Broken of Fire (The Cloud Warrior Saga Book 9)

by D. K. Holmberg

  “Then do that, Maelen,” Tolman said. “If that is a way to ensure that she lives, do what you can to heal her.”

  “Accomplishing that would require another who is no longer able to shape spirit in the same manner,” Tan said. What would Amia say about him implying that her ability with spirit had weakened? But he didn’t want to risk her shaping that much spirit, especially on a shaping that might not succeed, with her ability to shape altered by the pregnancy. “Which means that I must attempt to restore her bond,” he finished.

  “And you can do such a thing after so much time separated?” Garza asked. “Or do you simply give Tolman hope that will fade when you fail?”

  Tan turned his attention to her and sighed. “It’s possible that I will fail,” he admitted. “Even knowing the name of her bonded, it’s possible that I won’t be able to reach the elemental. And if I do, it’s possible that the bond cannot be reformed. But if I can, if I can reach her elemental, and if I can summon the bond back to her, then she should be restored to what she was before.” And then he would have questions for her. He would tell Tolman that later, after he managed to heal his wife. If he couldn’t, then would he attempt to seal off the spirit injury on his own, using the shaping that he’d seen Amia and the First Mother using as they healed Cora, or would he ask Amia for help, and accept the risk to her—and their baby—if something went wrong with their shaping?

  Tan didn’t know, which meant that he needed to continue to try to reach the wind elemental.

  Tolman stared at his wife. “Do what you can, Maelen,” he said softly.

  Tan nodded, fixing Garza with a firm gaze. “I will.”

  Wind gusted around the top of the tower as he listened. The hatchling clung to his shoulder again, though this time, Tan suspected that she understood why he had come and what he wanted to attempt. What was more, the draasin seemed interested in helping.

  She licked his cheek and he wiped it off, smearing it across his cloak. She’d done it often enough that his cloak had something of a glistening crust. Eventually he would need to wash the cloak. Or convince the draasin to stop licking him, though he suspected that she found it more amusing than anything to keep doing it.

  Do you think that you can reach the elemental? the draasin asked.

  Tan shook his head, uncertain. I struggle with wyln more than the others of wind.

  Wyln is strong in these lands, Maelen. Connect to wind as you do to fire and you would reach the elemental.

  He grunted. I don’t think that I can connect to wind the same way that I do to fire. With fire, I share the fire bond.

  You have made this objection in the past, Maelen.

  And you claim that there is a wind connection that I doubt exists.

  Why would fire be different than any of the other elements? You know of fire, and the fire bond, but that doesn’t mean that another bond does not exist.

  Without Honl, he wondered if he would be able to even reach wind well enough to ask the question. He could attempt to reach ashi, or ara, or even wyln, but would any of the elementals help him understand if there was a greater connection as there was with fire?

  But to find a particular elemental, especially one of wyln so that he could help heal Reyelle, he needed to reach a connection with wind.

  Tan sighed and focused on the breath leaving his body.

  That was the first lesson that his mother had ever offered him of wind shaping, guiding him to understand wind by recognizing what air blew through him first of all. Grounded to the wind, then he would be able to reach beyond himself and stretch for the elementals.

  Currents of wind pulled at his hair, his cloak, and even slipped beneath his clothes to tug at his skin. Tan focused on these currents, on the way that the wind worked around him, before shifting his attention toward the gusts in the distance. That wind blew with much more force than the swirls around him. Tan reached through that connection, stretching his focus, straining to try and understand the wind, but he could not.

  I need to reach Yawla, he sent into that stronger wind that pulled around the tower, straining into wyln as he searched to connect to it.

  The wind answered, but only by gusting more strongly.

  Tan listened again, focusing on the connection to wyln. With ara, he was able to reach the elemental fairly easily, though not as easily as he managed with ashi. With wyln, it had always been a quiet elemental, as if it didn’t know what to do with Tan. But for him to succeed and to be able to help Reyelle, he would need to reach wyln. Not only reach it, but he would need to reach a particular elemental within the wind.

  Yawla, Tan called into the wind, Reyelle needs for you to return.

  The wind gusted again, and then fell silent.

  This isn’t working, he told the draasin.

  Because you have chosen not to reach beyond your bond.

  Honl has disappeared. And I can reach the other elementals, but it’s not the same as when I reach through the bond.

  Not only the bond to the elementals, but the bond to fire.

  You think they are so different?

  Tan sighed. What he needed was someone with more experience with wind than he had. He was willing to listen, but would Zephra be willing to answer questions?

  Ara, send word to Zephra to join me here.

  He stood and waited, but didn’t have to wait for long.

  Zephra arrived on a shaping of wind augmented by her elemental, Aric. “You continue to summon, Tannen?” she asked. She glanced at the draasin. “Interesting place that you would call me.”

  “This is a place I like to come,” he said. He enjoyed coming here even after what had happened to Amia up here. There was a certain clarity of sight, an awareness of watching over the city.

  “What did you need me for?”

  “I need your expertise with wind.”

  She snorted. “I think that you have proven as capable as me with wind.”

  “Maybe as capable, but you have experience that I do not.”

