A Chronicle of Crowns, Prelude 2

Prelude:

Faye Ravenswood

Set one hundred years prior to the events in A Chronicle of Crowns

These brittle, useless bones ache within my blossoming flesh. How have I come to be reborn into this savage existence of weak skin, bruised, spotted and tender? I do not know. And yet I am. Once more, once again… I am. The dust around my bones has been blown by some sickly wind that clad me in this old familiar raiment, disturbing my rest and causing me to wretch with long-forgotten gasping to take in the air. Did I make query for this? Did my soul struggle to be free of its unearthly bonds to inhabit its old earthly form? So weak, I am. A spindly thing made of pumping blood and pink skin, born, unasked, as a babe unto a world anew. Must I cry out as all babes do? Weak and weeping at the blinding light that is not my salvation, but my mortality continued?

It is an exceptionally odd thing, to be reborn. I have lain in my grave for what must be thousands of passing suns and moons. My flesh, greyed and withered, grew taunt across my bones before feeding the crawling things that sought out my decay in my earthly rest. How now am I fully dressed before the waxing moon in the familiar skin that bound me to this earthly plane? Who woke my sleeping bones?

Could it have been…? My love, my master, my king? Was it you, Kostantyne, who crept through the night on a chill wind and awoke me thus? No… how could it be? My beloved is an echo in this world, a faint remembrance of an ancient past forgotten by the idyll, temporal minds of men. His soul hath long been tethered to the under, the realm of his own creating. Chained like a beast to that darkened plane of shadows and wailing, unending torture. With great difficulty did the Aiyar of old pin their kin to the lingering plane between life and death. And even I cannot fathom his wretched remnants freeing himself of those bonds. Nay, too few there are who could severe those bonds. And I do not count them among my friends.

Ah! But what is this? A familiar stirring within my renewed heart! A familiar queasiness that churns the insides of my mortal frame. I had feared my death had severed this magic within me. Come to me now, fill this fragile form and strengthen these quaking bones. I can taste the magic on my lips, a sickly-sweet drop that muddies my mind and touches me thoroughly. I remember its poison well. How it channeled through my weary feet into the earth beneath me to reach out and touch the dark places, the shadows, where the absence of light has sustained and strengthened me. Oh, perhaps to fill up with that power once more, perhaps to make this second life worth every waking moment. Let me absorb it, let it seep into my pores from the wells of the earth and feed my strength and sanity – or is it insanity?

I can reach out and touch the ground at my feet now. I can feel it stretching towards me. I can feel the wind pushing breath into my lungs. I can taste the heavy rains in the air. The elements praise me; they harken to my resurrection and rejuvenate my travel-weary soul.

Of course… This body is not a curse. Nay, it is a blessing. I have been reborn anew to continue the quest of my beloved; to merge the under-realm with the mortal one, to stretch the reach of my dear love from the Spire to the farthest reaches of the earth. With an outstretched hand, I will touch the corners of this aged world inch by inch. I shall not be careless in this life as I had been in the last. No, I will guard myself first.

I must gather my strength first. For too long have my bones been drying and crumbling in this dead earth. I must plan, I must study the histories during the time of my absence, I must be patient… Even now I can hear distortion in the wind, the groan of the earth, shrill screams in the skies, the wailing of the masses. It’s a song to my ears. I am the wolf that devours the weak. And all are weak before me. All will fall to this wolf’s hunger.

A wizard they used to call me. A Member of the Wise. No. This sack of reanimated bones, dusty and smeared with blood and guts is no wizard. “Witch” they will call me now. Wife of the Dark, Whisperer within the Night, Devourer of Light. Yes, I am all of those things and more. I am the creeping shadow before the blinding darkness. I am the plague that withers all within my path. I am the bringer of death and darker things. I am the Mother of Witches, the Mother of Demons, the Mother of the Children of the Dark. The Demon Lady. My name… Yes, my name was, no, is, Faye Ravenswood.

***

The small grave at her feet was unmarked save for a weathered stone, rounded and smooth along the edges from years of pelting rain. The words that had been carved into the stone had long faded. It was now just a simple outcrop in this yellowed field. A stone sitting curiously in this barren waste as if keeping watch over the expanse of dead grasses that stretched from The Eye to the empty Spires of Khadraban in the northwest. The lands here were chilled. Winter was waning, but still cold winds from the northern Hinterlands scoured the old lands of Kostantyne’s realm.

Was this the best they could do for you, dear son? A weathered rock, left to the winds and rains and snows of this barren hell? You deserved better, much more than the short life you suffered through. Would that your body had been reborn with mine, then perhaps I might have some remembrance of joy. Who has claim over these mounds and darkened woods now? The elves of Mynthellion and Greythalas, both west and east of the ruins, would not tarry in those dead fields. Here the ghouls of long-lost souls haunted the open moors and guarded the overgrown road that ran from The Eye to the Spires.

The dead have claimed these wastes. Broken spirits with haunting wails who cannot break from their ancient graves. So many battles had been fought there; ancient wars were waged on these fields when the hosts of the elves marched against the Demon Lord’s might. Faye looked down on the forgotten grave of her son. Those were the final hours, when you, dear son, were snatched from my arms. When the Rose fell from the tower, twinkling in her descent. When my beloved was shattered, body and soul.

