Festival of Mourn (The Dark Sorcerer Book 1)

by D. K. Holmberg

  She sighed. She didn’t even know what she was getting at. All she knew was that there had to be something more to the existence of the door. Some other reason for a room like this than simply to lock in power.

  She knew that the city itself was old, older than the kingdom, and older than most who had ever come here. It had once been occupied by a different kingdom, and a different kingdom before that. It had been handed over, time after time, always surviving the transition. Situated as it was near the edge of the forest, at the edge of the kingdom, the city of Nelar had survived. If nothing else, that was its greatest achievement, despite everything else that had gone on in the city.

  “There is something else to this,” Jayna said, glancing over to Eva.

  She had seen much in the time that she’d worked with Ceran, but nothing like this. She’d need to ask him about it when she had a chance. It was possible this was the reason Ceran had wanted her to come, that he had intended for her to find something like the power this room could contain.

  Eva stared at the markings in the back of the door, a deep frown working up into her eyes. “They have known darkness in this land,” she said.

  “That’s my fear,” Jayna said.

  As she looked over to Rendal, she noticed a faint trail of darkness starting to glow from his skin. It was almost as if shadows coalesced along the surface of his body before pressing outward, a purplish-hued energy that radiated from him.

  The dark energy was already manifesting.

  Whatever power had been used on him was starting to take hold.

  Dark power.

  And given what she’d seen from the dwaring, Jayna worried it would be released—and do something similar to what the dwaring had done.

  Which meant they had to stop it.

  Would the room be enough?

  That power pulsed again.

  A sudden constriction in her ring warned her that she had to act now.

  Only . . . she didn’t know what they would have to do—or what kind of power had been used on the dark sorcerer to make him like this.

  Rendal started to convulse, then he began to moan. The voice that came from him, however, was not his.

  20

  She had seen the glowing darkness enough times to know exactly what it was. There were others of power who had used a similar technique, and she had, at times, been tasked with stopping them. Creatures of darkness were one thing, and volar with their dark enchantments another, but she’d never faced a dark sorcerer herself.

  Still, she knew exactly what she needed to do, though she feared Char wouldn’t let her. Maybe she had to ignore what Char might want her to do. She just had to do it.

  She hurried forward, crouching down next to Char, looking over at Rendal. Other than convulsing, he hadn’t moved since they’d brought him into the room. She checked the circulation in his neck, noting that he was breathing, and ignored Char’s pointed glances in her direction. She used just a hint of the painful power coming through the dragon stone ring, the Toral magic guiding her, and she let it flow out from her, sweeping in a circle.

  The pattern was specific to what she intended. She wanted to trap anything that might be contained within him. If she could do that, then . . .

  “What are you doing?” Char asked. “How did you learn to do that?”

  “I’m doing what I have to do. And I have my own ways of finding things out,” she muttered, continuing to sweep her hand in a steady pattern as she held on to the magic.

  She probably should’ve done it before, but she hadn’t expected Rendal would have so much darkness within him. Then again, she didn’t know if it was Rendal or the room itself.

  “I can see it’s not a simple sorcery spell.” Char kept his hands situated above Rendal, and his own spell flowed down, as if he were trying to heal him. As Jayna looped her power around, trying to trap and confine the dark magic within Rendal, she felt Char beginning to withdraw.

  “Not yet,” she said.

  “Not yet? What do you mean?”

  She looked up, holding his gaze for a moment. “I need you to keep trying to heal him.”

  “What are you doing?”

  “I’m trying to hold the darkness within him so it doesn’t get out and infect us.” She hadn’t expected to need something like that here.

  “How is it that you know how to do that?”

  She flicked her gaze to Eva before turning back to Char. “That’s what I’ve been doing in the time I’ve been away. That’s what I’ve really been doing.”

  “You’ve been using unregulated sorcery.”

  She shook her head. “Not exactly. I made my agreement to get the power I needed in order to find Jonathan, but there was a price.”

  “The price of dark magic.”

  “The price of finding dark magic,” she said. She sent a swirl of power around and squeezed it inward, trapping the power in Rendal. His dark magic wasn’t fighting her efforts to contain it, not the way so many other dark magics worked, but she could feel it pushing outward in a way that suggested that if it were to escape from Rendal, they would have a very different battle on their hands. “I need you to use a healing on him while I trap this inside.”

  “If he’s sick from the dark magic, then it seems like removing it would be easiest,” he told her.

  Jayna shook her head. “Unfortunately, with the kind of power that’s within him, there will be no removal in this life.”

  Char started to laugh. “That means he’s going to die.”

  “Yes,” Jayna said. “Is that so bad?”

  “We’re taught at the Academy to preserve and protect life.”

  She thought of his comment when she’d first brought the sorcerer to him. He hadn’t been as concerned then, but she suspected it was more about Char’s irritation that she’d brought him someone else to heal than his real feelings.

  “That’s what you’re taught at the Academy,” she agreed. “But that’s not the way the world works. That’s not the way this kind of magic works.”

