Old Grudges

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"You, elf." A gruff sounding human man was seated in a tavern in the human village of Earlestown. It had once been a bustling market place, a meeting place for merchants and scholars. But now... It was lucky if a handful of hunters passed through on their way elsewhere. The people here lived close to the neighbouring kingdom that boasted that is was the seat of all civilisation, Elven, of course. The exact border was somewhat of a foggy issue, meaning battles often broke out over ownership of land. Elves passed through, most of them simply wishing to look down upon what they considered the uncivilised and rather boring humans, before returning to their own cities of silver.
"Elf?" The dark haired female asked, spitting that one word back at the man who had called it to her as she walked past his table. "You do not address the other women here as 'human', so not call me by my race either." She added rather haughtily.
"Well la-di-da! Ain't you just lady of the manor!" The man sneered, banging his glass down on the creaking wooden table. "Your kind aren't welcome here! You never will be! Get your knife ears back to your own side of the border!" 
The elven woman sighed heavily and with silent and sudden movements, she was in front of the human, her ornate elven dagger slammed into the chair all too close to his privates. "Do not test me, human. I have no humour for your kind this evening."

"Then I'll go to another human. It can't be that hard to find some willing to kill elves." Dahlia snorted, trying not to let emotion play into her voice. 

"What's the matter? Jealous it's her and not you?" Abalas sneered, suddenly tossing Eirwen down on the dining hall table and pinning her wrists above her head.

"Do you not trust your father's right hand?" Iris asked, an odd feeling creeping into her stomach. She couldn't quite identify it.

"There's the man I know." Eirwen ground out, baring her teeth. "That human isn't enough for you, is she?"

"I do, I just don't think two people against an elven army is enough." Dahlia replied. "I need Rothain here to watch over him while I find help."

"Spoken like a true whore." Abalas spat. "You preach about me doing you wrong, but how many of my men have you actually had between those creamy thighs?" He added, reaching into his belt and pulling his knife free. "How many!"

"Dahlia...there's something else here..." Iris whispered, turning to head back toward the castle. She could feel the darkness stealing over the castle. Something was casting a spell. "We're running out of time! Go get help! I shall do what I can to protect him here. But make it quick!" 

"What do you care? You cast me aside for another!" Eirwen shouted back, her chest heaving. "And now you are doing it again! What I do with my body is my business! It is no longer your concern!"

Dahlia pushed to her feet, not even bothering to wipe the mud off her knees before sprinting into the forest outside the palace. This place was more like home than the palace had ever been.

"Good, because you will no longer be queen." Abalas sneered, taking his blade and slicing through the long hair Eirwen cherished so much.

Iris ran through the palace, hoping she remembered where the dinning room was. Like Rothain she passed the strange creature just outside the door without even seeing it. Unlike the wood elf, however, she was able to open the doors to the room. She hadn't heard the order not to and no one was brave enough to tell her that she shouldn't. 

"You bastard!" The dark haired elf screamed loud enough to shatter the windows of the dinning room. But it would do her no good. The loss of her hair was like a death sentence. Abalas didn't have to kill her to remove her from the throne. Taking her hair was more than enough.

Abalas smiled and let the hair flutter through his finger to the ground. "Vanity... Who knew it was such a weakness." He purred as Iris burst into the dining hall.

"What have you done?" Andaer shoved Iris hard enough to send her to the floor as he stormed into the room. His multicolored eyes were flaming as he stopped mere inches from his father, his hand on his sword. "What the hell is wrong with you?" 
Rothain appeared from nowhere, at the king's side as he always was. He didn't make a show of holding onto his sword hilt. It was out and ready, in between father and son.

"You would speak to your king in that tone?" Abalas asked, through being a father to his children. His lenience had made them what they were. He was their king first and foremost.

