Tolan pushed away.
Then his shaping began to fail.
In that moment, another shaping exploded. Then another. Then another. And another. Each of them was incredibly powerful.
Tolan could barely look, afraid to turn his attention to whatever might be coming, knowing if he did look, it would mean that he was captured.
“Open your eyes, Tolan,” a soft and gentle voice said.
Tolan blinked. “I don’t want to.”
“It’s okay.”
When he opened his eyes, he discovered he was face to face with his father.
“Are you ready to come with us now?”
Tolan glanced over at the Academy. After everything, considering what he had done, the ways that he had served the Academy, protecting it when others would have done it harm, was he ready to leave it?
He hated that leaving seemed to be his fate. He hated the fact that it seemed as if he had little choice in the matter. And he hated the fact that Ferrah wouldn’t know where he was going.
Leaving didn’t mean he couldn’t return, did it?
It might. He had to admit the possibility was there that it might. And if he couldn’t return, the last time that he had seen Ferrah might have been in the hallway outside of the library. The last words that he had told her had been a lie—that he was going to return.
Tolan swallowed. “What choice do I have?”
15
A sense of shaping chased him as they streaked away from Amitan. The darkness engulfed him, and there was a part of Tolan that still clung to the sense of the elements all around him. It wasn’t the sense of the elementals, and it wasn’t the sense of the element bonds, but it was the true sense of the elements. He’d never experienced anything quite so pure before. And in this case, he wanted to know it again.
There came the ongoing buildup of energy. Inquisitors were shaping, out in the darkness. He’d not been able to withstand their attack, and Tolan didn’t think he’d be able to do so if it was only up to him. Now the Grand Master and Grand Inquisitor had called back the Inquisitors, searching for unity, Tolan had to better understand what was taking place.
That was his mission.
As much as anything, he understood the Grand Master wanted more from him. He might not have said it, and he might not have been able to say it, but Tolan knew the man. Well, at least as much as anyone could know the Grand Master. He wanted Tolan to uncover the key to what the disciples were planning. While he wasn’t sure if he’d be able to do that, he thought he could uncover the key to what the Inquisitors were planning.
And the more he thought about it, the more certain he was that they were planning something.
They streaked along the Shapers Path, moving quickly, shaped by wind and earth with a hint of fire mixed in, all the elements converging in a way that Tolan could feel flowing through him. He was fully aware of that power, and because he was, he let it wash over him.
No one spoke. What was there for anyone to even say?
They were running.
Tolan was running.
As they neared the path that would guide them toward Ephra, once again his father veered north.
This time, it would lead him away from the main part of Terndahl, toward an emptiness, and back toward where they’d been attacked before.
In the distance, something tugged at Tolan, a strange sensation, and something that left him troubled.
He couldn’t determine what it was, though he could feel it.
“You need to hurry,” his father said.
“I’m sorry,” Tolan responded. He had been quiet up until that point, and he didn’t realize that he was slowing while running, but now he did, he looked around. “Do you feel it?”
“What you’re feeling is the edge of the waste,” his father said.
“I don’t remember it like this before,” Tolan said.
He tried to ignore that sense, but as they traveled, he couldn’t help but feel as if something different was taking place. The more he focused on that strangeness, the more certain Tolan was that it was real.
All he knew was that it was off. He was different than when he’d been here before. And, the more he thought about it, the more it reminded him of the strange sensation he’d noticed when he’d been near the Inquisitor they’d encountered.
“Tolan,” his father urged.
Tolan took a deep breath, letting it out in a heavy sigh. There was no point in arguing with his father about this. He had to keep up with them. In order to do what the Grand Master needed, to go where he was needed, to find out what he was asked to uncover, Tolan was going to have to accompany them. And to be successful, that meant he was going to need to open himself to a willingness to travel with the disciples of the Draasin Lord.
Unlike the last time, Tolan wasn’t sure he had the option to go back. The last time, he’d believed he could go and find the Grand Master, that he could share with him what had happened, and he had believed that in doing so, he would be able to get help. This time, the Grand Master was responsible for what was taking place. This time, the Grand Master had made his allegiances known.
Which meant Tolan couldn’t go back.
This was his only option.
He let go of the emotions he was feeling. He let go of the helplessness. He let go of the strangeness, trying to ignore it, knowing there was not much more he could do.
When they reached the end of the Shapers Path, his father carried him on a powerful shaping of wind and fire, traveling to the north. As Tolan thought he would drop them to the ground, they continued to soar onward, more and more power guiding them. It seemed as if his father wasn’t taking any chances this time. The sense of energy used was greater than what Tolan remembered from before. Bondars had to be involved.
And then they started to descend.
It happened gradually, and in the darkness, it was difficult for Tolan to make out anything that would help them understand where they were. They were north, though he had no idea how far to the north they’d traveled.
