Powers of the Six (5 page)

“I
am
sorry,” Emery said, his eyes pleading. “I promise. I won’t search you again.” He studied Nolan again before speaking. “How old are you?”

Nolan tensed.
Why does he want to know?
Nolan considered making up a random number, but then he changed his mind. The man was an Empathy user, for Brim’s sake. He’d know if Nolan lied. And honestly, what difference did it make? It wasn’t as if he were hiding his age. “Seventeen,” he finally answered.

Emery’s brows raised in surprise. “Seventeen? How very interesting.”

“Interesting?”

“Well,” he said. “You are seventeen and not in the ranks of the Rol’dan.”

The blood drained from Nolan’s face. By Brim, he knew. He’d expected as much, but to hear him say it aloud …

Nolan didn’t notice Emery’s hand supporting his elbow at first. When his head cleared, Nolan gasped and yanked his arm away.

“Are you all right?” Emery’s muscles trembled as he examined Nolan.

Nolan’s fears ebbed away. The man could barely stand, let alone attack him.

Emery staggered to the window, chains dragging, and grabbed the sill for support. “I felt your power last night,” he said weakly. “I must admit, it surprised me to discover you. I had no idea I would find one so powerful, right here in the manor. And your age makes it that much more intriguing.”

“Powerful?” Nolan asked, still dazed.

“Why, yes, Nolan. You see, when I use my power on someone, their Shay talks back to me. The stronger their power, the stronger it answers.” He smiled slowly. “Let’s just say your Shay has a very loud voice. And I am most curious to know which Shay it is.”

His comment slapped Nolan from his numbness. He stared. Emery didn’t know?

Emery pulled up his sleeve and examined a nasty gash. “You don’t have to tell me, but I’d hoped, very much, that it might be Healing.” He eyed Nolan expectantly. “You don’t have Healing, do you?”

Nolan didn’t answer him, but his silence apparently satisfied Emery.

“Hm,” Emery said, “what a shame.”

Nolan licked his dry lips. “I thought you’d tell.”

“Tell them of your power? Of course not, boy. Remember why I’m here: I’m a traitor because I
left
the army. I’m in the business of saving people from the Rol’dan, not throwing them into their arms. Your secret is safe with me.”

Relief flooded through him, and then a question smacked his mind. He
saved
people from the Rol’dan?

“I find those with powers before they take part in the trials,” Emery answered Nolan’s silent question. “Then I give them the chance at a different life.”

A different life?
Nolan’s mind lingered so much on the idea, it took him a moment to realize Emery had asked him a question. “Did you say something?”

Emery’s expression softened. “I said, I have a favor to ask of you.”

“I can’t free you,” Nolan answered. “There are guards—”

“Of course not. This is far more dangerous than helping me escape.”

Nolan gawked.
What could be more dangerous than that?

“Since you are the scribe for Alton Manor,” he said, “I assume you’re the record keeper for your sector of the Tournament of Awakening?”

Nolan nodded.

“I’d like you to watch the new recruits, the ones who come into their powers. Find who might want a different path than the Rol’dan.”

“And how am I supposed to do that? I can’t read minds.”

Emery smiled slightly. “So Empathy isn’t your gift?”

Nolan grimaced. “How am I supposed to know such a thing?” he asked, hoping to redirect the discussion away from his Shay.

“I believe you’re a good judge of character.”

Even if he figured out who might be interested in a different life—whatever that meant—how could Nolan keep them from the Rol’dan? Once someone came into a Shay, they were automatically placed into their ranks. Deserting the army marked them as a traitor. Emery was a perfect example of those who avoided the king’s calling. Offering someone an alternative life sounded like a guaranteed way to reveal himself and get killed. Most people
wanted
to be Rol’dan.

“Some of my friends will arrive in Alton soon,” Emery said. “I came to Alton to search for Shay users who had not yet come into powers. My friends are meeting me here for the results of my search. But of course, I have found none … apart from you.

