The Dark Remains - Mark Anthony [225]
“But that’s impossible. I know it is. The only person who could possess that necklace as a child would be—”
“Would be Ulther’s last descendant and heir,” Melia said.
Falken and the others stared at Grace as if she had suddenly sprouted wings. Grace struggled for words but found she had none, so she struggled for understanding instead. According to Melia, the man in the statue—King Ulther of Toringarth—was her great-thirty-something-times-over-grandfather. Which meant, all this time, she was not from Earth at all. She was from …
Travis’s voice was soft with wonder. “You’re from Eldh, Grace.”
No, it couldn’t be true.
Except it was, and she knew it. Three years old, alone on the side of a mountain, and all she had was a piece of his sword. That and a fragment of a song she had heard as an infant. A song from another world. Her world.
And farewell words too often part …
“With Fellring sword of Elfin art,” Grace murmured aloud.
Melia caught Grace’s hands in her own, beaming with joy.
“Welcome home, Ralena.”
75.
Grace listened, utterly numb, as Falken and Melia told a tale—her tale—describing how for centuries they had, in secret, kept watch over the heirs of the lost kingdom of Malachor. At some point Lirith must have come from the throne room, although Grace didn’t see when. All at once she was simply aware that Lirith was there, eyes shining as she gazed at Grace.
“I don’t understand, Falken,” Beltan said when at last the bard paused in his telling. “All the old stories I’ve ever heard say that the royal line of Malachor was completely wiped out when Malachor fell, that no heirs survived.”
“You’re right, Beltan,” Falken said, gazing at his black-gloved hand. “That is what the stories say. That’s what I wanted the stories to say when I wrote them down seven centuries ago.”
His words seemed important, but Grace’s brain was too dull to comprehend what the bard was saying.
“I think maybe I understand,” Travis said. “One member of the royal line of Malachor did survive, only you and Melia didn’t want anyone to know about it.”
Falken’s wolfish visage was haggard, as if the centuries suddenly weighed heavy upon him. “It was the king and queen’s only child, their infant son. With a knife I cut him crying from her womb where she lay dead—only a day after the king himself was slain.”
Lirith moved closer. “You were afraid those who had murdered the king and queen would kill their child as well.”
“But how did it all happen?” Aryn said, blue eyes questioning. “The stories say that Malachor fell, but they never really say how. Only that you—”
Melia cast a sharp glance at the young baroness, and Aryn hastily bit her tongue. However, Grace knew what she had been about to say.
That you were the reason the kingdom fell.
“No, my lady, that is not a tale I will tell today.” The bard looked up, and his wolfish visage brightened. “Nor does it matter, not now. Not when you’ve come back to us, Ralena.”
At last Grace managed to find her voice. “Why do you keep calling me Ralena?”
Melia smiled. “Because it’s your name, dear. At least, it’s the name your parents gave you.”
These words were like a blow to the center of Grace’s chest. “My parents? You knew them?”
“Yes, dear, quite well in fact.” Melia sighed. “They were so young, so bright—sometimes around them I felt as if I were still only a thousand years old.”
Durge’s eyes bulged, and even Grace felt a mad impulse to laugh. But the feeling passed as sorrow filled Melia’s gaze.
“What happened?” she whispered.
It was Falken who answered. “Raiff and Anilena—your parents, Grace—were married young. Too young, Melia and I both thought at the time, but I believe they felt some urgency in the matter. You see, Anilena was at the time the sole living heir to Malachor—the direct descendant of the last king and queen. Her parents had died young, her mother while giving birth to her, and