The Quintessence Cycle- The Complete Series

by Terry C. Simpson

  Stupid, stupid man. Why didn’t you follow your first instinct?

  He knew the reason even as he asked. Arrogance. Arrogance and stupidity. A lethal combination.

  Hands trembling at the unusual sensation of being wounded, he thought back to the events that led to his current predicament. Occupied with the pursuit of his leads, he paid little attention to the clangor outside the room, thinking it part of the preparation by Tomas’ men to join the others in the foothills of the Whetstone Mountains. By the time he took heed of the screams and the clash of weapons, and Heart’s warning growls, the Blades and Farlanders were breaking down the door to his room.

  Soul magic flew, firesticks thundered. Metal balls blazed a white-hot trail of pain through him. He was uncertain how many of the enemy had died to his barrage of lightning. For an added distraction he’d manifested versions of himself and set them attacking wildly. When he ran into the hall, some of the Red Beggars still fought, but one by one they were cut down. He’d fallen to the ground, drawing on lumni , the seventh cycle, expelling the majority of his soul from his body to give an appearance of death. Moments later, he’d fled deep into the Undertow, blood streaming from his wounds, his assailants not far behind. In the chaos he lost track of Heart.

  Arrogance and stupidity. He’d forgotten some of the first things he learned as a Blade. No matter how good you are, how strong in soul magic you might be, someone or something might be better. Defeating the strange Dracodar had left him too confident. No. Arrogant.

  He was paying for it now in pain-filled spikes. As if the holes from the metal balls aren’t payment enough. He winced. How was it that the projectiles ignored soul enhanced by tern ? The combination should have deflected them. And the balls had punctured his scales, treated them like paper. Since his evolution, only soul blades or weapons crafted from Dracodarian-forged steel, had ever duplicated such a feat.

  Clutching his side, he peeped around the corner of the ruins. The hunters appeared to have turned back. Praise the Dominion. He doubted he could continue much farther. Even as the thought crossed his mind, his leg buckled, and he sunk down to the hard, cold ground.

  Get up, you fool. Up. Get up.

  With a hand on the wall for support he struggled to his feet, the scrape of his boots and his breathing loud to his ears. This part of the Undertow was not a place to be caught alone. It was a place of deep silences and musty air, of dust and age, of things long dead. Bandits had made these depths their home to escape the watchmen. So did people from the Smear who wished to avoid the Day of Accolades. Many were offshoots of Dracodar, driven insane by the manifestation of a power they did not understand and lacked the ability to control. Tales claimed there were worse things deeper still. He shook off the idea before it took hold.

  He had been this far into the Undertow on two previous occasions, both with Elysse, each time to hide from an overwhelming number of assassins in Jemare’s employ. The feel of something watching him from the darkness was as prominent now as it was then. Perhaps it was only his imagination, but he’d be a much bigger fool to ignore it. He enhanced his sight but detected nothing out of the ordinary. Ruins of old structures, a few statues, and a road with broken cobbles, partially blocked by debris, made up his surroundings.

  Closing his eyes he dredged up memories of the trips. He manifested them into a map of the Undertow with a dot for his location. West. That’s the way out. West. He released the image of the map and pushed off the wall, gritting his teeth against the agony that shot up his leg.

  The wound troubled him even more than what might lurk in places out of sight. In the past, his scales would knit themselves together in tiny increments, even without rest. He sensed none of that now.

  As he limped along, the sensation of someone or something following him persisted. At the edge of his periphery he swore there was movement, always too quick for him to catch more than a glimpse. He withdrew some of the soul from his eyes and applied it to his ears. Prior to this meld, the silence had stretched, interrupted only by his breathing and the uneven scuff of his leather boots on stone. He now discerned more. Much more. Cloth brushed against skin or stone, a shifty step, an intermittent susurrus. Left, right, behind, in front. He stopped. An indrawn breath. Silence.

