Vash is told he was betrayed

Vash sat and sang, as close to the fire as his body could bear, alone. He did not believe the Dark Lady would come, but he was beginning to look forward to the nights of the new moon as he had looked forward to the full moons when he was a boy.

The Bright Lady was wrong—he did not believe that he alone suffered. Too many of the elves he loved had lost elves they loved, and the future of all of them was a bleak unknown. His entire race suffered, and Vash the son of the Khor suffered for them now because one day they would be his.

But Vash the elf had lost the three elves he loved above all others, all three carried out of reach by death or love or sacred law, and those were the three forces Vash was least willing to defy.

Vash the elf preferred to suffer alone, and there was solitude on these nights like the end of the world.

Or so he thought.

He could hear feet padding through the pine needles behind him. For a moment he believed it was the Dark Lady after all, and he was frightened.

When the intruder stepped into the firelight, he saw that it was only the religious man he had met once in the forest, and he was annoyed.

“How did you find this place?”

“I thought I could smell a fire.” The old man held his hands over the flames to warm them, though the night was very warm.

“No man could find this fire.”

Myrddin shrugged. “I have seen stranger things than your little fire, young elf. Smelled, too.”

He walked around Vash, looking up at him as if he wanted to inspect him from all angles. It was unnerving—so would Nimea walk around him when she spoke to him lately, though she would trail her fingers along his arm or touch his shoulder as she passed.

“I thought you might wish to see me tonight,” Myrddin said.

“I did not wish to see anybody tonight.”

“Is that why you came out on a night of the new moon?”

“That is precisely why.”

“I thought you might wish to see one you call the Dark Lady tonight.”

“You are not she.”

“Oh, certainly not,” the old man chuckled. “She is quite lovely, and rather vain. She would not appear in my ugly form—you may be certain of that.”

“What do you know of her?”

“Now, then! I knew you wished to see me tonight.” He gave Vash a familiar pat on the shoulder, as if he were a young boy.

“Do not touch me! I said I did not wish to see you, and I still do not.”

“Then I must content myself with wanting to see you. I believe you went last moon to the lake?”

“What do you know of that?”

“Let us not waste any more time wondering how I know what I know,” the old man grumbled. “I know a great many things about you elves. More importantly,” he smiled, “I know many things you do not know, and that you would like to learn.”

“At what price?”

“You know that I wish to go where you have gone. For that I would tell you a few things you might like to know.”

“You want me to betray her.”

“Let us talk about betrayal, since you mention it!” the old man cried, waving his finger beneath Vash’s nose. “Here is something you do not know, and which I shall tell you without price. Did you ever wonder how Dre learned of your hiding place when you esc—”

“How do you know about Dre?”

“Do you want to hear or don’t you?” Myrddin snapped.

Vash did not reply, so he continued.

“Did you ever wonder how Dre found your hiding place when you escaped from his prison? How he awaited you at the mouth of the cave all day and all night, for fourteen days and nights, until the full moon shone and he was obliged to hide himself?”

“You told him!” Vash snarled.

“I certainly did not!” Myrddin huffed. “I was not even here then. She told him.”

“She couldn’t tell him! That’s not possible! His entire purpose for capturing me was to find out where she dwells!”

“She did not tell him, but she sent a messenger to him. Who else knew of that hiding place but you and she?”

The only reply Vash could find was to cross his arms and frown. More than anything he wanted to ask the old man how he knew all of this, but he already knew the answer he would receive.

“Now, I have often wondered why she did it,” Myrddin mused. “She knew Dre would have to let you go when the full moon shone, so why would she want to keep you holed up for fourteen days? Tell me something, Vash. Why did you stop going to the lake?”

Vash shook his head.

“Was it because she had taught you all she knew?”

“I doubt that.”

“Has she taught you anything new recently?”

Vash stubbornly did not answer, though he knew it was as good as an answer.

“I didn’t think so,” Myrddin chuckled. “You see, it’s a difficult time for her. She has nothing more to teach you, and nothing more with which to hold you. Unless she has found something else?”

Vash choked, which was also as good as an answer.

“Ah, I thought so!” Myrddin laughed delightedly. “One would have thought she would know better. You have her in your hand, Vash. You may do what you wish with her.”

“I certainly do not wish to betray her,” Vash hissed.

“Don’t you? But I haven’t finished. It has recently occurred to me that something rather important happened during those fourteen days and fourteen nights you spent waiting for Dre to leave your door. Now it all makes sense to me. In that time, the elf Iylaina was married to a man.”

Vash clenched his fist and shook his head, shook it until his hair hung down over both eyes, and then he choked on a sob.

He had thought of this a thousand thousand times, and this alone was already reason enough for him to go on living. He wanted to live so that he might have the chance to kill the elf Dre—who was no elf—because he had done this to him. This and more—but the rest was nothing compared to this.

If he had been permitted to speak with Iylaina before her marriage, it would have changed everything. This he knew. If she had known she was already his wife, she would have respected that tie. More than that—she loved him. She simply had not known how he loved her.

He had never told her, and so he had lost what was most dear to him, and perhaps sealed the death of his people thereby. He had put sacred law above love, and this was the result. That was already reason enough to die.

But was he not putting law before love again?

“That is a betrayal indeed,” Myrddin murmured, shaking his head sadly. “Your happiness for hers.”

“Go!” Vash howled. “Get away from me!”

“Next moon, perhaps?” Myrddin smiled.

“Go!”