Chapter Five: Political Posion

Mirage awoke from her bed roll in a cold sweat, dreading what she saw through her peircing blue eyes. The Queen of the underworld's voice rang in her head. Discord has filed itself away, deep within her heart and head. She opened her eyes To see that Rayson shone brightly in the distance.

"Impossible," she murmured to herself, "I SAW them dead!'"

 

And a voice in her head answered slyly, "and perhaps they saw you dead too. Should a child of royal blood and stormbringing line bow to the fears of a human?"

 

" 'Yes,'" she replied to herself, " 'I should, for I am human as much as stormbringer. I am a talent on lend, no more. Mayhap to some mortals, godlike I shalt become, but I am not nigh nor shall I ever be.' "

 

Silence in her head, she could hear only the crickets croaking in the high prarie grass.
A wolf howled in the distance, the sound was, to Mirage, enough to chill her heart to the emotion-less temprature of the Artic's ice. The wind sang songs in her ear much like the siren's most beautiful tale. Her stormbringing sense of hearing soon told her it WAS actually a story of some sort. But which one? It was in a foriegn tongue, and somehow, she couldn't believe it.

 

A group of people in red and blue garments were ambling cordially through the field in which she resided. Mirage flattened herself silently against the dusty, dead ground, her hair falling about her like a midnight-colored shroud.The song was entrancing and alluring as a mouse is to a cat, and every fiber in Mirage's mortality-condemned body tingled with a mysterious arcanous energy beyond compare.

 

It sounded as thus:
"Soleil et la lune et les étoiles -- Hiegh ui! Down ci-dessous fait le juste folklorique aller..."

 

Something in the bright, vivid chords were different hten any music Mirage had ever heard [Perhaps, more accurately, ever WOULD hear] in her short lifespan.

 

The women were all fair-haired, the same hue as a banana's peel, dressed in long grecian tunic gowns and golden sandals of preistesses. Their eyes were a lumienescent blue and green, seeing the world as if for the first time.The men were tall, stern, and serious, they wore blue tunics and pants that were more elegant then any men would wear.

 

Their hair was dark as Mirage's, and they had sharp violet eyes. All bore a strange mixture of swords, [encrusted with great gems of an even greater value], arrows of solid jade [that were fletched with feathers spun of moonbeams], and small knives of copper and reddened stone.

 

Children danced in front of wagons spun of the praries' lush grasses, and the song wafted around them like a comforting, familiar scent. Mirage felt an overwhelming sense that she BELONGED with them, that it was her who should be singing and not the strange foriegners. As they approached her, she raised a hand in greeting.

 

'Aaye!' she called in common tongue, 'Hail, folk most fair!'

 

From the front of the procession, a man and a women (with two small children lagging close behind) moved outward. Both of them had silver circlets in the shape of amazingly crafted leaves. Their eyes, unlike the others, were a golden topaz color that gleamed like forgotten treasures, boundless and hidden in feircesome dragon's cave.

 

Their hair was a cerculean, translucent blue, and their and through their perfectly pale skin purple vains subtly stood out. These two, with their high cheekbones and lips that shamed the reddest rose, were obviously royalty.

 

"Salutations, Human." The man said, in a voice layered with pain and remorse, "I am Slyandrile, high king of the realm of Aborarae for hundreds of thousands of years before your people were borne." The women smiled at him, flashing fang-like white teeth in his direction.

 

"I am Soliei," she said, "Which means 'sun' in another tongue of your folk. These are our two children, Forêt and Mer." She nodded once towards the two young children, just as beautiful as their kin.

 

"We hear you are in trouble," one of the children (Mirage assumed it was Mer) squeaked. "The wolves were gibbering something awful about..."

 

"Mer!" Soliei chided, "Have some manners."

 

"Ah now, my dear, Children will be..." Sylandrile quieted under Soliei's firm glare.

 

"That is to say, listen to your mother." Soliei laughed, a silvery sound that coated reality in fantasy. Slyandrile's smile reached his eyes.

