Warrior Elf

  The World of Elves

  Book 3

  Terry Spear

  Contents

  Synopsis

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Epilogue

  Acknowledgments

  Author Bio

  Also by Terry Spear

  PUBLISHED BY:

  Terry Spear

  Warrior Elf

  Copyright © 2022 by Terry Spear

  Cover Copyright by Frost Alexis Arts

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission from the author, except for the inclusion of brief quotations in a review.

  Discover more about Terry Spear at:

  http://www.terryspear.com/

  Print ISBN: 978-1-63311-089-2

  Ebook ISBN: 978-1-63311-088-5

  Synopsis

  Rina is a warrior elf from a long class of shadow warrior elves on the planet Xibos, a world populated by elves, griffons, dragons, giants, pixies, fairies, trolls, merfolk, centaurs, and other fantastical creatures. They’ve recently had visitors from a whole other planetary system who call Xibos a primitive elf world. But Rina doesn’t believe they are a primitive people in the least as she fights for right and though she earns much gold from her work, she also takes on cases where there is no hope of reward—just because it's something she must do. Fighting is in her blood. And she has a magic trick up her leather sleeve. She is all about work and no play, so when she takes on the mission of rescuing a princess from a tower—if she even really needs rescuing—Rina ends up meeting a champion elf knight—who also rights wrongs. But he works for the king of Castle Grande of the Wild Meadowlands elves and she's not sure they have the princess's best interests at heart.

  Artur serves as the king's champion from a long class of champions of the Wild Meadowlands elves when he encounters a warrior elf fighting dark arts knights all on her own. He watches in fascination, until he eliminates the last one, and he's not sure what to think of her. Does she have the princess's welfare in mind? Or some darker purpose? He admires Rina, but he doesn’t trust her. Yet it appears they have a common enemy and until that's resolved, he'll watch her back and hope she watches his!

  To my good friend Louise Evans. We had such a lovely time visiting in Waco for lunches and book talks. Thanks for loving my books and meeting with me to have even more fun!

  1

  Preparing for a journey to take on a new night mission, Rina was a warrior shadow elf from a long line of warrior elves and a special class of high elves with different magical abilities on the planet Xibos, populated by elves, griffons, dragons, giants, pixies, fairies, trolls, merfolk, centaurs, and other fantastical creatures. But this mission had only to do with a Black Hills elf in crisis, she thought.

  Rina’s sister, Sylph, her brother, Aegis, her mother and father, her uncles, her aunts, her grandparents on both sides of the family were all warriors. Suffice it to say she was born into the role, and she was certain she would die fighting in that capacity someday. Her kind would fight for years, but when it was all said and done, they often didn't have long-life expectancies. They lived for the day, for the glory, for righting wrongs and saving those who could not save themselves.

  Not to mention she wanted to leave the shadow elf lands for a while after she learned her boyfriend had cheated on her with a blue elf. A blue elf, of all things! They were their sworn enemy! He was just lucky she felt he wasn’t worth killing or she would have eliminated him on the spot. Even his close friends had told him he was an idiot for risking such folly.

  Rina and her siblings were cousins of the famous Dracolin Rossover, who was the Warrior Chief, son of the shadow elf’s king’s advisor and their age too. He was from a long line of Warrior Chiefs and had recently married Persephonice, an amazing creature that some called a landbound mermaid who could speak with all kinds of different creatures that no one else could. She called herself a langolar and no one in any of the elves’ realms had heard of her kind before. She said they had come by spaceship from the sky, from another world even. Then another woman like Persephonice had come into their realm—Eloria, who ended up with Viator, crown prince of the Darkland Forest elves. Eloria was just as amazing as Persephonice, able to talk to a dragon, Talom, who would not be tamed, and befriended him. But she was also part high elf who had magical abilities. So she hadn’t been a complete outsider.

  Rina had wondered if any remarkable males would come from the world where Eloria and Persephonice were from, not that she had any designs on one if he did. But the idea of meeting one was intriguing.

  Today, she was on a mission on her own, like she often was. She'd heard tales about a girl locked in the tower of a castle in the territory of the Black Hills elves. A princess, if the tale was true. Rina fathomed that did not sound like a place a princess should be, locked in a tower against her will. Rina wasn't even being paid for the mission. She didn't usually undertake an assignment like that because of the danger she put herself in. But this case intrigued her. She didn't bother to tell her family. Her sister and brother were off on jobs of their own. Her mother and father, the same. It was a wee bit out of the shadow elf territory, but she just needed to get away and see for herself if a princess needed rescuing.

