The Gift of Madness (The Lost Prophecy Book 7)

by D. K. Holmberg

  Jakob had hoped his vision would improve with the connection to his ahmaean, but it didn’t. It remained blurry, a lack of edge to everything unless he was looking up close. He tried pulling on more ahmaean, honing it, but his vision did not improve.

  He made an effort to make himself small, hiding in the back of the host’s mind.

  It might be too late. Jakob didn’t know if he had already revealed himself. When he had done the same in others, he had been able to observe—to actually glimpse the fibers rather than walk back, though he suspected the way he glimpsed the fibers was still quite different from what the other damahne had done. Jakob was still far too invested here. All it would take was him stepping forward, claiming control, and the host would be the passive one.

  Could he know what his host knew?

  There were flashes of memories, but Jakob had a hard time understanding them. What he did sense puzzled him. Why should there be pain? Why should there be sadness? The daneamiin were gentle beings and welcoming. Why would they have treated one of their own in such a way?

  Jakob attempted to reach for more understanding.

  Doing so required a deft touch, the barest scraping of understanding from the host. He would have to be careful, not wanting to damage the host or to reveal to the host what Jakob knew—not until he was certain what form he’d taken on. Was it possible that it wasn’t one of the daneamiin?

  Maybe it was a Mage.

  Jakob had never been back as one of the Magi, but why couldn’t he? The Magi were descended from the damahne the same way as the daneamiin, though their connection might be weaker.

  Was that the reason for his weakened eyesight?

  That didn’t make sense. He thought he remembered the Magi having excellent eyesight. Roelle certain did.

  Then what was this?

  He began moving.

  The host walked along the side of a hill, moving away from the river and the others playing in it. Why wouldn’t he want to join in? Did it have anything to do with the pain and sadness the host had experienced?

  As Jakob opened himself to the connection, he became even more aware of the pain. What was the source? Could he understand it, even if there was nothing that could be done about it?

  The host kept that pain hidden—tucked away so that Jakob couldn’t easily access it. The emotions were powerful, even then, nothing like the way Shoren or some of the other damahne had kept their emotions tucked away when Jakob sat within their minds.

  He pushed.

  Curiosity made him do it.

  Jakob wanted to know what tormented his host. Was this the secret that Aruhn hadn’t shared? Had he wanted to hide this? And why would the daneamiin have been a part of it?

  It wasn’t anything he would have expected of the daneamiin. They wouldn’t cause pain and anguish, not like what he detected here.

  But as he pushed, he caught flashes of memories, enough for him to realize that the pain was caused by the daneamiin.

  It was nearly enough to pull Jakob from the host.

  Ahmaean had been used on this host in a way that had caused pain. Daneamiin had tormented his host, but for what reason? Why would the daneamiin have done this to this being?

  This had to be the secret that Aruhn intended to show him.

  Jakob had to push.

  He would be careful. This host had suffered enough, and he would not be responsible for causing even more suffering. Would there be a way for him to take a delicate approach and step forward into the being’s consciousness? Could he do it and not reveal too much of himself?

  There was a soft pressure within the host’s mind that began to ease.

  He waited, focused on the ahmaean, trying to use it to help him reach the host.

  There was something familiar about the ahmaean.

  Why should that be? What would he recognize?

  It wasn’t the same as damahne, and it wasn’t the same as the daneamiin. Both of those ahmaean connections were similar, but they were different enough that he could tell them apart. For that matter, now that he’d spent some time around the Magi, he could tell their ahmaean apart.

  This was similar to none of them, but he’d still encountered it before.

  Jakob pushed a little more.

  The control over the ahmaean almost eluded him.

  If he couldn’t understand the connection to the energy, he wouldn’t be able to understand how to use it, and if he couldn’t find a way to use it, he might not be able to return to his time very easily.

  What did the host know about ahmaean?

  If he didn’t know anything about his connection to the energy, then there might not be anything Jakob could do to connect to it and use it.

  The host had seemed familiar with it, though. He would have to have been to have stood in the meadow, letting the sense of power swirl around him.

  Jakob pressed.

  There wasn’t the same resistance as he detected when reaching for the memories. They were confined in a deep part of the host’s mind, tucked away so that he didn’t have to acknowledge them. The understanding of ahmaean remained along the surface, and easier to reach.

  The memories were tainted, touched by what had been done to the host.

  Why should that be? What had happened?

  Whatever it was had allowed the host to understand the connection to ahmaean.

  They continued walking and reached the river, now heading quickly back toward the others that Jakob had seen playing in the water.

  A sense of excitement started to race through him, though Jakob knew it wasn’t his excitement but the host’s. Ahmaean began to flow, swirling around him, oozing away in something like a fog.

  Why use it like that?

  Even as he wondered, the answer came to him from the host. Using it in that manner allowed the host the ability to conceal himself.

  There was a familiarity to that, though Jakob wasn’t sure why that should be.

  They began moving more quickly.

