The Bonded: The Allseer Trilogy Book I (29 page)

“Kirheen, help me!”

The metallic smell of blood filled her nose as she got closer to Tomias. He rose to his feet as she approached and slowly began to limp away. “Wait, Tomias! Let me help you,” she called but he kept walking, leaving a trail of bloody foot prints in his wake. “Damn it.”

She raced after him, frantically trying to catch up. No matter how fast she ran, he always seemed to be just a few steps ahead. He slipped through a door up ahead, leaving a bright red handprint on the glowing surface. She realized that they stood at the Temple of Trials and her brain reeled. Why was she there, standing by herself?

The thought slipped away as quick as it came, breaking into a fragmented after thought like a crushed piece of glass. She followed into the temple. The center of the room was heavily shadowed, a great behemoth stretching the length of the room, clawing its way towards her. It was a great contrast to the bright sunlight bursting through the windows on either side of the room. At the deepest point of shadow, a man sat. Hawkish eyes watched her enter, regarding her with disdain. 

Nyson.

To either side of him stood a pair of familiar faces. Tomias looked up as she entered, his eyes filled with pain. His face was a patchwork of purple and yellow bruises. The corner of his lip was bloody and one eye looked painfully swollen. Fenir kept his eyes to the ground. He looked better off than his twin, but his gaze never wandered from the floor.

There was a thought wriggling in her brain, twisting and churning just below the surface. The Tomias she’d followed into the room was nowhere to be seen. He was beaten, surely, but the dying man she’d seen lying in the road didn’t exist. He’d never existed to begin with. She nearly stopped breathing when the realization hit her.

“You led me here,” Kirheen said, glaring up at Nyson as he sat safe on his perch.

“It was easy enough,” he said smugly, barely moving. “You may be strong, girl, but you’re still just a pup. Your powers have only just developed. Imagine what they could be, given time and proper training.” His words dripped with seduction, as if he were offering her all the secrets the world had to offer. It was disgusting.

She snorted, crossing her arms over her chest. “Yeah, thanks, but I think I’ve had it with you and your powers.”

Nyson huffed, leaning forward so his elbows rested on his knees. “Did you see the world outside, Kirheen? Did you get a taste of the barbarism that happens to our kind, what happens simply because we exist?”

Her mind wandered back to those swinging bodies, swaying in the wind, the creak of the rope around their necks. A bloody club and a wicked smile. A girl broken simply for being what she was. She shook the thought away, trying to remain focused on the man before her. She cast a nervous glance at the twins she’d come to rescue. They stood motionless, almost as if they had gone through the unbinding. But there was a still a light in their eyes, something still remained of them.

“I did see. It was terrible. I won’t deny that, but I’ve also seen the same barbarism from you. I saw the village, Nyson. I saw all those people you control. The people on the outside, they don’t deserve the treatment they get, but neither do those children that trusted you, that grew up thinking you kept us safe! All this time we thought you were keeping us safe from the Darkness when we should have been kept safe from…from you!”

“Such misguided passion,” Nyson cooed with an amused grin. “The Darkness was a necessary lie and one designed specifically to keep you safe. You think you could survive outside these walls? Do you believe any of your fellow Bonded could? We are murdered, burned, tortured for what we are. And yet here, we’ve stayed safe. We’ve been free to practice our powers, just as the Allseer meant for us to.”

Kirheen shook with anger. “Then why the lies? Why unbind all these people, my friends?!”

“Sooner or later, human nature takes over. Curiosity becomes a damning thing that creates nothing but pain. All these powers we have, everything I have strived to create would be destroyed because of people like you, people who believe freedom is more important than reclaiming our place in the world. The worshippers of Zekar would have us wiped from the history books, to pretend we never existed and they’d do it under the guise of their own self-proclaimed righteousness. We could change that, Kirheen. We could infiltrate them, corrupt them from the inside and watch them fall. We could make a world that is better for our kind, a place that is safe and then we’d all be free.”

