Faith Of The Dragon Tamer (Book 2) (40 page)

Ren started, surprised by Zorc’s statement, and released the calm. His emotions washed over him in full force. They were random and uncontrollable. In the calm they had been controlled and predictable, almost purposeful. He suddenly felt alone and weak, unable to control his thoughts to one purpose. He began to reach for the calm when Zorc stopped him.

“Don’t go to the calm for the calm’s sake. It’s peaceful and powerful, but it will destroy you.” Zorc’s voice was low and grave. It shivered down Ren’s spine like a cold rain. Somehow Zorc had twisted his words with magic, breaking him from his desire to reenter the calm.

“How?” Ren asked.

“If you go to the calm for the calm’s sake you’ll eventually not see, or hear, or smell, or feel anything. You’ll just sit and feel nothing, sit and slowly die.” Zorc paused to make sure Ren understood. When Zorc found what he wanted in Ren’s eyes, his voice softened.

“I know how it feels. Not many wizards are able to feel the calm. Only a handful of us have ever reached it. We just aren’t powerful enough. When I did reach it I almost gave in and let my mind become washed away. Feeling no loneliness or pain or hurt is a wonderful thing, but I’ve seen what the calm can do. There’s a wizard in the fields of the Alcazar, body alive, mind dead. He’s called the Residuum Man. He isn’t human, animal, or plant. He rests cross-legged, moss and fern coating his body, limbs rooted to the earth, eyes staring blankly ahead, breath and pulse nonexistent. When he reached the calm nothing else mattered. He gave in to that peace, and that peace destroyed him.”

Zorc’s dark eyes studied him, waiting for the shock to spread over his face. Ren drew in a breath, still yearning for the calm, but now revolted by the seduction of its peace.

Zorc started toward the camp. Ren was surprised. It was only midmorning and there was still much he needed to learn.

“Wait, I’m not tired. Now that I can reach the calm you can teach me how to use it.”

Zorc grinned. “You have the calm, Ren.”

“Yes.”

“You know the pinnacle. You are the pinnacle. That’s all I can teach you.” Zorc turned away, muttering that he was half starved.

Ren watched Zorc walk away, unable to find the words. When they finally came, they exploded from him. “I don’t know anything about the Quy. What do you mean that’s all you can teach me?”

Zorc turned back to him, holding up a finger with a winsome expression on his face. “You’re a mage. I’m a wizard. Wizards can’t teach magi. Magi teach wizards.”

The others turned to listen, interested in the sudden change of conversation. Ren felt his frustration building. Zorc saw it as well. He crossed his arms, grin spreading.

“What do you want to know?” Zorc asked. “Do you want to know how to meet the Quy?”

Ren frowned. “No.”

“Do you want to know how to merge a body with a spirit? No, that can’t be,” Zorc said, crinkling up his face, “you already know how to do that. I know! You want to know how to light a wolf on fire, or cause a castle wall to crumble. No,” he said again, scratching his head in mock confusion, “you already did those things now, didn’t you?”

Ren was beginning to feel foolish, but he was unsure why. “But what about all the instructions in the books we found about how to use the Quy?”

“Instructions for wizards, Ren. Merely words that help wizards harness their emotions so they can create magic. Those words are a guide, a blueprint for those who do not have the calm.” Zorc held up a finger. “You do. What I could teach you about using the external elements, what I could teach you about using the internal elements of the Quy, what I could teach you about rules and guides would serve you no purpose. In fact it would clutter your mind and serve to bring you doubt when you’re instinctively reaching inside yourself to do what you must.

“The more recipes you have for magic the more those rules will clutter your mind when your instincts are needed. You’ve learned the first truth. Yes?”

The question took Ren off guard. He thought about the Druids and the closing. He thought about his faith in the Maker and his faith in himself to listen and give in to that power. Belief was a powerful thing. It could damn you or it could raise you. With belief anything was possible. He could only nod.

“Then you know how much danger and destruction doubt can cause. Doubt can destroy your conviction and clutter up your thoughts until you begin to believe what you need to accomplish is too unreachable to try. The small doubt will snowball and you’ll think of it over and over. You’ll fear it. You’ll run from it. One doubt can ruin every chance of happiness, can damn your hopes, can mar your dreams, can change your destiny, and can destroy your soul.

