The Chronicles of Lumineia: Book 02 - The Gathering (39 page)

Finally the
captain seemed to understand and he backed off. “Yes sir,” he grumbled, and retreated
towards the cliff. The rest were quick to follow but the druid remained until
they had gone a hundred feet. Finally he grunted in satisfaction and strolled
to the group of dark elves, arriving about the same time as Braon. Just before
they stopped, Braon caught Newhawk’s eye and gave him a subtle nod of approval.

“Nicely
handled, although I would have dealt with it . . . differently,” one of the
elves, a female, said as she stepped forward. Her accent was rich, but she
still spoke common.

Newhawk smiled
graciously, “What would you have done?”

“Probably
slipped a dagger in his ribs,” she admitted.

Braon listened
to the druid’s response without saying anything. For the moment, the dark elves
considered Newhawk in charge, and it allowed the young commander time for a
quick study of the newcomers.

They looked
remarkably like their surface cousins, at least in body shape, and each was lean
and fit. The female wore a tight, revealing outfit and a cloak that hung to the
ground. Her black hair was pulled back and tied, showing an angular face
dominated by black eyes that glittered with deep intelligence. Everything about
her clothing and demeanor demonstrated superiority, and Braon recalled that for
dark elves, females were considered dominant.

The males, for
their part, wore thin swords. Their stance betrayed their skill with them. Garbed
in black cloaks and equally dark clothes, they appeared as blots of midnight
absorbing the light from the setting sun.
Guards
, Braon thought,
confident in his conclusion, but their looks towards the female revealed
something more. Not only were the guards nervous, which could have been
attributed to their presence on the surface, but they were nervous for the
female. Their apprehension could have been explained by any number of reasons,
but their behavior led him to think that she was of higher rank.

“Val’Trisian,”
she said, introducing herself.

“Newhawk,”
Braon’s second said. Then he tilted his head towards the phoenix fifty feet away.
“And that is Reiquen, my Joré.”

“A druid,” she
said with a nod, understanding filling her eyes. “And bonded to a phoenix.
Impressive.” Although the guards shifted, Braon could see no deception in her
tone or look.

“Did the elves
select you as the commander of the gathering?” Val’Trisian asked, and Braon
heard the slight inflection as she mentioned her surface cousins.

Newhawk smiled
and shook his head. “This is Braon,” he said, sweeping his hand at him, “high commander
of the gathered races.”

All of the elves
snapped to look at him in confusion, and then back at Newhawk as if waiting for
the end of a joke. Before they could decide what to think, Braon addressed them
in his most serious voice. “Welcome to the gathering. I am sure you have quite
a few questions, as we have for you.”

“You can’t be
serious,” Val’Trisian said, her voice incredulous. “He’s just a boy, a
human
boy at that.”

“I am
serious,” Newhawk said, his smile gone. “This boy has more of a mind for battle
than anyone I have ever seen. The Oracle herself placed him in command, and you
would do well to listen.”

Her expression
displayed disbelief, so Braon decided to take a different tact. “While you
decide whether or not to believe him or trust me, do you mind if we get some
questions answered?”

She shook her
head, seeming about to protest again, but shrugged like it didn’t matter and
said. “Let’s hear it.” Her voice was patronizing but Braon ignored it. It was
hardly the first time he'd heard that tone.

“We did not
send a messenger underground, although we would have if we knew where your city
was. How did you come to know about the gathering?”

Val’Trisian’s
lips twitched as if she had expected the question first. “We didn’t until a ten-day
ago.”

She didn’t
offer further explanation but her expression was hard, with just a tinge of something
more. The anomaly was so subtle that it took him a second to recognize it for
sadness. Then an idea crossed his mind. It was a gamble, but if he was right it
would help her trust him. “The fiends are underground . . . aren’t they?” he
said and watched her expression twitch. Not respectful exactly, but surprised.

“They attacked
our cities and drove us out,” she admitted.

