by Steven Drake
“Ceres?” He turned to see his bodyguard with a very strange look on her face, something altogether unlike her usual stern face. “What is it?”
“There is something we should discuss,” she said calmly. “Do you remember when I explained the love bond to you?”
“Yes, but why does that matter now? We need an idea where to search.”
“Just listen,” Ceres said. “As I told you before, elven love is far deeper than what humans are able to experience. Our spirits change to accommodate our partners. This process is barely perceived as it is happening, but it was not always so. In ancient times, when our magical power was far greater, our love was called soul bonding and the change had profound and noticeable effects. For our ancestors, there was no distinction between a person’s soul and what we now call their mage aura.”
Jerris nodded. Darien had explained this to him many months ago, almost as soon as he started learning magic. Magical strength comes from the soul, as physical strength comes from the body. That still was not particularly helpful.
“In true soul bonding, powerful mages were able to join their auras together, greatly augmenting their abilities for a short time, even enabling them to share thoughts and memories.” Jerris froze in place as the realization kicked in. That’s what had happened, when his spirit and Nia’s had seemed to join together. It wasn’t related to the Star Sword at all. Jerris would have been relieved, had Nia been with him, but as it was, he only felt more miserable. He almost cried.
“Soul bonding was once fairly common, as I understand, but over the centuries, it faded with our magical power. It has been centuries since a true soul bond has occurred.”
Jerris wondered if he ought to tell Ceres what had happened between him and Nia. Of course, if he couldn’t get her back, would it matter? Then something occurred to him. “Why are you bringing this up now?”
“Since I became your bodyguard, I have familiarized myself with your spirit, so that I can track you from some distance away. I’m not as talented as a true mystic, but I maintain a constant awareness of your location, as part of my duties,” Ceres said. “Twice now, you’ve disappeared, vanished completely from my perception. It happened when we were searching the caves for the Star Blade, and I thought it might be because you had gone too far away, or there was too much rock between us. I didn’t think much of it, until it happened again while you were standing right in front of me. I think you know why.” Jerris’ eyes opened wide, those were the two times he had joined with Nia.
“I’m sorry.” All Jerris could think to do was apologize. After all, he had not intended anything like that. It had just happened. “I didn’t know what I was doing. I didn’t mean to.”
“That doesn’t matter,” Ceres said. “If you’ve already been bonded, there’s nothing more I can do. The soul bond is held sacred, there will be no objection to a bonded partner as queen, regardless of race.”
Jerris trembled slightly as he stared over his shoulder at Ceres. For the first time, he dared to hope he might really have Nia as a lover, wife, and queen. It was an exciting, but bittersweet revelation. She was still missing, and he still had no idea where to search. “But now she’s lost.” Jerris almost lost his composure entirely as tears formed despite his attempts to push them back.
“Not yet,” Ceres said with a smile. “Bonded partners had many unusual abilities. One was the ability maintain an awareness of each other. They could tell their partner’s location, even thousands of leagues away. They could sense whether they were in danger, or if they were killed. There are stories where the death of one actually killed the other. She is alive, Jerris. If she weren’t, I think you would know.”
“Then I ought to be able to sense where she is?”
“I don’t know. I only know what the old stories say,” Ceres said. “I don’t know much about how the magic works. I’m not sure anyone alive does, even Galen, but then you didn’t need anyone’s instruction to subdue the creature we’re riding, did you?”
“You’re right, I’ll try.”
Jerris shut his eyes, and cleared his mind. He had tried using mage sight many times under Darien’s instruction. It had been frustratingly slow. Only recently had he been able to sense anything at all, and only profound auras seemed to affect him. He doubted whether he could succeed, but for Nia, he would try. He stretched his mind out. He felt the enchanted wyvern beneath him, and Ceres’ weak aura behind him. He felt a dim sense of some power beneath him, probably Geoffray and the other Shield Knights in the camp. He put these aside, and looked farther, into the distance, where he felt only an empty expanse that seemed to stretch into forever. He found nothing, but there was one last thing to try.