  Although his heartbeat sped up, Thar smiled to himself. He stretched his soul to its limits. “You might as well show yourself.” He held up his good hand. Flames flared from his wrist up, casting a red-orange glare into the darkness. A crackle announced the lightning that ran between the fingers of his other hand, the arm hanging limp at his side. An azure hue spread in that direction.

  “We could simply wait you out,” answered a deep, vibrant voice. The accent was cultured, Kasinian, but of bygone times.

  “That would be a very long wait.”

  “We possess all the time in the world. You do not.”

  “I doubt you could stop me before I made it into the higher levels.” Thar tried to place the person’s exact location despite the echo that distorted his senses.

  “We could overwhelm you. Numbers favor us, and you are wounded.”

  “An animal is often most dangerous when it’s hurt and cornered.”

  “Or most desperate.”

  “Desperation and danger go hand in hand.”

  “Desperation leads to bad decision making. To stupidity. Almost as much as arrogance.”

  Thar’s breath caught in his throat. He bit back his response. Did they read his thoughts? A trickle of sweat eased down his forehead. He double-checked to make certain his sintu was present. Through the centuries it had become a natural part of him, another limb.

  A chuckle echoed. “At a loss for words?”

  “I’m done with the games. Either attack or leave me be.” He separated his mind from his pain.

  “Neither is an option.”

  “Then show yourself. Why hide in shadows?”

  “Because it is fun? The expression on your face is worth its weight in coin.”

  “Fun is relative.” Thar ground his jaw in an effort to suppress his rising anger. He hated feeling helpless. The last time he experienced the sensation was when he lost to Elysse.

  “Agreed.” The voice was directly behind him.

  Thar whirled. A man in a patched velvet jacket with an oversized collar was standing less than ten feet away at the edge of the building’s ruins. How had he gotten so close? Why didn’t I feel his movement? Didn’t I use jin? Thar felt along his soul. He had activated the tenth cycle. The dome created by the meld stretched a hundred feet past the stranger.

  “I am Envald of the Dwellers.” Envald held his hands up, palms facing outward in a nonthreatening gesture.

  “The Dwellers?” Although wary, Thar made his voice as conversational as possible. From centuries of experience he had learned how to tell when someone meant harm. No such intent radiated from Envald, but that didn’t mean the man was trustworthy.

  “Those who dwell beneath.” Envald gestured around them. The susurrus of voices began once more. Thar cocked his head to one side. “Be not afraid. They are but children, curious at the sight of an Outsider. They wonder if you will be accepted.”

  “Accepted for what?” Thar’s brow wrinkled.

  “Every few decades, when the winter is dire or when there has been an uprising among the Outsiders, some of you find your way here.” Envald leaned on a wall. “Those without violent intentions, who do not stink of murder and rape, are allowed to join us should they wish. Or are given our assistance if they require it. ”

  “And the others?”

  “Left to wander aimlessly.”

  “What happens to them?”

  Envald shrugged. “They either become fodder for the Blighted Brothers or are taken in by them. Sometimes both. Once in a great while one escapes the Brothers. When next we see the person, their minds are broken, and they whisper words of having seen Hells’ Angels.”

  “How do you know I’m not one of those you named? And who are these
… Brothers?”

  Envald smiled. His teeth were filed to points. “The same way I know of your bad decision. And … I would smell it.” He licked his lips. “As for the Brothers, some would call them monsters, remnants of a bygone time, men and women twisted by a plague that scoured the world.”

  Frowning, Thar asked, “Why let them live then? Why not kill them?”

  “Because every living thing is precious, no matter how horrid. Each deserves its time in this world, has its use. Theirs will come one day.”

  As Thar made to reply, a wave of dizziness dropped him to one knee. He was abruptly cold, hands numb and jittery. He lost a hold of his melds and the world crashed down around him, black and cold as death. Then came a shout and the sensation of being carried. A flurry of questions followed, one more adamant than the others.

  As darkness took him, he heard someone say, “No, this one is not food, he is of the brood. We are poison to our own kind.”

