Fortress Of Fire (Book 4) (10 page)

“The First Mother could help find them,” Tan suggested.

“That… poses dangers I’m not willing to risk.”

“I don’t know that I can ask it of Amia, Roine. Given what she’s been through, she’s struggling with what it is that the Great Mother placed her here to do. If it’s not to help her people—”

“I haven’t had the chance to tell you, but the Aeta are making their way toward the kingdoms. I’ve sent word they will be welcomed. This
would
help her people.”

Tan wondered what that meant for the Aeta. What would change for them? “Give her time, Roine.”

Roine’s face twisted in a pained expression. “I hope so.”

Tan wished there might be something he could say to Amia, but she had to come around on her own. He turned away from him and looked at the map, thinking about how he would do what Roine asked. Where would they find allies? Chenir was separated from the kingdoms by a massive inlet of water. It was the reason most trade with Chenir came by sea. Could they find help there?

“What keeps Incendin from attacking Chenir? From the map, it’s not clear why Chenir hasn’t suffered the same fate as Doma.”

“Incendin technically shares a border, but the mountains lining the northern border between Chenir and Incendin are even more impassible than between Galen and Incendin. They had no need for a barrier to protect them. Their traders come to ports in Vatten, as ours go to Chenir. They are a peaceful folk.”

“And you think I should go to Chenir?”

Roine sighed. “Chenir doesn’t have shapers. Not like Doma. But there are rumors of shapers beyond the sea, past Incendin.”

“Why send me?” Tan asked. “Why not Zephra?”

“Honestly? Zephra can shape the wind, but you can travel as a warrior. That’s respected, even now.”

“You’ve barely shown me how to travel that way.”

“You’ve seen enough. Wind and fire, water for stability, and earth for strength. As your skills improve, you will manage the shaping fine.”

“That’s not the real reason you want me to go, though.”

Roine turned away. “Your mother really underestimates you. No. I want you to bring Amia with you. With her ability to sense spirit, she should be able to help. Find us allies.”

“Not force them,” Amia said, approaching slowly.

Roine fixed her with a hard stare. “No. We will not repeat the mistakes of the past.”

Amia looked from Roine and then to Tan, where her eyes lingered a moment. “Is this what you’ll do?”

Tan nodded carefully, not certain what Amia was getting at.

“You’ve told me what is happening in Incendin. I agree that you shouldn’t be involved. Not so long as he asks you to stay away.”

Roine smiled. “Thank you.”

“I don’t mean you,” Amia said. “So if it keeps Tan from Incendin as the draasin requests, I’ll help.”

M
aster Ferran stopped working
with the massive blocks of stone as Tan and Amia arrived at the university courtyard. Chunks of fallen rock stacked high, like some massive puzzle he worked. Sweat beaded his brow in spite of the cool day.

“You’re leaving?” he asked Tan as they approached.

Tan glanced at the pack he had slung over his back. At least this time, he’d be prepared. Most of the journeys he’d taken had left him with nothing more than a cloak and the clothes he carried. This time, he had a thick wool cloak for the cold Amia promised they’d find, the pack with a change of clothes, and his warrior sword. He might not feel entirely comfortable wielding a sword—he’d been an archer once although he no longer felt the need to carry a bow—but the warrior sword helped him shape more strongly, much like the artifact.

“Theondar asked of me,” Tan said.

“Then it must be done,” Ferran agreed. He wiped the sweat from his brow, smearing a layer of dirt and debris across his forehead. Then he glanced back at the remains of the university. “I thought you would have more time with me for training. We could use someone with your strength, you know. Even untrained, there is much you can do.”

“I would have liked more time to learn,” Tan admitted. Ferran had shown a genuine interest in helping him learn.

Ferran nodded slowly, strangely reminding Tan of the way golud felt as it rumbled beneath his feet. “Since learning of your abilities, I’ve tried speaking to golud, asking for help with my shapings, but I’ve heard nothing.”

“Maybe when I return, I can see if there’s anything I can do,” Tan suggested.

“And I will carve time to teach what I can,” Ferran said before nodding solemnly and crossing his fists over his chest before turning away and returning to his work shaping the rock away from the university.

Amia’s mouth twisted into a frown.

“What is it?” Tan asked.

“Probably nothing. I just never expected to see someone in the city make that greeting. It’s a sign of respect.” She turned to Tan and rested a hand on his shoulder. “The Aeta have long used it as greeting when meeting another of the family. Maybe Ferran saw it from the archivists.” She tapped the stones of the landing circle with one foot. “Are you certain you shouldn’t speak to Zephra again before we leave?”

Tan sighed. He hated leaving as he had, but would seeing her change anything? It would likely only make him more frustrated. She saw him as her child, as a boy to protect, no matter what she claimed. Even her attempt at helping him under the guise of Sarah had been intended to get him away from the city, to send him to the place of convergence where he could use the nymid to help Elle. That he’d instead gone to Incendin likely upset her as much as when he’d gone wandering through the mountains of Galen when he was younger. Was her attempt to teach him more of the same?

