The Last Conclave (The Lost Prophecy Book 6)

by D. K. Holmberg

  “He seeks the Deshmaker. He seeks undoing.”

  Chapter Two

  Jakob stood outside the santrium, his mind racing. The nemerahl crouched next to him, his ears peaked and swiveling, as if hearing things that Jakob could not.

  What do you think she has seen? Jakob asked the nemerahl.

  The madness comes from the fibers. It is possible that she glimpsed much along the fibers.

  If she had, and if there were things that those who had been afflicted by the madness had learned, then didn’t he need to know about them? There was only so much that he could learn on his own, and there was no question that those in that room possessed ahmaean.

  He needed these people. They could be his allies in the fight against Raime.

  He wasn’t certain how, much as he wasn’t certain what role they could play, but if the healer was right, and strangeness happened around those who had been afflicted by the madness, he needed to understand what else might have happened, and what else they might know.

  I need to keep them safe.

  Yes, damahne. You do.

  I don’t know how.

  You are not alone. You are the only damahne, but you are not the only one who faces this danger. And this is a fight you are not suited for.

  Why is that?

  It will require patience and a presence that you are unable to maintain. You must find another who can help, and who you trust to serve in your stead.

  This was the most the nemerahl had ever shared with him. He wasn’t sure why he was doing so now, but it didn’t matter. He needed to listen to his advice and find someone willing to help him. But how was he to do that?

  Who did he trust to work with these people?

  Novan came to mind, but he needed the historian to continue his studies, researching what he could find in the library, working with the Magi, or the scholars at the university, to discover secrets about the past, answers to what else Raime might attempt.

  The daneamiin might be able to help, but that risked pulling them from the Old Forest, and risked exposing them to Raime. The entire reason that they were in the Old Forest was to avoid his reach. If he discovered that they were in Chrysia—a place where he could shift and steal their abilities—Jakob placed them in danger once more.

  Could he ask the Magi?

  The Magi were attempting to expand their reach, reentering the world once more, but doing so extended them in ways that they may not be capable of managing. They had lost many in the fight in Vasha. How many more could they risk?

  That was not the answer, either.

  Roelle and the other warriors were needed in the south lands. He needed her influence there to control the impact of the Deshmahne. He could ask Brohmin, but he was one man, and the Hunter might be needed for other purposes.

  Who did that leave?

  Jakob wasn’t certain.

  He looked around, and as he did, his eyes settled on the new temple rising from the grounds near the palace. The original temple had been destroyed during the Deshmahne attack, and the Urmahne priests had begun rebuilding it, though its rising tower was a poor imitation of the Tower of the Gods in Thealon. Now that he had been there, Jakob recognized just how poor.

  Could the priests be useful?

  He knew they would protect these people. The santrium was an arm of the Urmahne religion, though a distant one, that many of the priests preferred to forget existed. When his brother had been there, and when his father had served as a priest, there had been greater attention paid to the santrium and those who suffered within its walls. But it had still been very little.

  If he asked the priests, how would he do it? Would he go to them as his father’s son, and claim a need for them to watch over the santrium and those who lived within it? Or better yet, he could take those people to the temple, and ask the priests to nurture them.

  He doubted that would be effective. The priests would not simply agree to his request. He might be the son of a dead priest, but he had no authority over them.

  Not as Jakob.

  What if he went as a damahne?

  Not just a damahne. A god.

  No. It seemed too much for him to attempt.

  But he might need them. And if they believed that he was a god, they would do exactly what he hoped for. They would watch over those recovering from the madness, especially those who had seen things along the fibers, experiencing a glimpse of Raime’s power.

  Then there was their tenuous—but real—connection to the ahmaean.

  What if the madness had been a sign of something else?

  Before his abilities had developed, Jakob had had visions. What if these people had the same potential he’d had to become damahne? Wasn’t it possible that he wasn’t the only one? That he wasn’t the only one who had grown into powers and abilities that he had not been born into? If so, there was even more reason for him to protect them.

  But finding a way to protect them meant convincing the priests that he was a god. Jakob wasn’t sure how he felt about that. The damahne had been viewed as gods in the past, and both the Urmahne and the Magi still believed that they were. Would it be taking advantage of that if he appeared, and asked for their help?

  And it might not even work. If there were priests within the temple who recognized him, who knew him as Jakob Nialsen, he was doubtful that he would be able to convince them that he was a god.

  How did Alyta view people considering her a goddess? Jakob asked the nemerahl.

  Few of the damahne cared for that perception.

  But they did nothing to stop it.

  Not in this time.

  Jakob frowned. That seemed a strange answer. Does that mean there was another time when they did attempt to stop it?

  There was a time when wars were waged between believers and nonbelievers. The damahne wanted only peace.

