But it turned out he was far worse than I’d ever imagined. As I flipped those dusty pages in the quiet library, my desire to remain in Ithenmyr and fight increased tenfold.
* * *
The Females’ Rebellion was exactly what it sounded like. After having found the first book, I discovered two more tucked in behind it. What I found between those pages was horrifying, to say the least.
Nearly three centuries ago, when High King Edgar was still a young king, he had enacted a set of stringent laws declaring that all females, no matter their species, were second-class citizens in Ithenmyr.
According to the priests, the king had received a vision from the gods. They had told him, in no uncertain terms, that females were only good for one thing: breeding.
As such, females had no use for education. The day after the king’s vision, laws were passed banning females from all learning centers and public spaces.
Fifty years later, the females had risen up. The details of the actual rebellion were scarce, but the result of the uprising had been two-fold.
First, females were allowed in schools once more. But as punishment for the uprising, High King Edgar had also enacted the Accompaniment Law.
A shudder ran through me as I found a letter tucked between the yellowed pages. Clearing my voice, I read it out loud to myself. My voice sounded too loud in the quiet library.
“If you’re getting this letter, it means that the worst has happened to me. They are coming for me. For all of us. Because of our… meetings.
“Yesterday, the Winged Soldiers took Mari. She was walking to the market with her brother, but he ran ahead to see his friends. In his youth, he forgot. He left her behind. He didn’t do it on purpose, of that I am certain. But that was all it took. One moment of youthful forgetfulness cost Mari her life. She had been alone for no more than a minute before one of the king’s guards had snatched her off the street.
“Her father, my cousin, pleaded with the guards to release her. They turned a deaf ear to him. She was beheaded at dawn. Her blood painted the streets. Her crime: walking down the road. What can we do? How will we survive? Get out of Ithenmyr while you still can. I hear the border to the Western Kingdom is still unguarded.”
I sighed, putting the letter down and rubbing my eyes. This story…
It was horrible. Terrible. The High King did this.
When I got the courage to continue reading, I found dozens of stories like Mari’s. The details were different, but they all ended the same. Execution. Deportation. Separation. Death.
So much death. So much suffering. The one thing they all had in common—High King Edgar. I knew that not all Death Elves were bad. Just like not all Light Elves were good. People were more than just the labels placed on them at their birth.
But High King Edgar and his son… They were the epitome of evil.
They had to be stopped.
But how?
* * *
The next day, I hurried through breakfast. I gulped down my tea, and Xander smirked at me from across the table. “Do you have somewhere to be, Sunshine?”
I nodded. “The library.”
He raised a brow. “Did you find something?”
“Maybe,” I said, shrugging. “Not what I was looking for, but something of interest.”
“I’m glad.” He reached into his pocket and pulled out an apple. I watched as he bit into it. I couldn’t help it. It seemed that no matter where we were these days, Ialwaysknew where Xander was. He swallowed, placing his hand on the table a few centimeters away from mine.
I stared at our almost-touching fingers. The air around us was thick as the noise from the other residents of The Pines faded away. Suddenly, it was just the two of us, and our almost-touching hands.
I wanted to pull my hand away. I wanted to grab his hand and never let go. To call my emotions complicated at that moment would have been an understatement of epic proportions.
Xander cleared his throat. “I have to leave for a few days, Aileana.”
And just like that, I was back in the present.
“Leave?” I echoed.