The Queen's Opal: A Stone Bearers Novel (Book One) Read online

  The bald man stepped back, and his eyes widened. “What stone? Why the stone, of course. One of the bearers’ stones that connects them to our deities, the Stone Shapers.” The elven children stared as the man continued his lecture, stepping forward as if to herd them out. “And with Renewal still dormant for the last few years, people are always making up stories about hearing the call just to see it. To do it in front of a bearer, wasting time and—”

  “Wait a moment, Orwin.” The bearer stepped around the first man. “The elves mostly live on their own now. It’s quite possible that they don’t know, and all the more likely that this girl actually heard the call.”

  Orwin sneered. “A fairy?”

  The sea snake around the bearer’s neck perked up, and the man frowned. “That can be an offensive term.”

  “Oh, we don’t mind,” Saylee said, even though Marryll was glaring.

  “Still, Orwin should know better.” The dark man straightened his back. “Lady Kylta is part elven and every bit as much a bearer as I am. So if Orwin wishes to remain here he will fetch the stone and keep such thoughts to himself.”

  The bald man frowned, bowing himself out of the room stiffly. “Yes, Lord Bearer.”

  The bearer watched the man retreat before turning. “I’m sorry about him. There used to be a faction of white-robed men who made it their business to condemn foreign influences and magic, saying they had the blessing of a goddess. We had hoped that when the true bearer of that goddess appeared to restore peace, their movement would end on its own. It mostly has—they don’t chant on the streets or wear the robes as they used to—but some of the ideas remain.” He let out a long sigh.

  Echoing footsteps on the stone floor heralded Orwin’s return. He held a small box, which he handed to the bearer before retreating to the back rooms of the temple. The bearer took the box and held it open toward the elves with a flourish of his hands. “This is Renewal.”

  Both elves peered inside, but it contained nothing but a slightly green rock. It was smooth, and the green tint made it interesting, but still, it was only a stone.

  Marryll scoffed, but Saylee said, “It’s a very nice rock.”

  “Oh.” The bearer frowned as if just realizing its poor looks himself. “You should see it when it’s in the hands of a bearer. It’s certainly something then!” There was a pause. “Go on. Aren’t you going to touch it?”

  “Touch it?” Marryll asked as Saylee reached for the stone.

  The moment it brushed her fingers, a bright light burst from within the stone. Sudden darkness shrouded the scene as Saylee covered her eyes. When they could look back again, the stone was gone. In its place was a glittering, swirling green opal.

  His mother’s opal.

  Drynn woke on his side with his hands behind his back. The light outlining the door shone brightly, and the cart hadn’t moved yet. It might be morning, but Drynn had no way to be certain. He had lasted through the previous night by pretending to sleep until he actually fell asleep. The humans had done nothing but retie his hands after fixing the door.

  For now.

  Still, the restlessness remained, building to the same frenzy as before. He shook with energy. They had barely let him outside at all last night, even with his hands tied. He never saw much of the camp or surrounding landscape, but he had caught a glance of the boys that had first held him in the alley. But no one was asking him for gold or anything else now.

  Whatever the humans wanted to keep him here for, they kept to themselves. How long did they expect him to stay in one corner, doing nothing in a freshly resealed box?

  The day wore on. He pulled his arms around his legs and untied them without thought. It seemed almost routine now. He checked for the opal, still hidden beneath his tunic.

  It glowed with a faint green light, as it always had. No one had to run through human cities, touching it to make it shine. The dreams really didn’t make much sense, but at least they were interesting enough to distract him for a few hours. They had even started using the same words Cindle had used to describe the ancient dorran gods, the ones that suggested a stone could be a healing agent.

  Drynn still wondered about his mother’s illness and other ways of healing at times, but he could only sit so long before the reflex to move overcame the rest of his thoughts. He fidgeted, shuffling through the boxes again to relieve some of the built-up tension. Maybe if he left the door alone, the humans would stay outside and never notice. He didn’t have much hope of escaping anyway. He would stay here until the humans tired of him or Tayvin found him.

