David Dalglish - Wrath of Lions

He stood up, took off his belt, from which his khandar still hung, and placed it on the table. He then removed a short dagger from his boot and examined it. The blade was sharp enough to slice down the length of a piece of thread. “I serve you always,” he whispered. “Even in the darkest of moments.”

Sheathing the dagger in a leather wrap and tucking it back into his boot, he lifted his eyes to his surroundings.

It is time, he thought.

He was in a chamber far underneath Palace Thyne, accessible via a passage in the crypts hidden beneath the sarcophagus of Ra’an Dultha, the first Lord of the Dezren. Tantric Thane, leader of the rebels fighting his father’s regime, had revealed the passage’s existence to him. “From the tunnels you can access any section of the palace unnoticed,” he’d said. “We have tried to use them before, but to no avail. The palace is too large, the tunnels too narrow, the rooms too numerous. It took us three full evenings just to examine eight chambers, and all we found inside were servants and underlings…and your quarters. However, if you could tell us exactly where to look…”

“No,” Ceredon had replied. “I must be the one to do the deed.”

He had first he met Tantric in his bedchamber in Palace Thyne on the evening when his room was discovered. It had happened after yet another patrol during which Ceredon had protected the very rebels he’d been assigned to exterminate. They’d talked for only a short time before Tantric handed him the dagger that was now stowed in his boot, marked with the Thane family crest, which would help steer suspicion away from Ceredon when he used it. After that, the old elf had told him of the secret door behind the emerald fireplace that connected to a series of narrow, interlocking tunnels, one of which led to Lord Orden Thyne’s secluded shrine, where Ceredon now prayed.

The time for prayers was over, though, and the elf breezed past the table, fingers sliding over the chamber’s glimmering green walls as he disappeared inside a geometrical trick: one wall was positioned slightly forward from the other, creating a nearly invisible gap wide enough to slip through.

Although the exterior of Palace Thyne was of shimmering emerald, the foundation and what lay between the walls was pure granite, hard and compacted and bleak. When Ceredon exited the breach, leaving behind the twinkling green chamber, he was thrown into near darkness. He waited for his eyes to adjust and then placed his foot on the first step of a constricted staircase. The well was a steeply angled upward climb, the walls so close on either side that he had to move sideways so as to not scrape his shoulders against the rough stone. Every thirteen steps, a level ended, and four narrow openings in the floor led to small, circular tunnels containing access points to concealed entrances in dozens of rooms in the palace.

He climbed floor after floor, keeping count of how many times the stairwell rotated, until he reached the ninth story. After another quick prayer to Celestia, he dropped on his belly and pulled himself forward on his elbows, entering the north tunnel and a darkness so bleak that even his elven eyes could not adjust to it.

Panic tickled at the hairs on the back of his neck. The blackness was a living thing, squeezing in on him, trying to crush him. He had never experienced its like before, not even in the deep caves or the catacombs beneath the city. An urge to retreat to his room filled him, and he had to fight it. He felt ashamed of his cowardice. It was only darkness, and he would navigate the tunnel as he must, his claustrophobia and fears be damned.

He inched himself along, shooing a few squeaking rats away, sounding like a rat himself as his cured elk-skin breeches scratched against the rough stone. His hand fell on one portal to the right, one to the left, one to the right, one to the left, each emitting a soft, whispery puff of fresh air. He counted seven openings before stopping, swiveling on his stomach, and steeling himself for the task at hand.

Reaching above, his fingers found a thin stone shaft. He latched onto it with both hands and pulled himself upward, sliding from the tunnel like a snake. The world brightened, the air growing pleasantly warm. There was a second shaft above him and he ascended that as well. The heat grew with each passing moment, and when he drew himself up, he met a haze of smoke.

Just like all the portals, this one opened up behind a wide hearth. Ceredon carefully placed his feet on the sooty stone ledge and inched his way to the side. He had to hold his breath to keep from coughing, and every so often one of the dying embers would pop and leap, threatening to scorch him. Luckily none did. Perhaps Celestia was looking out for him after all.

There was a latch on the far side of the interior of the hearth, and when he pulled it, the corner bent away with a quiet rumbling, opening space for him to exit. He crawled out, not bothering to slide the corner back into place. He’d need it ready for his escape. Brushing himself off, he pulled the dagger from his boot and stepped into Conall’s bedchamber.

The room’s emerald walls lightly twinkled with the fading glow from the coals. The room’s eastern-facing windows were covered with heavy drapes, blocking out light from outside. Still, Kindren could make out a pair of dressers arranged on one side of the room, a wardrobe positioned along another. Straight ahead was a four-poster bed, finely crafted from lacquered mahogany. The sheets on the feather mattress were silken and glossy, bulging in the center where a sleeping form lay.

Creeping across the room, Ceredon made sure his soft-booted feet made no sound. One wrong move and Conall would awake, summoning the Ekreissar to protect him.

When he reached the bed, he stopped, hovering over it for a moment. His father’s cousin rolled onto his back, eyes firmly shut, chest rising and falling at steady intervals. Ceredon slowly knelt, even the faint creak and crumple of his clothing sounding much too loud to his ears. With one hand he grabbed a pillow. With the other he pressed the dagger against the side of Conall’s neck.

In a single smooth motion he ripped it across the jugular. As blood erupted across the bed, Ceredon shifted, slamming the pillow against the older elf’s mouth to hold in the sudden surprised shriek he emitted when he woke from his dream. Conall thrashed, clutching at his gushing throat, and from beneath the pillow came a subdued gurgle. Ceredon pressed harder, keeping the pillow positioned so that no blood splashed on his own clothes. The crimson fluid soaked the satin sheets, forming macabre patterns.

When Conall finally fell still, Ceredon pulled back the pillow, and he shuddered involuntarily at the sight of the ghost-white look of horror on the dead elf’s face. Swallowing down bile, he moved to the window, careful not to step in the puddle of blood that had dribbled down to the floor. Pulling aside the curtain, he gave the pane of stained glass a quick strike with his gloved hand. The glass shattered, the shards tinkling when they struck the shimmering emerald floor.

The deed done, he hurried back to the hearth, sparing only a single look back at the mess he’d created, at the corpse of one of the three powerful members of the Triad in his fine satin sheets.

“And then there were two,” Ceredon whispered before crawling back through the raised corner of the hearth.

The occupied forest city of Dezerea was thrown into chaos in the aftermath of Conall’s death. Countless Dezren men were taken from their treetop homes and brought to the palace courtyard. They were forced to bow, near two thousands of them crowding the grass, while the Ekreissar stalked up and down the lines, prodding them, taunting them, trying to force a confession. Aerland Shen paraded Lord Orden and Lady Phyrra before the stooped masses. The former rulers of the city had been beaten so badly, they were barely recognizable, and the plain white robes hanging off their backs were torn and speckled with dried blood.