Broken of Fire (The Cloud Warrior Saga Book 9)

by D. K. Holmberg

  The resistance eased.

  But only barely. Tan had a sense of urgency. If he didn’t work fast enough, he wouldn’t be able to continue past whatever harmed her. Or if he did, he might be trapped with her.

  Using spirit, Tan pressed into Reyelle’s mind. There, faintly, he detected a trace of alertness that he wasn’t sure had been there before. You must wake. You must reach for your bond.

  Reyelle didn’t react.

  Yawla awaits. Call to the wind or you will fall.

  When she finally answered, it came from a distant place. Who… who speaks?

  One who knows the elementals and would help. I am the one they call Maelen.

  There was no answer for long moments. The pressure on Tan increased, almost painfully now. He fought, drawing even more on the shaping and the elementals, simply to remain connected to Reyelle. Much longer and his strength would fade.

  Maelen, Reyelle breathed out. The wind…

  Yawla awaits, Tan said again.

  There came another sigh, and this time she carried with it Yawla’s name.

  A surge of wind flooded into Reyelle, and a flash of spirit.

  Tan receded, and as he did, he helped pull the conscious part of Reyelle with him. Another helped, a connection that he suspected came from her bonded elemental, and together they were able to push, driving the resistance from Reyelle’s mind until it shattered completely.

  With that, Tan staggered back.

  The hatchling jumped from Reyelle with more agility than he would have expected and landed on his shoulders, curling around until she was settled.

  Reyelle breathed, no longer aided by the elementals.

  Tolman took a hopeful step forward, reaching for his wife as he looked at Tan. “Maelen?” he said.

  “Give her time,” Tan said. “The bond has been restored, but she will need time to recover.”

  Garza started toward her as well, all the anger faded from her face, though Tan wondered how much of it was from what he had done and how much from the shaping done by the draasin. She took one of Reyelle’s hands while Tolman took the other.

  No one spoke, but the wind around her was less agitated and Reyelle herself seemed more at peace. Moments passed in silence.

  And then, finally, Reyelle opened her eyes.

  20

  THE FAILED PLAN

  Making his way back toward the estate, carrying Reyelle on a cushion of wind shaping, Tan tried sending a message to Amia so that she would know he was on his way. Before the pregnancy, it would have been a simple matter to send such a message, but now… now it was a faded communication that he no longer knew if it even arrived. When she met him at the door, at least he knew that they still shared some connection, though it might not be what it once had been.

  She nodded as Tan and Reyelle filed through, with Tolman and Garza following close behind. Her brow furrowed and a soft shaping built that she pressed onto each person, likely with a lighter touch that Tan had managed when attempting with Garza.

  I’ve already checked whether a spirit shaping exists, Tan sent, pushing with as much strength as he could. Another time, an earlier time, it would have seemed as if he were shouting. Now, he saw her tip her head as if straining to listen before nodding.

  Tan walked them back to the library, choosing it as the best place to congregate and where Tan could have a chance to understand what Reyelle remembered. Tolman refused to leave her side, not that Tan would have asked that of him, and neither did Garza. He suspected they both would have been more comfortable in the tower rather than in the estate, but this place would be better for Reyelle, especially as she recovered. More than that, after what had been required to heal her, Tan felt an urge to oversee her recovery.

  Amia brought three oversized pillows into the room, clutching them against her chest as she carried them, before spreading them along the floor. Tan lowered Reyelle onto the pillows and knelt next to her to check for the strength of her heartbeat, noting that Garza did the same.

  “She is stable,” Garza determined.

  “She is. Thank you for allowing her to come here,” Tan said. Garza had been reluctant to move her, but either Tan’s refusal or something the draasin had done had changed her mind. He wondered how much of it was really from the draasin rather than him.

  As if in answer, the draasin licked his cheek.

  Why do you do that?

  She didn’t answer, only licked him again.

