The Last Conclave (The Lost Prophecy Book 6)

by D. K. Holmberg

  “What is this pattern?” Jakob asked.

  Novan followed the direction of his gaze, and a deep frown furrowed his brow. “How is it that you see it so clearly?”

  “How could I not? The pattern practically jumps out at me.”

  Novan leaned forward on his staff, and the tip of it pressed into the rock. “There are not many outside of the Conclave who recognize that there is any pattern here.”

  Jakob looked over to him and frowned. “How many outside of the Conclave have faced the Deshmahne as often as I have?”

  “Probably not that many.”

  “What does the pattern mean?”

  Novan dragged the tip of his staff across the ground, re-creating the pattern. “There is protection in the shape. Long ago, some of the first members of the Conclave imbued this area with their ahmaean, and they used that to create this pattern, concealing the location from outsiders.”

  “Others can’t find this place?”

  “Not easily. Others have found it, but they struggle in doing so. Imagine had I not led you here, would you have discovered it?”

  Jakob arched a brow at him. “I doubt I would’ve looked on Salvat.”

  “Even had you looked on Salvat, without having guidance, would you have known this was here?”

  “I would have suspected there were ruins here,” Jakob said.

  “Are you certain? From the shore, you knew where to look only because I showed you.”

  “I knew where to look because I could see the ruins, Novan.”

  He frowned, studying Jakob intently. “Sometimes, I forget that you are damahne. You shift us, which means that you must be damahne, but when I look at you, I still see the inexperienced—and uncertain—young man who came to work with me in Chrysia.”

  Jakob patted Novan on the shoulder. "Most of the time, I still feel like that person. It still amazes me that I have these abilities and can do these things.”

  “I never asked Alyta if she was able to see past the distraction placed here to disguise the Conclave. Perhaps she was, even without knowing what was here.”

  “There must have been other damahne who visited here over the years.”

  “Not as many as there once had been. The damahne have dwindled over time, and he last few had taken varying levels of interest in the Conclave. Alyta was active, as was the damahne who was nearly the last.”

  Jakob still hadn’t learned about all of the damahne, but he knew that there would have to have been others before Alyta. He assumed all of them would have been involved with the Conclave, but perhaps that wasn’t true.

  “Where now?” Jakob asked.

  Novan tipped his head in a nod toward the buildings. “Now we need to enter.”

  “Is there some trick?” Jakob asked. He was thinking of what he’d needed to do in the heart of the Great Forest, the way he had to rearrange the stones so that he could create the opening, and enter the hidden area of the damahne.

  “No trick. This is not a place only for damahne, or only for Magi. Many of those who have been chosen to serve the Conclave over the years have no abilities.”

  Novan hopped down from the rock and made his way toward the nearest set of buildings. He approached slowly, and Jakob noted the way that he dragged his staff across the ground, the tip scratching along the stones, the sound reverberating from the rock.

  Jakob followed but kept a careful distance. There is something about this place that made him somewhat uncomfortable. He’d asked to come, and he needed to hear what the Conclave might know about Raime. They had to know something, and he needed to discover what it was.

  Once they entered the space between the buildings, Jakob felt a tingle wash over his skin. This was the same as every other ruins that he’d visited. He drew upon his ahmaean, pulling it toward him, uncertain what he might need to do next. Perhaps there would be no need for any response, but everything he’d been through had taught him that he needed to remain prepared for the possibility that he could be attacked, or surprised by someone else.

  Novan motioned to him, signaling for him to hurry along.

  “There’s no need to be so reticent.”

  “But you are,” Jakob said.

  “My reluctance comes from a different source. I have been away from here for many years.”

  Jakob looked over at him, frowning as he did. “You’ve been away, but you continue to serve the Conclave.”

  Novan leaned on his staff, and he twisted a dark ring on his finger while staring ahead. “I have never stopped serving the Conclave. From the moment they welcomed me, I have done nothing but serve the cause.”

  “You’re nervous about something.”

  Novan blinked and turned to look at Jakob. “You’ve met those of the Conclave who have remained a part of the world, and who have sought to influence it. Endric, in particular, has remained an integral part of the world. Even Brohmin, for all of the ways that he remains hidden, and moves in shadows, has remained a part of the world. There are others here, many who have a great understanding and experience, but who have taken themselves out, removing themselves from the rest of the world.”

  “You don’t think they will understand?”

  “I don’t know whether they’ll believe what we have to tell them. That troubles me more than anything else.”

  Novan started forward again, and as his staff dragged across the stones, he began to lift it periodically, and drop it with a strange rhythm. Every few steps, he lifted the staff and dropped it to the ground, letting it make a soft thunk as it hit.

  The ahmaean flowing from Novan into his staff increased. The power surged, and Jakob realized how careful Novan was being.

  They reached a doorway, and Novan stopped in front of it. The door was made of stone and was carved with intricate patterns along the surface. It blended into the rest of the stone surrounding it, practically trying to conceal it. Up close, it was obvious that it was a doorway, but from a distance, Jakob imagined that it would be less obvious, and harder for him to see.

