Chapter Seventeen: Truth Of Fear

Callum knew he was dreaming. He could see nothing but darkness around him, though he himself wasn't washed in darkness, observed when he looked himself over. He was silent as he looked around, seeing a black void in every direction. After a second or third visual sweep, Callum's eyes were finally granted the sight of a solid object that was glowing pale blue and white.

Callum approached and picked up the Key of Aaravos. It had just been glowing blue and white as it now did for him, but Callum watched in wonder as every rune lit up in a dazzling display; pale blue for the sky, white for the moon, yellow for the sun, deeper blue for the ocean, green for the earth and pinkish-purple for the stars. Lately, seeing the key had been giving him a feeling of guilt. It had been years and he had stalled in revealing its presence to the Dragon Queen. Would she be furious with him that he kept this from her; if it had Aaravos' name on it, it was bound to be a huge deal. Having her favor was something Callum enjoyed, as well. Would such secrecy damage or even destroy that favor? Or would she insist on destroying the key itself? There were several reasons Callum didn't want that.

"Remarkable thing, isn't it?" Somehow, Callum wasn't startled by the sudden voice. He turned around to see Aaravos.

"Do you know what this is?" Callum asked, despite knowing better. Any information was better than none at all, he supposed. "They call it the Key of Aaravos."

"Oh, how flattering." The elf smiled. "I'm pleased your people think so highly of me. Getting back to your question, though, I do know where it came from." Callum watched him steadily, waiting for him to go on, while also continuing to keep in mind that he could very well be lying in everything he was about to say. "The unicorns were always selfless. Generous to a fault, one might say. Long before the days of dark magic, they took pity of the humans who had no magic, and so granted it to them by creating primal stones."

Callum knew this; in the past years he'd heard the whole story more than once. Unicorns created the primal stones out of kindness toward the humans, and once dark magic was discovered, the humans had repaid that kindness by driving the unicorns to near extinction for their horns; the single most powerful source of magic outside of the primal sources themselves. It was ultimately this show of ingratitude and betrayal that had turned the dragons and elves against the humans. Before this, there had been the argument that dark magic was a necessary evil for the survival of humans, but that was a lie. Humans had been granted magic before, they just chose to discard it in favor of something more powerful and convenient. It wasn't a matter of survival, it was a matter of greed. Though Callum distrusted dark magic before on principal, this shameful account of his people's true crimes had truly disgusted him.

Aaravos continued. "Before the primal stones, however, the unicorns endowed primal magic into this little cube as am experiment, to be sure it was possible. It began its journey as a simple toy. I supplied the noble creatures with a barrowed vasal; they endowed the cube with small traces of magic, enough to react to the primal sources. A deal, if you will."

"Deal?" Callum asked.

"Yes." Aaravos said. "A simple glow-toy for a child, that's how it started. When Aarush was grown, I began using the cube to keep track of my progress as an archmage. Not unlike yourself, I know."

Callum stared before asking in a slow whisper, apprehension creeping up his back. "How do you know about that?"

"Not important." Aaravos dismissed, "But you have had it in your possession for a while, haven't you? Tell me, boy, how did you come upon your powers?"

"I started out with a sky primal stone." Callum told him. It was back to the guarded answers, but he couldn't fathom any way a long-gone primal stone would impact anything. "Only for a week, though."

Aaravos hummed. "It's rare to have two magical items in a humans constant possession for so long. Perhaps there is a chance that such a constant concentration of magic had somehow rubbed off on you. It was another proposal to the idea of humans gaining magic, if one was too close-minded to approve of elven-human relationships. Of course, it's all still only simple speculation."

The two looked one another in the eyes. Callum's gaze was hard and full of distrust. Aaravos grinned as he finally saw it. "Those eyes of yours. Identical to his eyes. Yes, in fact, I can see the exact same fire in your eyes had his had shown after he turned against me. Such a shame, really. Aarush's eyes, he had gotten from his mother, they had been her most captivating feature." When Aaravos told all of this to Callum, the boy began to feel foggy, not liking the idea at all. Aaravos felt the pull as well.

"You are waking. Take our little conversation into consideration." Aaravos said. "My mission is not to end lives, Callum, but sacrifices are needed to achieve balance. We will talk again soon…" Aaravos turned, facing away from Callum. When he turned his face back so that it was half visible to Callum, the boy beheld a wide grin stretching across his face and a narrowed, cunning eye looking at him. Panic spiked in Callum's pounding heart as Aaravos finished his farewell with the worst possible word. "Son."

