Born of Water

by Autumn M. Birt

  The illusion Zhao had created disappeared the instant the Curse’s open claws found air and then water. The Curse landed haphazardly in the deep pool of water Niri had held back all morning. Trumpeting in confusion, it changed from a giant eagle to a dragon as it reared out of the stream.

  Niri was quick to thicken the water, pulling at the Curse’s struggling bulk. It shot fire at the watery bonds. Then, sensing more than seeing, it shot fire at Niri where she waited under the trees. Ria dashed them away from Niri and Ty, sparing Niri the pain of touching fire.

  The Curse’s wings beat the air to help it gain ground against the sticky water. Zhao thinned the air. The Curse’s form slumped back to earth, its wings finding no purchase to rise against. Angry now, it thrashed a tail out striking anything in reach. Rocks exploded. The debris fell back on the Curse as if the ground itself fought it as well. Darag would not waste such an easy opportunity to inflict damage or disorient the creature.

  Seeing Zhao, it lashed out a tail again and hit air. The illusion vaporized only to appear elsewhere. The fire borne of the Curse’s anger engulfed the clearing by the stream. Automatically, Darag pulled Lavinia behind him, the flames parting and flowing around them harmlessly.

  Twisting, the Curse struggled upright. Its head pivoted on its long neck as it took in the clearing and the Elementals fighting it. Ria’s heart was hammering. Power pulsed in her hands, but she didn’t know what to do with it. The serpent head angled towards her as if it sensed her. The slitted gold eyes narrowed as it looked through the trees. It blasted Ria with fire, as if wanting to burn her from the planet, incinerate this girl that had escaped it time and time again until the very rocks she stood on melted. When it had to take breath again, the Curse paused and stared at where Ria stood unharmed.

  It moved again, as fast as a striking snake. This time, it reached out to attack with something it controlled: it’s teeth. Ria reacted without thinking. She launched herself upward becoming a sparrow. The whoosh of the teeth snapping below her sent her higher faster as she changed herself into something with more strength in its wings. She became a hawk.

  The changes came naturally, but the feeling of becoming a new form was unnerving. Ria beat her wings into the sky, hurtling herself out of range of the Curse’s fire and teeth. Her heart beat so fast in the bird body that she felt she would explode.

  Struggling with her new wings, Ria called updrafts to help her climb. Her vision was no longer in front of her. She panicked again as she tried to focus and could not find the Curse below her. Her flight dived erratically as she tried to turn her head and lost altitude. With desperation, Ria launched herself upward once more.

  The Curse’s struggle redoubled as it tried to break free from the water bonds to chase after Ria’s quickly diminishing form. A foot landed on rock and then sank through. Surprised, the Curse arched its neck to see its claws trapped in solid rock. It roared and slammed its body down, snapping its head toward Darag at the last second. Darag spun backwards barely out of reach of its teeth. Lavinia’s sword slashed across its nose as it flashed past. The Curse reared back in pain as blood trickled down its scales.

  It sucked in air to ignite the place where Lavinia stood only to breath in a mixture of dense air, dust, and water. The fire died before it was formed. The Curse hesitated, surveying the clearing again. Its eyes paused where each Elemental stood.

  A low rumble formed in its chest as it stopped struggling. It lowered its front legs to the ground, its chest so low it scraped the surface of the water as its long neck tensed. Its lips pulled back in a snarl. Darag pulled Lavinia behind him as the ground under their feet started trembling.

  “This isn’t me,” he warned her. He held out a hand palm down as he tried to still the shaking earth.

  The motion rose up into the trees around them. They splintered in explosions from their bases. Darag pulled Lavinia into his arms, protecting both of them as the forest crashed down. Niri protected herself and Ty. Zhao did the best he could to deflect the onslaught with wind while diving behind a boulder.

  Once they were distracted, the Curse lashed out again. It was quickly redeveloping its battle skills long unused since the war. The Curse swiveled despite its trapped leg, turning to quickly strike physically at Zhao. It hit an illusion again, this time finding rock hidden beneath it. the boulder shattered, cutting a deep gouge above the Curse’s left eye. It screamed, pulling power around itself. The air around it shimmered as it hunted the ground for Zhao.