There was truth to his words, Kirheen knew that. The situation beyond Sanctuary was entirely unstable. She’d seen it with her own eyes. People like her were dying because they had these powers. It was a situation that would inevitably boil over and it needed to be stopped before it got to that point. Nyson had a plan, a desire for conquest. He’d remedy the situation at the cost of countless lives, at the cost of provoking those without powers to hate and fear them more than they already did.

The man truly was insane, so bent on power and vengeance that he couldn’t see the very damage he caused around him. “You already tried to create that world and look where we are. You’ve raised us as nothing but pawns, matching us together for power. You stripped us of our childhood; of any choice we ever had all so you could start a war. You need to be stopped!”

Nyson’s face grew dark, his features a rippling pool of malice. The calm façade was cracking. “A war we could have won. If you had all stood behind me, if you’d all have stayed loyal to my cause, you would have had your precious freedom long ago. My brother corrupted this place long ago, corrupted it with a useless desire to have answers. And now you do the same. You’re senseless actions have caused nothing but death and despair for your fellow Bonded. Their blood is on your hands. And now you’ve come back to act the hero. They’ll spit on your girl, spit on you for the suffering you’ve created.”

“None of this would have happened if it weren’t for you. It’s true, I pushed over your precious tower of lies and it has caused terrible things to happen to people I care about, but I came back to save them and I intend to do just that! Unlike you, I will right my wrongs. I will save them from your corruption.”

“A shame there is so little left to save,” he said, rising from his chair and stretching to his full height. His black robes blended with the shadows, making him look large and ominous. “Did you know, while unbinding makes a person fully under my control, it also strips them significantly of their powers. I can control only a fraction of the ability they possessed when they were whole. But if you take control of a person when there mind is whole,” he said with a flourish of his hand. Fenir and Tomias raised their heads in unison. “…you get the full extent of their abilities and power. It is more taxing, certainly, but infinitely more enjoyable. They are fully aware of what they are doing, but incapable of stopping their actions. Tell me, Kirheen. What would be more painful for you?”

The twins turned towards each other, each pulling a dagger from the sash around their waist. They took exaggerated steps towards each other, looking like oversized dolls, their movements awkward and strained. They stopped within arm’s reach, daggers held at their side.

“Perhaps them hurting each other?”

It took a moment for the words to sink in. It wasn’t until they both raised their daggers high that she felt her blood go cold. “NO!”

They struck with their daggers at the same time, slicing each other vertically down the chest with barely a flinch. Blood followed, seeping from their wound. It made Kirheen sick and she squeezed her eyes shut, trying to block out the sight.
This is an illusion. It has to be an illusion.

“This isn’t real. Allseer tell me this isn’t real.” She forced herself to use her power, to strike at Nyson with all she had. She felt the power leave her, felt it driving through the air between them and then it was gone, like someone flicking a switch in her head. She’d felt it before, a mental wall that wasn’t of her design. She tried to move her hand and realized with sudden terror that she couldn’t move at all. Nyson had her under his control, at least partially. When she opened her mouth to speak, she found herself able to. Perhaps he wanted to be able to hear her scream. “Damn it, Nyson. Stop this. This is insane! What are you trying to prove?”

“This is power, Kirheen. This is what our kind could do, this is what we could be. We could control the world, a new world just for our kind.”

“You can’t possibly want that. You can’t.”

“Perhaps a further demonstration will change your mind. It would really be a shame if your act of heroics ended in their deaths, wouldn’t it? Watching them cut each other to pieces must be terrible to see, but you’ve yet to feel true terror. Terror lies in betrayal, of having those you love turn against you.”

“Nyson please, stop this!”

A flick of his hand and the twins turned towards her, daggers dripping crimson onto the floor. They marched towards her, brown eyes haunted.
Allseer, they know
.
They know and they can’t stop
. It pained her to realize that all her training, all she’d strived for was useless to her now. She pushed against her bonds, trying desperately to flee but it was pointless. There was nothing she could do. It was as if someone had glued her legs to the floor.