Callum was reeling before he realized where he was. He was in his room, heart still pounding, and forehead soaked with sweat. It was still dark. He forced himself to sit up in his bed, maybe to ground him to the waking world. He looked to the bedside table, opened its drawer and pulled out the Key of Aaravos. Callum rolled the thing around in his hands, lazily observing it. He had at least gotten used to the idea that he might – might – have had elven ancestors going back centuries, but…this? Did this mean he…was he descended from Aarush? And that meant…

Around ten minutes later, Amaya entered the kitchen to get breakfast started, and was surprised to find Callum already up. In front of him was a half-empty glass of berry juice. She went over to him and placed a hand on his shoulder. He looked at her and she signed.

'You are up early. Bad dreams?'

'You could say that.' He replied. Amaya watched Callum for a moment as he sighed. He supposed his aunt would probably at least know something. His next sequence of signs was something unexpected to her. 'Aunt A-M-A-Y-A, what was my dad like? Not King H-A-R-R-O-W, my real dad.'

This was an interesting question. Callum had never shown much interest in his birth father before. Amaya wondered where this suddenly came from and why it seemed to be bothering him so much, but she would save her own questions for later. 'Wait here.' she told him, and left the kitchen. Callum waited, hearing her go up the stairs, into and out of her room than back down the stairs before she reemerged. 'I saved this the night K-A-T-O-L-I-S was lost. It was all I had left of him, and now' Amaya stopped, a crushing pain coming to her eyes as again as she was faced with the reality. She blinked rapidly to tame the tears she felt coming on. Taking a deep swallow, she continued; 'it is all I have left of her, too.'

It was a small portrait of four people. He could just barley recognize his aunt, Commander Gren and his mother, all much younger than he had remembered them. His mother, though, didn't look so regal as he remembered, with her lack of a crown, slightly tousled hair and slightly protruding stomach. The forth figure was a stranger, though his identity wasn't difficult to place by how he had his arms around Sarai, with his hands protectively cradling the small bump. More than any of that though, Callum felt that if not for the man's sandy-blond hair, he might as well be looking into a mirror. Even so, this picture was much clearer than any of the few memories Callum still had of him.

'F-E-L-I-X was a charming, gentle man, and a brave soldier. That was how he and your mother met, in training when we were about your age, maybe a little younger. The three of us would train together day and night, and I think F-E-L-I-X fell in love with S-A-R-A-I just before we were released as fully trained soldiers.' Callum was happy when, finally, his aunt smiled, even if it was a smile tinged with sadness and longing. 'I used to tease her all the time about her little fairytale romance.

'They stayed together for years. If your mother wasn't with me, she was with him. I think the only one who didn't like it was King - at the time, Prince - H-A-R-R-O-W. Poor guy loved seeing each of us on our own, but I think seeing S-A-R-A-I with F-E-L-I-X hurt him deeply. When S-A-R-A-I found out she was pregnant, F-E-L-I-X was so excited. He never told me why, but he was adamant you be named C-A-L-L-U-M. The next day he proposed to your mom.' Amaya, who until now had had that soft, sad smile on her mouth, now lost it. Her eyes dropped before she started signing again. 'And so they married. You might not remember, C-A-L-L-U-M, but the five kingdoms were constantly at war, partially because of King H-A-R-R-O-W's father. King A-L-O-S-T-O-R was a cruel monarch who tormented the other kingdoms with K-A-T-O-L-I-S' might and a part of why his son worked so hard to reverse the damage of his reign was because of what ended up happening to F-E-L-I-X. Soon after your third birthday, K-A-T-O-L-I-S was at war with E-V-E-N-E-R-E and your father was assigned to a battalion that was due for battle. He left with his battalion, promising to come back to us. Seven months later, we…received the news. He was gone.'

Callum had to admit, absorbing a lengthy story like this was harder without actually hearing it. He would have to thank his aunt for going slow. Some days, he felt bad for being unable to remember his father even if he had been so young. He did remember a little bit about King Alostor, though, the man's cruelty and pettiness. He'd been the first to call Callum a mongrel and Sarai a name that Callum hadn't understood at the time but now understood to mean that she was overly fond of male attention. From that little Callum understood, he hadn't been a kind father either. In fact the only person he'd ever seemed to like was Viren.

Wiping a tear from her eye, Amaya smiled when she looked at Callum and continued to sign. 'You look so much like him, C-A-L-L-U-M. You have his eyes.'

