“What were they scared of?”
He shook his head. “I can only guess it was my mother, but I don’t really know. They were afraid of something.”
“Were they influenced in any way? Did you see the draasin?”
Tolan looked up. The Draasin Lord settled to the ground along the mountain, curling his tail around himself, wrapping his wings to the side. Heat radiated off him, though it was a comfortable sort of heat. The sense of the Draasin Lord pressed up against Tolan, filling him. He could feel that awareness, and he thought that all he needed to do was to reach for him, but perhaps the Draasin Lord wouldn’t want that.
“I didn’t see the draasin, and I don’t know if they were influenced. I didn’t test them.” Now he thought about it, he realized he probably should have. Given what he knew of his mother and how she was using her shaping, he should have attempted to see if there was any sort of influence upon them. And if there had been, what would he have been able to do? Out there, in a place that seemed as much like the waste as any other, he wasn’t sure he would’ve had the strength to do anything.
“What did you feel?”
“I didn’t think they were influenced,” Tolan said. He turned toward the Draasin Lord and found him with his head settled on the ground, looking out toward the clearing. Tolan realized then that the Draasin Lord had been weakened as well. The effort of being out over the waste took much from him. Why would he have thought otherwise?
The Draasin Lord was powerful but being out in the waste and flying the way he did, and pulling upon heat and flame, would tap any reserves he had, the same as it did for Tolan. Coming back here to this place, to the Convergence that was here, allowed the Draasin Lord to restore himself.
Tolan breathed in, matching the Draasin Lord’s breathing patterns.
“I didn’t know there was an elemental of spirit.”
“Spirit is within all things.”
“I understand how spirit is important. I understand how it connects us, but in this case, these are elementals that have the power of spirit.” He stared at the Draasin Lord. “How is that even possible?”
“As far as I know, it would not be.”
“If they’re connected to spirit, and if they have elemental energy that is tied to it, I worry my mother would try to use them.”
“She wouldn’t be able to overpower something that’s tied to spirit like that, would she?” Ferrah asked.
Tolan sighed. “Given what I know of her, the way she has attacked in the past, I can’t help but think she would. Besides, she has bondars. Those bondars give her even more strength than she would have on her own. With something like that…”
With something like that, Tolan thought it was all too easy to believe his mother might be able to control spirit. She could wrap that awareness around them, and in doing so, she might be able to control the elemental. It was that control he worried about. If the elementals were partially tied into spirit—and given what he felt, he was convinced they were—then having someone who had a great control over spirit, using a bondar to do so, might allow them to control the elementals as well.
It would be dangerous.
More than anything else, he felt the elementals were afraid of that control.
He thought about when his mother had attacked before, using the elemental. She had used the bondar to control it, to force it to serve her.
If she did something similar with an elemental bound to spirit, how much more powerful would that make her?
He didn’t want to think of that.
The elemental had been afraid.
That much he was certain of, but it wasn’t so much that they had been afraid as it had been the reason why they were afraid. There was something out there that terrified them.
That was what Tolan needed to find.
He breathed in again, thankful they were this close to the Convergence.
Sitting within the village, at least within the edge of the village, he was able to call upon the power of the Convergence. The energy of it filled him, growing within him. He was able to use that and restore himself.
He took another deep breath, letting the power fill him, drawing it in. In doing so, he focused on the energy of the Convergence. He got to his feet, looking down at Ferrah. “I think I’m ready.”
“Are you sure you can carry both of us?” Ferrah asked, looking from him to the Draasin Lord.
“I’ve done it once before, and that was without having the energy of the Convergence nearby.”
“We won’t have the Convergence once we get there.”
“We won’t, but we will have the Draasin Lord,” he said. Tolan looked at the Draasin Lord. “You’re going to need to bring us out of there.”
“I grow tired.”
“I know you do, and all that I would ask of you would be to fly us free.”
He hoped that was all he would ask of the Draasin Lord, but it was possible he might need to ask more. If there was more, then he worried what it might mean. He worried what the Draasin Lord would have to do.
Still, they were going within the waste. It was a place of safety, at least nowadays. They weren’t going beyond, though eventually they would have to. Once they went to the place beyond, then he hoped they would be able to restore themselves, to draw upon the energy of the elements and the elementals and the element bonds.
The Draasin Lord stirred himself, getting to his feet, and he waited for Tolan.
He called upon energy, letting that power fill him.
There was considerable energy here. It was all around him. The power of the runes around the Convergence allowed him to tap into the Convergence itself, and Tolan filled himself with that power. It exploded outward, and from there, he tapped into that natural and incredible power.
He used that. The shaping he drew came from the Convergence.
The warrior shaping through the Convergence was far more powerful. Far faster. The lightning bolt that streaked through the sky did so with a burst of energy.
Ferrah cried out, and even Tolan braced himself. The Draasin Lord was the only one who showed no reaction.