Her eyes were filling with tears, her jaw clenched tightly together as she watched them approach, step by step. Walking death.

“Are you afraid, Kirheen?”

“Stop this, please,” she pleaded but Nyson ignored her. She forced her way into her own mind but found that familiar space tainted; a hazy dream filled with vague shapes she couldn’t comprehend. She tried to branch out her power to Tomias but like her attack on Nyson, her power fizzled out, losing life in the space between them.

“Tomias, listen to me. Look at what you’re doing. You need to stop! Tomias, please!”

And he did stop. His feet slowed beneath him, his face contorting with pain as he fought against the power that held him. “I…can’t…” It only halted his advance for a second before he was moving towards her, a white ghost carrying death in his hands. Fenir was only feet away from her, his fingers clenched tight around the hilt of his dagger. He raised the dagger high above his head, ready to strike.

I’ve been such a fool. Trying to stand against Nyson had been a hopeless task, a death wish. She’d wanted to save her friends and instead she’d gotten them trapped in a terrible nightmare. They would be forced to watch themselves cut her down, would feel her sticky blood on their skin. They’d be lost to her forever. She’d never have another moment with them. That gentle laugh from Tomias, the rare warmth in his twins eyes… All lost.

There was a swooshing noise in front of her face, a parting of the air as the dagger descended. Pain burst to life across her cheek, the cold steel biting into her flesh with intensity she hadn’t expected. She felt the control over her body release and she stumbled back, raising a hand to her face. When she pulled her hand away, it was slick with blood.

Terror; pure and primal.  Nyson was leaving her just enough control to fight back, to struggle against the death that was sure to come. He wanted to watch her fight for her life, wanted to see her fight against the inevitable. He meant to break her.

Tomias had fallen further behind, his hands shaking violently as he fought against his own body. His brow was covered in sweat, his eyes wild. A low growl escaped his throat, giving voice to his struggle.

Fenir launched forward, the dagger cutting through her robe and slicing across her left ribcage. It was a shallow wound. He was toying with her. Nyson meant to drag out her torture, to see her die screaming. The pain on her cheek was a burning flame, the smell of blood in the air making her nauseous.

Fenir stood over her like a wild cat, his teeth bared. Kirheen saw the dagger sweep towards her again and out of instinct she raised her right arm. The blade bit deep into her forearm at an angle, slicing through skin and muscle as if she were made of cloth. She expected more pain but her body was pumping full of adrenaline. It was a surreal feeling watching him wrench the dagger away. All she could feel was the hammering of her heart, sheer animal terror vibrating in her chest.

The blow had forced her to the ground and she scrambled back away from Fenir. She collided with the wall behind her and huddled against it, trying to make herself as small as possible. Strong fingers pushed past her shoulder, forcing her hair aside. Those same fingers found her neck and with anger she didn’t know they possessed, she was lifted to her feet and pinned to the wall, a butterfly pinned to a board.

He was squeezing the air out of her and a mesh of black and white spots flickered in her vision like insects. She could see his cinnamon colored eyes swimming in her sight, saw the despair hidden there. The dagger slid forward and this time she felt the sickening slip of the blade as it drove through her right side. She thought briefly how lucky she’d be if it missed her innards when the blade was driven forward again, this time aimed at her heart.
Forgive me

Kirheen squeezed her eyes shut, waiting for the attack that would spell her doom. A scream from behind Fenir forced her to open them again and she saw a flash of Tomias, faced crazed as he ran forward with his dagger raised. The blade connected with flesh, driving through his brothers neck with enough force to drive his own blade off course. What should have driven straight through her heart collided with the wall behind her as she slipped from his grip and landed on the ground. Her wounds came alive as if she’d suddenly been doused in alcohol.