  He wanted to slow things down so that he could understand why the host would approach from this direction but could not without taking greater control. Fear of alerting the host to his presence made him hesitant. How much would the host learn about him if he stepped forward and claimed control? Without knowing more about his host, it was difficult for him to know whether that was something he should do.

  The figures along the shore came into view, though through the fog of ahmaean, they were difficult to make out. Jakob was aware of their location through the connection to ahmaean, something that surprised him, as did the strength the host possessed. He had thought there might not have been a significant connection to ahmaean, but it was there, only tightly controlled.

  The suppressed memories drifted toward the front of the host’s mind, mixed with excitement.

  For a moment, Jakob thought they came from a happiness at seeing those people playing by the water, but that wasn’t what the excitement came from.

  It was revenge.

  These were the same beings who had caused harm. They had tormented his host.

  And why?

  Because he looked different?

  Because his connection to power was different?

  Because he was born the wrong way?

  Jakob had to push back. Those weren’t his thoughts but the host’s.

  Now that the host had begun to allow emotion to seep out, there was even more connection than there had been. The host had been reserved, and holding it inside had only restricted the host from knowing what he felt, but as he ran toward the other figures, feelings emerged.

  Not only feelings but a plan.

  There would be violence.

  The ahmaean pulsed, spreading in a wave.

  It constricted, surging into the others—daneamiin, he realized now that he was aware of the connection to the ahmaean—choking them.

  They fell, convulsing.

  The host paused. Jakob detected the hesitation within the host, but then he pushed o
n, sending the ahmaean out in a dark and deadly manner.

  The ahmaean thickened, becoming more of a fog.

  As it did, Jakob realized why it was familiar.

  The ahmaean reminded him of the groeliin.

  Was that what he had come back into?

  He traced through the connection, trying to see if he could understand, but found nothing that would help him know whether this was a groeliin or not. The ahmaean certainly had been darker, and there was a difference to it, but was there enough difference for him to be certain this was a groeliin?

  Could it be the first groeliin?

  But why would the groeliin be with the daneamiin? Why would there be the same anger at the way the daneamiin had treated it?

  The daneamiin convulsed.

  If Jakob did nothing, they would die.

  Maybe they had always died, but he couldn’t remain in the host, not if it meant watching as the groeliin killed the daneamiin, and not if there was anything that he could do.

  Jakob pulled on the ahmaean, taking control of the host.

  He drew the ahmaean away, and the daneamiin slowly managed to get back up. With another surge of ahmaean, he shifted.

  It didn’t matter where he went, just so long as it was away from here, and away from a place where this host could hurt the others—and away from where the host had been hurt. Jakob would do what he could to protect both.

  It didn’t surprise him that he should choose to appear in the mountains to the north.

  Was it his fault that the groeliin ended up here?

  The groeliin wouldn’t have been able to shift without Jakob, but then, had he done nothing, the groeliin would have killed the daneamiin.

  He needed to return and find out what Aruhn knew and whether this was what he’d intended to show him. If it was, it was a horrible secret. The daneamiin had tormented the groeliin—or whatever being that was. That was nothing like the daneamiin that Jakob knew. They were welcoming and peaceful.

  Before he retreated from this host’s mind, he pushed, drawing from the memories of the host. He would take them with him and leave, leaving his host—this first groeliin—in the north.

  Emotion flooded into him. There was pain and torment, and so much else.

  Jakob was overwhelmed and lost the protections that he’d tried to place to keep the host from knowing him.

  Did it matter?

  He started to withdraw, taking the knowledge of what had happened to the groeliin with him. The host deserved that much from him.

  He pulled on his ahmaean, drawing it inside of himself, and forced himself back out, and back to his time.

  When he opened his eyes, tears streamed down his cheeks. Anda watched him, saying nothing, but he recognized the emotion in her eyes.

  It was shame.

  Chapter Nineteen

  The air in the Old Forest carried a dampness and an edge of a chill. Jakob sat on a fallen tree, Anda by his side, and stared into the darker section of the forest. They’d been here for a while, as Jakob tried to process the memories that he’d gleaned from the host, but he couldn’t make sense of them. They were jumbled. Was that because of the challenge he’d faced leaving the host or were the memories jumbled for the host, too?

  “How much of what I saw do you know?” he asked.

  Anda took a deep breath. He didn’t look over at her. He didn’t need to to know that she stared ahead in much the same manner as he did.

  “If you walked back to witness what happened on the river, then I know much of it. It is something the daneamiin keep within ourselves. When we visit—or visited—the Cala maah, each of us sees this. We do not know why, though most think it’s a pivotal moment for the daneamiin.”

  “I was a groeliin, wasn’t I?” Jakob still wasn’t certain, not even after claiming the memories from the host, but what else could he have been? What else would have allowed him to use the ahmaean in that way so that he could destroy with a fog of power?

  The memory of that had lingered. He thought he could recreate it were he to have the need, but why would he ever have the need to destroy like that? What purpose would there be for him to slaughter others with his ahmaean? Such a thing went against what he considered the purpose of ahmaean, how it bound the world.

  Anda sighed. “I wasn’t sure what form you would take when you went back.”