A cool wind chilled her frail bones and meandered across the dead grasses, disturbing the dust that coated the late spring’s decaying remnants. The smooth stone that marked her son’s grave stood still against the breeze, immovable yet beaten. The children, her most devout followers, had not attended to this grave as they had hers over the years. Her own shrine was a well of fell magic adorned with candles and gold, worshipped for a thousand years, sitting in the bowels of The Eye, pristine, even as the stronghold around it fell into ruin and disrepair.

Curse those fools for feigning to ease your rest, dear son. She recalled his likeness before her now, as if he still squirmed in her arms, a young boy radiating in glory. Oh how you shone. Sparkling with magic and gifts of the under. You were a mighty boy, a strong boy. A power that the world feared, though they should have loved you, as I did.

She recalled how fearful they were of the boy. How that fright twisted the faces of the wise and the Aiyar. All who beheld her son knew he would mount the world and shatter the barrier between the multi-planes. This world would meld with the spirit realm and the under, and the Demon Lord’s children would walk in this plain as freely as the mortal races.

She cradled the remembrance of her son in her empty arms and could recall his sweet fragrance. How I miss you so. Perhaps I was better off as dead bones in the earth, rather than reborn to toil here without your warm embrace, dear son. There is no joy. No magic can fill the emptiness that is inside of me. It festers and widens, begetting despair and rage. I will avenge thee, dear son. As I swore a thousand years ago, I will avenge thee. And those who call themselves the Wise will rue the day they took the life of my child and tarnished the happiness of my heart.

“Dark Lady, your suspicions landed true.”

She heard the voice of Mathaleth Uphynda behind her and looked down at her empty arms, cradling nothing but a lost figment. She turned around to face him. He was a beautiful man, with smooth, caramel skin and foreign features. The dark trident on his head and the markings on his arms stood out against his smooth skin, and it pleased her to see them. He had been there when she had awoken, when she had crawled gasping from her tomb. His face had been long with fright at her arrival, but he was kind to her and wrapped her in a shroud and saw to her hunger. He was the leader of her children, guiding them through the dark.

When she had gained some strength she had asked him if he had awakened her. But he shook his head and called her rebirth a will of the Master. But she knew better. Her beloved was barred from this mortal plane.

She straightened her back and forced the memories of her son deep down inside of her and walked over to the young man. With her withered, opaque hands she rubbed the markings on his arm, the trident above the skull, flanked by stars. The mark gave her strength. Through these darkened scars, she felt Mathaleth’s spirit given freely to her will.

Mathaleth continued. “The tree of the Spirit Warden lives. The sapling strives for light through the rubble of Astalar. Does this then mean that the Spirit Warden lives? That he was not shattered with the destruction of his city and tree all those years ago?”

She did not know. She did not have the answers. It was another mystery. When Mathaleth had told her that he was not responsible for her rebirth, only one name came to mind: Lóthuel, the Spirit Warden, the Aiyar who alone was master of life and death. He could bring the dead back to life, not as mindless cadavers, but as living, breathing souls. But he had been long dead. That tricky bastard should have died when I syphoned the energy of his and his sister’s trees to resurrect Kostantyne. He should have died when Astalar was washed with demons and crumbled under the weight of their own arrogance, but somehow he survived… though not for long. I can remember when he marched on the Spires of Khadraban. His golden armour gleaming in the sun. He was so prideful, Lóthuel the un-killable. She smirked. In the end he begged for his soul like all the rest. Before it was ripped from his body and dissolved in the winds. But now his tree has begun to grow anew… that should be impossible. The lives of the Guardian trees were tied to their wardens…

“We were not alone at the ruins,” Mathaleth said. “The curious sapling had attracted the eyes of others.”

Her interest peaked as she wondered who it could have been. The answer was plain before her. There could have been no others. Still she asked, “Who?”

“The Remnants of the Wise.”

“Who among them?”

“An old, withered man, a Jinthan woman, a dwarf, an elf, and a faun.”

Fools, all of them. She thought. My old friends, my old companions.

Mathaleth continued, “Two were missing, if your account of the surviving members is true. The Massau woman and the Mother-Heijin were not present.”

Faye waved her hand as if their absence didn’t matter. “Did they spy you?”

“We exchanged words, yes.”

“Fool!” The stories of Ravenswood’s renewed strength bubbled to the surface as her anger swelled. “They will be on their way here next. They will search this ruin and find me. And I do not have the strength to face the Council of the Wise yet, even if they are just a remnant.”

Mathaleth cowered at her rage and said, “We have shrouded ourselves from the eyes of the Elven Rangers–”

“Our tricks may fool those archers, but they will crumble under the weight of the Wise. We must abandon The Eye immediately. They will take to the river with the winds at their back.”

“Where will we go? To the Spire?”

Faye shook her head. These dead lands were not hers anymore. “No. Here we are living in the past and cowering from the present. We must look to the future. We will head south, through the mountains avoiding the Pale River.”

Mathaleth looked puzzled. “There is power in these ruins, Dark Lady. The mighty Demon Lord chose this land well when he built The Eye, should we not remain here while you regain your strength?”

