The Exalting

by Dan Allen

  Forget it. Thinking about her plan would be her undoing if the enchanter were close enough to pick up on her intent.

  The slope lessened near the summit. Dana was almost there. She slowed as she neared the top, clearing her mind of every thought. She couldn’t let the enchanter sense any emotions when she changed her tactic. She walked in a daze away from the road crosscutting the top of the steep ravine, headed away from where an ambush could be waiting on the road to Shoul Falls.

  Blanking her mind, Dana squeezed between two boulders and up a thin chute between two granite outcroppings. The echoes in her mind faded. The enchanter had either lost her, lost interest, or with luck, assumed she had finished the climb and was in the hands of whoever was waiting at the top. But she couldn’t wait here, or she would eventually be discovered. She had to lose them, and the only way was up the cliff face.

  Dana wedged her body into the narrow cleft in the rocks. She chimney-climbed up the crack in the rock, with one foot against the far side and her back and the toe of her other foot countering. She kept wedging and worming her way higher in the crack until the gap was too wide and she was forced to place both feet behind, hard, and both hands in front. She looked down.

  Her stomach twisted.

  Dana’s cut hands burned as she slid them along the rock. The next hold was a big one but too far to bridge. She would have to jump.

  Dana took a deep breath. She pushed off the wall and then thrust with both legs, leaping out.

  Her fingers dug into the cupped hold as her body jerked downward.

  Dana pulled up desperately, flexing her biceps to drag her body up the rock. Her arms trembled. For three seconds, she held herself on the rock. Then her fingers, slick with sweat, lost their grip.

  She fell.

  Dana’s vision filled with the open sky as her hands reached uselessly for the rock that had slipped out of her grip.

  “Gotcha.”

  A hand flashed out over the edge of the cliff, seizing Dana’s wrist. She jerked to free herself, but the strong arm lifted her upward.

  “It’s okay. It’s okay—quiet now.”

  As Dana’s feet found purchase on the top of the outcropping hidden behind the thick boughs of juniper, she looked up into the eyes of a dark-skinned young man. He wore a long staff strapped to his back, and his hair was tied in tight braids along the sides of his head. The white sclera of his eyes around his sable irises had a silvery sheen.

  A blood-sworn.

  “I heard your scream. Come on. This way.”

  He pulled her toward another chute, this one shaded by an even larger cliff.

  “Move.” He tugged on her arm. “There’s a gang of armed men at the top of that hill. Someone really doesn’t want you to reach the sanctum.”

  Dana wished to ask the young man who he was and why he was helping her, but she had barely strength to control her limbs as he led her into the tight vee in the rock.

  “You first.”

  She began to climb. The chute ran with a trickle of water. Dana hoped it wasn’t tainted by sayathi, or her bleeding hands would be her death.

  Her foot slipped on the loose rock, but the young man’s hand clamped her calf and pushed her foot back underneath her.

  “Quickly,” he said. “By now they’ll know you turned uphill. We don’t want to get caught in a place like this.”

  Dana gave the young man a confused look but scrambled forward, the sliding rocks moving her back a half step for every one she took.

  With several boosts from behind, Dana finally reached the point where the chute widened and flatted onto a terrace on the mountainside that sloped uphill into a dense pine copse. The trees led around a curve in the mountain, and Dana had a brief hope that perhaps it might lead to safety.

  As she fell to her knees and caught her breath, Dana looked up at her rescuer. “Thank you.”

  “What’s your name?” he asked.

  “I’m Dana.” She had rarely been more eager to make an introduction.

  The young man was only an inch or two taller than her. His silvery eyes with coal-black irises shone with interest. From the triangular shapes of his calves, visible under the knee-length pants he wore, to his trim stomach and the square look of his jaw, he looked the match for any creature of the wild. With the dark skin, he was obviously of West Aesican descent, from across the divide. Perhaps Shoul Falls was a city of mixed heritage—unlike Norr, a more isolated city peopled by primarily pure North Aesicans.