  S orrows

  P ractice daggers extended, Keedar circled, straining to discern a weakness in Winslow’s soul. All he required was the slightest crack to launch a mindbend. But the misty haze of sintu flowed around Winslow’s entire body in a complete nimbus, even, and several feet thick. The manifestation of the first outer soul cycle was so strong Keedar felt it from a dozen paces away. Through its translucence the giant trees at the edge of the Treskelin Forest appeared wavy, as if seen through a desert’s rising heat.

  Keedar tried to ignore the sweat trickling down his face, the salty taste, but despite his loose-fitting cotton trousers and shirt, he was hot. Uncomfortably and unnaturally so. Not that he was complaining … much. He preferred his current disposition as opposed to the life he once knew on the Smear’s streets: bundled up, nursing the warmth of coffee or mesqa, or crowded around a fire. The winter was turning out to be one of the most brutal he’d witnessed, which made him all the more content with the little cottage in the Treskelin Forest.

  As he shifted in the opposite direction from Winslow, he thought of Keshka, wondering how the old man was faring in his endeavor. Three weeks had passed since Keshka left, three weeks without word from him. That in itself wasn’t unusual, but the urgency with which Keshka had left bothered Keedar. It concerned him enough to ask Stomir if they could sneak into Kasandar by way of the Undertow. A request the Kheridisian bluntly refused.

  “You’re thinking too much,” Winslow called from opposite him, turning his foot-long practice dagger with a flick of his wrist. “How are you supposed to judge if I’ve grown any better when you’re distracted?”

  “I see you well enough,” Keedar retorted. He refocused on the task before him.

  “Now , you do. A moment ago? Not so much.”

  “I—”

  “Don’t waste your breath.”

  Keedar ground his jaw. Winslow’s ability to perceive the truth, or at least what a person believed to be the truth, made for conversations that would try a wiseman’s patience.

  “Now, if you don’t mind?” Winslow beckoned him on.

  Ignoring his brother’s apparent arrogance, Keedar pictured the vital points around his own body as if they were veins, and willed them to open wider. Soul gushed forth in greater amounts than normal. He activated tern , increasing the amount of soul around his legs and arms. The weight of his limbs became like feathers. Pulling harder on tern’s influence, he darted in, a streak of cloth, flesh, and slashing steel.

  His attacks landed, but none penetrated more than a quarter inch into Winslow’s nimbus. The deflected strikes sent vibrations up through Keedar’s arm.

  Faster and faster Keedar stabbed and sliced, hoping to slash areas before Winslow could apply his protection: a combination of tern and sintu that thickened his nimbus. But Winslow kept up, nimbus flashing, steel ringing as he parried any blows too swift for his melding ability. When they leaped away from each other, mere seconds had passed in what felt like an eternity. They were both breathing hard.

  A smile spread across Winslow’s sweaty face. “I see you have adjusted to my little change.”

  Keedar nodded. In their first encounters, when Winslow hardened his sintu , he’d made it like iron. Striking its surface allowed Keedar to build a rhythm and discern the weakest areas. Since then, Stomir had taught Winslow how to adjust his use of tern by applying shi , the last median cycle, to create a malleable nimbus, one with the consistency of wet clay. The first few times they’d sparred afterward, the change from the reverberations and solidity of metal to the sucking feel of the softer substance had caught Keedar unawares. He’d lost those sessions. In the next two days he’d gone from winning every fight to losing a little less than half.

  “So, what do you think?” Winslow asked.

  “You’ve improved. You’re almost able to keep up with me now. And your knife work is better than I expected.”

  “Almost able?”

  “Right arm, stomach, left ribcage,” Keedar replied.

  Winslow glanced down, head shifting from left to right and back again. Several slices marred his clothes in those three spots. “How? I know I was fast enough with each meld.”

  “You were fast enough but …” Keedar held up his daggers. While applying tern for his arms and legs, he’d done the same to his daggers, surrounding them with soul by use of shi . It gave an extra six inches of reach, making his weapon more like a short sword.

  Winslow’s eyes widened. “I-I never considered that.”

  “I know,” Keedar said, chest swelling with pride.