  Tan stood and wiped the saliva from his cheek onto his shirt. There weren’t many places on his clothing that weren’t covered now. “How are you?” he asked Amia.

  She took his hand. “Better. I could sense that something had changed for you. You were… lost… for a while.”

  He leaned toward her and let out a soft breath, reaching toward the wind bond to see if he still could, and was pleased to see the connections all around him. Wyln remained strong around Reyelle, and likely would be until she fully recovered. “I discovered the wind bond,” he said softly.

  “Honl? Where has he been?”

  He shook his head. “Not Honl. The wind bond.”

  Her eyes widened. “I thought that you said there was no such thing.”

  The draasin lifted her head and snorted. A shaping built and Tan knew that she spoke to Amia. It seemed so strange that the draasin could speak to whoever she chose, rather than requiring a bond, but then she was strange.

  This time, she squeezed him with her tail.

  “That’s what I thought, but there was another who seemed convinced otherwise. Because of the wind bond, I was able to reach Reyelle’s bonded, and helped them reunite.”

  Amia nodded. “That’s… that’s wonderful. But that’s not all that happened, or you wouldn’t have been lost to me.”

  “Not all.” He described what he had been forced to do in order to reach Reyelle, and what he had detected when he had.

  Amia gasped. “That sounds the same as what happened to me, doesn’t it?”

  And if he hadn’t managed to save Amia, would she have languished much like Reyelle had? How many years would have passed before she lost her mind? Or would she have even lasted that long?

  “It does. And I think… I think that it’s the same thing that attacked Asgar.”

  He still didn’t know what that was. With Asgar, there had been a nebulous sort of darkness that had attacked him, and when Tan had assumed Amia’s connection with that entity, he had detected a distinct and very real strength. If they were connected, and if the entity that had attacked Amia—and probably Reyelle—had a way to manifest itself physically, they were in much more danger than he had realized before.

  Tan began to understand why Honl had disappeared.

  Where would he have gone? Could Tan use the connection to the wind bond to find him? Now that he had discovered a different way to reach the elementals, there had to be a way to reach through the wind bond to find Honl.

  “She awakens,” Tolman said.

  The draasin jumped from his shoulders and made her way to the fire, where she curled along the stone surrounding the hearth. Tan sensed a relaxation come through the fire bond, and recognized that she slept.

  Tan and Amia turned to Reyelle, lying on the three pillows. Not only had she awaken again—her time initially had been brief, lasting long enough to look up at Tolman before she settled her eyes closed again—but she started to sit.

  Garza slipped an arm around her shoulders and tried to lean her back, but Reyelle resisted. “Easy, Rey,” Garza said, trying to soothe her sister. “You’ve been sick for a long time. Just give yourself a chance to recover before you try to push too hard.”

  Reyelle looked from Garza and then to Tolman. Wrinkles in the corners of her eyes softened as she gazed at him. “Where am I?” Her voice was a soft, almost breathy, whisper.

  “You’re safe, Reyelle. Thank the Stormbringer that you’re safe.”

  Tan glanced to Amia and mouthed a question. “Stormbringer?”

 
She shook her head, but a troubled look clouded her face.

  “Safe. How? How is it that I can reach her again?”

  “Reach who?” Garza asked.

  Tan knew, though. Reyelle didn’t know how it was possible that she could reach Yawla. Did she know that the elemental had kept watch over her during the time that she was sick? Not only Yawla, but other wyln elementals, all working together to keep her safe, and all on the behalf of Yawla.

  “She never left you,” Tan said, stepping forward.

  Reyelle looked up at him. “Who are you?”

  Tolman glanced from Tan to Reyelle. “He is the one who saved you. Without the Maelen, you would have been lost.”

  Even Garza nodded, and Tan wondered how much it pained her to agree that Tan had helped her sister. He no longer had the sense that she resented him, but there was a strange disconnect with her.

  “Maelen? You?”

  Tan nodded.