  To Dana he was pure strength. He wasn’t muscle-bound like the bargemen she had traveled with. He was trim, but his eyes shone with a kind of strength she had never seen before, a look of deep conviction.

  “Who . . . who are you?” Dana asked breathlessly.

  “I’m Ryke, high acolyte of the sanctum of Shoul Falls.” He rehearsed his name and rank without the slightest hint of pride at the statement. His eyes and interest were fixed on her alone, her safety.

  High acolyte. Dana supposed that was just below a full kazen. “What are you doing here?”

  “I was told to watch for new arrivals. I wasn’t actually expecting . . . well . . . you.”

  Dana gave a half smile. “What’s so unexpected?”

  Ryke just smiled. Then he knelt in front of Dana. “You’re in some kind of trouble, aren’t you?”

  Dana forced herself to nod.

  “And you’re trying to find the sanctum?” His voice seemed almost hopeful.

  Dana had no idea whether it was a good idea to say yes, or not. But she realized there wasn’t any sense in lying, especially if he was going to help if he thought she was headed there. “Yes, the sanctum.”

  “Well, you’re a lot older that most new acolytes. But whether or not they make you the next ka, it takes a brave soul to give up their will and choose a life of service,” Ryke said. “It says a lot about you.”

  “Um, thanks.”

  A life of service?

  What am I getting myself into?

  Ryke gave her another of his confident smiles. There was real interest there, interest undoubtedly mirrored in her own curiosity.

  “We’d better get to the sanctum fast. By now that group of foreigners at the top of the ridge must have realized you left the road.” Ryke pulled her to her feet.

  A twig snapped. The sound came from the dense trees at the edge of the clearing. Then another branch cracked under foot.

  If it was an animal, Dana would have sensed it. “It’s them.”

  Ryke loosened a draw string and drew his staff from its sling on his back. “I think we’re about to have trouble.”

  Dana winced. He hadn’t just saved her life. By getting involved, her problems were now his. “Can’t we just—”

  The sounds of footsteps and leaves rustling grew until Dana could tell that the sounds were coming from not one but many feet.

  She got to her feet.

  Ryke stepped in front of her and swung his staff to one side. He took a wide stance, facing the dense pine trees. “I can protect you. Just try not to get in my way. I move quickly.”

  “What are you—”

  A crossbow bolt launched from the trees.

  Dana barely had time to register the metal spike headed for her chest before Ryke’s swinging staff knocked it right out of the air.

  The bolt slammed into the mossy ground in front of her feet, and Dana let out a scream of pure terror. Already on edge after her near-death experience on the cliff, she lost her composure completely.

  Two more bolts zinged out of the trees. Dana cringed as Ryke sidestepped one headed for him and flicked the other so that it turned halfway in the air and slapped flat against Dana’s thigh.

  In panic, Dana held up her forearms in front of her face, as if they would do anything to stop the next razor-sharp quarrel. Panic grew within her, overwhelming her senses. After all she had been through, she was cornered. Backed up against the edge of a cliff, there was no escape.

  “Please, no. Please—” Dana begg
ed as motion in the trees revealed the presence of even more enemies.

  Two shots came at once, both headed for Dana. Ryke whirled his staff in front of him in a blur. One bolt slammed into the ground, and the other was knocked high in the air and over the edge of the cliff.

  “We can do this until you run out of bolts,” Ryke called out to the attackers hiding in the trees. He turned his head enough for Dana to see his white teeth gleaming in a smile. A feeling of strength grew in the space around her frozen heart.

  Eight men emerged from the wood. They crept forward, fanning out to blocking all possible escapes. All but one of them drew an immaculately crafted blade that likely cost far more than Dana could ever have spent if she tried.

  “Those are Torsican blades,” Ryke said under his breath, his voice unwavering and coursing with righteous indignation. Then he called out to the men, “You have trespassed dedicated ground. I won’t ask you again. Leave now. The girl is under the protection of the sanctum of Shoul Falls.”

  “Why?” sneered one of the men. “Hand her over. We’ll make you a rich man.”

  “I’m sworn to poverty.”