  Or all the humans’ lifespan ended. That only took a few decades, right?

  The slight squeal of the new metal hinge echoed through the door.

  Drynn was too far from his corner to pretend he hadn’t moved. He ducked behind the boxes as two humans came into the cart. The bigger one was Cain. He shouted the loudest and hit the hardest. The other human Drynn had not put a name to yet, though he was certain he had seen him before—one of the never-ending cycle of thieves guarding him. He set a lamp on the floor and carried a long stick.

  Cain also had a stick and a sack resting over his shoulder. “All right, lock it,” he said to the men outside the door. Then Cain cocked his head to one side. “You go left.” Cain turned right, and the other man walked toward Drynn, using their sticks to prod through the piles of storage.

  Drynn couldn’t account for it, but he had a much easier time following the human language than before. Many of his old lessons stood clear in his mind as if they had barely happened, and after hearing a new word once, he would never forget it. He still shied away from speaking Human, certain the men would only laugh as he fumbled to say the words himself. Not that they ever tried to talk to him besides shout orders. They took for granted that he wouldn’t respond.

  “All right, elf.” Cain still faced the other direction. “Come out now, and we won’t hurt you.”

  It probably would be better if he did. Take whatever punishment the humans wanted to give him. Stay as still as he could afterward. Then they might let him out for longer than before.

  Cain peered through a pile of boxes, tapping it with a stray movement of his long stick. The top box teetered and fell, striking the man’s foot. He stumbled back with a curse.

  Drynn winced. He hadn’t thrown the box this time, but he would be blamed for it.

  Cain’s face reddened. “Last chance. Come out now or else.”

  They were going to hit him, whether he came out or not. Still, doing anything else only delayed the inevitable. They would herd him out in the end—hit him with the poles until they could grab him with their arms. Their movements were slow, but impossible to avoid in such close quarters.

  Drynn stood.

  The closer man jumped, startled.

  Cain whirled around. “Hold ’im.”

  The man grabbed Drynn around the middle, pinning his arms. He didn’t struggle but he wanted to. The man was strong enough to cut off all the air without realizing it.

  Cain dropped his stick, swinging the sack off his shoulder. He pulled out a metal rope. It clanked together as he dragged it to one side of the cart and hammered one end to the wall with long metal spikes.

  “Are you sure it will work this time?” The man’s hot breath pressed against Drynn’s neck.

  “It’s iron.” Cain stepped back with his hammer. “Iron blocks fairy magic. All the bard stories say so. Bring it ’ere.”

  The man dragged Drynn forward. Drynn pushed back the other way. He wasn’t a fairy, and didn’t think the forest sprites cared about iron anyway, but he was still struck by a sudden urge to run at the sight of this new metal thing. How and where weren’t important. The human holding him didn’t even seem to notice, his pace unaltered. The last link on the metal rope was open and wider than the rest. Cain snapped it around Drynn’s ankle and both men stepped away.

  Drynn shifted his foot one way and then the other. The rope clanked together, the unyielding link scratching
at his skin. Drynn stared up at the men, heart racing.

  Cain struck him across the side with the stick. “Don’t look at me like that. If you stayed where I put you from the first, I wouldn’t be forced to take these kind of precautions. The Tower is leagues away and I have to protect my investment somehow.”

  Drynn shrank down, eyes on the floor. Cain ordered the men on the other side to let him out. The sunlight faded as the door slammed.

  Drynn pulled against the metal rope again. It didn’t budge. He might fit a finger or two into the loop, but he couldn’t yank it past his ankle bone.

  The cart jerked forward. His foot shot out beneath him, and Drynn fell to his knees. His breath came in quick, shallow gasps. The cart seemed darker and hotter than before.

  Iron.

  It might not block fairy magic, but it had blocked him. He might never get it off. Even if all the humans died. Even if Tayvin found him. He would still be stuck in this dark box with iron on his foot. And there was nothing he could do about it.

  CHAPTER 13

  CINDLE HAD SAID Sheargreen was a small village, but Tayvin hadn’t believed her until they reached Wildred. It held more humans than an upturned anthill, packed together in spiraled wooden walls connecting all the buildings in a great maze.