He opened himself, trying to recreate the feeling of being connected to Nia, reaching out with his spirit, attempting to connect with her as though she were sitting next to him. He pictured her smiling face in his mind, and he called with the entirety of his being. He needed to feel her spirit. He needed to touch her. He needed to be with her again. He focused all of himself on her, on the connection that he had felt. He lost all awareness of everything else in the universe except himself and her.
Then, a point flared to life, like the ignition of a distant star in the heavens. He felt a rush of power and relief as for just a split second, he could almost feel her beside him. He opened his eyes, and the sense of direction remained, like a beacon, somewhere in the direction of the setting sun. He locked his eyes on that point, though there was nothing there to see. She was there, alive. He laid his hand on the wyvern’s scales, and roared a command in his mind. The wyvern shrieked and sped away towards that point with terrible speed that matched the fury building in Jerris’ heart.
∞
Nia sat bolt upright as she felt a strange warmth come over her, like a gentle spring wind caressing her cheek. It wrapped itself around her like a blanket and pressed against her, pushing away her still grieved mind. Quite against her will, she felt herself remembering the feel of Jerris holding her after he had pulled her from the raging river. The strange warming energy seemed to carry Jerris presence, something deeper than a memory and more powerful than any dream.
“Jerris?” she whispered without thinking, so powerful was the sense of his presence, as though he lay next to her. She looked around, but nothing seemed different. The light from the window had turned orange. Evening was upon them. The wagon no longer moved, and Nielas’ head was no longer visible at the window. He must have stopped to make camp.
Nia had spent most of the day curled into a ball, lost in grief, but now she felt a sudden surge of hope. Her mind told her it was silly, a simple case of wishful thinking triggered by unbearable despair. Still, she couldn’t forget it, and she felt strange, as though the presence remained at her side. It felt like the prickling of her magical senses, but those were suppressed by the shackles, so it couldn’t be. She felt her heart beat faster. “What’s wrong with me?” she whispered aloud, trying to talk sense to herself. Try though she might, she found it impossible to calm down, and impossible to dispel the irrational hope that had gripped her heart.
Chapter 13: Battle in the Canyon
Rushing air roared past as Jerris directed the wyvern towards that invisible point that marked his destination. Jerris pushed the beast to fly at its fastest. Through the beast, he felt the strain of its muscles and the rapidly building fatigue. Still, he had to find Nia quickly. He could not continue flying through the night, and the sun had already sunk low on the horizon.
He paid almost no attention to the ground, relying instead on the sense of Nia’s presence in his mind. He felt it begin to draw closer, becoming stronger and brighter in his mind’s eye. Jerris kept careful watch on that single point, reasoning that when he drew close, it would seem to move more beneath him. Sure enough, after perhaps an hour, maybe more, of sustained rapid flight, he felt a change, as the light seemed to sink. He opened his eyes to scan the ground. A high ridge rose at his right, the edge of the high platea
u that marked the beginning of the Burning Lands and the borders of Ebonscale territory. To his left, the vast expanse of the desert stretched into the distance. In the middle, almost precisely along the line of his course, lay a canyon, deep and wide, the remains of some ancient river long since dried up. The canyon made excellent cover. They had to be there.
Jerris commanded the wyvern to slow, and descend into the canyon. The land rose up on either side of him. The north side of the canyon was sharp, rocky, and broken, with cliffs jutting outward regularly, so he kept to the gentler slopes towards the south.
“Are we close?” Ceres asked.
“I think they’re in this canyon,” Jerris said. “Keep your eyes open, and be ready.”
“If you get the chance, use the wyvern to attack Nielas. He’s a capable fighter. Don’t give him a chance to defend himself. This isn’t the time for honor.”