“I know there is power in these ruined halls!” she spat. “I know it better than you. I drank from the well of The Eye and tasted the magic in its water. I looked out across those withered fields and felt the mountains tremble beneath the power of my beloved. His blood was spent here, drenching the parched ground and wetting the cracked earth. His energy lingers here and I taste it with every step. But I am new to this world, a babe with weakened bones and a want to weep. Nay, we cannot tarry here, not while the Wise make for us.” Mathaleth nodded, but there was doubt on his youthful face. “What would you council me to do, Mathaleth?” she asked.

“We will fight for you.”

“You will die.”

“We are touched by the dark. We have welcomed it into our bodies. We can withstand the Wise, kill them.”

“You will die,” she repeated.

“Not all–”

“Yes, all.” She placed a hand on Mathaleth’s face, and winced at the wrinkles that lined her pale hands. How smooth this young man’s face seems. To be young and beautiful again, I wonder if I shall have that experience in this life. “You are young, Mathaleth, and even the eldest among my children are young. You do not wield the power of the dark as well as your ancestors did. You have much to learn, much to heed from the whispers in the night. I will show you how to spin the darkness and harness its strength in the fullness of time. But not here.”

His eyes were big and dark as he looked at her longingly. “Where will we go?” he asked.

“South, to Elm Enneré. Do you remember what you told me about the splintered soul of the Demon Lord?”

He nodded his head, and his short, brown hair rustled in the cool wind, as his eyes remained trapped in hers. “Two were destroyed. One by the Wise, Dashara Rose, as she fell from The Eye, the other by the Moon Warden in the protected glade, while the third was stolen away by the alliance of men.”

“And so long as one of the fragments remains true, my beloved can return to this wretched world.” She retracted her hand from his warm face and he broke from the spell.

“Elm Enneré is no longer,” he said. “The kingdoms of the exiles of Valdorrea have merged into one: Aralia. The old realms have been forgotten, passed into fable by the short-lived memories of the men who now reside there.”

“Does the city still stand?”

Mathaleth’s brows knitted together in confusion. “The city?”

“Elm Enneré, the city on the misty lake, the city of the vault.”

He shook his head and shrugged apologetically. “I am not of these lands, Dark Lady, I do not know the cities or their marks.”

It would be there, she thought to herself. Well hidden in the vaults. Left to rot over the centuries. Forgotten. Dormant. If those wretched men had stolen the last of my beloved’s fragments, it would be in the vaults of Elm Enneré. I wonder if the city still stands, or if it has fared the same fate as The Eye…

“Dark Lady…?” Mathaleth’s voice was cautious and soft. Her eyes snapped to his at the interruption of her thoughts. “What of the Wise? They will know we were here, surely.”

An idea struck her then, and the corners of her cracked lips turned up into a smile. “I shall leave them a gift.”

***

How sad and pitiful my children are. They impersonate me, left with nothing but loose skin wrapped around thin bones. They are as sickly as I am. Gone are the days that my beloved’s army stretched for miles as far as the eye could see. Gone are the rows upon rows of shining elven armor and behemoth creatures breathing flame and rage. Gone are the hordes of wild northmen, hooting and hollering within their quarrelsome ranks. Gone are the lines of elven priests, the blue-clothed mystics of the Children of the Dark. Gone are the stout dwarves of Dun Icefen pounding their drums at their arrival. So too has my beloved’s ranks withered with the years into this small collective of naked men and women with naught but their ribs to shield them and their frail arms to defend them. Are my beloved’s champions all dead? Has Akor the Terrible been felled from the sky? Has Fhardim fallen victim to the elves’ justice? Was the high priest Inethin bound in chains by the druids? So much has been lost, and I alone am left to rebuild it all.

But there is promise here, in these thin, gangly creatures. I must awaken the power within them, bind them to the under-realm, and tie them to the power of the demons within. I must start anew, as I had once before.

There it is before me. My final resting place. How serene it looks now. To think just weeks before my barren bones rested there in tranquil peace. Oh to know who woke me from that ignorant slumber. I would praise and curse them for their deed.

“The Dark Lady approacheth!” Mathaleth Uphynda stood before the tomb with his arms outstretched. He wore the faded blue garb of the ancient priests of the Children of the Dark. The bells stitched on its dress jingled slightly and danced in Faye’s ear before the deep, ceaseless chanting of the surging crowd swallowed the sound. They were naked, all of them, writhing and undulating to their chanting beat. Darkness licked their heels and feet, a dancing demon’s breath that broke from the boundaries of the under-realm into the mortal plane. Faye smiled. They have some power, even if it is quaint. Good.

As she approached her old tomb, the candles that dripped upon her resting place were lit and cast a yellow shadow about the ringed room, dancing off the ruined walls and lost into the darkness above. She stood before the tomb and rummaged through her memory for the ancient spells, calling forth a chant to imprint a ghostly familiar on her resting place. The demon would assume her form and wash the room with a disarming presence. But as always, the spell would come at a price.

Mathaleth handed her the dagger, and she did not hesitate as she brought the cold steel to her hand, slashing it deep across her palm and letting the blood spill from her body in a torrent. It smelt so fresh, so new, this baby’s blood that splashed through her insides around her bones and through her heart. It spilled across her tomb and filled the carved runes crimson. Faye felt her mind swirl as she bled causing her to gasp for air. When the blood-flow slowed to a trickle, she clenched her fist and held it high above her head.