  He couldn’t make sense of all the movement. The constant noise built to a thundering in his ears. Tayvin winced, an urge to run growing in his chest.

  If he hadn’t had Cindle to follow after, he might have. He stopped when she stopped and walked when she walked, never venturing out lest the wave of humans swallow him whole. She pressed through the streets, starting with the inn and sorting through a whole slew of humans with slow and deliberate steps that Tayvin found himself admiring.

  He would be lost without her.

  Tayvin tried to decipher Cindle’s conversation with the final human, a woman, but he got frustrated quickly. The Human here sounded nothing like the Human he had attempted to learn as a child in preparation to join the rangers . . .

  The rangers. The reminder stopped him short. He was supposed to be a warrior. He faced the humans on the street dead-on. He could do this. He had to do this, or everything he had done so far would be for nothing.

  Cindle turned, waving him over. “Tayvin, come here.” She pointed to the woman, standing under the inn’s sign in a gray wool dress. “This is Nami Calfisdaughter of Porsia, a healer aligned with the house of Der’helder. I believe she will be the best to teach you. She knows something of magical healing even though she does not use it herself and has reason to keep her distance from noble wizards. She can give you a foundation while I—”

  “You will look for Drynn.”

  Cindle nodded. “But only if you promise to stay here—stay here or go home, but don’t go rampaging off into the human cities on your own.”

  A part of him was relieved to take her orders. He had to help Drynn, but the humans were so . . . different. What could he do out there on his own? Were those his only options?

  Tayvin shook his head. “If you think she is best, then I will agree, but I wouldn’t have to go into the cities alone. I could look with you.”

  Cindle laughed, shaking all the metal that she carried around. “And what makes you think you would be any help to me? You would only slow me down.”

  “I’ll do what you say and never say a word. I’ll—”

  “Stop. It’s pathetic and only proves my point. If Drynn is in trouble, you’d be useless at bargaining, promise up your kingdom and your unborn children, assuming you don’t run in and get yourself killed beforehand. We have to play it smarter than that.”

  She thought he was an idiot. Maybe he was.

  “It’s nothing personal.” Cindle pressed on, turning her head. “Not this time. I understand you now. You and I, we’re warriors.” She waved over her hammer and thick leathers. “We favor the masculine spirit, one who rushes in and takes what he wants. But there is another spirit, just as strong though not so often recognized. The spirit of the matron, one who prepares and draws in what she needs.”

  “You want me to be a woman?” She wouldn’t be the first. All the council elders had hoped for a female heir, but with new details of his mother’s illness revealed, it was harder to say why. Before, he had assumed that they wanted a female to rule on the council like The Lady, but if the curse was more likely to fall to a female, that wouldn’t make much sense.

  “I want you to be smart,” Cindle said. “Drynn’s going to get sick soon, right? Someone has to find a cure for him. I will find him, and you’ll find the cure. At least let me look on my own first, and in a few months, I’ll come back—with or without Drynn. By then, you might know enough to avoid attention and actually help me.”

  She could be right. His father might have been too. “I can’t solve this with a sword.”

  “What?”

  “Nothing.” He bowed his head. “What do we do next?”

  “Next? We prove you’re an elf and get her to help you. She still thinks you’re human.” She gestured to the woman healer. Nami had her brown hair braided in a knot and had been squinting at them as they spoke.

  “He’s not human?” the healer asked. “I mean, I’m sorry. I should’ve told you I spoke Dorran.”

  Tayvin spun back to look at Cindle. Had she known that?

  Cindle shrugged. “What are you looking at me for? She speaks Dorran. So go and show me you can get something done without your sword.”

  The healer lived near the center of the city. The houses were older and not connected together by any of the wooden walls that snaked around the rest. That, combined with the wind, made the houses look like they were on the verge of collapsing. It was worse when they entered the healer’s house, the sound of pounding feet greeting them as two small boys ran in a circle from the sitting room to the eating room—kitchen?—nearly shaking the walls.

