“But I want to go!”

  Galan stood in the doorway of the farmhouse, anger building by the moment. His mother was seated in a wooden armchair before the hearth. A fire burned there, even though it was midsummer.

  “It’s not safe,” Sheora insisted, barely glancing up from the trousers she was hemming.

  “But you promised me!” Galan let the door slam shut behind him. “You said…”

  “I said that if you did the chores I gave you, I would think about it. Don’t slam the door.”

  Galan sulked. “I did everything you asked. Everything.”

  “I’m sorry,” Sheora said. “But it is simply too dangerous for you to go. Maybe next year.”

  “That’s what you always say! Every time, you tell me, ‘maybe next year.’”

  “The road to Stormgarde is dangerous. There are highwaymen on that road. That’s how your father died, did you forget?”

  “No.” Galan had not forgotten. How could he, when his mother took every chance to remind him, particularly whenever he talked about going anywhere beyond the borders of Ambermill. His father had been Renael Sidellyn, a merchant dealing in furs and books. Galan did not remember him. Sheora told him that his father had been tall and fair. That was where Galan’s golden hair had come from.

  He had heard the story of how they had ended up in Ambermill a dozen times. Renael had brought Sheora and Galan, who had been just an infant, to Tol Morad in the hopes of plying his wares in Stormgarde, Ravenwood, and all the little towns in between. Somewhere on the road between Ambermill and Moonbrook, they had been waylaid by highwaymen. Renael had been killed. Sheora and Galan had escaped with their lives. Sheora had made her way to Ambermill and they had lived here ever since.

  Highwaymen were her excuse any time Galan wanted to go anywhere. He hated it. This was the third year he was old enough to go with Master Callahan to Stormgarde, and the third year that his mother had told him she would ‘think about’ letting him go, then after all the chores and tasks, denied him.

  “It’s not fair!” Galan tried again. “Not fair. You do this every year!”

  “Galan, all I want is for you to be safe. The roads are dangerous. Stormgarde is a dangerous city, and with all the tensions between House Raith and House Celwyn, it’s just too dangerous. You are too young. Next year, I will let you go.”

  “San is going,” Galan said. “He’s twelve. I’m fourteen. How am I too young if San is going?”

  “San is Westerling. You are not.”

  “What difference should that make?”

  “We have different customs, son. San will reach his majority when he turns sixteen. Able to marry. Able to own property. You are Tuatha. Your majority will come in your twentieth year. Once you are cuendallar, you will be free to go out into the world and have every adventure you’ve ever wanted. Though I hope you will spend it wisely. We’ve discussed you going to the University. Until then, you will do as I say. When you are older, you will look back and appreciate your longer childhood.”

  Galan sank wearily into a chair before the hearth. All his arguments were exhausted. He’d had real hope this time. He’d split enough wood for the next three months, mended every bit of harness that needed it, cleaned the barn from top to bottom, dug out the springbox, and chopped vegetables for supper every night, even though he hated chopping vegetables. He’d run every errand his mother had given him. Still it wasn’t enough. The disappointment was almost too much to bear.

  “Nora is going,” he said flatly. “San is going.. Jeren. Caleb. Alin…”

  “Why does going to Stormgarde with Master Callahan mean so much to you?” Sheora asked.

  “Everyone else gets to go at least once,” Galan said. “Everyone except me. I guess its not enough that I’m the only elf in class, I’m also the only one that can’t go to Stormgarde!” He was not going to cry over this, not this time. He was fourteen. Tears were for little boys. Still, it was hard to hold them back. His hands shook from the effort of keeping his emotions contained. He had never felt so angry. He had done everything he could, and it still hadn’t been enough.

  Sheora gave a sigh. She held out the trousers she’d been hemming. “These should fit you for a little while, at least. You’re growing like a weed.”

  Galan took the pants and went to stuff them in the rough-hewn dresser in his room. He was outgrowing the trousers he was wearing. Despite that, he was still smaller than the other boys his age. That made him a target. That, and his elven heritage. It wasn’t surprising, not really. Ambermill lay within the borders of House Raith. Raith was a gaian house. Celwyn was an elven house. Most of the elves on Tol Morad lived in Celwyn lands, in Ravendale and Silver Creek and Illidar, places like that. Galan had once asked why they did not live in one of those towns. His mother had told him that they had landed where they landed. “Besides, it’s good for you to grow up with Westerlings. It will serve you well.”

  Galan might have sulked in his room, but there were chores yet to do before sunset. He reluctantly went back into the main room. His mother was still seated in the chair before the hearth. He headed for the door, hoping to make it before she noticed him.

  “Galan.”

  He paused, hand on the door.

  “If it means that much to you, you can go.”

  Galan turned. “Do you mean it?”

  I mean it. You’ve done more than I’ve asked of you. You deserve it.”