Andaer cocked his head to the side, offering his father nothing but a hateful sneer. "When was the last time you ran this kingdom, sire?" He hissed. "Aside from the occasional order to burn down a human village or to gather up a small army to fetch your wayward child, you have done nothing. You are not the king here." Behind him, Eirwen was getting to her feet, her face streaked with humiliated tears.

"I see." Abalas remarked calmly as he helped Iris up to her feet. "And you think you are king?" He sneered. It was no secret that Abalas had always favoured his daughter's over his son. "I would wager that little Dahlia could best you in combat."

"Little Dahlia is gone." Andaer said darkly, his strange eyes resting on the darkness behind his father. "The moment she was left alone she made another run for it. Sorry, father. Unlike the rest of us, she just can't stand you." 
"There is something wrong here." Iris whispered softly, allowing Abalas to keep a tight grip on her. She turned her head, watching the door. 
Rothain was watching both, his movements steady. He knew full well that he was going to have to fight something. He just wasn't sure what. "I allowed it. She is my bride. She asked for a boon and I let her go. You don't know what you speak of, boy."

"Bride?" Gwen mocked from where she had rejoined her family. "She's a petulant child. You really think she is doing anything but running back into the arms of that human you tore her away from?"

"Abalas..." Iris gave the king a shake. She'd seen a pair of claw like hands. They were moving like a puppet master, moving the elves around like they were toys. "We need to get out of this room. Now." 
Rothain didn't respond to this. Iris' words were tugging at him, pulling at a sheet of darkness that was beginning to form over his thoughts. His hand was on a familiar dagger and he was no longer aiming it at the king's son.

Abalas barely seemed to hear Iris. He was glaring at his daughter now, his fingers turning white he was gripping his own blade so tightly. "Do you wish to look like your mother?!" He growled, advancing on his middle child.

"Abalas!" Iris shouted. When he still ignored her, she grabbed his ears and turned his face toward hers and pressed her lips to his. 
"That whore!" Eiwen hissed, though there wasn't really much else she could say or do. The shock of the action had them all floored.

This did finally seem to calm Abalas somewhat and he dropped his blade as his hands came to rest upon Iris' slender waist.

"I need to speak with the king!" Dahlia had ignored her rational side and ran straight to Saul, his was the nearest kingdom anyway. "Please, it is urgent!" She declared as she arrived at the castle gate.

"There you are..." Iris pulled away slightly, her forehead resting against the icy one belonging to her king. "We need to get out of here. There's something in the room that's casting a spell. It's trying to making your right hand hurt you. We need to go." 
"Sire..." Rothain was fighting the darkness now. The sound of the king dropping his blade enough to wake him up as well. "Listen to her..." 

"Go away, knife ear." The guard there laughed at her. "We ain't falling for nothing. We have orders. You keep standing here we get to kill you."

Abalas looked around and saw nothing, but he could feel the pressure in the room. It was now like a physical force trying to crush all of them. He nodded in agreement at Rothain, then took Iris' hand and took several large steps to the door.

"You can try." Dahlia snorted. "But I don't have time for fat, slow little boys who don't know what the pointy end of the metal stick does!"

"Bring about your tournament, father." Andaer said darkly. "But make sure you join it. You must prove as well as the rest of us that you are fit the rule here. From what we have seen this evening, you can't even fight the control of a simple monster..." 
"Monster my ass." Rothain hissed once they'd made it to the garden. "That was the work of a djinni." 

Another guard had joined the first and he was now laughing too. "Ah yes. The little knife ear is going to tell us how it is done. Go on then. Show us how to hold a sword, little one."

"Ro..." Abalas turned to his most trusted man with a serious expression. "You need to win that tournament." He breathed. "I cannot have Andaer on the throne, he will lead us all to war." He seemed to be avoiding the issue of the Djinni altogether.

Dahlia smiled sweetly and very slowly pulled out the two elven blades that were holstered beneath the  quiver on her back. "How shall we do this, you both rush at me, and embarrass you together? Or would you rather I humiliated you one at a time?"