  Humans had a thing or two to learn about wooden construction.

  The healer walked into the kitchen, rolling up her sleeves to attend to several things stewing over a fire. Most of them didn’t look edible and had mysterious colors and odors. Then she called over her shoulder for a girl named Mira, gesturing for her to take the younger boys out. “We have guests, clients.” She started in Human and repeated the last word in Dorran.

  Mira had freckles on her face and her hair in two braids. She ran to Cindle twittering in her language as if it were exciting to meet a dorran, but Tayvin stared at her younger brothers. The boys were completely identical, from the shades of their eyes and hair to the sound of their voices.

  “What happened to them?” Tayvin asked.

  Nami turned to the two boys, stopping them in their tracks. She rubbed dirt from their freckled faces, but after a thorough inspection, she looked back at Tayvin. “What? I don’t see anything wrong. Randall, Wendell, this is Tayvin.”

  “Hi, ’Ayin,” they said together. Eerie.

  The healer had spoken Human slowly, so Tayvin tried to do the same. “But they are being the same boy.”

  The two boys giggled, and Nami looked confused. Maybe he couldn’t speak Human at all.

  “Elves never have twins,” Cindle said in Dorran so the children wouldn’t understand. “He’s never seen them before.”

  Nami nodded but still looked mystified.

  Cindle turned back to Tayvin. “Sometimes human and dorran children come in pairs that look alike, like a litter of rabbits. They’re called twins.”

  “More than one at a time? And the mother can carry them both?”

  “Obviously,” Cindle said in her usual matter-of-fact, almost condescending tone that made Tayvin regret the question. “Though, I thought only noble humans have them. Something to do with their magic and all their inbreeding?”

  “Not all the time.” Nami looked away.

  The healer’s daughter, Mira, stepped around Cindle and broke the silence. “I can speak Dwarf too! Mama taught me.” She listed the words she knew. The twins mimicked the ones t
hey thought were funny, but with very bad pronunciation.

  “Evac!” One jumped at his twin like it was some kind of war cry.

  “Evac!” the other called back. They chased each other around the kitchen table that took up most of the room along with a wall of cupboards covered with potted plants, some already looking slightly disheveled.

  “No.” Mira sounded scandalized and had her hands on her hips. “Not ‘evac,’ its ‘vez’ack’ and it means ‘boy.’ It’s got nothing to do with leaping about like a pair of monkeys!”

  Cindle winced. Vez’ack wasn’t quite the proper pronunciation either.

  “Oh, I don’t know about that, Mira,” Nami said, tasting one of her herbs with a smile. “These particular boys do very little but leap about like monkeys. Can you take them outside now so I can talk to Cindle and Tayvin?”

  Mira put out her lip. “Cindle and I were talking.”

  Cindle grimaced. “Oh, I don’t mind postponing it.”

  “What was she saying?” Tayvin asked as Nami finally herded all the children out the back. He had gotten most of her words with her mother, but none of the ones before when she had just been talking to Cindle.

  “Nothing. Everything. I haven’t met many human children, but she has made me grateful.”

  Tayvin laughed. “Elves aren’t so different.” The girl reminded him of his cousins at home.

  “That doesn’t surprise me.” Cindle rolled her eyes.

  “I’m sorry about the children,” Nami said when she returned. She stood by the couch, moving books and wooden toys so they could sit. “They’ve become quite the handful lately and I don’t have the time I used to.”

  Tayvin nodded. “Twins are . . . different, but I like children.” He sat in the place Nami had cleared next to Cindle.

  “But you’re not from Kalum.” She pulled a stool from the kitchen and sat across from them.

  “I came from the forest, Elba. I’m an elf.” Hadn’t they already established that?

  “That’s what you said outside, but you look so human.” Even as she said it her eyes roamed over him as if marking his smaller frame, wider eyes, angled cheekbones, all the subtle differences formerly ignored. She turned to Cindle as if asking her to deny it. “Elves are forest fairies. Shapeless spirits that cause travelers to lose their way.”