Return to Blue Mountain
Part Three: Darkness
Haken slowly drew himself to his feet, his lip curled back in a sneer. Then his golden eyes alighted on Suntop, and his angry demeanour melted away into an expression of wonder.
“Runya...? Is that you?” Haken reached out with his one hand. “Runya... my son... oh – bright eyes... golden hair... my son?”
Suntop licked his lips. “Haken. My name is Suntop.”
Ekuar took a step towards Suntop, and Venka held him back gently. Skot hurried down the stairs, then came to a halt.
Haken blinked. “A spirit... come to visit me. Oh, I knew I would see you one day... my son.”
Aroree quietly moved behind Ekuar. Tyldak tiptoed down the final steps, Timmain sheltered under one wing. When Timmain saw Haken her jaw dropped in horror.
“Haken–” Suntop began, but now Haken’s eyes fell on Timmain, and a rage sprang to life in their depths. A low growl built within him, and his hair seemed to rise as if charged with static.
“YOU! Wolf-bitch!”
“Haken–” Timmain raised her hands defensively.
“Food for worms...” Haken sneered. “You... are food for the WORMS!”
“Please...”
“Leave me! I don’t want you here, spirit.... LEAVE!”
He sprang at her. Timmain held up her hands and an invisible force pushed him back.
Quicksilver caught Suntop’s shoulders and pulled him out of the way of the battling High Ones. Venka and Aroree drew Ekuar back up the staircase. Skot and Tyldak had already darted away from Timmain, who now seemed possessed with a strange new strength.
“Timmain!” Suntop cried.
A sizzling static charge ionized the air around Haken as he extended his one arm. Timmain was beginning to shudder again, only this time not with fear, but with a hint of great magic to come. Her hair rose like the hackles of a wolf, and feathery white fur began to sprout along her cheekbones.
“Oh, poke it!” Skot wailed. “She’s going to change!”
Haken sprang forward again. Timmain snarled as her tunic began to split at the seams under the pressure of her shape-changing flesh.
**Enough!** Venka’s mind shouted, and a powerful sending star shattered their concentration and blocked their shape-changing powers. Timmain and Haken both cried out at Venka’s attack, and raised their hands to their foreheads. **You are High Ones, not wild beasts!**
“What is this... what is...” Haken looked around desperately. “Who are you?”
“I am Venka, Blood of Chiefs. And you will not hurt our High One.”
“High One? Her? She’s a dog – a dog. Go away spirits! Take your dog with you.”
“Oh, Haken, would that I had cleansed this world of your hatred ages ago.”
“Murderer!”
“No one will duel here!” Venka snapped.
“I am no murderer, Haken. I never struck out in malice and fear as you did – I never killed for the sheer pleasure of it!”
“You stupid, senseless BITCH! You killed us all! You embraced death, and bade it to embrace us in turn! Our kind never died before – not until you brought us here, not until you wished us to leave the safety of our ship! You invited death and decay to lie down with us!”
“You don’t understand, Haken–”
“Blood! Blood! Everywhere! Your hands are drenched in blood! You only lick it from your fingers and beg for more like the beast you are!”
Timmain began to shiver. “Please, Haken–”
“Her death is on your hands!” Haken pointed to the stone structure. Suntop swallowed hard as he finally realized what it was: a coffin, a stone version of the containers the humans often buried the death inside.
Timmain’s eyes came to rest on the sarcophagus for the first time, and tears welled up against her will. “No... by the Palace...”
“She’s dead because of you! Mud-lover! You wanted the dirt and the worms. You killed her the very instant you gave her life!”
“Chani...” Timmain shuddered. She took two steps towards the sarcophagus and her legs gave out. Whimpering softly like a wounded wolf, she crawled up to the base of the coffin and touched the cold stone. “Chani... my sweet daughter.”
“Her daughter?” Skot looked over at Suntop. Suntop could only shrug helplessly.
“Your tears come too late, Timmain!” Haken snapped. “Ice ages have come and gone since you killed her.”
“I DIDN’T KILL HER!” Timmain screamed. “I loved my daughter! I wanted only the best for her. I only wanted her to live – to thrive in this world–”
Haken turned away. “And die... die.... Because of you.”
Timmain wept, moaning. “Chani... Chani... my daughter...”
“Please!” Suntop called. “Haken, Timmain, talk to us.”
Haken slunk back into the corner of the room. “No. I will not waste words on the wolf-bitch. No. I will speak only to Runya.”
Suntop took a step towards Haken, and Quicksilver held out a hand to stop him. **Malin, no.**
“Haken,” Suntop said. “Will you talk to me, alone? Will you promise not to hurt my kin if I stay here and speak with you?”
Haken blinked, and once more it seemed the haze of many lonely centuries fell over him. “Runya... oh... you know I would never hurt you...”
