Jakob couldn’t move. The trunk was captured. He could almost hear the Deshmahne laughing, thought he felt hot breath on his neck.
What have I done?
He heaved himself forward and felt another tearing of his mind, unbearably worse than the last.
“No!”
The word echoed through his head was chased by strange thoughts: Was this real? Could this all be the madness? Hadn’t his brother screamed like this?
But he had seen Tian die and had watched as Rit took his last breath. He had seen the clearing full of dead Denraen.
Hadn’t he? What if that had all been in his mind?
Jakob threw himself forward again, nausea and a sense of spinning returning as he did. Pushing through it, he surged forward again. And again. And again.
Finally, he couldn’t muster another surge. All the strength had left him. His head was a steady drumbeat, a pulsing pain that sent waves throughout him.
The stench of rot was gone.
Daring to open his eyes, he noticed everything was different.
His vision was hazy, as if a smoky fire obscured his view. He could still see trees, but the sky was different somehow, now gray and clouded where it had been growing dark before.
Strange.
It was the only thought that came.
Then he noticed something else seemed different as well. The ground was not flat as it had been. All around him were hills, rolling and flowing into the horizon. He knew without looking that the city in the distance was gone.
Where was he?
When he turned, two figures stood behind him.
Panicking, he dove to the ground, rolling as he landed, and felt a sharp pain as the trunk crashed into his back and his saddlebags slipped off his shoulder. He twisted noisily as he rolled, eventually coming to rest behind a large bush, ready to defend himself if needed.
He peered out around the bush. Through the haze, a man and a woman stood in a clearing. Not a woman as he knew them, he realized. Her hair was a light flaxen blonde, her skin deeply tanned from the sun. Her face was long and sloped with a slightly different shape.
She was beautiful. There was a warmth about her, friendly and reassuring.
The man was dressed in a simple woolen vest and dark breeches. A sword was sheathed across his back, a dark leather scabbard covering the weapon. Jakob could almost make out the figures adorning the hilt of the man’s sword. Something about them tugged at a memory, but passed. Gray hair was cut raggedly and short gray whiskers covered his face in a beard.
These were not Deshmahne.
They were talking and didn’t seem to notice his appearance or noisy roll to cover. He didn’t know how they could not, but he listened and could just make out their words.
“Sharna, the split was not successful. The people hide in the south, and though no longer attached to the mainland, they reach us still,” the man said.
“We have done much, Niall Tinmril. My people have suffered to save yours.” Her words had an almost musical quality to them.
A pained look came to Niall’s face. “The north is lost, Sharna. The south will soon be, I fear.” As the man spoke, tears welled in Sharna’s eyes. Her eyes were as yellow as the brightest sunflower. “They use ships now to reach us. It was bad enough when they could just cross the land bridge and reach us in the south. Your people stopped that with the split.”
“And many were lost. My husband was lost.”
Niall looked visibly shaken at the news, and tried to regain his composure before going on. “Yet they keep coming. And there are so many of them that the ships keep coming. Ours can only hold them off so much longer,” he said.
Sharna nodded. It was a sad gesture.
“The people expect you to save them. Some still think the gods will save them.”
Sharna laughed lightly, a sweet sound. “Some still think us to be gods, Niall.” She stopped for a moment, looking around. “We are what we are. And we will not be for much longer.”
“I know, my lady. To some you are. To others... to others, you never will be.”
“Much the better, I should think. Better to not have been and failed than to have the hope and the failure. Failure is all I can see. All many can see.”
Jakob sensed an enormity to their words. They spoke of war, though he had heard nothing about a war such as they described. Would Novan hide that from him?
Jakob shook his head. Novan would have shared that news.
Observe and report.
The thought interrupted, and he focused on the two people in front of him. It was what Novan would expect.
Niall nodded. “I have heard.” He seemed to hesitate. To Jakob, it looked as if he was uncertain about how to proceed. “Some still see hope. Some saw the possibility.”
Sharna’s words came out a whispered reply. “The fibers are twisted, that much is true. I can only untangle so far”—she demonstrated with her hands, spreading them wide—“before the tangle falls back into place. Others, they can see farther. That is why you were chosen. That is why you are the one.” She paused long enough to take a deep breath. “Hope? I will not say there is none. Only that I cannot see it.”
She fell silent. There was something different about the haze around her, not the fearsome fog that surrounded the Deshmahne, but similar. Softer, warmer. It was almost welcoming.
Niall seemed content with her answer. Jakob had moved slightly to the side of the bush without realizing it as he’d listened to their conversation. He noticed that he was now completely out in the open. Though he was visible, the hazy smoke still obscured him somewhat from their view. He shifted to his knees, his fingers clawing at the dark grass, and moved slowly back behind the bush.
Sharna glanced in his direction. A slight glance, more occasional than chance alone would have it. He wondered if she knew he was there.
Niall spoke again. “Have your people considered my proposal?”
“It... is risky.” Niall nodded in agreement. “And many more of my people would be lost.”
“Why?”