Tolan focused on where he wanted to carry them, thinking about where he had been, though he didn’t fully know where it was. He could find it.
The warrior shaping struck, carrying them. As they headed out over the waste, the energy of the shaping started to dissipate.
He held onto it, feeding more power into it, using everything he had.
And then they landed.
Tolan blinked, looking all around, searching for a sign of anything here.
There were the mountains of earth, there was a hint of smoke, but as he pushed out with the elements, there was nothing else.
“This is it?” Ferrah asked.
“This is where I was trapped.” He pointed to one of the mounds of earth and decided he didn’t have enough strength to carry them inside. “There is something in these structures.”
“There are no doors.”
“Not for us. I had to use the warrior shaping to get out of it.”
“I detect something here,” the Draasin Lord said.
Tolan swept his gaze around, focusing on the energy he was able to detect. “It’s everywhere,” he said.
“Everywhere?” Ferrah asked.
Tolan nodded. “It’s a strange sense.” He shrugged, turning toward her. “Like I said, it’s everywhere.”
The sense of it was strange, but considerable. He knew there was power here, though he wasn’t able to see anything. It was that sense that suggested there was something here. Whether or not it was elementals or something else, Tolan wasn’t able to determine.
The Draasin Lord sniffed, slithering between the buildings as he crawled forward, looking for something.
Tolan held onto his connection, using what he could of the element bonds, drawing through not only his connection to hyza, but also to the Draasin Lord.
He held onto each of the elements, prepared for the possibil
ity they might need to use his warrior shaping again. He didn’t know if he would be able to carry the Draasin Lord—and doubted he would—but he thought he could carry himself and Ferrah out of here if it were necessary.
“We’re still in the waste,” she said.
“We are, which surprised me. When I was attacked and fell from the Draasin Lord, I thought that I was falling into the beyond, but I landed within the waste.”
“Why would that be?” she asked.
Tolan shook his head. “I don’t really know.”
The Draasin Lord rumbled. “There’s something wrong,” he said.
“What is it?”
“There is something coming.”
“What?”
“Power,” he said.
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Tolan readied a shaping, but even as he did, he wasn’t sure if the shaping he held and the power he was able to call upon would be enough. If what the Draasin Lord sensed was something other than the elementals, he thought he might need more power than he was able to reach out here. If it was just the elementals, then there was no need to try to shape. He didn’t feel the elementals were dangerous.
“What do you detect?” Tolan asked, heading toward the Draasin Lord.
“As I said, there’s a sense of power here.”
“What sort of power?” Ferrah asked. She held out one of the orb bondars, which glowed. She shaped softly, using the orb’s energy as she did.
How many of the bondars did she have with her? If she had more than one, then she would be able to shape for far longer, but if it was only the single bondar, then she would be depleted fairly quickly. He didn’t want her to tap herself out too fast. That was a danger out here. She might need the energy of the bondar to protect herself.
“Unusual power,” the Draasin Lord said.
“The draasin?”
“I’ve seen no sign of a draasin.”
There was disappointment in his tone. Maybe the draasin had been a dream, nothing more. That would be unfortunate if true.
Tolan didn’t detect anything, but the sense of an unusual power could be anything out here. Given what he had detected of the elementals, the unusual power could be them.
He squeezed his eyes shut, focusing on that power and energy, and thought about what he could. There was a sense of it. He had to keep thinking about it, thinking about the nature of that power, and about what he could imagine of the energy.
It wasn’t enough.
“Can you show me what you’re detecting?”
The Draasin Lord swung his head toward him. “You may try.”
Tolan reached through the connection. It came through fire and the fire bond, but it also came through spirit. He reached across the distance, using fire and spirit, mixing them. All he wanted was an understanding, and what came instead was something different. Greater.
Power surged toward him. It came from the Draasin Lord, flowing from him, toward Tolan, and it did so with an incredible amount of energy. He braced himself, trying to understand, but the connection bridged them in a way he had been unprepared for.
Power flooded through him.
Awareness of the Draasin Lord came with it.
He was tired. That was the primary sense that Tolan had. It was more than just a tiredness that came from time spent out over the waste. It was a tiredness that came from time spent alive. The Draasin Lord was old. Elementals could live a long time, and Tolan had learned that this one in particular was incredibly old, but he didn’t know just how long they would survive. In this case, he couldn’t help but wonder whether or not the Draasin Lord was reaching the end of his time.
There was a sense of fatigue from the elemental. There was a sense of tiredness, and the sense that the elemental was ready to move on.
As Tolan turned toward the Draasin Lord, he debated saying something, but what would he say? Instead, he turned his attention away from what he was detecting through that connection between them. He shifted toward the sense of power. That was what the Draasin Lord wanted him to know. That sense of power was there, and it connected in a way that left him trembling.
He felt it.