In the crowd of writhing bodies a figure rose. It was a girl, young and pink-fleshed, fatter than the others. She ambled toward the tomb on wobbling feet, her face downcast as she chanted to the ground. She approached Mathaleth. He reached back for the dagger he’d given Faye. When the girl had arrived, she looked up at Faye with unseeing eyes. They were swirling with black, the blackness spreading to her cheeks and temples. She had a youthful face, like Mathaleth’s, only her skin was pale and her hair a dirty blonde. She was one of these Aralians as Mathaleth called them. The remnants of the Valdorreans Faye had known. The girl’s small breasts bounced with her movements as she chanted from the depths of her throat.

Mathaleth placed a hand on the tomb, wetting his fingers with Faye’s spilled blood. Then he marked the the girl’s forehead with the blood, and whispered in the demon’s tongue, a binding curse that summoned the demon-familiar. He then lifted the knife to the girl’s throat and with a clean swipe, sliced it open, spilling her blood down her chest and bosom. The girl dropped to the floor and bled until a dark pool had surrounded the base of the tomb, seeping into the cracks in the floor.

The multitude of chanting bodies slowly quieted and the lid of Faye’s tomb was removed. She caught a sniff of the pungent scent of decay lingering in that tomb that had housed her body for centuries and centuries. The now lifeless body of the girl was placed inside, and it was sealed up once more. The runes carved into the front of it shone an eerie green that penetrated into the dark ruins and mingled with the yellow candlelight. Faye could feel the fell magic seeping from the grave, and the emergence of the demon within, ready and now lying in wait.

The ritual came to an end. The trap had been set. She knew it might not be enough to topple the entire remnant of the Wise, but it would be enough to distract them for a time.

Within the next hour, the group of frail, thin men and women had collected what little belongings they had and began filing out of the ruins, and headed toward the tall mountains south of The Eye. As they progressed out, they swept their path with incense in an attempt to hide their presence from the Wise, and began their trek south through the harsh heights of the mountains. Faye and Mathaleth stood alone looking back at the ruins.

“Will it be enough?” Mathaleth asked.

Faye nodded. Her head was still spinning from the loss of blood. “They will approach the tomb first, if I know them well enough. There is one among them who can read the memory of objects, and his curiosity will lead them to the trap. When he touches my resting place, the trap will spring. They will not find any memories of myself among the ruins, not while the incense lingers there to muddy their senses. They will think my ghost is all that stirs in the ruins of The Eye. And I will pass unnoticed.”

She looked to the barren hills north of the ruins and saw the round, dark stone that marked her son’s grave. Once more, farewell, dear son. Watch for me in the coming hour when I might fulfill my oath and avenge thy death.

She felt a tug on her sleeve as Mathaleth motioned for them to be on their way. She let the chilled wind whip around her, flicking her hair across her greyed face. She brushed away the strands and saw her cold, wrinkled hands. There was some colour to them, albeit faint, but there nonetheless. It was a pinkish hue that coloured the skin and chased away the wrinkles. She lifted her hands before her eyes and smiled. I have been reborn and so does my youth return to me. Chase these greyed, aged hues from my visage and make me beautiful again, as I had once been, when I had held my son close, and kissed my beloved’s lips.

***

Four nights in the cold mountains felt like a lifetime. The clouds wet their clothes and made the rocky path slick, forcing their pace to slow to a crawl up and down the treacherous heights. She couldn’t see the dead plains to the west, or the Pale River to the east. The clouds were too thick and a black mist hung heavy around their caravan to shield them from unwanted eyes. The further they hiked from the ruins of The Eye, gradually, the more life they encountered. Up along the edge of the mountains, frail mosses and lichens coated the slippery rock in green, basking in what little sun pierced the grey clouds. Alpine squirrels and chipmunks scampered along the bare trees and chattered incessantly in curious tones as they watched this company amble on by. On the fifth day, scouts returned with the remains of mountain goats draped over their shoulders, and that night her children ate greedily from the cooked meat.

Later, as her children slept, Faye was aroused by a whistling wind that swept throughout the rocks. A sensation tickled the edges of her perception. They are close, she realized.

She pulled herself up from her bed and wandered to the edge of the mountain pass where a sheer cliff dropped down into the valley below where the Pale River meandered silently from The Eye down into Lewessa Lake. She closed her eyes and breathed in deeply, inhaling the cold air through her nostrils and smelling for the members of the Wise down below on the river.

It was faint, but they were there. She couldn’t sense who, nor could she discern their numbers, but she knew the Wise drifted upstream, against the current, pushed by an unnatural wind. They would reach The Eye in a couple of days, and then her trap would spring.

She heard Mathaleth Uphynda approach before he spoke. “What is it, Dark Lady?”

“We must quicken our pace,” she replied. “The Wise sail towards The Eye. Once the trap is sprung they will sail back down the Pale River. I do not wish to meet them on the lake.” It was only a half-truth. She wished she could reveal herself to them now, to fly out of the clouds and mist and descend upon their tiny boat and thrill them with her resurrection. Oh to see the looks on their dumbfounded faces. But it was better to wait. Better to remain in the dark, bide her time, and regain her strength. She would need it.

