Not only glowing but pulsing. The longer she was here, the more she was certain of it. Almost as if the light beat in time with her heartbeat. Were she a stronger water senser—and in the dreams, she had been a stronger water senser—she might be able to determine whether it was timed to her heartbeat.
Her legs felt even weaker. Now not only her fingers but her entire hand and arm felt numb, flopping uselessly. In another moment or two, she wouldn’t be able to reach the glowing light. Worse, in those moments, she would be trapped here, stuck no differently than Doln.
She lunged forward, pushing with what remained of her strength and ability to move.
A sound came from the far side of the door.
Ciara tensed. Her heart hammered.
Power began to build, but not a summons. This was different, and she wasn’t sure why she should feel it.
Shade came. She knew that he did.
Ciara hurried forward, but there was a burst of air movement that told her that the door opened.
She couldn’t move. Her body didn’t work. And the light was there, right out of reach, right where she longed to touch it.
A shadow loomed in front of her, and Ciara looked up.
Shade stood in front of her. He didn’t bother to hide his furious anger.
Ciara tried to move but couldn’t. Nothing worked.
She was trapped. Helpless. Stuck here the same as Doln. And given the rage evident on Shade’s face, and the increasing numbness throughout her body, she knew that she was never going to return home to Rens.
45
Alena
I regret the need to send shapers to battle Rens. If we did not, Rens would have destroyed us completely. I understood the outside influence too late. Now, I only intend to hold back the tainted elementals, but even that requires more lives than we possess.
—Lachen Rastan, Commander of the Order of Warriors
The spirit stick glowed softly with Alena’s shaping. It made a brighter glow than any others she had managed to create. This particular spirit stick was made of gleaming steel, much like her sword, and the markings ran along both sides of the metal.
Alena hadn’t been certain she would be able to recreate the spirit stick but had been willing to try. Now they had five spirit sticks and twice as many rings. Each of them wore a ring or bracelet, protecting them from spirit shapings. When Bayan had slipped hers on, a sense of relief had seemed to wash over her. It had only grown stronger with each attempt to shape her with spirit. When each failed, she had finally started to seem relaxed.
“I don’t hear it,” she admitted to Alena.
“You heard it before?”
She nodded. “It’s all around in Atenas, like a low hum. I couldn’t get it out of my mind. But now it’s gone. I don’t hear it anymore.”
Alena handed the spirit stick over to her, this one with an extra line of marks. “And with this, we should be able to attack the darkness like I did the first night we felt it.”
Bayan sighed. “I don’t want to attack anything. I just want to keep from getting called by it. If this works…”
“We’re in Atenas to help others,” Alena reminded her. In some ways, she felt as if she should no longer be Bayan’s instructor, not when they were outside the barracks, but Bayan still needed guidance, and in some ways, she needed it more now that she had returned from whatever Tenebeth had done to her.
“That’s why you’re here,” Bayan said.
Alena took the length of steel back from Bayan. This could be sharpened and placed on a hilt, and she might be able to use a blade like this in some way and keep with her at all times, a spirit stick she could hide.
There was a blacksmith at the barracks, but she didn’t know of anyone in Atenas she could trust.
“I’m here because Cheneth asked me to come. I’m here because I recognize there is something happening here that we can be a part of stopping. And I’m here because I failed to help Ciara.”
“You can’t blame yourself,” Bayan said. “If it was Tenebeth—”
“That’s the problem. I’m not sure it was Tenebeth. They attacked in a way I have never seen, and with power I have never experienced. And the only person we knew of who could suppress Tenebeth is gone. We can’t lose Atenas to darkness as well. Not when something greater threatens us all.”
Bayan stared at the small rod she’d claimed as her spirit stick. It was wider and thicker than the others but had the same series of patterns along it. She said nothing, turning it over in her hand. “We don’t know what is coming,” Bayan said softly. “Cheneth doesn’t even know.”
“You can’t know that,” she said.
“I know what I’ve seen.” Bayan looked up from fidgeting with the spirit stick and met Alena’s eyes. “He would never have left the barracks if he knew what comes. I doubt he would ever have even come to the barracks in the first place if he knew. Whatever happens here, this is not something that Cheneth is prepared for.”
Alena sighed. “I don’t think any of us are prepared, but we can’t sit back and do nothing. This darkness, and whatever is happening with Tenebeth, have to be tied together.”
“And if they are, do you think that we’ll be able to stop it?” Bayan asked. “Even with your ability to reach the draasin, do you think we’ll be able to stop what’s coming?”
Alena tapped the spirit stick on the palm of her hand. “That’s why we have these,” she said.
“And these spirit sticks will make a difference?”
“Hasn’t the ring made a difference?” Alena asked.
“For now, but what happens when the attack is stronger than what you can pull through this?”
