“Dracen?” Gabriel’s
voice was filled with uncertainty that his friend would even speak with us.

Dracen wiped at
his eyes as though he had been crying, but when he turned to face us, I saw no
evidence of any emotional distress.  His expression only showed how
apprehensive he was of us.  But I noticed how his eyes deftly avoided looking
directly at me as he seemed determined to only look at those around me.

“Dracen,” Gabriel
said.  “I would like to introduce you to Marshall John Fallon, Captain Inara
Irondale, King Aleksander Chromis and Queen Emma Vankar.”

Dracen’s eyes
moved from one face to the other as Gabriel made his introductions but he
simply returned his gaze to Gabriel when I was introduced.  The odd behavior of
the sorcerer made me curious to know why I was having such a peculiar effect on
him.  I felt no intentional disrespect by his behavior.  It was more like he
just couldn’t bring himself to look at me for fear his composure would crumble if
our eyes were to ever meet.

“We came to
discuss the plagues,” I said to him gently, not wanting to frighten him away
any more than I already was.  If nothing else, I knew we were not looking at a
mass murderer.  Gabriel had been right; Dracen was not the source of the
plagues.  “I assume Gabriel has told you we know the plagues were caused by
magic?”

Dracen nodded as
he kept his eyes averted to the floor in front of me.

“Yes, he’s told
me.”  Dracen said in a soft voice.  He glanced up at me and quickly looked back
down.  “I’m afraid I don’t know who could have conjured the spell.  I didn’t
even know the plagues were magical in nature until Gabriel told me just now.”

“How is it that
the supposed greatest sorcerer in the world didn’t know?”  Aleksander asked
accusingly.

Dracen looked at
Aleksander and smiled grimly.  “I don’t get out much.”

“Master?”

At the sound of
the strange man’s voice, we all looked to the entrance of the room.  A young
man dressed in similar fashion to the fae stood in the doorway.  He had blacker
than black hair and lily white skin, but the one feature which stood out to me
was his bright blue-green eyes.  They looked almost identical to the ones of
the fae mage, Lorenna, who gave me the vial of melted snow.

“Come in, Karis,”
Dracen’s voice sounded relieved by the other man’s sudden appearance.  “We have
guests.”

The fae walked
into the room and came to stand beside Dracen.  He studied us with undisguised
curiosity and met my eyes with unflinching nerve.

“Are you fae?” I
asked.

Karis nodded his
head.  “Yes.”

“From time to
time,” Gabriel began in way of explanation.  “The fae send Dracen one of their
mages to apprentice under him.  Karis has been with Dracen for quite some
time.  I believe you were only ten when you first came here?”

“Yes, I was ten.” 
Karis smiled at us but the friendliness of such an expression was not reflected
in his eyes.  I could tell he was merely performing a polite action for the
sake of appearances.  “I plan to return to my people very soon.”

“How the hell did
you get here?” Aleksander asked.  “We had a hard enough time getting here by
airship.”

“I would assume
Karis came by dragon,” I said, receiving a genuine smile from Dracen’s
apprentice this time.

“You are correct,”
he affirmed with an inclination of his head.  “My father brought me here on his
dragon.  He will come back for me when the time is right.”

“I’ll hate to see
you go, my son,” Dracen touched Karis on the back like a father would his own
child.  Having spent what had to be over ten years with Karis, I could easily
understand Dracen’s fond attachment to the man.

But there was
something about Karis’ carriage which bothered me.  Perhaps it was just because
of the natural tension of mistrust which had been bred into each of our races. 
Fearing the fae was like breathing, natural and thoughtless.

“Is there any
possibility you could help us figure out whom or what is causing the plagues?” 
I asked Dracen, taking the vial of melted snow from my skirt pocket.  I handed
the vial to Dracen and watched it glow the same phosphorescent yellow as
before.

Dracen immediately
dropped the vial like it had caused him physical pain.  The glass shattered
against the white marble floor spilling out the liquid at his feet returning to
its natural colorless state.  Dracen’s hands shook as he looked directly into
my eyes for the first time.

“Where did you get
that?” He demanded, his voice almost a growl it was so low.

“Queen Nuala gave
it to me,” I answered, startled by Dracen’s reaction.  “I went to her seeking
aid in discovering the source of the plagues.”

“What’s wrong?”
Gabriel asked Dracen, alarmed by his friend’s sudden change in demeanor.  “Do
you know who cast the spell?”

Dracen looked at
Gabriel, pain and horror etched across his face.

“It’s me,” Dracen
said in disbelief.  “I’m the source.”

“Then you’re
admitting you cast the spell?” I asked, certain the man standing in front of me
couldn’t have knowingly killed so many people.

“No, but…” Dracen
shook his head as if he were trying to figure something out which made no
sense, “the source of the magic in that bottle is mine.  I know of no one else
who calls upon the trillian.”

“Trillian?”
Gabriel asked, confused by his friend’s words.  “What are you talking about?”

“It’s something
I’ve never told you about.  I’ve never told anyone about it,” Dracen said
almost as an apology to Gabriel.  “Trillian is a crystal which can only be
found in this mountain.  It’s the main reason I chose this place to make my
home.  The crystal helps me amplify my powers a thousand fold.”