The Elder Demon's Dilemma (Realm of Arkon, Book 9) Read online

  Masyanya smiled. "Better listen to him. I’m pretty sure his dissertation was on alcohol. What to drink, how much to drink, and when to drink it."

  "Ugh, there’s no arguing with her," said the bald man as he patted the mage on the shoulder, gesturing at the huntress. "You might as well try wrestling a pig in the mud without getting dirty." Bonbon winked at Masyanya, then turned to address me.

  "Well, Roman? Can we go have fun for a day?"

  "Sure, but walk me to The White Crane first." I pulled a griffin figurine from my bag and tossed it up and down in my hand, smiling at the whole party. "In the meantime, let’s pick colors for our mounts."

  The inn turned out to be the carbon copy of Kort's place. Even the puddle on the floor was in the exact same spot. Only instead of a grinning dude with scary dames, the signpost depicted a white crane. Or what was supposed to be a crane. The innkeeper was a man named Zurab, whom I had already heard about.

  I had never met an elf so large before. I wondered if he was even an elf! The behemoth was nearly twice the size of Aritor. Now, sure, the local princes and gods had a combat form that was much larger than their regular forms, but this was no combat form. He stood over seven feet tall, closer to eight, with mighty broad shoulders and powerful, hairy arms. A deep scar bisected his face, from his right eye all the way to his chin.

  At the knock on the door he turned - and froze when his eyes met mine. A wave of incomprehensible emotion stampeded across his face. Disbelief, recognition, and... joy? It looked like he had been waiting for me for a thousand years.

  "Are you sure you haven’t been here before, dar?" Reece asked anxiously as he approached.

  I didn’t answer, but the innkeeper stretched out his hand towards me. His voice was low and hoarse.

  'You are Prince Krian? The Black Demon of the Prophecy, and the friend of the Guardian?"

  Of course. The elves greatly revered the Guardian. This Zurab probably remembered Max from when he had stayed here. Imagine the owner of some corner inn in Washington or London hearing that the president or prime minister of his country had visited his establishment. Plus, he had also likely heard about me from somewhere.

  "Indeed, I am." I nodded and looked at him expectantly.

  But the innkeeper said no more. He silently took our order, gave us our keys, and then seemed to lose all interest in us. Not that I wanted him to have any interest - I had experienced enough conversations with strangers for one day.

  We sat in the dining hall for a time. Nearby sat twenty players, as well as half a dozen local mages in light green robes with patterns interwoven as tightly as the city walls. Chickens roasted on skewers, and a kettle boiled over a special plate. The air was filled with the smell of beer and tobacco smoke.

  We sat by the window, at a table which some self-important types had carved their names into. We had managed to go without attracting much attention to ourselves. Everyone in the hall had simply blinked at us as we passed and then returned to their conversations. Before, somebody would have likely approached me, but now that I was just some mysterious blue-eyed human with a hidden level in the company of high-level NPCs, hardly made anyone wanted to talk to me. Much had changed in the past six months.

  "So you're still going to look for the Nameless with me?" I asked my wife, hoping to pass the time while we waited for our order.

  Lita looked up from the carvings on the table.

  "The blood of the Nameless can hide anything - except itself," she shrugged. "You yourself said that a whole pool of the blood flowed around the White Dragon."

  "Sure, but where will you get..." I started to speak, then stopped short.

  Of course. I’ve the White Dragon's blood flowing through my veins.

  I smiled. "So, how much blood will you need from me? Half a gallon?"

  "A glassful is enough," she reassured me. "There is a certain interesting place in the Valley of Illusions, where... Actually, don’t worry about that. All you need to know is that I’ll be back with our coordinates sometime tomorrow."

  The innkeeper approached our table. He wiped the surface clean and placed three clay bottles of wine and six carved glasses before us, then stepped back and froze.

  I looked up at him. "Is something wrong?"

  "I have a message for you, prince," he replied calmly, holding my gaze. "It is important, both for me and for you."

  All conversation at our table immediately subsided as everyone looked with surprise at the innkeeper - Reece with a bottle already in hand.

