Unseen Secrets

by S. B. Sebrick

  Before Keevan could get a better look, the Persuader reached the end of the stair and hurled himself around the corner with a throaty cry for war. Even as he charged, Keevan saw the field pulling the Temple into the ocean shudder with lost concentration. At the least, distracting Kors would keep the worst from happening until help arrived. He risked a glance down below, but the guards were still hundreds of yards beneath them.

  Bahjal raced after Madol. Keevan caught her hand, steadying himself against the iron rod with his other. "Be bored Bahjal. You can't out push him, you'll have to neutralize him."

  Bahjal pursed her lips, uncoiling her whip. Above them, Madol screamed. Plumes of steam rose from the Temple, then turned in on themselves. "I'll try," She promised, pulling him to the edge of the stair. "Together?"

  "Together. Try to disable his bracer. After that, we just have to deal with him," Keevan urged her. Bahjal nodded, taking his hand. With a reassuring smile to each other, they charged.

  Kors stood at the center of the Temple's flat, circular summit. He stood resolutely, holding the bracer inside a metal barrel, the Danica crystal within glowing blue against Kors' face. The exile whispered incessantly to himself, eyes closed, his concentration complete. The roof curved above them in a wide dome shape, filled to the brim with water as if the rules of gravity no longer applied. A dozen large gaps in the stone offered a spectacular view of the sea and Issamere, despite their dangerous situation.

  The Danica veins spreading along the walls and domed roof, showed Kors' intent with each pulse in its field. Pulling hard enough, with Danica of this magnitude, could topple the Temple into the sea. Kors might even survive the fall, with the water bracer to aid him once he landed in the ocean.

  Madol's stood a dozen feet from Kors, holding his sword before him like a shield. Kors dispatched a river of water, rife with seaweed and driftwood, into the Persuader with all the might of a cascading waterfall. Madol's sword reduced liquid to steam in an instant, but his exposed skin was already crimson from the heat and the steam Kors kept swirling back into Madol would soon burn out his body with heat, the way Calistra burned out her hand.

  "Sad and bored," Keevan insisted, taking Bahjal's hand.

  She unfurled her whip, wrapping it around them both, closing her eyes. "Talk me through it, Keevan."

  "Just walk forward," Keevan urged her, holding her shoulders in his hands and trying to whisper in her ear. Given the constant roaring and rushing of their surroundings, it was more like shouting in her ear. "Use that imagination of yours. Dad asked you to work the forge again."

  "I hate the forge work," Bahjal grunted, smirking. "So tedious."

  She stepped forwards, one pace, and then another. Her field, enhanced by the whip, reached out another four feet than normal, spreading out against Madol's and the Danica veins in the walls of the dome. Kors glanced at them both in disgust as Keevan watched the exile's water rush around them and along the floor. Severing his hold left the element to obey its true master, gravity.

  In a few heartbeats, the dome above them was free of water. Outside the dome however, fish looked in on them in mild curiosity and floating debris contrasted oddly with the distant view of ocean, ships and buildings in the distance. Kors' constant deluge though, drawn into the dome by the west side, rushed around him like a mounting tide and into both Madol and Bahjal's fields. With the sea itself as his source, he would easily win a war of attrition.

  Madol and Bahjal managed another step, their combined fields turning on Kors like a three-man arm-wrestling match. Bahjal's whip glowed with her command of water, pushing every drop outside the coil farther away. A thrill of anticipation coursed through Keevan's veins, neutralizing Kors' field was the answer. It allowed them to step closer and closer, without facing his immense willpower head on, as Madol was attempting.

  "Why won't you three relent?" Kors cried over the din.

  The water around the dome trembled and smoked, his anger infusing the water with additional heat. The fish within writhed and tried to swim away, only to tumble back around the dome, caught in the Danica field's mighty current. Keevan gulped nervously, he didn't have to ask what would happen to them if their fields failed.

  "Give up, exile!" Madol howled, glowing like a forge amidst the dark dome's confines. "Surrender now and you will only be imprisoned. Continue and you will die."

  "I died a long time ago, with my parents," Kors said, suddenly calm. Keevan had to strain to hear him over the din. He saw Bahjal's field shift immediately, however, collapsing in on itself in a sudden wave of frost and despair. "The Malik sent them and thousands of others to their deaths. A distraction to expose the Barbarian forces to a counter attack."