 

"Ah.. actually, I do need help. You people are... uh... elves, right?" Intoned Mirage.

 

"Indeed, child. Why would you make such an inquiry?"

 

"You... Well. My mother's book--"

 

"The book of Arathas!?"

 

"Arathas?" The elves, after cross-checking it was actually Arathas' book, began to converse rapidly in a tongue so painfully wonderful, Mirage stopped breathing. Finally, the godlike boy-child bowed to Mirage and said:

 

"Greetings, Stormbringer. What would you wish to know?"

 

"I-I've been having some unusual dreams," she began slowly, "and I... well. I want to know if they have basis in what is actually happening." The elves eyed one another with their enchanting stares and then burst in raccous laughter; the tents shook with the lion-like roar of Slyandrile's amused sound.

 

"Do you think us arcanal masters, mortal?" Giggled Forêt, "I can explain in a sense, but not in another."

 

"Please do," Mirage begged, "I implore you."

 

"What is in the isn't in, and why is the isn't in out?" Mirage stared blankly at him, and he errupted in laughter again. Mer slapped his arm with her tiny, pale fist.

 

"Forêt! You're cruel." She clicked her tongue in dissapproval. "It means... Well. Tell us first."

 

"I lived once on the mountain of Ivea, where every mountain's cloud seemed rimmed with gold..."

***

 

"And so Sariel Stormbringer shall lie forever, entombed in the mountain. But fear not, citazens of Lunlia! For, on this grave, it shall be engraved: 'For the last remaining Stormbringer who could truly see.' " The priest lay his calloused, aged hand on the cool mountainside courtyard. "Hunter, would you like to say a few words?"

 

"Its is my one regret," the Hunter said, "That my men and I did not arrive in time to stop the cruel fiends from cold-blooded murder over political power, and that Sariel, John, and Susan should die as a result of human's failing humanity. So to your graves, just and gentle ones, say I:
Rest in peace, and curse your children for slaying you."
 

The ironic thing of this statement is that everyone in the audiance cheered-- Reality is not so clear, even in itself.

***

"And so I awoke here, and found thee." The elves were silent. Even the coveant who had been traveling with the Royal line had stopped, were watching Mirage tell her tale with wide-eyes.

 

"Come," said Slyandrile, "We must save your siblings before your dream comes yet to pass." The elves bequeathed to her a bronze dagger, a bow and arrow of Elephant's tusk (which they had borne with them for many miles), and a sword smithed by the great smith Toliein.

 

"It is named 'Sky,'" he said quietly, "and it will draw the magic of the Celestial to you." They also gave to her a glowing white horse who would never tire, and shoes that would allow her to run faster then any other mortal. Then they faded into the night, and Mirage was alone again.

 

That night, rather than sitting idle with wasted dreams, she journeyed to the great castle, and a plan began to unfold. She headed across the plains to the great road, down southeast to the castle of the Sharpstar council. The guard of the golden gates said to her, "You must be a person of real importance."

 

"I am Mirage Stormbringer," She said evenly, with an air of forced tranquilty, "I have come to claim my place in council."

***

 

"You say she came from the EAST?" An elderly man said, and the young guard [who was in his twenties at best] nodded seriously.

 

"That's impossible!" Susan Liae snapped, "I was SURE I followed your instruction, Sharpstar member--"

 

"Speak not my name!" Hissed the man, "or I shall punish you accordingly."

 

"I was sure my tracks were followed," Insisted 'Auntie' Liae, "Damn Arathas! He couldn't even keep track of a ch--"

 

"She had the blue blood of Titus Levantanse on her blade-- a normal blade." The young solider (who was remarkably similar to Phillip) said, "Do you think she really killed him?"

 

Bang. Bang. Bang. The great white doors groaned in protest, and swung open:

 

Gasps met the person who was revealed, a shadow in the night.....

Author's Note

The elves, my dears, are meant to be heard as a chorus: A smooth one. Not a group of vagrabonds screaming death metal.

Yes, seriously. :/