  “Can… can I go out for a bit, before supper?” he asked. Only after he spoke did he question the wisdom of making additional requests after he’d just gotten the one thing he wanted.

  “You want to go tell your friend?” Sheora asked.

  Galan nodded.

  “Then go. Be back by dark.”

  Heart bursting with excitement, Galan sprinted through the woods. He was going to Stormgarde!

  He didn’t find Nora in town, at her house, or at the swimming hole half a mile south of town. Only a couple of younger boys were swimming; the water was still too cold for most. They were able to tell him, through chattering teeth, that Master Callahan was telling stories. That’s where Nora would be.

  Galan cut through two barley fields and a sheep pasture to reach the Callahan farm. It was a place he normally avoided. Master Callahan was Caleb’s father, and anywhere Caleb was, Galan wanted to avoid.

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  The horses grazed lazily in their pastures, the fine colts that were to go to Stormgarde already separated into their own pen.

  The sound of voices came from the barn. Galan crept around the farmhouse, hoping not to be noticed, and slipped inside. A dozen or so Ambermill youths were seated on the hay-strewn floor or on stacked hay bales, all their attention fixed on a graying man of middling years. He was seated on a bale of hay, a mug of ale at his side, and he was presently engaged in telling a story.

  Nora was seated on a bale near the back of the group. Galan made his way over to her and sat down beside her.

  “I can go,” he said in a low voice, leaning over to her.

  “That’s fantastic!” Nora said. She gave him a quick hug.

  Up at the front, Grayar Callahan moved seamlessly into a new story.

  “Once, thousands and thousands of years ago, longer than a thousand lives of elves, a sorcerer began dabbling in the necromantic arts. What his true name was, no one knows. It has been lost to time. But what is known is that this sorcerer succeeded in raising the dead. He called the dead from their graves and sought to harness the shadows to his will. From the primal shadows he made Fades and Wraiths and Shadowmen, and the huge Shadowolves that serve them. He bound the wild leshy and the skinwalkers to his will, along with all manner of unsavory things. He built an army of shadows and walking dead. Now, his fortress lay in the wilds of Alftane, in the foothills of the Icespire mountains, far away from cities or towns, so no one took notice of what he was doing until it was too late. By the time he marched, he was calling himself Ud?m, the lord of Shadow.

  “He marched across Alftane, devouring towns in his path. Those that fell rose to join his army and the ranks swelled. In those days, Alftane was ruled by the Istarions, the elvenkings of old. Lath is but a remnant of their former kingdom. But Alftane was much as it is today, sparsely populated and wild. So the Istarion king, Cildarrin, the Shining King, did not notice Ud?m right away. He ignored the reports coming in from the northern frontier.

  “That was how Ud?m marched straight to the gates of Inve Serin, an elven city on the banks of the Anduril River.”

  “Isn’t the Andruil River in Chiand?” Nora asked.

  “It is,” Grayar said. “Now, at least. This took place before Chiand was a cluster of mud huts on the shores of the Sheltered Sea. Back then, the elves ruled all of Am’Theran, from here on Tol Morad to the Caledonia coast in the east, with the exception of the demon lands, of course.

  “When the army of the dead swept down upon Inve Serin and King Cildarrin saw that the reports from the northern frontier were true, he marshalled his armies, called out the city guards, and summoned the Istarion dragon riders.”

  There were collective gasps from the listeners. Dragons! Galan loved stories of dragons and dragonriders. He wished he had his sketchbook and pencils. He had an image in his mind, one he wanted to draw as soon as possible, of a battalion of knights atop their armored drakes, sweeping down to breathe fire upon the legions of the dead.

  “The elven army stood firm against the legions of the dead. They stood valiantly against wave after wave of attacks. But Ud?m’s army seemed endless and all the elves that fell rose again. The Istarion soldiers were faced with their former friends. Their resolve began to fail. But then the dragons arrived.

  “The dragonknights won the day,” Grayar continued. “They swept down over the armies of the dead and unleashed their dragonfire, burning the undead legions where they stood. It appeared that Ud?m would be defeated there that day before the walls of Inve Serin. But the Lord of Shadows was clever. Seeing his defeat before the dragons, he retreated to his mountain fortress, burning and pillaging as he went.

  “King Cildarrin hunted Ud?m’s hidden lair, but the dark lord hid himself well. He sent his legions out to kill and destroy, leaving nothing in his wake. The war lasted for a hundred years while the elves hunted Ud?m’s fortress. At long last, just when they thought that the undead would sweep across Am’Theran and the world, the Bright King found Ud?m in his lair, deep in the wild Icespire Mountains. They battled, the Bright King and the Lord of Shadow, upon the icy slopes, for a day and a night. At last, at dawn, King Cildarrin threw down Ud?m and slew him. But King Cildarrin was gravely wounded and wouldn’t survive. He gave orders for Ud?m’s corpse to be sealed in a tomb deep within the mountains with many spells and wards upon it, for he feared that Ud?m had achieved his goal, which was to make himself immune to death itself with his necromantic arts.