He nodded,
filling in the blanks. “You tried to fight, but there were too many, so you
were forced to flee. Who suggested you contact the surface?”

She flashed
him a tight smile, her chin tilting upward, “I did.”

Now that he
appeared to be gaining ground, he didn’t let up. “Magic or messenger?”

Her smile
widened. “Both. The messenger came out of a cave near the dwarves, and she
overheard some of them talking—but that wasn’t enough for most of the houses.
Mind magic was used and we discovered that many of the minds in Lumineia were
moving towards one location, driven by a vast collection of darkness. The
invaders resembled what drove our people out.”

“How long did
it take before you decided to come here?” Braon asked, guessing that it hadn’t
been an easy decision.

“Almost a week.”
She grimaced. “Our people were loath to leave the underground and ask the
surface people for aid.

“Especially
when the few times your kind have come to the surface it has been to pillage or
kill,” Braon said, making the statement with no rancor.

Val’Trisian
bared her teeth. “Yes,” she said after a moment, and he saw Talfar and the
other watching gnomes nod, as if she had confessed a sin.

Braon allowed
a small smile. “I understand why you are here. Now, what do you want?”

“We are here
to
consider
joining you.” She bit the words off and threw a look at
Newhawk.

“How many
warriors do you have?” Braon asked. Now that he’d gotten her to open up, he
settled into the usual queries.

“Thirty
thousand female magi and roughly the same number of male warriors,” she said,
but again, Braon saw that there was more she didn’t say.

“How many
slaves?” he asked.

She blinked at
his knowledge of their society. “Most of them gave us time to escape.”

Braon tried
not to think about their callous look at life. Instead, he said, “Are you
accustomed to the surface light?”

“We have been
using visible fire as much as possible, but none of us will be able to stand
full daylight.”

He nodded,
satisfied with the information he’d received. “We are grateful that you have
come. The Oracle let us know several things about the coming engagement. We now
have ten days before the vastness of Draeken’s army reaches this cliff. As you
know, we are outnumbered, and we
will
be killed.”

“Inspirational,”
Val’Trisian said, but Braon ignored her. He knew enough about the dark elves to
know that if he wanted them to trust him, he needed to be direct.

“The Oracle
departed several weeks ago with a force that carries our only hope. They will
attempt to reach Draeken and destroy him before we are wiped out. In the
meantime, we have gathered everyone we could, and fortified the cliff and the
city. All we can hope is to survive long enough for them to succeed.”

“How many are
already here?” she asked, her eyes narrowing.

“Well over
nine hundred thousand now,” Newhawk answered, “from more than eight different
races and tribes.”

Val’Trisian's eyebrows
shot up, as did her guards, and their gaze flicked between Newhawk and Braon
like they were seeing them for the first time. Braon also saw the slight
tightening of her jaw as she realized that her entire race presented a fraction
of the forces commanded by the two humans in front of her. When she looked back
to Braon, a grudging respect was reflected in her opaque eyes.

After several
moments she said, “
Assuming
we decide to join you, and accept your
leadership, what would you have us do?”

Braon tilted
his head towards the dip in elevation that led to the wall being constructed.
“That area is The Deep Battalion. Your entire race would live in and defend
that area during any time the light is gone. Someone your people respect will be
my appointed general, per my approval.”

 “That would
be me," she said with an edge to her tone. "I am the eldest daughter
of the house of Trisian, first house of our race. Our matron was one of those
killed during our forced exodus, elevating me to my new rank.”

Braon inclined
his head. “My condolences.”

Her expression
hardened. “It was an acceptable loss.” She spat the words out with such
vehemence that Braon almost flinched. “She was even more brutal than most of
our people.”

Resisting the
urge to frown, Braon continued, “Newhawk will give the details of our strategy.
How soon do you think you can get your people here?”

She jerked her
head in the direction of the mountains. “Two days.”

“Then I will
see you again in two days. Report to Newhawk if you have any questions or
concerns, and as soon as you understand our communication structure, use it
whenever necessary,” he said.