“And my kin?”
Haken looked at Timmain, then at Venka. “Away – out of my sight!”
“Everyone, go back up the stairs into the other room.”
**Malin! I won’t leave you here alone.**
**Please, Khai. Trust me. I’ll be all right.** He glanced at Venka. **Venka, please. Take care of Quicksilver. I won’t be long.**
Venka took Quicksilver’s arm gently, and guided her up the stairs. Tyldak and Ekuar helped Timmain to her feet, and the High One limped away from the sarcophagus, her eyes lingering on the carving of the elf woman.
**Suntop? You aren’t seriously going to stay in the same room as that rot-brained magic-user?** Skot asked as he hesitantly held up the rear of the retreat.
“Go, Skot,” Suntop said.
**Ohh... if you weren’t Swift’s son, and Rayek’s too...** But as Skot slowly retreated up the stairs, Haken waved his hand and a wall of rock rose up, sealing the staircase.
“Haken!” Suntop cried. “You betrayed me!”
Haken stared at the ground. He didn’t seem to hear Suntop.
**Khai?** Suntop sent.
**We’re all right. He just closed the door on us. Should we let Ekuar–**
**No. We’ll honour our pact. Stay there.** Suntop glanced back at Haken uncertainly. Just what had he gotten himself into?
“Timmain,” Venka said gently, but firmly, rousing Timmain from her tears. “Can you explain this to us? Please, we must understand. Who is Chani?”
Timmain’s face was a mask of pain. “My daughter. The first elf ever born on this world... the first elf born since we could remember. Our kind had long stopped breeding on our own world, but once the Palace crashed here, the old instincts returned. I... I mated with Aerth, the healer in our Circle. It was... not a true Recognition... not like it is now. But it was something new and strange to us... we who had not mated for endless years. It was... a hunger that could only be sated through joining and childbearing. And Chani was born. She was... so beautiful, radiant with new life. She was proof to me that I was right to oppose Haken’s path of pain and anger. She was proof that I had been right to embrace the world. She was proof – suffering can be an unexpected gift to those whose hearts have been stretched to encompass the challenge.
“But she... and I drifted apart as she grew up. She asked so many questions – questions about Haken, and the Palace, and why we never tried to reclaim it. Finally, when she was three eights old... she left us, intent on finding Haken. And I... I escaped the grief by becoming a wolf permanently. A few years later, I gave birth to Timmorn Yellow-Eyes.”
“Haken’s lifemate was your own daughter?” Venka asked. “Was... then, was she–”
Timmain nodded. “Winnowill’s mother. I was grandmother to that... broken soul. And great-grandmother to Aurek of the Great Egg. My daughter rejected all I had tried to teach her and mothered the founders of Blue Mountain.”
“Egg could have told us that part,” Skot growled under his breath.
“So this is why you have been senseless since you learned of Haken’s fate! But why did you never tell us?”
“Shame...”
“Shame? Of what?”
But Timmain only began to weep again. “Chani...”
Suntop crept closer to the sarcophagus. He stared down at the face shaped into the rock. She looked rather like Timmain, but with softer features. Her face was ever-so-slightly rounder in shape. Her cheekbones were less prominent. Her eyes were closed as if in a gentle sleep.
“Isn’t she beautiful, Runya?” Haken said dreamily.
“My name is Suntop,” he repeated.
Haken didn’t hear. He traced a stone lock of hair on the sarcophagus. “She was always so full of life – not like the broken creatures I met in my travels and gathered close as my followers. She had a vitality no one could dim. She was... like a living shard of the Palace.”
“Haken. Please, tell me everything. Can you start at the beginning – after Timmain drove you from the Palace?”
Haken reflexively touched his left shoulder. “She bit my arm clean off and left me to die in the underbrush outside the Palace. ‘Leave now or die,’ she said. Hah. She wanted me to die... die in the forest, drained of my life’s blood, nothing but a worthless piece of meat for her wolves...”
Haken’s babbled words and half-clear sendings formed pictures in Suntop’s mind. He saw Haken lying on the ground, trying desperately to staunch the flow of blood from his severed arm. Timmain’s jaws had crushed his humerus, and shredded all the tendons and blood vessels. The little flitrins – the Preservers – buzzed around Haken. One – the black one Suntop had seen earlier – spit wrapstuff around the bleeding stump and sealed the wound. But too much blood had already stained the ground. It would summon predators and scavengers alike. Gradually Haken pulled himself up off the ground and limped away. The woods grew darker, the branches gnarled and dripping with dark moss. Somewhere in the distance, wolves howled.
Haken was alone, helpless as any wounded beast. Every night he tore off the wrapstuff and tried to heal the wound. Every night the black flitrin had to wrap it up again. At length Haken sealed it up just enough to keep infection at bay. By day he struggled to find enough to eat. He shaped branches and bones into crude weapons and speared small game.