The only thing in the far north was the Maileen mountain range. His parents had brought him there when he was younger, testing him to see if there would be any way for him to reach earth or wind or even water. Tolan had failed, and now he was coming with his father, he couldn’t help but wonder if they had done that as part of their testing to see if he belonged with the Draasin Lord.
When they reached the ground, a hint of color was starting to cross the sky as daylight started to surge. Wind whistled around him. The distant mountain peak rose high overhead, marking the northern edge of Terndahl. They had headed this way, veering away from the waste and from where Tolan had expected his father to have led him. This wasn’t the domain of the Draasin Lord, at least as far as he’d have known.
He was underdressed for the weather, and without any connection to fire, he would have been cold, bitterly so. Thankfully, with his connection to fire, he didn’t suffer quite as much as he would have otherwise. He shaped fire constantly, holding onto that connection, and his time with the furios and learning to hold onto fire shaping had made him skilled.
“There’s a reason the Academy never found us,” his father said.
“Beyond the mountain?”
“Something like that,” his father said.
“I thought you went beyond the waste.”
“As you’ve already seen, there’s nothing beyond the waste.”
Tolan wasn’t sure that was quite right. When he’d been to the waste before, there’d been a sense of something, though he didn’t quite know what it was. There was a part of him that wondered if it was an elemental, some marker of power, but if that was what it was, how could it be out in the vast expanse of the waste where there was no elemental power?
From here, they walked, and as they went, he continued to wish for different clothing, a cloak or boots or something other than the thin wool of the Academy uniform.
“You haven’t asked about your mother.”
The three disciples were in front of them, and Tolan glanced toward them for a moment before turning his attention to his father. “Should I have asked about her? If she worried about me, she wouldn’t have left me.”
“We were needed.”
“So you said.”
“You don’t understand the role we played.”
“You make bondars,” he said to his father.
“Where did you hear that?”
“I didn’t hear it anywhere. I found evidence for it and have memories of it.”
“You shouldn’t have any memories of it.”
“Because you stole them from me?” There was more bitterness in his voice than he had intended, and yet, he couldn’t help the fact that he felt as if he’d had memories stolen from him, memories he should have known, things he should have been able to experience. Had they stripped away the memories that would have revealed who they were and left only those making it seem as if they had a happy life?
“We shielded you from memories that would have been harmful.”
“Like the ones of you making the bondars.”
“If the Academy learned the technique has not been lost…”
“How do you know how to do it?”
“Because it’s been handed down through the generations.”
“What generations?”
“Ours.” His father fixed him with an unreadable expression.
“So, I will be able to make bondars?”
“If you choose to do so. The technique isn’t so difficult, but it’s learning the intricacies of it. It takes someone with specific abilities to do that.”
“They can make copies of bondars at the Academy.”
“They can, but that’s all they are. Copies. They aren’t nearly as potent as those made with a specific purpose. And the bondars the Academy possesses are only those that have a specific type of power. They lose something because of that.”
“And what sort of bondars do you make?”
“All kinds,” his father said.
Tolan thought about the memory he had, the vague recollection of watching his father as he worked, creating the bondar. It was tied to runes and shaping, but also tied to elementals, he was certain of that. There had been nothing else within that memory that would share with him what his father had done or how he could replicate it, yet he couldn’t deny his interest in attempting to create a bondar. If he could do so, if he could use power like that, it would be valuable. Not just to him when he couldn’t shape quite as strongly as he wanted, but to those with him. Not all shapers could reach each of the element bonds equally.
Then there was the potential to be able to create bondars with specific purposes. That had a different kind of value. He could imagine ways of twisting the elementals, and using various runes, together to grant even more power.
Tolan looked up the slope of the mountain that they were climbing. As he did, he shivered.
“There is a delicacy to creating them. I always enjoyed that. Even when we lived in Ephra, I found much satisfaction in creating bondars.”
“Why were you in Ephra if you were serving the Draasin Lord?”
“Ephra was the easiest location to reach. Trade moved through, which meant it would be less suspicious when people came to me for the bondars I made.”
“You always served the Draasin Lord?”
“Tolan—”
“Just answer.”
“I’ve always served. As has your mother.”
“Because of the bondars?”
“Because of many reasons,” his father said. “The bondars are but one.”
“What other reason did you have?”
Before he had a chance to answer, the disciples glanced back at him. One of the men, a tall, dark-haired man with dark skin, said, “We will send word that you’re coming.”
His father nodded. “Thank you for the escort.”
“Nothing was lost, so…”
With that, they turned and hurried forward, moving on a shaping.
“What was that about?” Tolan asked.
“There was some question about whether or not we should go for you.”
“Why?”
“Some viewed it as risky, but the Draasin Lord thought we needed to reclaim you.”
