They had the boat sidled against the dock within half an hour. Niri kept the ladder leading up to the deck an easy step from midship. Ria went first followed by Darag and Lavinia. Niri waited while Ty approached Tam.
“I would still pay you. Say how much.”
Tam shook his head, his gaze on Niri. Ty narrowed his eyes.
“You brought us here at risk to your crew and boat. We owe you for that.”
Tam met Ty’s look. “Not as great a risk as I thought, I see now. You also saved the ship and crew, we are even.”
They stared each other down for a moment. A faint smile played across Tam’s lips and he idly scratched his beard.
“Don’t worry, if anyone asks I’ve never seen or heard of you. I prefer not to attract attention myself.”
Ty didn’t know enough of Tam, but he respected how he ran his ship. Ty held out his hand and Tam took it.
“Safe journeys.”
“To you and your friends as well.”
CHAPTER 38
THE RIVER DHAZOH
“The Temple is forbidden.” Yihn’s voice was firm. Zhao expected nothing different from his sister or really anyone who lived in any of the villages along the fjords of Karii. The rules were driven into them daily from a young age.
When Zhao didn’t say anything, the natural slant to Yihn’s eyes rounded. She looked over at him. “The Elders have said so. It is forbidden for anyone to go there.”
Zhao’s gaze never wavered. “The Temple belongs to Air Elementals not to the Elders. It is up to me to say who goes there.” Zhao didn’t realize he was the one speaking until the final word fell from his tongue.
Yihn was quiet. “They won’t give you permission to let them go,” she finally responded in their musical language so that only he would understand.
“I wasn’t going to ask.”
Yihn stood up and walked into the back room where her kitchen and pantry were housed. Zhao looked at the mat made of dried and woven seaweed under him.
“Why is it forbidden?” Niri asked after a moment.
Zhao looked up into her strange lavender eyes. The sudden arrival of three Elementals continued to astonish him.
Zhao had frozen mid-step when he had seen five strangers approaching the door to his sister’s house, three of them Elementals. How the elders had not known Priests were coming stunned him. They had always known before. He had been safe. The thought of what the Church would do with him now, far older than a typical acolyte, had frozen his mind.
His initial reaction to turn and walk back up the path had quickly left him. One of the Elementals, a woman with long brown hair and lavender eyes had stopped and was watching him. The others had turned as well. Zhao had swallowed his anxiety and smoothed the yellow and cream trim on the sleeves of his burgundy tunic, a design that his sister had woven for him. Zhao had stood straighter and walked down the path past the stone pagoda whose basin of water reflected the cloudy sky.
It was Niri who had met him on the path and introduced herself first, ridding him of his first worries that the group was with the Church. His sister, Yihn, had invited everyone into her home for a greeting of tea and sweet rice before asking their business, which was how things were done with the Tiak. That they wanted to go to the abandoned Temple intrigued Zhao. His world was turning upside down this day.
Yihn came back carrying a new pot of tea as if that were the reason for her quick departure. She glanced up at him through her lashes, her mouth a pert line. It was up to him to answer even though it was her house.
“It simply is forbidden. The elders give us rules passed down from generations. It has never been up to us to question.”
Zhao’s eyes stayed on his sister as he finished speaking. She sank slowly to her woven mat on knees that did not want to support her. The anger was gone in her face as well as the fear. She looked at her brother with a sorrowful face softened by love. Yihn folded her thigh length violet tunic under the knees of her cream pants.
“Why is it you want to go to the Temple?” Yihn asked her quests.
Darag answered. “We have been to the Temple of Ice and the Temple of Dust. The Temple of the Winds was the last destroyed during the war. We hope to find some answers there, some way of finding out how to hide Ria’s gifts from the Curse.”
“And by the Curse you mean the Church?” Yihn asked.
The group of strangers exchanged glances. Ria took a breath, holding it for a second as if to organize her thoughts or brace her courage.
“No, not exactly. You see, I’m a Spirit Elemental.”
