The Key of Allen

This story was my second round entry in NYC Midnight‘s 2017 Flash Fiction Challenge. The writing prompts that I had in my brief were: Fantasy | A Dry Riverbed | An Allen Wrench.


 

 

Elora stifled a shriek of surprise as a whip-thin blade flicked past her ear, nicking her cloak and coming to rest firmly against her neck. ‘Yield, thief, and I will be merciful,’ the warrior said, her voice quiet and hard as steel.

‘Talawen,’ Elora mumbled. ‘It’s… it’s me.’

Her older sister straightened and blinked in surprise, peering through the darkness of the gilded hallway. ‘Elora? What in all of Faen do you think you’re doing?’

‘Shh!’ The younger woman waved her hands desperately. ‘The guards will hear!’

Talawen hesitated briefly, but dropped her sword to her side and her voice to a whisper. ‘Is that the Key of Allen? How did you even get it out of the treasury?’

Shifting the uncomfortable weight of the artefact strapped to her back, Elora set her jaw and averted her eyes. ‘I’m taking it to the fortress.’

A look of exasperation flickered across Talawen’s face. Grabbing her younger sister by the hand, she dragged her down the hall toward her bedroom. Elora allowed herself to be led, trying to still the trembling of her hands.

Once they were safely out of the halls, Talawen closed the door behind them and walked over to her balcony doors, drawing back the curtains to let silvery moonlight spill across the room. She paused a moment as her eyes adjusted, then opened the doors and walked outside into the cool night air. Elora followed.

‘Mother has made her decree,’ Talawen said. There was no heat in her voice, only tiredness. ‘Preparations are already underway. We leave a week hence. You know this.’

Elora walked over to the edge of the balcony, unshouldering the Key of Allen and resting it against the white marble balustrade. She stretched her arms, feeling the relief of the muscles in her already-aching back. The Key was a dreadful, imposing thing: a thick rod of shining black metal fashioned into a perfectly hexagonal shape. It was featureless and unmarked save for the last third of the rod, which had been bent precisely perpendicular to the rest. Were it straight it would measure more than two full inches, almost as long as Elora was tall.

She gripped the railing with both hands. ‘We can’t just leave. This is our home. Our people have lived here since they left the forest.’

‘And the Queen has decreed that we will return there. It isn’t your decision to make.’

‘Leaving won’t protect us! The forest of ancestors is too far for us to travel there safely. How many will die before we reach it?’

Talawen sighed. ‘The flow of the river powers the wards that protect us. Unless the water returns soon, we will no longer be hidden. The fell beasts of the field will prey upon us. The humans will find us. What other choice do we have?’

Only a week ago, Talawen’s balcony had commanded a breathtaking view of the river whose flow protected their kingdom. On a fine day you could see clear across the glittering waters to the shore beyond. Now all that remained was a tiny trickle of mud, a bare whisper of the once-powerful torrent that had carved out the now-dry riverbed.

The hairs on the back of Elora’s neck prickled as she looked upriver. Though it was concealed by distance and darkness, she could still sense the foreboding presence of the grim citadel that now spanned the river, diverting the water from its natural course. She pictured it in her mind. Stark, blocky parapets of enormous size and long ramparts that allowed only the barest trickle of water through.

The construction was many hundreds of inches long—perhaps even a thousand!—and, given that it rose from the deepest parts of the riverbed to the height of the shore, at least forty inches tall. That the humans had raised such a fortress in a single day was a testament to the power of their dark and terrible magics.

‘Grandfather’s journal—’

‘This again?’ Talawen interrupted. ‘Mother told you we cannot rely on those stories.’

‘Grandfather’s journal,’ Elora repeated stubbornly, ‘says that the human child he befriended bestowed the Key upon him as a gift.’

‘Yes. And?’

‘He said it was a tool. One that could be used to build things, but could be used to unmake them as well.’

Talawen shook her head. ‘Even if that were true, we don’t know the first thing about their magic. You aren’t human. You can’t just wave one of their tools of creation and hope it does something.’

‘Look at it.’ Elora rested a hand on the black metal. ‘It looks large to us, but to a human? It wouldn’t even be the size of a finger. It would be tiny. I don’t think it was forged for them. I think was for us. Maybe Allen—whoever he was—knew that we would need it one day?’

‘That’s still not enough to risk the whole kingdom on!’

‘But I think I know how to use it! It’s a key. It’s always referred to as a key. If there’s a key…’ She paused, waiting for her sister to follow her thought.

‘…a key implies a lock.’ Talawen grimaced, but nodded reluctantly.

Elora turned to look at her sister, a look of fierce determination on her face. ‘I will take the Key to the fortress and I will use it to undo what the humans have done.’

Talawen looked at her for a long time. ‘All right,’ she said eventually. ‘Give me a few moments to gather my armour.’

‘You’ll come with me?’ Elora blinked, surprised.

‘Of course.’ Talawen sighed again and allowed herself a tight smile. ‘What kind of a sister would I be if I let you go alone? We’ll do this together.’

Minutes later, they were gone.

1 Comment

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1 Response to The Key of Allen

  1. Stephen

    Omg I want the rest of the book!

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