Chapter Twenty-Eight –
Eclipse of the Heart
Shortly after this, the dinner was over, and Jaedin stood, telling them all in an abrupt, cold tone of voice that he would be needed again at the helm; they must stay on course. What that course was, she couldn't tell, but it seemed that he desired to give them no time to ask. The Antari reappeared, and he instructed them to return the faery guests back to their rooms, where they would remain for the rest of the night.
It went without saying that that last comment of his command was a scarcely veiled threat.
He left them before they had even all stood up from the table, and then the Antari were escorting them back to their rooms. Elowyn was too confused and frightened by her own emotions, the turmoil within her heart, to speak with even remote coherence to anyone, and so she went straight to her room and shut the door.
Once there, she crossed the deep green carpet and went to her bed, to sit on its edge and think, purposefully, to herself.
Her thoughts began to wander…
Trust, resounded in her mind, like the tolling of a gigantic cathedral bell. Trust, and faith. Faith and trust. These you will live by, for they are a part of you – they are a part of everything. All will be answered in the end…
Much as she feared Jaedin, she knew that she must speak to him, and yet she knew that venturing out to find him, alone, would scarcely bring enjoyable repercussions for her. It would either anger him, or upset her companions. She almost considered calling out to him in her mind, and demanding that he should come and speak to her, but then she remembered that he was now busy with other, more pressing matters. Dragging him to her side, when there might be so much at stake, could hardly be honourable.
Jaedin, Jaedin…why must I be apart from you? Why do you frighten me so? I feel my heart begging to be near you, but you are everything that I have ever been taught to stay away from, to avoid and distrust…why must it be so?
My heart belongs to you.
At that moment, she couldn't tell if that thought was hers, or his, but she didn't have time to so much as think about it – in the next split second, there was a knock on her door. It was probably one of her friends, most likely Sala, come to talk to her about that evening. With a sigh, Elowyn rallied her mental forces and got up off of her bed, brushing the mussed silken skirts of her gown back into their proper places around her, and went to answer the door.
It was not Robbie, or Brendan, or Sala at the door.
Rákkhed Dahk-Marr stood before her.
Elowyn froze, slightly startled, and with good reason. A vibration of apprehension ran through her, as she sensed his reason for coming. Rákkhed spoke quickly then, as if to hurry in assuring her that he brought no overture of war to her.
"I come at the command of my lord, Jaedin of Sytherria," he said, "Who requests one last favor of his esteemed guests. Princess Elowyn, you are to come with me."
She stared at him for a moment, trying to comprehend this. Jaedin had sent his captain of the guard with a summons, a summons for her to come to him. What could he possibly want of her now? Would he finally answer her questions? Could this at last be her chance to have her answers? Or would it be into darkness and evil that she descended…
Now she noticed that Robbie, Brendan, and Sala had come out of their rooms and were standing there, watching her exchange with the captain of the Antari with looks of both alarm and question on their faces. She made a slight quelling motion with one hand, knowing that they had heard Rákkhed make his master's request known to her, and also knowing that they would attempt to keep her from what they saw as danger.
And then she nodded, assenting to go with the Antari to wherever his master awaited her. Jaedin wanted her to come to him? Then she would.
Rákkhed stood aside, allowing her to exit her room, closing the door behind her, and they went for the door that led out into the halls of the warship. Before Rákkhed had stepped outside, however, Robbie stopped him: putting one hand on the Antari's arm. The young prince's blue eyes were cold and smoldering with resentment and threat.
"If any harm comes to her…" he warned.
Rákkhed, understanding and – it may have been said – sympathizing with the boy's emotions, gently put the hand on his arm away from himself, and gave a slight bow, his eyes never leaving Robbie's.
"I will do my best to ensure her safety," he said.
Then he turned, with one last bow, and was gone with the princess.
* * *
Rákkhed, wordless, led Elowyn along through the glider ship, taking her in a direction that she knew was totally opposite to that which they had gone in order to reach the dining room. She was now certain that the vessel that they were upon had at least seven different levels, and there were many more rooms within it than she had at first estimated there to be. The whole ship was a sort of floating fortress.
In the area that they now traversed, there were hardly any lights lit, and Elowyn realized that they must have been drawing near to the Dark Lord's own personal quarters. Jaedin, as he himself had told her on several occasions, was not incredibly fond of the light. As he was a vampyre, it was obvious why.
Suddenly, they had come out into a wide-open room, which had a short flight of steps leading up to a gigantic set of double-doors: black, and steel-bound, with sharp, wicked-looking sconces on either side of them to light the air, and fill it with a vague fragrance of incense. The shadows felt as if they slithered around her.
Elowyn trailed behind the captain of the Antari as he approached those doors, pushing one of them open so that there was room enough for them to enter through it. He motioned with his hand for her to follow him.