She groped in the dark for Mathaleth’s hand, and found it outstretched to her. He led her back to the camp, back to the hard blanket on the rocky ground where she feigned to find sleep for the night. The dawn came too quickly, but it seemed her desires were fulfilled. The pace of the group quickened, and by the evening, she could see the mighty Lewessa Lake off in the distance through a break in the clouds. That night they slept in the shelter of a cave, warmed by fires that struggled against the damp air. She sat at the mouth of the cave and looked out to the mountains below them and saw movement down below. It wasn’t one of the scouts. They were out hunting for mountain goats and any meat they could find. And it didn’t move as any man did. It scrambled up the mountain side on all fours, occasionally pausing and sniffing the air, lifting its arms off the earth and peering with white, blind eyes into the empty mist. She could sense its presence, and knew what it was. And smiled at the good omen.

The thing was pale, milky white, with twisted horns that sprouted from its knotty head. Its spirit was drenched in demonic energy that almost wafted off its cursed body and seeped into the crevices and cracks of the mountain face.

Once more Mathaleth was at her side. He stood beside her and followed her gaze. When he saw the pale ghost move, it startled him. “Do you see that, down there in the valley? What could it be?”

“It is a good omen for us. A fell-faun.” Mathaleth looked puzzled. “The faun were mighty in their gardens and stood in defiance of my beloved’s creations. Ever did they seek to disassemble his works, his beasts and flora and unique art. The earth bent to the fauns’ will, the trees and the grasses, and they heard everything through their whispering winds. That is until they were silenced by my beloved’s hand. He entered their gardens and polluted their wells and bred his dark things in their sacred temples. He twisted the minds of those troublesome faun into fell things that craved flesh and blood, and bound them to his will. The gardens of the faun withered, and they passed through the woods as shades and perversions, prideful no longer.” She watched the creature sniff the air curiously and smiled once more. “They sense my awakening, they smell the fell energies on the wind, the magic in the air. Perhaps there are other dark things that came from my beloved’s hand that still hide in the deep places of this realm.”

“Should we go to it?” Mathaleth asked.

Faye shook her head. “It is an animal now, nothing more. Those that still remain will climb out of their darkened holes and take the woods and lands away from the elves. Let their putrid fellness sour the trees and the creatures of the north. This is good indeed. I have hope now that this world has not been lost. Discord will seed these lands. And the fell-faun will stir discomfort in the hearts of the few remaining elves. Our goal will be grander. We must weaken the weight of men in preparation for my beloved’s return.”

Mathaleth still stared at the fell-faun, watching it meander through the mist until it was swallowed up by the darkness. “How many are there?” he asked once it had passed from sight.

Faye felt her smile grow wide across her face, pulling her cheeks and lips taunt. “An army’s worth.”

That night, she slept comfortably next to the fire as it warmed her cold bones and chilled blood. Upon her waking, she was greeted with the gentle smell of tea and cooked meat. The scouts had returned with two-dozen pheasants, having discovered a flock near the base of the mountains. They ate well that morning, and Faye sipped on her tea as she watched the sun rise in the east and chase away the lazy moon hanging heavy and large in the western sky. The clouds had parted, and the cold wind from the north had fallen away, leaving the fresh, spring scent among the mountain’s heights. It was pleasant, beautiful and for a moment Faye forgot herself.

To think, that weeks before I had no eyes to gaze at this sun, no flesh for it to warm, no thoughts to be rekindled by it’s greeting. I was a dark, dead thing in the ground, an ancient relic, passed by and nearly forgotten by the world, spending my days in solemnity. And now here I am, by some unknown work, peering on this familiar sun in the blazing sky. I had forgotten how warm it’s lingering fingers were in the cold damp of The Eye. Warm my heart, old sun, and heat my blood, for it has been too long since I have seen you last.

The day was warm and brightened the spirits of the trudging misfits as they felt the mountains descend beneath their feet. By nightfall, they had descended halfway into a northern forest trapped between the mountains and Lewessa Lake. They slept under the trees that blocked out the stars and lazy moon, and warmed themselves by towering flames that cast eerie shadows into the woods around them. But none among them feared the shadows, for they knew what resided therein. They each had been marked by the dark and craved its cool embrace as much as they enjoyed the warmth of the sun.

That night, a recurring thought came to mind that had troubled her since her reawakening. How will we cross the mighty lake? In the years of her first life there had been a ferry on the northern shore, a point of contention between the elves and Kostantyne’s forces. And she felt foolish for thinking it might still be standing at the ready. Mathaleth and the other children had made their way to The Eye on foot, drawn by some subliminal pull. But it would take them well over a month to circumvent Lewessa with the numbers they had.

She sat up in the dark and pondered this more, but as she was about to wake Mathaleth who slept soundlessly beside her, she heard shouts in the woods. Voices, belonging to their scouts.

The camp began to stir and Mathaleth yawned as he awoke to the noise. “What is it?” he asked.

“In the woods,” Faye replied. “The scouts have found something.”

