A Fallen King
“It’s time, Lorial.”
Lorial looks up from the map on his father’s desk. Mother stands in the doorway, and the pain in her eyes mirrors his own grief.
“You need to be strong now, my son. For our people. They will take their strength from you.”
Lorial says nothing as he folds the map and replaces it in a drawer before following Mother from Father’s study.
His study now.
As he passes through the doorway, Mother hands him a large earthen jar, and he clutches it to his chest.
“My king.” Nestraya waits in the corridor, ready to guard Lorial as he visits the Tree of Memories, as all new Lostarien kings must do.
As the closest friend Lorial has ever known, Nestraya’s presence is a comfort. She was brought into the king’s family as an orphan when Lorial was only a child. Now they’re both grown, and she stands guard over him as a Third among Father’s warrior elves.
His warrior elves.
Her words land on him with an awkwardness borne of unfamiliarity. Newness. And a distancing between them that leaves Lorial unsettled.
My king.
The title should have belonged to Father far longer than it did.
“Thank you for doing this,” Lorial says, and Nestraya nods.
“It is my honor to accompany you on this journey.”
Lorial studies her. Her long black hair, plaited in a single braid, hangs just past her shoulders. It used to stretch nearly to her waist, but she cut the tail when her king fell, as they all did.
Lorial’s own silver hair barely brushes his shoulders now.
Little does it matter. His hair will soon grow again as Lostariel moves on without her king. As will Nestraya’s and that of all the elves who honored the ancient tradition.
The old generations give way to new ones, and time speeds on regardless.
“What is it, my king?” Nestraya asks.
Lorial turns his gaze back to the corridor in front of him. “Nothing. Shall we begin?”
With a nod, Nestraya follows Lorial and his mother as they make their way out of Windhaven House, the royal residence in Darlei, the elven city closest to the Nunian border.
Or what’s left of Windhaven. Nunian soldiers burned part of the tree-grown residence to the ground before the elves fought them back to the border of the Wildthorne Woods.
Elves with plant magic have already begun repairs.
It was the same night Father’s most elite band of elf warriors got cut off and cut down by the soldiers as they fled.
Did the humans know who it was they killed that night in their retreat? By the time Lorial and Nestraya found Father lying in a pool of his own crimson blood, not even a heartbinding could have saved him.
And as Father passed from the light while clutched to Lorial’s chest, the elf prince became the elf king at the tender age of thirty-two.
That night, Father’s sticky red blood seeped from the wound near his heart as Lorial pressed his hands over the gaping hole and begged Nestraya to save him. The memory assaults Lorial now as their boots clack on the floor with each heavy step. The smell—sweet and coppery—is still burned into his nose.
It took an hour for him to scrub the blood from his hands once Nestraya dragged him back to Windhaven, and Mother, always full of strength, looked him in the eyes and told him there would be time to mourn later.
For now, he must be strong. Their kingdom is depending on it.
The acrid odor of lingering smoke and ash assails them as they pass through the burned portion of Windhaven House on their way to the Tree of Memories.
Darlei. The City of Kings.
Normally, a new elf king would travel from the capital city of Celesta at the heart of the Wildthorne Woods to Darlei to lay his father’s ashes at the base of the Tree of Memories and take his own place among the Kings of Lostariel.
Lorial need only travel the short path from Windhaven to the sacred tree.
A line of elves has already gathered on either side of the road he’ll walk, and the sight slows his steps.
“Be strong, my son,” Mother says, and Lorial pushes his feet forward again.
As they tread the path toward the Tree of Memories, Mother slows her own steps. This is not a journey she can make with Lorial. Lorial walks alone as his companions follow at a distance. The elves gathered along the path turn their palms skyward as he passes.
“Be at peace on this last journey.” Over and over, the elves whisper the traditional words as Lorial walks among them, carrying his father’s ashes. Their voices rise in a lilting chorus, and he clutches the urn more tightly to his chest as the elves of Lostariel pay their final respects to the king whose reign was far too brief.
Nestraya stays on high alert as she watches over Lorial. Her life magic traces the path around him, searching for anything or anyone out of place, but only the familiar essences of elves greet her. It’s challenging to sense anything around Lorial’s powerful air magic. No humans are nearby that she can detect, though she doesn’t lower her defenses.
Something about Restoval’s death still niggles at her—a sense that all is not as it seems. With little more than a vague feeling of unease to go by, though, she dares not say anything to Lorial. Not yet, anyway.
Tonight, she will simply keep him safe as he journeys into the Tree of Memories. Perhaps, somehow, he will receive a morsel of truth while entranced that will either confirm or allay her suspicions.
She was surprised at first when he chose her to hold the magic for him. She’s merely a Third. Surely someone of higher rank would have been better suited for the role. Perhaps he wanted to do this with as few people as possible. Few elves bear dual affinities for plant and life magic, and both types are required to access the Tree of Memories.
Other than his mother, Nestraya is now the closest thing the young king has to family, and that likely influenced his choice as well.
Nestraya’s parents struggled for hundreds of years to conceive, and they were already aged when she was born. Some elves speculated that her mother made a deal with the powerful Lothlesi people to open her barren womb, and that’s why Nestraya was born with more magic at her command than any other elf alive today. Dual affinities are rare among low-born elves, like Nestraya’s parents.
Nestraya wields the magic of three elements.
It was why she was brought to the king as a child when her parents died of old age. Because she was an anomaly.
And Restoval, the crown prince at the time, soon to become king, welcomed her into his home. Into his life.
Into his family.
The daughter he never had.
She received the best of everything. Training. Education. Opportunities to shine.
Losing him was like losing her own father all over again.
Perhaps that’s why Lorial chose her to accompany him. Her grief mirrors his own, even if she can’t claim the former king as her father.
She loved him like one.
As Lorial approaches the ancient willow, his skin blanches, though he gives no other outward sign of the struggle warring within him. His shortened hair still catches Nestraya off guard whenever she looks his way, as it has since he cut it two days ago. The same feeling overtakes her every time she looks at her own reflection in the mirror.
Lorial stops in front of the tree and turns to face his people. The youngest king in Lostarien history.
He looks strong. From the outside.
But to Nestraya’s eyes, he seems lost.
Lorial searches her out, and she steps toward him and the willow tree that looms behind him, its drooping branches guarding the secrets it hides.
The Tree of Memories.
Nestraya reads the beckoning in Lorial’s gaze, and she stops beside him. The branches won’t part for her. Only for him. And when they do, his right to claim his father’s throne will be established. His rule absolute. And the tree will respond to the magic of anyone the king grants entry to this sacred place. To Nestraya, as she temporarily joins Lorial’s life force to that of the Tree of Memories using her life and plant magic.
What he will see there is a secret he can never share. Not in this world, at least. It is rumored that all secrets are laid bare in the heartlanding for those who are heartbound.
Hopefully, this new King of Lostariel will never face an injury grave enough to warrant a heartbinding.
As Nestraya stands at Lorial’s side, she lays her hand on his arm so the willow will grant her entry as well. Together, they face the Tree of Memories. The air hangs thick around them, and Lorial’s knuckles are white where he clutches the urn carrying his father’s ashes. Gingerly, he releases his hold with one hand and reaches toward the willow.
Holding her breath, Nestraya waits for the branches to part. The chanting of their kin has ceased, and the distant sound of frogs croaking and crickets chirping is all that breaks the silence.
Then, slowly, with a soft creaking, the tree’s branches open to receive her new king.
