Against her better judgment, she opened her mouth slightly, accepting a swallow first, and then more, drinking all the water in the cup.
The man chuckled again and set the cup next to him.
Ciara focused on water sensing. With her thirst quenched, she should be able to reach for water, to reach for the connection, but other than the faint pulsing within her veins, she wasn’t able to detect anything.
“What did you do to me?” she asked.
“Do? You are dangerous, ala’shin. We protected ourselves from you.”
Dangerous. If she were so dangerous, then she would have managed to escape from them. Instead, she was captured, trapped by men she knew served Tenebeth.
“Why?”
“Why? You must learn, ala’shin. Is that not what you’ve asked?”
She tensed. “Learn what?”
The man crossed his arms over his chest. “Ah, the questions without answers. For now. They will come soon enough, but for now… for now, you will remain here.”
He stood and Ciara lunged for him but found that she could only move her hands and bend at the waist. Her legs and arms didn’t work. Not even her fingers moved.
“A precaution that will be relaxed in time,” he said. “You have shown yourself more competent than I expected. I will not have you attempt a summons against me until I am ready.”
She licked her lips. He knew, and somehow he managed to block her ability to move. Not only that, but he blocked her ability to reach Reghal. Even water was obscured from her.
“Who are you?”
The man, now working at a small table, glanced at her. “I am someone who wants to correct the imbalance in the world.”
“By serving Tenebeth?”
He laughed again. “Serving. Is that what you believe? Is that what they taught you? Ah, ala’shin, you have much to learn, much about your birthright. And that is why I have brought you here.”
If Ciara could crawl away from him, she would. “My birthright? What would you know about me?”
He set his hands down on either side of the table. The tips of both index fingers moved in a swirling motion, one that worked counter to the other. Ciara could almost make out the power that he summoned in such a motion. “You are of Rens. How can I not know about you?”
She thought of the staff that she’d seen. A j’na, she was certain of it. But did that make him nya’shin? Did that mean that he was from Rens?
He was trying to play with her emotions, make it seem like he sided with her when he did not. She had seen the way that he attacked, the power that he summoned. There was no question where his allegiance lay.
“I saw you using the power of Tenebeth,” she said.
The man sniffed. “Tenebeth. A term of fear, I would think. Those who serve him call him the Lord of Night. Perhaps that is more fitting. There are other names for him, those filled equally with fear, names such as—”
“Voidan,” she whispered.
He cocked his head to the side before nodding. “Yes. Voidan. Interesting that you know that name… ah, but the other with you spoke to the draasin. A pity she escaped.”
Alena escaped. That was good to know. At least if she got away, then Cheneth could learn what happened. But would there be anything that he could do?
Would he send the shapers after her? She was not of Ter. What would a girl from Rens matter to them?
“Who are you?” she asked.
The man smiled, and the green light around him began to fade. “You can call me Shade.”
She laughed bitterly. “Shade. What kind of name is that?”
“Not a name. But it is what you may have.”
“What’s your real name?”
“In time, ala’shin. Have you not learned that names matter?”
15
Ciara
On the Nasthar Plains, I saw an attack that should have killed him. A draasin left him burned, his body a ruin, and all others with him dead. Yet he lived. Not only did he live, but he returned to the border unscathed, as if he had never been harmed. None ever learned of the extent of his injuries, but I knew. Only an elemental bond could make that possible.
—Lachen Rastan, Commander of the Order of Warriors
Ciara couldn’t move, no matter how hard she might try.
The room was dark around her, but she was thankful the green light had faded, leaving her in a real darkness. Her mouth was dry again, and she hated that she wished for another drink of water.
She was alone.
All she had were her thoughts and the faded sense of her heart beating within her chest. Her pulse was more rapid than it should be, another sign of dehydration. Ciara strained for the connection to water, wanting to reach it, wishing that she could find some way to know if there were others around her, anyone else nearby, other than the strange man.
But he hadn’t tormented her.
That had been her fear when she first awoke in the darkened room. Other than taking her ability to reach for water sensing—and possibly separating her from Reghal—she hadn’t been harmed.
Her stomach grumbled, the only sound in the room other than her breathing.
She had to find a way to get free. Shade served Tenebeth. She was certain of that. And if he served Tenebeth, how much longer before he summoned Tenebeth and the darkness returned? She had resisted him in the past, fought against his seduction, but now she was no longer certain that she would be able to continue to do so, especially if she couldn’t reach for the connection to Reghal. Tenebeth had managed to force himself on her father, and he was the strongest man that she had known.
If only she could summon the elementals, but to do that, she would have to move, and she could not. Her arms moved, and she could bend at the waist, so she sat up for a while, but with the darkness all around her, she saw nothing.