  He looked over to her. She clutched the fabric of her skirt in her lap, and her fingers twisted it. “Have you been back in other forms, then?”

  She closed her eyes, a sweep of her eyelids that went in from the side. “Most have gone back as the same host you seem to have had.”

  “And do you see the excitement when he attempts to kill the daneamiin?”

  “They all died, Jakob Nialsen. They were daneamiin, and though they were also tormenters, they did not deserve to die, but this creature killed them all.”

  Jakob wasn’t sure the first groeliin had killed the others. He had shifted his host to the north before it could do any more harm and left it there. Hadn’t he? Did his action change the past, or did the groeliin, indeed, carry out its attack and kill those daneamiin? Jakob had no answers, but Anda and many other daneamiin had seen the same thing. The killing. “You understand what happened. Tell me.”

  She shook her head, and her eyes came open. “What is there to say beyond what you would have seen?”

  “How deeply do the daneamiin go back?”

  “We see the same as you saw.”

  “That’s not what I mean. Do you go back to observe or do you walk in the host’s steps?”

  Anda frowned. “Few walk as you do along the fibers. None of the daneamiin were gifted with that ability.”

  “I know what I do can be dangerous. Shoren has cautioned me, as have other damahne of the past. But going back that way is how I helped Aruhn. When I went back that time, Shoren helped me. He would not have had I not had previous conversations with him.”

  “If you walked in this creature’s steps, you saw much darkness.”

  “I saw pain. I saw suffering. The daneamiin had used their ahmaean against him.”

  That had to be the reason the groeliin had lashed out in the manner that he had. He had chosen to attack with his ahmaean because of what they had done to him. There had been practice, and intent, and… he had gained enough knowledge that he was able to use that to harm the others. Maybe kill them.

  “As I said, they were tormenters.”

  “Why? Was that the secret that Aruhn wanted to keep? He feels the same shame as you that a few daneamiin tormented a groeliin?”

  She frowned at him. “It wasn’t just a few daneamiin. The daneamiin were different back then. They didn’t follow the path we do now. So, though there is much reason to feel shame for the behavior of our ancestors, Jakob Nialsen, that is not the reason.”

  “Then what is it?”

  “You didn’t see?”

  “I had to withdraw quickly and wasn’t able to focus as well as I should have.” He had been trying to understand the host, but not wanting to be too present and risk the host knowing that he was there. And from what Anda said, the daneamiin all went back and looked at that same moment.

  “The daneamiin and the groeliin share a background.”

  “The damahne.”

  “It is more than that. Were it not, we would not feel the same shame.”

  Jakob studied her. What was the connection? The groeliin’s ahmaean had felt familiar, but there hadn’t been anything more than familiarity. It hadn’t been the same ahmaean as the daneamiin, and their connection to it was more like that of the damahne.

  “Many beings owe their connections to the damahne. The daneamiin. The Magi. The groeliin.”

  “I know that,” Jakob said.

  “The groeliin have a more painful background than most. They were born of human and daneamiin parents.”

  Jakob’s breath caught. The daneamiin were the result of damahne and human mixings. He remembered that from when he had gone b
ack as Aimielen. “What of the Magi?”

  “They are the result of a different pairing, a dilution of the damahne.”

  “And the groeliin? What happened with them?”

  “You saw what happened with the first of his kind. He was different.”

  “Much like when the Den’eamiin were first born.”

  Anda nodded. “Much the same. In this case and sadly many others, he was treated poorly. There are others who have gone back and seen a time prior to that, and they saw how some of the daneamiin tried to help. Some claim the use of ahmaean on him was meant to heal him, but—”

  “It hurt him,” Jakob said. If nothing else, that memory had been clear. The use of the ahmaean upon him had been incredibly painful.

  “That is what we think.”

  “Why?”

  She looked at him, and her ahmaean streamed away from her, tentatively touching him. Jakob welcomed it, not willing to push her away. What happened wasn’t Anda’s fault. She’d played no part in it, but he could see she felt shame for what had happened, nonetheless.

  “I do not know. He went north afterward, as did the others like him.”

  “How many others were there?”

  “I do not know. In time, they settled in the mountains and became the groeliin.”

  “The groeliin aren’t anything like the host I was in. He wasn’t a creature. He was a person who had thought and emotion, and had cared.”

  “Much changed for them when they went north. They were outcasts, focused on survival. They discovered a connection to an ancient power, and they began to use it to somehow fuel their own power.”

  “Teralin.”

  He didn’t know how the groeliin fed on it, but that had to be the key.

  If it was, would there be any way he could save them?

  It was the same question he’d asked Novan.

  “They could not escape nearly as well as the daneamiin were able to. They felt hunted, and ultimately they were,” Anda said.

  “But the mountains would have hidden them.”

  “Hidden, but what they needed was affection, not more suffering. Instead, men hunted them, thinking them some sort of dangerous creature. They were forced to develop other connections, which many of the daneamiin think pushed them closer toward the power of the teralin. That was the only way they could be safe.”