“I’ll speak to her when we get back,” he said.

Amia rested a hand on his arm, sending a calming shaping through him. He arched a brow at her. “It’s different with you,” she explained. “And you don’t even know how long we’ll be gone. You want to leave it like that with her?”

“I thought you two didn’t get along.”

“I can’t say we’re on the best of terms, but I think of what I’d say to my mother were I to get the chance. I won’t ever get that chance. The lisincend took it from me.”

Tan glanced over to the palace. Perhaps he
had
been a little harsh with his mother. She only wanted him safe. And her teaching of him had seemed genuine. “Maybe you’re right.” There was time to go back and find her before they left. Delaying only kept them from finding the allies Roine sought, but seeing as how Tan wasn’t even sure where to begin, it wouldn’t hurt to wait.

“Come,” Amia said, taking his hand and starting toward the palace.

Tan let himself be led. As they left the university courtyard, a gnawing sense came to him from someplace distant. It was like a pinprick of pain, deep in his mind.
Asboel?

It had been days since he’d felt the draasin. What had happened in that time?

Tan reached for his bonded elemental. Searing pain split his head. His eyesight flickered, growing dim. Colors swirled at the edges. Tan strained for the draasin, feared there wouldn’t be an answer.

The pain came again, this time like a hot knife cutting through his mind. He screamed and dropped to his knees.

The agony seemed to last an eternity. It overwhelmed him, overwhelmed his ability to push aside anything else. For countless moments, it was all he knew.

Then Amia touched his forehead. A cooling calm came over him, easing the pain.

He blinked away tears that had streamed from his eyes. Remnants of the pain were still there, but less than they had been before it struck him.

“Tan?” Ferran approached and looked from Tan to Amia with concern in his soft brown eyes. “You screamed and the ground trembled as you did.”

He hadn’t felt the ground trembling, but then, with the pain in his skull, he couldn’t feel much else. Even the touch of the wind on his cheek and the heat in the air was lessened.

“What is it, Tan?” Amia asked.

He shook his head. Asboel still hadn’t answered. Usually that wouldn’t concern him. The draasin remained a distant sense in his mind most of the time, coming to the surface when he wanted to speak to Tan or when Tan called for him. This time, there was no response. There was no sense of the draasin in his mind.

“The draasin,” he whispered to Amia. “I don’t sense him.” He took a step and stumbled.

Ferran slipped an arm around him for support. “Come with me.”

“I can’t. I need to find out—”

“You need rest,” he said.

Amia held his arm, pushing a constant shaping through him. “Whatever attacked you nearly knocked you out. You were screaming and the wind whistled. The air grew warm. And, as Master Ferran said, the ground trembled.”

All shapings. Had he done them without intending to? What did it mean if he had?

“Theondar,” Tan said. “Find him.”

He reached into his pocket and pulled out a summoning rune. He tried to shape it but failed. As he did, the pain in his head returned even stronger than before. The coin dropped to the stone with a soft clatter.

Amia scooped it up and closed her eyes. With a shaping Tan felt as a vague pulsing in his ears, the rune began to glow. “Where can we go?” she asked, looking around at the fallen university.

“The archives,” Tan said.

Ferran gave him a strange look and then lifted him easily, carrying him down the street with a shaping of earth.

T
an sat
at one of the tables in the upper archives. The lisincend had tried destroying the archives, but someone had been through here and righted all the furniture except the shelves. Books were stacked in most places, though strewn across the floor in others. The air had a musty odor mixed with the faint hint of burned paper.

He rested his head on his hands, leaning over the table. Pain pulsed behind his eyes. Amia touched his forehead again and the pressure eased.

“What is it that you’re doing?” he asked.

“Taking away your pain.”

“You can do that?”

“Not the actual pain,” she said. “Just what you sense of it. When the shaping weakens—which it will—you’ll begin feeling it again.”

“Can you tell what’s causing it?”

“As far as I can tell, nothing is causing it.”

The door to the archives opened and his mother flew in on a gust of air. She looked from Amia to Tan and stopped in front of the table. Power surged from her. Tan shouldn’t feel it so clearly, but somehow, he did.

Roine followed her into the archives, moving with a determined stride. He wore a worried look on his face that furrowed his brow and fixed Tan with a frown.

“What happened?” Zephra demanded.

“I don’t know. We were returning to the palace to find you when he collapsed,” Amia said.

His mother shot Amia an annoyed look. “Why would you return for me? Theondar sent you—”

“You knew?” Tan asked, looking up. “You’re not upset that he asked me to go?”

She shrugged. “It is harmless enough. It’s Incendin that I fear for you, Tannen, especially with what the draasin do. You’ve faced too much of Incendin. Let others do their part.”

“Zephra—” Roine said.

