The Elements Bond (Elemental Academy Book 7)

by D. K. Holmberg

It exploded him outward.

  When it did, he pushed out with spirit, trying to reorient himself and see how many others were here. There had been at least the seven attackers, but as he pushed out now, he felt more. A dozen. Possibly even more than that.

  They needed to get moving.

  Where was Ferrah?

  He pushed outward with spirit, searching for her.

  The only thing he was able to detect with spirit was the sense of these others near him. As he focused on it, and as he pushed outward, he could feel that energy as it attempted to press back.

  Somehow, he would have to find some other way.

  He swept out with earth. There was no sign of Ferrah.

  He used each of the other elements. When he did, there was nothing.

  There had to be something. He had to uncover how they were holding onto her.

  Could it be that they were aware she mattered to him?

  Maybe these attackers were trying to hold her so he would reveal himself.

  He needed strength. What he needed was one of the orbs…

  That was what he could use.

  He might not be able to find Ferrah, but she would have the orb bondars with her. Using them, Tolan could find her, and he could draw himself to her. He focused, thinking about the nature of the orb bondars and the power within them. In doing so, he could feel that sense of energy. It came to him. A few steps away, nothing more than that.

  Tolan darted toward her, heading toward the sense of Ferrah and the sense of the bondars, and he found her.

  She was hidden, concealed beneath some sort of shaping of earth and wind, and he reached down, grabbing her and pulling her up.

  A shaping spattered at him, and it took everything he could to withstand it.

  As Ferrah got up, he started to pull on the warrior shaping. All he needed was to find some way to draw that shaping so they could reach the Draasin Lord.

  “What happened?” she asked.

  “I don’t know. We were attacked, but—”

  Another attack struck him and sent him staggering. This time, Ferrah held onto his hand, keeping him from separating from her.

  He spun around, searching for the source of the attack.

  Someone was powerful, and they were able to battle at him in a way he couldn’t withstand. It wasn’t somebody with a bondar. If they used one, Tolan thought he would be able to withstand it, but whatever was striking him was something different.

  He found no sign of it.

  Tolan pushed out with spirit, probing.

  As he did, he added each of the elements. He started with earth and wind and water, and when he got to fire, he felt it.

  One of the combined elementals. Spirit and fire.

  It was out there, and was what struck him.

  It was unlike any of the other elements that had attacked.

  Tolan braced himself, focusing on that attack, and could feel the energy within it.

  He turned his attention to the attack, focusing on where it was coming from. All he needed was to target the source. Once he did that, then Tolan thought he might be able to use that to know where he next needed to target.

  Pushing on a hint of water, he pressed power into Ferrah. She needed his help, and until he was able to get to her, he worried she wasn’t going to be safe.

  Tolan drew the shapings toward him, using the power of the warrior shaping. He wrapped that energy around him, calling it through him. When he did, he could feel the energy building. He had to add spirit. That was the last remaining connection he needed, and once he did, the shaping would explode.

  It filled him. There was a sense of it, and he used spirit, lashing out.

  The warrior shaping surrounded him and Ferrah.

  It carried him up toward the Draasin Lord flying overhead. He targeted the last location he had seen the Draasin Lord occupying, and streaked overhead.

  It was a dangerous shaping. By using something like that, he ran the risk of not landing anywhere. He relied upon the Draasin Lord being able to catch him, but he wasn’t sure he would be able to do it.

  When the lightning bolt faded, the warrior shaping carrying him only to the sky and then no further, the draasin was not there.

  There was a shadow near him.

  Tolan reacted, trying to grab for wind and fire, using that to connect in a way that would help keep them in the air, but the shaping was not fast enough.

  They started to fall.

  He scrambled, struggling for a shaping, something that would keep him aloft, but he wasn’t connected enough.

  The power he’d been using was gone. Everything he’d attempted had begun to fade, and as much as he wanted to scramble for the sense of the draasin, he couldn’t find it.

  Wind swirled around him.

  Where was the Draasin Lord?

  Ferrah stirred.

  He braced himself. He had managed to save himself from a fall like this once before, and he thought that if it were to come down to it, he would be able to do it again. All it would take would be to use a shaping that would support them as they crashed.

  Tolan took a deep breath, hoping for a connection to earth. He reached for hyza…

  The elemental wasn’t there.

  Could he have been drawing too much strength from the elemental?

  It was possible. Everything he had been doing so far had taken considerable energy, and he didn’t even know if he had enough strength remaining.

  He needed to reach for something, but as he attempted to, there was nothing there.

  Tolan shifted the nature of what he was doing, focusing instead on using earth.

  Ferrah gasped, suddenly awake.

  She pushed something into his hands and Tolan glanced down before realizing that it was one of the orb bondars. He grabbed for it, trying to pull power through it, and found that it was there, though not nearly as strongly as it had been before.

  He shook his head. “I don’t think it’s going to be enough.”

  “Just try it,” she said.