  I paused. If at first the name and size of the innkeeper caused nothing but a smile, now there was a sense of alarm in the air.

  "Who is this message from?"

  Zurab shifted his cloth from his right hand to his left and lowered his head.

  "Merdoc!"

  It was my turn to be surprised. Why would the Dreamer send a message when he could relay it to me personally Had his rising from the dead been in vain? But perhaps this was a message from long ago, and I was about to hear the same thing I had heard in that burning house from my dream.

  "In the Battle of the Wolfish Wastes, the century in which I served came under the blow of one of the Elder Demons," Zurab began, shifting the cloth from hand to hand once more. "I was the only survivor carried away from the field. I survived and grew, and yet lost my ability to have children." He raised his head and smiled bitterly. "None could help me; not even the prioress of the temple of Loaetia in Vern. She advised me to contact Merdoc. My wife and I did not believe that the Dreamer would speak to me, but the old man did indeed receive me, and said that only an Elder Demon, or the closest friend of the new Guardian could help me. That was three hundred and twelve years, three months, and two days ago..."

  Can you really help him? I asked Lita mentally.

  Easily, she replied. I must simply remove the bit of Chaos that Velial left in him. But he must tell us something very valuable in return. So say the rules, dear husband.

  "Very well." I spoke out loud. "So what did Merdoc ask you to tell me?"

  The innkeeper looked intently into my eyes.

  "You will meet the New God soon, prince. When you're standing over the bones of perished bandits. Do not try to fight. Leave. You will not be able to deal with him on your own. If you fail to obey these words this time, the world will be doomed."

  Now who the hell was this New God?! The Ancients had never reached the Kraet Peaks! And how had Merdoc known three hundred years ago that I would not listen to his corpse and still take the fight with Vill? And what was that bit about the "perished bandits" about?

  As I tried to process all these things, Lita gently rose from her seat, walked up to the frowning innkeeper, and put her right hand on his chest.

  "Be still!" she whispered. The next moment, the elf’s body convulsed in pain. A thin cry escaped from his throat as his veins swelled up in his arms.

  The inn suddenly became quiet, with all of the players from the neighboring tables looking over at us Zurab. One of them grabbed a weapon. But the elves calmed down immediately - it was over just as quickly as it had begun. Zurab, whose mind had clearly returned, grasped my wife’s hand with his massive paws and slowly raised it to his lips.

  "Thank you, my lady!" he said softly. "And thank you, prince. I do not understand much of the message, but I hope that you know what to do. Good luck!"

  He bowed to my wife and turned to silently retreat behind the bar, followed all the way by the surprised looks of the players sitting in the hall.

  Chapter 7

  Our order was brought over, and I sat thinking about what I had just heard. My mood was grim. The situation’s prospects were less than ideal. I cut a small chunk of meat and chewed, mulling over the Dreamer’s warning. What did it all mean? Did this "New God" actually exist? And what about the part about him absorbing all of the malice and hatred the Ancients felt for this world? So he wasn’t as evil as had been planned? Then how could he be appearing now? All right, enough! I could think on it ore t
omorrow. Today was a special day, sort of like a wedding, and yet... I ate without tasting the food, and soon lost my appetite entirely.

  I pushed my plate off to the side, took a gulp of wine, and reached for my pipe. Holy hell! Merdoc and his cursed riddles! Could he really have known way back then, three hundred years ago, that I would ignore his corpse and try to kill Vill anyway? Alas, that was a mystery to me. Though I was a Dreamer myself, I utterly sucked at prophesying. Of course, in Arkon, anything that didn’t make sense could be blamed on the System, which often shuffled things up. And transformed them into nonsense in the process. But it wasn’t that simple. The higher beings could see the web of probabilities, the intersecting, diverging, converging chains of events past and future. Merdoc could see these chains as well. Had I listened to him, what the innkeeper had just told me would be utterly without meaning. But then that chain would have moved me in such a way that I would have never ended up in this tavern. Or, if I had, the innkeeper would have simply failed to recognize me. There was no skill a planner could have greater than the ability to see the future. Merdoc was not a god, but he could perceive as well as they could just the same. And he could leave messages scattered throughout the realm - he'd had enough time for that. Yet all of that still failed to explain the meaning of the innkeeper's words.

