The Shadow Elf Read online

  “You couldn’t carry me, Dracolin. It won’t work. Save yourself.”

  “No! They’ll only keep me long enough for a prisoner exchange, if they manage to take me prisoner,” he said, trying to maneuver in front of her legs without dislodging her from her shaky holdings. “But they won’t give you up. If they get hold of you, they could hide you anywhere. I won’t allow it.”

  She nodded, but he could tell she had no faith in his plan. Though he had little faith in it either.

  Suddenly, rocks rained down from above. Dracolin glanced up. The prince and Balon lobbed good-sized stones at the river elves, which wasn’t a good sign. They wouldn’t have done so until the river elves were within dart range.

  “Maneuver in closer to where the female is!” one of the river elves shouted.

  “I can’t get closer with the shadow elves bombarding us with rocks!” another responded.

  “Get below the girl! They can’t throw the rocks in her direction! But we can’t tranquilize her until someone is there to catch her!”

  Persephonice grabbed onto Dracolin’s neck and gasped as she nearly fell. He released one of the rocks he held and grabbed her leg. “Wrap your legs around my waist.”

  She did as she was told, holding onto him for dear life with a fierce grip. He hoped he hadn’t steered her wrong as he began the climb again. And yet they seemed to make better progress, as he grew closer to the top edge.

  Curses from river elves followed as some of the rocks made their marks.

  “Hurry,” Balon shouted.

  Dracolin was hurrying. He had never climbed up a cliff this fast in his life, and yet he knew they were far from safe. All it took was one well-placed dart to bring them both down. If they hit Persephonice only, she’d lose her grip on him, and he was sure he’d lose her for good.

  “Aim your stone at that one, Balon, hurry!” the prince shouted.

  Then there was silence. No rocks bounced off the stony riverbank. No elves, river or shadow, said a word. And Dracolin feared the worst when Persephonice’s strong grip on him began to loosen.

  ***

  As soon as the dart struck her back, Persephonice felt her body slipping away into a world of dreams.

  “Hold on!” she heard Dracolin shout to her from far away. “Don’t let go!”

  She clung to his neck as hard as she could, but her legs had lost any feeling. Were they still wrapped around his waist? She couldn’t tell.

  “She’s been hit!” a river elf shouted. “Don’t hit her again. Aim for the shadow elf!”

  “Persephonice, stay with me!” Dracolin said. Though she thought he might have shouted the words, it sounded more like a whisper now.

  The roar of the river continued to drown out other sounds, though she imagined it to be like the engine of her spacecraft, droning on and on.

  What planet would she next experience? What kind of people?

  “You’re almost here!” the prince shouted. “Just a little farther and I can reach her.”

  “Hurry,” Balon shouted, his voice in a panic. “Hurry!”

  Persephonice closed her eyes as she pressed against Dracolin’s warm hard body. And then she slipped away.

  “Persephonice!” Dracolin shouted, the anguish evident in his voice.

  “Dracolin!” Balon coaxed. “We can do nothing for her now. Hurry, before they try for you again.”

  She felt herself falling, too fast. She used her innate ability to slow her fall, just like she could use her powers to levitate objects. Yet, she couldn’t judge how far she was from the ground as blurry as it appeared.

  “What is she?” a river elf asked, as he caught her midair.

  “What about the shadow elf?” another elf asked.

  The one who seemed to be the leader waved his hand. “Leave him. It’s the girl we wanted.”

  “But what about the prisoner exchange?”

  “Jolla can wait a little while longer. He shouldn’t have been in their forest scrounging nuts.”

  “Is she a land-bound mermaid?” one of the elves asked.

  And then everything grew quiet and very dark, as if Persephonice had drifted into outer space and all of the spacecraft’s lights had suddenly been switched off.

  Chapter 4

  Dracolin had to return to his kingdom to seek permission to rescue Persephonice. He assumed the king would want her just as much as he did. But what he was hearing didn’t suit him at all.