  Niri gathered her power. She had promised Ria to try to stop its heart. From where Ria rode the updrafts, she knew this was what Niri was going to do. Ria held her breath. Niri had cautioned that she didn’t know if it would work.

  “Who knows the amount of water in a dragon’s blood?”

  But Ria knew it would work. Niri’s eyes were closed, her hand held out. The Curse screamed. It’s head reared up, eyes flashing with hate. The Curse dived towards Niri as fast as it could in one motion, opening its massive jaws.

  Ty pulled Niri back, breaking her concentration. Her eyes snapped open as the Curse sucked in its breath. She flinched from the flames that were about to come. The Curse choked on the last intake no longer finding air. It lunged its head back to escape the combined effort of Zhao and Darag. Its tail lashed out abruptly. Without turning to aim, it struck Zhao, finally finding him at last.

  Zhao was knocked fifty feet back. Darag tried to soften Zhao’s impact as he hit the ground, the dirt giving away beneath Zhao’s unmoving form. The distraction was enough. The Curse could breath again. It turned and opened its jaws sucking in a mighty lungful of air. Its head tilted with deadly accuracy toward Lavinia and Darag.

  Then Ria slammed into it. She had changed at the last minute into a form to match it. Dragon to dragon, she raked the Curse, talons extended and mouth aiming for its neck. Dragon blood seared in her veins, powerful muscles responded to her mind. There was no room for fear in a dragon.

  The Curse swiveled around to fight her off, their claws scratching against the scales of the other. The breath of flames meant for Lavinia was blown into her face and wafted harmlessly past. It tried again and Ria redirected the flames back into its face. She could control the other elements, Ria thought with triumph. It could not.

  It stumbled, trying to break its foot encased in rock free. The Curse’s wings beat at the air again. Zhao lay unmoving. Niri thinned the air instead. Its wings lashed into the sky without affect. It reared up, its other foot sinking into stone as Darag pinned it down.

  So near the Curse and using the same Elemental skill it controlled, Ria sensed its mind as Niri once had been forced to. It wanted nothing more than escape, to reach the blue sky. At the same instant, Ria could feel a compulsion placed on it to fight, to shred her into oblivion. It fought to ignore it, but could not. It turned a golden eye to her, opening its jaws wide to snap her neck and destroy the thing most like itself, another Spirit Elemental.

  Ria dodged the bite. The Curse’s teeth raked the scales of her neck. She flinched but did not back away. It was very hard to hurt a dragon. Power surged through Ria. With it, she could feel the magic bindings that held the Curse tighter than Niri’s watery hold had in the Sea of Sarketh.

  “Stop,” Ria yelled with a mental will to the Curse. Ria flashed her thoughts on the binding spell. “Help me. I’ll free you.”

  The Curse did not hesitate. Seeing one chance, it summoned all the power it commanded and joined the force with Ria’s will. The air through the clearing hummed and snapped with the combined magic. Untrained, the power writhed in Ria’s grasp, threatening to break free from her hold. Panic surged through her. Ria pulled at the ancient spell surrounding the Curse with the finesse of a bull. The old binding splintered in an implosion of light.

  The breaking of the magic knocked her away from the Curse. She fell, cushioned by Niri and Darag’s skills. Ria landed as a young woman once again. Niri hurried to her side, helping Ria as she rose shakily to her feet. Ria looked around
the clearing. Ty knelt by Zhao, who had come around. He sat up, clutching one arm to his side. Darag and Lavinia were walking slowly to the stream. The dragon that had been the Curse was gone.

  In the water, a young man lay. His skin was a red brown and his long hair was so dark it blended into the shadows of the stream. A cut slashed across the bridge of his nose and a gash bled above his left eye. He opened his eyes once, the gold in them fading as the spell holding him to do the biding of the Church died. The color left behind was dark, the same black violet of the night sky above the desert. He looked from Ria, recognition crossing his face, to the sword Lavinia held to his neck. He closed his eyes and lay still.