He hated the taste of raw flesh. The warm blood revolted him, and the meat only made him sick. At length he remembered that fire could cook meat and render it safer to eat. His fire-starting powers were the only gifts that remained strong, and every night he cooked what little meat he caught.
He fled south, towards the waning rays of the sun. Winter was approaching. He remembered the seasons of a world, and he knew that he would never survive without help. So Haken did what he knew best. He stuck at the humans. He slaughtered an entire pack of them five days’ travel south of the Palace and took their poorly tanned furs and their stores of food. Suntop watched in horror as though he were there. Children fled into the forest and women screamed piteously as Haken cut down the powerful menfolk and stole their furs off their backs. He took all he could, and left no survivors to seek vengeance. He shaped himself a small cave as the first snow began to fall. He survived.
“I survived!” he hissed in the dream-vision. “I learned to kill as skilfully as Timmain. I learned to enjoy the ‘song’ of death and conquest. As long as I was the conqueror, as long as the darkness touched something besides me. Was that was Timmain was trying to teach us? Or had she in her foolish wide-eyed ‘love’ never felt the true pangs of near-starvation?”
Winter took hold. Haken sought out a larger cave, one already hollowed out by the wind and rain. The Preservers wrapped up every new piece of meat he brought back, until he had amassed a large store of food to see him through the winter.
One day in the midst of a blizzard Haken went hunting. He came upon a sort of prey he had never expected. Five half-dead Firstcomers lay in the snow. A crackling aura of magic hung in the air around them... rotten magic dispersing into the blizzard. They had tried to start a fire to warm themselves, but their powers had failed them. A golden-haired female lay on her back, her lips and fingertips already blue from cold. A man lay next to her, his arm locked about her waist. A red-haired couple crouched against a snow-covered rock, trying desperately to keep themselves awake. The female was shivering uncontrollably under her thin pink gown. The fifth elf, a lone male, was still struggling, feebly, to light a fire out of thin air.
Haken stared at them for a long moment. For a split second he considered leaving them there. They had not seen him yet. And they were nearly dead anyway. But he couldn’t turn away from the pitiful sight. And so he bent his head to the wind and crept closer. The golden-haired maiden was the frailest, and he easily drew her up against his body. She was mumbling something faintly.
He carried her back to his cave. She was barely breathing. “Flitrin,” he commanded one of the Preservers. “Do.”
The blue-black Preserver hastened to the unconscious woman and wrapped her in glossy threads. Haken shivered, turned around, and hiked back into the storm.
He brought them back one by one, and had the Preservers seal them up tightly. They could survive in wrapstuff until the cold ebbed. He set the cocoons aside and waited for the weather to turn. But his patience was thin. He longed for the sounds of other elves. The foolish chatter of Preservers was no consolation. Indeed, his favourite one was the little black one who seldom spoke.
Haken had once thought that he enjoyed solitude. He knew better now.
Finally, he could bear the silence no longer. He chose the largest cocoon and cut it open next to the fire.
A red-haired male slowly awoke. Haken draped the body in furs as the elf began to regain his wits. Slowly, the man’s shivers began to abate. Finally he looked up at Haken with clear sight.
“Who...?”
“I am Haken. I am – I was, one of the Circle of Nine.”
“Yes... of course.”
“I don’t remember you.”
“Sunan. I was... cocooned.”
“A Navigator? Surely not.”
“No. Only a sleeper... meant to waken at landfall... but the burrowers...”
“I know.”
“Where...?”
“I found you in the snow. The flitrins are here with me. We cocooned you until the storm had passed.”
“The others... they were with me..”
“Still cocooned. They’re all alive... for now.”
“Are there... other... survivors?”
Haken lowered his head. “Not here.”
Gradually, Sunan recovered his strength. By the end of the night, he was no longer shivering so painfully. By the next day, he could rise from his bed of furs. A few days later, Haken cut the next Firstcomer out. It was the blond male, Mora. The next day, Tillin, the pink-robed female, was set free. A few days later, Dauri and Berith were released. Berith was so emaciated that she was re-cocooned twice, when it seemed she would die of exhaustion. But at last she too began to recover.
“You saved us from the clawing darkness, Haken,” Sunan said. “You have kept us alive. Will you be our leader?”
It was all Haken had ever wanted – to be depended upon by others, to be recognized as provider and protector. Of course he said yes. And he taught the others how to hunt for themselves, how to protect themselves from the wild beasts. By summer they were strong enough to survive the next winter. The Preservers stored enough meat and plants to see them all through the cold. As summer ebbed into autumn they were strong enough to pool all their shaping talents and make a “throne chamber” in their cave.
It was a reminder of what they had once had, and of what Haken swore to recover.