  “We can’t just go into the river elves’ territory whenever we want. It could mean an all out war,” King Sar said. He glanced at Dracolin’s father and chief advisor. “Don’t you agree, Palmoran?”

  Dracolin’s father scratched his chin. “Yes, sire. Son, you must listen to your king in this matter.”

  Prince Cronus shook his head. “But, my lord father,” he said to the king, “she is ours, not theirs! We found her first!”

  Dracolin’s stomach clenched. She was his, not anyone else’s. Though he was certain neither the king nor his father would accept her fully for what she was, whatever that was. But as far as he could tell, she was alone in their world and defenseless. He wouldn’t leave her to the river elves.

  The king said, “What do we know about this creature?”

  She was warm and soft and shared the sweetest kiss. Dracolin noticed everyone waiting for him to respond. “She is a…an overseer who lost her mate.”

  The king leaned back on his throne. “An overseer? What is that?”

  Dracolin shook his head. He knew no more what she was than anyone else did.

  “You do not entertain the notion that she would be your wife, do you, Dracolin?” the king asked, his voice darkened.

  Shadow elves took shadow elves as marriage partners. In a rare case, a shadow elf married a high elf. But never did a shadow elf wed a river elf, and certainly never a creature that wasn’t even an elf.

  Dracolin glanced at his father who narrowed his darkened brown eyes at him. Facing the king, Dracolin said, “I pledged my protection to her.”

  The king’s mouth dropped open. Then he frowned. “To a creature we have never seen or even heard of before? How could you do such a thing? From the sounds of it, you know very little of what she can do. She might be a danger to our society.”

  “She can swim, she said.”

  “Swim? Prince Cronus says she looks like a legendary mermaid without the fishtail. And her voice carries like their sweet, luring songs.” The king took a deep breath. “Not a mermaid, surely with legs. Do you think she’s a water sprite of some sort?”

  “No, sire. She’s a land creature. Only she knows how to swim. She’s very elflike, only smaller than our kind.”

  “And can fall forty feet without injury? She sounds like a sprite. You know how mischievous they can be. Has she cast a spell over you?”

  “No, sire. She is not small enough to be a sprite, or a pixie.” The part about casting a spell over him, he wasn’t certain. Even her voice seemed to call to him. Did she have the same affect on his companions? Why had he kissed her? If she’d been some other race of elf even, he wouldn’t have thought of doing such a thing. Why this creature? Unless she had bewitched him. Maybe she would do the same to any shadow elf should he get too close to her.

  “In the northern reaches, they say the sprites are as tall as our females.” The king glanced over at Balon, an avid reader of everything he could research, and he nodded in agreement. “Very well. The matter is decided. You, Dracolin, will be paid handsomely for removing the obstruction from the river. Our wells are again full. But as to this other matter, leave the land mermaid well enough alone.”

  He motioned to dismiss them. “Next case?”

  Dracolin bowed to the king, then his father. Afterward, he stalked out of the throne room, determined to rescue Persephonice. If nothing more, he had to find out what she was. Then he vowed to discover if she bewitched everyone or just him.

  “Did you really tell her you would serve as her protector?” Balon asked as he
hurried to join him.

  “Someone has to keep the girl out of trouble.”

  The prince soon joined them. “You were paid well for the river job, though it seems the river elves did your work for you. But you would have been paid even more for the girl, had you returned her to my father.”

  “I tried,” Dracolin said under his breath, still irritated that the prince would think he’d rescue the girl, just to turn her over to the king. He still couldn’t believe they’d been so close to the top of the edge of the cliff when the river elf had managed to shoot Persephonice.

  “I couldn’t believe it when that short little elf hit her,” Balon said. Venom laced his words. “I’d even hit his arm once with a good sized rock before that, really hard. I think it made him even more determined to get her.”

  “Every pair of eyes focused on that dart as it struck her in the back. Except for the river rushing in the background, there was no other sound. No one spoke a word, issued orders, nothing, as everyone waited to see what happened next,” the prince said. “I’ve never seen anything stop a battle in progress so profoundly.”