  “And you know so well how this magic works?”

  She looked over, smiling tightly. “I need you to try to heal him,” she said again.

  “Jayna, I’m not going to get caught up in using dark magic.”

  “You’re not using dark magic. He did.”

  “And you are.”

  She started to shake her head, but cut herself off. “I’m going to trap it, and you need to heal him. Once he starts coming around, then you need to back away.”

  “What are you going to do to him?”

  “I’m going to question him,” Jayna said.

  Char looked over to her, saying nothing. He kept his hands in place over Rendal’s chest, and the power flowing out from him didn’t shift, but he didn’t do anything more with the magic, certainly nothing that would imply he was trying to help heal him.

  “You know me, Char. You know what’s in my heart. When have you ever believed I would use dark magic?”

  Char watched her for another moment, then he turned his focus down to Rendal, and his power began to build again. It started slowly, building with a rapid intensity, washing out from him. It was a rippling, almost wavy sort of power. It was far more controlled than what she had seen him using with Topher, and far more impressive than what she had ever seen from Char before. He had learned quite a bit in the time since the two of them had been at the Academy. When she had been here before, having him help her with Topher, she had known he had learned more. Yet seeing it in action now, seeing the extent of his power and knowledge was . . .

  Exciting.

  She couldn’t deny he was an attractive man, but the power and control he held over his magic was even more attractive.

  Behind her, she could hear Eva’s soft laugh, just loud enough that Jayna suspected Eva knew how Jayna’s thoughts had turned.

  “I don’t know if this is even going to work,” Char said.

  “It has to work,” Jayna replied.

 
“And if it doesn’t?”

  “If it doesn’t, then . . .”

  If it didn’t, then she was going to have to find a different way, but right now, she didn’t know how else to find the Festival of Mourn or the Celebrants of Asymorn. All she knew was that she didn’t have much time remaining.

  She used the dragon stone ring, letting the painful energy swirl around, her hand continuing to constrict the darkness back into Rendal. It flowed into him, held there. She knew that if she hadn’t held on to that power tightly, she would lose control over it, which would likely cause some aspect of it to shift, and when it struck . . .

  Suddenly, Rendal took a deep, gasping breath.

  “Back away,” she said to Char.

  She stayed near Rendal. His eyes were open, though the irises were completely black. In fact, both eyes were entirely black. The energy pushing outward against the power she held to contain it threatened to seep out. Had she not looped so much energy around him, using the containment spell, she might not have been able to hold it. Strangely, there was something within the room that seemed to augment that containment spell, almost as if the room itself were designed to facilitate the kind of magic she used. Jayna would have to think about that later.

  “I need to know when your festival is going to happen.”

  Rendal turned his head, looking at her. “You are too late,” he said, his voice strange and twisted. There was a dark energy within it, and Jayna could practically feel the darkness constricting his vocal cords, altering the contours of his voice.

  She shivered, holding even more tightly to the power around her.

  Smoke swirled in the room, and she glanced over briefly to see Eva standing off to the side, her fists clenched, droplets of blood dripping to the ground. The smoke streaked upward and formed a soft pattern. Jayna suspected that she was the only one to see it, and she might even be the only one to feel it, other than Eva.

  She turned her attention back to him. “Asymorn, I presume. Rendal decided to summon your power himself.”

  He wanted power. Of course he wouldn’t have been willing to wait.

  Either that, or she was too late and Asymorn had already gotten too strong.

  “You are too late,” he repeated.

  “The dwaring haven’t been released, so I know that I’m not. When is the festival?”

  Rendal started to laugh. He thrashed, his body writhing on the ground, but the containment spell that Jayna had formed held him in place, preventing him from moving beyond her hold.

  “I compel you to tell me the timing of the festival.”

  She ignored Char’s soft gasp.

  That kind of magic was forbidden by the Academy, but it was that kind of magic that she needed now. Jayna understood the reasoning behind some of what the Academy had taught, but there were times when she had seen the need to go against the Academy’s teachings.

  Using sorcery to compel someone to follow instructions was considered dark magic. Using it to compel a dark sorcerer? That seemed like good magic to her.

  She twisted the spell, adding a layer that flowed into his mind, swirling downward. She used sorcery for that, ignoring the painful magic of the dragon stone ring. It was only through the combination of the two that she could compel Rendal to share the information she needed.

  “Jayna?” Char started.

  “Leave her,” Eva snapped.

  Jayna continued to push power out, focusing it on Rendal. “Where is the festival?”

  Rendal started to laugh even more. “You are never going to stop it in time. You could not.”

  Jayna took a deep breath, and she let another layer of power swirl around, holding the dragon stone ring above his belly.

  She could hold him now. The spell was complete, intact, and even though she didn’t understand it, she recognized that the walls of the room were designed to help her contain any more magic. As she continued squeezing, she could feel how the spell held that darkness inside.