"Come," he said, holding out his hand. "Come."
Well, she couldn't very well refuse. Whether she liked it or not, Jaedin would have her in whatever room was beyond those doors – even if it meant him coming out there himself and swinging her over his shoulder, like an errant child or a bag of so much sugar. Better to preserve her dignity, and walk in with what composure she had.
But as she followed the Antari's black-robed figures in through those doors, she felt the very core of her being shaking with dread, with anticipation of what may be coming to her. She remembered all too well how he had kissed her that night in Dranthiris-Ankhar, and how close she had come to utterly surrendering to him, to giving up whatever he asked of her, to doing whatever he said, if only to be with him. It was utterly dangerous.
She could not go back now, though. She was already inside of the room.
Rákkhed strode forward a few more steps, before he stopped and paid homage to the seemingly empty air in the chamber. As he did so, Elowyn glanced around herself: feeling small and weak in the midst of so many shadows.
The atmosphere in this room was not only black and full of the many layers of shadows: it was also quite cold, like a tomb. It seemed empty, although she guessed that it was most likely not. In front of her, she saw the stark outlines of a huge, hourglass-shaped stairway, at the top of which was an enormous glass bubble of a window, its frames constructed of pure, black-silver steel. Through those windows, she could see the star-studded night sky.
She shivered, wanting to shrink back and hide.
What am I doing here? Fates, why did I come?
"My lord, the Princess." Rákkhed said, his voice shattering the silence.
Before the echoes of that sally even faded into nonexistence, Elowyn felt that there was a pair of eyes somewhere in the great darkness that surrounded her, and, even more frighteningly, they had focused on her. Then, she heard his voice.
"Very good, Captain."
A pause, and then the words that caused her mind to explode with fright—
"You may go."
NO! she felt like screaming. She watched, helplessly, as the Antari moved towards the door; in what felt like a split second, he had vanished through them, slipping out of her sight like a shadow. She had been left alone, with the living shadows. No! Do not leave me here! Let me out, let me out! I cannot stay here!
But Rákkhed was already beyond hearing her, even if she did scream, and there was simply nothing that she could do. She had to stay now.
Something gleamed from within the darkness, drawing her attention, and she, after glancing around herself again – and seeing nothing – moved towards it. Jaedin had not, as of yet, spoken to her. She crossed the room, and the shadows unfolded before her, allowing her full view of her surroundings. It appeared to be a sort of throne room; indeed, there was the throne itself, sitting on the landing halfway up the stairway.
"Elowyn…"
Again, his seemingly disembodied voice came out of the shadows around her, and she could not decide where exactly he was. His pronunciation of her name made it into a caress, and it was all she could do not to succumb to the false sense of comfort and warmth that it gave to her.
"Welcome," he said. "Please – have a seat."
A few of the sconces that lined the walls of the room lit, the flames within them leaping up to give a faint, ambient glow to the darkness. She now saw that there were two available seats in the room – the throne, and a mound of sensuously soft-looking pillows off to one side, thrown in a pile onto a thick, elaborate rug, near a low table.
He was giving her a choice.
It hardly even took her a moment's reflection to decide upon what she thought was the relative safety of the cold, hard black throne. She slid into it, still looking around herself for any sign of him, and felt even smaller as she froze there: the throne's immense, carved back towering above her, looking down on her.
There was a sound that might have been a soft chuckle from within the shadows – he had taken note of her choice. The sound of it made the fine hairs on the back of her neck stand up, again, and she went rigid with fear and anxiety.
What new game was he going to play with her now? He had her at his whim, and he could very easily employ whatever sort of cruel mirth that he wanted to on her, to spend his wrath and need for vengeance…
"Did you enjoy the dinner tonight, Elowyn?"
Stiffly, she replied, "Yes."
Jaedin, deciding that he wanted to be closer to her now – closer than the cloak of the shadows would allow him to be, at any rate – materialized from the darkness behind her, and slowly approached the throne, his footsteps silent upon the black onyx floor. She did not see him; did not mark his approach. He smirked to himself.
"Ah, but you are lying to me, fair one," he said, in a knowing, patronizing manner, much like that a teacher would use in correcting a pupil struggling in error. And a teacher is what you will play tonight, Jaedin DragonMaster…
She sat up straight in her seat, as he allowed her to hear his voice close at hand, almost next to her ear. In reality, he stood behind her, but off to the side enough so that he could see a sliver of her profile. She stiffened, and sat up straight, her head turning as she looked slightly to the side. He felt his heart pound.
"Can I, Ríth-Anstarinaor?" she questioned him. Her voice was alarmed and breathless as she asked this. "Or do you not only have the ability to reach into my mind, but to know my deepest thoughts as well?"