  She smiled and tucked the loose strands of gray hair behind her ears. “Is that your way of reminding me that I’m getting old? I can assure you, Tannen, I do not need any reminders.”

  “Not that,” he said, smiling at the more lighthearted version of his mother. Having her make jokes was unusual, as was her not lecturing him every chance that she got. “I’ve told you about how I’m connected to fire?”

  She nodded to the draasin draped around his neck. The hatchling took that moment to lick his cheek again, and Tan wiped it away, smearing it on his shirt. “I think that we can see that quite clearly, don’t you?”

  He patted the draasin’s head gently and turned his attention back to his mother. “There is something called the fire bond. All fire elementals are connected to it. Since bonding to the draasin, I have learned to reach the fire bond.”

  She nodded. “That would answer a few questions.”

  “Is there… is there anything like that with wind?”

  Zephra sighed and created a swirling wind around her before releasing the shaping. “How many shapers are able to reach this fire bond?”

  “There are no other shapers able to reach it,” Tan said.

  “That’s what I suspected. With wind, the different elementals are connected. They have to be, given the way that wind flows through everything. Ashi blows through Incendin but gives way to ara. Each of the elementals comes together, sharing the same breath. They interact, but I do not think there is the same bond as you’ve discovered with fire.”

  “Could there be and you simply don’t know of it?”

  Her face contorted in a way that told him the answer. “Anything is possible, Tannen. When you’re dealing with the elementals, there is much that I do not know. Much that I simply can’t know. I am not of the elementals. I can speak to ara, and have bonded to them, but knowing them… that is more than any shaper can ask.” She pulled on a tight shaping of wind and reached him. “What is this about? What makes you question whethe
r there is a wind bond as there is with fire?”

  Tan focused on his sense of Reyelle, lying on the cot. Using spirit and earth, he detected Garza with her. The water shaper had done much to try and help Reyelle, enough that Tan wondered if her objection to him coming and attempting to heal was more about fear of her failing than about Tan succeeding. If he managed to succeed, he would have to remain aware of that potential issue.

  “This is about a bonded shaper who has lost her bond,” he said.

  “But to heal such a bond, you would have to know… But you do, don’t you? You would have used spirit to find out the name. And now you think that if there were some sort of wind bond that you would be able to find this elemental.”

  Tan nodded.

  She patted his arm and sighed. “I commend you for even trying. The Great Mother knows how painful it can be when separated from the bond. But what you are suggesting means that you will try to tie them together once more. That you think that you can heal her and restore her to the shaper that she was before. Why, when you have shown with Cora that you can heal in spite of reuniting the bonded?”

  “Because I don’t want to ask that of Amia.”

  She frowned. “You wouldn’t? She is the First Mother, and her spirit shaping is… Ah. I understand now. How much has it changed?”

  “You know that it would change?”

  She smiled. “When I was pregnant with you, my connection to the wind changed as well. I… I thought that I had lost it, and can admit now that I was pleased when the pregnancy was over so that I could reconnect with the wind. It’s the reason many shapers will only have one child. Losing that connection, even if briefly, is difficult for even the weakest of shapers. And Amia, well, she is a very strong shaper, isn’t she?”

  Tan nodded. “What of Father? Did anything change for him while you were pregnant?”

  An amused smile played across her lips. “Fathers do many things, Tannen, but they are not affected the same as mothers. It’s interesting that you ask.”

  Then the changed connection between he and Amia would have more to do with her shaping changing during the pregnancy than about anything that happened between them. That was good to know, as well as knowing that it would pass when the pregnancy was over.

  “Will you tell her?”

  Zephra smiled. “I will tell her. Perhaps we can find a bit more in common than our affection for you.”

  If nothing else, that would be a good change.

  Zephra smiled and patted his hand again. “Now, when you’re done up here, perhaps you and I can sit and talk. I think that it has been too long since we’ve had any time together, where it is only the two of us.”

  Tan reached for the hatchling and rubbed his hand across the top of her head. The draasin clawed at him and then made a contented noise deep in her throat. “I think that would be nice.”

  Zephra arched a brow at him. “From your tone, I take it that you are not going to leave the top of the tower anytime soon.” He shook his head. “And I do not think that you will share with me the name of this elemental.” He shook his head again. “Then I will return to your… estate, I think I heard it called, and visit more with Amia. As you have said, I think there are some hints I can give her about being a pregnant shaper.”

  She took off on a shaping of wind.

  When she was gone, Tan focused again on wyln, calling for Yawla, but no answer came.

  17

  ANOTHER BOND

  The cavern was darkened and stunk of the draasin and their food, that of rotting meat and decay. The pale whites of the bones stacked in the corner caught the faint light that Tan shaped, not wanting to make it too bright in the cavern. Asgar moved along the back wall but stayed there, not coming forward as Tan entered.

  Through the fire bond, he knew that Sashari circled high overhead outside the cavern as she hunted. Cianna was with her, whatever difference there had been between them now repaired. Kota prowled along the valley that ran beneath the cave. Tan still hadn’t learned where she had gone with Sashari, but didn’t think it mattered. Having her gone gave Tan the opportunity to speak to Asgar alone.