Ria did not wait for Zhao to say he had never heard of such an Elemental. She did her best to explain what they had learned on their journey from Mirocyne and the summer solstice ceremony. Details swirled in Zhao’s mind. He had never been further than the villages of the fjords. He had never seen the Sea of Sarketh or magical beasts.
“Nirine is from the archipelago, a Water Elemental and former Priestess?” Zhao waited for a nod that he had gotten this correct. “Darag is Kith and so an Earth Elemental and Ria is Sarkethian and is a Spirit Elemental. But if this thing that hunts Ria was created from the same power she wields, it is a Spirit Elemental as well?”
Darag rocked back on his heels where he knelt. His jaw was tense as his eyes found Niri’s while Ria paled.
“The letter said it was magic so as to hunt magic,” Niri answered. “It may be. I don’t know.”
“You can see,” Ty cut in. “There is quite a bit we need to learn. The Temple holds our best chance at finding answers.”
“The villagers showed you here because they said my husband navigates the Dhazoh? You told them you needed to go upriver to the Temple?” Yihn asked, her voice warm with concern.
Lavinia leaned forward. “Yes, why?”
Yihn looked over at her brother. “They will go to the elders and tell them. They’ll come and prevent this.”
Zhao felt a flush swell across his skin and sicken his stomach. Yihn was right. The elders ruled the fjords. He knew what he was in their eyes. Under the dark hair and skin nearly the same creamy tan as the Yisha trees, despite the silver eyes unlike the normal night black or that he followed the traditions and kept his temple locks cut chin length and tipped in white, in their eyes he was not yet twenty. He was young before he was an Elemental.
“The tide was wrong for anyone to leave. The elders are in Himil for the summer. By the time someone leaves and comes back we can be gone. Gagee will be back before dark. We can head out by dawn.”
Darag, Niri and Ty exchanged looks. “We don’t wish to cause you trouble,” Niri answered, sitting forward.
Yihn snorted delicately, shaking her head and casting Zhao a sidelong glance. “Zhao does not mind challenging the elders.”
Zhao’s heart panged at the story Yihn referred to. “What my sister means, is that I am an Air Elemental and the oldest Elemental of my people. By rights, I should have a seat with the elders, but they deny it to me. It was the Temple of the Winds, it should be my decision to say who is allowed.”
Ria’s forehead was scrunched. “You are the oldest Elemental here?”
Zhao’s mouth was dry. Yihn glanced at him before answering. “In our traditions, Elementals are not allowed to marry or have children. It was thought the trait was gone from our people. It has been many generations since the last Elemental was born here. The elders were . . . surprised when Zhao was born.”
“Are you the only Elemental?” Lavinia asked.
“No, there have been three more since I was born, two boys and a girl.”
“How do you learn?” Niri had a line between her brows. “I know it was not with the Church.”
“No, the elders have always hid the gifted children from the Church. There were books, some scrolls on calling the air. I try to teach the younger ones what I have managed to learn.”
“They are all Air Elementals?” Ty waited for Zhao’s nod. “And the Temple of Winds was here. It might not be a coincidence.�
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“I don’t understand.”
Darag answered in a measured voice. “It could be like the Kith. We are all Earth Elementals. The Temple might have been built here not because of the mountains, but because of a grouping of Air Elementals.”
Zhao rocked back, staring up to the wooden timbers of the ceiling. “It could be. None of the writings I have says such a thing.” He said the words, but in his heart he knew it was true. The Temple of Winds was his by right and legacy.
“Do they say anything about the war?” Niri asked softly.
“No. There is very little about the Temple either. I always thought the elders had removed it before they gave it to me.”
“Zhao!” Yihn’s face was pale as she stared at her brother. “It is one thing to stand against the elders and give them permission to go to the Temple and another to accuse them.”
“Accuse them of what? Keeping me in a shrine where I know nothing and am forbidden to learn? Where I cannot do any of the things it is in my heart to do?” Yihn looked away from Zhao’s angry stare. “I wasn’t going to give them permission to go, Yihn. I am going to take them.”