  “Don’t,” Ria said, stopping Lavinia. “He has suffered enough.”

  Lavinia was covered in fine scratches from when the Curse had exploded the trees around them. Darag had managed to block most of the debris, but not everything at all times. Lavinia’s gaze flicked to Darag. He looked mildly injured compared to Zhao, whose face was pale and eyes tight. The anger in Lavinia’s eyes faded. Her hand shook slightly. Darag placed his hand over hers, as he had done when he had taught Lavinia to fight. He enfolded her against him with his other arm. Lavinia closed her eyes and moved the sword from the man’s neck.

  “He doesn’t look much older than Ty,” Lavinia whispered.

  Niri parted the water so that it flowed around the man’s unconscious form. “We’d better move him.”

  Darag and Ty helped drag him out of the water. Ty looked around at the remains of the forest near them.

  “At least there is plenty of firewood. I think we might be here for a few days.”

  Ria laughed.

  CHAPTER 41

  AFTERWARD

  The falling night hid the remainders of the battle beyond the light of the campfire. The fear was gone from Ria’s face. She watched the man who had been the Curse in fascination. Niri understood. He was the first Spirit Elemental other than Ria any of them had seen. He was perhaps the only Spirit Elemental who knew the limits of the power, who could sort out what for the Kith were two gifts: Earth and Life.

  Zhao dozed, his broken arm wrapped loosely at his side. Darag had some skill at mending bones, but preferred to work in stages while letting the body heal as well. Zhao handled the pain well, admitting with a look toward the unconscious man, that they were in no hurry. Everyone was bruised, scratched, and cut from the fight. But for once, they were not running.

  For how long though? An unease was already growing in Niri. The Church would eventually know the Curse was not simply out searching, but gone from their control. And Sinika and Ci’erra, they would eventually make their way to Solaire. There were still things to be wary of.

  At her silent musings, the man who had been the Curse stirred at last. His long lashes flickered open. He didn’t move for a moment, his eyes wide in surprise as he looked around. Stirring slowly and cautiously as if he expected either broken bones or to be beat, he pushed himself upright. Niri remembered the memories he had shared with her, of not knowing what he was. She doubted he had been human for a very long time. His dark eyes flickered around the faces lit by the fire.

  “You didn’t kill me,” he said in trade. His accent was strange to Niri’s ears. Zhao stirred, watching the young man’s face across the fire.

  Ria shook her head. “The magic that was binding you is broken. Why should we?”

  He didn’t answer that.

  “Who are you?” Ty asked, his voice tinged with harshness.

  A look of pain passed over the man’s face. It slowly deepened to panic.

  “I don’t know.” His voice was soft and deep, throbbing with fear. “I just remember snatches. The war and the Priests coming. They tried so many spells . . . so many died before they came to me. Gods, what they made me do.”

  The agony of the memories made him double over at the waist. He rested his forehead against his knees, his hands shaking as he dug them into the sand.

  Ria bit her lip. “Where are you from? Do you at least remember that?”

  He was silent a moment.

  “Que Ka.”

  Niri shook her head and glanced at Ty and Darag. Ty moved his head just a fraction to the right. Darag frowned. Neither of them had heard of such a place. The man saw their confusion.

  “Near the Moors of Erowok.”

  Niri’s heart gave a leap. “There are no towns there. Just the Temple of Solaire.”

  He looked at her disbelieving. “There is no Temple . . . where did they build a Temple?” His voice was hoarse as he struggled with the gaps in his memory. His hand shook. “How long ago did the war end?”

  “Almost nine hundred years,” Darag answered.

  The man’s eyes widened with true fear. He looked down at his hands, letting out a shaking breath.

  “And the Order of Fire won.”

  “Yes,” Niri answered. He looked up at her. She thought she could see moisture glimmering his eyes. “It is called the Church of Four Orders now. But the Order of Fire controls the running of it.”

  “And there are no towns on the moors?”

  “No, not that I know of. Just the Temple of Solaire on the southern shore by the Lake of Tears. It is the home of the Order of Fire. I thought it had been there since before the war.”