“I’ve struggled this time, finding those with powers,” Emery said. “Something is happening that I can’t explain. I believe my own power is weakening somehow, as well as those of my friends. It takes all of my concentration to find new Shay users. I had thought perhaps I was just missing them, that it was just me. But we’ve noticed that the numbers of Rol’dan recruits have dwindled as well. If what we suspect is true, I believe that soon there will be no more Shay users in all of Adamah.”

Ridiculous! Powers don’t weaken.
But the more he thought about it, the more it made sense. A year before, Nolan could barely keep his power under control. He’d figured that he’d just gotten better at hiding. Or maybe it was both.

“Though I can’t prove it,” Emery continued, “I believe King Alcandor is responsible. His powers and abilities are like none other. I suspect he is harnessing our Shays, using them to increase his own.”

Emery squeezed the window ledge so hard his blood-smeared knuckles whitened. “It’s essential that we save these children before they are lost to the king’s army. Increasing our numbers also gives us a better chance of finding a solution to our fading powers. Do you understand our plight? Nolan, can you help us?”

He couldn’t answer. Emery was asking him to alter everything. His life was safe as a scribe. He should tell Emery to shove off, but something made him pause. Nolan was as much a prisoner in the manor as Emery.

“I can understand your hesitation,” Emery said. “It’s a serious crime I’m asking you to commit. Even if you refuse, I’d like for you to go with my friends. Our life isn’t safe, but neither is the one you’re attempting now. With my friends, at least you’ll no longer have to pretend.”

His jaw dropped.
Such a place exists?

The echo of footsteps approached. Nolan’s supplies lay strewn on the floor near Emery’s feet. Nolan scrambled to retrieve the book and quill. As he rose, Emery grabbed his arm and whispered, “What is your gift, friend?”

A guard entered and Emery quickly dropped his hold.

“General Trividar, sir?” The guard looked around. “Where’s the general?”

“He left,” Nolan lied. “Didn’t you see him pass?”

“I uh … Yes. Of course.” He cleared his throat. “Are you done then?”

“In a moment.” Nolan bent to retrieve the bottle of ink off the ground and locked eyes with Emery. In that brief moment, he made a decision.

He relaxed, letting a pulse of his Shay leak through his control. The blue light of Accuracy flickered in Nolan’s eyes, just long enough for Emery to see, and then he hid it away again. For the first time in his life, he’d shared his secret.

The guard led Nolan from the room and pulled the heavy door closed. He casually reached into a small pouch around his waist, digging into it with a confused expression. “Strange. Must’ve left it downstairs.”

“Left what?” Nolan asked.

“My key.” The guard grunted. “It’s not like the traitor can go anywhere with those chains, but still …”

“I’m sure it’ll turn up.” Nolan reinforced his words with his best reassuring smile and readjusted the pouch … which held the key.

Chapter Four

NOLAN BRUSHED HIS HAND over the battered red cover. Inside, the book listed the results of the Tournament of Awakening for the last hundred years. He opened it and thumbed back two years prior, the year of his own tournament, the year his life drastically changed. Nolan’s name was under the large list of people who’d failed. The list of those obtaining a power contained twenty names.

Nolan pulled his eyes from the book to the activities of the pub. It was mid-morning—well past breakfast and well before lunch. Every table was filled, and people hovered at the outskirts of the room, all waiting their turn to grab a chair.

A robust woman appeared at Nolan’s table. Her rosy cheeks crinkled in a pleasant smile, and a mane of salt-and-pepper hair framed her round face. “What can I do for ya?”

“Ale please.”

“Of course, love.” She wound her way through the crowd to the bar, chatting and laughing with several patrons on the way.

