"We have the palace at capacity, Your Majesty. No more people can fit into it," said Orolon as she paced in front of her throne."What of the food to the north? Has any of it been salvageable?" she asked.
"The team dispatched to check on it said the buildings holding the barrels of food were knocked off their foundations, and will probably need to be rebuilt," he said, glancing down at his stack of reports. Flipping through them, he said, "It"s really too soon to know how much of the food was lost. Many of the barrels were found unharmed, several miles south of the site, where the waters carried them into a grove of trees. They haven"t yet had a chance to do a full inventory, since all of the prior doc.u.ments were destroyed in the water. Only two of the residents who lived there, managed to survive by climbing trees. The others were swept away and ended up drowning."
"What about the infrastructure? Are the roads and bridges still there?" she asked, glancing at Xathtak.
"I"ve heard that two of our major bridges to the north are gone. They allowed people to be able to cross the river, so trade has been heavily effected," said Xathtak, flipping through papers.
Aella wanted to scream at them. Everyone and everything was affected by this flood! Taking a breath, she nodded and sat on her throne, only to jump back up again to resume pacing.
"The roads have been washed out in places that were susceptible to that, but otherwise, they are fine. I still don"t have any reports from the northern regions against the mountains, where we grew most of our herd animals. I know that area was the hardest hit," Xathtak added softly, turning to Varnin who was reading at a breakneck pace through the reports that had just been handed to her.
Servants had been running back and forth into the throne room for the past thirteen hours. Everyone was tired and trying the hardest they could to keep going, but Aella knew they were all needing rest. When Edgar entered the throne room, carrying a tray of food, she stopped her pacing and knew that it was that time.
"Advisors, you will go to the Dining Hall and eat, then go sleep a couple of hours. I expect all of you back here in 4 hours. Seifer, since you and Frederick have the most rest of anyone, I want the two of you to keep up with the reports as they pour in, so the advisors can go through them when they return. If there are any emergencies that you can"t handle, come get me. I"m going to check on the heroes and get some sleep myself."
The two nodded and turned to the freshest wave of people that were pouring into the room. Giving Edgar a smile to show her thanks, she took the tray and was about to teleport away when Firion entered the room and waved at her.
"Aella, it"s important, if you have a minute?" he asked, jogging up to her.
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"What is it Firion?" she asked, picking up one of the strawberries on the tray.
"I was heading down to the dungeons to interrogate some of our prisoners, when I heard one of them talking to someone. I tried to listen in, but they knew I was there somehow, when I stepped into the room, the guy was alone. I know he was talking to someone, Aella. I"ve hung around since then, trying to catch them talking again, but the visitor has never returned."
"Which guest?" she asked, narrowing her eyes.
"Zalgor," he answered softly so only she could hear.
Aella nodded thoughtfully. That was the demon counselor that Firion had said was odd. Could the visitor have been the demon from the Spell Spire before she cut all of the magical lines? She couldn"t risk it. The church was mostly out of the picture, but she had to make sure. Holding out her hand, Firion paused, confused, then tentatively touched it with his own. The moment he touched her, she teleported them both to the hall just outside the treasury room.
"Let"s go," she said, eating another strawberry from her tray. Firion nodded and followed her as she took off down the hall. Her crown led her to the dungeon, even though there was a secret door she had to go through. Firion seemed impressed, but she wasn"t about to tell him her secret. Pausing outside the third door, she waited for him to open it and she stepped inside.
Ignoring the gasps from the demon hanging from the chains on the wall, she pulled out her goggles and slipped them on. All of the magic that was attached to the demon was shredded, hanging in tatters, except for one. It was a different color, than the other strands she had seen. It was pitch black, like the magic she had seen from the demon in the Spell Spire. He knew this demon wasn"t killed, and played along with her!
She stood there, chewing various morsels from her tray of food, looking at the counselor as saliva dripped from his mouth. If the demon in the Spell Spire had known she hadn"t killed this demon, then everything he had done since could be suspect as well. Swallowing the food to hide her discomfort, she turned to Firion.
"Kill him. I want him dead before the sun comes up. Let me know when you think he"s dead."
Firion had turned towards the demon after her first comment, but paused to glance back at her after her last. Turning to leave the room, she stepped outside while Firion did his deed. She had seen enough demons die. She would rather eat her meal and think, than watch another die.
Every time she had asked the demon in the Spell Spire about something, he would get upset and start screaming at her, and she would end up leaving. Could he have outsmarted her each time? Was it all an act? She needed to ask Bridgette if she had found out anything about the king"s brother. It seemed like every time she was about to get ahead, something else would happen that would threaten her kingdom more and more. She was getting tired of it.
"It"s done," Firion said, stepping outside.
She entered the room, and saw that the demon did indeed look dead. Pulling on the goggles, she shook her head. The line of magic was still there. Pulling out her black dagger, she stepped forward and slashed it. The moment it was severed, Zalgor screamed an unholy scream, arching his back and turning his face to the ceiling. His face and body shook as the meat of his body seemed to shrink against his bones. With a last gasp, he fell from his tethers, as a pile of desiccated bones. Not even the tatters of skin that were left could hold them together.
"What was that?" asked Firion, his face showing his eagerness to learn.
"Let"s see the other two," she said, her dagger returning to that place inside of her, where all her magical items now dwelled. She followed him as he quickly led her to the next room. It was further down the hall, so that they couldn"t holler to each other, probably.
"Gugrith," Aella hissed, handing Firion her tray as she moved past him to look at the old demon.
The wrinkled face turned towards her, but there weren"t any eyes to see her.
"You"re the king," he managed to say, drool and blood dribbling out of the corner of his mouth.
"You are going to die, Gugrith. Did you know that? I"m going to cut the cord that ties you to your master in the spire above us, and you are going to be reduced to a pile of bones," she said, forming the dagger again and watching the black line of power tremble through her goggles.
"No!" he howled. "Please!"
The mumbling with drool disappeared, and he seemed able to suddenly speak correctly.
"Don"t cut the cord! I"ll tell you whatever you want to know!" he pleaded, his back arching in pain as power coursed down the cord.
She watched it pump him full of black magic, filling his frail frame with power. She needed to cut it quickly, before he grew too powerful. But there were questions she needed answered.
"Aella," said Firion in a quiet voice.
"Tell me about the demon in the spire," she asked, ignoring Firion"s warning.
He was twice the size he had been, and his muscles were straining against the chains and shackles that held him. As he opened his mouth to answer her, Aella cut the cord. The magic that had acc.u.mulated in him, whooshed out into the room, and Aella was jerked back, out of its path by Firion as he grabbed her just in time. By the time she had picked herself up from the hall outside the room, where they fell, Gugrith had fallen to the floor as a pile of bones, just like Zalgor had.
"The demon can hear what they say, and respond to it," she murmured to herself, looking at the black magic that billowed in the room, dissipating now that there was no direct connection controlling it. She didn"t want to find out what it would have done to her.
"Stay out of that room," she said, to Firion as he picked himself up as well. He nodded without even looking in there.
By the time they reached Jugthu, the counselor was crying uncontrollably. She was already twice the size she had been, with more black magic being pumped into her by the second.
"I"m not going to kill your son," said Aella, as the demoness saw her. "Unless this demon in the spire has his claws in him, too."
She opted to throw her dagger at the black line this time, rather than enter the room. Closing the door as it sliced through the line, she teleported her and Firion to the throne room as the black magic welled out through the cracks of the door. There was going to be one ticked off demon in that spell spire!