  The Uniter. Jakob remembered that vision and remembered sitting in the center of the Great Forest, watching as the first Uniter was brought forward. What had the damahne said? He couldn’t remember clearly, but suspected he could walk back, could sit within Shoren once more, to observe that Choosing once again.

  The Uniter was chosen to establish peace. There was violence, and many were lost over whether the damahne were gods.

  Why did they not simply stop it? They would have had that ability.

  They had the ability, but doing so meant revealing themselves. At that point, revealing themselves meant risking death.

  But they had the connection to the ahmaean. They would have been able to stop others from attempting to harm them.

  Perhaps. As I said, much was different then. The damahne were still coming to terms with the fact that they were mortal.

  They didn’t know they were mortal before then?

  The damahne live a long time. Long enough that none had discovered their own mortality. It is an interesting thing coming to grips with the fact that there is an end to all things. The damahne handled it no better than any man does.

  I feel deceptive by pretending to be a god when I know what I am.

  Then don’t make that claim. Choose only not to correct them when they make an assumption.

  Is that what Alyta would have done?

  It is what Alyta did. Rather than starting more uproar, she chose to avoid the issue.

  It felt deceptive, but what other choice did he have? He needed the help of the priests and thought that they were best suited for what he needed, but asking required that he have them believe something of himself that he did not believe.

  If he did it, he couldn’t go in with his sword. He would need to be dressed appropriately, as well. Luckily, he knew a place where he could get clothing.

  Jakob shifted, appearing in the Tower of the Gods in one of the upper levels. He had been here infrequently since defeating Raime, and each time that he came, he felt something of an imposter. The damahne who had lived here had known about their abilities and had known what they were capable of doing. Jakob had only memories,
and those borrowed from damahne who had lived long ago.

  He was unsurprised when the nemerahl appeared next to him.

  The great creature sniffed the air, pawing at the stone.

  You weren’t here when she was captured, Jakob said.

  She asked that I not. She feared what would happen if we both were captured.

  Has Raime stolen from any nemerahl?

  There are two creatures that he has failed to acquire.

  Nemerahl and damahne, Jakob said. What would happen if he were to capture a nemerahl? Would he be able to steal ahmaean the same as he has with the daneamiin and Magi?

  Both nemerahl and damahne have a different connection to their ahmaean.

  Jakob waited for the nemerahl to expand on that, but he did not. How is the connection different?

  With the daneamiin and the Magi, there is a derivative connection to ahmaean. Damahne and nemerahl both have a more direct connection.

  There was something about his explanation that did not feel quite right to Jakob. He’d spent more time around the daneamiin and understood their ahmaean better than he did the Magi, but neither connection to the ahmaean felt derivative. Both had a connection, though it might be different from the damahne’s connection.

  Jakob made his way up the stairs and reached a room on one of the upper levels. He chose this level because of familiarity. When he had walked back along the fibers and stepped back into his ancestor, he had visited the Tower and knew which rooms Shoren had claimed.

  You will borrow from Shoren, the nemerahl said.

  Jakob glanced over at the creature. You think that I should not?

  You have much in common with him.

  That surprised Jakob. When he stepped back along the fibers, he never had the impression that Shoren cared for what he did. Shoren recognized the need and had been willing to help him, teaching him some of what he did not know about what it meant to be damahne, but he would never have considered himself similar to Shoren.

  Did you know him?

  Only near the end. I was born too late to know him well, but there is a reason he is exalted among even the damahne.

  A god among gods. That had been what Brohmin had said to him, describing Shoren and everything that he was. The city that was now Thealon had once been named after him. Jakob had walked back along the fibers but had not visited the time when Shoren had such influence.

  That wasn’t entirely true. He’d had a vision of the founding of the daneamiin, and the time when they first moved across the Great Valley. Shoren had much influence at that time. He had sat on the Council, helping guide the damahne. Had that been a time when he already led?

  The room at the end of the hall seemed familiar. Rescuing Alyta had taken him many floors above here, and Jakob felt that those rooms deserved to be left untouched. Alyta deserved that much. He had not taken time to explore the lower levels, other than in the visions when he had walked them as another damahne.

  Which rooms were Shoren’s?

  You know which floor but not which rooms?

  When I walk the fibers, there is… an incomplete connection. I can tell where I am in the Tower, and know some of it, but not all of the memories filter through.

  Your connection is different from that of most who look back along the fibers.

  That is what Shoren tells me, as well.

  You have talked with him?

  We have talked, but each time I go back, there seems to be something more that I need from him. And Jakob needed to go back again. He needed to ask Shoren if he influenced the present by looking forward, and what consequences there might be. For that matter, he wondered if there were consequences to him walking back along the fibers. Did his presence change things for Shoren?

  You should return.

