Page 70 of Forged in Fading

“Yes, runes. My father studied and used them all the time. They might be useful.” Though her preferred method for using them had always been heating up a bath each night, until Eloisa had passed.

“I understand the sentiment, but the sheer amount of time it would take to inscribe each stone in the wall is daunting to say the least. And we would have to recharge them with magic every few days. It would be a misuse of our wielders.”

“Not if we use elves who are already planning on staying but not fighting.” Like Lilja. But Alvara wanted to keep her head intact, so she kept that part to herself.

He scratched his short beard. “It could work, though we’ll need to confirm the correct runes and pass around drawings to those willing to inscribe them. Are you interested in a trip to the library? Ilmanir’s is quite small compared to Tasírath’s, but I suppose that’s true for the capital of every kingdom besides Ela.”

The library. To be surrounded by books, the feel of the soft leather, the endless reminders of her father… “I would go, but Sithuren needs help at the forge.”

Boden studied her for a few heartbeats. “I’ll find you when I’m done.”

Gods, she was such a coward. But the very thought of stepping foot in that place was enough to send her running in the other direction. Alvara fiddled with one of her mother’s earrings. If he was already going, it couldn’t hurt to ask. “While you’re there, can you try to look for anything about King Einar’s dagger? It’s been in every nightmare since I left his dungeons. Something about it is off. I don’t know why, but I think it could be important.”

His brows knitted. “Are you still having nightmares?”

“Are you?”

Boden tilted his head and loosed a long, exasperated breath.

“They’re…better. Happy?”

A faint grin tugged at the corner of his lips. “I’ll head to the library. You’ll be all right?”

“I won’t impale anyone with icicles if that’s what you mean.”

The ground rippled beneath her feet in response.

Boden returned just as Alvara’s ice spear splintered a tree branch with a resounding crack. She stood a little straighter. Her skill in magic was now more than passable, and the ability to craft weapons with it had slowly grown her enthusiasm for wielding.

He wiggled two tomes in the air. “The runes were quite easy to find. The ancient and most likely cursed weapon? Not as simple.”

She wiped her hands on her coat before grabbing a book. “They let you take these outside of the library?” Her father would have panicked at such precious knowledge exposed to the elements.

“You’re more worried about the books than the fact that I mentioned a cursed weapon?” Boden shook his head, quietly chuckling. “You really are a tarinthúr’s daughter.” He placed his hand on the cover of the tome she held. “Also, this may come as an immense shock to you, but some people do enjoy my company and find me rather charming.”

Alvara harrumphed and shook his touch away. “Then they clearly haven’t spent enough time with you.”

She thumbed through the pages and stopped on a depiction of a dagger. The dagger. Her fingers trembled at the corners of the image. Dagger of Helvati.

“The goddess of Helvahem?” Boden’s voice tickled her ear, and she jumped away from where he leaned over her shoulder.

“I was hoping for something less ominous.” She traced the outline of the dagger on the page. “The other weapons in this book, they’re all the original weapons of the gods. Forged by the gods.” Before even Vitharen’s Fracture and the creation of the dwarves. “How did King Einar get his hands on it?”

“A temple? I’ve seen other relics of the gods in the humans’ temples.”

“He couldn’t have found it in one of our kingdoms. We don’t have any temples.” Hardly a wonder, seeing as the gods had butchered their High King and tossed the elves out of their council when they were no longer deemed worthy.

“It’s possible when his father invaded the human realm, he decided to pillage a temple or two, and the blade somehow returned here without him,” Boden said as he flipped through the book on runes.

King Einar’s father wouldn’t have been the first elf to make rash decisions after the loss of a seluri. But none of it mattered if they didn’t know what the blade did or what power it offered the wielder.

She slammed her book closed, and it coughed up a cloud of dust. If anyone would have known, it would have been her father. But that knowledge had faded along with him.

“Here.” Boden tapped a group of symbols on the page. “This matches the runes most palaces use to block visitors from wielding their magic. I’ll bring it to Rav, and he may be able to help sway the council.”

After days of conversations Alvara hadn’t been a part of, though Boden had tried to admit her to the council meetings, they agreed to her plan with the stipulation that she proved its efficacy. An easy task and a satisfying one, especially when it meant she could throw rocks at Boden’s head that he could do nothing with his magic to block.

Over the next few weeks, any Nyrian elves they could spare from the trenches focused their efforts on inscribing each stone of the wall with the magic-blocking runes, while the few Elan elves, Lilja included, grew what food they could to build up stores in case of a siege. Though from Alvara’s limited knowledge of King Einar, she doubted he had enough patience for anything but razing the city to the ground.