Disguised as Rydell, Prince Aidan made an excuse to step out and slipped into a secret Ideal Kingdom stronghold that looked like a Treehouse from the outside.
"King," he called.
The young man bent over the table looked up. "Your High—Knights? What are you doing here?"
"What did you send the steward to do?" Prince Aidan asked.
"Continue the attack plan... He just went to the Garden Corridor!"
"He's been caught." Prince Aidan headed for the door. "Tell the Butler, the Prince, and the Gardener to move to another secret stronghold. I'm going to rescue him. Until I return, no one is to make contact on their own."
"Understood."
After giving the King his instructions, Prince Aidan activated the Shortened Scepter Handle and silently teleported to a tree hollow near Dark Night.
Searching the area around the Garden Corridor by force would be like looking for a needle in a haystack. But...
Magic Power gathered at the tip of the Shortened Scepter Handle, forming a vast, intricate Map. Any Elf would have recognized it: it was a Map of the Emerald Capital.
And it was gradually drawing closer.
Eight red dots were scattered across the Map's central region. Six moved slowly, one stood still, and one moved fast.
Prince Aidan murmured.
"Found you..."
"You like Kael'thas?"
On the way back to Dark Night with the Attacker, Annan asked the question out of nowhere.
"No..." Leona thought of something and changed her answer. "Is it that obvious?"
"Elves are always cool toward outsiders, but the way you look at 'me'—or rather, Kael'thas—is different."
Most Elves were reserved, devoted, and deeply affectionate. Irilanze had the latter two qualities too, though the first had taken a strange turn... She had been single for fifteen hundred years, after all.
Irilanze had already been