Broken of Fire (The Cloud Warrior Saga Book 9) (23 page)

He pressed through the fire bond, pushing as much of himself into the bond as he could. Within it, he sensed the trail of darkness, and the effect that this other had on the bond. It already had begun to be tainted. Tan traced the taint and found a focus. His heart raced. The eggs.

Pressing fire through the bond, a cleansing surge of heat and flame and true Fire, he mixed spirit, pulling on his connection, on the thready remnants of the bond that he shared with Amia, and added spirit.

It was not enough.

Tan twisted his shapings, pulling on the elementals, reaching for spirit. But it only slowed the darkness.

The bonds. He would need to join the bonds.

Twisting his connection to the bonds together, he felt a sudden surge, a flood of spirit that reminded him of each time that he had stepped in the pool of the Mother. This flowed through him, and from him, as he added it first to the fire bond, sending that torrent raging along with his connection.

The darkness burned away.

Tan didn’t rest. He couldn’t rest.

He shifted to wind, pulling himself into the wind bond much as he had done with fire. There he added the same connection to spirit, the same flood, as he pressed true Wind through the bond, letting it rage in a torrent, sweeping away all remnants of the darkness.

Next he did the same with earth, and then water.

It had worked. It had to have worked.

Tan knew fatigue unlike anything that he’d ever experienced.

His eyes drifted closed, and he fell.

W
hen Tan awoke
, he was lying on the pillows in the library. Garza pressed something to his forehead that smelled of bitter soap and mint. His throat felt dry and his head throbbed painfully.

“You’re awake,” she said.

“Awake, but beaten up.”

“Better than some.”

“The students?” he asked, sitting up quickly. His head swam and he lost the ability to focus.

“They will be well. I have been to the tower and seen to them already.”

Likely she saw to them first, Tan suspected. Which was just as well. He would prefer her to worry about the students. The elementals would watch over him.

He looked around but didn’t see the draasin. Had she survived the attack? Had Molly, for that matter? “What of Elanne?”

“The Mistress of Bonds was unharmed. She fought bravely, and with more compassion than most would have expected of her.” Garza pinched her lips together and fixed Tan with a frown. “That was you, I presume?”

“I couldn’t have her harm the students. They are the future of Par.”

“Hmm.”

“Where are the others?”

Garza patted his head and tried to send a surge of water shaping through him, but he resisted. “You should rest.”

“Garza?”

She still refused to answer.

Elanne stopped in the door and looked at Tan with worried eyes. Garza nodded to her and then stepped away from him, as if eager to leave his side. “Do you know what happened?” Elanne asked.

Tan sank back and stared up at the ceiling of the library. “The only thing that I can think is that the binding began to fail and whatever it restrained began to seep through. Not all of it, but enough that it managed to attack.”

Elanne sighed. “The Records were unharmed.”

“I don’t think the Records were the target. Marin realized the last time that it wouldn’t be enough.”

“You were able to restore the bonds,” Elanne noted.

Tan nodded. The runes on the side of the tower had been more difficult in some ways than those hidden with the Records. With the Great Seals, the challenge was in knowing which shape they should take, and adding enough shaped energy to it so that they were able to be restored. With the runes on the tower, it had required a connection to the element bond to repair them. Had he not found that connection… Tan didn’t want to think of what might have happened.

“What was it?” Elanne asked.

“I don’t know. Darkness. Power. When it first attacked Amia, I thought it an elemental bond. Then I pulled that connection onto myself and felt the power that surged through. What other than an elemental has strength like that?”

The only similar thing that he had seen was the power within the element bond itself. And in some ways, what he had experienced was stronger than that. Keeping that power restrained had taken him pulling on each of the element bonds, tying them together, and reaching for the Mother.

Could it be that whatever he had discovered rivaled the Mother in strength?

Tan rested on the pillows. A physical fatigue still weighed on him, different than the weakness he once had known while shaping. All he wanted was to close his eyes and rest, but he couldn’t. He needed to find out what had happened to the rest of Par.