  Tolan drew upon the orb, but it was empty. All the power that had been it was gone.

  They were falling.

  There was still no sign of the Draasin Lord. He had no ability to shape anything that would support them as they crashed to the ground. There would be no way for them to survive this.

  He grabbed for Ferrah. He pushed spirit at her, connecting to her. All he wanted was to apologize for this. For bringing her out into the waste. For taking her away from the Academy. From forcing her to try to understand the elementals.

  The use of spirit connected them.

  It happened briefly, but there was a surge.

  Then he felt something else.

  It was like an echo. A reverberation of power, something that called to them, suggesting that there was something else out there. He hesitated, frowning as he focused on that sense, thinking about what else might be out there. The wind continued to swirl around him.

  Tolan realized they weren’t falling nearly as fast as he thought they should be.

  Something was trying to catch them.

  Wind.

  Not just wind, but a wind elemental.

  That was the source of spirit.

  It began to lift them.

  There was power in it, but not nearly as much power within this wind elemental as there was in other wind elementals. It lifted them, but it seemed to struggle.

  Tolan pushed through the orb bondar, trying to give the wind elemental little bit more strength, focusing on what he could draw from it. There had to be something more there.

  The wind continued to swirl around them.

  Tolan held onto it, pushing outward, trying for any way he could help the elemental.

  Ferrah was there, and she pushed power out through the second bondar as well.

  The combination was enough. They stabilized.

  Tolan pulled in a breath, looking down. They were still high above the ground, which suggested that the warrior shaping
he’d used had carried them too far overhead. He hadn’t coordinated it well enough.

  “Where’s the Draasin Lord?” Ferrah asked.

  Tolan shook his head, looking overhead, but didn’t see any sign of it.

  There was a sense within him, angry and hot.

  The wind gusted, carrying them out and away, swirling them down until they landed on the ground. The wind elemental formed in front of them, taking a humanoid shape. Ferrah gasped.

  Tolan closed his eyes, focusing on spirit. He couldn’t be concerned about the wind elemental. Not until he knew what had happened to the Draasin Lord.

  He focused on spirit. There was a sense of that connection, and he could feel the Draasin Lord, though the sense of it was growing more distant. The angry sensation he had been aware of came from the Draasin Lord, emanating from him, from wherever he happened to be.

  Where are you?

  The Draasin Lord rumbled, a roar of anger stirring across the distance.

  Let me help you.

  Get to safety.

  That came from the Draasin Lord. The connection was there, though weak. Tolan tried to focus on what he was able to detect, focusing on the sense of the Draasin Lord, but even as he did, there was a separation. He feared the separation, and he feared the reason for it.

  Something had happened to the Draasin Lord.

  Out here, having experienced what he just had, knowing that whatever was beyond was where his mother had gone, Tolan worried that something had claimed the Draasin Lord. He had seen his mother use spirit on elementals before, and he wouldn’t put it past her to do the same thing with the draasin.

  An elemental like that would be powerful. Far more powerful than any others could resist.

  Help me figure out where you are. I can come for you.

  Get to safety.

  Tolan tried reaching through the connection, if only to understand where he was, but it seemed as if the Draasin Lord was severing the connection with him, separating him.

  He wanted to go after the Draasin Lord, to see if there was anything he could do to help. And there had to be something that could be done.

  As he reached through that distance, he didn’t detect anything.

  It was there, Tolan was certain of it, but the Draasin Lord was separating him from an ability to find him. The Draasin Lord didn’t want to be found.

  Maybe he worried about being discovered.

  Tolan struggled, pushing through that connection, searching for any way he might be able to reconnect to the Draasin Lord, but the attempt failed. There was a sense of him, but there was nothing else.

  He opened his eyes, looking over at Ferrah, who watched him with concern, glancing from him to the strange wind elemental.

  “He’s gone.”

  12

  Tolan took a deep breath, looking all around. They were in another section of the waste. All of it had felt much the same, though each area had a different appearance. The stone was a little bit different here than it had been even where the other elemental had been. He could feel the energy here, almost as if there was something within the ground straining for freedom.

  Tolan pulled in a sense of that, trying to reach for an understanding of that power, and didn’t detect anything he thought he could use.

  He was tired. After having shaped as much as he had within the waste, his strength had waned. He needed to get to someplace where he could recuperate and recharge, but he didn’t dare do so until he knew that the Draasin Lord was safe.

  Maybe that was what the Draasin Lord wanted. He wanted Tolan to get to safety so he could recover long enough to help him get to safety.

  He would do that. For the Draasin Lord, he thought he would have to do that.

  “What is this?” Ferrah asked.

  He nodded to the elemental. The wind elemental was there, though as he stared at him, he could feel something off. Why, though?

  “You helped us.”

  “I feel need.” The elemental still sounded as if he were distant. His voice sounded… wrong… though Tolan wasn’t sure why.

  “Through spirit,” Tolan said.

  The wind elemental frowned. “Spirit. Perhaps. Connection. A bond.”