  I know. We need to return to Chrysia and convince the priests to watch over those who suffered from the madness.

  That is not what I mean. You should return.

  Return where?

  You have questions. This is a place to seek answers and is as safe as any place you will find for you to look back and venture along the fibers.

  Why now?

  Because you are like him.

  Is that a compliment?

  It is what it is. You are different. In that, you are like him. To the damahne, he was different.

  When I’ve spoken to him, he has been willing to listen, but I get the sense that it troubles him that I walk back as I do.

  As it should.

  What does that mean?

  You should return, the nemerahl said again as Jakob opened the door.

  He stepped into the room and noted a long wooden table with several chairs pushed back along the walls. This was not a room where Shoren would have stored any of his clothing.

  He looked over to the nemerahl and realized the creature had guided him here not so much to find appropriate clothing that would fit the priest’s expectation of one of the gods, but so he could walk back along the fibers.

  You will watch?

  I will watch. You will be safe, damahne.

  Jakob took a seat and walked back along the fibers.

  Chapter Three

  The long table was heavily lacquered and polished until it practically glowed, an appearance that reminded Jakob more of what he had seen in Vasha than anyplace else. It was made of thick, solid wood, and the dozen chairs stationed around it were similarly well built. Everything in the room had a faint sheen to it, shimmering energy that he saw despite the steady glow from the white lanterns stationed throughout the room. They were little more than solid orbs of light, a pure, glowing light that cast away most of the shadows. Jakob likely would have seen through the shadows anyway.

  The sculptures in the corners of the room were unusual, and crafted more precisely, and with a much defter touch, than any he had seen outside of the Tower of the Gods. Likely, they were made by damahne craftsmen, but in the time that he had walked back along the fibers, stepping into damahne he had descended from, he had never seen craftsmen among them. That was not to say there couldn’t be, only that his experience was limited.

  You have been silent since you came.

  The voice came from within his mind, the steady and powerful voice of Shoren, a damahne widely viewed as one of the most powerful and influential to have ever lived. After learning that, Jakob had been surprised that he was descended from Shoren, and he was even more surprised at how willing the damahne had been to connect with him.

  I have discovered a connection to one of the nemerahl.

  So you have bonded. That has taken longer than I would have expected.

  How do you know how long it has taken?

  It didn’t make sense to Jakob for Shoren to have a sense of time passing in Jakob’s present time.

  Shoren chuckled, the sound deep and rumbling, and simply within his mind. The connection goes both ways. Did you think that only you gained from the time we spend?

  I didn’t know if I had anything for you to gain from.

  Perhaps you don’t. It’s possible that your experiences, and the time that you live in, are far too different for me to understand and to help.

  But you don’t think so.

  There is a benefit in knowing, even if there is nothing you can do about it.

  This was the reason Jakob had walked back along the fibers. He had wanted to know if glimpsing along the fibers, and seeing the possible futures, would change his actions, and influence what path he would take.

  I have begun to see forward.

  And?

  And it requires that I go to a place we call the Old Forest.

  Jakob had the sense that Shoren was surprised by that. You should not have entered that place.

  Why?

  The Old Forest should not have granted your passage. There is a particular power there.

  It was Jakob’s turn to chuckle. Could it be that he’d discovered something the damahne never had? I don’t know if I should share with you then.
r />   And why not?

  If I share with you, it might change what happens.

  Ah, now I see the reason you have come. I see your dilemma.

  Does it make a difference?

  Shoren moved his hands so that they were resting flat along the table. He had long fingers, hands that were slender much like the daneamiin. He was dressed in a robe of royal blue, the fabric so soft against his skin that it was practically invisible. A single ring circled his finger, the dark metal band reminding Jakob of that which he’d seen from the Conclave.

  Knowing what might come presents the possibility of altering how you act. That is the power that exists in glimpsing forward along the fibers. When you learn enough, when you begin to master it, you can affect the future in such a way that you can choose which course you would push toward. Even that does not guarantee that your choice will matter.

  Jakob thought about what he knew of the fibers, the way they twisted in front of him when he had glimpsed forward. In some, there had been thousands of strands that twisted away, so many that it was difficult for him to gauge how to influence them. In others, there were only a few different choices, and those it seemed easier to impact. He thought back to how he had surveyed the fibers, the way he had searched along them, looking for tendencies, and had used that as a way to know what might be possible.

  I fear that knowing what might come might impact my choice in a way that I don’t intend.

  Such is the power of the fibers. Many damahne chose only to look back along the fibers, preferring to glimpse a vision of their past and nothing more. They recognized the danger in looking into the future, even if they were able to do so.

  Jakob had not been able to look forward until he had gone to the Old Forest, and even then, to do so required that he draw upon the ahmaean within the Forest.