Cheneth claimed that she might be able to learn to summon without using the j’na, without using any movements, but Ciara had no instruction on how. Reghal had begun to help, and she’d seen that there was a way to do it, if she could visualize the pattern in her mind, but doing so required focus and concentration that she struggled to maintain.
So she lay with her head on the hard surface, some sort of stone slab. Waiting.
Time passed slowly. Ciara still could not detect the drawing of water, and still couldn’t sense anything other than the slow pulsing of her heart, regardless of how much she strained for it. Gradually, light began to fill the room, the same steady, sickly green that she’d seen from the man.
When Shade appeared next to her, she noted the thick scent of pine and the earthy stink of rot before he said anything. She hadn’t seen any doors open, had not felt a shifting of the stagnant air around her, nothing that would signal how he had appeared. He simply was.
“Why do you torture me?” she asked. “Do you think it will help you convince me to join him?”
Shade chuckled. “Impressive that you recognized that I was here.”
“I see you.”
He leaned forward, more shadows than anything, until she could smell him more clearly. “If you see me, then you can summon the same power, ala’shin.”
“I will not use Tenebeth.”
“Ah, you give him a name when you should not. Names grant him power over you.”
“You said that names matter.”
Shade chuckled again. “Names matter because they are power. His is power, but of the sort that not any can use. Not like the other elements.”
“He is darkness. Even the name you have claimed serves him.”
“The name I have given to you. And how does it serve anything? What of wind? Water? Earth? Fire?” Shade stepped close enough that she could see the outline of his face. His dark eyes pierced through the shadows and held her in a heavy gaze. “Do you think that darkness and light are any different? They are a part of this world as well.”
“Fire never attempted to destroy other elementals.”
“No? You have ridden th
e draasin. I can sense that much about you. Powerful creatures like that, and you think they are benevolent? All elementals have a purpose.”
Ciara shifted on the slab, her back aching, either from where she’d been struck or because she’d been lying in this place for so long. She wanted to move but could not. Even sitting up might be better, but sitting up would put her face to face with him, and she had no intent of doing that. “Tenebeth is no elemental.”
“Perhaps not the way that you have been taught to see the elementals, but that creature is no different. There are those who understand such things.”
“Like Hyaln? I’ve heard what—”
“You have heard from one man. A man who has chosen to separate himself from what he could learn, abandoning the opportunity for lessons that would grant him a greater understanding. No, you have not heard, ala’shin.”
He stood in silence, and Ciara held her breath, focusing on water. If she could sense him, if she could detect his pulse, she might know when he returned. She might be able to use that to help her escape. And then she would have to find a way out.
“Why are you doing this? Why do you care about me?”
“Care? I would not say that I care about you. You have potential, and you can help shift the balance. That is what I care about.”
“What balance?” she demanded. Frustration surged through her at her inability to reach anything with water. She could find some connection to water within herself, but nothing like what she should. There was not the steady pulsing through her veins that she should feel. There was not the pounding of her heart. There was barely the sense of her sweat or any of the other moisture within her body. There was nothing.
And from Shade… she detected nothing from him as well. As much as she wanted to, she picked up no sense of his heart, or his blood, or sweat. Almost as if he were not standing across from her. Were she not unable to detect herself, she might think that he wasn’t standing right in front of her.
“There is a balance, ala’shin, one that you will understand more as you follow along the pathway. You will understand in time. These first lessons are only the beginning, but others will come. And in time, you will see that your ability to call to the elementals means that you can serve a role in resetting the balance.”
“These are lessons? You coming here, taunting me, speaking cryptically about what you intend and telling me that you control Tenebeth rather than the other way around?” She sat up then and wished that she could move her fingers. Her arms couldn’t make the necessary patterns, not as well as she wanted in order to summon the elemental strength that she had used to create the explosion when she was first abducted. That had surprised her as much as anything. Had it not worked, she would have been less surprised. “The green that swirls around you tells me that you serve him. You might think it’s the other way around, but I can see his influence. I have spoken to him.”
Shade leaned toward her, his smile fading. “You have spoken to those who worship him, but I doubt that you have spoken to the darkness. There is nothing to speak to, only power to claim, power you fear when you should not. And this light that you fear, this green you claim swirls around me, you must see that it is around you as well. How else could we have found you?”
With that, he faded. The scent of pine and decay disappeared. The darkness did not, leaving her with the strange, awful green light.
She waited for the light to fade, for there to be nothing but darkness, but it did not.
Could he have been right? Could the light come from her?
If so, why had she not seen it before?
She sighed, wishing for the ability to at least sense water. If she were wishing for something, she would wish to be able to reach Reghal once more. The lizard knew things and could help keep her safe.
Instead, she was left with only the trembling fear that she might already have begun to serve Tenebeth.