  Rina swept her black hair off her shoulders, one of her eyes a pretty green, the other a dazzling blue. Some would say having different eye colors made her special, others that she was cursed. Truth be told, she enjoyed her unusual eye colors and was often amused when someone would see her for the first time and be taken aback, look again, as if the person had been mistaken about what they’d seen.

  She mounted her horse, Midnight, her trusty sword in its scabbard, her saddlebags packed. She was said to have been born with a sword in her hand, at least that's how the story was told for any of her warrior kind. Some battle on the horizon always needed to be fought. There was always someone who needed help in dealing with some blackguard. She loved her job and couldn't imagine doing anything else.

  For two days she had traveled, riding her black stallion through the woods, valleys, and through a mountain pass. She finally reached the edge of the thick pines and oaks of Larimar Forest and said to her horse in a whisper against his velvet ear, "If you hear me whistle once, come for me. If you hear me whistle twice, run home at once." If Midnight ran home, her family, if any of them were there, would know she was in trouble and her horse would show them the way. She wouldn't call on him in the middle of danger to join her though, unless she was certain she needed a fast getaway and believed he wouldn’t be injured. She certainly didn't want to risk her horse's safety for anything. He was too precious to her, her companion in battle and beyond. Which made her high elf genes different from the ones living in the mountains—also magic users, because they tamed dragons as their companions.

  She slipped off the back of her horse, then crept through the woods to reach a small castle. She'd seen the golden eyes of gray wolves peering at her through the darkness, a darkness she could see in just as well as them. A large, horned owl hooted high above in a pine tree, warning there was a new danger on the prowl. Her, of course. Not a danger to the owls in the woods, but to the elves who would keep a princess locked in a tower.

  She saw a couple of bearded guards outside of the castle, talking to one another about the long, cold nights and how they wished they were anywhere but here. She moved closer to more clearly hear their words.

  "The king will be changing my post at the end of the week. What about you?" the blond man asked the other. They were both big men, heavily muscled. Protecting the princess? Or keeping her from leaving the tower?

  "A month. I fear it will be the longest time I've ever had to serve at an isolated, disagreeable post."

  "Well, just don't become cozy with the princess. The king killed the last two guards who allowed her to escape. She didn't make it beyond the ground floor, yet that was enough to send the king into a rage. He wants her married off to someone who will promise him an alliance."

  Then the men grew quiet, watching their surroundings like they should have been doing all along. Rina skirted around through the woods, looking for any other guards, but saw none. The others had to be inside. The stone fortifications were thirty feet tall, the walls at least fifteen feet thick, substantial enough to prevent unwanted visitors from entering the keep, but not her.

  Not only did Rina have her trusty sword, her magic, and her stealth, she could climb walls like a chameleon, blending in, slithering upward, and no one would be the wiser. She had to reach the tower window and see for herself if the princess was indeed a prisoner there.

  Marrying off royal sons and daughters to forge alliances was often done, so it wasn't a given that the girl was in any real danger, except from herself if she should pursue attempting to escape her captors. Rina couldn't imagine a princess being able to live in the wilderness on her own. Not like a warrior elf could live off the land, fight evil, and survive t
he challenging weather—lightning storms, snowstorms, windstorms, you name it.

  Rina had already breached the wall and saw a couple of guards peering out at the woods from the wall walk to the north of her, oblivious to her climbing down to make her way to the tower.

  The place was deserted except for a stable hand exercising a horse in the inner baily. She just needed to reach the side of the tower without being seen and make her climb. Vines would help to give her something to hold onto and offer her a modicum of cover, but her ability to blend in with the red stones would ensure she was unseen as she made her way up the tall tower. She saw no one within range that could spy her, no windows that looked out this way except for the one tower window about forty feet high, and no guards on the wall walk on this side either—they were all on the other side where they suspected their greatest threat would come. She was free to race across the open space between the wall walk to the tower, throw herself at the wall, and begin the climb.

  She was known for her speed and agility, often beating her sister out, not her brother though, and was halfway up the tower wall when she heard someone say to the guards down below, "King Leogane will be here in short order. Be alert. We don't want him to think we're not sufficiently guarding the princess."

  The voice was that of a middle-aged woman, gruff and stern. She must be in charge of watching out for the princess, Rina thought. She continued to climb up the wall, grasping narrow finger holds, using the toes of her pointed boots to poke between the brickwork to continue making her way up the tall tower wall as the woman returned to the keep and the men grumbled to themselves about having way too many bosses. That's what Rina loved about her job. She would usually have one boss only per assignment. Except when she was on a mission of her own where she wasn’t receiving any payment. Payment was always welcome, but no bosses was also nice.