As summer turned to autumn, Haken and Tillin were collecting nuts for storage when they happened to look over at each other. Suddenly something... akin to hunger or thirst deeply rooted in their bones, swept over them both. They were both terrified. Neither food nor water could quench it. For moons they agonized, unsure what would satisfy the strange hunger.
They had never felt Recognition before.
Finally, as they watched the bucks rutting in autumn, as they watched the mated pairs of foxes seek out new burrows, they understood. And fear and uncertainty gave way to sheer horror.
“We are no better than beasts now!” Haken raged.
They left their first joining filled with self-loathing. Tillin felt violated, and resented the unborn child now growing in her belly like a parasite. And Haken was ashamed of his scarred flesh, his mangled stump of a left arm. He was disgusted that he couldn’t simply grow a new arm. He refused to undress more than was necessary. He refused to sleep near Tillin for many months afterwards. They never joined again.
The entire tribe spent an uneasy winter. No one knew how long it would take the baby to be born. No one knew what it would look like. Would it resemble the form they had taken now, or would it have the elongated head and hairless gray skin of their true shapes? Would it even be born living? No one knew anything about babies. Haken had been the last High One born on their dying homeworld. By the next summer, Tillin’s stomach began to swell, almost painfully, and the growing baby kicked constantly. Tillin’s terror grew with her appetite.
Even as the last winter was colder than the first, the summers grew hotter, and when Tillin looked up from her gathering tasks and saw a lone elfin figure striding towards them, a small bundle in its arms, she dismissed it as a heat mirage. Then the figure came closer, and she took it for Berith. But it wasn’t Berith. It was another blond elf maiden.
**Haken!** Tillin sent frantically.
Haken came rushing out of the cave as Tillin warily escorted the newcomer towards their camp. Gibra stood before him, still clad in the tatters of her old green gown, a little baby in her arms.
“I see...” he stammered. “I see Timmain’s tribe has discovered the uses of the flesh before us.”
Gibra smiled, almost embarrassed. “Haken. I thought I would find you alone, not leader of your own tribe. This... this is my child, Vol.”
“Vollllll...” Haken mocked, drawing out the sound. “And who is the father? Ah, with eyes like that, it must be Deir’s whelp.”
“I came to show you the miracle of new life... but I see you and your kin have discovered it already. Or you will, in about another year’s time. Oh, this world breeds fine children, Haken. Timmain has already given birth to a fine daughter at the start of spring. Please, will you not lay aside your old grudges and come back to the Circle?”
“Never. I swear, if Timmain and I cross paths again, one of us will die.”
Gibra looked about. “Might not your tribe wish to meet their kin?”
Tillin answered quickly. “Haken is our lord. We follow his lead in all things. He saved us when we would have died on this world. If he says that Timmain is no friend of ours, then we believe him.”
“Go home, Gibra,” Haken said. “Take little Vollllll with you.”
But instead Gibra remained. Just for a month or two, she said. “I can teach you about childbirth. I can share other wisdom as well.” Then she said she would remain until winter passed. “I can’t survive a trip back in this snow.” Then another season. “I should stay until Tillin’s child is born.”
Gibra was there when Tillin gave birth. She gathered leaves for Tillin to chew to ease the pain. She coached Tillin through the delivery. And she held up Haken’s firstborn child.
“A daughter,” she smiled.
Haken stared down at the baby. She had Tillin’s auburn hair and Haken’s gold eyes. She was so frail... a sudden cold wind could kill her. Gingerly, Haken crooked his arm to hold the baby against his chest.
“We will name her Vreya,” he said, and his voice faltered in a way it never had before. “And I swear, we will recover the Palace... for her, for Voll, and the other children who will come. They will know what it means to be High Ones.”
Within a month of Vreya’s birth, Haken Recognized Gibra.
Two years later, Haken’s son Krey was born.
The others began to Recognize each other. It seemed that new baby was being born every other season. And each year the winter snows grew heavier. An ice age was sweeping over the World of Two Moons.
“We have to regain the Palace,” Haken said, as he held his newest daughter Imalee. “My children deserve better than this squalor.” He looked down at Berith, almost a year pregnant by Mora. It would be her second child. “We must take back our Palace-ship, no matter how much human blood we must spill. By the time Berith’s child is born, we will have regained his birthright.”
This time no one disagreed. Not even Gibra.
“Berith and Voll can remain with our young. The others will follow me. With a force of six armed adults we will surely reclaim the Palace. I took it once, alone and unarmed, and I would have held it were it not for the wolf-bitch. This time, we will keep it. And we will gather all who wish to leave this wretched world. Timmain can stay here and die if she loves the world so much. We will build a better life for our children.”