“But if I leave you to your inner strength, as all teachers should do with magi, you can build on your strength, intensify it, and become something far more than you can imagine. The first truth is the most powerful truth there is, others follow. But this truth and this truth alone can help you defeat the darkness, can lead you to the second truth.

“So don’t doubt yourself. I’ll be your guide. I’ll answer any questions you have. I’ll teach you the Code of the Alcazar. I’ll guide your through the Code of the Quy. I’ll encourage you to seek the Truths, for only with them can we grow stronger. But I won’t teach you how to use the Quy. It’s in here,” Zorc said, tapping Ren’s chest, “and that’s where it belongs.”

Zorc smiled at Ren’s frown. “Do you know why you’re the Chosen?”

Ren remembered the day he had asked Zorc’s impostor the same question. “Grauss said I was born on the equinox, under all three internal and external elements. The Quy said I only use her in love.”

Zorc’s grin broadened. “They are both correct and incorrect. Yes, you are the Chosen, and yes you were born on the equinox. Yes, you only use the Quy in love. But the synergy constellation was only a sign in the stars, it doesn’t make you the Chosen, and your use of the Quy is how all righteous people strive to use the Quy. The stars symbolize what you are. The way you use the Quy represents the side you’re on. But that isn’t why you’re the Chosen.”

Ren was unsure if he really wanted to hear what Zorc was about to reveal. Grauss’ explanation had been external forces forming who he was, and the way he used the Quy was a conscious decision, alive heartbeat by heartbeat and not inherently inside him. By the way Zorc spoke he was the Chosen because of something internal. Ren didn’t know if he wanted to believe that his naming was internal. The external explanation gave him a humble justification as to why he was the Chosen. Internal forces were something altogether different. They marked him as strong, as someone who formed himself into the mold of Chosen.

“You’re the Chosen because of one simple thing.”

Zorc paused. Ren would have given anything to halt Zorc’s words, but he couldn’t force his mouth to open or his arm to move to stop the wizard.

Zorc leaned forward. “I don’t know.”

Ren was too stunned to speak.

“Only you know,” Zorc said. “You tell me.”

Ren remained silent for a time. “But, I don’t know.”

“Yes, you do. Yes, you do. It’s in your soul, Ren. It’s the one thing that sets you apart from everyone else. It’s the one thing that makes you who you are. It’s something that cries to you every day. Take it and use it. Use it with all that you have. It has made you strong. It will make you stronger still. Barracus will try to take it from you. Don’t let him. If he takes it you’ll fail. No pinnacle will save you because you will have lost the essence of yourself, the one thing that makes you the Chosen.”

Marva studied a man beyond the glowing orange light as the others talked in angry voices. His pale eyes stared blankly ahead, his lips were open as if he had just taken a shallow breath, but he neither breathed nor moved. It was as if he had turned to stone.

When they had reached the castle the Collective hadn’t been standing on the interior wall as they had the outer. Instead they had found the Collective outside the wall, skirting its entire length as if guarding it from entry. They stood at attention, arms stretched to each side, linking hands.

They were linked so well their hands had melted together, forming an impenetrable circle, a circle not of hundreds but of one: one mind, and now one body. Marva shivered.

The magic they had conjured cast them in a pale orange glow that hovered a hand’s width from them and then abruptly stopped. Nothing Presario had tried could penetrate it. Instead of attacking, Ista had chosen a shield of protection.

Marva turned her attention to the conversation behind her.

“There has to be something we can do! Nothing is impenetrable,” Ramie said, trying to shroud his panic. “We haven’t thought through every contingency. A weakness has to exist!”

“There’s a weakness,” Presario said, “but we can’t reach it.”

Marva stepped forward, curious. Beside her, Renee lifted her head and looked at Presario with a twinge of hope.

“What do you mean?”

Presario nodded toward the circle of men. “Ista has formed a conglomerate weave. One of the men you see originated it. He is the weak link, the vulnerable link, but there are hundreds of the Collective forming this weave. We cannot with any certainty distinguish the weak link from any other. Hence we cannot focus our attack, and if we can’t focus our attack, we’ll be unable to penetrate the circle.”

