Rebirth and Second Chances

Chapter 285: Balfour

"Where is Lleu Llaw Gyffes?" I asked.

There was nothing I could do to save Brigid and Cu Chulainn, not until I reached Asgard. Even then I might not be able to do much. It would take luck and fate for me to find where they were chained. There was no telling where the dungeon they were being held might be located, or if they had even been captured and were being held by Odin.

"Did he decide to hide Underhill too?"

"No," Gwydion replied without hesitation.

Now that he had been defeated, his attitude had changed, and he had decided to cooperate fully. I didn't trust that cooperation, not completely, but I would listen. I would listen to what he said carefully because although he could not lie, that didn't mean he would be telling me the shades of truth.

"Once he had shared most of his [Authority] with the twelve, he planned to retreat from the world too. He has always had an affinity with the ocean, so he was going to find a deep rift to hide, a place safe enough that he could risk entering Sleep. He never mentioned where or for how long, only that there would come a time when he would return to free the Sidhe and take back what was once ours."

His response was eerily similar to the King Arthur myth. Similar enough that I wondered if Merlin hadn't borrowed Lleu Llaw Gryffes' words and ideas as a way to add mysticism and hope to the falling nation and kingdom of Camelot. Merlin was like most Sidhe, a bit opportunistic and lazy. If a good idea existed, it was simpler to borrow that idea. I had to admit that stealing the myth of his return when he was most needed from a High King took a certain amount of moxie, more than the legends of Merlin I was familiar with gave him credit for.

"How long ago was this?" I demanded.

"He created the last of the twelve kings almost thirty years ago," he answered. "I'm not sure how much longer after we retreated Underhill he remained before entering Sleep. We have been cut off from the world and the rest of the Sidhe until the geas restrictions began lifting a couple of days ago.

"When I was able to leave Underhill, I thought that High King Lleu had decided to lift his [Geas], but I have not been able to contact him through the [Geas] links that were formed when he bound us, or by scry. The waters of reflection I used to communicate show only a blackness whenever I make the attempt.

"That blackness proves he still lives, but I can only assume that he is still in [Sleep], and that whatever event happened recently to restore my magic and weaken the [Geas] had nothing to do with him."

"What did you find out, Balfour?" I asked as I saw the Aziza in the peripheral of my vision. I hadn't been looking for him specifically. I hadn't realized he was here to look for. But I knew who he was the second I caught a glimpse of him returning from somewhere to the east.

I would have noticed him sooner if I had equipped the [Diadem of Focus] from the start. Its clear-sight enchantment made me immune to illusion and charm, and he wouldn't have been able to hide.

Balfour shouldn't have been here. He had not been included in any of the planning I had made for this trip, but that Gwyn ap Nudd had transported him anyway was no accident. Gwyn ap Nudd was too powerful to not notice his presence. Balfour could not have hidden and joined us without tacit approval from the Huntsman.

Gwyn must have had his own reason for allowing the Aziza to stow away, and I had no choice but to accept his presence. I could have insisted that he use a portal through Summerlands to return to Talahm, but I wasn't that foolish. The Aziza were master spies, and his efforts might be instrumental in gathering actionable intelligence.

His people were masters at spying and infiltration. I doubted there existed another race that could challenge them when it came to their natural proclivities. Their abilities were further enhanced by a strange twist of magic that made them able to ignore any ward that might be used for protection.

Truthfully, I had wanted to bring a member of the Aziza, Kelpie, and Knocker along with me, but the Oracle had been clear on who should be included. That Balfour managed to sneak his way here could only mean that he had the Oracle's blessing, and she wanted to hide his inclusion in our group for some reason. There was no way that she could have missed something this important.

It made me wonder why she felt it necessary to keep Balfour's involvement hidden, even from me. I would have allowed him to come. There was no need for deceit. The only rationale I could come up with was that this method obscured his presence from other Oracles. That I hadn't found him until after I had cast the ritual to blind my presence from any attempts at scrying or spying seemed to support that conclusion.

The Oracle must have seen that I would invoke a [Ritual] to obscure my presence and blind my enemies' powers from any form of divination or scrying, and that I would only equip the [Diadem of Focus] after my arrival and I had performed that [Ritual].

Without Asgard or Olympus knowing of his existence, I could use his specialized talents to gather information and bypass wards, especially when it came to gaining entrance to Asgard. Heimdall guarded the Bifrost bridge well. Almost nothing could slip past his gaze. I had thought to use Ag's mastery over [Shadow] to sneak in, but with Balfour here, the chances of success were greatly enhanced.

"There is a ring of bluebell flowers to the east that is serving as the entrance to Underhill," Balfour informed me.

"The people inside are almost exclusively Unseelie. With the exception of a few Wisps and Brownies, not more than a dozen or two of each, and all of them working as servants. I saw one Hob working in a smithy, but I couldn't find any other type of Sidhe.

"They haven't bothered to station guards at the entrance inside. I assume they thought no one but Sidhe could enter, so it wasn't worth the effort. The Underhill itself has taken on the seeming of a mid-size hamlet. Large enough to house 10,000 Unseelie comfortably.

"I didn't bother trying to get an accurate count of how many people there were. It would have taken too much time. The place was too quiet, there was almost no one roaming the streets. The only place that had any traffic at all was the place that was dispensing food. A [Horn of Cornucopia] was being used to produce food and drink.

"The topic of conversation for most people was that horn. It had changed recently, become more powerful and able to produce better quality food, and a wider variety of drink," he said, finishing his report.

He had gathered a huge amount of information quickly, more than I thought possible in the small amount of time he must have had. But that was what made Aziza such capable spies. Their ability to move fast, increase and decrease their size, and manipulate illusion and glamour with skills that seemed to have been tailor-made for them.

They were the descendants of Pwyll, the God of cunning, it was His will that had created the first colony of Aziza. His need for Sidhe of cunning and guile had coalesced into that first colony. [Fairy] responding to his need by creating the Aziza. He had created them during a time of war, when Macha the Goddess of cunning was attempting to subsume his Domain.

They had been locked in a stalemate for eons until Pwyll had the idea to create a race of people that could sneak into Macha's territory and ferret out her secrets. He had gifted them with their most powerful skill, the ability to ignore wards. That skill allowed them the ability to enter anywhere and do so without triggering alarms or activating defenses. It was the reason Balfour had been able to enter an Underhill that had been sealed.

There was no place they could not enter, no wards or defenses created they could not infiltrate or bypass. That unique trait had allowed them to turn the tide of battle between Pwyll and Macha. The secrets they had discovered, enough to force Macha to concede defeat and retreat. It forced her to share the Divine nature of cunning that overlapped Pwyll's.

I'm not sure if He ever regretted creating the Aziza, they could be dogged in their pursuit of ferreting out secrets. Even He and his court had been forced to guard against the Aziza, eventually. I had never bothered trying to protect myself from them. It wasn't worth the bother, and one of their redeeming qualities was their ability to keep the secrets they discovered. They would only share those secrets with the person who had hired their services and their King.

My creation of a Kingdom that ignored the factionalism of Seelie versus Unseelie had drawn them to my banner. They were loyal to me, and I managed to gain [Oath's] that would protect my secrets by acknowledging them as the force they were and rewarding them with official positions in my kingdom.

I had found it easier to recruit them than guard against them.

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