A short time later, the spindly scouts returned to the camp with another man bound and gaged. He was a middle-aged man with flaxen hair that was riddled with mud and leaves. His clothes were well tailored, if a little grimy, and a small sheath in his belt had been emptied of weapons.

“We found ‘im and another sleeping in the woods yonder,” one of the scouts said.

Faye looked into the eyes of the man, they were wide with fright and filled with terror. And she could understand why. He probably expected these woods to be devoid of anything but game. And here was an entire community of grimly decorated people. “And the other?” she asked.

The scout’s mouth turned into a twisted smile. “Dead,” he snorted.

“Ungag him,” Faye said.

The scout looked displeased. “But Lady, ‘e’ll scream, ‘e will.”

“Ungag him,” she repeated firmer. The scout did as he was told. The first thing the man did was shout for help, but Faye was quick with a knife and had an edge poised to slice the man’s throat. “Calm your cries, man,” she said. “Or I will silence them for you.” The man quieted and looked into her eyes, she held his gaze and invited him in. She whispered a little calming spell and felt him relax. With a second spell she opened his mind like a book, and invited herself in. “Where are you from?” she asked.

He swallowed nervously before answering. “Misthaven.”

“Misthaven?”

“The wooded home o’ House Ashwood on the southern shores o’ Lewessa Lake.”

She nodded. “And how did you come to this northern wood?”

“By boat I did, to the Hunting Camp there on the shore.”

“Have you ships there?”

The man nodded languidly. “To send pelts and meats back to Misthaven and to the Northern Vale.”

“Where is this camp of yours?”

His hand rose shakily and pointed southwest. “Along the mountain’s edge where it does reach the lake.”

A smile tickled the edges of Faye’s mouth. Slowly, she slid the dagger across the man’s throat while his eyes remained trapped in hers. She could sense the pain coursing through the man’s body as it spasmed and fought to free itself of her gaze. But she wouldn’t let him escape. The blood poured down his throat and wet his worn clothes as the men and women around her began to holler and hoot in excitement. The man’s life faded from his eyes, and finally she let go of his gaze. His eyes rolled back into his head and he fell forward onto the forest floor with a thud.

“The body will go to waste,” the scout said, eyeing the dead man greedily.

Faye wiped the blade clean and waved a hand nonchalantly and said, “Do what you want with him.”

The scout cried out and dragged the body away. As Faye looked out into the woods in the direction the man had pointed, she heard the sharpening of knives and the hooting of her crazed children as their mouths watered for a meaty feast.

Mathaleth sidled up beside her and said, “Do we make for the camp?”

Faye nodded. “We will take their camp tomorrow eve. And set sail under a full moon.”

***

As she had predicted, it took a full days trek to reach the mountain’s edge where the rocks fell off into the lake. And there, just as the tracker had told them, sat a small gathering of four log houses in a clearing on the shore, with boats that sat lashed to the long docks. They knocked against the docks from the impact of the waves of the mighty lake. They approached the camp from the south, and from atop a forested hill Faye could see down into the camp, spying another twenty or so men. “We will have to kill them,” she said. “We cannot risk any to be left alive.” Beside her, Mathaleth nodded. “Send them against the camp, and I will summon a fog to blind these trapper’s eyes.”

Mathaleth did as she asked, and sent the entire host down the hill to the trapper’s camp. Faye stilled her breath for a moment and calmed her churning blood as it pumped through her renewed heart. She conversed with the wind and the rain and the earth and summoned a thickened haze of vapor and cloud to mingle about her people and hide their approach.

From the camp, it might have appeared as a heavy fog rolling in through the trees, creeping over the rocks and the grass, tumbling towards the lake. All grew quiet. The birds in the forest flitted away and stopped their pleasant chirping, and the men down in the camp grew tense. Faye could feel their unease at the approaching fog. There was a strange silence held for a moment as even the waves on the lake quieted before screams began to echo against the mountains before finally being swallowed by the woods.

The attack didn’t last long. A half-hour at most while the fog dampened the log houses and her children snuck through the shadows and stuck the living. As quickly as the shouts and screams began, they ended and gradually, the normal noises returned to the woods. The birds chirped once more, the waves resumed their lapping clap, even as blood stained the ground of the trapper’s camp and watered the earth.

Faye and Mathaleth descended to the camp and instructed the others to loot what they could and ready the ships. As everyone went about it, Faye wandered through the log houses and learned what she could of these men. “Aralians, you called them?” she asked Mathaleth as they surveyed the log cabin closest to the lake.

“Yes, the exiles of Valdorrea, or so the fables say.”

“Do they not remember their ancestry?”

Mathaleth shook his head. “The world of men does not take pause to remember the past. They blunder forward, repeating their mistakes and forgetting their solutions.” He was sizing up a leather pack, searching through the pockets and judging the quality of the leather.

As she looked around the cluttered place a ray of light filtered in through the small window facing the lake, and the rays lit up the back wall. There, pinned among a myriad of letters and notes was a map, crinkled along the edges, and creased from multiple folds. She approached it and unpinned it from the wall, but as she studied the map, her eyebrows knotted together and worry grew within her heart.

“Is this the kingdom of these Aralians?” she asked.

