To ignore the diary was unthinkable. She had to discover if the lost Elfstones still existed and, if they did, where they might be found. She had to gain possession of them for the Druid order before they fell into hands that would not use them well. Elfstones were a powerful magic, and while she had given back the seeking-Stones long ago, believing when she did so that the Elves would keep them safe and use them wisely, she had kept the Black Elfstone—the most powerful of them all and the only other Stone that had ever been recovered—believing its magic better off in the hands of the Druids.

Which was what she believed about all magic.

It wasn’t that the other Races were incapable of good judgment and clear thinking. It wasn’t that the Druids possessed special insight or better reasoning, though she believed they did. The difference lay in the depth and breadth of commitment to a way of life that respected what magic could do and how it should be managed. Only the Druids had given their lives to this cause. Only the Druids understood and respected the power that magic offered, both good and bad. Only the Druids studied endlessly what history had to teach about the mistakes and misuses that had doomed so many before them.

To abdicate magic of any sort to a political entity or even to any one of the Races that populated the Four Lands, no matter the promises offered or the feelings expressed, was a failing of monumental proportions, and she would not be part of it.

Everyone who knew of the missing Elfstones, Races and individuals alike, had been seeking them since their disappearance in the time of Faerie. But no one had found them. No one had found even a trace. Not a word written. Not the briefest glimpse. Nothing.

What made her think it would be any different this time?

She walked back to where Aphenglow sat watching her and stopped in front of her.

“Do you know what to do?” Aphen asked softly.

Khyber Elessedil shook her head. “But I know who to ask.”

6

KHYBER SLEPT LITTLE THAT NIGHT, HER MIND ROILING with possibilities and the plans for bringing them to fruition. She walked the halls of the Keep alone, thinking of the missing Elfstones and how finding them might help the Druids in their efforts to bring the Races together in a peaceful alliance. They had been at war for so long—struggles like the war on the Prekkendorran, which had lasted for more than fifty years. If the magic of the Elfstones could in some way serve to contain such wars or even keep the Races from instigating such conflicts, she would have accomplished something that no Ard Rhys ever had.

She basked in the warmth of the idea one minute and went cold with her doubts about the reliability of the diary in the next.