  "The plan worked, Kors," Bahjal cried against the wind and water. Keevan realized she was actually crying, and a sudden chill coated his skin. He knew in that moment, she wasn't in control of her emotions anymore. He'd felt it all along, some truth she was holding back. For some reason, this murdering exile did not fill her with righteous fury, like Madol. Instead, she felt only despair. With that, her field stopped neutralizing Kors'.

  Keevan remembered her icy lock-picking technique, the same as Kors'. Looking from one to the other, he could now see the vague similarities in their facial structures and their eyes. "By the Gods," he muttered. "He's your brother."

  Water in her reach turned cold indeed, contrasting perfectly with Madol's heat. Enough to strip the feeling from Keevan's fingers and toes with startling speed. He couldn't survive standing alongside her at this rate. Bahjal kept talking, unaware of Keevan's plight. "They died to save us. They did their duty and their deaths saved us. Destroying the Malik or even this city, won't bring them back, Kors. No matter what this Zerik has promised you."

  "You!" Kors challenged, whirling on her. "You should be standing by my side. You know the pain the Malik caused us. You know. Yet you spend your time with this Outlander, the Malik's ear among the Rhets. Ready to jump to his aid should they decide to stand and fight."

  With Kors' words, Bahjal's sorrow grew too strong for Keevan to endure. He scrambled out from her whip's coils, an awkward task indeed since his limbs were too frozen to cooperate properly. The whip fell aside as he escaped. She dragging it along after her, creating a trail of frost as if the stone itself shared her sorrow. Through his elemental vision, Keevan found a single spot of safety, in the corner between the wall and the floor of the dome. Here, Kors' anger and Bahjal's sorrow left a pocket of warmth he could survive in, briefly.

  "They were my parents too, Kors. You weren't the only one who suffered. I was alone when you left. Mom and dad died doing their duty. You abandoned me to center your life on revenge and murder," There was no anger in Bahjal's words, only a pain so deep the water turned to ice and snow the moment it touched her field, rushing around her in a tide. "Who in this room truly deserves to suffer? Who abandoned their duty?"

  Bellowing in rage, Kors turned his attention back to the metal barrel, the crystal within and his bracer. The tides crashing down on them intensified, halting their slow advance. Bahjal's ice and Madol's heat were centered on Kors, his constant deluge swirling out behind Madol and Bahjal. Duel streams of steam and ice spun in the air around the citadel, Kors' control of the water resuming once the elements left his attacker's fields. Around them, the Temple buckled and swayed dangerously. It wasn't enough.

  Madol's skin glowed on the point of burning out and Bahjal had suddenly turned to a fiercer despair than he'd ever seen. Her field cast heat aside like a disease, coating her hair, Suadan dress and eyelashes in frost. She looked strangely beautiful and agonized at the same time. They fought so hard to stop the exile, to save the city, and all he could do was crawl out of the way.

  Feelings of helplessness washed over Keevan. He felt like a child again, after his scar's power failed him. All he could do was curl into a ball and wait for the beating to end. But this time, it wasn't just pain or humiliation he endured. The lives of his friends, people who counted on him, protect
ed him, were at risk. Now, he could only watch them die in elemental splendor. What good was a power that could only see, but not act? Why was he such a fool to thick he could actually make a difference?

  Water surged around Keevan, the byproduct of so many conflicting fields, but it didn't wash him away. As a matter of fact, it avoided his torso and head all together, only wetting his extremities. He patted his pocket, realizing the presence of the small little repulsor orb he'd kept on his person. At least, if they went down, he'd be able to breath underwater. From its little perch in his pocket, the orb's field included his head. Lot of good it would do against Kors.

  Sympathy welled up in his soul for Bahjal, pulling Keevan's mind to more important matters. Kors was her brother. He should have sensed it. He'd watched Kors' reactions as he saw Bahjal beaten, then spoke of his sister in the catacombs. The feelings, the elemental combinations were similar. He should have pried her more for the truth when he felt her holding back. He should have prepared her somehow for the intense emotions she'd need to harness to face Kors.

