But this was not new information.
“There’s something here.” Mev jumped across the rocks as if she’d grown up doing it.
We followed her back to the palace.
“Do you remember,” Mev asked me, “when I asked you why some relics resonated while others lay dormant here? You told me that Elydor required balance for its magic to thrive. And that it also depended on the hand that wields them.”
Though I didn’t yet understand her line of thinking, another memory came back to me. It wasn’t a pleasant one, but the conversation with the historian Elvric. He had mentioned, offhand, that relics remember wounds.
Why did that feel important?
“Elydor requires balance,” I said aloud, so the others could hear my thinking. “The hand that wields them can alter their power. Elydorian artifacts remember wounds.”
“Their answer is only revealed together,” Nerys added, echoing Mev’s earlier thought. She stopped, so we did too. “You speak of relics and wounds, of balance and memory. But Elydor has always demanded more than relics. It demands those willing to bear the weight of its memory. That is why even immortals fade when their time has passed. Perhaps the Gate waits not for power, but for the one it deems ready to carry that memory forward.”
“You think Mev, maybe?” I asked Nerys.
Mev, who was intently examining the rock she stood on, was oblivious.
I understood the question and had had the thought many times. Clearly, the princess had no notion of what we meant. She’d not like it. Not until she could be reunited with her mother first. There was no reason to speak the thought aloud until we were certain.
Could Mev be the preordained next ruler of Aetheria? Maybe she, and not Galfrid, should have attempted to reopen the Gate? Even that didn’t feel right. It missed something… something we were close to piecing together.
“I think we are close,” I said, silently telling Nerys not to speak her thoughts aloud. Not yet. We’d had one new king in as many days, and I knew from being, even briefly, with Terran, how heavily it weighed on him. Mev wasn’t ready, even if that was to be her future here.
She was certainly powerful enough. Though not more powerful than her father.
“Let’s go talk to Eirion some more. Maybe tell him what we’re thinking.” I turned to Nerys. “If that’s alright with you? I don’t want your last two days here to be taken up with this every waking moment.”
“I do,” Nerys said, her tone not leaving any room for discussion. “There is naught more important. For you, but also for my partner and his people, too.”
It was easy to forget that she was partnered with a full human. Unlike Mev, not a demi-immortal, but one just like Issa, even if he was more intuitive.
And I had no doubt he was. From all I knew of Rowan, he was more in tune with his abilities than any other human.
“Two days then,” Mev said, rejoining us. Resolute. “We will figure this out and try again before you leave. And if it doesn’t work, we’ll keep looking for the answer.”
“And when you find it, I will return with the Pearl. We cannot fail if we do not give up, aye?”
“Aye,” Mev and I said in unison.
With luck, I sounded more confident than I felt. Having been at Galfrid’s side for many years as he attempted to reopen the Gate, I knew first-hand this was no easy task we attempted. But what else could we do before Nerys left but try?
At least it kept my mind, or nearly kept my mind, from wandering back tohim.
36
TERRAN
Chaos erupted around me. It was no less than I expected.
It was the first time using the throne room and would be my last. If any other chamber in the palace held so many at once, I’d have utilized that instead. Having informed the palace staff—those who remained—I would not be moving my residence, work had begun to renovate much of the space back to its original state. Less ornate. More… Gyorian.
“This cannot stand.”
I watched reactions carefully, as did Dren and Dell. Collectively known as “The D’s,” both had become instrumental to me these past weeks. Working together well, and with a similar vision for our clan, the latter also served me well in another respect.
But the near-daily whispers with Lyra could not be my focus at the moment. Against King Galfrid and my own Council’s wishes, I had just informed the gathered nobles of the Aetherian king’s thus-far defunct plan.
