Alfrdaughter: Part II
"Hello, we're looking for your king…"
Angela trailed off as yet another person with delicate, fluted ears peeled away from her at the fastest walk that could not be described as a run. She ran a hand through her hair impatiently, then cursed as it met resistance in the tangled purple mess that served as her coif.
"We're getting exactly no where with this." Hawkeye remarked callously, and the princess glared at him wrathfully.
"I thought they'd be friendly, since we've got Carlie and all." Duran offered, looking sad at seeing hatred so total on display.
Kevin did not say anything, but Angela knew that it affected him worst of all. They had come expecting a warm welcome.
Probably hurts the kid even more than when we go through normal towns.
:I don't think you have any idea, Princess.: said the faerie, and for once, Angela agreed.
How do we find the king, Faerie? All of these buildings look exactly the same to me.
She received a mental image of the faerie shrugging her shoulders helplessly. :They call him the Faerie King, but that's just a title now. Elves and faeries lived together once, and it's possible that he is the same elf that ruled back then. The elves left the Holyland long ago, though, and that was before my time, so even if he's the same person, I wouldn't know him if I saw him.:
Fat lot of help you are. Angela "muttered" irritably. The faerie just sighed and retreated into the depths of Angela's consciousness.
"Look!" Riesz said, and pointed. Angela followed the other girl's finger down the rough path that seemed to serve the elves as a street, to see two elves arguing, gesticulating wildly in what appeared to be anger. As the Seeds walked slowly down the path, it became clear that one of them was a woman and the other a man; both with the vibrant brown hair and slightly slanted green eyes that seemed to be uniform among these strange people. Angela couldn't tell what they argued about, since she did not know a shred of Elvish, but it seemed to be something fairly important.
"Mama?" Carlie walked up to the pair, somehow evading Duran's hands as he tried to catch her. The little girl's blue eyes shone with liquid, and her voice quavered. The man whirled on the tiny half-elf, green eyes narrowed in disgust, then, with a last glare for the woman elf, stalked away. The woman did not look at Carlie, instead peering over her to look at Angela. Wordlessly, she bowed and turned to walk slowly toward what appeared to be a gigantic tree, obviously meaning for them to follow her. Angela looked to Hawkeye, who raised a skeptical eyebrow but did not comment. Kevin was silent.
"I think we should follow her." Duran admitted, though he appeared to have doubts as well. "It's not like we have any other ideas. With the way the pointy-ears have been running from us, there's no way we're going to get a better guide than this."
Dejection making her eyes droop and shoulders go lax, Carlie shuffled over to Angela and slipped her hand into the older girl's. Angela nodded to the others and walked purposefully after their reticent guide.
When she reached the tree, the elf knocked politely two times, and a door, so cunningly formed that it had appeared to be part of the tree's bark, opened. She gestured for them to enter with slender, willowy arms.
"Thank you." Riesz said to the woman as they passed by into the tree's confines, but she did not get an answer.
Once inside, Angela was astounded by the fact that the tree's insides looked much like any house might. Oh, the chairs were formed of interlocked roots, and tables were covered with broad, flat leaves instead of cloth, but for the most part, it seemed that elves lived pretty much as others did. Several young elves were seated in those odd root-chairs in the first room, and they glared at the six travelers as Angela and the others passed through.
"Why are you here, humans?" one of them called after them.
"Did you come to take this place from us too?" demanded another.
"Haven't you taken enough from us? Isn't it enough that you killed them?"
Carlie clutched at Angela's hand, and though the princess made soothing noises, the little girl did not relax.
"Come on, Carlie, let's go." Angela told her, and glared daggers at the elves who sat at the tables. They tried to return in kind, but Angela was not Princess of Reason for nothing. The young feykin were the first to look away, and the princess moved into the next room at a stately pace. When one of the elves rose from the table, murder in his eyes, he found a valkyrie's spear in his way, and a knife at his throat.
"Now now, you really don't want to do that." Hawkeye bent the elf's wrist back to relieve him of the strange, slender blade he held. "Go sit back down there with your little friends until we're done chatting with your king, right? You wouldn't want us to be hasty now, would you?"