  Now, they were lucky to push the exile to a stalemate. Judging by the trembling Temple around them, even that wouldn't hold for long. Keevan's best friend was on the verging of Icing out, dropping her temperature too low for her body to survive, and there was nothing he could do to stop it.

  "This is your last chance, Kors," Madol growled, flames from his sword licking his arms and shoulders as he pushed through the torrent of water. "Surrender and be tried as a traitor or die here."

  "You've already lost this fight," Kors bellowed, clutching his bracer with his free hand. His veins bulged with pressure as he threw all his willpower into the crystal before him. "This Temple will fall and all of you will die."

  "Together then," Madol said flatly, raising his blade overhead. The hilt burst into a powerful lightning bolt, billowing steam in every directions and plastering the dome around Kors with scorch marks as the electric tendrils reached for him.

  Kors grit his teeth, adjusting the water rushing around him. The swirling tide caught each bolt but curbed it away, sometimes only deflecting them by inches. The Temple ceased shaking though. Madol's attack was demanding more and more concentration to fend off, though his command of the elements was slowly slipping away. Etrendi have their limits, but even a Danica enhanced Haldran's was more so. Madol was fighting a battle of attrition and loosing.

  Then, Bahjal snapped her wrist, twice. Kors saw the impending attack, adjusting a stream of water to cover his face and torso, but the whip's first attack carried no element at all. Keevan watched in slow motion as he saw Kors' expression turn from disdain to utter shock. The weapon's second blow wasn't aimed for him. Keevan grit his teeth and grabbed a window sill in anticipation, as he watched the Danica enhanced tip scratch the surface of Kors' bracer.

  Chapter 28

  The explosive force hurled water, ice and steam if every direction. The shockwave drove the air from Keevan's lungs, plastering him against the side of the wall in a brief instant of pure force. Just as suddenly, the attack relented, and Keevan sank back to the floor. His head rang from the force of his impact with the wall. His back and arms throbbed in pain and his lungs gasped for air. Slowly, he regained his sensed and looked around.

  To their good fortune, water explosions weren't as lethal as fire or lightning, unless they threw you against something sharp. Madol lay unconscious against the far wall, luckily thrown against the stone wall instead of the adjacent open window. Blood leaked down his face and neck, a nasty dent in his helmet attesting to a serious wound. He was down for the fight.

  Bahjal stood resolutely alongside Keevan, more ice than flesh. Trickles of water ran down her sleeves and face as she fought to stabilize her emotions. Her limbs trembled and the whip thrashed before her like a wounded fish. Her eyes were closed, teeth gritted in concentration. The ice, covering her skin was cracked and fractured from the blast. Every inch that retained heat, oozed blood as she fought to stabilize her temperature.

  Metal clattered to the floor and Keevan looked up, past the metal Danica container protruding from the floor. Kors struggled to his feet. The splintered bracer lay next to him, his one remaining hand fractured at the wrist, twisted to an odd angle. With a grunt, he bent it back into alignment, water coating it. The sea water swirled around him like a cloak, but Keevan saw it was Kors' own field, without any Danica assistance at all.

  In the distance, a great splash echoed beneath them. All the water Kors pulled up had fallen to the sea or the city below. The exile’s plan to use the Temple's Great Crystal lay in twisted tatters on the floor. Around them, Keevan saw the crystal reverting back to its original path, coaxing water up above the dome into the shape of Suada so many citizens cherished.

  "You couldn't just leave me be," Kors growled, stumbling over to Bahjal. He stood before her icy frame, watching her broken skin slowly bleed down her dress and crystalize. "Not so high and mighty now, are you? I've lost my hand, but you're about to lose so much more."

  Bahjal gasped, shuddering beneath her icy prison. Keevan's heart ached for her, only intense despair could weave such an elemental cage. Her mouth twitched, as if trying to speak, but the ice grew around her legs and shoulders like the jaw of some mythical creature closing around her. Kors reached over, touching the ice dangling from her right earlobe and shattered it with a flick of his wrist. Bahjal stiffened, gasping. The ice growing around her accelerated. She hung seconds away from freezing out, doomed to melt away like a snowflake in summer.

