Trey sat in his chair in the Town Hall, stunned. The room was silent for a long moment. “That was…quite the story,” he said finally. He felt numb at first, but something was growing inside him, suffusing his body.
The Sundering. The Ascension. The things the elves had done. It was almost too much. It was almost far too much to bear.
He stood.
“I would never have believed it,” he said, “but I’ve seen you. I’ve seen how you work. How you think.” He felt his hands start shaking. He walked up to Silanar, finally understanding the feeling that was shooting through his veins.
It was anger.
“You killed them,” Trey said. He was standing right in front of Silanar’s chair, glaring down at the man. “You killed them. Seven billion living human beings. It wasn’t a virus at all. It was elves.”
Silanar just sat there, looking at him with those elven eyes, expressionless.
Trey leaned down until he was inches away from the man’s face. “How dare you,” he said, his voice almost a whisper.
Then he spun and left the room.
* * * * *
“Well, that went well,” Bellas said. Arra could hear the sarcasm dripping in his tone. She glanced over at Fenian, trying to gauge his reaction. They’d both heard parts of the story before, but never in this much detail. And never from the Cothellon’s side.
It was…sobering.
Fenian seemed nonplussed. This business of killing most of the humans didn’t seem to bother him much. Well, it bothered Arra. It bothered her a lot. She wondered, not for the first time, just what kind of a man her father was.
“He’ll be back,” Silanar said, referring to Trey. “I hope. In the meantime, we have a meeting to continue.”
“Hold the fuck on,” Orym said suddenly.
“That language isn’t necessary,” Silanar said. “What do you want?”
“You’ve heard it all now,” Orym said, “every detail. You know what the Fennas Elenathon device will do. And I’ve already told you that they plan to activate it soon. Very soon.”
“It’s been what—296 years?—since their first failure,” Silanar said. “How do you know they’ll activate it now?”
“Because I still work for them, you idiot,” Orym said, his voice dripping with contempt. “How can you not understand, after all this? I’ve been undercover the whole time. I arranged all of this. Trey, your new Prime Mage, is down here because of me. And this entire planet is going to be destroyed if we don’t do something. Right. Fucking. Now.”
“And just what do you propose we do?” Daylor said.
“We need to destroy the cities once and for all,” Orym said.
“How? They’re invisible, and even if they weren’t, they’re also shielded by those forcefields you described. They can’t be destroyed.”
“They can be,” Orym said. “There’s something very few people know about the forcefields.”
“And I suppose you’re going to tell us.”
“Picture an egg,” Orym said, ignoring Daylor. “Picture it standing on end. Got it? Now cut the egg neatly in half.” He made a sideways chopping motion with his hand. “Now you have two shells: one on the bottom, and one on the top.”
“Very descriptive,” Silanar remarked. Orym glared at him.
“The city shields used to be the whole egg—a full circle around the entire city. But over time, forcefinder Talent atrophied in the population. People just aren’t as genetically predisposed to it as they are to the other Talents. As a result, we don’t have enough darkmages to maintain the full Shield. So only the bottom half is active.”
Arra saw her father thinking that over. “But why even keep the Shield up at all?” he asked.
“To keep people like you from getting in.”
“Are all the cities like this?”
“Yes,” Orym said.
“So all we have to do is get our people three thousand feet in the air—high enough to clear the forcefield—then, what, throw explosives at the city? Shoot it? And we have to do this six times, in locations all over the planet?”
“Seven times,” Orym said. “New Tokyo has been rebuilt.”
“It’s just not feasible,” Silanar said.
“That’s why I brought you the Prime Mage.”
“He’s really only half a Prime Mage, and a very weak one at that. How is that supposed to help?”
Arra was looking at the window, watching Trey. He’d left the village, stomping out into the forest with a murderous expression on his face.
“He’s not going to be able to do anything if he’s not here,” she said.
Everyone looked at her.
* * * * *
Arra found Trey in a clearing deep in the forest, nearly a mile away from Sylrantheas. He was sitting on a fallen tree, glowering at the ground. Arra made sure to make noise as she approached so he wouldn’t be frightened. He looked up as she neared, his expression dark. She didn’t say anything, just walked up and sat beside him on the log.
They were both silent for several minutes. Then Trey drew in a ragged breath. “What kind of person commits genocide?” he asked, still staring at the ground.
She looked at him, at the hunch in his back, at his hair where it met the nape of his neck. She put a hand on his forearm, the touch awkward.
“I’m not going to defend him,” she said quietly. “How could I? I think it’s unspeakable what he—what they—did.”