Your thoughts are your own, Elowyn, he whispered in his mind, but only to himself, as he continued to watch her, in silence, before replying. I will not touch them – but I can draw upon what I feel coming from you: your dreams, your desires, and your fears. In this, I am the artist, and you are my subject. But I do not know your thoughts.
"It is all a matter of perception, sweetest…" he told her, speaking softly and tenderly, as if to convey to her the fact that he meant her no harm. "And my name is Jaedin…do you not remember?"
She did not take the bait; she would not change the course of their discussion. He realized, with a pang of chagrin and frustration with himself, that she was yet determined to be angry with him – she may have sensed his intentions, but much remained to be dealt with. In the end, however, he knew that only she would ever heed him.
"You haven't answered my question," Elowyn fired back, her jade green eyes narrowing. She didn't like it when he was evasive with her.
Well, she was also trying to evade him – to deter him from the discussion that they both knew they must soon have, and he decided to let her have her way, and played along with her, for the moment. Indulgently, then, he made his answer.
"How do I know that it is a lie that has fallen from those sweet lips of yours, my frozen white lily?" he asked, lightly; then he let his voice take on a darker, more compelling and ardent tone. "I can hear it in your more rapid heartbeat, in the sharp, shallow breaths that you take into your lungs; I can smell it, in the air of this very room; I can see it in the dilating pupils of those lovely green eyes…"
He trailed off into sibilance, and moved forward. Now, at last, he would approach her in concrete, tangible form. He reached forward and touched her hand with his own, as he continued, in spite of her gasp, "I can feel it in your rigid body."
As he had half-expected she would, Elowyn stood, pulling away from him: only to have him almost violently whirl her into him, yanking the two of them close together.
He looked down into her eyes, regarding her much as a predator might its fallen victim, she thought – analyzing and assessing her.
Her fear climbed into her throat, begging to be let out, and she swallowed, trying to keep it from taking away her sanity, as she gazed back into those gray, violet-flecked eyes, which seemed to burn with a glowing, incandescent flame as they looked upon her.
"And…" he continued, as he ran a gloved finger down the side of her cheek, not stopping until his hand had come to rest in the curve between her neck and shoulder, cupping there as if it had a right to, "I think…I may even be able to taste it, if I wanted to…"
Elowyn writhed away, openly showing her fear of him for the first time ever when he had touched her. Jaedin loosened his grip a bit, and released her, staring after her as his eyes lost their fire and became dark, almost sad. She backed away from him, seeming as if she was struggling against great, wracking sobs from within.
"Don't," she begged him, "Please don't."
"Elowyn…"
He stretched out a hand towards her, as they stood there together in that room – the throne now between them.
"Do not fear me."
She made an abstracted movement with her hands, shaking her head from side to side so viciously that it made her golden hair whirl out in a pale aura around her.
"How can I do otherwise?" she asked, despairingly: almost more to herself than to him. "You hold the lives of my dearest friends, my world, in the palm of your gloved hand."
Jaedin looked at her for a split second longer, and then – without stepping any nearer to her – slowly began to remove his black velvet gloves, finger by finger, his eyes never leaving her as he did so. When he had them both off, he carefully leaned forward, and placed them on the armrest of the throne. Having done this, he stood back, the corners of his mouth curving a bit.
"Not anymore, Princess," he told her. "There – you see? I can be reasonable."
But she would not come back to him again, although she was now eyeing him with mistrust, rather than fear. He was certain, however, that that fear would return full-force, if he did anything to re-ignite it. And he did not desire to do this.
"You have a very odd way of showing your thanks, Dark One."
He only just kept himself from grinning – which would have exposed his vampyre teeth, and might have reminded her to be fearful again – as she called him that. At least she was becoming at ease enough to again use her given nickname for him.
"Ah yes," he said, coming around the side of the throne, slowly advancing on her. "You saved my life, and your uncle restored to me my memory – my recollection of childhood memories and long-forgotten past, my heritage. For which I will, undoubtedly, be ever grateful to you…"
She had not moved back again as he had walked towards her, and now she allowed him, without protest, to gather her hands into his, and draw her along with him as he seated himself in the throne – causing her to perch herself in his lap. Her eyes removed themselves from his and averted to the floor, where they remained until Jaedin became impatient with being ignored, and took her chin between his fingers. He turned her head, gently forcing her to look at him.
They gazed at one another in silence.
Then, she spoke.
"It would seem, my lord," she said to him, in a soft tone, "That you took our help as more of an offense than an aid."
Jaedin let his left eyebrow lift, as he altered his expression from scrutinizing to half-skeptical, half-amused. Fully disbelieving.
"An offense?" he echoed. "Nay indeed, beauteous Princess! I simply found the need to make certain that your more highly vocal and dare-I-say more easily-exasperated friends were kept from making a commotion while I held a brief meeting with my elite guard. That is all. My intentions are still to bring you to the Dark Gate, and then to the Black City. You may trust my word on this; I will not lie to you. I cannot."