  “The king’s attendants did this. Then they gathered around their dying king. With his dying breath, Cildarrin Istarion spoke a prophecy. ‘The Lord of Shadows shall rise again. His shadow shall lie across the land once more. My descendants shall keep eternal watch over his tomb, but the time will come when my line shall fail. Ud?m shall rise. But one shall be born to oppose him. The Nhimeron shall be the one to destroy him.’ Then Bright King Cildarrin Istarion died.” Grayar Callahan fell silent.

  Galan’s head was full of questions. “But the Istarions are gone now,” he said. “Does that mean no one is watching over Ud?m’s tomb?”

  “It’s just a story,” Caleb said. “It’s not real.”

  “It is, son,” Grayar said. “Ud?m was real. His tomb is real. His armies were shattered, but not eradicated.” He stood. “Now, it’s getting late, and you lot need to be heading home.”

  Nor a lingered near Galan. “What does Nhimeron mean?” she asked.

  “It’s Old Elvish,” Galan said. “Really, really old Elvish. It means ‘Son of Light’ or ‘Child of Light,’ something like that.”

  “Huh,” Nora said. “That’s interesting.”

  Galan slipped out of the barn. Nora followed. He didn’t want to be caught alone by Caleb and his cronies.

  “I’m so happy for you,” Nora said. “You’ll love the city. They have street performers and real theaters, and last year a carnival set up right next to the horse fair, so we could all go.”

  “I can’t wait to see it,” Galan said, still in disbelief that his mother had actually agreed. He was all but certain that something would happen to give her a reason to say that he couldn’t go after all.

  “Come on,” Nora said. “Let’s go tell my ma the good news.”

  They walked together through the forest west of town. It was a way they had gone hundreds of times before, one they could both follow on the blackest of nights.

  “Have you ever seen anything weird out here?” Galan asked suddenly. He was remembering the shadowy figure he had encountered not so long ago.

  “Like what?” Nora asked.

  “Like, I don’t know, strange people? Shadows?” It sounded stupid now that he said it out loud. He had been so scared of whatever that thing had been that he hadn’t told anyone, not his mother, not Nora.

  Nora stopped in her tracks. “You saw it too?”

  Galan nodded slowly. “Last week, when I was walking home from the Dunford farm.”

  “I saw it three days ago,” Nora said softly. “In the woodlot behind our pasture. I… I didn’t want to say anything. I thought maybe I was seeing things.”

  “Me too,” Galan said. They walked in silence through the sun-dappled wood. Nora had seen it too. It was real, then.

  “What do you think it is?” Nora asked.

  Galan nodded slowly. “Last week, when I was walking home from the Dunford farm.”

  “I saw it three days ago,” Nora said softly. “In the woodlot behind our pasture. I…I didn’t want to say anything. I thought maybe I was seeing things.”

  “Me too,” Galan said.

  They walked in silence through the sun-dappled wood. Nora had seen it too. It was real, then.

  “What do you think it is?” Nora asked.

  “Don’t know,” Galan said. “I thought it was a man, but…I don’t know.”

  A smell reached them on the breeze, interrupting their conversation. It was the stench of something dead. Nora and Galan exchanged a glance.

  They found the source of the odor lying beneath a stand of white firs. The surcoats they wore were green, edged in silver. A black raven flew stark against a silver crescent moon. They were elves, in the livery of House Celwyn. The three men had not been dead that long. They were only starting to bloat.

  Nora took Galan’s arm. Her face had gone pale, her eyes wide. “Come on.”

  ***

  “This is just another of their wild stories.” Coewynn Ashlock glared at Galan. The assembled villagers had gathered in the common room of the Golden Trumpet, Ambermill’s only inn. “You’ll see. Like the time he said there was a bear in the old watchtower.”

  There had been a bear using the old tower as a den, Galan thought. He had seen it. It had gone by time the hunting party arrived, but it had been there.

  “We shall see when Jeren returns,” Liddy said. She looked at Coewynn like he had tracked mud across her pristine floor, which he had on occasion. She wore a high-necked green dress today. Her golden hair was bound back with an embroidered white scarf, which also covered the tips of her pointed ears.

  The whole town had shown up, or at least it seemed that way to Galan. He and Nora were the center of attention in the crowded common room. They had been made to recount their grisly discovery three times now.

  The front door banged open. Galan cringed as his mother marched in, shouldering aside several townsfolk as she passed.

  “What is going on here?” Sheora demanded.

  “These two say that they found something disturbing in the woods to the west of town,” Liddy said.

  Sheora turned to Galan, but before she could speak, the door opened again. This time it was Jeren, breathless and panting.

  “Well, boy?” Grayar Callahan asked.

  “They’re there,” Jeren said between breaths. “Three of them.”