Mathaleth draped the pack over his shoulders and came to her side. He nodded as he looked at the wrinkled map. “The Kindgom of Aralia.”

Faye felt lightheaded all of a sudden and found a seat to plant herself in. The map was riddled with names and places she did not know. There was hardly an inch free for another word. Cities, towns and villages covered every corner of the map and it exhausted her. She let out a sigh and dropped the map to the floor.

“What is it, Dark Lady?” Mathaleth asked, rushing to her side once more and clasping her hands in his own.

She shook her head as doubt replaced every other emotion within her. “I cannot do this,” she whispered. “Much has changed. Have I been gone so long that men have swallowed the world whole?” She pointed to the map on the floor, “Look at these names, they cover the map from edge to edge. I suddenly wish for my grave. For the blissful ignorance death brings.”

Mathaleth looked down at the map and frowned. “Aralia is wide, and heavily populated, but it is not the widest kingdom, nor the most populated. The touch of men has stretched the world over, but they are weak, fragile things, subject to their emotions first and reason second. You fear something so trivial, but the world of men will expand for an eternity, you cannot stop it, Dark Lady. Even if the planes were merged, as is the Master’s want, I believe men will continue to expand and reach. But you must reach with them, guide their hand as you will, control their grasp.”

She sighed again, thinking of her new future. “I am, but one,” she said.

“No,” Mathaleth replied. “You are many. We are many. And we will grow with the coming years, and be your fingers, to guide the world as you see fit. To guide the world in its preparation for the coming of the Master, the Demon Lord.” He picked up the map of Aralia and folded it neatly before handing it to Faye.

She held it in her hands, and saw how the colour beneath her skin had warmed and spread up her arms. She was no longer grey and withered. Her hands were smooth and young again. She stood up and wandered over to the window, and caught her reflection in the glass. The wrinkles had receded and her formerly tired eyes were now alive, sparkling back at her. I look myself again, she thought.

She felt the wrinkled page in her hands and looked down at it. I have toppled cities and kings, withered guardians and raised gods. I am the mother of these children of the dark… and the mother of you, dear son, whose death I have promised to avenge. Yes, I am capable of all things. These kingdoms will bend to will, as they did before. And my want will blanket these pathetic kingdoms of men. I shall be queen of this mortal plane, and await patiently for the moment to welcome my beloved back from his eternal damnation. No elf, no dwarf, no man shall stand in my way. Yes, I am the bringer of death and darker things. I am the Mother of Witches, the Mother of Demons. The Demon Lady, Faye Ravenswood.

So easily do those words recite in my mind… let them be true… I will make them truth.

Within the hour they had set sail from the trapper’s camp across the mighty lake. Faye stood in the boat at the front of the procession. She had calmed the lake, and listened as her children rowed the small boats in rhythm. She had wrapped a fog around them, a mist that blinded their paths, but she knew where they were headed. They would land on the shores of Aralia, the kingdom of men, the first that would fall under the force of her will.

A low, guttural moan filled the foggy air, a chant from her children that resonated in their throats and drummed on the glass surface of the lake. A higher voice wailed above the drones like a warbling bird’s call, rising and falling with the undulating fog as it wrapped around them and swirled about the boats.

Faye smiled at the sound and shut her eyes to imagine the notes dancing in the dark. She reached one hand into the pocket of her dress and thumbed the edge of the map that sat within, and plotted the downfall of the Kingdom of Aralia.

***

A month had passed since Faye and her children set out across the lake. She had sent her children far and wide across the kingdom to seed disorder from the shadows while she remained behind in the region now called The Valley of Elm. She had kept a handful of her brightest close at hand to train them to harness their connection to the under-realm.

She had studied the map of Aralia and deduced that the city now called Emmese was where Elm Enneré once stood. It was now crumbled and decayed; a shadow to the former city that she had known in the past.

She walked undisturbed through the empty streets as she felt dust swell about her boots, dirtying her thighs and scratching her face. She reached out and touched the broken walls recalling their past; here trellises once stood with blooming ivy stretched across lattice covering over the street and forming a green roof; here a well once bubbled where people of the city would come to fill their jugs and chatter to each other about local gossip; here there had been a green park, halfway up the tiered city, which over-looked the lake of Elm Enneré once spotted with the white sails of ships that would lazily drag up and down the shoreline; here there had been a statue of King Wingham Tinius with one arm clutching his book and magical texts while the other was outstretched, reaching toward the blue skies in exaltation. Now only his boots remained, weathered and worn with years of abandon.

Now, the few commoners remaining in the city were hardened people, with scowling faces and wrinkled, concerned brows. They kept their gazes downcast, interested only in their own business, their own paths. Their tracks in the dusty streets were swept away by the chilled wind that erased any trace that someone had lingered there still.

“So this is the legacy of Elm Enneré,” she said in a soft whisper. Mathaleth Uphynda, who trailed behind her, turned to hear her words. “Gone are the traces of the Gift Warden, Malaryn and the elves of the Totam, their trees left to wither and their art left to decay. Gone are the traces of Thane Dolan Turad and the dwarves who tinkered away in the depths of Elm Enneré, carving out the city under the mountain. Gone are the traces of the Wise, whose tower stood taller than the royal palaces of the three kings.” She looked up the mountain to where the tower used to stand, piercing the sky. It stood there no longer; it had crumbled under the weight of misuse, and now the empty space looked odd. “So much has been forgotten by these small-minded folk. So much history, so much knowledge.” She turned to face Mathaleth and asked, “Who rules this city now did you say?”