“That much change, that much energy requires that we give up our own. We have learned this from experiences in the past.”
“Can you not do it slowly?” Niall offered.
She shook her head. “What you ask requires that we work quickly. Otherwise, the effort would be in vain. And speed requires strength. Some among us no longer have that strength.”
The words rattled Niall and his eyes widened.
“We have considered, though. That is enough for now.”
Niall nodded. “The people will be ready. I assure you of that.”
“That is why you were chosen, Niall Tinmril. That is why you are the Uniter.”
Uniter.
Jakob knew the term. Novan had mentioned it and had him read about the Magi practice of the Uniter.
Was this woman a Mage then? She looked nothing like the Magi he’d seen, though admittedly that was few. In many ways, she was different from any woman he had ever seen. He considered the idea that she could be a goddess.
Sharna’s glances became more frequent in his direction. At the same time, he felt as if the energy he saw, what he thought of as her aura, reached toward him. It seemed to beckon him, calling to him. He didn’t know how to respond but knew he needed to leave. Soon. He didn’t feel threatened, but didn’t want either of these people to think he’d been listening.
Finally, Jakob heard Niall ask, “What of our cousins to the east?”
Sharna paused as she thought. “We don’t know. They’ve not come to us in some time. They’re capable in their own ways, though. Doubtless, we could use their help.”
After a brief silence, Niall asked, “What can I do now? How can I serve?”
Sharna shook her head, long blonde hair moving only slightly with the motion. “We must go on as we have been. We will contact you as needed. You still have the gift?” she asked, eyes seeming to examine him before looking back to his face and nodding. “
Good.”
“We need to stop him, you know. It could change everything.”
“It may be that he cannot be stopped now. The man has grown strong over the years. We’re not sure how. We don’t know what it will take to stop him now.” She stopped for a moment. “We should have been more careful with him.”
Jakob could almost feel Sharna pull at him now. Her energy seemed to encircle him, cradle him in warmth. As he struggled to figure out how to leave, the pain in his head returned. Not as strong this time around, but still a tearing of his mind. Nausea rolled through him, and the pulsing came again. His head spun, around and around, and he felt the urge to vomit.
Something was wrong.
He struggled against the nausea and the pain again, futile. He felt things move beneath him and the ground tremble. The pain intensified in his head, ripping at his mind. Colors flashed before his eyes. He opened his mouth and his lungs burned.
He screamed until he could no longer hold breath. He panted with the pain, panting because he could do nothing else. It stretched on, seeming an eternity.
Finally, everything ceased.
The pain pulled back to a slight throb, and everything was gone except the pulsing in his mind.
He felt wetness on his cheeks.
He opened his eyes and saw himself surrounded again by trees. Trees so high they blocked out the sun and the sky. Trees so big around, he knew he would grow tired trying to circle them. All about him was strangely dark greenery. He was deep within some great forest, but didn’t know where or how he’d come here.
Am I dreaming or is it the madness?
The smoky haze had followed him so that nothing was clear. No edges were really straight and everything had a slight blur to it, a fuzziness so that he squinted to see. It was much worse here than it had been in the last clearing.
He found himself walking a bit, short strides on his part seeming to take him miles at a time, and he decided that he must be dreaming. The scenery blurred even more as he walked. Pausing, he realized the smoke didn’t clear as he moved. He turned his head, looking around, trying to see if he could make sense out of where he was.
The forest still surrounded him. He was lost. In spite of the anxiety, he felt a sense of serenity and peacefulness.
He took another step. Trees blurred past him and the terrain changed.
Another step and the blurring continued.
It was almost as if with every step, he jumped hundreds of miles, but he knew that couldn’t be so.
He stopped again and his head still throbbed.
Jakob was in a clearing and all around it huge trees formed an almost perfect circle ringing the clearing with their monstrous branches reaching higher into the sky than any others. Dark leaves covered the ground in a thick layer, the smell of their sweet decay teasing his nostrils. Huge gray boulders formed another circle in the center of the clearing. He counted thirteen. Beyond the boulders, he saw little.
Three figures perched atop the boulders. Jakob knew he could be seen standing where he was, just inside the clearing at the edge of the trees, but something told him that he couldn’t. The smoky haze still covered everything, almost in a film, and made it difficult for him to even make out features at his distance. He believed something about the haze protected him, hid him.
He shuffled closer, careful not to move too fast, pulled to the boulders as though by a magnet. He reached the nearest stone and easily climbed atop it. He watched the others as he did, and they seemed not to notice.
One of the people was familiar to him—the blonde hair, darkly tanned skin—and he knew it to be Sharna. Something about her was different, changed from the last time. It took a moment before he understood. She was younger. Her face was smoother, her features a little less severe. He wondered briefly how that could be. Around her, he could clearly see colors, an energy. Pale and vague, but he knew he saw it this time. It swirled off of her, toward the other two, occasionally touching the others and pulling back.
The others were the same as Sharna with the elegance in their form, the shape of their faces and eyes, and the slight point to their ears.
Was he looking upon a meeting of the gods?