  “How can that be? I thought the Maelen was…” She shook her head, as if trying to clear the confusion from years spent unaware, years where she had been fed by a reed down her throat, able to breathe, but not much else. “How can you be the Maelen?”

  Tan lowered himself so that he sat near her, and reached toward the wind bond. Much like with the fire bond, the more often he reached for it, the easier it became to connect. Through the wind bond, he saw the translucent shape of Yawla that he couldn’t make out when he was not connected. Other elementals swirled around the room, mixing with each breath taken. Elementals even worked in with the flames, mingling with saa in a strange, and surprising, dance.

  How much more would he see if he could connect to the earth bond, or water? Knowing that there was one of wind much like fire meant that there had to be one for the other elements, didn’t it?

  As I have said, the draasin told him.

  Tan resisted the urge to glance back at her, knowing that she had curled up along the hearth. As you have said, he agreed.

  “You are connected. She never left you. It is because of your bond that you still live,” Tan said.

  Reyelle tipped her head as if listening, and then nodded.

  “What happened?” Tan asked softly.

  Garza shot him an annoyed look. “What do you mean? You know what happened. You said so yourself! The Utu Tonah tore the bond from her—”

  Tan shook his head. “Not the Utu Tonah, and her bond wasn’t torn from her.” That had been the most troubling to him. He had assumed that her bond had been stolen, but that hadn’t been the case at all. Had the bond been stolen, would Yawla have remained so close by? She would have been forced onto another, and possibly wandered free after Tan separated the bonds when he defeated the Utu Tonah, but that wasn’t what the elemental had done at all. She had remained near Reyelle, and had even brought other elementals in for support. “This wasn’t the Utu Tonah.”

  “Maelen,” Tolman said, “you told me the bond was taken from her.”

  “I was wrong.”

  Reyelle glanced from Tolman and then to Tan before surveying the room. Her eyes widened slowly. “What happened to him? Where is the Utu Tonah?”

  “Gone,” Tan said.

  “How? He had claimed so many bonds! How could anyone have managed to… You did it, didn’t you, Maelen?”

  Tan nodded. “He had forced bonds, but they did not serve him as he had hoped when he faced someone naturally connected to the elementals. He has been gone for months.”

  Her eyes widened even further. “But he was all that stood between what she intended!”

  Amia wore the same troubled expression that Tan felt. “You knew what Marin intended?”

  Reyelle shifted on the pillow, trying to sit up even more. She had to shake Garza off as she attempted to lay her back down. “I’m fine, Garry, really, I am.” When she managed to sit, she looked around the library, eyes skimming slowly before settling.

  “You’ve been here before, haven’t you?” Tan asked.

  Reyelle glanced at Tolman before nodding.

  “What? You were with the Utu Tonah? But you were a Servant!”

  Reyelle made a point of keeping her eyes on Tan, not looking at her husband. “My task was to infiltrate the Servants,” she said carefully. “I was wind bonded. The Utu Tonah thought that I should take other bonds, but I refused, knowing that I would be detected if I did. The Mistress of Souls was known to have a keen eye for reading others, and I feared risking myself by taking on additional bonds.”

  “Why would he want to infiltrate the Servants?” Tan asked.

  Reyelle sighed. “I think… I think that he recognized that they opposed him. Perhaps it was more than that, but he was a difficult man to understand.”

  The tone in her voice made Tan pause. “You respected him.”

  “I recognized the need for strength,” she said. “Even more so when I joined the Servants.”

  “Why? What did you learn?” Tan asked. Had he taken the time to sort through her memories when he had been using spirit on her, he wouldn’t have needed to ask these questions. But the first time, he had assumed that the bond had been separated and he went searching for the name of the elemental. The second time, he simply wanted to reach deeply enough in her mind to help draw her out.

  “The Mistress hid much,” Reyelle said. “It took a long time before I was close enough to her for me to learn anything useful. Most of the time was spent walking the streets and offering prayers. After a while, she allowed me closer access.” Her voice grew stronger the longer that she talked, losing the breathy quality and taking on the tone of giving a report.

