The Lost Sun Series Box Set 1: Books 1 and 2 (Lost Sun Box Set)

by Riley Morrison

  She took his hand and led him out the door. Many of the light bulbs had blown, but some still lit the bunker. They picked their way up the rubble-strewn stairs and went outside into the dim sunlit field spread out before the entrance.

  The sun was lost in gray cloud, giving off little warmth. A light snow fell, blanketing the gray, bleak land in a fresh layer of cold white. To their left, rising through a dense ground mist, stood another wooded grove with a statue head of Imogen poking over the tops of the dead trees.

  In Kara's first visiondream, Aisha had said the Steel Children had built the groves to honor Imogen. The sacred places seemed to be everywhere, forlorn memorials to an undeserving goddess. Crusted in ice and forgotten.

  Semira stood with her back to them and gazed out at the ruined city in the distance. She turned as they approached, and Kara noticed tears in her eyes and the toy egg clasped tightly in her hand. "You live," Semira intoned through her teeth, turning back to the city.

  "What happened? I passed out and didn't—"

  Semira kicked a rock, sending it flying into a clump of snow. "You killed him." She spun to face Kara again, her eyes feverishly bright. "You killed him!"

  As Kara recoiled from her sister, she knocked Sasha to the ground. "What? What are you talking about?"

  "The tree. He was tied to the tree. It was part of him, just as the flowers were." Semira took a menacing step forward. "You burned them all with your power, turned them to ash, and now he's gone. He's gone!"

  Kara's guts twisted. "No... the tree told me to do it. I was trying to help. I was—"

  "What are you talking about?" Semira demanded. "The tree told you to kill father?"

  "No, it spoke to me." Kara's legs were shaking. What if I killed him? She tried to freeze her heart again, but the pain was too much. Kara might not have cared much for Arden, but her mother had loved him more than life itself. I don't want to care about him. He was nothing to me. He wasn't. My heart is ice.

  But the guilt was still there. What if I killed him?

  Kara wiped her eyes. "The tree wanted me to feed my power into it, so I did. I think it killed the servants. There was no other way."

  Semira glared at her, chest heaving, hand clenched around the toy like she meant to throw it in Kara's face. Sasha snuffled on the ground beside Kara, his head between his knees.

  Then Aisha appeared right beside them. Kara jumped, and Semira backed away. "Stop this," Aisha scolded. "Fighting will do us no good."

  "You survived," Kara gasped. "What happened to you? I went looking—"

  "They caught me, but the energy burned them away and I was free."

  Semira ran up to her. "Did you find him?" Her voice was frantic.

  "No. He is gone." Snarling, Semira spun on her heel and started toward the bunker door. "Wait," Aisha said. Semira stopped but didn't turn around.

  Kara choked back tears. I killed him. I think I killed him. She'd not liked Arden, not after what he'd done to her mother, but she hadn't wanted him dead. Why? The tree told me to do it! Why did it let this happen?

  Aisha raised a hand. "Listen to me."

  "Why?" Semira turned around, her scarred face twisted with rage. "He's gone, and I'm stuck here with you..." Her voice trailed off into vile cursing as she began kicking more rocks around.

  "We must leave here now, and go to the Oracle," Aisha said. "It will tell you what you must do to leave this place. If there is a way."

  Semira stopped cursing. "And my father? You said we can't die here, so he must be alive somewhere."

  Kara's heart fluttered. "We can't die here?"

  "No," Semira said. "Not according to her." She scowled at the ghost woman.

  So all this time, I didn't have to fear death—only pain.

  "He might be alive, but he is being swept along by the currents of code that make up this place." Aisha took Sasha in her arms and ran her fingers through his hair. "The tree that bound Arden here was a manifestation of the Oracle and it kept him tethered to my home. Now that the tree is dead, he has been swept away again."

  "So how do we find him?" Kara asked.

  Aisha shook her head. "We cannot. We do not have the power."

  Kara's heart sank. "Does the Oracle?"