Talk stopped soon after. Yihn was more afraid than angry, Zhao knew that. But the elders would not dare to harm her or Gagee. They would know it was his fault, as it had often been. If there were time, Zhao felt he could make the elders see reason. But like the argument to allow his sister to marry when they had feared she would pass on her brother’s gifts, it would take years. From the story Ria had told, they did not have the time to wait. After years of following the role laid out for him by others before his birth, Zhao’s step was light as he walked the path to the Dhazoh to prepare two boats for the journey upriver.
Gagee was back before nightfall, a question in his eyes to see two of his boats overturned and half packed. The cuffs of his deep emerald shirt were rolled back to keep them from getting wet as he worked in the river and his long dark hair was still pulled back in a pony tail, its length nearly touching his shoulder blades. He held a catch of fish, which he handed to a quiet Yihn. Gagee turned to his brother-in-law.
Gagee said nothing as Zhao told them of the five strangers and their journey. His face did not alter when Zhao said he had given them permission to go the Temple. Gagee only looked up to meet Zhao’s eyes when Zhao told Gagee he was going along. When everything was said, Gagee did not argue, but merely agreed they needed to leave before dawn. Yihn sighed and continued packing with the help of Niri, Lavinia, and Ria.
Zhao was not surprised. Gagee had stood for his sister when no one else would. He had been a friend to Zhao, someone who listened and help plan arguments to the elders, before he had become a brother.
The mist still clung to the river in the morning as Gagee said a quiet goodbye to his wife. He cupped Yihn’s cheek gently and brushed back the few loose strands of her hair escaped from the tight bun with his other hand. Zhao waited until Gagee had given his assurances and turned to finish loading the boats before he approached Yihn.
“You will see me again, sister.”
Yihn nodded but did not look at him. Her downcast face was doubtful and her dark eyes were full of tears. Any doubts left Zhao as he watched the first two adult Elementals he had ever met use their power. With a touch, Darag lightened the wood of the boats so that they slid effortlessly into the water. Niri created an eddy, keeping the boats close to shore and pointed upstream. They were not Air Elementals, but for the first time Zhao did not feel alone.
Darag and Lavinia took the second boat with Zhao while Ria, Ty and Niri rode with Gagee. Even with the four Elementals, the way upriver was hard. In the long flat stretches, the two boats were easy enough to propel upstream under Niri’s skill alone. Zhao had little difficulty believing she had called the sea into the heart of the desert. But when they reached the many rocky sections of fast tumbling water, the work became more difficult.
Gagee knew where the old iron rungs were driven into the rocks at the head of the rapids. A rope could be tied to a ring in the stout prow of the heavy twenty foot boat and taken upriver to be fed through the rung. Then the boat, with Darag’s and Niri’s help, could be pulled through the torrent. Only one person could ride in the boat, keeping it steady and upright, as it was hauled upriver. The rest walked over the slick boulders, Darag occasionally creating steps to surmount impassible sections and saving them miles of hiking.
By dusk, everyone was tired. Camp was set up on a wide sand bar just upstream from a set of rapids. In the evening air, click beetles snapped their songs in the darkening damp woods. Darag formed a fire ring by calling rocks out of the sand while Zhao watched, his arms full of forgotten sticks.
“Too bad we are missing a Fire Elemental,” Zhao joked as he dropped kindling into the newly formed stones.
Ria, Darag, and Niri exchanged fleeting glances. Zhao stiffened. He knew when information was being kept from him. He had seen it often enough growing up. Eyes narrowing he drew in a slow breath.
Before he could speak Ria sighed. “Oh heck.”
Ria flicked a fireball into the mass of bark and sticks, holding it in existence until the tinder caught on its own. Ria giggled at the look on Zhao’s face.
“But you are a Spirit Elemental. You said you could manipulate living things, not create fire.”
Niri leaned forward from where she sat next to Ty. “Have you ever heard of the Ashanti?”
Zhao had heard of the mysterious desert tribe, which helped him believe the story that unfolded. When it was done, he was still shaking his head.
“It isn’t possible.”
