Harlen put his arm under Hyandai's ribs and helped her stay on her feet. She felt wasted and thin, like she had spent months in a dark cell. He looked over the carnage in the room that Hyandai had wrought alone. Body parts lay strewn about, and whole bodies, cloven in two, heads, arms, and legs.
She shuddered as she saw it too, as for the first time. "No wonder they called me a witch." She muttered.
Harlen started to move them forward again, toward the shattered doorway. "You were magnificent." He said, kissing her hair. "You looked like a warrior goddess from the old tales from Syriss."
She looked at the ehladrel in his hand. "It was the weapon." She said. "There is a reason the orcs fear it. And my people seek its return.
They came to the fallen body of Letharon. Hyandai looked at his still-shocked face. "He was one of our greatest warriors, Harlen." She said, her voice heavy with sadness.
"Why did he do this?" He asked.
"Some elven folk believe it a mistake to work closely with the humans, a minority, but a increasingly radical minority. The losses of the battles in the Windy Isles have caused them to begin a campaign to subvert the people away from the crown's will and turn us back inwards, like our Starre Island cousins." She shook her head. "There are dark elves among them, as well, being as they share some goals."
Harlen muttered. "The enemy of my enemy is my friend."
She knelt and closed Letharon's eyes, needing the huntsman's help to regain her feet. "I wish it were not so, but they see it that way, indeed." She looked back at Lotharon as Harlen guided her out the doorway. "He was a hero once, and now has died defying the will of his people, the ones he swore to protect, it pains me to see him in such ignoble company upon a field of death."
Harlen nodded. "He chose the wrong path." He said. "Becoming that which you hate to destroy another which you hate gains you nothing. I learned that the hard way." He gave her a wry smile.
She kissed him on the cheek. "Forgive yourself now, beloved." She said.
They cautiously approached the stairs, but there was no movement in any of the side chambers. All the orcs, it seemed, had truly fled in terror at the wroth of the 'witch queen.' Harlen could not blame them; he was more than a little frightened of the small woman who now leaned on him for support.
As they descended the stairs, Harlen said. "I thought you had to have a willing person to perform your spiritual leap into them."
She shook her head. "Only if you wish them to survive it." She looked at him with sad eyes. "I was not concerned if the orcs' minds were destroyed at my coming into them. She again looked at the ehladrel. I was not concerned for much, except defeating those that would stand in my way to freedom. It is a terrible weapon you hold, Harlen. It does not care who it destroys, so long as an elf wields it and believes in what he is doing."
"Isn't it that way with all weapons?" He replied as he looked into the corridor toward the exit of the tower.
She sighed and said. "Yes, I guess it is." Again, there was nothing moving in the tower. The orcs had fled far from this place of terror for their kind. There may have been several hundreds in the fortress, but the word of the witch queen broke their will, and none of their kind would stand for being simply slaughtered. Harlen envied orcs their very selfish attitude, though it is also why they have achieved little in the world. He grinned realizing that selfishness gains an individual, and selflessness gains a people.
They emerged into the darkness of early night. Hyandai scanned the surrounding hillocks and rock piles. "There is nothing moving, save small animals." She pronounced. "Was I truly so terrifying?" She asked, looking at Harlen with large eyes.
He nodded sadly. "Yes." He said simply.
She touched his cheek. "Even for you?"
He looked away from her, breaking the contact with those green, luminous eyes. "Yes." He said. "To know my lover can destroy a man's mind with but a glance, or his body with a simple flick of her wrist." He looked back at her. "How is a man to react to such terrifying power?"
She shrugged, a habit she had been increasingly using as she spent time with the man she loved. "How am I to react to a man who could snap my neck like kindling?" She said quietly. "Or break my heart with a few little words." She added, her eyes dropping. "You may not know it, but when I first met you, the very first human I had actually spoken to, and one of the first I had seen, I was terrified of you. You were so big and powerful, and moved like an animal, a bear stalking his wood." She smiled. "But I needed to trust you, so I bit that back and trusted you."
He smiled at the memory of their meeting, seemingly so long ago, but only, in reality, perhaps two weeks. "You're saying I should trust you now?"
She nodded. "Please." Her eyes implored him. This was very important to her, and she knew if he could not trust her, their love was doomed. "My power will never be used to hurt you, and you know that."
He considered this as they descended the steps that led to the mouth of the fortress, both keeping wary eyes out on the field and surrounding environs. "I guess that I do." He finally said. "As I suppose you do, as well."
She smiled and kissed his shoulder. "With my very life." She whispered. They finally reached the first outlying rock piles and did their best to blend into them, and move quietly between the formations and small hills, leading back to the high pass to his home.
Hyandai could not climb the steep path up to the pass this night, and they sought out some secluded location to pitch their blankets for a night's sleep. Harlen finally declared a spot somewhat suitable and they unfurled their beds. She immediately sought his touch as they lay down and he embraced her, knowing that to make her feel, even in the least, unwanted, would hurt her greatly. He soon realized he was drawing as much comfort from her as she was from him, and smiled into her cinnamon-scented hair as they both drifted into uneasy sleep.
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