Cloud Warrior 05 - Forged in Fire (14 page)

Water searches on your behalf, Maelen. You needn’t worry.

Tan sighed. He would have to let the nymid search and be content that it would be enough. It was hard for him to let go, especially when someone he cared about was in danger, but there was too much for him to do alone.

Now you begin to understand. You will gain wisdom yet.
Asboel made a clucking sound much like a laugh.

Tan gave Asboel a stern kick. That hadn’t been funny.

Asboel dropped his nose and dove.

Through the draasin sight, he expected to see one of the lisincend, or perhaps fire shapers, but instead he saw something else entirely.

Aeta.

You will frighten them
, Tan warned.

Fire burns already, Maelen. Do you not sense it?

Now that Asboel mentioned it, he did. It burned slowly, steadily, but the intensity of the flames increased.

If he did nothing, fire would destroy these people the same as the others and he couldn’t wait for Asboel to reach the ground.

Tan stood and jumped from the draasin’s back, streaking down on a shaping of lightning, exploding near the wagons.

Tan didn’t give the people time to react to his arrival. He focused on the fire shaper among the hundred or so Aeta huddled in their wagons. With a spirit shaping pressed through his sword, he cut off the fire shaper’s ability.

The fire faded.

Tan jumped into the wind, landing on the other side of the wagons.
Where is he?
he asked of Asboel. He sent a shaping of spirit and earth searching for where he’d sensed the shaper.

Asboel showed him a vision of the wagons through his eyes. A flash of brighter orange moved near the back one.

Tan leaped forward on the wind. The shaper was dressed in black leather and his head was shaved. He crawled forward with wide eyes staring toward the sun, and his breathing was erratic.

An Incendin fire shaper, but why?

“Who are you?” he demanded.

The fire shaper didn’t answer.

Tan prepared another shaping, this one building with his anger at what the fire shaper had nearly done. He had thought they could work with Incendin, that they could find common ground, but what if he’d been wrong? Could Incendin really want nothing more than power? Was that why they had attacked the kingdoms for decades?

Maybe they wouldn’t be able to use Incendin with Par-shon.

Movement behind him caused him to spin. A thin man in a black robe stepped out of the nearest wagon. Tan shielded his mind before realizing he probably didn’t need to. Now that he shaped spirit, he was protected. At least, he thought he had been, but now that he knew one of the archivists was here, he recognized the subtle effect of his shaping, the way it slithered across his mind, only enough to add to his doubts.

“Impressive work,” the man said. “Made all the more impressive when it’s learned that you killed all these people.”

“You’re mistaken if you think you can shape me,” Tan said.

“I’ve shaped other warriors before. You will not be the first.”

Tan raised his sword and pulled angrily on a shaping of all the elements, surging it through the sword. “You haven’t shaped anyone like me.”

“You are all the same. Weak minded.”

Tan laughed darkly. “And you are predictably blind.”

Asboel’s dark shadow began to descend. The man looked up, and as he did, Tan pressed a shaping through his sword, using the combined elements to wrap the archivist’s mind and bind it with power.

As the shaping took hold, the archivist tore his eyes away from Asboel and stared wide-eyed at Tan. “That’s not—”

“You know nothing of what is possible.”

Tan twisted his shaping, and the archivist collapsed.

T
an started
toward the fallen archivist as he rested against the wagon, his back arched uncomfortably, with one foot bent behind him. One hand reached toward a prickly bush, his fingers spasming. Tan checked the archivist’s injuries and found that he still breathed.

He hadn’t killed him, but what
should
happen to him?

The archivist had wanted the Aeta dead. He had known about the fire shaper. “Can you see if there’s a shaping on him?” he asked Amia as she approached, motioning to the fallen fire shaper.

Amia made her way toward the man.

Tan reached out with earth and spirit, layering the sensing over the Aeta within the wagons. None were dead, only stunned—
shaped
—though the shaping was a simple one. He sent a shaping through the sword and reversed the hold on the Aeta.

Thank you,
he sent to Asboel.

I will hunt. You will join when you are finished here.

Call Sashari and Cianna,
Tan said.
This will need more than only us.

Asboel huffed in agreement.

Hunt well,
Tan sent.

Asboel leaped to the sky and quickly became nothing more than a shadow. Tan turned back to Amia.

