The Demon and the Elf (Book 1)

Chapter Fifteen pt 6

In the momentary silence that followed, Eial's thoughts drifted to their fight with the guards not long ago, fragments of memory lost in the action. But the guard's words were heard clearly. To capture the escaped prisoner, the former queen. Drowning further into the demon's hold, Eial's eyes lowered. His lips, pinched and relaxed. "They wanted mother, as well. I hope she's safe."

Realizing Eial may not have seen the demoness at the fight, that he might have already fainted by her arrival grew the darkness heavier. Because Drokn had no idea. Paid no attention until he was limp against his arms.

Before Drokn could utter a word, Eial's eyes darted open and his body left the demon's, hands pressed against the ground. "Someone's near the barrier," he whispered to Droknn's quizzical look.

At some point, Eial had already created a barrier without the demon's notice. Of course he had. The demon thought about the elf's barrier and then stared at his own in the entrance to their hut. He blinked and looked away to the right with wrinkled brows.

Zinging at the palms of his hands, Eial could feel the muffled THUMP, THUMP of the steps walking near. The pattern he had grown to learn the past week. Without looking back, eial jumped through the barrier and out the entrance with the help from a push of air. And without stopping, he sprinted breathlessly straight into his mother's hold, cheering her arrival and tightly holding close.

Unsure if he should follow or not, discomfort settled in the demon. But not long after, the demoness hovered over the entrance of the room, looking in. "Come out, we need to talk," she said wearily, but determined. Drokn stretched into his fitted shirt and cape that sprawled loosely on separate beds, and without making a split second of eye contact, He cautiously crawled out of the hut.

By the time he was out, the two others had already gathered around a fire, a bright glow among the darkening skies. When he came closer, he noticed the demoness push aside her cloak away from her left arm where a once tan colored linen bandage was now soaked crimson.

"I should have known that fucker would know to find demons with combat training." The demoness unraveled the bandage and threw it into the fire.

Horror marked the elf's eyes that reflected the flame in front. Without questioning, Eial went to the arm's side and hovered his palm over with a pale blue glow. But his mother gently grabbed his wrist with her other hand and lowered it away. "Save your energy for now, Eial. A paste is enough for this." Then, she reached into a pouch and crushed a mix of leaves and herbs between her fingers until they blended together in unison before smoothing it over the wound and wrapping a newer strip of linen over.

Eial's and Drokn's eyebrows both crimped for different reasons. Eial's was worried. Drokn's was complicated.

The demon remembered the lying body on the dusty field. And now, the bloodied fabric burning in the fire. He looked to his clean palms. And clenched his fingers tight.

"How did you know we were there?" asked Drokn, briefly distracting his thoughts.

"The same way I knew you were here." She tapped on her cloak. "Tracking spell."

Arm lifting to drape his cape wide, he did indeed find another parchment with a spell circle in his pocket. How the demoness stealthily added it there, he did not know. This time, after observing, he left the parchment in the pocket and did not bother throwing it into the open flame.

"Thankfully, you two were close to where I was. Didn't expect to find you like that, though." Pulling out her pouches, the demoness started to fumble into various ones, mixing, sorting, one hand in one and then another.

Meanwhile, Eial was not following the conversation that his mate and his mother seem to understand for themselves, but chose to stay quiet and perk his ears in attention, his eyes darting to his mother's quick hand movements and trying to notice any other injuries she might have.

"First, let's eat. Then, we have to move out of here while it's dark." Tying the tops of her pouches closed, the mother knotted them back to her waistband. "I have someone waiting for us. She has information to give me and I think it's better if you two hear it, too."

"I don't have time for trips—"

"It's about Eial."

The dark lips of Drokn's sealed together, eyeing the woman with curious suspicion. He didn't quite trust her, but knew that Eial would want to follow. Nothing of his own curiosity at all. "Shouldn't we leave now? We've been in one place for long enough. They'll find us." The toes within Drokn's boots tapped an unsteady beat.

"No, this place is fine. It's meant to be obscured by vision. No one knows about it. Even the fact that you found it is odd." The demoness had a distant look in her gaze and the demon could almost hear her faintly whisper, "Or is it fate?"

"You obviously know about this cabin. Are you still going to hide why?" Narrowed amber eyes looked her way.

A moment of thought silenced the demoness until she extended out a long breath of defeat. "...It just belonged to my brother... and someone he knew." She looked at the cabin in deep thought, a touch of melancholy glinting her eyes.

"...You have a brother?" Like a splash of cold water, it dawned on Drokn then that he really had no knowledge of his mother at all. Not her family, or about her research. How she lived before, nothing of it. Eial shared the same thoughts, but continued to listen quietly.

With upturned brows and one corner of her lips curled low in a pained smirk, she voiced, "Had."

And no more was said.

Later that night, the crickets chirped and lightning bugs greeted the darkness. After a feast of a meal of rabbits and fish, they packed what they would need and the elf drew his powers to close up their underground room, leaving almost no trace. The demoness touched the side of the cabin, looking up and down, studying as if leaving an old friend, before drifting the fingers away and turning out of view.

They left the structure that looked a bit lonely in the distance, slowly hidden by the shadows of passing tree trunks.

A few hours after their departure, shuffling of grass revealed boots of white next to the abandoned cabin. A sort of unnatural, unearthly pristine among the dark nature of the night. The figure stepped into the cabin and paused before stepping further in. The stride was like a melody, drifting with grace until it stopped in front of a cabinet. Opening a drawer, the slender, pale fingers caressed the ribs of a wooden comb that lay on its side. Each needle echoed a low pitched mark as the fingers plucked from one to the next, a stifled tune in the stillness of the deepened night.

"I'm home."

In the next flash of a moment, the wooden boards of the cabin shattered, broken pieces, furniture, herbs, soil, flying every which way as sharp whites of air magic danced out the cracks.

And there stood the ethereal figure in the middle of the destruction as the dust settled among the fallen cabin, not a single spek of debris resting on the delicate white robes.