Newhawk
shifted, drawing their attention to him. “And a word on discipline. It would be
best for all if you keep your people from . . .
harming
any of your new
allies.” The hardness to his features made the suggestion sound more like a
threat.

She accepted
the warning with a smile that didn’t reach her eyes. “We are glad to join your
gathered army, and I assure you we will do our part.” Her eyes sparked. “We
look forward to killing these dark beings.”

Braon nodded
and turned to leave but she asked one more question. “How long do you expect this
battle to last?”

When he looked
back he saw that she had no desire to stay a minute longer than necessary, so
when he replied he did so with pity in his voice. “After the battle is joined,
it will be over in no more than seven days.”

Her forehead
wrinkled as she tried to understand. “But why—”

“Because that
is the longest the Oracle said we could survive,” Braon said. “If Draeken is
not destroyed by then—” He shrugged. “—we will be dead.”

As he walked
away from the stunned dark elves, he hoped that his gut was right. They needed
the dark elves, and they would fill the last real hole in their defenses, but he
prayed with all his might that they wouldn’t ruin the tenuous alliance that the
surface elves had begun.

It would mean
their destruction long before Draeken's army arrived.

Chapter
30: First Scars

Braon mounted
Reiquen behind Newhawk, still pondering the exchange with the black elves. The
conversation had revealed much about a race shrouded in mystery, a race that
many regarded as pure evil. Although he had seen certain tendencies in
Val’Trisian that lent credibility to the legend, he’d also observed signs of
good in the head of the house of Trisian.

For one thing,
she had denounced the cruelty of her mother. For another she had been willing
to work with the surface races. This demonstrated that the dark elves were more
similar to the surface races than even they would care to admit.

In his
opinion, every race contained light and dark qualities, because both attributes
were inherent in every individual. The darkest days in the chronicles of
Lumineia where when the majority of a race succumbed to evil, or the few that became
corrupt were in positions of power. Either way, wars and oppression had been
the result.

Dark elves
were a perfect example. The tales of their raiding were common, yet it seemed
that many were variations of a few incidents. The discrepancy led Braon to draw
one of two conclusions. One possibility was that the dark elves had only come
to the surface to attack when a large portion of their people had chosen evil.
The second was that the surface attacks had been perpetrated by a faction of
the population, and did not represent the people as a whole. The latter
explanation appeared more likely, and if it was true, would mean that the dark
elves didn't merit their reputation. In truth, the history of Lumineia brimmed
with the atrocities of mankind, but the dark elves were still perceived as more
evil.

Indeed many of
the races that had joined the gathering had come only because they had been
forced to. The desire to live was a powerful motivator, and Braon knew that many
in his army would willingly choose to sabotage their efforts—or even join the
fiend army—if they thought they would survive. It was just as well that the
enemy they faced had a way of forcing inter-race cooperation. Fortunately, most
of the attempts at sabotage had been unsuccessful, and the results hadn't
caused critical damage to his plans.

“Commander,”
Thacker said from behind him, leaning forward to speak into his ear.

“Yes?” he
asked.

“Emeka is
reporting another group of . . . large reinforcements approaching his
division,” Thacker said. “Several giants.”

Braon
considered the report for a moment, then asked, “Friend or foe?” Giants were
not known for their kindness, and lived in hills or mountains. They could have
just wandered down here.

Thacker mentally
spoke with his son Jake, Emeka’s link, and then replied, “They appear friendly,
but, just in case, General Emeka has stationed several commands ready to repel
an attack.”

Braon nodded
in satisfaction. “Remind the general that we cannot afford bloodshed. Then find
out the giants’ intentions and report back.”

“Yes
commander,” Thacker said.

As they
continued to fly east towards the city, Braon reviewed his task list. He
considered several changes he wanted to make in the training schedule—but kept
his ear open for the situation with the giants. He also reviewed what he knew
about the large race. Although they were renowned as vicious, Braon tended to
believe most of the stories he’d heard were embellished with a generous dose of
fear.