  Novan closed his eyes and took a deep breath before opening the door, tapping his staff against the stone. With each tap, his ahmaean flowed from the end of the staff and into the patterns along the door.

  “I thought you said you didn’t need to have any powers to reach this place.”

  Novan glanced over at him. “You do not.”

  “And yet you’re using your ahmaean in such a way that it appears that it is necessary.”

  Novan smiled. “Only to announce myself. This way, there will be fewer questions about my arrival.” Novan glanced down at Jakob’s sword and shrugged. “And yours.”

  They waited, and when nothing happened, Novan once again tapped on the door with his staff. This time, the sound was louder, reverberating across the stone. He pressed even more ahmaean through his patterns along his staff, and even more ahmaean flowed from him and into the staff, before swirling into the stone itself.

  Novan muttered something under his breath that Jakob could not hear.

  Jakob was prepared for them to depart, thinking that Novan had been mistaken, or that perhaps he had been away from the Conclave long enough that they no longer welcomed him, when the door began to open.

  It moved slowly, and dust rained down from the top of the door, making Jakob think that it had not been opened in ages. An older man, who looked as if he might have been muscular in his youth, stood on the other side of the door, an intensity to his eyes that almost forced Jakob to take a step back.

  The man fixed his gaze on Novan, seemingly ignoring Jakob. “Historian. You’ve been gone for many years. What brings you back now?”

  Novan glanced over to Jakob, as did the older man. He studied Jakob fleetingly, long enough to flick his gaze down to Jakob’s sword before looking back up and meeting Jakob’s eyes.

  “You brought another with you. Do you think to introduce others to the Conclave now?”

  “I think that much has happened since you’ve been outside of t
hese walls.”

  “We are fully apprised of the situation with the Deshmahne.”

  “And with the groeliin?” Novan asked.

  “Only that they moved south in numbers.”

  “And they moved against Thealon. There were ten thousand groeliin in that horde. Was the Conclave aware of that?”

  The man met Novan’s gaze. “Yes.”

  Novan smiled slightly. “Endric sent word?”

  The older man’s jaw clenched slightly. “Endric has been faithful to the vows he made to the Conclave.”

  “Endric made vows to the Denraen. Any vows he made to the Conclave would be superseded by those to the Denraen.”

  “You don’t need to lecture me about the vows of the Denraen,” the man said.

  An uneasy silence settled between them, and Novan tapped his staff on the ground. “Are you going to let us in, or are you going to hold us here?”

  The older man’s gaze drifted back and considered Jakob once more. “This is not how it’s done, historian. The Conclave simply doesn’t welcome a new member because one member—and particularly you—choose it.”

  Novan took a quick breath, and Jakob recognized the frustration within him. He’d seen it from Novan before, but that had been back in Chrysia, and usually at the expense of the city leaders. Occasionally, he’d seen it drawn out from the Ur, especially when they had left the city searching for raiders. Novan had been irritated then, though he had made an effort to hide it.

  “Do you know what happened with Alyta?”

  “Alyta often remains silent for stretches of time.”

  “She’s gone.”

  With those two words, Novan elicited the most response that Jakob had seen from the older man. “Gone? How can she be gone?”

  Novan sniffed. “If you would have been willing to leave this place, you would have seen that she knew her time was coming to an end. She had been growing weaker, and knew that she wouldn’t be able to last much longer.”

  “She was the last.”

  Novan arched a brow. “Was she?”

  “What does that mean? How did she pass?”

  “Raime captured her.”

  “Raime would have no way of stealing from one of the damahne.”

  “He has learned more than any of the Conclave. If anyone would have learned how to steal from the damahne, it would have been Raime.”

  The older man crossed his arms over his chest, and Jakob had a sense of the strength that once would have existed within the man. “What about your comment that she is not the last?”

  Novan turned and looked at Jakob once more.

  The older man chuckled. “You would have me believe that this young man is damahne?”

  Novan shrugged. “I admit that it surprised even me. The only person who might not have been surprised was Endric. He trained this young man and sent him on a mission that we had intended for Endric.”

  The older man’s gaze drifted once more to Jakob’s sword. “Endric trained him?”

  “He did.”

  “No damahne has ever used a sword.”

  “Until now. Alyta passed on her abilities to him as she was dying. That was the only way she was going to prevent Raime from taking them.”

  The older man frowned again, and Jakob realized that he had a faint ring of ahmaean around him. It was subtle, and not nearly as much as what even Novan had. There was something to it that was familiar, though Jakob was uncertain why that would be.

  “This is unorthodox, historian.”

  Novan sighed. “All of this is.”

  The older man seemed to consider for a long moment, and his gaze lingered on Jakob, and on his sword the longest. He didn’t know why that would be, or why there should be something about the man’s ahmaean that resonated with Jakob, that seemed to remind him of another he had known, though Jakob couldn’t tell who that was.