And his mother.

How had he forgotten about Zephra? Would she have any lasting problems from the attack, or had he managed to separate the darkness from her completely? Tan had worked quickly—he had
needed
to work quickly—but that didn’t mean that his spirit shaping had no effect on her.

“Maelen, you should rest.”

“I have to check on—”

He didn’t need to finish. Through his improved connection to wind, he recognized both Zephra sweeping into the room and the effect of ara coming with her.

“Tannen,” she said, dropping next to him. Tan wasn’t surprised to see that Roine came with her but remained back, taking in all of the estate. “You’re awake.”

“How are you?”

She took a deep breath. “Because of your shaping, I am fine. Spirit?”

He nodded. “I don’t really know what that was, but I can keep it from influencing your mind with spirit.”

Zephra sighed. “I was a fool. Working with those students as you asked and didn’t keep my guard up.”

“I don’t think that you could. Not with that…” He didn’t know what to call it. Entity. Darkness. Those were terms he used for it, but they did not describe it well.

“When she came into the tower, it was all that I could do to avoid her shaping. She was powerful. In some ways, she reminds me of the strength that Amia displays, only blunter.”

When Zephra mentioned a shaper, Tan had expected it to have been one of the element shapers that had attacked him. But could Marin have attacked? Could that have been the reason that Zephra had attacked him?

“I think her name is Marin. She the Mistress of Souls,” Tan said. When his mother frowned, he explained. “It is a religious title in Par, but one that I don’t fully understand. And she’s a spirit shaper.”

“That would be who attacked me,” Zephra said. “And she
forced
something onto my mind.”

“Is it gone?” Tan reached for his mother with a spirit sensing and stretched gently through the wind bond, expecting some resistance from her, but there was none. No traces of the darkness remained. Only his layer of spirit.

“Gone. And whatever you did remains, Tannen.” She glanced at Roine. “I need… I need you to do the same for him.”

“Zephra—”

“Theondar, you don’t understand what it’s like.”

“I have been shaped by Althem. I think I know exactly what it’s like.”

Zephra shook her head. “This is different. This is something in your mind, filling it with thoughts that I still haven’t managed to shake.” She turned her attention to Tan. “The bond has changed.
He
says that Maelen sealed that as well. What does that mean?”

“It means,” Tan said, slowly getting to his feet, “that there is a wind bond, much like there is a fire bond. And earth. And water. The attack on the elementals attempted to reach through the bond, but it is stopped.”

“A wind bond? How could I not have known?” She closed her eyes and her lips moved without her saying anything.

“I think that all shapers reach through these bonds,” Tan said. “I think that’s how we connect to our abilities. And to the elementals.”

He didn’t know if the darkness that had attacked wanted to reach the bond or if there was another intent. Somehow, it had attacked and influenced the elementals. It had influenced shapers, some too young to understand. And it had wanted to destroy the binding. But why?

Hatchling.
Tan reached through the fire bond, pressing spirit through the connection as well, needing to reach the draasin. Where had she gone? Why hadn’t she been with him?

Unless she hadn’t survived. Had Molly injured her?

A flash of fire in the hearth surged and Tan looked over to see the hatchling come slithering out of the flames. Her body glowed for a moment, then faded. The wings on her back were even smaller than the last time he had seen them. Would they even hold her aloft if she attempted to float to the ground, as she had with Molly?

She stopped next to him and licked at his hand. Tan hadn’t even thought about the burn that Molly gave him, and only now realized that the skin on his hand was pulled tight and shiny, a rough scar forming. Surprisingly, this faded as the draasin licked him.

Roine back away from the draasin. Zephra stared at her.

The binding. That entity. It wanted to escape.

That is what it seeks, Maelen.

And had I failed?

One binding would have released. I suspect that it failed long enough for the part of it contained here to have freed.

Tan leaned back.
Part. That wasn’t even all of that entity?