  "Are you upset, dar?" Vaessa asked, laying her knife on the table and leaning back in the bench.

  "I just don’t understand what’s happening. I thought we would find this White Dragon, free the people imprisoned in the Azure Valley, and that would be that. But now there’s some other bogeyman to deal with, too."

  You know, Roman, the elf’s ‘soon’ could be a hundred years. Whatever you mean by 'bogeyman,' I don't think we need to worry about it just yet." Jaelitte remarked, carefully positioning her glass on the table. "No sense wasting time on it now, anyway. We’ll find the dragon, and he’ll tell us what’s going on. Trust me, he knows. The Nameless is a shadow of this world’s creator, after all, if the legends can be trusted."

  "You never mentioned that before."

  My wife shrugged. "And you never asked. How would that knowledge have helped you, anyway? Besides, legends can still be lies."

  "Wait a minute!" Kan placed his arms on the table, drawing all of our attention. "The Ancients never reached the Kraet Peaks, right? So they could not have created this god!"

  Turning his gaze to me, the knight-commander continued.

  "Those in the Azure Valley remain isolated from the wider world. Vill escaped, so how can you think that the New God is anyone but him, prince?"

  I folded my own hands on the table and leaned forward. "Then why did he beg to be finished off?"

  As Kan went to answer, Raena put a hand on his shoulder to stop him, then looked at us with tension in her eyes, and spoke softly.

  "Could it be that this beast is so disgusting and so alien to our world that even the Twice Cursed God did not want to turn into it?"

  Silence hung over the table for ten seconds. Then Jaelitte pushed her plate away and rose.

  "That’s enough for today." She smacked her hand on the table. "It’s late. We’ll talk about it tomorrow, when I return." Looking at me, Lita bowed her head and inquired whether we had wine in the room.

  "Ten kinds, at least," I replied, the strength suddenly drained from my voice.

  "Excellent!" She smiled. "I strongly advise you all to remember who’s staying in what room this time, so that we don’t have any unnecessary embarrassment in the morning. I’ll be taking the prince from you. He should get to sleep. See you all tomorrow."

  With a wink at me, Jaelitte turned slowly towards the stairs leading up. I put my untouched pipe back into my bag, nodded to the table, shook my fist at the grinning Reece, and moved to follow her.

  It was a strange feeling. I watched the walking demoness’ thighs saunter back and forth, making me feel like a schoolboy whose most beautiful classmate had just invited him over to help her with math. This was the woman I was to live with for thousands of years. What if I did something wrong? First impressions were usually right, but the cost of being wrong on this one might prove too much to bear.

  Once we reached the second floor, I opened the door to our room for her. Lita stepped in and examined the room.

  "A little small," she smirked. "Are these paintings by artists from your world?"

  "More like replicas."

  I followed, closing the door behind me, and leaned back against the door frame, arms crossed.

  Lita looked at me skeptically, from head to toe. "All right, first, let’s see who you like best."

  She stepped towards me, hands in the air, and twirled.

  Hart! I physically felt my jaw drop. I had imagined that something like this might happen, but it was another thing altogether to see first-hand. A completely different woman stood before me. Blond hair cut short, slightly slanted eyes. I had seen that face often in the old world, on the covers of glossy magazines and in ads. How was she doing this?! Oh, duh. She had been communicating with me mentally for quite some time now, and must have possessed access to some of my memories.

  I stammered, without wanting to.

  "You don’t like?" She raised an eyebrow. "How about now?"

  With a wave of her hand, the blonde became a languorous red-headed beauty with skin as pale as alabaster. She peered longingly into my eyes, stepped closer, and tilted her head ever so slightly. Her voice was low and throaty.

  "Still not right?"

  She could even change her voice! We hadn’t even gotten started yet, and I was already on the brink of insanity...