Elowyn stirred uneasily, as she became ever more aware of what was going on between them at that moment – she was sitting there, on his lap, and it could very easily be considered as a more close contact than she might desire. But then she looked into his eyes, and was immediately arrested by the emotions that she glimpsed passing through their silvery depths. He had not lied to her. He never had. He wouldn't.
She then saw the real words within those eyes.
With infinite slowness and care, she leaned towards him, until their faces were mere inches apart, and then she reached out – hesitantly – and let her hand come to rest on his high collar. Velvet brushed against her hand, and she was reminded of how, once, his lips, which felt so much the same, had brushed against her very fingertips.
"If I were to promise to stay here, with you – forever – after this…would you let them go?" she whispered, not releasing him from the power of her gaze. "If I ran from you again, would you come after me?"
She bit her lip, not truly knowing if she could bring into being her next words; but then, before she could wonder any further, they simply came flowing forth from her lips, as simple and easy as that.
"If I loved you…" she said, "Would we become everything to one another?"
His eyes gazed back into hers, telling her the answer to all of those questions.
"Our agreement remains in place, Princess," he murmured, and she sensed that – right at that moment – he very much wanted to kiss her, but wouldn't.
She felt a pang of sudden, unexplainable, childish disappointment.
Why not?
"My promise to you was sealed in blood – I do not intend to break it. You know that I cannot lie to you; I cannot deceive you. Nor," as his hand cupped around the side of her face once again, the warmth of his skin seeping into her, making her want to close her eyes and lean into his touch, "will I."
She tried to see into his mind, to know what he was thinking.
"What do you want, Jaedin…"
At her words, he pulled back, his hand leaving the side of her face, and she realized that she had caused a wall to be put up between them – she had distressed him, or given him cause for regret.
"You see within me, Princess – as you are within me," he told her, and let her stand, his hand sliding off from around her waist; she had not even realized that it had been there.
A fiery blush kindled to her cheeks, as he stood and took a step or two away from her, silent for a moment. Then, he revealed, "I'm afraid that I haven't been entirely truthful with you, however, fairest – I did ask you to come here, tonight, for a reason other than reassuring you of my…fidelity, to our agreement."
He said the word 'fidelity' as if it had a bad taste on his tongue, when used in such a context, and he wanted to spit it out. Now he was regarding her with his business air: calm, analytical, and formal.
"I would like to discuss with you the, ah, terms of the said bargain. There is something that I would like for us to add to it."
She ran her gaze up and down him, suspiciously.
Once again, he was playing a game with her.
"And what is that?"
His answer, as she might have been able to predict – had she really thought about it – shocked her, and she felt frightened again.
"A kiss," he told her. "I want a kiss."
With admirable composure, in the face of such things, she withdrew away from him, as she said, "I do not know if I can give you such a thing, my lord. A kiss from you has proven a far more deadly, far more intoxicating and consuming entity than I would have been like, at first, to believe. Or imagine."
Still he walked towards her, and she stopped moving away.
"But we are both deadly, Princess…" he whispered to her.
His arms went around her waist, his hands gentle but insistent as he pulled her carefully to him; Elowyn restrained her urge to close her eyes and lose herself in the whirling maelstrom of her mind. The blackness threatened to consume her again, but she would not give in to it. As he leaned down, bringing his head close to hers, she turned her head away: at the very last moment, so that his lips only caught her on the side of the mouth, instead of full on the lips.
Jaedin, however, instead of reacting with anger and annoyance at her refusal to let him truly kiss her, merely looked satisfied. He was, really; for he saw, in the flickering shadow of doubt that went over the princess's beautiful features, her temptation to respond – to let him stoop to kiss her again, and this time allow him to have her lips.
She wanted him to kiss her, and this was enough to please him.
Elowyn drew an unsteady breath, and said, remarkably calm, "In this game, we are both deadly, Dark Knight…"
Then her hand had come up to stroke his cheek, but Jaedin suddenly flinched back, the look of affection and remembrance leaving his proud features as something much darker, something much more haunting, replaced it.
Without warning to her, he turned away, walking down the stairway to the main floor of the room. There he stood for a long moment, his gaze rooted to the floor, as she remained where she was, wondering what she might have done to upset him so.
"You may go, Princess," he then informed her. He made a sudden distracted, half-hearted gesture towards the door, which she noted had been left open wide enough to admit a thin stream of light from the chamber beyond.
"I'll not further disturb your evening with my foolish requests or my personal demons."
His back was to her now, but the tremor that went through those straight, powerful shoulders, beneath their black velvet cloak and tunic, was unmistakable. Something, from within, deeply troubled him.