  “My old swordmaster would have said such tricks lack honor.” Winslow sheathed his dagger, disappointment thick in his words.

  “Sounds like something a Marishman or a noble would say … or a person upset by a loss.” Keedar released his meld and put away his weapons.

  “Honor in battle is for guisers’ tales,” Stomir called from where he stood overseeing their training. “In a true fight, survival is all that matters.”

  “The nobles always spoke of fighting fairly. It’s why they called for duels,” Winslow argued doggedly.

  “Nobles.” Stomir snorted. “What’s noble about us? We’re dregs, remember? Besides, the only thing fighting and fairness have in common is the “f”. A man who goes into a fight expecting it to be fair is courting death. As for the nobles, very few, if any, deserve their title.”

  Keedar knew Stomir’s words to be true. He’d learned the harsh lessons of such a life in the Smear. Eventually his brother would experience the same.

  “Have you ever wondered why Delisar kept your melding a secret from you?” Winslow asked.

  “More than I care to recall.”

  “And?”

  Keedar shrugged. “At this point it doesn’t matter anymore. What’s done is done.”

  “You were training under him all that time, and he made you believe what you did was simply the natural abilities of your soul cycles, that you were a cycler, when in fact you had already become a melder.” Winslow shook his head. “Upset barely describes how I would feel.”

  Closing his eyes, Keedar tilted his head, first to one side, and then the other. A vein pulsed at the side of his neck. Winslow’s words brought a plethora of unwanted memories, many he’d submerged deep in his mind through constant training. A hundred scenarios played out as to how he could have changed things for the better. And yet … “I wasn’t ready.”

  “But—”

  “Knowing myself as I do now, I would have done something stupid.”

  “Stupider than running off on your own to warn people in the Smear when you should have escaped with me?” Winslow’s lips twitched as he tried to suppress a smile.

  Keedar gave a rueful shake of his head. “I admit it wasn’t my smartest moment.”

  “Understatement.”

  “Fine, fine, fine, I messed up. Feel better?”

  “A little, but to tell the truth, I wished I had done the same,” Winslow said.

  On the porch, Snow bounded to her feet, snarling in the
direction of the forest. Keedar spun just as Heart dashed from among the trees. Blood covered the male derin’s fur. After a series of barks to Snow, Heart turned and galloped back into the dense underbrush. Before Keedar could move, Snow sped by him.

  Bewildered, Keedar regarded the still shaking brush. A sudden thought rose, sending prickles along his skin. Where was Keshka ? Heart would not have returned without his master.

  “What are you waiting for?” Stomir’s words cut through Keedar’s thoughts as the Kheridisian dashed by. “Go, go, go, Keshka’s in trouble.”

  Spurred on by a cloying fear for Keshka’s life, Keedar ran as if Hells’ Angels were chasing him. He pushed himself harder and faster, gaze riveted on the fleeting white and grey forms of Snow and Heart. Stomir sprinted ahead of him, weaving his way through brush, over roots, around trunks, leaping over or ducking under branches, feet gliding inches above any surface as he relied on sintu to pave the way. Winslow was perhaps a dozen steps behind, making a good account of himself despite not being at full strength.

  As he relived the images of the blood on Heart’s fur, the look in the derin’s eyes, the barks to Snow, Keedar pictured a wounded Keshka struggling against packs of the forest’s predators or worse yet, Farlanders and Blades. He was uncertain what help he might be, and yet he knew he had to try. He was a melder now, and as such, trying was better than the alternative. The circle of thoughts brought a fresh surge of dread. His legs pumped harder.

  They found Keshka among the ice-covered rocks and shale below the Cliffs of a Thousand Sorrows, his clothes a bloody mess. The two derins stood nearby, both of them whining. Keedar’s heart hammered as he approached his father. He prayed for the first time in years. When Keshka’s chest rose and fell, Keedar thanked the Dominion.

  R eports

  “Y ou should have conferred with the Order before you made such an announcement,” High Priest Jarod said. He stood across from Ainslen, one hand stroking the Star of the Dominion where it hung chest high from a gold chain.