That was eighty thousand warriors in the air alone!
The first man spoke again. “We’ll have ten legions ofelves, assuming the seventh and ninth legions make it back from the wilds in time to march.”
That was another fifty-thousand men, all elves, the strongest fighting force in all of the three realms.
The same man continued, “And we’ll have five hundred dryads assigned to each legion to use tree-teleportation, moving each legion nearly instantaneously to the campus. We’ve picked five locations where we’ll come out, hopefully surprising this upstart’s forces.”
That was extremely useful to know. Though where, exactly, would be better.
But then the general in question pointed to a map of the campus and mentioned the five locations in detail. Perfect. It looked like they planned to have three legions come out on the south end of campus, along the tree-lined cliff over the ocean. We wouldn’t likely expect an attack from that side. Two legions each would come in from the east and west. A legion of “dummy” soldiers — cannon fodder shifters — would attack from the north as a distraction, engaging our forces while the others sneaked up behind us and slaughtered us. The last three legions would be stationed around the queen herself, also in the north.
It was a good plan; too bad I knew about it.
Now I just had to survive long enough to tell someone.
There was a little more talk of strategy after that, but it was mostly how they’d go about finding or luring out our commanders and Izzy, so they could be dealt with. They did not expect Izzy to be on the front lines.
The meeting broke up, and I instantly shadow-stepped away, to a shadowed corner of the royal suite. I’d already scouted the suite and had seven different shadows I could jump to if need be. When I hadn’t found Valnea here previously, that’s when I’d begun scouting the rest of the palaceand overheard some servants talking about the meeting I’d just witnessed.
I waited for Valnea to return, masking myself in shadows, pulling them around me like a blanket. This would make it difficult to sense my life force or spirit. That was my one worry. Elves had power over creation, life itself. And the strongest elves could sense all living beings around them. Valnea certainly could do so… the question was: would she even think she needed to while safe within her own rooms?
While I waited, my thoughts slipped back to my last conversation with Izzy. Her words still haunted me.
There is only one reason I’d ever consider breaking our bond, and that is ifyouasked me to.
I want you in my life. Period.
How many times do I have to say it?
Apparently a few more. Some part of me still couldn’t quite believe I was worthy of her. And she’d been right to say that was on me. I had a deeply ingrained belief that I wasn’t worthy of anything or anyone.
And yet… here I was, unseen in the capital, in the palace, spying on the queen, doing perhaps the most important thing for Izzy and the rebellion. I had to be worthy of something to be here, doing this, didn’t I?
Though, that niggling little voice of doubt whispered that I was only here because I was expendable, unimportant. If I was caught, no one would miss me.
Even though I had tangible proof that that wasn’t the case — that Izzy would very much miss me if our bond was broken — the voice persisted.
In my head I was starting to see the value I had to Izzy, to Safir, to others. I was starting to trulyfeelmy strength and capabilities. And yet, in my heart, I still felt like nothing. Notall the time, but enough to make me wonder what it would take to get past this persistent negative belief.
Footsteps approached and I pulled the shadows tighter around me.
Five dragons entered first. They spread out and did a visual inspection of the room. It seemed the false queen was paranoid. I leaped around from shadow to shadow, avoiding the five dragons as they searched every corner, never noticing me. Dragons were strong in spirit and if they hadn’t noticed me, I had to assume my shadows kept even my spirit concealed.
They gave the all-clear, and Valnea entered.
She gave one cursory glance around — never even looking in my direction — then dismissed the dragons.
She was alone.
I didn’t move, barely breathed. I didn’t know what, if anything I might get from the queen while she was alone, but I hoped for something. And I was rewarded.
Valnea began muttering to herself, her ramblings slowly getting louder.
She let out a strange child-like giggle and spoke loud enough for me to hear as she paced frenetically around her suite.
“Yes, yes, yes, all coming together, all together. They’ll pay. They’ll all pay. They’ll die and I’ll live. Yes, perfect. Yes.”
I’d known, in theory, that Valnea wasn’t all there, but hearing her ramblings for myself was extremely disconcerting. How did everyone not know she was insane? She must have some awareness of it herself and have hidden it from others.