  "Perhaps, but its power dwindles too. The corruption is winning, and the Oracle expends much energy slowing its progress." Aisha studied both sisters. "You two need to put aside your feelings for him. You have more important things you must do."

  Return home and stop Imogen and the Steel Children. Kara hardened herself. She would not let herself feel guilt for what had happened. My heart has to be ice, for I can't allow my feelings to turn me from my course. Maybe one day I can let my heart thaw, but for now... searching for Arden will only slow me down. "We do have more important things to do."

  "Nothing is more important to me right now than my father." Semira snarled at Kara, then strode over to Aisha. "The sooner we get to the Oracle, the sooner I can find out if it can tell me where—"

  The ghost woman raised a hand for silence. "The Oracle resides on the other side of the world from us and I must use my power to get us there." She held her hands out and told the two sisters to take them. "I will transport us as near as I can to where the Oracle resides, but then the rest of the journey must be made on foot. Be warned, our journey will be dangerous. Wild servants and shadow beasts flitter about in great numbers there, and the corruption has eaten its way to within visible distance of the Oracle's mountain home."

  Semira made a fist. "Let them flitter. They won't stop me from finding out where my father is."

  Kara studied Semira. The tone of her sister's voice was anger, but her eyes showed she was hurting inside. Had she and Arden made up? Had he forgiven her, even after all she'd done? Kara hadn't expected that; she'd expected her sister to go in there and shout obscenities at Arden and refuse to make amends for anything. Perhaps there was more to Semira than she'd thought.

  But it doesn't change who she is. A vile murderer and a mutt who served Dwaycar like a loyal dog, following me everywhere I went, bringing death and horror to all. Kara held her hand over the wound on her chest, now hidden under her black cloak. And you still failed, and all those people died for nothing.

  Sasha and Aisha took one last look at their ruined home. The little boy had tears in his eyes. He held onto his mother's ethereal waist and waved goodbye. The bunker had been his home, its concrete passages and rooms his playground. Now it was open to the cold, strewn with rubble and the dusty remains of the servants. Where would the boy and his mother live now?

  A blinding light shone between them, followed by a sensation of rapid movement and then a lurching stop. It took Kara a moment to settle her stomach and notice they were somewhere else. Huge ice-capped mountains loomed in the distance, and a forest of dead trees covered the nearby foothills. The sun hovered over them as it began its inexorable descent into night.

  Strange... When they had left the bunker it had been early, and yet here it was near dark.

  The group stood in an empty asphalt parking lot beside a lookout overlooking the picturesque view of the mountains. The air was colder than back at the city and tinged with the smell of death. "The Oracle is in a great concrete sarcophagus under those mountains," Aisha said. "We must journey a day or more to reach the entrance."

  Sasha began to urgently point at something. "Mother, look. What is it? Will it hurt us?"

  Both Kara and Semira turned from the mountain view and gasped. A huge wall of gray filled the distant horizon. Spilling from it, like the entropy tendrils of the Great Shadow, were streaks of gray nothingness that arced through the sky or plunged into the ground. The nothingness didn't seem to be moving, but it did give off a great stench, much like the gaping maw of the Great Shadow.

  Kara backed into a rusted wreck of a car. "Is that the corruption?"

  Aisha faded until they could no longer see her. "Yes, one part of it. The Great Shadow is another and the rest is invisible. It corrodes the ver
y code that makes up this place, bending some to its will. The rest it consumes, leaving behind the gray void before us." She took Sasha's hand. "The corruption is the death of all things."

  Semira's eyes became narrow slits as she stared into the nothingness, her face as blank as the void. A ground tremor almost knocked them off their feet. Kara grabbed onto the car for support as the ghost woman held onto Sasha. When the shaking was over, Aisha motioned the two sisters forward. "We must move away from here and into the hills. The land is unstable, as the corruption eats away at the foundations underneath our feet."

  "Where are we going to spend the night?" Kara asked, letting go of the car and brushing the frozen rust off her hands.

  "Deep in the foothills is an old log cabin. We must reach it before night falls."

  "Why does it matter where we sleep?" Semira spat. "We can't die here."