Ramie turned to the circle, eyes conveying his panic. “So we just try each one until we find the link.”

Presario heaved a sigh and shook his head. The light of the fire played on his face, making his flesh appear to be melting once again. Marva barely took notice of Presario’s wounds. To her they were strangely beautiful.

“That would take years, centuries even. A conglomerate weave is acutely unique magic. Once you discover the link you have to discover its vulnerability. By this I mean there will be a slight marring, a slight characteristic of the link that’s contradictory.

“Take that one there.” Presario pointed to the man Marva had been studying. “He appears whole but there’s something peculiar about him. I’ve been examining him for a sun’s click and have just now identified his idiosyncrasy.”

Marva nodded. She had noticed an oddity as well. “One pupil is larger than the other.”

“Yes. That’s his weakness. If he was the link no magic directed at him would destroy him, no sword could penetrate the shield surrounding him, unless that sword hit the exact air pocket that led to his eye, his one vulnerability. All other areas of his body are now the conglomerate and unbreakable.

“That’s the power of a conglomerate weave. You have to ferret the link, espy the flaw, and hit the exact air pocket leading to that flaw. Even if you did the first two, the third would be virtually impossible. The weaver can link random air pockets to the flaw. The air pocket that finally touches the flaw in the eye need not necessarily be directly facing the eye. It could be anywhere near the body.

“And the weaver doesn’t just give a flaw to the link but to every person in the weave so the enemy will have to search each man to find his vulnerability and try to destroy him before approaching the next man. But to find the link, the vulnerability, and the air pocket …” Presario’s voice dwindled in the twilight. The crackling fire seemed too lively in the following silence.

Marva turned back to the glowing circle and stepped up to the next man, determined to find his vulnerability. The fury she carried boiled just beneath the surface. Behind her, she heard Ramie’s muffled cursing but ignored him. She had grown used to Ramie’s outbursts and paid about as much attention to them as a fly on the wall.

“You mentioned the weaver. Is the weaver the same as the link?”

Marva turned to Renee. She hadn’t given the weaver Presario mentioned a second thought. The queen may have discovered something. All eyes turned to Presario, eagerly awaiting his reply.

Presario shook his head. “No. Although there’s someone in the conglomerate who originates the weave, another, free of the conglomerate, must weave the magic.”

“Ista.” Ramie almost spat the word.

“I don’t think so,” Lazo said. The triplet stood a short distance from the fire, hands clasped behind his back. He had traded his black advisor’s robe for a rust-colored tunic and cream trousers. The clothes still looked out of place on the man, but the look in Lazo’s eyes left no doubt that his attire was the only feature he had sacrificed to the Mar.

“Ista wants to tap into the power of the Red Eye. She wouldn’t deplete her strength to form the conglomerate. She would use one of the Collective as the weaver. Besides, Ista is a sorceress, let us not forget. Though powerful, she would be unable to control the conglomerate at whim. She must plan for things well in advance. This was something she didn’t foresee. As I said, she ignored us until she saw we could use magic. She couldn’t have woven her emotions so quickly. A man, a strong one, is assisting her.”

Aaron’s brow furrowed. “But magic like this must take years of training. Could one of the Collective actually weave this? So soon?”

Lazo’s contrasting eyes flickered to Aaron. “No, but someone from her camp could, someone who has had years of training.”

“And if we could kill this weaver, would the conglomerate weave be broken?” The hope had returned to Ramie’s voice.

“Yes.”

Ramie grinned. “The tunnels.”

Lazo nodded again.

“I’ll summon some men.” Just as Ramie turned to shout orders, Lazo put a hand on his arm.

“My lord, we must send the women.”

Ramie’s eyes darted to Manda, who had remained silent throughout the exchange. Manda’s green eyes ignored the king and flickered to Marva and Renee. If Marva wasn’t mistaken, she saw a slight smile on Manda’s lips. She felt her own begin as well.

Heat rose to Ramie’s face. “I’ll hear of no such thing!”

“The Collective on the wall, my king, and the Collective surrounding the keep are all male. Ista doesn’t use women, and she pays little attention to them. Only a woman will be able to pass through the castle without notice. The women are the only chance we have.”

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