It wasn’t the elementals.
As the Draasin Lord said, there was power coming toward them, but Tolan wasn’t able to determine the source of that power. He could feel it, but he wasn’t able to feel anything more about it.
He held onto that awareness and closed his eyes, separating from the Draasin Lord. When he did, he could feel the sense of power coming toward them. Without the Draasin Lord, Tolan was aware of that energy, but he was aware of it in a different way.
He pointed.
“What is it?” Ferrah asked.
“I don’t know. He’s right. There is power, but the kind of power that’s different than elemental energy. It’s different than these strange elementals I encountered.”
“Is it shapers?”
He wasn’t sure.
“What should we do?”
“Until we know, we should—”
Tolan didn’t get the chance to finish.
Something exploded near them. The ground threw up stones as a blast struck.
He reacted by pushing out with earth, creating a barrier that prevented anything from hitting them, but even as he did, Tolan knew he wasn’t fast enough to completely prevent them from being attacked. He pushed out again, sending more power away from him. In doing so, he could feel the energy out there and could feel the nature of it as it blasted around them. He tried again, pushing outward, preparing for what was coming.
There were others of power marching toward them.
Ferrah held onto her orb, preparing a shaping.
“Wait until we know what it is,” Tolan said. Turning to the Draasin Lord, he added, “You should take off. We can reach you if we need to.”
The Draasin Lord rumbled before spreading his wings and launching himself into the air. The power he used was incredible as he leaped forward, blasting upward. Tolan steadied himself, breathing deeply before slowing his breathing and turning to Ferrah.
“I don’t know what’s out here, but we have to be ready for whatever it might be.”
She reached into her pocket, grabbing something else, and he wasn’t surprised that it was a second orb. She shrugged. “I just wanted to be ready.”
Tolan used a wind shaping, carrying him upward.
Ferrah joined him, and they surveyed the land around them.
For a moment, Tolan wasn’t able to see anything. He could feel that sense of power and was aware of the way it had blasted them, though he wasn’t entirely sure of the source. There was nothing out there. Something had attacked them.
He didn’t think it was the strange earth elemental he’d encountered. That earth elemental hadn’t wanted to harm him. The elemental had wanted to try to understand him. The elementals had been curious about the warrior shaping, and they had commented that they hadn’t seen it in centuries.
They had been afraid.
That thought stuck with him.
Whatever they had feared was out here. Whatever they had feared was coming toward him, threatening them. Whatever they had been afraid of was still here.
Tolan needed to find a way through that. This had to be some sort of illusion.
He thought about how power could be masked and used the only technique he thought would reveal anything out there.
Spirit.
Tolan pushed outward with spirit, surging.
What he wouldn’t give for a bondar to augment his strength, but out here, a bondar might not even be enough.
He drew upon the strength of spirit, and when he did, he saw a series of shimmers. They weren’t far off.
He counted seven, all of them holding onto power.
Strangely, the sense of spirit washed over them, and it gave him a different sensation of them. They might be holding onto power, but it wasn’t power that they had of their own. It was borrowed power.
Bondars.
Tolan f
ocused on the nearest of them and, using fire and connecting to hyza, he pushed outward. Heat burned forward, creeping along the ground.
Someone cried out.
There was pressure against his shaping, but with the way he had held onto fire, drawing not only through the sense of himself but through the energy he was able to latch onto when it came to the elemental, he suppressed that.
The heat and power continued to build.
Tolan pushed outward again, striking the next shaper.
He went along the line, using power after power. Ferrah joined him, following the sweep of his energy, and they knocked back these attackers.
They were going to succeed.
Something hit him.
Tolan hadn’t the time to react. He attempted to recover, trying to gain control over the shaping, but the nature of it was such he could barely withstand it. He struggled, straining to see if there was anything he might be able to do, but he couldn’t.
He staggered forward and fell, crashing to the ground.
Tolan struggled to get back to his feet. There was another attack. This one was wind and water, a strange swirling combination held him in place. The earth softened, trying to swallow him.
Tolan lashed out, using his connection to earth and fire, using them together as he tried to banish the shaping that threatened to absorb him.
There was considerable power in this.
Where was Ferrah?
She had to be safe.
She had the orbs, and with those, he had to think she would be able to keep herself safe, but if the shapings overwhelmed her…
Tolan didn’t have enough strength.
Hyza wasn’t strong enough.
There was another connection he could draw upon.
He felt the sense of the Draasin Lord. He was overhead, flying and sharing energy with him. Tolan borrowed from that power. The Draasin Lord had incredible strength, and yet there were limits to it. He could feel those limits, he could feel the fact that the Draasin Lord struggled. He tried to grasp for more, to see if there was any way he might be able to uncover anything more from the elemental, but there was not.
He surged forward, using that blast of power.
The Elements Bond (Elemental Academy Book 7) Page 12