16
Alena
It never dawned on me that Cheneth might collect those with similar abilities. Neither did it dawn on me that he was an outcast of Hyaln. Perhaps had we worked together, we would not have needed a separate camp, but had we done that, I would never have discovered the depths of the betrayal within Hyaln.
—Lachen Rastan, Commander of the Order of Warriors
Alena stood inside the city, listening to the cacophony of sounds around her. Bayan stood at her side, saying nothing. Neither of them had spoken after shaping their way to Atenas. They made a point of returning outside the city and walking the rest of the way into the city itself, mostly in silence.
“What was Cheneth thinking?” Alena asked softly.
Bayan took a shivering breath and looked up. “You know him better than I.”
“I don’t know him at all,” Alena said. She might think that she knew him, but the man she knew wasn’t the man who now led the barracks. She once thought that she had served as a scholar, but Cheneth was much more than that.
“How will we find Oliver?” Bayan asked her.
“Atenas. He will be in Atenas.”
“But Cheneth said Oliver discovered something about the council.”
That troubled her more than anything. Cheneth knew about a problem with the Order, with the council leading it, and did nothing.
“He claims this is not his fight.”
“How is it not?” Bayan asked softly. “If this is his Hyaln who attacks, how is it not his fight?”
Alena sighed, wishing she had an answer. Any answer would be better than the questions she was left with. “He claims Hyaln fractured, and that this is not the Hyaln he knew. Now he searches for Ciara,” Alena said.
She doubted he would find her. Wherever those men had gone, they had taken her—and not only her but Sashi as well. Had Tenebeth once again claimed the draasin? After all they had done to try to protect her, they had still failed.
They started through the city, and Alena took in the sights of carts moving along the streets. Supplies, she suspected. The war was supposed to be wrapping up, a war that had been a mistake from the beginning, but this had the appearance of another buildup. Why? What purpose would the Commander have for driving them back into Rens?
The last time that she’d been here had been with Wyath. Eldridge had brought them, leading them to Oliver in order to save him. That was the first time that Alena really saw Volth’s potential.
“Eldridge should be here now,” she said, mostly to herself.
“I haven’t been back to Atenas since I left for Rens,” Bayan said. She looked around, a distant expression in her eyes. She rubbed the back of her neck, brushing her dark hair out of the way. “There was a time when I thought that I would remain in Atenas, serving the Order. I had been so excited simply to be raised to the Order, to learn that I could shape each of the elements.” Bayan fell silent as she made her way through the streets.
“There was a time when I thought I might one day lead the Order,” Alena said.
Bayan glanced over at her, her brow furrowed, but said nothing.
They reached the base of the tower and paused at the door leading inside. They could shape their way in, especially now that Alena knew the trick of reaching the inner portion of the tower, but she didn’t want to return to Atenas that way. No, this would be better. Harder, but better.
She pulled open the door and started inside. Within the tower, the entrance rose two stories in a grand foyer, stairs curling off and up on either side. Paintings of the first shapers hung, representations of the first shapers, those men and women who had founded the Order and who had first settled Atenas. Then there had only been a city. The tower had come later, as a place to learn, but more than that, it became an icon in Ter, a place that all associated with the power of the shapers. Over time, that power consolidated.
Always, though, the college of scholars had been separate, counseling the order. That ceased only in the last few years. The Commander had something to do with it, but perhaps it was the council as well.
“Where will we find Oliver?” Bayan whispered. “I’ve never known where to find the different guilds.”
Now that she’d come with Eldridge, Alena knew. It might not matter, but she did. “Up,” she said.
A part of her wanted to wander through the tower, to visit places that she hadn’t been in over a decade, but they had a purpose. Cheneth had warned them that Oliver might be in danger and they might need to protect him. Once, Alena would have scoffed at the notion that she might be able to help others of the Order, or that she had skills that they didn’t, but she had learned much in her time working in the barracks. There were things she discovered that were not taught elsewhere. In some ways, she and Bayan would be the most potent shapers in Atenas.
As long as the Commander wasn’t here. The man was well-known as the most powerful shaper. She hadn’t seen what he could do firsthand, but even Wyath had remarked on the Commander’s ability. What did it mean that he was so skilled in spite of never having studied at a place like the barracks? Was it possible that the Commander had been to Hyaln? Cheneth thought it unlikely, that he would have needed years to train, and that he would have needed a sponsor to even reach it, but with the rumors about him, she wasn’t so sure.
They took the stairs, Alena going two at a time, pushing off with a shaping of earth and wind with each step, masking it as she did. There were enough shapers here that it probably didn’t matter that she masked her shaping, but she didn’t want to draw any more attention than was necessary. Not until she knew what she dealt with.
When they reached the level where she would find Oliver, she made her way carefully down the hall, holding onto a shaping of earth as she did, using this to detect where she might find him. The hall—and the rooms on the other side—were empty.
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