The young elf spat something unintelligible in Elvish that did not sound complimentary, but did not try to move. Carlie turned about to look at him, her large eyes sorrowful. "Boy have bad, nasty mouth. Hawkie ish nice. Dun say bad things 'bout Carlie's Hawkie, or she punish you!"
Hawkeye thought that he could see a heavy shadow encircling the girl in that moment, wrapping its arms around her in what looked like it was supposed to be comfort. The elf boy the ninja had at knifepoint quavered and bit his lip, but held himself as still as he could; Hawkeye's dagger was very sharp.
"Let him go, Hawk." Angela admonished. "We don't have time for this. If they don't want us here, then it's best we meet with the Faerie King and be on our way."
Hawkeye thrust away the elf roughly, and the youngster promptly raced out of the tree at breakneck speed. In truth, Hawkeye could not find it in his heart to blame these people. Hadn't he hated beastmen without cause, and for more of his life than he cared to think about?
Angela nudged Carlie a bit, and the girl nodded solemnly.
"Okete." Murmured the tiny priestess, and what appeared to be a wall suddenly opened next to her. The six travelers entered, doing their best to ignore the hard glares that followed them on their way inside.
They were greeted by the sight of what must have once been a beautiful audience chamber, fit to grace any royal castle in any of the five kingdoms. Furniture was not carved, but grown, as if the myriad chairs that lined the entryway were a part of the tree itself rather than shaped at all by elven or human hands. The floor gave slightly beneath their feet, as if it had once been a spongy material like moss. Now it was just an indiscriminate shade of gray-green mess that squished unpleasantly. That Diorre, kingdom of the once proud elves, was in a state of decay could not be doubted when presented with the vanishing beauty of this antechamber.
There was a dais, and upon it a throne, and upon the throne an old, wizened figure of an elf with moustaches longer than he was tall. As the six Seeds entered, he made as if to stand, then fell back into the cushions that covered his throne wearily. Twin boughs of myrtle formed a circlet for his head, mirrored in the designs of the throne he sat in. "Go away. I have no patience left for children. Leave this place, humans." He snapped, but Angela ignored him, walking until she stood exactly ten paces away from the throne; the traditional distance for a figure of royalty seeking audience with someone she considered her equal.
"Are you the Faerie King?" she asked bluntly. Doesn't look like much of a king to me. Carlie squeezed her hand softly.
"Of course I'm the Faerie King, child. Now leave. There is not place for humans in the kingdom of the elves."
:Then I suppose that it is fortunate for us that we are not all humans.:
The faerie's mental voice was deeper, more powerful than Angela recalled ever hearing it, and when she appeared outside of the sorceress' head, she glowed a blinding blue that nearly obscured her form.
"A visitor from the holy land." The King said flatly. "I suppose I should not be surprised. What do you want?" he asked coldly.
:Advice, sire.:
"I do not dally with humans, child. If you wish counsel, perhaps I may be of some help, but not in front of them."
"But we need your help!" Angela interjected. "You don't understand, we're not here to hurt any of your people. We just need to know where to find the spirit of wood."
The king made another attempt to stand, and succeeded this time. "Child, I do not know how you managed to find your way here or how you evaded our defenses, but even if I would tell you of this place, Dryad's whereabouts would not pass beyond my lips. Now go."
:You cannot do this, sire.: The faerie's glow intensified. The king's thick, pale eyebrow's rose. :Mana has planted her seeds, but it is up to us to give them the sun and water that they need to flourish. Tell us where Dryad hides. I beg of you, tell us.:
"And if I do not?"
The faerie's aura wavered and her small eyes glowed with the anger she obviously felt. :We all do what we must, sire. If you have forgotten the Goddess so easily, then perhaps you should be…relieved of your position. She may love Her fools as much as her scholars, but right now, there is no time for them.:
Blue energy entwined around the deity's form in two strands, pulsing rapidly and ominously. Angela took a step back; she had never though that the faerie had the power she felt radiating from that tiny form now. Surprisingly, the king laughed, a hollow, thin sound that rustled up from his diaphragm and whistled out between his moustaches.