The force of six set out for the Palace. They found the meadows surrounding their ship encrusted with ice, even in late spring. But the humans lingered there, bundled under furs and their heavy body hair. The elves struck with spears and stones, as Haken had once before. Haken, Sunan and Dauri led the first wave while Gibra, Tillin and Mora raced in as reinforcements.
It had only been fourteen years since the Palace crashed. It should have been easy. But the humans had tripled in number. And they had learned by Haken’s own example that they could forge spearheads of bone and mount them on wooden shafts. The elves fought their way within a hand’s breadth of the door before they were turned away.
“We’ll try again,” Haken said. “Under the cover of darkness.”
And they did. And when they failed again, they charged during a dark thunderstorm. Seven assaults on the Palace, and seven failures. And then, during their final, heartbreaking retreat, Mora was mortally wounded. They carried him high into the trees and pooled their talents to heal him. But they failed, and Mora breathed his last.
They left him high in the tree, so the roving wolves could not feed on his flesh. And they limped home to their cave. Haken couldn’t find the strength to smile when his little ten-year-old daughter raced up to hug him.
“We can always try again,” Sunan said. But Haken didn’t seem to hear him.
“We are the Rootless Ones, Haken,” Sunan continued. “Though we live the forest, we can always ‘replant’ ourselves elsewhere, perhaps one day among the stars.”
Haken could only lie down on his fur bed and stare at the cave wall. What was the use of living only to die like forest beasts? He scarcely noticed the passing of the seasons, from summer to autumn to winter. He hardly ate. The others feared he was losing his will to live.
Voll sat down next to him one day. “Father,” he began softly. “You are right. Why must we suffer out here in the wilderness? The world will change us if we let it, we’ve already seen that. But why must we let it? The Palace is lost, but we can create a new Palace for ourselves. Is that not what elves do? We rebuild, we reshape. We can build a bastion against this world’s corrupting ways – one where we are the masters, not the helpless beasts.”
Haken rolled over and looked up at his adopted son. Tears glimmered in his eyes. “Dear Voll... how well you know my heart’s desire.”
That spring they moved further south, towards the mountain peak on the western horizon. Its blue-gray peak always pierced the clouded sky like a shadowed beacon. In time they settled on the north-western flank, above the many natural caves and crags. Haken and Dauri pooled their rock-shaping powers and began to expand upon the caves to create multiple chambers. It was slow work at first. But it seemed that the deeper they burrowed into the rock, the richer their magic flowed. Within a few years they lived in almost unimagined comfort. The children lived together in a huge nursery, filled with exotic rock sculptures and lined with softly-tanned furs. Tillin and Sunan lifemated, and lived in a room together. Haken slept alone in the deepest chamber.
He had Recognized all three women, but he had no mate.
“Tillin and Sunan have mated,” Gibra pleaded. “I’m certain it’s only a matter of time before Berith and Dauri do as well.”
“Are you so certain? I think I see Berith looking at Tillin’s boy sometimes.”
“What matters, Haken, is that we are not meant to live alone. We have Recognized twice. We have two beautiful children together. Clearly we are well suited. Even when we stood in the circle, we were perfectly matched. Will you not mate with me?”
“If it’s joining you seek, Gibra, then look elsewhere.”
“Does the bloodsong not flow in your veins, Haken?”
“Not for you. Not for anyone I have yet seen.”
Gibra tossed her head. “You may regret your choice later.”
“You forget that I am lord of you as I am lord of all the others!”
Gibra drew back. She remembered the last time he had turned such rage on her: long ago in the days after the Palace’s crash. She turned her head and let him stalk off. Their tribe had made such progress in the last few years. Berith and her son Aosir were now the finest hunters of the tribe. Tillin and Vreya had designed softer, more civilized leathers, closer to the clothes the Firstcomers had worn before. Their new Palace was a success. But still Haken brooded, trapped in the nightmares of the past.
The day began just like any other. Haken sat in the audience chamber, perched on the little ledge he had shaped for himself. Gibra stood a few paces away, waiting to pounce on his merest wish. Then Sunan and Aosir entered the chamber with news. They had come across another elf in the course of their hunting.
Haken glanced up as they led the newcomer into the audience chamber. It was a maiden, dressed in dark brown leathers, her face shadowed by the pointed hood sewn to her tunic. Strands of white-gold hair fell out from the hood. Haken narrowed his eyes. She seemed achingly familiar, yet different, like an echo of dream. He drew himself up from his ledge-seat, and stared into her golden eyes. They were wolf eyes.
“Who are you?” he demanded.
“I am Chani, daughter of Aerth,” she said calmly. “I come seeking Haken and Gibra.”
“Chani!” Gibra blurted out. “I was there when you were born. My Voll was born less than three moon-dances later.”
“You are Timmain’s child!” Haken raged.
“She is the one who bore me, yes.” Chani brushed her hood back, revealing long fair hair loosely bound back in a tail. “But she is not what I would call my mother.”