Trey looked at her then, and she could see tears glistening in his eyes. “What could have become of us?” he asked, his voice quavering. “What could we have accomplished in all this time? We might have saved this planet, not killed it.” He looked out at the forest.
Arra squeezed his arm. “I know.”
She felt something, then, as she touched him. As if in a long-lost life, she had once known him. She withdrew her touch, suddenly confused.
He looked at her again, his blue eyes finding hers. “Everything I’ve ever known was a lie,” he said, “and the truth—the truth is far worse.”
He reached for her then, needing physical contact, needing comfort. She wrapped one arm around him and held him as he cried.
* * * * *
“So you’re an elf?” Rylan asked. The boys in the tent were staring at him, watching his reaction.
“You got it,” Dill—Dillon—said.
“How old are you?”
“We don’t really keep track in the Under. I guess I’m something like 430, give or a take a few decades.”
“Holy shit,” Rylan said.
“Well said.”
“And you’ve been down here the whole time? Who else knows?”
Dill looked around the room. “Just these guys, mostly,” he said. “Oh, and him.”
Someone new stepped into the tent. He was older than most of the boys in the Under—much older. He had shaggy gray hair and walked with a slight hunch, making him seem short. He was wearing a dirty, floppy black jacket made of cloth, and baggy black pants. The strange man walked up to the table and sat, dropping a heavy bag onto it with a loud clanking noise.
“Rylan,” Dill said, “meet Smoke. Smoke, Rylan.”
The man named Smoke turned to look at him, but he didn’t stand. His eyes were gray, glinting like steel. He didn’t say anything.
“Smoke here makes mergeguns,” Dill said.
“Mergeguns?” Rylan asked.
“Yup. Same as what Shot uses, and the guards that chased you.”
“Stupid name.”
Dill laughed. “It is pretty stupid, now that you mention it.”
Rylan eyed the man named Smoke. He seemed like he was hiding something. But then again, it seemed like everyone was hiding something around here. He looked over at Elanil. She hadn’t reacted much during Dill’s story. Maybe she’d heard it before.
Her expression was one of pity.
“I found Con,” he said, changing the subject.
Dill quirked an eyebrow. “Oh?”
“She’s in an old jail in Planner Central. They aren’t feeding her. She looks like she’s about to die.”
“We don’t rescue people from Planner Central anymore,” Dill said. “It’s too dangerous.”
“I thought you wanted to take over the city.”
“Sure,” Dill said, “but I don’t see how saving her will help do that.”
“Con can help,” Rylan said. “We have to rescue her.”
Dill looked at him for a moment as if weighing his options. “If we get her out,” he said, “will you help us?”
“I was already going to help you,” Rylan said.
“Not much of a negotiator, are you?”
Rylan shrugged.
Dill turned to Elanil. “What about you?”
Elanil looked surprised at being addressed. “I want to go home,” she said. That haunted expression was back in her eyes.
“I don’t see any way of getting you back there,” Dill said. “Unless Dad knows a way. Grime, is the radio working yet?”
Grime shook his head. “Not yet, boss. It works for short-range stuff, but something’s wrong with the antenna. We haven’t been able to raise Orym on it.”
“Get it fixed,” Dill said.
“Sure thing, boss.”
“In the meantime, there’s something I want you to see.”
“Not until we get Con,” Rylan said. He wasn’t going to budge on the subject, not this time. He needed to save her, and time was rapidly running out.
Dill sighed. “Fine. Shot, go find Small. You and him and me will go with Rylan to get Con. Elanil, you coming?”
Elanil looked around the room nervously. She was probably afraid of what would happen if she were left alone with the boys. “I guess,” she said.
Dill went over to the big chest and rummaged around. “Here,” he said, turning back to Rylan and handing him a handful of dark wood.
“Maple?” Rylan asked.
Dill nodded. “Dark maple,” he said. “Heard you were out.”
“Thanks.”
“I don’t suppose you have any prime elm on hand?” Elanil asked.
“Nope,” Dill said. “You didn’t bring any with you?”
Elanil looked crestfallen. “I used it all getting here.”
Dill stroked his chin. “Grime, will the radio reach Greyson?”
“Sure will, boss.”
“Get him on the line. See if he can get us some prime elm. Real prime elm, not the dark stuff. I know the Planners still have some. Tell him to use the dead drop just outside Planner Central. And Grime?”
“Yes, boss?”
“Tell him to hurry.”
Dill turned to Rylan, sticking out his hand. “We’ll get your friend out,” he said, “and then we’ll fix this city. Deal?”
“Deal,” Rylan said, shaking Dill’s hand.
He hoped they wouldn’t be too late to save Con.