  Struggling to his hands and knees, Keevan crawled towards the Great Crystal at the center of the room. There wasn't much time, but if Kors saw him and reacted, there wouldn't be any time at all. There was no way of knowing if the idea tickling at his consciousness would even work.

  "Interesting, how full circle we've come," Kors said, holding her shoulder in his damaged hand and squeezing her skin until the ice cracked. Bahjal's pupils widened in terror and her pale face already carried the empty white one would expect of a corpse. "Now, I could offer you forgiveness. I bet that would give you enough joy to thaw you out, but instead, I think I'll let you see mom and dad again. You can all praise the Malik together, from the elemental realm. Tell them I'll be sending your great Malik Morgra to meet you all, very soon."

  Rising to his feet, leaning against the Great Crystal's metal container for support, Keevan pulled out his repulsor stone. Its feeble field stretched out a few feet in every direction, leaving his face oddly dry amidst the soaked dome.

  Holding the orb above the Great Crystal's metal cage, Keevan stepped to the right by a few precious inches, adjusting where the repulsor orb would hit the crystal. Now, Kors stood between the crystal and the open window on the opposite side of the dome, while Bahjal faced the window's adjacent wall. Leaning over the metal cylinder, Keevan took a deep breath.

  Before him, Kors whispered something in Bahjal's ear, but her eyes centered on Keevan instead of her brother's shoulder. Immediately, her face regained some color and the ice massing around her shoulders paused its advance. Kors stood up, staring down at her in confusion.

  "How could such a threat bring you anything but despair?" he asked, looking into his sister’s eyes. The ice bound her jaw shut now, so her only answers were the curving of her lips into a fierce smile and a subtle twitch as her eyes darted to Keevan.

  Kors whirled, facing Keevan, and then relaxed, laughing. "The powerless Sight Seeker brought you hope? Bahjal, my sister, he's powerless. I'll prove it. I'm sure watching him die will send you crying into the afterlife. Come here, boy," Kors extended his fractured hand and the waters above closed in. They slithered along the walls and floor toward Keevan like hungry snakes, weakened by Kors' wounded state.

  "You're forgetting one thing, Kors," Keevan said, forcing a grin. His insides curled and twisted anxiously. If he misunderstood Nariem's words about repulsor metals... "I was raised by a blacksmith, who works with Danica and repulsors. What do you think happens when they meet?" K
ors gasped, realizing his mistake, diving forward.

  Keevan dropped the orb into the crystal's chamber.

  A heavy, hollow whumpf filled the dome. The repulsor field grabbed every drop of latent water, and every Tri-Being within its great field, and hurled them outward. Outside, the water image of Suada burst into a deluge of rainfall, as if the goddess herself were undone. Pain clawed at Keevan's mind, blue light flooding his vision. Burning, agonizing pain hammered his skull from the inside. In the moisture covering the floor, he saw his own reflection. Blue veins of energy glowed beneath the skin around his eyes, leaching further into his face and giving the impression his eyes were somehow bleeding beneath his skin.

  Gasping in agony, he managed to look up. The continuous blast held Madol and Bahjal against the walls with impressive force. Bahjal cried out in pain, splayed out against the stone wall like a bug for dissection. A flicker of motion drew Keevan's gaze out the window and he saw Kors, howling in rage as he tumbled like an oversized doll out into the open sea and an impossibly long drop.

  "Bahjal!" Keevan cried, hurrying to her side.

  The world seemed to toss and turn with each step, forcing him to crawl to her side. She lay there pitifully pinned to the wall, ice fragmenting from her skin and hair at a startling rate. For a moment, Keevan thought she was dying. Chunks of ice tore at her hair and fragments of cloth, and she convulsed in mysterious spasms. Then he noticed the healthy skin underneath each layer of ice flecking off and realized her trembling was...laughter.

  "Keeves, oh Keeves. Your eyes, are you alright? You did it. You saved us," Bahjal moaned, wincing as she laughed. Fragments of hair broke away with the ice, leaving the tussled matt of hair he remembered so well. It was as if the repulsor field were pulling away the Etrendi trappings to reveal his lowborn friend underneath. Then he saw the lacerations covering her exposed skin, thin and trickling blood, as if given by paper. She was wounded but not dead. She breathed. She was whole. She was alive.