How can it be they don’t see me?
The madness. That could be the only explanation.
Both men were dressed identically, simple brown cloaks made of some fabric he’d never before seen. It looked too smooth, too soft to be anything he’d known. One of them had dark hair, black as night, and the other had reddish hair, standing wildly and the color of fire. The same colors, the energy, surrounding Sharna surrounded each of the men.
“The great cities of the north are nearly empty,” Sharna said. “The mines deserted. All head south across the land bridge. The south cannot sustain that many people.”
The fire-haired man—likely god—nodded. “It is as you say Sharna day-Morin.” The words came flowing out, the name spoken in another tongue. He wondered how he understood what they were saying. “The north will be empty soon.”
As the man spoke, a finger of his energy, his aura, stretched out and touched that of Sharna. She made no movement away.
“What drives them south?” Sharna asked.
Her energy stretched fingers out to both of the men as she spoke, touching their auras before pulling away.
Both the men shook their heads slowly. Neither answered for a while. The quiet of the forest was almost too much.
“We do not know the nature of these creatures. We do not know what they are.” It was the dark-haired man that spoke now. “But Treval sen-Pornot speaks rightly. The north will soon be empty. The remaining cities cannot hold for long.”
Sharna nodded. “They cannot see what they are fighting, and we can do nothing?” The question seemed to be asking more than what it was.
“We must not interfere. Ours is a purpose much greater than that of mankind,” Treval said, answering the extra question Sharna implied.
Sharna seemed upset with the answer. Her words came out slightly more agitated this time. To Jakob’s eyes, the field of her aura, the pale cloud surrounding her, grew wider with her agitation. “Without mankind, what do we protect? What do we save?”
The dark-haired man answered. “You know we protect more than mankind.”
Treval nodded. “Denmri sen-Kalub and I are in agreement. We cannot interfere. We must wait.”
Sharna looked from man to man. Her words came quietly as she said, “You know what was foreseen. With destruction, he gains strength. With strength, he will break free. Soon we may not be enough.”
The words left a chill in the air.
He looked around again. The haze still covered him, cloaked him, but he noticed something else as well. All about his arms, his waist and legs, was a field of the same energy that surrounded the other two. It was pale, cloudy, and vague, yet it was unmistakable.
The madness.
He brought his eyes up fearfully. If he could see their auras, surely they must be able to see his. So far, they hadn’t seemed to notice anything. None of the three even bothered to look in his direction.
“He has gained the power to lead them,” Denmri said.
Sharna shook her head. “He too has grown strong since last we knew him. A man, and yet now...”
Treval picked up for her, finishing her thought. “Now he is more than a man. It does not bode well.”
Sharna looked right at Jakob. Bright yellow eyes seemed to peer right into his simple blues. His heart jumped, and he could feel it start to beat wildly. A finger of her aura came tentatively toward him, feeling its way along. The two men looked over, following her energy with their eyes, and began to send much thicker fingers his way, probes as thick as his legs.
Jakob needed to get away.
The pale energy neared him. His mind raced, frantic, and a sudden pain tore at his head again. It ripped from the front to the back of his skull, as if tearing parts of him loose as it moved along. He reached up to grab his head, to steady it,
and with the motion felt the nausea return. It rolled in waves up and down his body, through his head.
He leaned over, thinking he might retch.
It was worse than it had been before. The pulsing in his head began vibrating in a scream and combined with the tearing pain into some awful twisted hybrid of feelings. He opened his mouth, needing to scream, needing to shout in his agony.
As he did it ceased.
The world stilled. The spinning stopped. The pain pulled back to a dull ache. The pulsing softened, but did not go away.
Jakob opened his eyes. The haze was thicker now, and it was much more difficult to see. As he looked down at his feet, hard rock was all he saw through the haze. He brought a hand to his face, and still saw the pale energy around him.
What did it mean?
His mind provided the answer and he feared the truth of it.
The madness.
There could be no other explanation.
He took a step and the horizon blurred. He almost felt the whistle of the wind as it whipped across his face, loud in his ears. The faint impression of ever-heightening rock ahead of him pressed upon him as he stopped. Browns and grays of more rock surrounded him as he turned his head. He was in the mountains.
Another step, more blurring.
All around him the rocky ground sloped away. He was on the peak of one of the mountains.
Below him, he saw dark spots all along the face of the mountain that he suspected were caves. His eyes struggled to see through the thick haze, and he saw shapes stream from the mouths of the caves.
No, that’s not quite right.
It wasn’t that he saw actual shapes but rather many small circles of energy. An energy, or aura, that was both the same and completely different from what he had seen around Sharna and the others. It was dark, almost black, and seemed thick and heavy, whereas the energy around what he believed to be the gods was wispy and light.
He sensed that it was bitter cold. He shivered from watching. There were hundreds all the same, thousands even. Straining his eyes, he felt the now ever-present pulsing grow stronger in his head and as it did, shapes of creatures formed out of the dark energy.
The Threat of Madness (The Lost Prophecy Book 1) Page 21