Alfrdaughter: Part I
Once Luna had taken the flowers at the entrance, Angela had dared to hope that their entry into the forest of the elves would be unhindered. After the forest of night, this one seemed innocuous enough, though the trees were exotic beings that, despite never shedding their leaves, were nothing like the steadfast evergreens she remembered from her homeland. These trees were wild, growing almost up to the shoreline in their anxious desire to expand the forest. Angela knew what drove them; it was the madness that was enveloping all of Fa'Diel. She studied them, the corruption was of academic interest to a mage who wondered about the inner workings of the world, but the answer for the trees' fervent growth came from an unexpected source.
She had asked the faerie about the situation, a being of Mana could be expected to understand such matters, but the little winged woman was unhelpful.
:Dryad is here, Angela.: The faerie told her. :But she is very weak, almost as weak as Shade was after so many years imprisoned on that ship. I don't even want to think about what could have drained her, she has always been the most energetic, the most powerful of the Elementals. Still, even limited, she should be able to keep the forest under control. That she has not bodes ill for us, but I can't tell you why.:
Angela could understand where the miniature deity was coming from; the idea of something that could devastate the spirit of Wood, the Goddess' own messenger and emissary to the living world, was hard to wrap her own mind around. Yet it was something that she had to do. While she speculated, leaning on her staff, she noticed that Carlie kept peering into the forest, then whipping her eyes back to the shoreline as though afraid.
"Carlie?" She called, and the little girl bounded over to her, all bouncing curls and bells. It was disturbing that the girl wore the same sort of bells that the man Kevin called Deathjester had worn, but that was just another strange thing in a long series of strange things Angela had to learn to accept.
"Yeah, Angie, whatcha want?" Carlie gushed. The girl was good at concealing her mood, which was surprising when one considered her age, but Angela had been traveling with her for some time, and could see the tiny frown that threatened Carlie's ever-present grin.
"Do you know what's wrong with the forest?" Angela asked quietly. Carlie shrank back, glancing nervously at the forest and back again.
"Maybe." She replied.
"Could you tell me what it is?"
Carlie bit her lip. "It feels like…It feels like something is eating the trees, Angie. Carlie is afraid!"
Angela patted the little girl on the head, even as she discovered her own knees were growing weak from fear. Eating the trees? She thought. What eats trees? Weeds? Why would Carlie be afraid of a weed? Unless… Her thoughts went back to the animated mushrooms that had populated the Cave of Waterfalls and Rabite Forest, back near Jad. She picked Carlie up, still making soothing noises, and went over to where Hawkeye was standing guard. Oddly, Riesz had joined him; both of them stood at the edge of the forest, making an attempt to ignore each other and, to Angela's critical eye, failing miserably.
"We have a problem." She told them, and they glanced at each other before remembering they weren't supposed to be speaking. Angela was fed up. "You two stop that! I don't care what sort of bad blood there is between you, but it's not helping the mission, and it's certainly making things uncomfortable. Carlie and Kevin are hard enough to keep track of. I thought I could count on the two of you."
She gave them her best princess' grimace. Hawkeye looked up at the stars, while Riesz planted her feet stubbornly and glared back. After all, she was a princess as well. "Now you see here, hussy." She barked. "I don't know where you get off ordering me around, but you can stow it back in that sweet little head of yours where it belongs. I'm not talking to that bastard because he's a bastard. I don't even know why he's here, he certainly doesn't follow the path of the light."
Hawkeye shifted uncomfortably, and Angela's cheeks burned. Carlie gaped at Riesz from Angela's arms. "Hussy? You just called me…" She Riesz's words numbly. Setting Carlie down on the ground with exaggerated care, she stalked over to the larger girl, grabbed her hair and yanked. Shock and pain registered on the valkyrie's face, but she responded viciously, smashing Angela to the ground. Unfortunately for her, Angela had her hands firmly entangled, and brought Riesz down with her.
Riesz was a savage woman, but Angela had all the tenacity of ice, and they fought like two angry eagles who got too near each other's nests. Hawkeye, reluctant to get involved in a fight between two women, especially two women who he traveled with, did his noble best to ignore them, but their screams and shrieks brought Duran and Kevin running. They found Angela and Riesz rolling around on the ground, so entangled it was difficult to tell where the one began and the other ended. Carlie stared at them, perplexed by their behavior.