  Rina was nearly to the window when she heard a woman pacing inside. She knew it was a woman due to her light footsteps crossing the wooden floor. Then Rina peered inside the window and saw a room that was austere, not as lavish as she thought a princess's chamber should be. Simple bed linens, a small bed, a table and two chairs, very sparsely furnished. No tapestries on the walls to keep out the chill, no carpet on the floor either. The girl was alone, and Rina wondered if she could gain the girl's confidence without frightening her to death. The blond-haired girl looked to be about Rina's age, twenty or so, but Rina was sure the princess would have been coddled all her life and wouldn't know how to fight. Rina thought to take her home with her and after that, decide what to do with her, soliciting her family's advice. At least her parents were good about letting her and her siblings handle a situation they felt needed resolution without telling them outright what to do.

  In that regard, Rina and her siblings made their own mistakes, owned them, and had to deal with the repercussions. Which meant in this case, dealing with the princess's father, who most likely would want Rina's head. But she had to learn the truth. Was the princess in any real danger?

  She wondered who King Leogane was. A suitor? Wouldn't he object to the princess being confined like she was? Or maybe that was the only way the king could keep the princess from running away from her obligations. If the king was an ogre, and Rina’s parents agreed, she would attempt to steal the princess away to some other realm and let another kingdom take care of her.

  Rina had to take into account that the princess might be confined for her own good. That she was wayward and needed someone to control her willfulness. What did Rina know? She worked too hard to be rebellious and not do what needed to be done.

  Looking highly agitated, the girl was pacing, wearing a black gown sweeping the floor, her skin washed out, probably from not getting outside enough to soak up the sun, her shoes merely slippers to be worn inside. She needed boots to run in, though Rina had an extra pair that would probably fit the girl. Rina hoped she was wrong, and that the princess was fine and that this was her lot in life, but if it wasn't…Rina had every intention of rescuing her.

  2

  Artur was an elf from a long line of knightly champions who had served King Leogane and his ancestors forever. To Artur’s deep regret, his older brother before him had served well and had died in combat during a battle with a neighboring force. Now Artur was the king’s companion and loyal friend and guard as they made their way to the stronghold in the Black Hills. He oft spoke to the king about matters that others wouldn’t dare speak to him about—like who he should wed and who he should stay well away from. Despite being a warrior, Artur believed in romance, love, and chivalry and because Leogane was interested in wedding his advisor’s daughter, he felt the king should marry her. Forget going for the spoiled princess locked in the tower just because the king could make an alliance with another, whom Artur didn’t trust in the least.

  Artur could imagine all kinds of difficulties with this princess. Who wouldn’t want to wed the king? But her uncle had warned how unruly she could be, and the king would have to use a firm hand on her.

  But Leogane was good of heart, good to his people, wanting only to keep them safe, working, fed, and happy. From everything Artur could learn about the princess, she would try any man’s patience. She should support the king as his queen, stand by him, feel the same way about his people as the king did because they would be her people also if he wed her, but he doubted she would do any of that.

  At least Leogane was seriously considering Artur’s words and said he only wanted to meet her and see for himself if she was truly the ogre some said she was.

  Leogane was riding beside his chief advisor, Erlig, then glanced back to see Artur riding behind him. “Come ride with me.”

  “Aye.” Artur quickly rode up beside the king and the king’s advisor dropped back with a nod to Artur, the trail too narrow for more than two to ride abreast in here.

  “You look so glum. Even my advisor doesn’t seem as worried as you about my marrying the princess when it would be Erlig’s daughter I would wed instead.” Leogane smiled at Artur.

  “’Tis because Erlig doesn’t believe you will actually wish to take the woman for your wife, I suspect. Sometimes a woman can deceive a man into changing his mind.”

  Leogane chuckled. “You speak from experience, aye?”

  Artur may believe in love and protecting the one he loved, but no, he had never experienced a courtly love and Leogane knew it. “I’ve seen it oft enough.” Which was true. Some of his warrior friends had even become smitten with a woman who would turn on her heel and leave them destitute while the woman dallied with other men. He’d worried about his friend, Dracolin, the shadow elf Warrior Chief, when he had found a mermaid who walked on legs, so they said, and fallen hard for her, despite everyone warning him not to. Artur had met her and other than her beautiful fall of red hair and her pretty green eyes, she didn’t look like a mermaid to him in the least. But she could swim. Something most elves could not do. The blue elves, the ones who lived by the waterways or the oceans and lakes, they swam. But they were rather the exception.

  “Do not fear. I am not making any decision about the woman any time soon,” Leogane said.

  Good. But women could change the stoutest men’s minds when they were least expecting it, so Artur was wary about the king even meeting her.

  Then the birds in the forest took off in a frantic flight heavenward warning of imminent danger. Artur shouted to their knightly escort, “Prepare for battle!”