  Tan approached the draasin slowly, holding the connection to the fire bond as he did. Through it, he could tell that Asgar remained present, but faded somewhat. Reserved. The draasin feared what had happened to him and that it might happen again.

  You do not need to continue to check in on me, Asgar said.

  I don’t continue to check in on you.

  Asgar snorted. He managed a strong streamer of fire, much more than Tan had seen from him in many days. You reach through the fire bond for me. I know it when you do.

  Call me concerned for my friend.

  Asgar snorted again. I would say that the draasin do not need your concern, but that seemingly is not true, now is it?

  You fear what might happen to the bond.

  I know what happened, Maelen.

  Tan wondered just how much of what had happened that Asgar really remembered. Did he remember that together he and Tan had pushed back the darkness, or had he thought that Tan alone had managed to do that?

  What were you feeling when you were attacked? Tan asked.

  I felt… cold. As if a shadow settled across the sun. I feared what would happen if that shadow reached through me, and what would happen to the other elementals of fire if I allowed that to happen. Asgar shook his head and fixed Tan with his bright yellow eyes. Whatever attacked me will return, Maelen. That much I am able to remember.

  Tan reached for Asgar at the same time that the hatchling crawled off his neck and jumped to the floor of the cavern. She ran her tongue along Asgar’s feet and made her way to his stomach, but she wasn’t tall enough to reach.

  What are you doing?

  What must be done, she answered.

  Asgar regarded her with amusement and then flicked his tail. She is no longer draasin, but you know that, don’t you, Maelen?

  Tan studied the hatchling. In the last few days, it seemed as if her wings had shrunk. She had grown no larger, and her legs carried her low to the ground, more like a common lizard than what the draasin should be. She is still fire.

  Asgar snorted. She is still fire, he agreed, but no longer the same. What will she become?

  Tan didn’t know, and the hatchling didn’t seem inclined to share, if even she knew. Whatever she was becoming was something more than only fire, and more than even spirit. Her insight had grown, now rivaling Asboel before his death, as if she absorbed the knowledge of those around her…

  Is that what you do? he asked her.

  Maelen, you ask questions but forget that I am barely more than a few weeks hatched. How could I have answers if you do not?

  That was no answer, and Tan could tell that the draasin knew it. What was more, if she did absorb knowledge of those around her, then she was more like Honl. The wind elemental had been able to simply know the knowledge within the archives by passing through it. That was the reason that Tan had wanted Honl to return. If he could find answers to the questions he had, then he might be able to understand what he needed to do next.

  And yet, if the hatchling were able to absorb knowledge, albeit in a different way, drawing on those around her, then could he use her connection in much the same way?

  Making that suggestion diminishes your capabilities, Maelen. That is what I keep trying to tell you.

  You tell me that there are bonds to the other elements, much like there is with fire. Zephra would know if that were the case, and she does not think that possible.

  Then Zephra cannot be your guide.

  The draasin—or whatever she was becoming—didn’t offer him any other suggestions as to how to guide him into reaching the other bonds. And Tan wasn’t sure that there even was anything else to reach. Part of him knew as the draasin did, that she was young, perhaps too young to understand whether other elements had the same sort of bonds that fire possessed.

  I hear her, Maelen, only I do not, Asgar sai
d, still staring at the hatchling. He studied her with a curiosity.

  As large as Asgar might be, the hatchling still exuded confidence that intimidated the large draasin. Gone was the playfulness that he’d seen when she worked with Molly, if it ever had really been there rather than something that had been meant to placate the young girl. Now, she had a confidence belied by her size, and something of the same arrogance that he’d known from Asboel. In some ways, he wondered if she might be a reincarnation of Asboel, knowing how Asboel had told him that fire did not extinguish, that it instead burned anew in another, but Asboel had been pure fire, and this hatchling… she was something else entirely. For her, he hoped that she was an elemental of her own, not recycled power that had been changed, modified to fit into another creature.

  I think… I think she is spirit as much as fire, Tan said to Asgar. She exists in the fire bond when she chooses, and only then, I suspect.

  The small draasin jumped and reached Asgar’s belly to lick at him again.

  This time, Asgar did bat at her and sent her skidding back to Tan. Spirit should have taught her manners, then. I would think that with the connection to Mother, she would know what she risks by trying to play with me.

  She does the same to me, Tan said. He shook his cloak for emphasis. Rather than becoming something sticky or hard, the places Tan had wiped her saliva had turned into almost a soft film. Curiosity more than anything had him leave it on his cloak. What would happen when he had completely coated his cloak with her saliva? Would she still lick him?

  The hatchling snorted at him, sending a streamer of fire and a shaping of spirit at him. Tan tensed and pushed back against the spirit instinctively. She had already proven adept at passing beyond what he thought she should be able to manage. He didn’t want to risk her pushing past his natural barriers as well.

  You fear the wrong things, Maelen.

  Then help me understand what I should fear. With your connection to spirit, help me understand!

  In time. You will understand in time.

  And if we don’t have the necessary time?