Free The Dwarf Kingdoms (Book 5) by A. Giannetti

hidden road, nosily crunching through scales and bones.
    “This fellow is unusually brave and curious,” thought Elerian, noticing that the otter was watching him out of the corners of its soft brown eyes. “Is he more than he seems, I wonder?”
    Opening his third eye, Elerian beheld his own golden shade and the smaller one of the otter. Extending a portion of his shade shaped like a golden thread from his right hand, he delicately touched the end of it to the left shoulder of the otter’s shade. As if stung by that ethereal touch, the otter leaped back. Abandoning its meal, it dove effortlessly into the river, disappearing beneath the green tinted waters of the Catalus. Thoughtfully, Elerian closed his third eye and studied the placid surface of the river. At the brief moment of contact between his shade that of the otter, he had felt a brief resonance, as if he had encountered something similar to himself. He had sensed thoughts, too, that never belonged to any animal.
    “The creature was a shape changer as I suspected, but he did not belong to any race that I am familiar with,” thought Elerian to himself. A sense of frustration swept through him, for he felt as if he was on the verge of some discovery that might shed light on his own past. “Anthea did say that there was a part of me that was neither Elf nor human,” he reminded himself. “Is it possible that I have some connection with the creature that I just saw?” he wondered to himself.
    Maintaining his position on the road where he remained hidden behind its illusion spell, Elerian kept a close watch on the river, looking both upstream and downstream, but the otter never surfaced again. He was finally forced to abandon his scrutiny of the swift flowing water when Ascilius and his company of Dwarves appeared behind him.
    “I will have my answer some day, if I have to hunt through every stream in the Middle Realm to find another of these shape changers,” Elerian assured himself as he watched Ascilius rig his rope across the river. Using the line as before to keep from being washed away, the company forded the river a second time. Under the envious eyes of the Dwarves, many of whom were wet to the waist by the cold waters of the Catalus, Elerian crossed last, running lightly, with all the grace and agility of an acrobat, across the taut cord spanning the river.
    “Look for me at the road’s end,” said Elerian to Ascilius as the Dwarf coiled his wet rope. Leaving the company of Dwarves in the cool depths of the gorge, he ran ahead again, traveling through miles of empty forest until the road ended abruptly before him in front of a sheer face of gray rock covered with green moss and gray lichens. A diminutive, clear rivulet trickled down the center of the cliff, splashing into a small, shallow pool at its base. The overflow from the pool, a crystal clear steam barely a foot wide, disappeared into the wood to the right of the road. The forest grew right up to the face of the cliff, the thick green roof formed by the leaves and branches of the great trees around him preventing Elerian from determining how high the vertical face of stone was or what lay above it.
    “There must be a door here,” thought Elerian to himself, but even his sharp eyes could not find any hint of where it might be. Tiring of his fruitless search, he was about to sit down when a soft voice whispered in his head, “The pool to your right is suitable for aqua vitae.” Instantly, upon hearing the voice of Dymiter, Elerian looked around him, but he saw no sign of the mage’s shade nor did he hear his voice again.
    “At least I know that he is still alive,” thought Elerian to himself. Because of Dymiter’s long silence, he had feared that Elven mage had diminished his limited life force to the point where he had finally faded and left this plane of existence.
    Deciding to take Dymiter’s advice, Elerian emptied his water bottle, filling it again with cold, crystal clear water