“Tell me about your realm,” Alleria said to me, puncturing the awkward silence that had formed due to me becoming lost in thought.

  “Is there anything in particular you’d like to know about?”

  “Tell me about the dwarves; how many of them are there, where they live, how they live…”

  “Most of the dwarves live in my kingdom of Aseron; their own kingdom, Grunheim, was invaded by the kingdom of Kandalar, whose king wanted Grunheim’s mineral wealth for himself. The dwarves were displaced by the war and became refugees scattered throughout the realm. When I became queen I made an offer to the other kingdoms that I would take in the dwarves in exchange for debt relief; they agreed and ever since then the dwarves have been citizens of Aseron and have contributed enormously to the recovery and growth of the kingdom.”

  “What was it that your kingdom needed to recover from?”

  “My predecessor was an illegitimate ruler; her reign was disastrous for the kingdom.”

  “What do you mean she was illegitimate?”

  “She seized the throne when her husband, King Dorman, became old and infirm; she wasn’t chosen to rule by an Overseer.”

  “You have an Overseer?!” Alleria stopped, turned to me and asked with a look of shock on her face.

  “Yes, his name is Elias.”

  “You’ve seen him and spoken with him?”

  “Of course I have, he’s the Overseer.”

  “And he chose you personally to be queen?”

  “Yes; wasn’t it the same for you?”

  “I’ve actually never seen or spoken with Lumeria.”

  “Lumeria; is that the name of your Overseer?”

  “Yes, but we didn’t refer to her as an Overseer, to us she is a goddess, a goddess whose magnificence knows no bounds.”

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  “If you have never so much as seen her then how is it that you are the queen?”

  “Before becoming queen I was the Lumerian high priestess, when King Vaneron left us it was decided that I was best suited to replace him.”

  “I see.”

  Another false ruler. I could see a scenario under which Alleria, feeling insecure in her rule, decided to unite the white elves behind her by granting them the freedom to treat the dark elves as they wished. There were other plausible scenarios that I could imagine, but what seemed to be key in all of this was the absence of the Overseer and the white elves’ exaltation of her as a goddess despite possessing little knowledge of her due to her absence. Only Elias could provide me with the information that I needed about Lumeria, and with us being in a foreign land so far away from our realm I wasn’t sure if it was possible to communicate with him. Until I saw Elias again I had to keep fishing for whatever information I could get without letting on that I was here because of Saraya.

  The farmlands were separated from the hunting grounds by a high wooden fence made from thick logs that extended almost as far as the eye could see.

  “Your wolf is well trained? He won’t run off on his own?” Alleria asked me.

  “No, he won’t.”

  “Good, because if he runs off on his own in the hunting grounds he’ll most likely never be seen again.”

  “Don’t worry about Anbu, he’ll be just fine.”

  “Open the gates,” Alleria turned away from me and said to the two white elf guards standing in front of the gate that led to the hunting grounds.

  The two guards opened the heavy gates and then closed them behind us after we had passed through into the hunting grounds. Looking out at the hunting grounds, I felt like I was back in the Northlands. Before us stretched an overwhelmingly vast expanse of plains and woodlands that I wished I had the freedom to explore like I’d had the freedom to explore the Northlands when I was growing up there.

  “Our primary prey is going to be the dahus, but if we come across other animals that you would like to target just say so,” Alleria said.

  “Will we get the chance to see some wolves?” I asked.

  “Where there are dahus there are wolves,” Alleria responded.

  We moved further into the hunting grounds, heading for the plains where the dahu herds grazed.

  “These dahus are very big, are they going to be able to bring them all the way back to the city?” I asked, referring to the four dark elves that were accompanying us.

  “They’ll be fine, they do this all the time,” Alleria responded.

  “What happens if somebody gets lost out here?” I asked.

  “There are rangers who patrol the area; if there is anybody who is out here that’s not supposed to be here, they’ll be taken care of.”

  From the way she said ‘they’ll be taken care of’, I couldn’t help but think that what Alleria was referring to was dark elves that were caught trying to escape.