"So, nothing will come out of this portal, without a hero here to summon it?" asked her father, General Brimsey."Yes," answered the Hero of Earth, cowering before the general in real fear.
"Brian, why don"t you go with Alfred to finish summoning the deer that the general needs to feed everyone?" asked Aella, giving Alfred a look.
Alfred nodded and guided Brian back over to the portal.
"Is he really as dimwitted as he seems?" asked General Brimsey quietly.
"I think so, but I wouldn"t put it past him to be faking it so we don"t kill him. It"s hard to believe the church would leave someone like him to do this for so long, all alone. If he could do anything with his abilities, I think he would have used them already."
"My demons are having trouble understanding why you are working with the Heroes so willingly, and what"s this about gargoyles?" asked her father, moving her further away from the two.
"You understand why," she said, glancing at him, and he gave a small nod. "Tell them I gave you no reason for it. As the king I can do that."
"But, if you give a plausible reason, their faith in you will remain strong even when questioned by dissenters."
That was true, so she looked back over the valley while she thought. "It is my job to end the war, and to bring my kingdom back to prosperity. If I kill the heroes, they will merely be reborn and the cycle continues. By befriending them, or creating a truce with them, I am capable of working towards my goal. One should keep friends close and enemies closer."
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He looked at her for a moment, then nodded. "As my King has spoken. But, what of the gargoyle bit? Our people have always been called demons. Gargoyles always have wings and are of a single grey color. I don"t believe it is possible for our kind to be considered gargoyles."
"There are still many questions about that, General. I intend to learn what I can, as it may have huge repercussions for our people. Right now, that is not my focus. I came up here to save you and your troops, which I have done. I have other things that scream for my attentions. This portal, the Hero of Earth, and the carvings are all secondary. I leave you and your troops here, in the north, to continue "battling the monsters from the mountains", so any spies will not know that we have discovered the truth. We need to investigate this cave Brian kept mentioning, as it sounded like he had a communication device similar to the one you use to speak with the Advisors back at the palace. If he sends regular messages to the church, you will need to keep up the pretense of him still being here, so they don"t send someone to investigate, as I intend to take him with me. He is too important to allow anything to happen to him."
"What do you intend to do with him?"
"I will take him back to the palace and imprison him, for his own safety. If he dies, any children he may have fathered will gain his powers, and that will notify the church that he is dead."
He nodded, and the two made their way into the tunnel Brian had shown them. He claimed his father had made it, and as Aella stepped into it, she quickly recognized the same patterns on the walls and floor that had been on the underground tunnels she had spent so much time in. The similarity was so eerily similar, she stopped to run her hands over the swirling patterns.
"What"s the matter?" Brimsey asked, but she only shook her head and picked up her pace.
General Brimsey had trouble keeping up with her on the uneven floor, but she had plenty of experience walking on such a floor. It had never occurred to her that the Hero of Earth had made those tunnels. Could he or she have known what they would use them for?
Reaching the branch that split the tunnel, she glanced to the left to see the glow of daylight and turned right. The left branch would take her to the cliffside Brian had been shooting at them from, and her destination was the cave he apparently called home. It wasn"t long before she came to a large door. Pushing it open, she saw that it could be reinforced from the inside to block any intruders from getting into the next part completely.
Looking around, it seemed very animalistic in nature. A pile of furs in one corner must be where he slept, and in another corner was a chiseled shelf. The metal box that sat on it caught the general"s eye, and he went over to examine it. Aella glanced around the rest of the room, and shook her head. There was even less here than she had when she was in the pits.
"It"s exactly the same as the one I have," he confirmed, glancing back at her.
"Then you need to find out how often he reports in, and with what message, so you can keep up appearances as long as possible."
"Aella," he began, turning to her. "I never wanted you to be in those h.e.l.lish pits."
"Did you know how bad they were?" she asked, feeling numb as she looked back down the tunnel they had come down.
"I heard rumors, but I never thought you would be grabbed up. I thought you were far enough away from the palace and too small for them to consider."
"You can"t change the past. I survived and persevered. What"s important is that we"ve had a chance to meet back up again. I thought about you a lot, between my fights. I remembered everything you taught me, and tried my hardest to not give up. When this fight is over, you will live with me, in the palace, or not, as whatever the future brings."
"Do you have any questions?" he asked softly, almost afraid to speak.
"Lots," she whispered, glancing at him, then away. "Was mother really the Hero of Air? Why didn"t you take me somewhere else, further away from everything? Why keep me so close to the border? Where did you learn the things you taught me? Why did you never come back for me?"
Her voice was going to break if she continued with the questions that overran her mind.
"Yes, your mother was the Hero of Air, and she knew when she died her child would become the next hero, but she also told me something else, which is how you were born. She told me that the youngest child she had would gain them first, rather than older children. She begged me to father a child with her, so that the church would lose a hero. She believed if I raised you away from the church, and taught you everything I could on how to survive, it would begin a break in the power that the church had."
"Did she know my birth would kill her?"
"Yes, every half-demon child, born of a human mother, has always killed its mother. She was willing to make that sacrifice, for the sake of everyone"s future. I tried to convince her otherwise, but…"
"Did you love her?" Aella knew it didn"t care, but she was curious. She had always wondered, if her birth was one of love, convenience, or something else.
"Your mother and I met a long time ago, when we were both very young, on the battlefield. A prior king had ordered all the troops possible to try and stop the heroes. We lost so many that day. The battlefield was slick from the blood that had been spilled. I found your mother cowering behind a pile of rubble. I was nothing more than a slip of a demon, myself, so, instead of killing her, as I could easily have done, I sat down next to her, and hid from the fighting, too. We never said anything, but she eventually got up and left, leaving me there.
"When I saw her again, she remembered me, and managed to slip away from the others she was traveling with, hiding until I could find her later. She begged me to hide her away from them, and so I took her home. I was watched so closely, by the Advisors and others, I knew that if I ever tried to flee with you anywhere, they would probably find you and take you back to the church. I didn"t want you to be taken to the pits, but it was preferable to the church.
"Every half-demon child that has been born, has always disappeared to the church, and your mother told me many stories about what they would do to them. I"m not sure why they have such a hatred for us, but their hatred for half-demons is beyond understanding. Your mother believed that by giving a half-demon hero abilities, it would cause a hit to the church, that she couldn"t achieve any other way. It would please her to no end that you have managed to become the king, and that you have befriended the other heroes."
"But did you love her?" Aella looked at him, meeting his eyes with her own.
He looked back without flinching, meeting her eyes. "When you were conceived, no. By the time you were born, yes. I would have done anything if she had agreed to let you die so she could live, but she wouldn"t hear of it. When you looked up at me with her eyes, after she bled out, I couldn"t bare the thought of what this life would bring to you. The day I left you alone in that house was the second most painful thing I have ever had to endure."
"You lie well, father," she said, turning away from him and leaving him in that desolate cave.