  Now she had only to shift the containment spell again to compel him.

  It took another layer of power.

  It was drawing upon significant sorcery. Anyone who recognized sorcery—and inside of the outpost, that would be pretty much everyone—would recognize the kind of power she used.

  This was definitely forbidden magic.

  This would draw the Society to her.

  Doing it in front of Char, someone who was so tightly bound to, and affiliated with, the Society, was even more dangerous. It meant she would either have to explain herself, or she would have to find some way to compel him, to keep him from sharing what she had done.

  Jayna pushed that thought away, as well.

  Focus on Rendal.

  That was the reason she was here. Not to hurt Char. Char had helped.

  She pressed that power down into Rendal. “Where is the festival?”

  “You won’t be in time. Once the dwaring mature and emerge, he will take their power and come through.”

  At least she knew what his plan was. Even if she had no way of stopping it, no way of undermining the festival, she finally thought she understood what he intended: to bring the dwaring together.

  But “he will take their power”?

  Was Asymorn talking about himself . . . or someone else?

  She glanced over to Eva. “When the dwaring mature, what happens to their hosts?”

  “They will kill the host,” Eva said.

  Which meant Topher and the others would all die. More people would succumb to dark magic. She clenched her jaw, turning her attention back to him.

  “Tell me where the festival will be.”

  This time, she didn’t hold anything back. She poured everything she could into him, forcing it deep inside of him, even more power flowing out of her, slamming into Rendal. It was all of the energy of sorcery she could draw.

  As soon as she did it, she realized her mistake.

  She’d been using so much of her focus to compel him that she’d lost her hold.

  Rendal started to rise.

  The power he held attempted to squeeze out, and Jayna was forced to shift her focus, pulling on the energy of the dragon stone ring. She held it above his chest and started to twist her hand slowly, creating more of a containment spell. Even as she worked, she could feel the containment starting to fail.

  “Get out of here,” she shouted to the other two.

  “Jayna?” Char asked.

  “Get him out of here,” she said to Eva.

  Eva didn’t hesitate. She grabbed Char, pushed open the door, pushed him out of the room, and followed after him.

  That left her alone with Rendal.

  She didn’t want to be alone with him, but she recognized that if she lost control over the spell, she wanted to be the only one who would succumb to that dark magic. She didn’t want anything to happen to Char.

  “Do you think you can hold me forever, Toral?”

  “I don’t have to hold you forever,” Jayna snarled, squeezing even more power out.

  There was something in the dragon stone ring that reverberated off of the walls. She had to use that.

  Rendal thrashed, suddenly violent.

  She staggered back. She no longer needed to try to heal him and wake him. At this point, what she needed was to keep him held in place until she had her answer. She pushed out sorcery, using that in order to try to compel him to share what she needed, but even as she did, she knew he had more power than her.

  He had already tapped into the dark energy of Asymorn.

  Which meant she had to tap into something greater.

  The dragon stone ring connected her to Ceran, but because of the pain she felt each time she tapped into it, she had only been willing to use it superficially. Ceran had suggested that, over time, she would find herself drawing upon it more, but given her fear about how the pain tied her to something darker, she had hesitated. She’d glimpsed that power once, but had not fully reached it. Now seemed like a pretty good time to
have some mastery of it.

  She swirled her hand again, creating another looping of power to confine him. It barely held.

  Asymorn started laughing. “You make this too easy, Toral.”

  “And you will never escape this room.”

  “Oh, I know. But neither will you.”

  With that, he thrashed again, the dark energy pulsing, pressing outward, threatening to explode and overwhelm her.

  Ever since getting tied to Ceran, she had been bound to his quest, searching for surges of darkness. She had willingly accepted it, but she had also known the risk and the danger. Eventually, three things might happen: She could succumb to the dark magic herself, and end up chased by others like her; she could be destroyed by a dark magic user; or, less likely, she would grow in skill and power until she moved on to something Ceran hadn’t fully explained.

  She wasn’t ready to fail. Not yet.

  Jayna focused. She had felt the fluttering of power at the edge of the connection to the dragon stone ring before. She now had to reach it. Pain began to work through her, starting in her fingers, working up her wrist, and as she continued to reach for the energy within the dragon stone ring, it began to go up her arm. This was the point where she normally released it.

  She couldn't. Not yet.

  It was there. A vast emptiness. What did it matter if there was a twinge of darkness to it? Wasn’t the darkness a part of all things anyway?

  Jayna focused on the ring, felt the reverberation of energy off the wall, the power that pressed inward against her, and she squeezed.

  There came a flood of energy.

  It was more than she had ever reached from the ring before.

  Even more than what she’d glimpsed.

  She called upon that power. It worked into her chest. Ceran had suggested that she had some potential, and she tried not to think about what that meant for her.

  All she cared about was how she pushed that power into Rendal.

  He stopped thrashing. He stared up at her, dark eyes blackened.

  “You will never stop it,” Asymorn said.

  “Where is the festival?”