“How is she?” Gibra interrupted.
Chani shrugged. “She spends most of her time lost in the wolfsong. She forgets half the time that she is really an elf – that she Recognized my father and bore me. Her kin are the wolfpack – her mate is a huge brown wolf. Sometimes she comes to bring us food and I don’t think she realizes that I am her daughter.”
“Why are you here?” Haken asked.
“Timmain wishes to turn us all into two-legged wolves. But her way is not mine. I have grown up with stories of Haken and Gibra and Vol, who all chose a different path. I come here to seek a place in your tribe.”
Haken slowly paced towards her. He watched her eyes carefully for that telltale sign of revulsion as her gaze fell on his missing arm, the stump hidden under his little half-cloak. But he found no such disgb vvvust in her eyes. Her gaze was clear and steady.
He began to pace around her, examining her. He saw subtle hints of Timmain in her jawline, her cheekbones, her lips. “Why should I believe you?” he hissed in her left ear. “For all I know you are Timmain’s spy. You have come to see what has become of me, and you have come to steal my followers back to your lord.”
**My “lord” is a snarl-toothed beast! I do not follow her way. I come to follow yours. I come to learn what it means to be an elf.**
Haken flinched at the intensity of the sending. Then he waved his hand. “Paugh. I don’t want wolf whelps in my mountain.”
“I can hunt. I have a new weapon – a sling that shoots stones more accurately than any arm. I can teach you how to use it. I can be an invaluable member of your tribe.”
“Timmain’s blood flows true in your veins. Your mother condemned us to this nightmarish world. She destroyed the only chance we had to escape. And she maimed me!” Now he flexed the little stump under his shoulder-cloak. “Why should I so much as offer shelter to her child?” He came around her right side and stared deep into her eyes with that glare that intimidated all of his followers.
And then it struck. Once again the sudden urge of Recognition caught his breath. Only now it was far more powerful than it had been with Tillin, Gibra or Berith. It was something for which he had no name.
Chani’s pupils dilated in amazement. Haken began to draw back. He knew well what would flash through her mind. She would think of his missing arm, of his miserably flawed form and she would be repulsed at the thought of coupling with him.
**So... this is what Father meant...** Chani’s thoughts echoed in his mind.
Tears began to well in her misty gold eyes. But they were not tears of sadness or shame.
She was smiling.
Haken swallowed hard. Gibra was babbling something behind him. But he didn’t hear her. He held out his hand to Chani. She took it without hesitation. He turned and led her out of the audience chamber. They exchanged neither words nor sendings as they walked to Haken’s room.
He closed the crudely-hinged door and barred it with the equally simple wooden lock. A soft light from a bear-fat candle filled the chamber. They stared at each other for a long moment, suddenly shy. At length Chani inched forward and raised a hand to Haken’s tousled black hair. She cupped his jaw in her hands, then searched the planes of his face with fingertips. She leaned up on tiptoe and kissed him lightly on the lips.
Haken drew back, puzzled. “What...?”
Chani smiled. “Something we learned.”
Haken returned her smile shyly. He raised his hand to stroke her cheek, then wrapped his arm around her shoulders and drew her closer. Chani kissed him again, and Haken returned the embrace more confidently. Only now was he beginning to understand what had driven Tillin and Sunan to lifemate when a simple joining and parting of ways would have satisfied Recognition just as easily.
As the embrace grew more ardent, Chani reached for the clasps of his tunic. Haken pulled away. “No...” he breathed. “I... don’t want you to see...”
“I won’t turn away.”
“You will... it’s...”
**I won’t. I promise.**
There was such confidence in her sending, a clarity of thought that was lacking in Haken’s tribe... the sending of an elf who knew herself, who lived without fear.
Chani reached for the clasp of his tunic again. This time he did not draw back.
“Chani... she stood so proudly....” Haken’s broken narration continued. “Berith and Vreya made her beautiful gowns of fur and feathers... so beautiful... as befit a lord of our mountain. I tried to show... show her... the riches we had once enjoyed. The children... the little ones... oh, how they loved her. Everyone loved her... all but Gibra. Rage, Gibra... still you rage. But you knew you lost. I chose a mate, and it wasn’t you.”
He looked up at Suntop, and the haze of memory misted his eyes. “We had two children – beautiful Winnowill and you, Runya. Why didn’t we have more? More – I had hoped that Blue Mountain would overflow with our fledglings. But no... no... I kept Recognizing others... children of the Firstcomers... new Firstcomers who fled to our mountain when the ice came. The ice... it came closer every year... ever year–
“I sired ten children to women I did not love! But Chani and I had but two. No matter. I knew joy on this world. I knew peace. Peace! And pride. Pride in my fledglings... such a healer was Winnowill – so skilled that she could have outdone Aerth in skill even before the Palace crashed. Runya, you became a fine hunter and an expert rockshaper. You Recognized the daughter of Tillin and Aosir, and you had so many fine children...”
