A Secret Man of Blood

Chapter Twenty-One

27,000 years before the present day

A vast glass ceiling displays twilight's metal; dying embers of light outlined fine as handwriting against the descending black. The Floating City is high in the air, so the great hall's ceiling windows display the sky close up. Salazar is the only one around the long table who seems relaxed – a heavy, charged feeling of anxiety filling those around him. The Golden Age of The Elves has been forged by his strength and his will, yet they call it an age of peace.

Vitolo, his vast muscles bulging, leans over and whispers. "Salazar, what if Pilar demands that we stop expanding?"

The door blinks like a loud eyelid over the quiet room and several figures enter, Pilar foremost among them, followed by Salazon, Salazar's son, and Indulkar, his grandson. Salazar grasps his son's eyes with his, but Salazon looks down as he sits at Pilar's side, opposite his father. Indulkar is the most promising Elf of his generation and Salazar basically raised the boy during the Roenan Wars, but Indulkar sits down on Pilar's other side, his face tense and absolutely motionless, unwilling to ask his grandfather for anything.

Now Salazar is irritated: his thoughts drive in two directions, in a hand-to-hand struggle. Maybe they've convinced Pilar to take action and stand at his side; but perhaps they've betrayed him. Pilar speaks, her voice stern but recognisable, reminding Salazar of the wonderful times they had in heaven.

"You know why we are here, Salazar?"

"I do not." There's a gentle challenge in his words.

Pilar's eyes are hard, brightly glowing berries. To her sides, Salazon and Indulkar's are, like Salazar's, black holes tinctured with light. Their eyes are full of language, all of them. They're all hoping for something.

Pilar answers. "We're here because you've been fighting wars and oppressing other races, contrary to our mission to renew the world."

"The world is being renewed," Salazar answers.

Pilar's reply is as blunt as her brother's. "That is not renewal, it is destruction."

"Destruction is renewal. These are the ones who refuse, despite being given the chance, to take even the most basic action to save their world."

Salazon, who is smaller than his father or his son, shakes his head. "No, father, you have lost your way."

Salazar's hope is cut through by a chisel. He turns to Indulkar, who looks so much like him and is his favourite. "You fought with me during the Roenan Wars. Do you share this opinion?"

"You are the most talented person I have ever met, grandfather, capable of destroying armies, of leading and inspiring people, of writing the most beautiful poetry and singing the most wonderful songs, but this, what you are called to do, demands a different type of strength. You're between two extremes – Hate and forgiveness: one takes much of the best of you; and the other all of the worst." The young Elf unleashes a gaze which holds his grandfather's. "Use your talents for the good of people, all people."

Salazar feels the power of words moving through his blood stream like a drug, and if there's a moment to change then it's now, but he can't change. Time and violence have flowed by like water, and he doesn't know what the future holds.

Salazon senses that the moment is in the balance and walks around the table towards his father. "It's not too late," he lectures him.

Each word is a little knife.

Salazon approaches Salazar, arms spread wide in an embrace, and Indulkar watches his grandfather's face, senses the hunger there, the hunger to be right; he's lived that worldview under Salazar, felt its intoxicating effects. He senses something and, at the same time, feels Pilar tense beside him.