The Touch of Salvation

02: A Hunch

ADALIND
TWO YEARS AGO

My advisors sit before me around the ovular table. It was late, but night never fell. A pervasive lovely day always remained on my lands and my people did not mind sleeping as the sun stayed high. Still, we would draw heavy curtains in our chambers to aid in sleep.

The sun did wax and wane; the sun was not always at its highest point, so now it looked as if it would set over the horizon, but it would not go completely away. It would just begin increasing up the sky the next day.

"The High Council of Fae refuses to do anything about the moradarthian tribe in House Ares."

Moradarthians were a warrior race of fae, and they became so through brutal training that began at puberty.

My eyes gently slide to Daario who once called House Ares home. He was a moradarthian; he had been trained viciously and without respite. Now, he served as my Bloodrider, the commander of my armies.

Daario shares my look of disdain. We disagreed with the methods of moradarthian teachings, but it was not within my lands. I could not go into House Ares without causing war. My people would not survive a war; my people were not soldiers.

"They are dust-breaking the children," my advisor says. "And the females are being circumcised."

I grimace. Female mutilation was something I luckily never had to endure. It was barbaric in more ways than one. Female circumcision took away the pleasure that could be felt during intercourse, and they did this to limit reproduction to only those they saw fit. It was also a painful, unmedicated experience that was performed on young girls to scare them.

Dust-breaking happened to all children in the tribe. As fae, we naturally accumulated faerie dust through our wings. This dust was vital in our medicinal practices. Due to this non-stop production of dust, the tribe would lock their children in a wooden box until they produced so much that it suffocated them. Their powers are never strong enough to break the box.

My eyes slither to Lux who had also gone through moradarthian trials, though she was not a one. I never found out if she had been mutilated or dust-broken. She never stayed in the same room with me for too long.

"The Council feels it is out of our jurisdiction," I say.

"So we do nothing?"

My eyes fall on my advisor. "No, we do something, but we cannot allow other Houses to know this. If we are caught, we go to war and we cannot let that happen. Lux, infiltrate unnoticed and report back your findings; their patrol schedule, weaknesses, goals, etcetera. Once we know what we need, we will slowly begin removing children. Everyone," I say, my voice heavy with disdain. "We won't be able to save all the children.

"We will have to choose?"

I sigh, nodding.

"How do we choose who gets tortured and who doesn't," Lux asks. I don't know the answer. We discuss other matters for an hour and then dismiss. Lux remains on the other end of the table. She stands.

"Go on," I say to her.

"King Goliath is well. He has been assigned various missions, which does not seem unusual to me." She uses the term King because that was what he was to us. He was King, perhaps not politically without taking his oath, but culturally yes.

Of course, he was fine. He was fine without me. "Anything else?"

"While he is physically well, I fear he has started taking unnecessary, risky choices."

"Why do you think that is?"

"I think having a mate is also important to him, and now he has no reason to stay alive."