The Queen by Suzanna Lynn Read Free Book Online Page B

was not there to hurt him and he
seemed to believe. I explained who I was, and what I was, and that
I would help him if he promised to stay out of the forest. Together
we brought down a doe.
    “However, the next night, he showed up in
the forest again. This time, he was calling my name. I came to him
and we spoke of things like the Kingdom, the gods and about the
stars in the night’s sky.
    “Night after night he came, and we talked. I
found we were growing very close, much closer than I had ever been
with anyone. Even someone of my own race,” Lyra recalled.
    “What was his name?” Luana asked
timidly.
    “Mercher,” Lyra said. The word seemed to
carry such a weight when she said it.
    “So what happened?” Luana asked.
    “One night he didn’t come to see me. I was
so worried something had happened to him. I defied my brother’s
orders and left the forest in search of Mercher. I ran all over
Black Hallows and finally found him in his blacksmith shop,
working. I remember feeling so angry with him at the time. Feeling
betrayed. But those feelings didn’t last long. Little did I know
that he had been working on a ring. A ring made of the purest
silver. A ring for me.”
    “He meant to marry you?” Luana asked,
engrossed in the tale.
    “Yes. Yes, he did. And he asked me that very
night,” Lyra replied, her eyes moist with unfallen tears. “Though I
was certain that my people would never accept a common man as my
suitor, I accepted him immediately. He took me, right there, in the
hay, on the floor of the smith’s shop.”
    Luana blushed at hearing her mother talk
about having sex with her father. “And that’s how I came to
be?”
    “Yes,” Lyra said. “You are the product of
two individuals loving each other against the odds.”
    “Against the odds?” Baylin asked. “What do
you mean?”
    “For an elf to find a mate outside of our
race… Well, it was unheard of,” Rydel explained. “The elders felt
it was a disgrace to our kind.”
    “Such a disgrace, in fact, that they
demanded I not only cease all contact with Mercher, but that I must
also…” Lyra struggled with her words, sadness in her eyes. “They
demanded that I sacrifice you to the gods once you were born.”
    “A sacrifice?” Luana whispered.
    “You must understand,” Faylen said. “To the
elders, you were an abomination. Elves believe their bloodlines to
be the purest of all lines. Your father’s blood would have muddied
the waters, so to speak.”
    “Well, it’s pretty obvious that you didn’t
hand her over to be sacrificed,” said Baylin, getting a few steps
closer to Luana. “So, the question is, how did you die? How did
Luana end up with Hal-john and Fersa?”
    “I’m afraid it’s a rather long story, Prince
of Grasmere,” King Rydel replied.
    “The short version is, we had been on the
run for many months,” Lyra said. “We fled to Ranhold and then I
gave birth. We were happy. We were certain that the worst was
behind us.”
    Lyra’s smile faded. “But the arm of the
elves is infinite. Scouts were sent to every Kingdom in the realm
to find us. I knew our only hope was to return home and plead with
my brother to help the elders see reason. However, the evening we
docked back in Rivermouth, we were intercepted before we made it
halfway through the King’s Wood. Their instructions were to kill
Mercher on sight and bring you back for me to sacrifice. We fought,
of course, but we were completely outnumbered. Mercher fought with
his last breath, even as his blood stained the ground crimson. He
died protecting us. I managed to slip away, running as fast as I
could through the King’s Wood, holding you in my arms. In the end,
I wasn’t fast enough.” Lyra’s expression was full of memory and
regret.
    “And you died?” Luana whimpered, tears
running down her cheeks.
    “I found you in your mother’s arms,” said
Rydel, walking up beside her and placing a hand on her back. “Even
as she struggled for breath, her