“Humans! Humans came back... yes. And Tillin died. Tillin... I can see you... but don’t worry... we avenged you. We did! We massacred them all! All of them! But Sunan lost his love for Blue Mountain... he wanted to leave. He wanted to be Rootless again. Roam the forest – paugh! Fine, Rootless Ones. Go and die in the forest. Oh... but no... Vreya...” he held out his hand. “My firstborn... daughter... stay here. Don’t go with them. Don’t go to your death...”
Suntop bit his lip as we watched Haken cry out to his long-dead kin. He wanted nothing more than to offer Haken a warm embrace. But he didn’t dare try to break whatever spell had hold of the Firstcomer. It was too dangerous – for him... and the others.
“You died, Runya. Do you remember...?” Haken smiled sadly. “You went out hunting. You wanted to tame the giant hawks.... But you were too impulsive... too... too confident. You died, fighting to subdue your chosen mount. You fell... too weak to use your powers and save yourself. You died....
“See what comes of trying to live out there... in the dark, untrustworthy world?” he raged. “No! We have to go deeper! We had to seal out death itself. Oh... Winnowill... how your heart was broken. You could not save him... all you could do was build on your powers... build... build... so this never happens again.
“But it did happen again!” he wept. He collapsed against the wall, and curled into a defensive ball.
Suntop licked his lips. He couldn’t leave Haken there, frozen in his pain. So Suntop began to speak, gingerly picking up the tale.
“They were shaping a large archway high overhead.”
“Yes...” Haken breathed. “It would form a staircase... stairs for Winnowill. And it would connect the upper levels... with the reflecting pools. You loved reflecting pools, Chani.”
He was silent. Suntop prompted him again. He had to take Haken through the pain. Only then could healing begin.
“The arch crumbled...”
“Fools! They didn’t know... didn’t sense it. Weakness in the rock. Chani!”
“What happened then, Haken?”
“Couldn’t move! Couldn’t breathe. Chani... she was gone.”
“And then what happened?”
“Winnowill... as they were clearing the rubble... she rushed in. She wanted to find you, Chani. But you were gone... gone. Winnowill poured... poured out her soul... nothing... it was too late. Winnowill healed all the injuries – for nothing. What was a restored shell without the soul?”
“And then?”
Haken only stared into space.
“You came here, Haken. How? How did you come here?”
“I spent... forever... staring... staring at Chani. One of the Preservers was there. I turned to it. I said ‘do.’ And it sealed Chani up. She would not rot. No. She deserved more. And... and I took her... I took my Chani... and I went deep under the ground. I shaped the rock as I went... for days. I travelled... forever.
“Somehow... I came to rest here. I made a bed for Chani. I lay down on the floor... just over there, Runya. And I let Flitrin wrap me up next. And Chani and I slept together... and we dreamed...”
Haken paused. He glanced up at Suntop “I knew no time until Blue Mountain fell and a piece of rock broke from the ceiling and pierced my cocoon, waking me from my sleep. How long in between? How long, Runya?
“More than double eight eights times eight eights.”
Haken laughed hoarsely. “Then the mountain fell, and a little piece of stone cut through my cocoon. I awoke... and I wept. I had hoped never to wake again. But then... oh, then, Runya, I felt something... wondrous. I felt the Palace reawaken. I felt a light beckoning me as never before. Somehow, the power of my people have set the walls of our ship afire with light – with power! Can you feel it, Runya? Of course you can. I see now you are aglow with its light.”
Should I tell him? thought Suntop. No. No, Haken killed to take the Palace once. What would he do now?
“Tell me, spirit... did my children thrive?” Haken asked. “Did... Winnowill? Surely you have watched over your sister. Did she thrive? Did she ever... have a child?”
“Yes...” Suntop nodded. “She... she was the finest healer ever. She... ended all death in Blue Mountain... until in the end Blue Mountain became like the Palace, and the Gliders became deathless and birthless like High Ones. But she did have a son... a very powerful... very unique son, like none ever seen before.”
Lies, Suntop thought. But kind lies. I haven’t the heart to give him the harsh truth. And I shudder to think what it might do to him.
“Humans came to settled by Blue Mountain, and Winnowill and Voll tamed them into willing servants – as... they were always meant to serve us. And... she dreamed of expanding the Egg into a new Palace. She... she could not do it, and the mountain fell instead. But she came so close – so close to achieving her vision. And though her dream shattered, I think she died at peace. I have touched her spirit since then, and she is very happy.”
“And Chani? Oh, have you touched your mother’s spirit?”
“I’m sorry, no. I... I cannot always reach any spirit.”