It was the reason Alena debated returning to the barracks. She feared the same as Bayan, but in her case, there was the desire to find out what more they could do that would help protect the city. Cheneth might be able to do something, and if he couldn’t, then they needed to gather those within the barracks to return to the city. They might have been there ostensibly to hunt draasin, but they were shapers with more skill than most, and they could leverage that strength and use it to protect the people and shapers of Atenas.
“That’s when we get help,” Alena answered.
“If it’s not too late.”
Someone knocked on the door. It swung open with sudden force.
Alena leaped to her feet, the spirit stick thrust out in front of her, and pointed toward the door, readying a shaping.
Wansa stood in the door, her eyes wide and a satisfied smile on her face.
“What is it?” Alena asked.
Wansa glanced from Alena to Bayan. In the days since Alena had released the strange film from her mind, Wansa had seemed a different person. Sprier, and full of anger and a desire to do anything she could to end the infiltration of the council. That should have been a warning for Alena.
“I have used this on the others of the council.” She held the original spirit stick out from her, clutched tightly in her hand.
Alena glanced to Bayan. “You did what?”
“The council. I would not have the Seat compromised. I have used this on the council so that we can free them from the taint that lies on their minds.”
“Stars,” Bayan whispered. “We have to get back to the barracks.”
Alena looked at her and held her eyes. “Can you go for Cheneth? This escalated faster than I was expecting. Tell him that we need his ability.”
Wansa’s victorious smile faded. “What is it? Why are you acting like this was a mistake?”
“Because it is a mistake,” Alena said. “We’ve been working in shadows of our own, and now you’ve revealed we know about them. I think Margo already suspected. When I went before the council, she attempted to shape me—at least, I think it was her. But now the others will know about us. Whatever they intend will escalate, especially if they know that you’ve discovered them.”
“The Seat will not be abused by those not of Atenas,” Wansa said. She jabbed with t
he spirit stick to emphasize each word.
“Fine, but we have to be ready for—”
An explosion came from somewhere outside the tower, from out in the city.
“For that,” Bayan said softly.
She went to the window, pulling it open. The evening air was crisp, almost cold, and gusted into the room. Bayan turned to Alena, the concern plain on her face, and shook her head.
“Return to the barracks,” Alena said to her. That was the only thing that Bayan could do. With what she had gone through, and the concern that she had for getting drawn back into the darkness, Bayan would not be of much use to them.
Bayan stood on the edge of the window and then shaped herself out and into the night without another word. There was nothing she would have been able to say—nothing that she could have said—that would have mattered with what needed to happen.
Another explosion sounded, this time closer to the tower.
“Why would they attack now?” Wansa asked.
“You know who they are. And you have a way to protect yourself,” Alena said.
They needed help from others, but how? Alena had counted on having time to understand what they might be after, the same time she could discover some way of disposing of them, but now they would have to act quickly and at night, a time that seemed to be better suited for the dark magic they preferred. Was there anything they’d be able to do? Would the spirit sticks—and those who had barely managed to learn how to use them—be enough to withstand whatever attack was coming?
They had to be.
She glanced out the window and down into the street. There, as she feared, the dense dark fog had already begun to appear, moving like something alive. They would have to find the shapers responsible and somehow find a way to stop them with the shaping sticks that they possessed.
But the last time that she’d tried, the shaping stick hadn’t been enough for her to withstand it. Would this time be any different? There would be more of them, but that might not be enough.
The power of the elementals could help, but she didn’t dare risk calling to the draasin and asking for help, even if they would answer. Doing that only put the draasin into danger that she wanted to avoid.
“Find Oliver,” she said to Wansa. “We need as much help as we can.”
“And what of you?” Wansa asked.
Alena stood at the edge of the window, fear fluttering in her chest. What else could she do but fight? Atenas might not be her home as it once was, but she still belonged to Atenas, and to the Order. That much hadn’t changed.
She held the spirit stick that looked so much like a sword blade.
Unsheathing her sword, she used a shaping of fire—one with nearly as much precision and intensity as she had used on Wansa’s mind to remove the film, and cut the blade off her sword. She took the spirit stick, and with another shaping of fire, fused the steel to the hilt. She used a shaping of fire, coursing it along the blade in waves that tied it into the hilt. She ran her fingers along the edge of the steel, pinching a fire shaping between them and adding earth to it as she placed an edge on the sword.
It would have to do. At least this way, she could sheathe the sword and have the spirit stick with her and not fear losing it. Later, she would have to find a way to hone the blade better, and possibly even see if there was anything that she could do to harden it, much like Volth’s sword had been hardened by the draasin.
With a sigh, she stood on the edge of the window and finally answered Wansa. “I am going to discover if anything I learned while in the barracks will help.”
Then she shaped herself into the night.
46
Alena
Many think me coldhearted, believing me willing to sacrifice shapers for the sake of the war. They have never understood the fact that more is at stake than Atenas.