  “There is no lake on the southern shore.” His brow was drawn tight and his breath was quick.

  “It is a salt water lake. The Temple is between it and the sea.” Niri’s voice trailed off as her eyes widened. In her chest the ground fell away and everything she thought she’d known fell into disarray. Her mind went back to the Temple of Dust. Her hand went to her mouth.

  “Your people, magic was common to them? The Order of Fire hunted them?”

  He nodded slowly, eyes locked on hers.

  Tears welled in Niri’s eyes as she reached for Ty’s hand.

  “Your village is under the Lake of Tears. It was drown in sea water and the Temple built to watch over its ruins.”

  His warm brown skin paled. Dark eyes held bottomless depths of pain. Closing his eyes, he shook his head slightly. All his muscles were tight as he struggled with the twin agonies of his past and the loss of his home. Quietly, he unclenched his fist. He straightened his back as he looked up and met Niri’s eyes again. His eyes blazed.

  “I will not believe they are gone until I see it for myself. I must go home.”

  For a moment there was only the crack of the fire between them. Niri turned to look at Ty, her gaze snagging a look passed between Lavinia and Darag. Darag nodded in answer to whatever question Lavinia had asked with just her eyes.

  “Darag and I, we should go back to Lus na Sithchaine at least for a bit. We need to go back.”

  Darag took Lavinia’s hand. “It is difficult for us to be away. There is a danger in it.”

  Ty swallowed hard and nodded.

  “We shouldn’t go back to Xiazhing.” Zhao cast the stick he had been idly scratching in the dust into the fire with an irritated flick of his wrist. He shifted his shoulders, seeking a comfortable position to support his injured arm.

  “The elders know we came this way. They will wait there for us to return. I don’t want to have to fight them.” His mist grey eyes were filled with entreaty as he looked across to Niri. She saw him once more as merely a young man caught between the freedom he desired and the way of life he understood.

  “Heading back to Lus na Sithchaine would be a wise place to start.”

  The young man sat forward, his dark brows drawing together at Niri’s words. Ty held out a hand to stay him.

  “You don’t even remember your name and are not certain of your home. Niri knows what awaits you on the moors. We will have a safe refuge with the Kith to decide how to go on so that you can find your people.”

  The man who had been the Curse crossed his arms over his chest, sitting back from the fire so that he was lost to shadow. The flames glinting in his eyes were the only sign Niri had that he watched them.

&n
bsp; “You saved my life, I know that. I don’t know who I am or this world anymore it seems. If you will agree to help me find my home, then I will come with you.”

  Ria let out a breath. Her bright eyes had never left the man who had been the Curse’s face from where she sat leaning forward as if she were drawn to him now. Niri wondered if such a thing were possible, if the breaking of the binding that had held the Curse could have connected them. She wasn’t sure if she were more comfortable with that explanation or with the idea that Ria was simply ecstatic to no longer be alone in her gift.

  “There must be another way than back down the Dhazoh? Is there a way through the mountains, Zhao?” Ty’s voice was tight.

  With a start, Niri realized she could see his breath. Even this far off the mountain heights the air was turning colder. Fall came early to the mountains, Niri thought. And so would winter. If they went north, they would be in a different sort of running than when the Curse had stalked them. Niri shivered. Next to her, Ty wrapped the blanket draped over their shoulders tighter against her. She smiled but knew it was weak.

  Zhao was still silent, eyes in the flames. Finally he looked up to meet Ty’s gaze with a quick glance to Darag that slid over their newest member.

  “There is a legend of a path used by the Air Elementals in times of need. I think I could find it.”

  Ty nodded. “I know you are healing, but we should leave in the morning.”

  Energy stirred through the group. Darag’s face was toward the north but when his gaze came back to the fire, me met Ty’s eyes.

  “We have faced worse than the mountains. We will find a way through.” Darag’s voice was deep and rich, holding its usual humor and ease.

  Niri’s smile came easier. She looked to where the mountains rose above the dark forest, jagged peaks raking the stars. She had survived the desert. At least in the mountain water would not be so very far away.