The Tribes of K'haren - Completed

Chapter 22.3

'So, what is it that you're reading?' Tarlequin asked, plunging himself on the ground. He'd managed to convince Mersha to leave the tent so they wouldn't disturb anybody.

'A book.'

'Well, I can see that. What's it about?' Tarlequin said with a smirk. He liked the boy.

'Oh, it's a collection of some widespread dwarven guidebooks. The first part was about how to dig tombs for dwarves according to their rank, now I'm in the middle of a lecture about taming mountain bugs and I've already read a bit of the end, it's a small collection of bedtime stories.' Mersha explained without looking up, turning a page in the process. Tarlequin raised an eyebrow, did the boy talk and read at the same time?

'Bedtime stories! Lovely, what kind of stories?' he asked curiously.

'Most of them are boring, just the usual behave or you'll be punished and stuff, but there is one I quite liked, it's about a dwarf and his half-dwarf friend, they keep doing things they're not supposed to do and when they bother an old dragon, he tries to eat them. But he's so old he doesn't even have teeth anymore and because he can't swallow them whole, he just keeps them in his mouth until they starve there...' Mersha said with a strange shine in his eyes. Tarlequin didn't know what to say about that, he'd never heard that story before and he'd never heard Mersha talk so much either.

For a while, they both sat in silence, Mersha read on and Tarlequin was deeply sunk in his own thoughts. He didn't even notice the people passing them nor how they all went silent when they got close to the two. When Mersha suddenly said something, Tarlequin had to ask him to say it again because he hadn't been listening.

'I said your friend isn't dead. I just thought you might want to know that.' The boy said, not even taking his eyes off the book.

'Do you mean Raf'ney-krush?' Tarlequin asked. Of course he knew Raf wasn't dead, he'd seen the queen himself, but Mersha couldn't know that. Foreteller or not, nobody could know in advance who the queen of the night was going to choose. Not even the best foretellers had ever managed to see that coming, they could see that somebody was going to die and sometimes also when and where, but they couldn't tell the difference between death and joining the queen's army.

'Yes.' Mersha said, turning another page.

'How do you know?' Tarlequin asked, trying to sound casual.

'I saw him. Before it happened. I saw how she looked at him. Of course she was going to choose him, it was obvious, wasn't it?' The boy still didn't look up. To him, it seemed to be all clear and nothing to care much about.

'You saw the queen of the night?' Tarlequin asked, deeply confused now. Mersha sighed.

'Yes, didn't I just say that?' he sounded bored. 'I had seen her already days before, in the distance, not daring to come closer. She's scared of the Outcast, you know. But once she knew his time was coming, she couldn't keep away from him anymore. She followed you when you left for that battle, she was with you all along.'

The thought of that sent shivers down Tarlequin's spine. Could it be true? He'd always thought only death could allow people from their world to cross over to hers. But if she'd been following them, she must have found a way to reach them herself, at least to see them. But most importantly, was she really scared of the Outcast? And if yes, then why?

The queen of the night was from another world, she ruled there all by herself, always recruiting an army of people, stolen just before their deaths. She'd do that until she'd found a worthy king, then the king would lead the army into battle and she'd recruit a new army once the king was dead. The queen was the cunning mind behind it all, behind every battle big enough to cause new beliefs to form. A creature like her didn't have to be scared of anything nor anyone.