  The wind elemental had known what he was doing?

  But then, if he was connected to spirit, Tolan shouldn’t be surprised by that. The nature of the connection would bridge some sort of tie between them and would allow the wind elemental, especially one connected to spirit, to know just what he had needed.

  “I thought her going to die, so I wanted her to know how I felt about her.”

  “Warrior?”

  Tolan smiled at her. “Of a sort.”

  “Impressive.” The wind elemental started to make a circuit around Ferrah, and Tolan wondered how she might react. He wouldn’t put it past her to get upset with the wind elemental, and with the strange way he was acting, it seemed that Tolan, not the wind elemental, would deserve to have her anger.

  “You can talk to her.”

  “No spirit.”

  “She can understand you just fine,” Ferrah said.

  The wind elemental turned to Ferrah, frowning. “Spirit?”

  “What? No. I can just hear you talking.”

  The wind elemental turned his head toward her, tipping it to the side. There was something unusual about how he looked, and he studied her, almost like a bird, though even that wasn’t quite right.

  Tolan used what he could of spirit. That seemed to be the key with this elemental. As he focused on him, he noticed there was something within the spirit that troubled him.

  That was what was wrong.

  He reached for it, trying to connect to the elemental to fix it. There wasn’t any way he could.

  “Why did you help us?”

  “Bond there.”

  “You still didn’t have to help.”

  “No.”

  “Then why?”

  The elemental didn’t answer, but there was something about the absence of an answer that stuck with Tolan.

  It was almost as if he could feel something from the elemental.

  Then again, he should be able to feel something. He was connected to spirit, much like the elemental was. Because of that connection, he thought he should be able to know the reason for the elemental’s action. There had to be something behind what he had done, the reason he had been willing to try to help.

  It was that willingness that Tolan needed to work with.

  He focused on spirit. That was what he was connecting to, and what he was able to detect. By using that connection, he thought that there would have to be some way to reach the elemental in a different way. It might involve just connecting to him, but it might involve something else, too.

  As he pushed out with spirit, there was a resistance.

  It was subtle, little more than a pressure against him, but he could feel the elemental struggling against him, almost as if the elemental wanted nothing to do with him.

  Tolan pushed again, trying to send even more energy out, searching for some way he might be able to help.

  “You feared those attackers,” he said.

  That had to be the reason that the elemental was willing to work with them, but what was it about them that the elemental feared?

  It wasn’t something as simple as what he had thought initially.

  “They hurt.”

  “Is that why there are only three of you remaining?”

  “One.”

  “What do you mean? I saw the other two…” He began to understand. “They were taken.”

  The wind elemental breathed out. When he did, there was a stirring of the air all around them. Tolan took a deep breath, letting it out slowly. The elemental suffered. Whatever was happening tormented him.

  “How did they take them?”

  “Control. Danger.”

  “Who leads them?” Tolan figured that it was his mother, and if she were the responsible one, then he knew he would have to do something to
try to help these elementals. He couldn’t be responsible for his mother acting like that.

  He didn’t know how long his mother had been out here, active, but she had to have discovered something out here and beyond the main part of the waste. How, though?

  Having traveled this far, there wouldn’t have been any way for her to have uncovered anything. She would’ve been separated from her ability to shape spirit. It would’ve been incredibly difficult to make the journey across.

  He remembered the influence she’d used, the hint of chaos, the darkness she had burning within her. There had been something that had brought her across the waste. If she had been able to use that, then how would she have made it across?

  The wind elemental stirred.

  “Is that it?” Tolan frowned, looking at him. He glanced from the wind elemental and over to Ferrah. “The sense of chaos?”

  “Danger.”

  “Who is he?”

  “Enemy.”

  Tolan swallowed. His mouth was suddenly dry. “We can help, but we have to better understand what it is that you are facing.”

  “No. Long time.”

  “How long?”

  “Long.”

  There was something that drifted through Tolan. Understanding that came from the elemental. Time. Countless time.

  “What is it?” Ferrah asked.

  He shook his head. “Centuries. That’s what he’s getting at.”

  Could that be the reason for the waste? It was designed to offer protection, and with something like that, especially if the elementals had been in danger for centuries, he could see why there would be a need for it, but what exactly had it been?

  “My mother is a shaper who came here, and she was consumed by this power.” He pushed outward, sending a connection to the elemental, struggling to see if there was any way that the elemental would be able to recognize what he was trying to share. Tolan didn’t know if it would even work, but he thought that it would. It had to.

  He had connected to other elementals in a similar way, sending his understanding and awareness between them.

  The elemental shimmered for a moment. It was little more than that. There was a trembling sense from within it. Then it faded again.

  Tolan looked over at Ferrah. “He knows her.”

  “Yes.”

  He had believed that his mother had been serving someone else. That was what she had said. From how the elemental was talking, it sounded as if there was some other power they had to be concerned about. How could his mother be the one if there was another one?