  One of the attackers raised a gloved hand and pointed at Ryke. “You have no idea who you are messing with.”

  But Dana did. And now they were going to kill Ryke.

  At short enough range, he wouldn’t have enough time to block their arrows.

  He needed her help, or they would both die.

  I have to do something.

  While several of the Torsicans men worked to reload and hastily rewind their crossbows, Dana reached out, thrusting herself into the void that bled feelings and thoughts and instincts. But all their tramping about had scared off most of the creatures in the area with any killing power.

  No. There were always creatures in the forest that thirsted for the blood of Xahnans.

  Come. Drink. There is enough for all!

  A horde of fist-sized bloodsucking nightfeeders winged out of the trees. It was nearly time for the dusk hunters to rise anyway. The insects latched onto necks, faces, and hands. First dozens, then hundreds. The air clouded with beating wings.

  The men tried in vain to hold their weapons steady as the frantic insects, driven by Dana’s bloodlust, bit without even numbing the skin first.

  In the distraction, Ryke lunged forward and swung his staff into the side of a Torsican’s head. The staff rebounded in the opposite direction and slammed into the back of another, who knocked a third from the edge of the cliff with a scream of terror. The staff recoiled with even more speed, swinging back to sweep the legs out from under one of the soldiers sworn to Vetas-ka. His head knocked into the first soldier’s, which had just bounced limply off the turf.

  Dana gasped as two more guards met blunt force trauma in less than a second. It almost seemed too easy.

  Why are there no kazen?

  Dana’s eyes turned to the man who had not drawn a sword. He pulled his hand out of a pouch at his waist and flung a handful of shiny dust in Ryke’s direction.

  “Ryke, look out!” Dana screamed as the fine dust spread out behind him.

  The shadow-skinned acolyte dropped to the ground.

  The cloud of fine dust exploded in a brilliant white fireball.

  An alchemist? Dana thought. No. The dust was simply a fine metal powder he had willed into combustion. He was a warlock like Omren, only with the ability to channel heat energy, rather than physical force.

  “Get the druid!” the kazen barked.

  Dana whirled to see a Torsican charging at her.

  But her nightfeeders were faster. One tried to cram itself up his nose. Another two jabbed at his eyes. Dana stepped aside and kicked at the blinded man. Her foot connected with his back leg, sending his foot behind his calf. Tripping on his own leg, the man tumbled down the steep embankment, screaming.

  Dana turned to see the kazen warlock, with another fistful of metal powder, facing off against Ryke.

  He threw. Ryke lunged with his staff. The cloud of particles enveloped Ryke. Her ears registered a sharp crack.

  But the powder had not ignited. It was the sound of Ryke’s staff striking the warlock’s skull. He dropped to the ground. The Vetas-kazen was either out cold or dead.

  “That was close,” Dana gasped.

  “What was close?” Ryke said as he brushed the dusting of shiny metal shavings off his shoulders.

  “The metal powder. It was going to—”

  “Not even. Now let’s move. They may have backup on the way—and thanks for the distraction. That was magnificent. How many nightfeeders can you control at once?” Ryke started up the hill.

  “A lot. I guess.” Dana bolted after the young man, letting the nightfeeders have their fill with the unconscious Torsicans.

  She followed Ryke, keeping as close as she could, her arm brushing against his. She had been terrorized for hours, and having someone she could trust by her side was an indescribably sweet elixir.

  He was obviously from the sanctum, so he was an adept, too.

  Of course—the staff.

  “You’re a warlock,” Dana guessed. “You willed that staff to move faster.” She huffed for breath, pine boughs whipping at her face and legs. “You probably use the staff because you can keep hold of it the whole time so it’s easier to pass will into.”

  “My will serves the good purpose,” he said simply.

  As the slope steepened again, Ryke took Dana by the hand, guiding her through trees and over rocks she could barely discern in the long evening shadows. He seemed to know every turn. “I don’t think I’ve seen you before. You are from Shoul Falls, aren’t you?”