  Tan suspected that she had done that many times with the Utu Tonah. Without a connection to spirit, she wouldn’t have been able to simply send a message the same way that Tan could speak to the elementals and to Amia before the pregnancy.

  “When I got closer to her, I realized that she served a master of her own. She never allowed me to learn who, and when I attempted to discover…”

  “That was when you were attacked,” Tan finished for her.

  She nodded.

  He knew that Marin had served another purpose, a different master, as Reyelle had put it, but who would that master be? Something powerful, if the connection that he’d detected atop the tower were any indication, and something with the strength to attack—and nearly subdue—one of the elementals.

  “You never learned more than that?” he asked.

  “I learned that the Utu Tonah opposed whatever she planned. Enough so that she already planned a way to remove him from Par-shon. She knew the reason he claimed he had come to our lands.” Tolman’s face pulled in a sad frown, likely at how little he had known of his wife. Reyelle swallowed and turned back to Tan. “The Mistress decided the best way to remove him was to fill his head with ideas of claiming another bond, one lost for a thousand years, a way to make him even stronger. It… distracted him, I think, enough that she was able to continue whatever she worked on.”

  Tan leaned back on his heels. “Was that lost bond to the draasin?”

  Reyelle’s eyes widened. “How did you know?”

  “How long was she sick?”

  “We told you, Maelen, that it had been several years,” Tolman answered.

  Several years. In that time, Tan had released the draasin from the ice, and they had flown freely enough that the Utu Tonah had discovered their presence and thought to bond them. He had attacked Incendin for years, but had never fully attacked until after the draasin were freed. Could Marin really have set him on that path?

  But why? And what had brought the Utu Tonah to Par? Something that opposed what Marin intended, which made Tan wonder if maybe defeating the Utu Tonah had more consequences than he had imagined.

  “The draasin have returned,” Tan told her. “I bonded one, but now there are others. Many others.”

  “If they were real, and he had managed to bond them—”

  “I would not let him bond them,” Tan said.

  “But the
n the Mistress will have won.”

  “She hasn’t won yet,” Tan said. Yet he had to wonder if Marin had really been defeated the last time, or had she simply retreated to buy the time needed to complete whatever else she had planned?

  21

  PLACE OF BINDING

  “I need to know what Marin had planned,” Tan said, pacing the library now that the others had left. Only Amia remained with him, and the draasin by the hearth. They had moved Reyelle to a private room, where she could remain with Tolman. Garza had objected, wanting to return together, but Tan had remained firm that Reyelle stay near him. There had to be something more that she knew.

  “Tan—” Amia started.

  He paused and turned to her. “She attacked you, Amia. And then whatever this thing is that she serves, it attacked Asgar.” And probably Reyelle as well, but that would mean that Marin had control of this entity for far longer than he had realized.

  “She didn’t attack me,” Amia said softly.

  No blinked. No, she had attacked him. The attack on Amia had been happenstance. Tan knew that now. The rune that Marin had placed on the top of the tower had been intended for him. And probably placed as soon as he had defeated the Utu Tonah. Had she expected that he would return sooner?

  How much more had she learned about him? Because he was a spirit shaper himself, she should not have been able to get into his mind, but if she had access to some greater power, then he needed to fear what she might have managed to do.

  “There’s so much that I don’t understand,” he told her. “I stopped the Utu Tonah because I thought that it was the right thing—”

  “It was the right thing.”

  “What if it wasn’t? What if the Utu Tonah was the only person between whatever she intended and what we now face?”

  “Then you must be the person who stands between her,” Amia said.

  Tan stepped over to her and slipped his arms around her. How long had it been since they had time alone like this? A week? More? After defeating the Utu Tonah, they were supposed to have time together. They were supposed to have peace. And now… now there was anything but peace. Worse, they were bringing another into it.