Not Magic Enough and Setting Boundaries - By Valerie Douglas Page 0,60

at the look in his eyes, Elon knew that whatever would come was worth it for Jareth’s sigh alone.

Elon allowed himself a small smile at the look on Jareth’s face.

He glanced at Colath, who smiled at Jareth’s dumbfounded expression and nodded back.

“Elon,” an Elf said, reasonably. “He’s a man.”

“As I’m aware,” Elon said, “He’s also a wizard. Still, he will enter. He’s my friend.”

“Mine as well,” Colath added.

“No man has ever entered an Elven Enclave,” another said.

“There is a first time for anything,” Elon said, “although I believe that the men and women who were our allies during the wizard wars did enter our Enclaves.”

“We’re not at war,” another said.

“For which you can thank this man,” Elon said, “Or else we might have been. He saved my life at the risk of his own and nearly died for it.”

“As he did for me,” Colath said.

That silenced the opposition as shock reverberated through them at the thought of the loss of their First and his true-friend.

Jareth still couldn’t believe he was here, in Aerilann. Where men didn’t go.

“It’s beautiful,” he said, reverently.

Suddenly a dozen Elven eyes were on him.

He swallowed hard and looked back at them.

For a moment he was dumbstruck - his throat too tight to speak. He hadn’t meant to say anything, it had just come out.

Before them was a great stone veranda ringed with a wood and vine railing. From above, flowers appeared to drip like beads of water from vines that twined through the stone carvings of the roof. A circular railing twined around the trunk of one of the largest trees, it spiraled up into the branches to the balconied, silk-walled apartments above, the silk the color of turquoise and jade.

Colath looked at Jareth and nodded as Elon folded his hands on the saddle horn with a small smile on his usually stern face.

“Thank you,” Jareth said, simply. “For letting me see this.”

Among that empathic people, the depth of his feeling was clear.

It stilled them.

Then one, a woman, reached across their horses to lay a hand over Jareth’s “I am Sareth. Second among equals. You are welcome here, Jareth of the Kingdoms.”

Slowly, Jareth straightened in the saddle with a small apologetic smile and shook his head.

“No, Sareth. With my thanks but I am Jareth, wizard. I serve no one, am beholden to none. None command me, I serve all and everyone, Elf, Dwarf or man at need. I am Jareth… Just Jareth.”

Now Elon understood more clearly what the wizard Dorcet had seen in Jareth and why he’d sent him. They shared the same vision but Jareth was the heart of it.

A whisper of foresight went through him, bound in struggle, grief and triumph.

The way would not be easy, nor would it be straight, nor was it even assured, but hope for them all glimmered on the horizon.

Swinging off his horse, Elon tossed the reins over the railing of his veranda.

He was home, finally and at last.

Turning, he looked to Colath, who let out a sigh of satisfaction and relief as he looked around for a moment in satisfaction before swinging down from Chai.

Bewildered, a little uncertain, Jareth dismounted.

The horses trotted off in the direction of the paddock, to be untacked, brushed down and freed to graze by whoever served at the stables.

“Come Jareth,” Elon said and offered his hand in the traditional greeting. “Welcome to Aerilann and my home.”

Jareth’s breath caught as he looked at Elon, knowing what it was he did.

He let out a breath with a glance to Colath, and then, for the first time, clasped Elon’s arm as friend to friend.

Something seemed to lock and seal between them, a promise, from Elon to him and back.

Colath reached out, too, then, offered his free hand in the same way.

Straightening, his chin lifting, Jareth took it and felt the same sense of closure, of rightness.

Looking at them, at Jareth and Colath, a frisson of foresight whispered through and over Elon’s skin, a soft whisper of sudden sure knowledge.

Slowly, he nodded as he let it move through him.

Jareth, wizard and man, would be a part of his future for many years to come…in what way, what manner? Friend, companion, advisor…

Some of their folk arrived with food, Sareth joining them for the briefing.

Hitching himself up on the stone railing Jareth made himself comfortable as Colath crossed his arms to lean a shoulder against a post while Elon paced - his head lowered thoughtfully - as he considered their options and began to outline them for the others.

Looking