Tan lowered his head, staring at his hands. The pulsing behind his eyes started to return. He focused on it, needing to push it away. Whatever Amia did to ease the pain also separated him from his connection to the elementals. He
needed
that connection.

More than that, he needed to know what happened to Asboel. Why hadn’t the draasin answered him? He was bound to Asboel, meant to help protect him, even if he didn’t believe he needed protection. Had something gone wrong as he’d tried helping Enya? Or worse—had he attacked the Fire Fortress itself?

“That’s why Roine wanted me to go? Because you think it’s safe?” he asked as the pain lessened again.

“That’s not the reason, Tan,” Roine said.

“You’re sending the others, but did you really give me this ‘assignment’ to keep me away? Have I shown myself to be so weak that I need such help?”

Roine pulled a chair away from the table. He glanced at Ferran as he did. The earth Master stood along one of the shelves, studying it silently, no differently than he had stared when Zephra had admonished him. “I have a different responsibility now than I had before,” he started. “I told you how I need to look at more than my needs, but the needs of the kingdoms. Protecting you is a need of the kingdoms.”

Tan rubbed the sides of his head, trying to push the pain to someplace deep in his mind. “I think you’re inflating my importance.”

“I don’t think so. We haven’t had a warrior shaper in a generation, and then you appear. Not only able to shape all the elements, but able to do so with spirit, like the ancient warriors themselves. And beyond that, you can
speak
to the elementals. How much of an advantage does this give us? Even if we lose all of our shapers, we can’t afford to lose
you,
Tan. What you can do is irreplaceable.”

Tan stared from Roine to his mother. Roine nodded slowly, and Tan began to think that Roine hadn’t shared everything about his plan for Tan with Zephra.

“What is this? What happened to you?” his mother asked. “When Ferran sent word, he said there was an uncontrolled shaping.”

“That’s just it. I don’t know.” The pain seemed to be easing. “I’m having some sort of pain tied to the draasin.”

“Are you certain it’s the draasin?” she asked.

With a deep breath, he pushed away the sense of the pain as he so often did when Asboel tore through his mind. The effort left him feeling tired, but the agony he’d experienced receded, as if pushing away his sense of Asboel pushed away the pain. He listened for the other elementals for a moment, searching to see if he could still reach them. Ara fluttered nearby, but so did ashi. Now that he’d used the other wind elemental, he could identify the difference.

“I’m certain,” said.

Amia studied him and then rested her hand on his forehead. Her shaping built and washed over him. “What did you do? It’s changed.”

“It started when I reached for—” he caught himself before revealing Asboel’s name “—the draasin. I felt something in the back of my mind, but wasn’t sure what it was. So I tried reaching to him. When I did, that’s when the pain started. It’s better now.”

“You closed him away from you,” Amia noted.

His mother frowned. “You can do that?”

“I’ve had to before, otherwise he would destroy my mind. The draasin are simply too powerful. When he speaks to me, if I had no way of pushing him away, I think my mind would be torn apart.”

He needed to find Asboel. Whatever had happened was because the draasin was in trouble. That meant something had happened during their attack on the lisincend. Tan felt certain of it. “I need to find him.”

“That wasn’t what we discussed,” Roine said.

Tan glared at him. “You would have me leave an injured friend?” He shifted his attention to his mother. “And you? You know what it’s like to lose such a connection. You think I should ignore what I feel?”

“It is too dangerous, Tannen,” she said. “You’re talking about risking yourself for an elemental power who—”

“Who has done nothing but help every time I asked,” Tan said. “And I won’t do anything but help if he needs. Roine said the kingdoms need allies. The draasin
are
our allies. If we let anything happen to them, Incendin will already have won.”

He stood, shaking off Amia, who was trying to hold him down, and ignoring the hard stares coming from his mother. Master Ferran watched him silently, simply leaning against the massive stone support. His mother looked from Tan to Amia before turning away, her eyes giving away the irritation she felt. Tan took that as his cue to leave.

He stepped into the street, pausing long enough to get a sense of the other elementals. Asboel was a distance sense of pain in his mind. Were Tan to draw him forward, his mind would explode with pain once again. Ara swirled around his mother, drawn to her in a way he would never be able to replicate. Golud rested beneath his boots, filling the stones of the city. Mixed with golud was the nymid, mingling earth and water, the two building the city’s bedrock stronger than either would have managed alone.

He reached the university and pulled Amia toward him. She waited, arm linked in his. Roine might have taught him how to shape and travel like a warrior, but Tan had never attempted it. Now, with Asboel in danger, was not the time.

There was another way for him to travel, if only it would respond. He reached for ara, asking for the wind to aid his shaping.

“This is foolish, Tannen,” his mother said. “Stay and learn. The elemental will—”

“Will what? You think I should let him die?”

“Please…” she said.

“I will not lose him,” Tan said, but the wind elemental didn’t answer.

A satisfied smile came to his mother’s face. The translucent face of her elemental slipped around her as if hiding from Tan. “I will not help you in this.”