"You will win, sire. I will help you. There is no other way around it." Rothain said, already shaking his head. "Can you imagine a wood elf as king. Me, no less." He shook his head. "I am a guardian. Not a ruler." 
Iris was looking back toward the castle, her mind on the djinni. She wasn't sure what a creature like that was. She'd never even heard of it. She still remembered the hands and that was bad enough. 

The two men laughed and foolishly opened the gates. "Look at her and those toys. She really thinks she's going to do something!" The first one roared. 
"Come on then, girly. I'll raise your skirts just for letting you try!" The other chimed in.

"You would have been king." abayas assured Rothain. "If something happened to both of Eirwen's offspring, despite what I told her, Dahlia would have been Queen."

Dahlia tried not to smile as the gate opened. They would barely even see her as she ran at the first man, slicing through his belt and letting his pants fall round his ankles. A moment later she had turned on the second guard, her blade sheathed and her bow free as two arrows in quick succession pinned him to the wall by his clothing. There was no contest as to who would have won the tournament, were Dahlia still in her own kingdom. "Now this end, this is the pointy one." She purred as she picked up the sword of the guard currently pinned to the wall.

"I know." Rothain smiled ever so slightly, making it clear he didn't believe a word his king was saying. "But she doesn't want me. I am not a king like that human." He gave a soft sigh and turned to the trees, edging his way back to the castle. "Stay here, sire. I'll fetch the other guards and give them your orders. And get you bother something warm and dry to wear." He didn't wait for confirmation as he headed back into a secret passage. 
"That poor boy." Iris said softly, knowing how Rothain felt. "He truly feels that no one loves him." 

"Go fuck yourself, elf!" The guard hissed, though he'd already pissed himself and was crying like a baby. The other man was nowhere to be seen.

"I blame your idiot brother." Abalas sighed. "Filling her head with the silly notion that he actually wanted her." He added, sliding his arm around Iris and pulling her against him. "Tell me again how he rules your  kingdom, and not you?"

"Well there are certainly no men around here to do it." Dahlia sneered, stabbing the sword she had been holding into the rain soaked ground hatefully.

"Oh yes, I can see how that would work out." Iris said, resting her head against his chest. "I have killed a child. Nearly killed a king. I can see myself ruler of a kingdom. My people would dead in weeks time. Give or take four days." 

Saul had locked himself away inside his own castle. He'd lost Molly. He'd lost his sister. He'd been tricked by an elf he'd fallen for. His father had been a fool. There was no working with other creatures. They were all monsters.

"You didn't kill Molly." Abalas told Iris firmly. "You have't killed a king, and I think kingdoms flourish under the rule of a Queen, rather than a king." 

Dahlia met no further resistance when she entered the castle, as this time she kept to the shadows, thinking who would want to help an elf who incapacitated half the guards before getting to the king? Saul would most likely miss even the sound of her climbing up to the window of his bedchamber.

"You're just saying that because you want to kiss me again." Iris teased, in no way thinking this to be true. She rolled her eyes at him, her thoughts on the way his wife's hair had fluttered through his finger tips. She had no idea the significance behind it. 

Saul was sitting at the window, his large fingers wrapped around a heavy glass of ale. It wasn't his first of the night and he didn't plan for it to be his last. He was going to forget the losses he'd suffered, one way or another.

"If I wanted to kiss you again... I wouldn't tell you." Abalas chuckled, before doing exactly that. "How can I take your breath away, if you know it's coming?" He breathed against those warm human lips.

"Saul..." Dahlia frowned when she saw the human king sitting this way. She had come asking for help, but she was actually rather angry with him.

"It's...actually pretty easy when it comes from you." Iris whispered, the feel of his hands on her hips almost making her forget what she'd been thinking about. "Abalas, what happened in there? With your wife...why did you cut her hair?" 

"Go away." Saul slurred. "I don't want to bathe today. I didn't want to bathe yesterday either. Leave me be." He all but shouted, throwing up his hand but refusing to turn around.