Eyes. The warm feelings that this story gave him were quickly replaced with the returning apprehension brought on by his dream. His eyes were the same as Aarush's. He let out a big sigh and signed. He saw no benefit to keeping this a secret any longer, though he privately doubted Amaya was any sort of authority on such matters. 'Aunt A-M-A-Y-A, do you know anything about half-elves?'

It had been a week since their rescue, and Runaan couldn't fathom why they were still here. Of course, he knew what an inn was, there were a few back home. But sharing the building with humans and other kinds of elves. It made him feel dirty. Ethari seemed to be trying to mend bridges with Rayla, and if he were honest with himself, Runaan wanted Rayla to go back with them. Then they could put this whole mess behind them, and life would continue on as normal. But his pride wouldn't let him admit it; He had forgiven her for abandoning the mission and lying to and defying him, but this? When Runaan had offered to get her ghosting removed, Rayla had refused. She actually said she was happy here with the humans, who were now every bit family to her as Runaan and Ethari had been. If he could see or hear them, he would have let Tiadrin have it because he blamed her and Lain for this. They had to raise her to express herself, didn't they? And from that, she got it in her head that her personal feelings mattered above her pride as a Moonshadow elf. All of this said that Rayla didn't deserve to come home with them.

Tiadrin was in the room, too. Ignored, as she was beginning to get used to. She and Lain had shed their Dragonguard dressings and now sported the same wear common to the Silvergrove, though they knew they'd never return. Unlike Runaan and Ethari, they were used to being around other kinds of elves, at least, from their time on the Dragongaurd. They could probably learn to tolerate the humans, eventually. Therefor, they had elected to stay in Novus with Rayla and spare everyone the trouble. Rayla had been ecstatic to hear it, especially since it seemed that Runaan and Ethari were going home in a few days, which would have left her as the only Moonshadow elf in the village again. Not an altogether terrible thing, but it did get a bit lonely at times.

Thinking of Rayla had Tiadrin feeling sad again, and for a moment she wondered why. Her daughter had grown into a beautiful – it hit her at that instant; Rayla was grown. They had left her when she was a child and literally before they knew it, she was approaching adulthood. Tiadrin and Lain had planned to take a trip back to the Silvergrove for their daughter's sixteenth's birthday as a surprise in lieu of the traditional letter. Obviously, that plan fell through, but it alone would have softened this blow.

When the door opened, she saw her husband enter, though Runaan didn't. Lain sent his old friend a sorrowful look as he stood up and exited the room. Lain had thought Runaan was his best friend. They had been inseparable as boys, and he had been the first one Runaan had told about his feelings for Ethari. By now, there was no way he still thought they'd abandoned their posts. And anyway, everything had worked out in the end, hadn't it? Was a lifelong friendship really so fragile in the face of stubborn pride?

Lain saw his wife sitting on the bed and perched beside her. She leaned into him and he circled his arm around her shoulder. "Are you okay, love?"

"Lain, our little girl's not very little anymore." She told him. Lain nodded. "And…we weren't there for any of it."

"I know, it's not fair." He admitted and planted a kiss on her head. "But there's no changing the past."

"But there is changing the future." Tiadrin looked Lain in the eyes. His gaze was a silent question; what was she talking about? "Lain, let's have another baby."

Runaan had decided the outskirts of this village were a nice place. Another thing about that village was that it was too loud. His people valued silence in pubic and only spoke in softer voices outside, apart from small children who simply couldn't be helped and thus, no one really begrudged them for it. He sat with his back to a tree trunk, closed his eyes and savored the cool air and the quiet.

The sound of something hitting the grass brought him back after a minute or two of dozing. He looked to where the thud had come from and beheld three young Moonshadow elves, looking shocked to see him. Scattered around them were three weapons, discarded in the grass. They were older and looked a bit disheveled, but he recognized Sirus. Malin's boy, rather hotheaded if he remembered, used to follow Rayla around like a lost shadowpaw cub, no matter how much she clearly detested the attention. Kiara had always been a far more welcome face at their house, those girls had been best friends as small children. Lastly was Latis, a quieter boy, promising archer, but seemed to only talk to Rayla when Kiara was around her. They looked stunned to see him, though Runaan couldn't imagine what they were doing all the way out here.

"R-Runaan?" Sirus asked. "We…we thought you were dead."

