measuring in ways that transcended words. Wren could feel the
warmth of his breath and could see the rise and fail of his chest.
“Tell me,” she repeated stubbornly.
She felt his hands come up to grip her arms, their touch
light but firm. Then his face lowered to hers, and he kissed her.
“No,” he whispered, gave her a quick, uncertain smile, and
disappeared into the night.
CHAPTER
13
BY NOON OF THE FOLLOWING DAY everyone in Arborlon
knew of Ellenroh Elessedil’s decision to invoke the
power of the Loden and return the Elves and their home
city to the Westland. The queen had sent word at first
light, dispatching select messengers to every quarter of her be-
sieged kingdom-Barsimmon Oridio to the officers and soldiers
of the army, Triss to the Elven Hunters of the Home Guard,
Eton Shart to the remainder of the High Council and from there
to the officials who served in the administrative bureaus of the
government, and Gavilan to the market district to gather to-
gether the leaders in the business and farming communities. By
the time Wren had awakened, dressed, eaten breakfast, and gone
out into the city, the talk was of nothing else.
She found the Elves’ response remarkable. There was no
panic, no sense of despair, and no threats or accusations against
the queen for making her decision. There was uncertainty, of
course, and a healthy measure of doubt. None among the Elves
had been alive when Arborlon had been carried out of the West-
land, and while all had heard the story of the migration to Mor-
rowindl, few had given much thought to migrating out again.
Even with the city ringed by the demons and life drastically
altered from what it was in the time of Ellenroh’s father, concern
for the future had not embraced the possibility of employing
the Loden’s magic. As a result the people talked of leaving as if
the idea was an entirely new one, a prospect freshly conceived,
and for the most part the conversations that Wren listened in
on suggested that if Ellenroh Elessedil believed it best, then cer-
tainly it must be so. It was a tribute to the confidence that the
Elves placed in their queen that they would accept her proposal
so readily-especially when it was as drastic as this one.
“It will be nice to be able to go out of the city again,” more
than one said. “We’ve lived behind walls for too long.”
“Travel the roads and see the world,” others agreed. “I love
my home, but I miss what lies beyond.”
There was more than one mention of life without the con-
stant threat of demons, of a world where the dark things were
just a memory and the young could grow without having to
accept that the Keel was all that allowed them to survive and
there could never be any kind of existence beyond. Some ex-
pressed concern about how the magic worked, or if it even
would, but most seemed satisfied with the queen’s assurance that
life within the city would go on as always during the journey,
that the magic would protect and insulate against whatever hap-
pened without, and that it would be as before except that in
place of the Keel there would be a darkness that none could
pass through until the magic of the Loden was recalled.
She ran across Aurin Striate in the market center. The Owl
had been up since dawn gathering together the supplies the com-
pany of nine would require to make the journey down Kille-
shan’s slopes to the beaches. His task was made difficult mostly
by the queen’s determination that they would take only what
they could carry on their backs and that stealth and quickness
would serve them best in their efforts to elude the demons.
“The magic, as I understand it, works like this,” he explained
as they walked back toward the palace. “There’s both a wrap-
ping about and a carrying away when it is invoked. Once in
place, it protects against intrusions from without, like a shell. At
the same time, it removes you to another place-city and all-
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