  Dana sucked air in through her teeth. “Uh . . . originally.” It was a good half-truth. Her grandfather and grandmother were from Shoul Falls. Her mother was born shortly after they left, though her father was Norrian. So, in a way, she had originated from Shoul Falls.

  “You must be really beat. I almost thought you were a drale.”

  “I’ve been called worse,” Dana said in another attempt to avoid the truth.

  Ryke led her through a thicket of thorned tarberry bushes and along a cliff wall to a point where a seam in the rock lead upward at an angle, forming a small ledge.

  “You handled yourself pretty well back there,” Ryke said. “We made a good team.”

  Dana met his sable eyes. She smiled. “Thanks.” She didn’t want to think about the fighting. She just wanted to be somewhere safe.

  She followed Ryke up the thin walkway and rounded a corner. “Where—”

  Ryke’s hand pulled her sideways into a hidden cave.

  “You wonder why folks have a hard time finding the sanctum?” Ryke said with a smile. His white teeth and silvery eyes gleamed in the darkness.

  “We made it,” Dana gasped. The room was dark, but there was no chance her pursuers could find her now.

  No more hiding. No more running.

  I’m safe.

  Tears welled in her eyes, and Dana leaned against the rock wall as a sob broke from her trembling lips. She brought a hand to her chest shaking from the terror of what had just happened. The other touched the growing bruise on her thigh, still unable to believe the steel arrow had not pierced her.

  “Oh, now you’re going to cry. You know, I don’t do that sort of—”

  Dana dissolved into mess of tears.

  Ryke put a hand awkwardly on her shoulder. “If you’re still worried, they won’t find us in here. Sayathi run in the cave water. It masks us from any enchanters.”

  Dana reached out her arms and closed them around Ryke’s neck, hugging him, holding on to the one thing she could rely on. Her breath came in a shaky wheeze. “Don’t let me go. Please.”

  “Like this?” Slowly Ryke’s arms closed around her, wrapping her in what felt like an embrace of pure strength, as if she were wrapped in armor. For several minutes she held him close, pulling her body against his, willing the terror of the flight across the forest, through the foothills, a
nd into the mountain canyons to pass out of her.

  But as it left, Dana was left with nothing else but the warmth of Ryke’s embrace.

  “You saved my life.” Dana put her hands on the sides of his face and smiled up into his eyes.

  Ryke flinched slightly. Her face was only inches from his. “Only about seven times.”

  “I owe you my thanks.” Dana reached one hand around the back of his neck, pushed up on her toes, and kissed his cheek. “That’s one.”

  A kiss of thanks was standard in Aesica. Her mother had kissed a delivery man who brought her a new brass kettle and always any neighbor who brought over a baked dish. Dana had kissed the two friendly bargemen.

  This felt incredibly different.

  Ryke might have been blushing, but Dana couldn’t see well enough in the dim of the cave, and besides, his skin was dark enough to hide any flush of color.

  “It was my pleasure.”

  Dana laughed. She was exhausted. But having spent nearly all her will to summon the nightfeeders, she was also quite uninhibited.

  And so was he. He had to be after a battle like that. If there was to ever be a moment when two hearts could share without any thinking or reason in the middle, it was now.

  She was quite sure she had never met anyone like Ryke. He stirred her, like the sun on a spring morning, promising many days of warmth ahead.

  Dana wasn’t going to overlook the obvious fact that he was gorgeous.

  He had risked his life for me.

  Dana could have resisted the temptation to flirt. She should have.

  She just didn’t want to. Fine. Just a little.

  “It was your pleasure,” she repeated, a smile stealing across her lips. “Do you mean rescuing me, or the kiss?”

  Ryke’s chuckle was all too incriminating. “As much as I’d like to admit that you are quite the find, I am an acolyte. We have . . . rules.”

  “You deserved it,” Dana said. Her feelings went straight to words on her lips with unnerving ease. “Without you I would be dead.”

  Ryke smiled, his white teeth gleaming in the dim. “I know.”

  “Well I guess I still have six thank-you’s left to give.” Dana nearly gasped. It was not supposed to have been said aloud. She bit her lip to keep it from embarrassing her further.