You have seen the extent, Maelen.

The power rivals the Mother.

Rivals, yes. I begin to see that there was a time when they battled. Light and dark.

Light?
Honl had told him that he was a part of the light before he had disappeared, but Tan hadn’t known what that meant. Did it mean that he would have to battle this entity?

You already know the answer, Maelen.

What happens if the other bindings fail?

Then he returns to the world in full.

And that is what Marin wanted,
Tan said, thinking that he might understand.

This place was the only known binding remaining.

Was?

Another has returned.

Tan frowned, absently tracing a finger on the ground in the shape of the binding. When the binding formed, it flashed with a surge of light before fading again.

“What was that?” Roine asked. He leaned toward the spot Tan had drawn the rune, but there was now nothing more than the stone of the floor, no mark even on that.

“That is the binding that nearly failed,” Tan said tiredly. “Par is a place of binding.”

“Binding?”

Tan made the shape of the rune again, and it flashed again. Why would it do that each time that he traced it? “The tower is at the center, with these arms that spiral off,” he said, making it one more time.

Roine looked over to Zephra, and Tan saw that she had paled, her eyes going wide.

“Have you seen this before?” he asked. “There are two others, but they were supposedly lost.”

“I had not,” Roine said. “Until recently. When Assan requested to excavate an ancient temple, one that held historical significance, I thought there could be no harm. If our ancestors were responsible for all that we have seen, the way that they used the elementals and forced them to bond, then we should understand. And when he said there was a dormant elemental…”

Not an elemental, but something worse. Much worse.

“The Alast Temple,” he said. “But it was only a single structure.”

“That was all that you saw, but after you left, they began to find other parts, remnants of the city.” Roine motioned to the floor and the now-invisible run Tan had drawn. “The shape was much like that.”

This is the other binding?
he asked the draasin.

The other had been lost. And now it has been found.

What she didn’t say, and didn’t need to remind him, was that it had been found because of Tan. Had it not been for him, the temple, the lost binding, would have remained hidden.

“Where is Amia?” he asked, starting to stand and search for her. She might not know anything more about the temple, but he needed to know what she might have learned from Assan. What reason had he given her as First Mother to search for the temple?

“Maelen?” Elanne said, stepping toward him. “Did Garza not tell you?”

He frowned, realizing that he hadn’t seen Kota, either. Where was the hound? “Tell me what?”

“Your wife. She is gone.”

T
an paced
in front of the hearth, the draasin sitting on his shoulders. Maclin and Elanne had known that Amia was gone—not dead, at least not that he could tell, as he had first feared—but had not shared that with him. Most expected that he knew. And, had his connection to her been intact, he
should
have known.

Where is she?

I cannot tell that, Maelen.

Tan had hoped that the draasin and her connection to fire would have been able to help, but that she couldn’t reach Amia worried him.
Why would they take her? Spirit should protect her.

It is not her that they want.

With growing terror, he understood.

His child. Marin and that darkness wanted his child.

Tan took a few breaths to suppress the anger that coursed through him.

Kota?
he sent, at the same time reaching through the earth bond. He ignored Elanne, his mother, and Roine talking quietly behind him.

The earth elemental was not in the estate, but she was still in Par. Injured, but alive.

Tan hurried from the room, ignoring his mother’s pleas.

Outside, he took to the air and followed his connection to earth to reach Kota. She lay across rocks near the edge of Par, with nothing but the ocean spreading below. Her eyes were closed and her breathing sagged. Long, jagged wounds tore through her sides.

Tan landed and quickly used water to heal her as much as he could. Pulling on his connection to earth, he reached for her and felt her stabilize, but she was weak and would need time to recover.

Lifting her, he took her to the only other place that he thought she might be safe, and carried her to the cavern where Asgar had made a temporary den. He found Asgar and Sashari inside, tending to the hatchlings. When the hatchlings saw him, they bounded toward him and jumped, until realizing that he carried Kota. Then they backed away, snorting, with tails twitching in agitation.