  Finally, the older man stepped aside and motioned for them to follow. “You can enter, but he cannot.”

  Novan started to open his mouth, but the man shook his head, cutting Novan off.

  “Until we know for certain, we will not invite another into the inner sanctum of the Conclave.”

  “All you’re doing is delaying things.”

  “Delaying? The Conclave has searched for peace for hundreds of years. There is no delay in waiting for a few more moments.”

  When Novan started to object, Jakob rested his hand on the historian’s arm. “He’s right, Novan. What’s a few more moments, considering the centuries that the Conclave has sought the Uniter?”

  Novan closed his mouth and nodded slowly.

  The older man looked at Jakob, a new interest hiding behind his eyes.

  “I’ll wait here.”

  Novan nodded again. He turned away and followed the older man inside the building. When the door closed, there was a sense of heaviness to it that seemed designed to close Jakob off and seal him out.

  Now there was nothing for him to do but to wait.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Jakob tried not to grow impatient. It would serve no purpose here, not when he wanted answers. It was unfortunate that even the Conclave seemed divided. He thought of the first Conclave he’d seen, and the way those damahne, as well as the men who served, had worked together. They had wanted only peace and had been willing to do all that was necessary to establish it.

  Would he find the same here?

  He wasn’t certain. It was possible that the rest of the Conclave still searched for peace, and still wanted the same as what Jakob—and Novan—wanted, but what if there was a different type of separation that created barriers to him reaching what he needed?

  He wandered the clearing in between the buildings. There was a cluster of five buildings, and they created something like points on a star, with the stone set between them creating a different pattern that drew him toward a central area. Jakob couldn’t tell why he was compelled to go to this place, or why he felt the urge to sit once he reached it, but when he was there, all he could think about was taking a seat.

  Jakob looked around him, pressing out with his ahmaean. Whatever had compelled him to come here and take a seat seemed to want him to press out with his ahmaean.

  As he did, he noted a pattern in the stones.

  Why should there be a pattern in the stones here?

  Jakob stood and looked around the buildings once more. Novan said the Conclave had constructed these, and Jakob knew that the damahne had served as part of the Conclave. Several of the damahne had been among the founders of the Conclave. If this was a place constructed for the Conclave, then perhaps the damahne had created it.

  The buildings were simply made, not exquisitely crafted like the Tower in Thealon, or even the fallen Lashiin ruins that he’d seen in his vision. These were the construct of men, or possibly even of Magi, though the palace of the Magi was far nicer than any of these buildings.

  The stonework beneath him was done by skilled craftsmen. There was a pattern to it that seemed as if it attempted to blend into the stone. Jakob could feel it pushing against his ahmaean, especially as he sat there, holding on to his connection to that energy.

  Could they have used teralin here, as well?

  From his time in Vasha, and even visiting the Tower in Thealon, Jakob knew the damahne had known of teralin and had known ways to use it. Had there been something about that here?

  Would he be able to find the answers here?

  If it was a place of the damahne, then could he trace it along the fibers? Shoren had sat on the first Conclave and had been there for the first Choosing, so Jakob had a connection to those damahne. It would be far easier to walk back and explore what those damahne might have known, especially with a connection to Shoren.

  He closed his eyes, and pulled on his ahmaean, pushing himself along the fibers.

  Something felt different this time.

  The fibers surged with energy that tingled against him. It took a moment for him to realize that he detect
ed light within the fibers that he had not detected before.

  One of the nemerahl?

  When he’d been in Vasha, and when he had attempted to reach back along the fibers to understand the Lashiin ruins, he had no sense of the nemerahl, but then, he had pushed himself back thousand years so that he could try to see what had been there before. This time, Jakob didn’t push himself quite so far back. He drifted along the fibers, going back a hundred years, and then two hundred. As he did, the power that he detected within the fibers remained present. It had never been there before, not that he was aware of.

  The nemerahl had claimed power from the fibers.

  Raime had somehow drawn power from the fibers, as well, though Jakob had assumed he had taken it from others in the past, not the fibers themselves.

  What if taking power from others in the past wasn’t how he’d used the fibers?

  Jakob stared around him, searching for answers, but there were none. He wished the nemerahl wouldn’t have passed, and that he could have the creature here to answer his questions.

  Perhaps he still could. Jakob could step back into one of his ancestors and could question them about the nemerahl, and their connection to the fibers, but each time he had raised the question of the nemerahl to the damahne, he was not given a clear answer.

  Jakob pushed forward, drifting along the pathway of the fibers that led to his future.

  He found no connection to this place.

  It was the first time the fibers had failed him.

  Not that they failed him, but they did not connect him directly to the Conclave.

  Jakob pressed himself farther and searched for one particular connection that he was most familiar with. It was a thick band that seemed to be a main trunk of the fibers leading to his future. Finding Shoren was always easy. When he reached back far enough, he had to look for the thickest connection, one that was one of the strongest ties to the past for him.

  When Jakob appeared, he looked out through Shoren’s eyes, retreating to the back of his mind.