Elowyn gathered her skirts in one hand, to keep them out of the way of her feet, and slowly went down the stairs, cautiously approaching the Dark Lord from behind. She gazed at him for a moment, and he felt that her watchful eyes would bore holes in the back of his shaven scalp.
Gritting his teeth against a wave of emotion, he lashed out in his mind, but without allowing her to hear it – Would you just leave, child? You've no idea what things pass through my mind at this moment, you cannot understand them, and you would be appalled by their darkness if you were to be exposed to them! Why don't you run, now that you can? I have told you to go; I will not follow you.
But he remained where he was, as her voice rang through the quiet to him.
"You've never been loved, have you?"
Oh, she had cut right to the quick. The old, inflamed wound that had never fully healed, but had instead been allowed to fester and ache, for hundreds of thousands of years, even as he had tried – again and again – to bury it beneath a cold and contemptuous and cruel exterior, cried out at her touch.
"You've never been loved at all. All your life, she was training you to be her weapon of war – making you into who and what she wanted you to be. But she never showed you love, did she? She couldn't, and she wouldn't. You were never told that love is the single greatest thing that anyone can ever know."
It is true! All of it is true – every part of it, down to the core! I am floundering in the dark ocean, and I cannot escape it; why do hands not reach out to pull me from the depths that threaten to drag me down to death and eternal grief?
And he rounded on her, eyes alit with passionate flame.
"Then you show me, Princess – you teach me."
She recoiled, as he knew that she would.
"Oh – no, Jaedin – not me!" she breathed, and whether the look on her face, in her eyes, was one of horror and revulsion, or something else entirely, he could not tell. He only heard the echoing depths of his own bitterness and grief. Once again, he had tried to show her just what he felt for her, and once again, she had refused him. "I cannot—"
"Or you will not," he interjected, caustically. He held out both hands towards her, in a gesture that was as close to pleading as he would ever allow himself to come. Before her, and her alone, would he reveal this much of himself. To her alone would he bare his soul.
"You have stirred things within me, Elowyn," he breathed, "You've changed me in ways that I had not thought possible, in ways I did not believe could exist – within me. What I feel for you is deeper than anything else I have ever known."
She looked at him, and he felt himself stung by her pity.
"And you have known so much…" she murmured, softly.
He did not want her pity; if that was all she was willing to give him, then he might as well put an end to the charade, this endless dance of futile and wasted emotion, right as they stood. He gave a short, cynical little bark of a laugh and bit off, "A lifetime of battles – of war – will do that."
Then he looked at her again, despairingly.
"Elowyn, don't you see?" he asked her. "I need you. Oh, I need you so much…"
That was all that she needed to hear.
The final walls of her resistance, the fight of the light against the shadows, crumbled, and all she saw was him. It did not matter whether he was of the Dark Realm and she was of the White; it did not count that they had, at one point, both hated and desired one another; nothing mattered, now, except for him.
And so she melted in a moment, as she stepped forward, murmuring to him…
"Istver-ar, eran su aman …"
Jaedin knew, instantly, exactly what those words meant, and it only seemed to fuel the incredible, burning inferno of emotion inside of his chest even more, until he felt that he would burst if he did not have her in his arms that very second.
And this he did. He stepped forward, meeting her as she went to him, and in the blink of an eye, his arms were around her slender, lithe body, crushing her against him with a nearly bruising force, almost lifting her off of the ground as she clung to him.
He began to kiss her again, and this time, she gave him her lips.
Their embrace went on and on, until – suddenly – his sharp vampyre teeth nicked against her fine, soft skin. They broke apart: she, unnerved by her sudden rush of feeling for him, and her reaction to their kiss, as he stood back, horrified.
"Blood…"
He put out two fingertips, touching the tiny pinprick wounds that he had given to her, even as he had sought to give her proof of his adoration for her. He went tense as he felt the single, small teardrop of blood that had slipped forth from her skin, and put all of his power into a burst of healing magic for her.
The wound disappeared, but his shock and remorse did not. He looked at her, his eyes hollow and devoid of any emotion but grief and pain.
"Can I do nothing but injure and torment you, Elowyn?"
She felt her throat becoming tight; she did not want to be out of his arms; when he was with her, she felt protected and warm, knowing that – dark, powerful, and capable of much deadly strength as he was – he would never use anything of himself against her, for he loved her. She stepped forward, reaching out a hand to him.
"No; Jaedin, please—" she begged him.
At that moment, something very unexpected happened; he took his eyes off of her, freezing as he seemed to listen to something for a split second, and then he had grabbed her around the waist and was dragging them both out of sight of the windows nearby. They fell against the wall, with her pillowed against his chest.
Even as she had spoken to him, he had become aware of an unwanted presence. Upon listening to his finely-honed vampyric senses, he had learnt that Robbie and Sala had left their chambers, and gone in search of Elowyn, not having trusted Jaedin to behave with courtesy to her.