  "True," Aisha said. "But remember what I told you. One will linger on and on, in great pain and terror, never feeling the blissful release of death—living forever with the wounds you bear." She lowered her head to the ground. "There is no escape from it. You lose yourself over time and forget that which made you—you. I have held onto what little I have because of Dressen and Sasha. Without them..." She glanced up at Semira with her black eyes. "I would have still been one of those faces in the dark."

  Semira's shoulders slumped and she muttered to herself. Kara searched for any sign of the tingling feeling that heralded her energy, but felt nothing. "So what happens if one of the shadow beasts finds us? Can we kill them? My power only seemed to slow it down back in the city."

  "Yes, they can be killed, for they are born of the code of this place. We, on the other hand, are from outside and have been inserted into this world from the real. The beasts cannot kill us, but they can hurt us—endlessly."

  "Come," Aisha started off. "It gets very cold up here and without shelter, our night will be long and most unpleasant."

  Kara began to follow her. "How much time do we have to reach the Oracle? What if the corruption gets to it before us?"

  "We should be in no danger of the corruption reaching the Oracle before we do. Its work at consuming this world is slow. For now. Our greatest danger lies with the wild servants and the shadow beasts that prowl these stony, wooded hills."

  "Why are there servants all the way out here?" Kara scanned the horizon. "I can't see a city or settlement anywhere."

  "They once protected the Oracle and did its bidding as it aided those that built this world. Now the servants, like the shadow beasts, have become unruly. The minds of the builders of this place have long since perished and the Oracle cannot spare thought for taming the wild ones while it focuses on containing the corruption."

  The conversation ended as the companions climbed over the fence ringing the car park and picked their way down a winding path into a rocky valley that stretched all the way into the mountains. Kara glanced up at the giant ice-capped peaks spread before them.

  Soon, she would have her answers. Soon she would be with Aemon.

  CHAPTER 22

  AEMON

  When he saw Jalarfed up ahead, Aemon was struck by how much it had changed since the last time he had been there. It felt like years had passed since he and Kara had raced through the town on their headlong dash to the temple, Kahan in close pursuit. Back then, Jalarfed had been a sleepy settlement—now it was a bustling armed camp.

  Common soldiers in the hundreds rubbed shoulders with refugees, heavily armored knights of the noble houses and even the odd monk of the Order. The sacred lights illuminated the whole area, but their glow had dimmed since Aemon had seen them last. Perhaps the power was being drained from all the extra lighting required to keep the entire area lit, or perhaps it was the enemies' doing.

  Smoke from half a hundred torches choked the air, blanketing everything in a gray haze. The smell of human waste, sweat, cooking fires and overcooked meat came as an all-out assault on Aemon's senses. The din of the camp echoed all around them as they reached the outer metal gate. Like much of the defenses, the gate had been hastily erected and would serve as nothing more than a minor irritant to the enemy if and when they attacked.

  A guard ran forward, his eyes on Indalius who continued to lead Imogen along. She raised her hand and all of her children came to an instant halt. Aemon let go of the soldier beside him and went to speak to the guard.

  The guard did not seem to notice his approach. Aemon cleared his throat to get the man's attention. "Where is Captain Royce? He ran ahead of us."

  With his eyes still on Indalius, the man said, "He's in the command center. It's the warehouse near the center of town."

  "Are we free to enter?"

  The man finally focused on Aemon, his hand on his sword. "The captain said for me not to allow..." He nodded at Indalius and the rest of the machines."They are not allowed inside until the high commander has come out to inspect them."

  Aemon winced. Imogen would not like this and he would be the one to have to tell her. "Then where is the high commander?"

  "He's trying to deal with One Eye."

  "Wait here a moment. I must tell my wife what is happening, then you can escort us to the high commander." Assuming Imogen will part with her children and not decide to kill us all, Aemon thought, not at all sarcastically. From her display the night before, it was very possible she would slaughter everyone.