Unlike Hawkeye, Kevin and Duran had no sensibilities about breaking up catfights, and they were big enough not to take too much harm. Duran knelt close to the ground and neatly plucked Angela off of Riesz, using a pressure point to make her let go. Kevin did nothing so fancy; he just sat on Riesz until she stopped struggling.
"What…" Duran puffed as he wrestled with a furious Angela. "The hell…" She landed a blow with her open hand on his face that made his skull ring. "Is wrong with you?!" He managed to pin her against the ground, smothering her with his superior size.
:Are you quite done?: The faerie said into her head, and she slumped, all the resistance seeping out of her. There, under the stars, sand in her hair and a week's worth of Duran's sweat making her gag, Princess Angela of Altena began to laugh.
Well, at least we got our vengeance. Angela thought to herself as she set one of the nasty, creeping bugs that seemed to be everywhere in the Lampflower Forest on fire. The smell of roasted insect was unpleasant, but she had the image of a wetted Duran before her to soothe her temper. After breathing in the man's fetid odor, Angela had resolved to give him a bath on the spot. Their fight over, she and Riesz banded together, with Carlie in tow, to ensnare Duran (and Kevin as well, as Riesz had confessed the wolf boy was not exactly rose perfume himself) in a trap.
Carlie had served as wonderful bait. Kevin saw her as a playmate and Duran as a younger sister to be spoiled. So, when she had asked them to help her build a sandcastle (at Angela's instigation, of course), they agreed readily and without suspicion. Hawkeye, of course, would have nothing to do with it, "And get sand in my boots? Right.". Angela reflected that the ninja was a much wiser man than his larger companions. Still, her appreciation for Hawkeye's wisdom did not prevent her from summoning Undine to drench the two smelly ones soundly in icy water. She and Riesz appeared beside the burgeoning sand castle (which Carlie was still intent on building, oblivious to the boys' plight) with soap and towel in hand and grinning.
"Go, and do whatever you bloody well have to to get clean." Riesz said. Angela nearly frowned at the curse word- princesses did not curse, not even amazon princesses- but fortunately managed to keep her grin firmly in place. Duran and Kevin stared at them like they'd suddenly turned into bulettes. Angela giggled.
"Better find some water, boys, before I find it for you again!" she told them. Duran grumbled and snatched the soap from her hand, then the towel. Kevin accepted Riesz's burden meekly. The pair of them wandered off into the forest, Duran toting the long mental list of women's failings as they walked. Pleased with themselves, Riesz and Angela went back to the fire.
"Look! It's the Temple of Light!" Carlie had exclaimed. When she realized that no one remained to admire her creation, she stamped her little foot and glowered.
Now, it was morning, and they were trying to find their way through the forest. After an interminable amount of time searching through the trees for the hidden elf town that could look like anything, however, Angela decided that it just was not going to happen.
"We've been searching for hours!" Duran complained. "Can't we bloody stop for a few minutes? My armor's on all wrong, and I need to readjust it."
"You should have put it on right before we got started this morning, lackwit." Angela admonished, though she herself was weary enough for five women. "Carrying on about a few blisters isn't going to get us to Diorre."
Duran ignored her (where had he learned that trick?) and went on complaining, armor clanking louder than a walking skeleton put together wrong. Riesz glowered at Hawkeye, who glowered at Duran, while Kevin and Carlie walked together a bit ahead of their elders. Angela sighed.
"Carlie, are we getting close?" she called up. The little girl stopped and turned around, frowning quizzically.
"Close, Angie? Close to where?"
The Eighteenth Princess of Reason howled with frustration, but the trees all around her were not a sympathetic audience.
Kallalis gripped the bow in her hands hard enough for her tanned knuckles to go white as she stared through the trees at the humans who had come calling in the forest.
Humans! Right there! The arrogance they have to come crawling here with there heavy feet and dry intentions, after all they did to us! Oh, Shayla… The hurt had never really gone, not after fifteen summers, and the sight of those…creatures amongst trees that cried out in pain was beyond bearing. It took all of her will, and the knowledge that her niece walked with them, to stay her hands from drawing an arrow along her bow's silvered string and fire it to their hearts. She shook herself and pried her fingers away from the wood. No, my orders are clear. Charlotte is there, guiding them, and I cannot risk harming her. A thrill of happiness such as she had not felt for years swept through her at that last thought. At long last, the daughter of her sister was coming home from the human world, scarcely changed by the years that had kept her away. When she returned, Kalla would bundle her up in wreaths of diorre flowers and stuff her so full of good berries that she would never be hungry again.