“I am a coward...” Haken breathed.
“Don’t say that.”
“I should have gone... gone to join her long ago. But I’m so afraid, Runya. Afraid of the darkness. Afraid that I will be lost... unable to find her. I’ve been in this skin for far too long, and I fear to cast it aside. But why life? What is the point, Runya? All my children are dead. My descendants... all wiped from the face of this blighted world.” Tears welled in his eyes. “My dream is broken. Everything is broken.” He crouched on the ground. “Is this how our quest ends? Our dream to rebuild the Palace lying in ruins, our bodies bound to this sphere of dirt and death... all darkness? Oh, Runya... I am lost. Chani... Chani.... where are you?”
Suntop watched him retreat further into his shell of misery. He couldn’t bear to watch Haken slowly disintegrate. He couldn’t stand to see an elf – any elf – without hope.
“Haken!” he said. “Haken, look at me. The dream is not broken. Your children are not all dead. Haken, look at me. Your grandson, Aurek lives still. He has rebuilt the Egg of Six Spheres. Did you see the other tall elves with Timmain? The winged elf is Tyldak, one of your descendants. The other is Aroree, your great-great-granddaughter. Winnowill’s son is still alive, even now he is building new tunnels underground.”
Haken glanced up. Suntop knelt down in front of him. “Look at me, Haken. Feel my skin.” He took Haken’s hand and pressed it to his cheek. “I’m not a spirit. I’m not your son. I’m alive. My name is Suntop, and I’m your many-many-times-descendant. Your firstborn, Vreya: she and the Rootless Ones lived for many years in the forests south of here, until finally their children fled the growing numbers of humans to journeyed into a bright desert where they founded Sorrow’s End. And there they lived and thrived for ten thousand years. You are the great-great-grandfather of generations of elves!”
Haken blinked. “How do you know these things, Runya?”
“Because I have seen them, because I have learned them, because I have travelled the face of this world and visited all its lands. Our kind have reached a second golden age. We are free as never before.”
“Free? And you know this?”
**In sending there is only truth. Hear my words, Haken. Hear the truth. We thrive! All elves – those who choose this world and those who choose the stars, all live together and flourish as never before. Come out of this darkness, Haken. Come rediscover this world.**
“The stars...” Haken breathed. “But none can choose the stars. The choice was taken away from us long ago.”
**Limitless choices are laid before us now.**
“But how could that be... unless the Palace is truly reborn...?” Haken stared deep into Suntop’s eyes. “Because it is reborn!” he cried as he read the truth in the youth’s eyes. “Deceiver! The Palace is whole again! The Palace is here!”
“Haken–” Suntop began.
Haken silenced him with a sharp bolt of magic that threw him against the far wall. Pain lanced through Suntop’s mind, shattering his concentration before he could counter with a sending star. The agony was so intense – sharper than any of Winnowill’s black sendings. The youth moaned weakly as he lost consciousness and slumped against the floor.
“Haken!” Timmain screamed. “No!”
“Suntop!” Quicksilver cried. “He’s hurt! Ekuar, shape the rock. Let us into Haken’s room. Hurry – Suntop needs us!”
Ekuar touched his three-fingered hand to the rock and it melted away to reveal the staircase leading into the lower chamber. Quicksilver sprang over the crouched rock-shaper and raced into the room, her sword drawn. She found Suntop lying against the near wall, slowly beginning to recover his wits.
**Malin!** she called his soulname, reviving him. **Malin, are you hurt?**
“No... no... just stunned. Haken...?”
Quicksilver looked up. The room was deserted. There was no sign of Haken, or of the dark Preserver. The sarcophagus lid was gone, melted away by Haken’s powers. Quicksilver glanced into the deep stone casket and found it empty.
“Where did he go?”
“Chani!” Timmain raced to the empty tomb. “He took her! Why?”
Quicksilver helped Suntop to his feet. “Unh...” he moaned. “He... he touched my mind, he realized I had been hiding the truth. The Palace... he knows it’s here.”
“Why did he take the body?” Skot wrinkled his nose. “It doesn’t make any sense.”
“He’s going to take the Palace from us,” Timmain cried. “We cannot allow him to set foot inside it. He will repeat all the mistakes of the past... and perhaps more we cannot imagine. We must return – now!”
“Let’s go!” Suntop said. “No time to track Haken’s path through the rocks. We go back the way we came.”
Elfquest copyright 2014 Warp Graphics, Inc. Elfquest, its logos, characters, situations, all related indicia, and their distinctive likenesses are trademarks of Warp Graphics, Inc. All rights reserved. Some dialogue taken from Elfquest comics. All such dialogue copyright 2014 Warp Graphics, Inc. All rights reserved. Alternaverse characters and insanity copyright 2014 Jane Senese and Erin Roberts.