"Child, this has been an empty throne to hold since the death of my daughter. For fifteen years I have suffered, as my people have suffered, and all on account of the humans you now accompany. It has been long, too long since the prophecy of the Seeds was cast; it is forgotten, even among my people, who live many centuries." He wavered on his feet, and Angela thought he might fall, but he steadied himself before he toppled. Angela caught a bit of movement from the corner of her eye, and saw that Duran was easing himself back to a resting position. Had he been about to help the old fart? The king shook his head. "The legend is almost gone, yet you speak of it as though it walks and breathes."
:Sire, it does walk, and you should not doubt it. When was the last time you met one of my kind? Have you strayed from the Holy Land so long that you no longer remember us:
"Nay." The King said, and the faerie bristled unaccountably. "A man, a human man I knew not so long ago; he carried one of your kind with him. That one died as he did. His name was Leroy." The old elf's eyes grew milky as he remembered. Beside Angela, Carlie stumbled forward, letting go of the princess' hand. Riesz was instantly behind her, to prevent her from going closer to the elf king, but Angela placed a hand on her shoulder. Carlie stared up at the elder king with shining eyes.
"Papa? Carlie's papa, Mama called him Leroy."
The king snapped out of whatever memory had taken him from the room and looked suddenly at the tiny girl before him. "You are…No. It cannot be. The child, we thought that she died along with her parents."
"No, Father, Charlotte did not perish as we thought." Said a warm voice from behind the six travelers. Hawkeye whipped around, knives ready; even he had not heard this woman come into the room behind him. She gazed at him for a few moments with deep, blue eyes that seemed somehow familiar, and he lowered his weapons, nodding. She walked past him to stand before the throne, staring down the old king coolly. "This is my niece, your granddaughter. Are you so lost in the lies your memory knits for you that you do not even recognize your own kin?"
The Faerie King's rheumy eyes widened as he stared down at Carlie, openly weeping now. "Carlie, is that truly you?"
"That's Carlie's name. But who are you?"
"I told you, child. I am the Faerie King." He sighed. "But more importantly, I am your grandfather. Will you forgive a forgetful old man his eccentricities, young Charlotte?" He drew himself up, seeming somehow stronger than he had when the six travelers first met him, and held out his arms. Carlie leaped up to him, laughing and crying at once, and the woman, her aunt it seemed, looked on approvingly. She turned to Angela, and extended a hand benevolently.
"We thank you for bringing Charlotte home to us, Seeds."
Angela started, then took the hand reluctantly and shook it. "You're welcome, but…"
:But this is not just a homecoming: the faerie declared harshly. She floated next to the Altenan princess, her aura gone. She only looked tired, now. :I don't know who you are, but Carlie is one of the ones chosen by Mana to carry out the will of the Goddess.:
The woman just smiled and let go of Angela's hand gently. "We know." She looked over to the king and Carlie, who were so lost in rediscovering each other that they ignored everyone else around them. "I have learned that she was raised by her human grandfather, the Priest of Light. I am glad; Leroy was a gentle man, if hard, and I cannot imagine his father was anything less."
"The Priest of Light is a good man." Duran assured her. Then the elf's features hardened.
"I am sorry, but humans are yet not welcome here. The only reason you five are not dead is because you were with Charlotte. We would ask that you leave as soon as you can. As you are the Goddess' chosen, we cannot turn you out into the forest, but you will receive cold comfort here, and little hospitality." She paused, lips pressing hard together into a thin line. "I have tried so hard to forgive your people, Leroy's people, for the crimes they have committed against mine, against all the world. For crimes they still pursue. It is difficult, and I still carry hatred in my heart." She took a deep breath and turned back to them. "We will provide you with what you need, and you may stay in my home, but make haste, for your blood damns you in this forest."
With that, she went to join Carlie and the King in their embrace. Angela shivered.
"I don't think I've ever felt so despised before."
Kevin looked anywhere but at her, and Riesz nodded. Hawkeye looked over at the three elves hugging and weeping together.
"They still haven't told us where we're supposed to find Dryad."
Author's Note: Muhahaha...this time I have started writing the next chapter ahead of time! Not that it does me any good, since I doubt anyone will even see this update. Ah, well, that's what I get for not updating in over a year.
Tee-Dubs.