She was attacked. They have the Daughter.

Asgar snorted and nudged Kota with his nose.
This one will survive, Maelen.

I know.

What of the Daughter?

I intend to recover her.

Do you know where she has gone?

Tan now knew where to find the second place of binding. If they had Amia, it was possible that they intended to bring her there, so that was where he intended to go.

You should not do this alone,
Asgar said.

I can’t risk others getting attacked. They were able to influence Zephra, and the students. I cannot allow the same to happen again.

But Maelen—

Tan shook his head.
Watch over her for me? She is strong, but she needs rest.

You can’t go alone. You are strong, Maelen, but even you need help. Think of what help you needed when you stopped the Bonded One.

I am thinking of that help, Asgar. If elementals come to help, or if other shapers come to help, they put themselves at risk with this darkness.

You have protected them. You have saved them.

Tan considered whether he could bring Elanne, or his mother, or even Roine, but worried that if he did, and if more of the entity escaped, they would be in danger.

And then there was what the draasin said to him. That this was a battle between darkness and the light. If what Honl told him were true, and that
he
was meant to be the light, or at least a part of it, then he was the only one who
could
face this.

You begin to see a different truth,
the draasin said.

Which is?

There are some battles you truly must face alone.

* * *

T
he shaping carried
him across the ocean on a bolt of lightning, streaking faster than thought, with nothing more than a sense of movement. The draasin remained on his shoulder, her elongating tail wrapping even more tightly around his neck to hold him. Somehow, she still managed to lick his face as they shaped.

Coming out of the shaping, he floated above the ground, looking down at the excavation. He had been the reason that the ground had moved, revealing the temple. A place of binding. Had it not been for him, Par would have remained the only known place of binding.

But was that true? Eventually Assan and Sani would have managed to move enough of the earth to expose the temple, but maybe had Tan not helped, he would have had the time to understand what he might be facing, and time to understand what Marin intended. Now… now he simply had to react.

Then, had he not helped, would he have been pushed? Always the question came, a balance between growth and change, and having time to relax and reflect. He rarely had such relaxing time, but maybe… if he could find a way to stop whatever this was, he might have a chance. And for his unborn child, was that not what he wanted?

From above, he saw the pale stone gleaming in the bright sunlight. The strange absence of elemental energy surrounded the temple, something that he realized was not present in Par. Either the binding was different or there was something else entirely. Could he be wrong? Could this
not
be a place of binding?

But the shape… that was the same. Much as Roine had described, the shape of the rune sprawled across the ground, spiraling four different arms away from the central temple, much like they spread around the tower in Par.

If he was right, Amia would be here. Somewhere.

Tan reached deep within himself, reaching for the connection to spirit that pooled within him. Through that connection, he pressed, searching for the bond that he shared with Amia, knowing that it was there, if only he could find it.

The sense came distantly, and faint, but there.

Tan poured himself into that connection, straining for her, but found himself blocked.

He snapped back and looked at the draasin.
She is there.

But she is not.

Tan nodded.
She is not. What does it mean?

It means that you must find another way.

Far below, the temple teemed with activity that he hadn’t seen when he’d been here before. There had been Assan, and Sani, and the other excavators from Xsa, but not the hundreds of people—all men, it seemed—working over the ground. And they strove to dig up the rest of the binding, freeing the Alast Temple from the ground.

What if they succeed?
he asked the draasin. Since the attack in Par, she had gained another level of understanding that she hadn’t possessed before. With the way that she absorbed knowledge from others, she was the only way that he would know how to find any answers. And still he wasn’t sure that together they would be enough. The draasin might claim immunity from an attack, and Tan hoped that his connections to the elements, and the bonds that flowed between them, would protect him, but would that be enough?

As he remained in the air, a storm cloud started to close in.

Tan ignored it at first. But it moved quickly, more quickly than any storm cloud should move.