As he looked out of the window that was located a little ways down the wall from them, he caught sight of them. They were several levels below on the ship, and seemed bent on finding their friend, their precious princess, no matter what this newest violation of his commands would cost them.
The horror of the moment before had been brushed past them; Jaedin now turned his head aside, looking away from the window, and glanced down at the beautiful little prize that he had with him. She was so tiny, next to him – so small that he looked down fully onto the top of her head when he turned towards her. And yet he knew that she was also tall and athletic, strong and capable of both speed and grace.
"So…" he hissed, softly. "It appears that your friends have come looking for you, Princess."
Then, on the whim of the moment, he dropped the level of his chin, until it came to rest upon the crown of her head; he moved his own head slightly, rubbing his cheek against her silky pale gold hair. Elowyn remained motionless in his arms.
"Do you think they know where we are?"
Elowyn shook her head, disconcerted by the abrupt changes that had just gone by them in the past few seconds. But…she wasn't entirely unwilling to remain exactly where she was. When she leaned her head slightly to the side, her cheek came to rest against the warm white velvet on his chest, and she could hear and feel him breathing. Yes indeed, she wasn't about to run away now.
Not after everything that had happened to them…
"No…" she said, her voice low and thoughtful. "They will look elsewhere. They do not know."
She heard him make a sound of contentment, a rumbling noise that was almost like the purr of some gigantic cat, deep within his chest: his way of showing pleasure at the truth of her words. His arms shifted around her, settling them both into a more or less comfortable position, as they remained there, leaning against the wall together.
"Then we are truly alone, are we not?"
And now he turned her around in his arms and gazed into her eyes for a moment. There was a grief hundreds of thousands of years old lying within those vivid gray depths, and she well knew it. But then he had raised his hand to the side of her face again, and was smiling into her eyes, softly and sadly.
Where was the Dark Lord of old…?
Surely, this could not be Jaedin: Ríth-Anstarinaor of Sytherria.
Yet…she knew in her heart…it was. For she could give her heart to none other.
"Go back to your friends, Princess Elowyn," he told her, gently. "They will protect you tonight from creatures such as me. You should not remain here, in my shadows, with me. You need not remain here. Go."
He released her, tried to make her step away from him, but she grabbed the hand with which he did this in both of her own hands, seizing it with such a fierce and sudden determination that he abruptly stopped, staring at her. As he stood there, unable to speak, she gathered his hand close to her, and pulled herself close to him again, until they were touching: her skirts whispering about both her legs and his.
Looking up into his eyes, she said to him, "You told me once that you can love – even a Dark Lord can love. Jaedin, I believe you now. I believe you."
Then, suddenly, she had crumbled against him, burying her face in his chest, clinging to him once again as if he was all that was there to hold her up, to keep her from falling. Utterly dependent upon him. She seemed close to tears as she said, desperately, "Don't tell me to go, Jaedin – please don't tell me to go. Please let me stay."
Jaedin was still too shocked to say a word.
In all of the time that he had known the Princess, he had wanted for things to be this way between them. He had dreamt, long and vividly, of the moment when she would finally let him hold her, when she would respond with an ardency matching his to their kisses, when she would simply let herself be his. And now she was: she had told him that she believed him capable of love, even that she trusted him. She did trust him! Otherwise, why would she be here, like this, with him? She trusted him, and…
He balked at that thought.
Perhaps that was asking too much of the fair Child of Prophecy, as of yet. There were still walls for them to surmount.
With a hesitant, borderline uncertain tenderness, he put his arms about her again, holding her close to him as she nuzzled herself closer to him, her own arms draped with a vehement warmth about his waist, pulling him to her. This was far from the first time that he had held her, but it was without a doubt that he had held her in this way.
His mind began to wander off onto other paths.
When he had first seen her, in the gardens as she ran about: laughing and playing with her friends, he had taken note of her extraordinary beauty, and felt his cold heart warmed – to such a small degree that he had almost not noticed it – but the damage was done. By the time that he had ridden up behind her, gathered her unconscious body into his arms and then ridden off with her, he had already begun to be dangerously attracted to the princess: to this child of the light.
Zaschaea had warned him, time and time again, about the faeries' wiles; she had poured the acid of her stories about the devastation of his family, of their bloody and violent deaths, into his ears over the many years he had been her servant. She had fueled his bitter rage against the White Realm and all of its allies until he had nothing but hate for them, until he wanted nothing but their complete obliteration from the face of Evyrworld, and its history as a whole.
Then he had seen Elowyn, and he had known that his heart was lost, if indeed he had such a thing within him. To allow himself to love her – to entertain thoughts of spending an eternity with her, even if she was to forever remain his unwilling prisoner – was to turn against the Queen herself, who had ordered him to bring the girl to the Black City, where her fate awaited her.