  The man nodded, so Aemon cautiously made his way to Imogen, dreading every step he took. She watched him approach, her face unreadable, fingers wrapped around the passkey. He swallowed the fear creeping up from his belly like the bile that comes before retching up your guts. It looked like Kara standing there. Once that would have filled him with joy; now seeing her face made him want to run the other way and never look back.

  I hate you, Imogen, for what you have done to Kara and to me.

  He stopped some distance from her, the wounds she had inflicted on his arm throbbing along with his racing heartbeat. "They will not let your children in until the high commander comes out here to inspect them."

  Imogen shoved Indalius away and strode up to Aemon and squeezed his arm over the wound. Aemon grunted and almost fell to his knees, but she held him upright. The female sergeant watched from nearby. As she moved forward, Imogen's face split into a sweet, innocent smile, showing her teeth. "Then take me to this high commander, my love. I can feel my armor. It is getting closer."

  "Indalius and the rest will not try to follow?" he hissed through gritted teeth.

  "No, they will remain where they are until I give them the order to enter."

  The sergeant eyed Imogen suspiciously. Imogen let go of Aemon and turned to the approaching woman, her face still holding the toothy grin. "Yes?"

  Halting, the sergeant said, "Nothing... I guess. It looked like you were... well, hurting your husband."

  Imogen scruffed up Aemon's hair. "I would never hurt my dear beloved. He was just telling me we are free to enter the town as long as the Children of Ibilirith remain here." Imogen's grin grew wider. "So it falls to you to look after them until we return." She half-turned. "Oh, and look after my bird too."

  Asura flew over and landed on the sergeant's helmet, her talons raking the iron. The sergeant froze, her eyes widening in horror.

  Imogen put her arm through Aemon's. "Lead on, my love. Let's find this high commander."

  She skipped along, holding Aemon's hand, as he led her back to the gate. The guard motioned them to follow, and led them into the town. The crowded street was difficult to traverse as people, stacks of military equipment and animals were everywhere. Officers shouted orders to their subordinates and knights stood in groups talking among one another as their squires helped them into their heavy armor. Several monks of Ibilirith worked on an electrical substation, an Inquisitor in pristine white watching over them.

  There seemed to be a frantic energy to everything. Even the oxen were not immune from it. They struggled against their chains, threatening to run amok if
they got loose.

  Fear and desperation hung in the air like a toxic miasma that threatened to choke the life out of everything.

  As they moved aside for a detachment of heavily armed knights, a sudden thought occurred to Aemon. Here would be a good place to betray Imogen.

  There were hundreds of soldiers here, maybe more, and she was on her own. Even if Indalius and his brother machines somehow knew their mother had come under attack, there should be more than enough defenders to overwhelm them. If there were alchemists here, then all the better.

  Explosives would make short work of the Secondborn and harvesters.

  But then, how would he go about it? Should he start screaming at the top of his lungs Imogen was a threat and she might be planning to kill them all? Hardly anyone would hear him over the clamor of booted feet, hammers and voices. The ones who did would look at her and scratch their heads. To them, she would be some pretty, blind woman and not a threat at all. Most likely, they would think Aemon crazy, and might detain him or throw him out of town. Or worse.

  So he put aside the thought. When they got to the temple, Lucien would see Imogen for what she truly was and order her purged. Aemon only needed to bide his time a little longer.

  The guard led them directly to the warehouse, carved into the rock wall of the passage. He said something to the detachment of guards at the entrance and they moved aside and ushered Aemon and Imogen inside.

  Aemon led her through the door and found himself in a large two-story room. They were on the upper level, which consisted of little more than a couple of wide ramps leading to the bottom floor and a short wall that allowed for a good view of the lower level. Walking up to the wall, he leaned his walking staff against it and peered down.

  The lower level no longer resembled a goods-laden warehouse, but a fighting pit. Broken tables, chairs and scattered paper were strewn about, along with several pools of blood and a few soldiers writhing in pain on the floor.

  A group of people were throwing punches at one another amidst it all. One was even using a table leg as a weapon. Aemon focused in on one of the fighters. Royce. What was he doing?