It certainly wasn’t. Jerris was driven by his anger, and wanted nothing more than to rip Nielas apart. There was no point in stopping to talk. There was nothing to negotiate. This was a case of kill or be killed, a true battle without honor or mercy, the kind Darien had prepared him to fight.
Several minutes passed as they followed the turns of the canyon. The shadows grew deep at the canyon’s floor, and Jerris risked flying lower, slowing the pace once again. Finally, behind a gentle northward turn of the canyon, in the shadow of a great outcropping of rock, Jerris saw it, a wagon seemingly stopped, probably preparing to make camp. He kept his eyes open for Nielas, and reached out with his mage aura, but he sensed only Nia. He passed over the wagon, but there was no sign of a driver. Had Nielas gone inside, or…?
Before Jerris could finish his thought, he felt a slight pressure behind him. He reacted instantly, turning the wyvern with a thought. Jerris heard a sound like the ripping of leather, and the wyvern shrieked. The beast had taken a hit from something, but he couldn’t see what. Jerris felt the beast’s sudden pain and panic. For a moment, he lost control, and the beast turned violently, thrashing and snapping at the air. By sheer luck, Jerris noticed a glint of reflected light in the air in front of him, a metallic disk of some sort. Jerris placed his hand on the wyvern’s neck just in time to turn the beast away, avoiding another hit.
“He’s seen us!” Ceres yelled. “Those disks are his weapons. He controls them with wind magic. We can’t stay in the air.”
Damn, Jerris cursed. He had already lost his advantage, and he still had no idea where Nielas was. He dove toward the wagon in a zig zag pattern, altering his direction every few seconds, a fundamental tactic for avoiding projectiles drilled into him by his mentor. As he drew near the ground, he commanded the beast to land, but just as the wyvern touched the ground, he saw the metallic disk whiz past and lodge itself in the flesh of the beast’s trunk, just below the wing. It had narrowly missed taking off his leg.
Jerris struggled to get himself out of his saddle as the wyvern thrashed and bit at the weapon buried in its side. A river of blood poured from the beast. The blow had obviously cut a blood vessel. The wyvern would bleed to death in minutes. Finally, Jerris managed to free himself and rolled in the dirt, then dove underneath the wagon. He looked around for Ceres. He looked back toward the wyvern just as it lifted off again. Thankfully, Ceres was no longer aboard, but Jerris could see no clue where she actually went. He couldn’t see much at all from the two-foot-high space beneath the wagon. He kept his eyes open, watching for the disks, hoping Nielas would not be able to get them into such a small space. Several tortured seconds passed. Perhaps Nielas had lost track of him in the chaos, or perhaps he was still dealing with the wyvern, whose shrieks still echoed through the canyon.
“Jerris! Jerris is that you? Where are you?” Jerris heard the sound of Nia’s voice through the boards above him, and it flooded him with relief. He wanted to call back, to let her know he was hear, but his training reminded him not to reveal his location. He tapped gently on the wood, hoping Nia could hear, but he dared not make any more noise. Perhaps she did hear, because she quieted.
For several more seconds, Jerris heard the sounds of the wyvern shrieking, then a crashing of rocks and a long wail. He turned towards the sound and saw a pair of feet running across the ground. The wyvern must have knocked Nielas down from his perch. He crawled quickly toward the feet, about ten yards from the wagon, well within range. He slowed his breathing, preparing his magic, the same magic he had used to free Violet, and stared fixedly on the moving feet, waiting for the slightest pause. Finally, after several seconds of quick movements, a long, low wail signaled the wyvern had finally lost its battle.
The feet finally stopped moving, just for a moment, but a moment was all he needed. He released the spell, light flashed in Jerris’ eyes, and two white hot beams of light fired out. They ripped through the air and then through the left foot of the man who Jerris suspected had to be Nielas. The damaged foot gave way, an audible crack rang out as Nielas began to fall, the flesh and bone of his leg ripping free of the nearly severed foot. Nielas landed with a thump on the ground. An arrow protruded from his shoulder. Apparently, Ceres had been fighting from somewhere else.