  “She held on tightly for a few seconds after that, but I could feel her strength slipping away.” Dracolin shook his head, his heart aching to think he’d been so close to getting her to safety, then lost her. “We were so close.”

  He entered his suite and hurried into his weapon’s room where swords of various sizes and shapes hung on the wall along with bows, quivers of arrows, and shields. In one corner, several staffs sat in a stand. He grabbed his favorite sword, exchanging it for the utility one he’d carried earlier.

  “You’re not thinking of disobeying my father, are you?” the prince asked, disbelief evident in his voice.

  “I am fulfilling my promise.”

  “Serving as the girl’s protector.” Balon patted his bow. “I made no promise to either the king or the girl. I guess that means I’m just tagging along for the adventure.”

  The prince shuffled his feet as he scowled at the two of them. Then he pulled a staff from Dracolin’s stash of weapons. “Everyone knows we always travel as a threesome when it comes to a battle. Shall we raid the kitchen first? I always fight better on a full stomach.”

  ***

  Persephonice opened her eyes as the sound of water flowing over stones woke her. The sweet fragrance of water lilies drifted to her as she stared at the room she lay in.

  Except for one wall with a door, there were no other walls, just pillars that helped to hold up a vaulted, marbled ceiling. A steady stream of water rushed down the open areas as if the room had been built behind a waterfall and the other three walls were made of water. Through the screen of water, she made out a river. Despite the cool fine spray covering the moss-coated walls, her bed remained warm and dry.

  But where was she? Because of the whooshing sound of the water, she had expected to open her eyes and find herself in the shower stall of her spacecraft room. And then it dawned on her not only had her people left her behind on this primitive elf world, the shadow elf who had tried to get her to safety…

  Dracolin!

  What had become of him? Her heart sank with the notion he’d come to harm.

  She closed her eyes and tried to think as she rested against the satiny blue sheets covering the soft mattress. Was she now the prisoner of the river elves or had she and Dracolin made it to the top of the cliffs after all? Was she now resting in his kingdom?

  She glanced at the white marble floor. Blue streaks swirled across the surface in artistic sweeps. On the solid wall, four paintings of mermaids and mermen hung. They swam in the aqua water, or rested on boulders jetting out of the waves. Now she could see why Dracolin had thought she was a mermaid. Both the males and females had long red hair, either wet and darker from the water—dangling about their fish-scaled tail—or dry and lighter as they basked in the sun on their rocky homes.

  No, she remembered falling. She took a deep breath to quiet her fear. She was a prisoner.

  Disheartened, she eased out of bed, not quite feeling herself yet. Undoubtedly the effects of the tranquilizer hadn’t worn off.

  She glanced at the shimmering blue gowns she wore; three layers thick, though the two outer ones were sheer. Not good for climbing cliffs.

  Voices spoken in an outer corridor forced a chill into her bones. “I still say our men should have been more careful. The girl has been unconscious for two days now. The amount of the tranquilizer was excessive. What if she never comes out of—” The gray-haired man quit speaking as a younger man pushed the door open for him.

  For a second, the two men stared at her with their mouths agape. She leaned against a white marble pillar to steady herself, not sure what to do now. One thing was for certain, she had to pretend she had no special abilities. The less they knew about her, the better. As soon as her wits returned to normal, she’d escape.

  “Where’s the lady who is to watch the creature at all times?” the older man said to the younger one, without taking his eyes off Persephonice. A thin silver crown rested on top of his gray hair, and he was dressed in a heavily embroidered blue tunic and narrow-fitted trousers—very elegant, and she imagined, expensive. His blue eyes darkened and narrowed as he observed her.

  Was he afraid she’d just vanish?

  “I’ll find the maid, sire,” the man said, then hurried out of the room.

  “Guards!” the man wearing the crown, she assumed must be the river elves’ leader, shouted.

  Was he scared of her?