“It is,” Darag said. Without any warning, he created a tiny fireball and tossed it at Niri. Niri didn’t even flinch. A sudden damp wind struck the ball so that it winked out. Zhao didn’t know what to think. Ria intruded into his grasping silence.
“That is what I need to learn to do. You both can react so quickly. I’m never sure what to do.”
“We’ve had years of lessons and practice. Darag has even been trained to fight.”
“Yes, well then I need practice.” Ria crossed her arms and tilted her chin.
Niri eyed Darag, who smiled with a hint of challenge in his eyes. “There is some light left. And it would be only fair to show Zhao how to summon the other two elements.”
“Two?” Zhao asked.
“Water and fire, you don’t want to try to summon earth. Trust me,” Niri shivered.
“And spirit is off limits until we deal with the Curse,” Ria said rising to her feet. “Where shall we go?”
“Over by the river and away from camp. No accidents that way,” Niri replied.
Darag cast a sidelong glance toward Ty and Lavinia as he stood. “So you have the advantage?”
Niri’s eyes flickered. “We will be standing on rocks if that will make you happy.”
Ria bounced in Darag and Niri’s wake the short distance to the river, Zhao following a little less certainly. Next to the older two Elementals, he felt unskilled. Learning to call new Elements seemed far more than he needed when he barely knew what he could do with air.
But as Niri showed him how to summon fire and water, he found the thrill of touching new forces far outweighed his worry. It was even fun. Zhao found himself grinning with much the same anticipation as Ria.
Darag and Niri squared off first, Ty, Lavinia, and Gagee watching from the sandbar. Without any formalities, Niri sent a wave skimming at Darag. He parted it before it touched him and made the stone under Niri’s feet rock. She fell backwards but softened her fall by thickening the air and making the sand absorb her impact. Zhao and Ria both stood with mouths agape.
Niri laughed as she stood, wiping sand from her skirt. “Well, you knocked me over first. So I guess it is Ria and Zhao’s turn.”
Nervousness flooded Zhao so that his hand shook when he took a position facing Ria. She was pale as well, smoothing her tunic over his hips. Zhao grinned. This was the first time he actually had a chance to practice under the eyes of
trained Elementals.
Zhao pulled a mist around Ria, blinding her. She used the wind and blew it back into him. He rose the level of water in the sand under her feet, so that she began to sink. Ria yipped in surprise and jumped sideways.
“I don’t know. It just isn’t natural for me to fight.” Ria laughed at her reaction.
The sparring went on another twenty minutes as the shadows crossed the stream and then thickened. For the last match, Ria managed a cunning feint against Darag, tossing a fireball at him while swamping him with a wave from behind. She grinned and danced in the sand. Zhao played with fire, sparking it over the sand as they walked back to the fire pit.
“Is it really so bad to call your opposite element?” Zhao asked openly to Darag and Niri.
“Yes,” Darag said. “It is very unpleasant.”
“I agree. But it isn’t impossible. If you need to do it, just be ready for it,” Niri cautioned.
Zhao nodded. “This is more than enough.”
“This is something the Church can never learn,” Niri said soberly. Zhao swallowed, the smile pulled out of his lips as he sat around the fire.
Darag shook his wet hair at Lavinia. She blocked herself with her hands the best she could, giggling.
“I heard you laugh when Ria soaked me.”
Lavinia rolled to her feet, tossing a handful of sand at Darag before running down the beach. He chased after her, catching her in his arms when she had to stop or jump in the river. Lavinia’s laughter rang back bubbling over the river.
Gagee gave Zhao a sad smile. “Our ways are not the only options in this world. It is good for you that they came.”
Zhao looked down, jaw tight to keep at bay the disconcertion that swept over him at the sudden changes and new thoughts. He looked up through his lashes, watching Darag and Lavinia walking hand in and back to the fire.
“Yes, this is good. Hopefully Yihn will understand.” Gagee put a hand on Zhao’s shoulder as he stood up.
“I’ll make sure she understands.” Gagee walked to the forest to hunt for more wood.
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