Kalla knew the hunger that struck those of fey blood when outside of the trees, the longing that never quite left all too well. When Shayla disappeared, it had been Kallalis who went searching the world for her sister, with all the blessings of the King of Faerie and kin. Kalla had returned to the kingdom of Diorre, once so proud and wondrous, to find the remnants of the blessed kingdom of wood in ash. All that Kalla had found was a sending of the king that told her to come north from the place of death and hatred that was the budding town of Vizel.
Their graves lay at the root of the trees that hid the new, tiny village that held all of the elves remaining to the world of Fa'Diel. Charlotte's parents, an elf who had been Kallalis' sister, and a human man who had been her friend.
Kalla followed the group of six silently through the grass, careful of her steps. At times that filthy man with his long hair and soft clothing nearly caught sight of her, and frowned into the darkness where she lay hidden, but fortunately the noise of his companion's heavy armor hid the sound of her breathing.
Leroy was blameless, but he is the only one. I know why Shayla loved him, but I cannot understand why she loved his people. The screams of her green brothers and sisters, the trees she had grown up beside in peaceful repose, still rang out in her dreams. They cut down trees for their homes, instead of living within the branches like decent folk. And now they abuse the very Goddess herself, taint her with their disgusting thoughts and filthy habits. Can they not hear Her crying out?
Can they not hear Her weep?
Iris Harahan sniffed loudly at the plans that lay before her. Though the golems she made ran on magic, she was quickly acquiring contempt for them and their manner of use. Every improvement she made in programming, in the eldritch armor plating that she covered them with, had turned out to be useless. The first trial, on the bridge between Maia and Forcena, had been an unbridled disaster, with the horse running away, reins, bit, and all. Iris had worked tirelessly under orders for the ambush on home turf, and it all came to naught. Her machine golems had been overwhelmed by three of those dratted Seeds, how in Mana could she ever find a way to combat six?
Still, she was not one to question orders, and Captain had ordered her to manufacture a prototype of machine golem that could be mass-produced to protect the castle, should the Seeds ever try to invade in force. Privately, Iris thought that Angela alone could take on the entire Army of Reason, and probably never break a sweat, but she followed orders.
"Magesmith Harahan?" a cool voice called out as Iris turned her wrench absently. She jerked, and the bolt stripped out under too much pressure. Fuming, she stood and whirled on the owner of the voice, preparing to give the woman a tongue-lashing she would never forget, but swallowed her words when she saw who held herself regally in the doorway.
Queen Valda, Seventeenth Princess of Reason and Lady of the Ice was a hard woman, but beautiful. Perhaps the ice in her spine contributed to her beauty, but no man or woman could ever really tell, since the Queen could cow a tavern brawl by sheer force of personality. Not that Valda of Reason would ever be found in a tavern. Iris snatched herself out of her impending tirade and bowed at the waist. "Your majesty, you honor me by your presence. Light of the Goddess always warm your heart."
She could not keep a tinge of bitterness out of her voice at that last, yet the Queen hardly seemed to notice.
"Peace, Mistress Harahan, and be at ease. I do not come to strip your hide from your back, though perhaps it should be, for your failure on our own soil. I have come to assay your progress on the new Machine Golems, since your last attempt was…inadequate."
Iris unbent herself with an effort; she did not much enjoy looking at the radiant face of her queen anymore. "I am at your service, Majesty." She replied simply. Valda sighed frostily as she gazed at the model Iris had been working on.
"This one seems much in the same vein as the others. Can you not make a golem that is more pleasing to the eye?"
Iris had not thought that much contempt could fill a person's voice. "The model is made for functionality, not prettiness, Majesty. Captain Nieva requested a battle golem from me, not a metal maidservant."
"Keep your tongue between your teeth unless it can remain civil, Smith!"
Iris shivered; Valda was sharp when irritated. The Queen touched the golem on Iris' worktable, and it frosted over, grew brittle, then cracked, shattering into tiny bits. Iris nearly wept; it had taken days for her to get that model even to some semblance of working order, and she loved it like her own child.
"If I did not need you, Iris Harahan, you would be dead and left for the sahagin to find you. They use particularly sharp spears when hunting humans, did you know that?" Sweeping across the room to the door, the queen gave the room one last, disgusted look. "Begin again, and this time, do not fail."
Then she was gone. Iris fell to her knees, gathered the fragments of her creation up in a miserable pile, and let her tears fall upon them.