  Two brawny soldiers carrying staffs entered the room. Both had long blue hair tied back in plaited braids. Both looked fearsome enough to handle several of their enemy at once, as stormy as their blue eyes looked and the way their mouths remained grim. They were dressed in dark blue, nearly black, tunics with gold braids slung over each shoulder. It appeared to be a kind of a guard uniform.

  Did they not realize she was only a peaceful overseer who had nothing in mind but to study others’ worlds? She certainly wasn’t a fighter. But, she did have defensive skills. For now, she didn’t wish to use them, though as groggy as she felt, she wasn’t sure she could do much of anything. Still, it was best to pretend to be extremely vulnerable. Put these barbarians at ease and when they least expected it, she’d escape.

  The leader studied her for several tense moments, then he motioned toward the bed. “Return to the bed,” he barked.

  “Where’s Dracolin?”

  The leader raised his brows. “She speaks and with the mermaid’s sweet voice. She understands our language. How do you know the son of the shadow elf king’s chief advisor? Have your people made some kind of an alliance with them? What are you?”

  She folded her arms, but nearly fell. Quickly, she grabbed the pillar.

  He motioned to his men. Both moved hastily toward her.

  Her heart nearly leapt from her chest. Did he want them to kill her? Dracolin seemed to think they would want to keep her, being that she was so different. But he had said they were a vicious people, too.

  The taller guard handed his staff to the other, then pulled her from the pillar she still clung to. Her efforts to resist were futile as much as the drug still affected her, though she still squirmed to get out of his tight grasp. He seemed annoyed as he quickly dumped her on the bed.

  “The creature is disobedient. We will rectify that.” The leader’s lips turned up. “Dracolin left without you. He returned home with his companions. He knows not to stir up trouble by looking for you. Neither his king nor his father will approve of his coming for you.” An evil gleam settled in his smoky blue eyes. “Besides, he’d never find you where we are located.”

  She pulled the silky, blue covers over her and clenched her fists. Maybe Dracolin would not find her where she was located now, but if she could escape…

  But what if what the river elf said was true? What if Dracolin’s king and father forbade him to look for her? Would he go against them? And for what? To risk his life rescuing a…a c
reature he knew nothing about?

  She’d be on her own. That’s why overseers always had a lifemate, to help them in times like this.

  “What are you? Are you a land-born mermaid?”

  She pursed her lips. Let him figure out what she was.

  He sat on a chair next to the bed. “Explain what you are.”

  A pale-faced woman hurried into the room. Her blue hair was piled onto her head in pretty swirls and her blue gown swished when she walked. But her blue eyes widened to see Persephonice awake, and her mouth dropped open. She quickly curtsied to the king. “I beg your pardon, sire. I didn’t think she’d wake for several more hours.”

  “Where’s my scientist?”

  “He’s on his way,” one of the guards said.

  Everyone had blue eyes and blue hair, in varying degrees. Even the king’s gray hair was tinged with blue. No wonder Persephonice’s different coloration seemed to intrigue them. But then she glanced at the mer-creature paintings, and she wondered if they didn’t have some kind of an alliance of sorts with them. Maybe that’s why they had her in a comfortable bed and not some dank, dark dungeon. They thought she was one of them.

  Footsteps echoed in a hurried pace outside of the room, then a small, sprightly man entered, carrying a large black book. The king motioned to Persephonice. “What is she? She is obstinate and though she has mastered our speech and seems to understand our language, she will not say what she is.”

  The near balding man nodded, then quickly flipped through the pages. He closed it shut and shook his head. “No such creature exists.”

  The king’s brows knit together. “Of course she exists. Do you have anything about mermaids of the land-born variety?”

  The scientist’s pale blue eyes widened.

  “Look it up.” The king tapped his foot on the floor and turned his attention to Persephonice. “You could make this easier on us, and just tell us what manner of creature you are.”

  Now, Persephonice realized why the overseers didn’t live on primitive worlds. In more advanced societies, the peoples expected visitors from different worlds. Here, the elves wouldn’t be able to fathom such a thing.