“Why would he have cared?”
“Because he knew we wanted to reclaim you,” his father said. He turned to Tolan. “I know you don’t necessarily believe me, but everything we’ve done has been out of love.”
“Including abandoning me.”
“You weren’t abandoned. You were of the age to take on an apprenticeship and Daniels was there, perfectly capable of offering the apprenticeship. You were supposed to stay in Ephra, and from there, when the time was right, we would have come for you.”
They had a plan? Tolan wasn’t sure why that surprised him. “Master Daniels attacked me.”
“He wouldn’t have attacked you.”
“Maybe you didn’t know him quite as well as you thought.”
“We’ve lost communication with him, but he has served well over the years. It was why we thought it was safe to leave you with him.”
“Then you made a mistake. He tried to kill me. He almost got away with it, but I managed to…”
He wasn’t about to tell his father what he had managed to do. Not at this point. Not until he better understood more about his father and what he might do.
Instead, he looked around. They continued to follow a wide path around the base of the mountain, twisting as they made their way steadily upward. Not much farther from here, snow began to fall. Tolan would be uncomfortable, regardless of his ability to shape. Shaping could only keep him so warm.
“What happened with him?”
“The Academy has taken care of it,” Tolan said.
“Perhaps that’s for the best,” his father said.
“Perhaps?”
“If he really did attack you, then perhaps it’s for the best.”
“It is for the best,” Tolan said.
“Did he work with you?” his father asked.
“What?”
“Did he work with you? When you were with him, did he treat you well?”
Tolan shrugged. “I suppose he did.”
“And then when you went to the Academy, he didn’t.”
“I don’t think he knew I went to the Academy.” As far as Master Daniels had known, Tolan had been in Ephra. He’d been sent off to Amitan for some sort of additional training. It had to have surprised him to realize Tolan was no longer in Ephra and that he had gone to Amitan as well.
“Perhaps he isn’t lost,” his father said.
In the distance, there was a strange break in the road. Boulders loomed in front of them, massive and abrupt. It was almost as if they had been…
Shaped.
There was no question in Tolan’s mind that these had been shaped. The only question was why.
As they approached, his father stood before them. “On the other side of the stones, you will find questions. You’ll also find answers.”
“This is a doorway?”
“Oh, yes. On the other side of it, you will hopefully gain understanding.”
“Hopefully?”
“You have questions, and I have not been as forthright with you as you deserve. There are answers you need. They are answers you deserve. And perhaps I am not the one to provide them to you.”
“Who, then? The Draasin Lord?”
His father tipped his head, though Tolan didn’t know if it was a nod of agreement or something else.
Power built from him, that of a shaping, and the stones began to shift, rumbling softly as they pulled off to either side. The path opened wide enough for the two of them to walk through, though in single file rather than side by side. His father glanced over at him. “Unfortunately, it takes considerable strength to open the gateway. Even in this, I am limited.”
He started through, and Tolan followed cautiously. The wal
ls pressed against him, and he was acutely aware of how much power it would have to take to move this amount of stone. It was more than just a shaping.
Could he do it? Earth shaping was something he had some control over, but would it be enough to move these massive boulders out of the way? Perhaps with a bondar, he’d be able to do so. He wondered if perhaps that was why his father created the bondars the way he did.
There was another way Tolan might be able to do it, but he wasn’t sure his connection to the elementals was enough that they would grant him that level of control. And it was control. To be able to use the elementals in order to open up a doorway like this, he would have to have some level of control.
As he went through the doorway, the stone pressing on either side of them, Tolan resisted the urge to look back when he felt a rumbling behind him. There was a distinct sensation of the stone moving. As it did, he fought off the desire to push outward and shape. If he were to try to do so, he would probably end up overexerting himself.
The doorway stretched an impossibly long distance. Tolan found himself going on and on. He kept waiting for there to be an ending, but there was none. It was like walking through a tunnel. In that way, it reminded him of searching for the Convergence, though in this case, he didn’t have the sense of power he had otherwise.
His father kept walking steadily. The farther they went, the narrower the walkway became. That wasn’t just Tolan’s imagination. He could feel the stone pressing against him the more he went, and he worried what would happen if it were to squeeze him. There was enough pressure here that it would overwhelm his ability to hold it off.
“How much farther do we have to go?”
“Not much,” his father said.
Tolan found that difficult to believe. It seemed as if the tunnel stretched out in front of them, never ending.
Strangely, it ended.
Tolan blinked. Bright sky greeted him. Clouds hovered in the air. There was warmth, none of the cold he’d been experiencing in the mountains, and lush meadow stretched in front of him.
Tolan glanced back. The rock behind them closed.
They were on the far side of the mountain.
How was that even possible?
The Wind Rages (Elemental Academy Book 4) Page 17