To give her his heart meant to turn against his sovereign, and – in essence – to sign his own death warrant.
He could fight back, he had reasoned, as he held Elowyn prisoner in the Tower of Adamant, some miles outside of Dranthiris-Ankhar. He could either reason with the Queen until she no longer saw the need for the maiden's death, and let Elowyn remain with him, a quelled threat; he could do this, or he would oppose her until she gave in. He was not without his own resources, and even the Queen feared him as an enemy.
It was not impossible. To the contrary, it was quite doable.
But he had been wrong.
Elowyn was almost as allured by him as he was her, and she could sense, on some level, the same things that he did – they were joined by an unbreakable bond, and somehow, Fate had destined them for anything but separation from one another. But she would not let herself love him while he remained a Dark Lord. She hated everything that he was, everything that he represented.
And while she was willing to forgive him for wrongs he had done against her as an individual, she would not so easily forget his servitude to the Dark Realm.
What now could he do? She trusted him – she wouldn't let go of him, nor would he let go of her. Together, they might stand against the world.
He couldn't ask her to do that.
Jaedin turned his head, still receiving the sense that Robbie and Sala were out searching for Elowyn. Turning aside from his musings for the moment, he briefly took the time to conjure a double of himself, and had it inform the pair of faeries that they must now return to their quarters for the night. Where Elowyn was happened to be his and her concern alone, not theirs.
He vaguely sensed that they gave argument, and had his double argue back, and eventually summoned the Antari to escort the two back to their rooms. When he had done with this, he looked down at Elowyn again, about to speak.
Then he saw that she was asleep.
As they stood there, against the wall, together, she had left the world of consciousness and fallen deep into slumber; now, he realized, it was probably more like swooned, for he marked the utter exhaustion in her frame, and the trail of a single tear that had coursed down her face some time before. He felt immediate chagrin – she had wept herself to sleep, and all in silence.
Now he had to decide what would be best to do. Finally, he settled on the option of carrying her to her room, and leaving her there for the night.
Gently, with infinite care, he stooped, putting an arm around the back of her knees and lifting her from the ground. But as he moved towards the door of the room, Elowyn stirred within his embrace, making a noise that almost sounded as if it was a whimper.
He couldn't leave her alone, like this.
Compassion was not a concept that he, the Dark Lord, was familiar with; thus it was that he could not really put a name to the emotion that was coursing through him right now, but he knew well enough that he felt it, and that was enough. He carried her across the room, to the mound of pillows that she had seen before.
Without disturbing her, he lowered the both of them to the ground, reclining against their ornate silken depths. Idly, his fingers went to run themselves through her pale hair, as he began to think again, warmed by the way that she had snuggled against him.
He could not ask her to choose a lifetime with him over her world – although he had never known his own family, having been too young to remember them when they had been taken from him, he was well aware of the bond that his princess shared with her loved ones. He had seen the way that she had interacted with the elves in Iordania: Prince Skye and Princess Odessa-Gadriel, even the little elfling named Shelby. He could sense her deep love and devotion for her near family – her mother, the lady of the faeries, and her father, Orandor Raven-Helm, whom Jaedin himself had once fought against.
She would never leave them for him, and they would never accept him – not after all that he had done against them.
And he knew perfectly well that he would not have deserved such a kindness, even if they had been willing to extend it to him.
But now he had no reason to remain in the Dark Realm's service. True, he had long accustomed himself to the ways of evil, to the darkness; he had been one of its greatest and foremost proponents. This had been because of what the Queen had told him, however – he had only made the decision to become one with the darkness because she had lied to him, telling him that his family had been murdered by the faeries. She had taken his memory from him, causing him to forget all of the years of agony, struggle, torment, and mockery that he had endured under her. He had fought against the White Realm because he had thought that that was what was right.
This was no longer so.
Now he was simply the lord of a country – despised by his subjects, catered to by his base and debauched court. He was surrounded on every side by enemies…except for Elowyn. But even she could not defeat his troubles. She could not take on his battles for him, nor would he ask her to. There had to be some way that he could win the world's forgiveness…
Time was running short. Even now, he sensed that the Queen was on the move. The Antari had informed him that they had been keeping a careful watch on the Black City, and all of the remaining Dark Gates, in his absence, and now armies of hundreds of thousands were pouring out of the Ebony Queen's lands.
War was coming, and she would soon be ready to attack the White Realm, and all of its allies. It mattered not, now, whether she had succeeded in her plan to destroy the one who had been fated to make an end of all evil. The Queen would make one last, horrific strike against her enemies, and the world would fall, if nothing were done to stop her.
But there was more to the prophecy of World's End than even Zaschaea, the Ebony Queen knew. Jaedin remembered its words—
One raven's feather,
Black as the night;
A single white opal,
Shedding beams of its light;
A tongue of red flame,
Burning brightly and true;
A teardrop of crystal,
Purest in hue.