  "Look, I like every bit of it, but..."

  "But you want your familiar fox?"

  Jaelitte clapped her hands lightly and became Sata. With her real fox tail, her ears, and the same hairstyle she had worn that night in the tent. She raised her arms like a dog begging for a treat, wagged her tail, and fluttered her eyelashes a couple of times.

  "Meow!"

  "I - I don’t think foxes meow," I said as I stifled a laugh.

  "What does it matter?" Jaelitte approached and placed her hand on my chest. "As long as it pleases you, my dear."

  "Lita, darling, I like every bit of each of these, but why not be as you were the time I first met you?" I gently ran my hand through her hair.

  "You’re so boring!"

  My wife’s face twisted into a grimace of disappointment. Assuming her old form, she pulled away and walked to the window, crossed her arms, and watched the street. Jeez. The situation was a painfully familiar one. Thankfully, that meant that I knew just what to do!

  I walked over to her, gently gripped her shoulders from behind, leaned in and whispered.

  "So you’re nervous, too?"

  "I'm just feeling out of my element, as you might say," she replied without turning her head. "Not too certain how I should behave."

  "A girl once told me that proper behavior is the last refuge of a fool," I quoted, trying my best to sound serious. "She was right, you know. So behave however you think is best."

  She smirked at that. "Bastard!" Whirling and throwing her arms around me, she looked down and then scanned her gaze upward until our eyes met.

  "That's me..." A mild dizziness overtook me as I exhaled, pulled her in, and pressed her supple lips against my own...

  The rays of the sun nudged me awake. It was morning. My eyes opened to see my wife sleeping next to me, smiling. So it wasn’t a dream! She was still with me! I sat up quietly, careful not to wake her, and stretched. Holy hell! That was amazing! It was a little after nine, and the sounds of a city long since awakened wafted in through the window. The table was littered with empty bottles and an overturned glass, and the floor with clothing. Quite a fun night... I felt completely recharged, even though I had only slept three hours, at most. The fears of the day before had evaporated in the love of the night and the light of the dawn. I had no doubts now: this woman was meant for me!

  Rising gently, I pulled o
ut two porcelain cups from my bag and put them under the nozzles of the coffee maker. Then I returned to sit on the edge of the bed, watching my wife. She had removed her horns the night before and now resembled an ordinary twenty-year-old girl. If "ordinary" meant "maddeningly beautiful. Before midnight came, we sat drinking wine and talked about all sorts of nonsense. Then, we somehow found ourselves in bed, and the Fairy Tale of that night began. I had already been crazy about my wife. But when Jaelitte lifted the spells blocking her true charm - well, that just blew me away. I couldn’t express it in words. If the Black Widow from the Avengers had shown up with a bottle of champagne and lustful intent... and I mean Natalia Romanova herself, not Scarlett Johansson. And then that experience were multiplied by something close to infinity... that would still be only a pitiful mockery of the night I had experienced. I thanked the System that this was my lot in this world! Now I understood Lord Astarot and his affection for Janam.

  A soft ding announced that the coffee was ready, causing Jaelitte’s eyelids to flinch. She opened them. The mild alarm in her eyes turned into a coy smile, and she leaned forward to kiss me on the cheek, twisted herself out of my arms and the bed, and shook her finger at me.

  "You’ll have to wait until evening. I’m in a hurry."

  "Coffee’s ready," I smiled, nodding at the steaming gadget as I spread my arms wide and fell back onto the bed. "You might not like it at first, but soon you’ll be unable to live life without it!"

  "Like you with cognac and tobacco?" She smiled back as she gathered her clothes from the floor.

  "Like me with you!"

  Her smile widened. "Don’t flatter me. We’ll talk more in the evening."

  "Whatever you say."

  Lita straightened her belt, buttoned up her jacket, and took one of the cups from where it stood, carefully sniffing the coffee.

  "By the way, the prince who met us at the gate, he’ll be having a grandson soon enough. One who was conceived last night."

  "Great! Wait... How do you know that?"

  I sat back up on the bed and looked at my wife in surprise.