Nolan assumed she was Aunt Bonty, but he wasn’t sure. He’d never set foot in the woman’s famous pub before. When he arrived, the crowd nearly made him turn back around. However, the smell of freshly baked bread wafting from the open door—and the fact he still had an hour to kill before the tournament—finally lured him in. Aunt Bonty’s pub was one of the few places in Alton where everyone was welcomed. Clothing of all shades filled the room—segregated into their own sections, of course. Luckily for Nolan, working at the manor allowed him to sit wherever he wanted.

Nolan repositioned the book and flipped back to Kael’s tournament year. He was one of thirty-two discovered that year. The number of Rol’dan recruits increased the further back he looked. Thirty-eight. Then forty. Then sixty-five. The most recent tournament listed only nine names.

He stared at the page.

Why hadn’t he noticed? The numbers had radically dropped. How much longer until the Shay powers would disappear completely?

“You all right there, love?” Bonty stood at Nolan’s elbow, waiting patiently for a place to put the ale.

“Sorry.” He closed the book and stuffed it into his pack.

“Ah, not to worry.” She placed the mug on the table. “You meetin’ someone?”

“Um, no. Why?” He picked up the mug and took a drink. It tasted much better than he’d imagined.

Bonty smiled. “Just wondering. I thought she might be looking for you.” She pointed toward a young woman seated at the bar, patted his arm in a motherly fashion, and continued to the next table to drop off a bowl of savory smelling stew.

A girl, maybe a few years older than Nolan, sat straight on a stool. Her dark brown hair hung down her back, tied loosely with a strip of gray cloth. She was pretty. Not exotic like Mikayla, but still quite lovely. Wearing simple clothes—a light blue dress and no jewelry—she could easily fit in with the girls back home.

He took a prolonged drink and murmured a laugh.
Don’t be an idiot, Nolan.
He shouldn’t think of home—or admire pretty girls, for that matter.
The manor was his life. Today, he’d leave to record the proceedings at the tournament, like last year and every year to come. And when he returned, he’d hide in his gloomy room and die of old age as the scribe of Alton Manor. No trip home. No girls. No life. Just him, his ink, and his quill.

A boisterous laugh rebounded off the walls. A large, hairy man perched on a stool too small for him with his back to the pub’s far wall. His eyes sparkled. His beard hung long and matted. Everything about him was huge. If Nolan guessed, he would assume the man to be a Higherlander, the people from the other side of the mountain range. But that would be ridiculous; they didn’t usually leave their lands.

An energetic group of children, dressed in every shade of the districts, sat on the floor surrounding him, hanging on his every word.

“Nay!” the man said in answer to a child’s question. “I’ve never seen them. No living man has. But I have seen a man after the fact, after the dark beasts took his soul.” He leaned forward for effect. “Aye, you best listen to your mums about the night. Everything she’s said is true.”

The children leaned their heads together, whispering.

The Higherlander was quite a storyteller. Activities of the pub died as others hung on his words. Nolan reclined in his chair and stretched his legs to get comfortable.

“And the Demon Wars?” a girl asked.

“That, my lass, I do not know. I’ve heard a man who can tell those tales, so he says.”

“And the magic stones!” a boy asked. “Do you have the magic stones?”

The man stroked his long beard, smiling. “And what do you know about those?”

The boy looked around shyly. “My friend, Tommy, showed them to me. He said you gave him magic stones that keep the night beasts away. He said he got them from you yesterday.”

The man laughed so deeply it rumbled in his chest. “So that is why I have so many here to listen to my tales! Aye, laddie, I still have some.”

The children rose, pressing in closer. Nolan stretched to catch a peek.

“Now, remember, these here aren’t real,” the man said. “There are legends of real stones, hundreds of years ago. They say the light inside them can scare any darkness away. So don’t be wanderin’ out in the dark and getting yourselves killed. These here are only rocks, not true magic stones.”

The children didn’t seem to care if they were pretending. They chattered excitedly as he handed out small bundles. The brood scampered away with their new treasures, some running out the door and others joining adults at nearby tables. Conversations started up again. A boy at the table next to Nolan’s held out his bundle, showing it to his father. The man scowled, yanking it away.