—Lachen Rastan, Commander of the Order of Warriors
The cold air pulled at her, threatening to disrupt her shaping. She fought against the violent wind, putting more effort into the shaping than she preferred. This would fatigue her too quickly and leave her unable to force enough strength through the spirit stick. Now her sword.
This was dangerous. Coming out into the night alone, trusting that the others would come to her and help, was risky. She didn’t know what would happen were she attacked. It was possible she would be overwhelmed by the shadows and they would force a shaping onto her mind as well. At least the ring should protect her.
From above, she could see the way the fog swirled, filling spaces between buildings and slowly oozing along the street. How did she expect to find anything in that fog? How could she find the shapers responsible for it?
Using wind was the first thing that came to mind, but with wind, she ran the risk of exposing she was here. Any shaping would expose her to whoever might be down there, so when she did something, she needed to be ready.
She tested the sword—not a spirit stick, not now that she’d placed a hilt on it and turned it into a weapon. Shaping through it, she found that the doubled patterns, those on either side of the blade, allowed her to draw spirit more easily. Had she more time, she would have tested other possible configurations, determining what might help amplify her ability to draw on spirit.
Spirit came to her easily. Really, she found it increasingly easy the more that she did it. The shaping required less strength than even the last time she attempted it.
Thunder rumbled distantly, and she understood what it was they had heard. Not an explosion, but shapers appearing in the city. Reinforcements for these spirit shapers.
Ter—and Atenas—was under attack.
Alena took a deep breath. She shouldn’t be the one to lead the defense of Atenas. That should be the Commander, the man who led the Order when it went to war—which it had been for the last decade. But he had made himself scarce within Atenas, the council had been infiltrated, and few others in the city even knew there was a threat. That made Alena likely the only one who would be able to do anything.
She unsheathed the sword. Somehow, it felt right holding the blade with marks for spirit etched along it. As she shaped through it, it began to glow. Alena smiled in grim satisfaction.
Drawing on as much shaped power as she could, she began to pull more and more. The patterns on either side of the blade seemed to amplify the shaping much more than she would have expected, exaggerating the effect.
Hope surged in her with the shaping. Maybe this would help her be strong enough, to be able to shape enough that she would be able to push back the darkness.
Alena unleashed the shaping on the shadows below.
The fog disappeared, burned away by her shaping.
Alena smiled and lowered herself to the ground. Floating above the city wouldn’t help her understand where the shapers were located. If she could find them, and if she could manage to subdue them, she could end the attack before too many others appeared.
Thunder reverberated through the city. Once. Twice. A third. How many times had she heard it already tonight? At least a half dozen. That wasn’t counting the shapers who were already within the city, shapers she still had to identify.
And then there was the concern that those shapers could take the face of anyone.
What if that was what they did now?
They could kill—and then replace—anyone in the city. Only those who knew to look, and who had some way to pull on spirit, would have any way of seeing what they did and could attempt to stop it.
Alena shivered at the thought.
She held onto her combined shaping, pressing it through the sword. It required less strength than she would have expected to hold onto the shaping, and she let it slowly ease from her, sending the spirit shaping in a wide sweeping arc as she walked, parting the fog that filled the streets.
In the distance, she saw another similar glowing light and realized that Wansa had started sweeping through the street with her. Was that Oliver with her?
Alena leaped on a sh
aping of wind and landed next to them. Wansa’s eyes narrowed when she appeared, and a relieved expression washed over Oliver.
“Balls,” he whispered. “This… what is this, Alena?”
“This is the attack.”
“And this is because I attempted to test the council?” Wansa asked.
Alena shook her head, swinging her sword. “You had nothing to do with the fact of the attack. When I first came, I noticed there was something off. I’d seen shadows like this trying to climb up the sides of the tower, but wasn’t sure that was what they were. There was a night when I sought to try and stop it when it thickened into this fog.” She sighed. “So this is my fault as much as anyone’s.”
Wansa glanced at the tower. “The attack was coming regardless, wasn’t it?”
“What did you see with the council?” Alena asked her.
“I saw… I saw that Margo obstructed my attempt at using the spirit stick. Lester is the same, but when I appeared and tried using the spirit stick on Margo, he started to attack me.”
“Then he’s not the same,” Oliver said. “It’s like what Alena said when she healed you. There’s a film there. First, we have to find it, and then we can remove it.”
“We’ll need him,” Alena said.
“Blasted Commander,” Wansa said. “Were he here—”
“Were the Commander here, we’d be in even more trouble,” Oliver said. “Stars, think of what that man has done in the time since he’s taken control. He’s only kept us in the war we haven’t been able to win, he’s sent our strongest shapers out to the border, where they remained housed in cities we secured long ago, and he disappears for such long stretches that we’ve now been attacked!”
“You don’t think he’s with them…”
Oliver glared at her. “How can he be anything else? Balls, woman, what do you think is going on here? Atenas is at war, and we’re woefully underprepared for it, especially now.”
Summoner's Bond (The Endless War Book 4) Page 24