For just a moment, Nielas’ and Jerris’ eyes met. Nielas scowled as the realization of what had happened hit him, then a momentary look of pain and loss flashed across his face. The experienced mage had no doubt already felt Jerris readying another spell. Nielas must have known that he was too far away to counter, and too late to dodge. Two more white hot beams of light flew from Jerris’ eyes, boring through Nielas’ head. Nielas body shivered for several seconds, then stilled. It was over.
Jerris relaxed, and breathed slowly, waiting for his nerves to calm, then crawled out from under the wagon. “Ceres!” he called as he stood up
“Prince Jerris?” The reply came from somewhere behind him. He turned to see Ceres peering from the front of the wagon. She had taken cover in the driver’s seat. He let out a sigh of relief, as Ceres did the same.
“Nia!” Jerris mind suddenly leapt into motion. “We have to get her out.” He went to the rear of the wagon. The door was chained and locked. “Nia, are you in there? It’s over.”
“Jerris, oh thank goodness. He… He told me you were dead.” Jerris heard Nia’s voice break and fall into tears.
“Hold on. We’ll get you out of there.”
They searched Nielas body, finally finding a ring with two keys, a large simple iron key and a smaller ornate silver key. Given that both the lock and chains were heavy, partly rusted, iron, it wasn’t hard to tell which was the key to the door. They disengaged the lock, and unraveled the chains on the door. There she sat, chained to the floor, her hands bound with jeweled silver shackles. Jerris leapt into the wagon and embraced her. She wept into his shoulder as he pulled her close and rocked her slowly back and forth, relishing the closeness of the moment. For several moments, they simply held each other, allowing the intense feelings to pass. Jerris slowly realized that something was still wrong. Even holding her, he could not feel her spirit with his mage sight. He still felt her presence as he had before, but it felt little different than when he had been miles away, an impression without substance.
“Nia, are you alright?” Jerris asked. “I can’t sense your magic.”
“It’s these shackles.”
“Then let’s get them off,” Jerris finally declared. Ceres was already there. She handed him the silver key. He turned it in the hole situated on the band of silver between the two cuffs. They snapped open and Nia tossed them violently away. Jerris felt her spirit roar to life. She lunged forward, wrapped her arms around him and kissed him. He fell backward against the floor with her on top of him. He felt her spirit open to him, pressing him with the urgent need for intimacy, a need that he found impossible to resist. He opened himself, and once again, the boundaries between them disappeared, and he felt Nia inside his mind and soul. He shared her joy at finding him alive, and the memory of the awful feeling that had preceded it, when she truly believed him to be dead
.
Some time passed, and finally Jerris became aware of a coughing sound. He opened his eyes to see Ceres standing dutifully behind the wagon, her face expressionless. A wave of embarrassment broke the bond between them, and he returned to himself. He thought he caught the hint of smile on Ceres’ face.
They hastily made camp underneath the shadow of an overhanging ledge and shortly had a roaring fire going. Ceres dragged Nielas’ body some distance away and tossed it unceremoniously into a gully. They ate some of the numerous supplies Nielas had brought for what would certainly have been a long journey.
Finally, together again, Jerris and Nia exchanged tales, each relating what had happened to the other as night fell. Jerris waited until the fire burned low and Nia had calmed down before he broke the awful news of her grandfather’s murder. He held her and comforted her as the raw grief of losing her only remaining family sunk in. It left a bittersweet tang on joyous reunion, but Jerris did not mind. Rather, he felt lucky and grateful to be there to comfort her and dry her tears.
Finally, when the questions were all answered and the gaps all filled in, they sat in silence for several moments, each considering what had happened.
“I suppose now we return to Kilnar,” Jerris finally declared. “Then prepare for our return to Kadanar. The wyvern is dead, so we’ll have to walk back. As long as we follow the edge of the plateau, it shouldn’t be too hard to find our way back.”