"No." Runaan responded slowly. "Dark magic. Long story. What are you three doing out here?"

"We're here for Rayla." came Kiara's reply.

"She's a disgrace to us all." Sirus interrupted, much more passionantly. Oh yes, Runaan remembered, he was also very dramatic. Loved to tell stories. "First, she fought alongside the humans as if they were equals and then –" he shuttered. "She…she gave herself to one of them!"

"She did not!" Kiara protested, sounding tired. "As far as any of us have seen, they never did that."

"The human mage corrupted her." Latis told him.

Runaan stared. At first, he'd just written it off as another one of Sirus' exaggerations, but he had never known Kiara to lie. It…made a disgusting amount of sense, now that he thought about it; she was already fond of humans for some reason. There were moments when he would walk into a room where the two of them were scrambling away from each other. The way their eyes would linger on each other half-a-second too long. How whenever one went off somewhere, the other would suddenly find a reason to disappear as well. Even their first day back, when Callum revealed his strange ability to perform magic, Rayla had seemed...perhaps a little too excited.

Lain and Tiadrin had come over with an announcement; that they'd be trying for another baby, one who they could raise and watch grow up. Rayla supposed she was excited to be an older sister, huge age gap not-withstanding. The only two members of the household who weren't present were Amaya and Ezran. Ezran had asked how they'd get the baby, to which Amaya had told the now twelve-year-old that it was high time for a private talk. They had disappeared into the kitchen a minute ago.

The happy mood was ruined by Runaan who barged in and charged up the stairs, finding Callum's room. Five days ago, Ezran had attempted to get their new arrivals to warm up by showing him Callum's sketchbook, though for clear reasons, Callum had asked they not by shown passed a certain point. Runaan knew of the book and what it looked like. A feeling of dread overtook Callum and Rayla who exchanged a worried look. Ezran and Amaya had also reappeared in the doorway thanks to the commotion.

After another grueling moment, in which Ethari showed up, Runaan came down with the book in hand, looking ready to kill someone. He slammed the book down after opening it to a more recent page, for all to see the image. It was Rayla, captured in careful, loving detail. He flipped the pages passed the previous cutoff, revealing her on more pages, the images making it clear this had been going on for years, and doing different things. In battle, watching fluttering moon moths, playing with Zym, scouting from a tree. Most tellingly, was the pictures of the two of them, of which there were plenty. Their fingers interlaced, snuggling, her laughing as he held her close and kissed her forehead.

"Friends, are you?" Runaan demanded, eyes flitting between the pair accusingly. Most eyes went to Callum; Runaan in anger, Lain and Tiadrin in shock and Soren, Ethari and Ezran in fear. Rayla and Amaya's eyes were defensively fixed on Runaan.

"Runaan." Ethari said slowly, edging his way in front of his husband, in doing so offering the younger couple the kindness of blocking them from view. They were panicking, and they used the opportunity to rush up the stairs and out of sight. The party downstairs heard a door slam. Lain and Tiadrin looked at each other, neither really reacting. That would happen when they had time to process everything. For now, all they saw it as was an oddity, something that was sorely frowned upon – borderline forbidden – in their culture. For now, the couple just chose to watch the fallout between their former friends. Runaan looked betrayed.

"Ethari, you can't possibly condone this." Runaan said.

"I don't." Ethari defended, "I would love to see Rayla with another elf, even if it wasn't a Moonshadow elf. But her heart is set on the boy, for some reason."

"How can you defend them?" Runaan asked, raising his voice. Ethari than shocked everyone but doing something that none of them, not even Runaan, had ever seen before. He shouted.

"Because when your flower sank, my world ended!" There was silence for a moment and Ethari calmed down. Runaan stared as his husband carried on, his voice now back to its gentle volume. "I thought you were gone, Runaan. My heart was gone. It was months before I could get used to sleeping alone, waking up to an empty house. Say what you will about Rayla but doesn't deserve that kind of heartbreak."

Runaan couldn't resist taking Ethari in his arms and kissed him above his ear as he held him. Still, his eyes flitted up to the upper floor, where Rayla and her…friend had fled. He would never accept such blasphemy, he had raised her better, but in the interest of keeping peace, he'd restrain himself. For now.

Author's Notes: Oh, the heartbreaking, soul-sucking drama. I also forgot about Callum's sketchbook. Oh well, he's become a more proactive person, we'll say. Next chapter, Callum finally gets the answers to the key. Assuming Runaan lets him live of course. Review.