MAP
DEAD TROLLS haunted Essie’s nightmares.
She struggled to drag herself from the images of dead bodies and blood and battle. A nightmare. Just another nightmare.
A hand shook her shoulder, gently, pulling her all the way awake. “Essie.”
She rolled onto her back, blinking up at him. “Did I wake you?”
“No.” Farrendel, her elf husband of three months, withdrew his hand, his silver-blond hair cascading over his shirt and still perfectly unfrizzy and detangled thanks to the magical elf conditioner. Or possibly magic elf hair. Essie hadn’t decided which it was yet.
He rolled into a cross-legged position on his side of the bed. And it was definitely his side of the bed, pressed underneath the window while she curled against the far side of the rounded, elven bed grown into the wall, leaving several feet of space between them. “Are you all right?”
“Just tired.” Essie swiped her hair from her face, staring up at the ceiling, visible in the pre-dawn gray. If she hadn’t woken him, then he’d already been awake dealing with the aftermath of his own nightmares. “And you?”
It had been only two days since Farrendel had killed a hundred trolls with his destructive magic after the trolls ambushed her, Farrendel, and the rest of the royal elf family. Between her nightmares and Farrendel’s, neither of them had managed to sleep much in the nights since.
It was sad, really. Only reason she was even staying in her husband’s rooms was to more conveniently wake him from his nightmares. At least this was a whole lot better than tromping up and down two flights of stairs between his room on one branch and her room on another branch of their section of the elven treetop palace to wake each other from nightmares.
It had given them the chance to learn more of each other’s quirks. Elves had a magic barrier around their treehouses keeping them warm and bug free even though their windows were just openings without glass. Farrendel, however, liked to sleep with that magic barrier left open on his window, letting in the cool breezes all night long. Essie had hauled an entire mound of blankets into his room just to stay warm through the night.
For his part, Farrendel claimed she snored. Or, as Essie insisted, breathed loudly.
Farrendel glanced at the window. The sky was the deep gray of pre-morning. If there was a hint of light on the horizon, the thick foliage of the elven forest hid it from view. “I do not believe I will sleep more tonight.”
Essie scooted closer and took his hand. At the touch, she felt the connection of the heart bond warm in her chest. After two days of being this aware of the heart bond, she was becoming used to the feeling. Mostly. “Do you want me to stay up with you?”
“No. I will not disturb your sleep any longer.” He leaned over to press a light kiss to her forehead before he tugged his hand free from hers. With a graceful motion, he swung over the windowsill and dropped onto the small porch that surrounded the small treehouse bedroom built high in the branches of Ellonahshinel, the elves’ palace at the outskirts of their capital city of Estyra.
Shedding his shirt, Farrendel flipped over the porch railing, landing on a foot-wide branch. He dashed along that branch, then spun on his heels, kicked out, and pushed off, alighting on a branch only four inches wide with the ease of a great, hunting cat.
After crawling to his side of the bed, Essie rested her arms on the windowsill and leaned her chin on her arms. What did she want more? More sleep or to gaze at Farrendel while he performed death-defying feats of agility?
When she’d first come across Farrendel exercising like this, she’d thought it his way to stay in shape since he was Laesornysh, an elven title meaning Death on the Wind, given because he was the foremost elf warrior.
But was there more to it? Perhaps these early morning workout sessions were a way he stayed sane, working out his mental stress through exhausted muscles. How early did he wake each day, driven from his bed by nightmares?
She ought to know. She was his wife.
But they had only known each other for three months. Theirs was a marriage of alliance made out of desperation to draw her people, the humans of the kingdom of Escarland, and his people, the elves of the kingdom of Tarenhiel, together after decades of tension. They hadn’t had a proper courtship or time to fall in love like a normal couple.
Instead, they’d been married within two days of meeting, and she’d found herself living in the elves’ treetop home. Still, she and Farrendel had managed to build the beginnings of a relationship. Somehow they had even formed an elven elishina, a heart bond.
Would she and Farrendel have a chance to make more progress in their relationship? Instead of time to themselves, they had an impending war to deal with.
The real reason the elves had been so desperate for peace with her people was the threat of war from the trolls to the north. A war that someone was trying to start by planting some of her kingdom’s new rifles and repeater guns among the trolls, making it appear that Essie’s older brother Averett was aiding the trolls.
They had a spy in Escarland. A spy in Tarenhiel. A mess no matter where she turned.
After letting herself doze for another half an hour, Essie sighed and forced herself to get up. They were leaving for Escarland today, and she would have plenty of time to sleep on the train if she wanted to.
A peek out the window showed Farrendel still flipping, spinning, and running along the branches. Burning the rest of his restless, nightmare-fueled energy.
Stepping out of the treehouse bedroom that appeared grown into the branch, she crossed the small porch and navigated the set of stairs formed out of the branch. At the bottom, she entered the main room, which consisted of a small countertop and cabinet area while cushions filled the other side to form a sitting area.
She went through the next door over, up a similar staircase to a matching treehouse bedroom on the next branch. Inside her room, she changed into her elf-style tunic and trousers. After brushing her hair, she left it loose and flowing.
She would miss this in returning to her homeland. The elves in many ways were traditional and staid, but practically so. They didn’t go in for lots of frills and an excess of fabric in their dresses, nor did women have to wear dresses all the time.
In Escarland, Essie would be expected to wear a corset and yards of fabric once again. It would be scandalous to wear her hair unbound like this.
But...she was a princess of the elves now. Maybe it would be her role to introduce elf fashion to Escarlish culture.
In the past three months, she had proven her place among the elves by showing them she could become one of them. But in Escarland, her people needed to learn to respect the elves, not just hate them as enemies. She would wear the elves’ clothing and hold her head high while she was doing it.
With that in mind, Essie packed the rest of her elven clothes, as few as there were. She hadn’t lived in Tarenhiel long enough to have more clothes made for her, nor did elves tend to have large wardrobes.
Once she was finished, she returned to the main room and placed her bag by the door, waiting to be loaded onto the train.
Essie blew out a long breath, trying to calm her tight chest and churning stomach. Would her family like Farrendel? How would he react to being in Winstead Palace in the bustling capital city of Aldon, so different from the elves’ earthy and calm capital of Estyra?
It wouldn’t be an easy thing, bringing her elf husband home for the first time. But they had weathered the disapproval of his family. Surely it would be no different with her family.