Aella teleported back to the throne room in time to see Alfred entering."Aella! I need to ask you something!" cried Alfred, zooming to her side.
"What is it? Is the city safe? Has Rupert managed to get the dome up?" she asked, looking around for anyone else, but the room was empty except for them.
"He finished the dome, and I took him to get working on a dome over the human city when I realized no one has gone to check on the human kingdom!" said Alfred, concern in his eyes.
Aella fought the urge to squirm under his gaze. The humans had been struggling with a horrible sickness when she last saw them, and with the raging magical storm originating from her old palace, there probably wasn"t a lot of survivors.
"I haven"t had a chance," she began.
"Aella, those people don"t deserve to be forgotten. If any of them has managed to survive, we need to be the heroes we are, and try to save them!" he insisted.
"Alfred, I don"t have time. This storm is raging here, my people need me to help with the abilities I have. I have the dwarves, elves, gnomes and halflings to coordinate with because of my ability. Besides, those humans have tried to kill my people for ages!"
Alfred looked at her in silence for a moment before speaking.
"Aella, the church tried to kill the demons off. The humans that we need to save had nothing to do with that. You know this. What are you not telling me?"
"I took Bridgette to steal the books from the church library," said Aella.
"I know. She"s been going on and on about some of them. But what does that have to do with saving the survivors?"
"There were some church leaders having a secret meeting when we arrived and I listened in. They said there was a terrible plague ravishing the countryside, and most of the people were dying from it. They were planning to run off to hidden estates and let it run its course," she admitted.
"That doesn"t mean there can"t be survivors!" exclaimed Alfred. "That just means those people need us even more!"
"Alfred, there"s more," said Aella. "Remember that monster they kept under the church?"
Alfred grew still and looked up at her.
"I went to the dwarves about it, to see if they had a way to neutralize it, or something."
"And?" he asked in a subdued voice.
"It had already broken free by the time the dwarves could check on it. The magical storm had destroyed it."
"That should be good news, but why do I think it"s not?" he asked.
"It ravaged the entire human side of the valley before it broke apart. The dwarves that reported back died after giving their reports, from mana sickness," she said softly. "I hadn"t wanted to bring up the humans so you wouldn"t be upset about it."
"When did this happen?" asked Alfred, staring at the floor. "I"ve been with you the entire time you were at the dwarves. Not once was this mentioned."
"Do you think I would lie?" asked Aella, raising an eyebrow.
"Yes, you"re a demon, aren"t you?" he spat, glaring at her before turning on his heel and zapping out of the room.
"Seems you really upset him," said Firion, from behind her.
"You really have a penchant for showing up when no one else is around," said Aella, not bothering to turn around.
"You watched me come in," he pouted.
"What do you have to report?" she asked.
"Not much. Rupert has been pretty busy. He formed a dome over the city, and part of the fields around the city, in a bid to protect the crops and animals, I think. He also formed a domes road from here to the human city, so we could trade back and forth without worrying about the storm. All of the local wildlife has retreated back into the trees and the lions are complaining about the difficulty in hunting. Things are going to get pretty interesting if we have to live with this storm for three more months."
"I"ve negotiated with the halflings for food, so we shouldn"t starve, though feeding the lions may become more difficult. I may have to hunt the dying animals in order to keep them alive."
"What do you plan to do now? We don"t really need you at the moment. Everyone"s doing what they should be, under penalty of death, of course," he said with a small smile.
Aella glanced at the door and with a sigh said, "I"m going to be hunting for survivors in the human kingdom. Inform Josephine I may need her. I will be bringing any I find to the courtyard of the castle."
"Is that wise? The mana will be at deadly levels," said Firion, not really sounding very concerned.
"The realm informed me it wouldn"t let me die," she whispered, remembering the conversation.
"Sucks to be you," he said in her ear.
Aella teleported across the room before he could stab her. "Why do you think I told you that?" she said.
"I had to try," he grinned, shrugging and slipping his dagger back into its sheath. "Would you mind being the G.o.dmother of my kid?"
"Your girl is pregnant?" asked Aella in shock.
"It was bound to happen," he said with another shrug.
"Are you going to marry her?"
"And risk going up in flames when I step into a church?" he laughed.
"You could have Bob marry you," offered Aella.
"You would accept the word of a bartender?" asked Firion, eyeing her.
"I would accept his word," laughed Aella.
"I"ll talk to her. But what about the G.o.dmother bit?"
"Firion, do you have any idea what you are asking?"
"Of course," he said with a smile.
"Sure," she sighed. "I have work to do."
Teleporting back to the far eastern edge of the mountains, where the storm had blown her during the drinking contest, Aella looked down at the dwarven remains before her. The rocks she had painstakingly piled on their corpses were untouched, but green tendrils that had a faint glow were peeking out.
Turning to look back at the glow on the horizon behind her, she sighed again. This was going to be worse than searching for her own people. Alfred would appreciate it, and she needed his support. All of the heroes had to stay on her side.
Flying low over the water, she glimpsed dark forms moving under the waters. They didn"t seem that interested in her, but she flew higher just in case. She wouldn"t be swimming in these waters any time soon!
The blast of mana hit her as she came around the end of the last mountain. There was no way any human could have survived this, but she started looking anyway. When her skin started to peel, she teleported to the north, and lay in the snow until she had healed, then teleported back to search some more. The days ran together, as the storm raged around her, with her visiting the north more and more frequently. She was just about to give up and call it, when she spied smoke in the mountains to the north.
Protected by the northern mountains, a group of humans had managed to survive. Most of them were women and children, and the disease the church leaders had mentioned had been picking them off, as the graveyard was already huge. There must have easily have been ten times as many who fled here. Aella imagined many may have also died from mana poisoning.
Pangs of guilt tugged at her as she descended from the sky to approach them. She might have been able to save more if she had arrived sooner. Alfred had been right. These people weren"t the ones who had waged war on her people. They deserved better.
"Who are you?" asked a little girl with blond curls, gazing up at her from a mound of wild flowers she had been sitting in the middle of. Her bright blue eyes were burning with curiousity and fever.
"I am the hero of air. I have come to save all of you," said Aella.
"That"s great!" cried the girl, jumping to her feet and scattering picked flowers all over the place. "Do I have time to take these flowers to my mommy first?"
"Of course," said Aella, helping the little girl gather up the flowers again. "Where is she?"
The little girl turned and pointed at the graveyard. "Big Brother took her there when she fell asleep and wouldn"t wake up. He said she wasn"t in pain anymore, and I told him that was good. Mommy was hurting a lot before she fell asleep. She was even crying! Mommy never cried before."
Aella frowned. This was too much. Was Joseph trying to rub salt in the wound? She knew she should have come sooner, but this? She would not cry! She never cried! GRrrr!