Not a storm cloud. The darkness he faced.

How am I to defeat that?

We must replace the bindings, Maelen. I do not fully understand this, but what I can tells me that we cannot allow this free in the world.

But I have restored the binding in Par. This hasn’t failed.

I am not so certain of that.

Tan looked down at the surface again and realized what he had missed before. A long crack formed in the pale white stone, streaking up the sides and working around the face of the central part of the temple.

The door was opened.

He didn’t know if that mattered with the binding, but when he’d been here the last time, the door to the temple had been closed, and there had not been any obvious way for it to open. With the bond nearly failing in Par, he wouldn’t put it past Marin or whoever she worked with in Vatten to find a way to open the temple door.

Tan took a deep breath. This was the reason that he’d come.

And he plunged toward the ground on a shaping of lightning, letting it carry him down.

He stepped from the shaping to find dozens of men from Xsa. They immediately began to form two separate circles around him. The inner circle moved in one direction while the outer circle moved in the other. As they moved, Tan felt a strange pull, a separation, that reminded him of when the Utu Tonah had attempted to separate him from the elementals.

Tan didn’t pull on elemental shaping. Doing so risked drawing more elementals to this place and with the growing cloud of darkness overhead, he didn’t dare attempt that. Instead, he shaped, reaching through the bond he had discovered to each of the elements, and pulled on it, drawing strength forth.

The two circles began to move more quickly.

You must hurry, Maelen.

Tan drew on the four element bonds and tied them together, forging spirit. With this, he sent out a massive spirit shaping, wanting only to slow the Xsa shapers.

But they resisted the shaping, moving with more speed.

Tan attempted to take to the air on a shaping of wind, but found that he couldn’t.

What were the Xsa excavators doing? He had never seen something like this, almost as if they created a rune…

Maybe that was exactly what they did.

Tan charged at the nearest circle, dragging his feet as he did, unsheathing his sword in a single motion. He didn’t know if they were controlled or shaped by the darkness, but he needed to end whatever they attempted.

But he bounced off an invisible barrier.

Tan remained connected to the different bonds, pulling them together, drawing on as much shaped potential as he could alone, and twisted it in such a way that he would form a spirit connection.

He had touched spirit deeply many times since learning to shape, and there had been several times where he had a sense of time stopping, always when he had reached into enormous pools of spirit. With as connected as he was, with the draw that he pulled through the bonds, Tan expected that he
should
be able to have a similar effect.

Nothing happened.

It was as if whatever these men of Xsa did countered everything that he attempted.

Not a separation from the elements. He retained his connection to each of them and could shape them, but they nullified his ability to exert any influence beyond their pattern. In that way, it almost seemed as if they were forcing him into a void, one that reminded him of Alast Temple when he first discovered it.

Tan glanced over at the temple, which now rose above ground level. They had removed massive amounts of earth around the temple and created huge trenches which revealed the spiraling arms that comprised the rest of the binding pattern. This close, he could feel that something of that pattern had changed. He realized that even though he had come, he was too late.

He might not be able to shape outward, or up, but could he focus his attention downward? Would the earth allow him some sort of assistance?

The draasin squeezed her tail around his neck, as if knowing what he thought.

Tan shifted his focus to shaping below him. At first, the ground began to heave and to lift free, and he felt a surge of hope that he might be able to find a way out from this strange trap, but then he reached a different void, one that he should have recognized if not for the panic that had set in and the fear that he needed to find some way to freedom.

The same pale white stone that comprised the temple formed a sheet beneath him. And, as he focused on it, he realized that the sheet grew larger. Not only larger, but it began to curl upward.

His heart began to hammer.

This was a trap, but one that he never could have imagined. They would trap him in the same type of stone that created the Alast Temple. And if they managed to do that, his ability to shape, his connection to the elementals, and his newly discovered ability to reach the element bonds, would mean nothing. He would be stuck and would waste away while the rest of the binding failed.