"Well," I offer graciously, "You can just touch my arm or something if holding hands makes you uncomfortable."
"I didn't say I would do it," he snarls. The pretty boy thinks I am teasing him. He doesn't like it much. Of course, I was. I didn't intend to. It just snarked out. I take a deep breath. I don't want to lose his help because I can't stop being contemptuous.
"Enturi, I'm sorry. You offered your help yesterday and I need it. This is important."
"Why?"
"I already explained why. I can't get through the ward-"
"No," he interrupts. "Not why you need my help. Why is destroying this particular rune so important? What's the big deal with this rune? I don't see how it can have any connection with Jeamo or Calmorien. No one goes near those old ruins and if you're telling the truth about the fear ward, now we know why. I'll bet you're the only one who has even seen this rune since the rebellion. Why not just leave it alone?"
I sigh. I'm not sure I can answer his question. But I'll give it a swing.
I am not a sorcerer like Enturi. But I am an elf. And I remember what Nana Romina told me so long ago.
"We are magical creatures, Arquë; it's our nature."
She was right. I heard in a song once that magic flows like music within the elven people. And that sometimes we can draw on it. That's why there are people like Enturi in Elftown in spite of the humans' prohibition on magic. In spite of the fact they kill every sorcerer they find. In spite of the fact that they have made elves so afraid of another red tide that we are afraid to even speak of magic. The humans want to eliminate elven magic, because magic is power and they think that we would use it like they do. To hurt, to control.
But you can't stop elves from being magical. It's who we are. And in some of us, elves like Enturi, and Raichon and his apprentice, and Alvar and his friends, the magic just leaks out and somehow even in this knowledge-forsaken shithole their elven instincts kick in and they learn how to control it, to channel it, to use it. Secretly.
I guess now maybe I can add myself to that list.
I am fairly sure that when I swore my oath of revenge against Alvar's murderer that I tapped into the elven magic that must lie dormant within me. I borrowed the words from an old song and made the oath sincerely, voluntarily, with the strength of deep emotion. And ever since then I have felt a force within me, quiet but insistent, pushing me to exact my sworn revenge. I expected it to dissipate after Bolin's death. But it didn't. It's still nagging me. I feel, with hard certainty, that there are still loose ends to be tied up before my vow is satisfied. And that somehow, the blood rune is one of them.
"I don't care about much," I say to Enturi. "Why should I? Why should any of us? It just brings unhappiness." I pause. Talking to him about this is more difficult than I would have thought. "But sometimes I slip up. Sometimes caring creeps in like a rat through a wall."
I look away.
"So, yeah. Someone I actually liked got pulled into this Jeamo and Calmorien net and got killed." That's vague enough. He'll probably think I'm talking about Norien. Which is fine with me.
"I swore an oath that whoever did it would not hurt anyone else like this again." I might be paraphrasing a bit here, but Enturi doesn't need to know everything. I look back at my fellow enforcer.
"Jeamo is dead. Calmorien is dead. But that's not enough. As long as this rune exists, it could be used to initiate the torture ritual. It could be replicated. Maybe no one else knows how to use it. I don't know. But I'm not taking a chance. I need to destroy it. I gave my word to the dead."
Enturi stares at me like he's never seen me before.
"I will help you," he says.
* * *
Another dark night, another slog through the rain on a clandestine mission. Fourth night in a row. This is getting to be a bad habit.
Once again the little alley between the wall and this last row of ramshackle huts is empty. I'm not sure whether I've been lucky two nights in a row or whether the placement of the alley, far away from heavy traffic, under the shadow of the guarded wall and close to the haunted ruins makes midnight brigand ambushes here a waste of time. Probably the latter. I turn back to Enturi and nod.
Time to leave the cover of the buildings and creep along the base of the wall. We move out together, pressed against the wall, with me leading.
For once, I am feeling rested and alert. Enturi and I had taken turns catching some sleep at the Red Meadow. When half the night had passed, I roused him and we made our way here, slinking through the alleys like silent predators. We didn't have far to come; the main reason I chose the Red Meadow, aside from the likelihood that no one else would be there, was its proximity to the Hall of Law.
So far I haven't found Enturi to be as annoying as usual. Probably because we have to stay silent and so he isn't saying something stupid. Much as I don't like to admit it, we do work well together.
As an enforcer for Jet, a petty elven crime boss, Arq has it better than most in Elftown, the prisoner of war slum of a human city. It's violent work, but it provides him with a little more money than he needs to survive, a little status, and a little free time.
When a prostitute under Jet's protection is brutally murdered, Jet sends Arq and a team of enforcers - including his creepy, ambitious rival; Jet's dangerously alluring girlfriend; and a chatty dwarf-of-all-trades - to find the killer and make an example of him. But when they uncover the dark reason for the murder, the delicate balance of power in Elftown begins to crumble.
To avenge a friend's murder, Arq must contend with betrayal, warring crime bosses, deadly monsters, underworld plots, and forbidden magic that, if discovered by the humans, will send a red tide of death through Elftown. His greatest challenges, though, will be grappling with his own bitter, violent nature, and trying to figure out what it means to be an elf in a place where the humans have taken away everything that makes life worth living for elvenkind.
Author: A. Harris Lanning
Cover Art: Xavier Ward
(c)2016, 2023
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