“Reginus Tinius, Lord Protector of the Valley of Elm.”

“Lord Protector,” Faye snorted. “The great House of Tinius could not even protect their own city from cracking beneath their feet.”

They trudged up the tiers, taking their time in their ascension through the city. The higher they hiked, the less people they came across. The city sat eerily silent before them, the only sound coming from the high-pitched whistle of the constant wind that whipped about the torn, frayed banners of House Tinius. The sky was clear this spring day, and every so often, Faye would catch a glimpse of the lake down below, stretching along the countryside, bordered by thick forests and tall mountains. It was a breathtakingly beautiful sight.

As they reached the top they stopped momentarily to look out at the lake. In the west, the sun had dipped behind the mountains and the red and orange sky was mirrored in the watery surface far below. The deep blue skies of night swept in from the east, swallowing the distant western mountains and edges of Elm Enneré. With each passing moment, the sky continued to darken, blanketing the city of Emmese in a spring night, cool and refreshing, touched with a rain that fell in sparse sheets, only enough to slightly dampen the dust that covered the streets.

Finally, night covered the city in a bottomless darkness as they continued on their hike. Above them, the keep of Lord Reginus Tinius provided the only light on the upper half of the city. Its balconies and windows were lit with the soft glow of yellow firelight.

As they approached the courtyard at the entrance to the keep, Faye shut her eyes and called the wind and rain to form a black fog around her and Mathaleth. It rolled between her legs and crept along the bricks and walls as she ascended. The keep was well protected. Knights stood watch at the gates and lined the courtyard up to the keep’s elaborate door. With a flick of her wrist she sent tendrils of the dark fog toward the knight guardians. It licked up their bodies and passed into them through their nostrils and mouths, quieting their brains and sending them into a deep slumber. The sound of clinking metal welcomed their approach as the knights crumbled to the ground, sleeping soundlessly.

Once they had reached the courtyard, her gaze turned westward, towards the towering mountain at the city’s back. A path led from the keep’s courtyard to a large, stone door engraved with the owl crest of House Tinius. She took this path towards the mountain with Mathaleth walking quietly behind.

The stone door was heavy, but she managed to open it. It creaked as its ancient hinges cracked open. It was dark under the mountain. No light lit the tomb-like insides, the city carved into the mountain’s innards was dark and silent, and from the heavy smell of dust, it had been empty for some time. The doorway from the courtyard led to a small bridge. Faye knew where it went. She had been here countless times in her previous life. But she had never seen it so quiet, so empty.

At the end of the bridge was a mighty golden door, the doors of the Vaults of Emmese. Inside, a series of chambers and vaults held an ancient collection of relics and magical artifacts. Lost memories from a past that had faded from the knowledge of men.

“You think it is in there?” Mathaleth’s voice disturbed the darkness and bounced off the walls, echoing all the way down through the city tiers below, finally being swallowed within the crumbling handiwork of the dwarves.

She nodded. “If the alliance of men took the last shard of my beloved’s soul, as history has recorded, then they would have housed it here, in these vaults. No other place in this world is so secure.” She marveled at the golden doors. An intricate design wound up and around the doors, disappearing into the darkness.

“How do we enter?” Mathaleth asked.

“Perhaps…” Faye lifted her arms and reached out with her senses to touch the door. She could sense the myriad of magical spells placed over it to lock it shut. There were too many bonds for her to break. She reached out and touched the golden door with a finger and felt a shock of pain ripple through her body like a lightning bolt, withering her breath and jolting her mind. She gasped and recoiled. Mathaleth rushed to her side and stroked her hand gently.

Faye looked up at the massive doors in awe. “After all these years the magic remains true. After the fall of the elves and the disbanding of the Wise, after the fall of Elm Enneré, still this door stings those without an invitation.” A part of her respected the magical bonds in place.

“Then there is no way in?” Mathaleth cried at her side.

She shook her head and pointed to a small keyhole in the surface of the door. “We need the key.”

“Who has it?”

She turned to look back the way they had come, over the bridge and the chasm to the empty mountain city below. “Old King Wingham had one. Perhaps it has passed to his heir.”

A wicked smile crept across Mathaleth’s caramel face. “Then we kill Lord Reginus.”

“Not quite,” she replied. “There are more spells in place than a mere key can banish. The king’s key will only let the named heir enter. We must be patient. The sky is not yet right for my beloved’s return. We will wait, there is much to do before then.” She looked back at the large, golden doors and reached out once more. She felt the tingling warning on her palm this time and stopped short. “My beloved will be safe in here for the time being. We must ready this world for his arrival. We must uncoil our hand and touch every land from here to the ends of the earth. None will escape our caress. The world will be mine. And my name will dance across the lips of millions. And I will avenge my dear son. Let this new life of mine be a blessing, I have been given a second chance to avenge the wrongs wrought against me. And from the dark I will bend this world to my will.”

The story continues in A Chronicle of Crowns.