Paul Kemp - Realms of War

A shimmering halo rose around the lythari. Ferret impatiently seized Elaith's hand and pulled him toward it. The three elves stepped through into the deep green shade of an ancient forest.

One step-the journey was that quick, that smooth and simple.

Elaith inclined his head to Ganemede in a gesture of respect. "I have traveled magic's silver paths many times, but never so skillfully managed."

The lythari nodded acknowledgment. "Meet me here at nightfall."

"It's a brisk walk to Suldanessellar, but we can be back before dusk," Ferret said. Without waiting for a reply, she circled the trunk of an enormous oak and started down a faint path.

Elaith soon found that keeping pace with a forest elf was no easy task. Before long Ferret veered off the path and headed for a thicket of thorny bushes-formidable thorns, Elaith noted, each as long as his thumb.

"Stay close behind me," Ferret instructed. She paused, cocked her head, and considered. "Better yet, keep a hand on my shoulder. The thorns might not recognize you otherwise."

There was magic here, subtle but powerful, quite different from anything Elaith knew. Curious, he did as Ferret bid.

The branches parted to let them pass. It seemed to the moon elf that the guardian thicket begrudged his presence, for the branches slid back into place behind him with an ominous hiss, close enough for the thorns to scrape against his travel leathers, but not quite hard enough to pierce them.

Finally they stepped out of the thicket into a tree-ringed forest glade. Stones had been piled into a shoulder-high cairn in the center of the glade and crowned with a platform of rune-carved wood. On it rested a low-sided casket topped with a rounded glass lid. Within lay an elf female of middle years, clad in armor of a style not seen in five centuries. Still as the grave she lay, untouched by death's corruption. Magic lingered in the air like incense, and so did something rarer and more wondrous: a sense of legend. Elaith went to one knee to honor a story he had not yet heard.

"Zoastria's tomb," Ferret said.

Memory stirred. Elaith knew that name. His heart quickened as he rose and stepped closer. The entombed elf's face seemed familiar to him, and her long, braided hair held the distinctive black-sapphire shade Elaith thought of as Moonflower blue. More than fifty years ago, an elf who looked very like that sleeping warrior had come to Evermeet. Thasitalia Moonflower had been kin to the royal family of Evermeet, and she named Princess Amnestria as her blade heir. Elaith had been captain of the king's guard then, betrothed to Amnestria and full of hope for the future they planned to share.

"Zoastria Moonflower, a friend to the forest folk," Ferret said, confirming Elaith's suspicions. "She was slain in battle some four years past."

Elaith whirled toward her. Anger, sudden and inexplicable, filled his heart and blazed from his amber eyes.

"That's impossible. Zoastria was the fourth moonfighter in her line. She lived and died long before you were born."

"The first time, yes," Ferret agreed, unperturbed by the moon elf's ire. "But every moonfighter adds another magic to the sword, is that not true? The elf who passed the sword to Zoastria ensured that as long as her moonblade's magic endures, a hero will return when the need is great. Arilyn is of this line. When she placed the sword in her ancestor's uncor shy;rupted hands, Zoastria became a living elf."

Deathless sleep… the first of her line… a hero will return… her line… will return… a living elf.

Ferret's words tumbled through Elaith's mind, staggering in their implications.

Amnestria was the seventh in Zoastria's line.

It was possible. Somehow he'd always known it. When he'd caught his first glimpse of Arilyn nearly six years ago, for a moment he'd thought her Amnestria reborn. Such things were not unknown in Faerыn, even among the elves. But except for that one scalding moment of hope, Elaith had never really expected Amnestria to return.

But what if she could? What if she did?

"This place troubles you?" asked Ferret.

"Perhaps we should reconsider the plan."

That was not what Elaith had expected to say, but the words seemed right to him. He'd been so busy arranging the usual web of primary, secondary, and contingency plans that he'd neglected to weigh these arrangements on any sort of moral scale. In all candor, he was not in the habit of doing so. But if he'd been spared by Amnestria's moonblade to play some part in her return, he'd damn well better get into the habit!

The forest elf's face fell slack with astonishment. "Abandon the plan? Whatever for? It is a good plan."

"But not an honorable one."

"And for that, all gods be thanked," she said tartly. "Any honorable course would bring reprisals against my people."

She brushed a lock of hair off her forehead with a quick, impatient hand. "Why these doubts? You are a fine battle leader. Foxfire has been singing your praises since he returned from Waterdeep."

"Foxfire is a competent battle leader himself-more than competent, and he knows this forest far better than I do. Perhaps he could devise-"

"No." Ferret cut him off abruptly and decisively. "Foxfire is too pure of heart to do what must be done. Why else would I have come for you?"

Her words stung Elaith more than they should have. "These are strange words to speak over Zoastria's tomb."

"If I'd known how you would respond to this place, I would have spoken them elsewhere."

"Then why did you bring me here?"

"It is traditional for the sy Tel'Quessir to honor ancestors before a battle." Ferret pointed to the Craulnober moonblade on Elaith's hip, sheathed and peacebound. Bringing it had been an act of impulse. The symbolism was important to Elaith, even though he could not wield the sword.

"I do not know the places sacred to your line," Ferret went on, "so I brought you here to honor another moonfighter's legacy."

Something in Elaith's face made her falter. "Did I do wrong?"

"No," he said in a dull, soft tone. "You did not do wrong."

You did not, he repeated silently, but it appears that I must.

And just like that, his decision was made.

Some men called Elaith impulsive, though usually not to his face. That wasn't quite true. Elaith believed in destiny.

There was a reason the Craulnober moonblade rejected him, a reason Amnestria's moonblade had spared his ill-spent life. There was a reason he was thrice-pledged to the Moonflower family: raised by the elf queen, trained by her warrior king and made captain of the royal guard, betrothed to the youngest princess. And the reason for a life entwined with the royal family seemed suddenly, bleakly evident.

He could do things they could not.

Amnestria had been pledged to the service of the forest elves. It was strangely fitting that Elaith take her legacy upon himself. There was a great need in the Wealdath, but this time, the forest people did not need a hero.

They needed him.

Thanks to Ganemede's magic, five elves stepped into the shadows of the Mytharan Woods, a place that was old and strange even by the standards of this ancient forest. The small band included the lythari and two recruits Ferret had brought back from the elven settlement Suldanessellar. One was Kivessin Sultaasar, an elf of the Suldusk tribe. The other, to Elaith's astonishment, was Captain Uevareth Korianthil, a moon elf from Evermeet. Apparently Queen Amlaruil had sent representatives to the Wealdath four years ago, after the forest elves fought off an incursion of human mercenaries. She'd made it known to Tethyr's humans that another such attempt against her forest kin would not go unanswered.

That raised the stakes considerably.