All bound together in one great crest,
But two must join above all the rest.
Raven and white are destined to blend –
With light, good shall prosper,
And evil will end.
But this was not all of the prophecy, as Orandor himself had noted – at a meeting between the heads of the White Realm that had occurred seeming lifetimes before, and Jaedin had not known of it. Indeed, far from it. Jaedin himself knew of the rest of it, which was the part that the Queen was aware of, and he as well.
Ris'n from time long before,
The Dark One shall be first to open the door:
Sharing a mark with she who is of Light,
To whom he is bound by all that is right.
By this they shall be known,
And naught else that will come –
Lovers, rescuers, they shall be, when all else is flown.
It was easy enough, now, to guess at what that prophecy had meant. The raven's feather, the Dark One – that was Jaedin himself. The white opal, filled with light and radiance, the one who was of the Light itself – this was Elowyn, he had no doubt. The others mentioned – the red flame, the crystal teardrop – were Robbie and Sala. All four of them had joined together for the quest, but in the end, it seemed, it was only Jaedin and Elowyn who could somehow bring the prophecy to fulfillment.
That was why the Queen had slain his family, and taken him captive.
She had been trying to avoid the consummation of the prophecy's threat to the Dark Realm; she had thought that if she could turn one half of the pair who would destroy all evil in the world to the darkness herself, then the prophecy would never be able to come to pass.
But she had not counted on his ever falling in love with Elowyn.
Even turning him to evil had not proven enough for her. After thousands of years of waiting, Zaschaea had grown impatient, and anxious. What if she had not done enough? And so she had tried to have Elowyn – the other person named in the prophecy as the bringer of the Dark Realm's doom – brought into the Black City, there to be killed.
Again, the prophecy could not be thwarted.
What the Fates had decreed could not be denied…
Jaedin was not certain how he and Elowyn could defeat the Dark Realm, nor did he know of this 'mark' that they were supposed to share.
As an adamant foe of the White Realm for the greater part of his life, he had never heeded the worship of its deities, and so he had never applied himself to beseeching the Fates or even the Three for their guidance, although he knew of them all. Elowyn, he knew, was familiar with this, and it seemed that this was how she had kept herself from going mad in the most desperate times.
He did not know now if he could so suddenly change himself; he had lived the millennia of his life in hatred and evil – was it possible that he could attain forgiveness, turn from the darkness, so quickly? Even if he could be pardoned for everything that he had done…
Could he change the darkness within himself?
So, here they stood: at a crossroads of destiny. He and Elowyn had finally met, finding their way to one another by turn after turn of mysterious fate, and now they had the ancient, unforgettable prophecy before them.
And time was running out.
Zaschaea was slowly chipping away at his life essence; he could feel the great weariness that comes from the death of the soul growing upon him day by day. If he did not soon reach the Black City and somehow reclaim his soul for himself, then he would soon be faced with death.
He could not speak of this to Elowyn. Soon enough, he would reveal what he knew of the prophecy to her – of the answers behind its riddle – but he could not reveal to her the threat on his own life. She would feel, he was certain, compelled to save him, to do anything that would keep him from being taken from her. He wanted to do much of the same himself; the thought of being separated from her by death was more than chilling.
It was unbearable.
Looking down, he gazed longingly at Elowyn's soft, beautiful profile. Her cheeks were flushed rosily with warmth, and her long, dark lashes rested gently closed over her enthralling green eyes. He wondered what would happen when she awakened.
He glanced out the window, briefly taking his eyes from her.
Already, morning approached, and when daylight had fully come upon them, he would reveal to each of the faeries the plan that he had kept hidden from them thus far – aboard the Apocalypse, they would travel the rest of the way to the Dark Gate. This way, their journey would be cut almost in half as far as time went, which was a very good thing considering how much time they had already lost between the Silver City and his illness. They would also avoid the massing armies of Skullex and other Dark Realm creatures that the Queen was now preparing to send out into the lands beyond her own.
But not until then would he bestir himself to move. Until then, he would remain here: with his princess sleeping in his arms.
And he could not imagine a scenario that would cause him greater bliss.
* * *
A/N: *sighs* There, you see? I told you I'd get them together. (One way or another.) Last chapter in the update for now – r&r, and I will do all I can to get some more out soon! And now I must go and keep Shinzon, Jaedin, and Bellerephon from calling up Darth Vader and Morgoth, and adding them to the list of challengers in their Villains' Grand Duel.
*runs off, shouting: Bellerephon! You put that phone down now or so help me I'll have both Xena and your mother over here in a minute to deal with you! Shinzon, don't make me break out the Barbie dolls – and Jaedin, I know that you are at the head of this, give me the flipping phone!*
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