“He was shaped with spirit,” Amia noted.

“That is my fault,” Tan said. “I needed to stop him from shaping quickly.”

“No,” she started, looking back at him. “Not yours. This is another. Different and complex. He was compelled.” She turned to the fallen fire shaper. “It’s much like what Althem used, but less complex. I think I can remove it, but it will take time.”

“See what you can do.”

Tan didn’t know what to do about the archivist. If he left him here, he ran the risk of the same thing happening again when he recovered. The shaping holding him should work, but what if he managed to escape from it? Could Tan risk that with the Aeta?

He started down the line of wagons, checking inside. There would be the Mother, a Daughter, and the leaders of the wagons. Searching wagon by wagon, though, would be much too slow.

He focused on a shaping of spirit and earth. If another among the Aeta could shape spirit, he might be able to sense them. Not all Aeta were led by someone with the ability to shape, but Tan suspected enough were, a secret the First Mother had hidden from even the rest of her people, leaving most thinking the ability much rarer than it really was.

He didn’t really expect another spirit shaper among the wagons. For the archivist to be successful, he needed to be the only one able to shape. Tan sensed the hint of a void, but nothing as he had with the Aeta they’d met with Roine outside Ethea.

He went back to searching the wagons one at a time. He paused at the innermost wagon, set in the middle of the line, and pulled the door open. A young girl, barely older than his friend Bal had been when he last saw her, stirred on the ground. A band of narrow silver encircled her neck.

“Daughter,” Tan said as he approached her.

She cocked her head and blinked sluggishly. He detected her weak attempt at shaping and blocked it. She started struggling, kicking.

“Shh,” Tan soothed, holding his hands out to her. “I’m not going to hurt you.”

“You’re Incendin! They attacked—”

“Not Incendin,” Tan said. “I’m from the kingdoms. And it was not Incendin who attacked you anyway.”

“I saw them… I sensed them,” she said.

“You were shaped into sensing them,” Tan said, extending his hand to her. “Come. Let me show you.”

She eyed his hand for a moment before taking it and letting him lead her outside. Some of the others had begun to recover enough to come outside on their own. They stood around, dazed expressions on most of their faces, confusion on the others.

Tan braced himself as a younger man with more mental clarity than the others threw himself in front of the girl. “What is this?” he demanded.

He couldn’t be more than sixteen or seventeen. The jacket he wore was tattered and stitched in dozens of places. His pants were loose. Tan had once thought all the Aeta families were successful traders, but this one appeared to have fallen on hard times.

“This is us saving you,” Tan answered, trying to push past him. He wanted to show the Daughter the archivist. She needed to know what had happened.

“By abducting the Daughter?”

Tan suppressed the frustration he felt. It wasn’t this boy’s fault that he’d been shaped. “Had I wanted to abduct the Daughter, I would already be gone.”

The Daughter rested a hand on the boy. “Easy, Kayl,” she said. She shaped spirit, using a faltering attempt to soothe him. She might be young, but she had grown accustomed to leading.

“Where is the Mother?” Tan asked her.

“She fell sick. We were nearly to…” She trailed off and shook her head. “It doesn’t matter now. We had to turn back. Search for healers.”

They had been heading to the Gathering in Doma, Tan suspected, the Gathering disrupted by Incendin. “Incendin attacked. You would not have wanted to be at the Gathering.”

Her eyes widened.

“How is it you know of the Gathering?” the boy demanded.

He stepped in front of Tan again, his hands outstretched to stop further movement. He wasn’t particularly tall, or even threatening, but Tan appreciated the show of loyalty.

Tan glanced from Kayl to the Daughter. There was more to this than he understood. With a quick sensing of spirit, he recognized she was more than the Daughter to him; she was his sister. “I won’t harm your sister,” Tan said softly, leaning toward him. “I’m here to help.”

Kayl’s gaze slipped from Tan to the Daughter and then back.

“Kayl,” the Daughter said soothingly.

Kayl frowned but stepped aside, hanging on her arm and making it clear that she wasn’t going anywhere without him. He motioned toward the other Aeta, now coming out of the wagons.

Tan shaped soothing spirit, much like he had when shaping all of Ethea, using what he’d learned from the First Mother. He didn’t need a battle here. What he needed was to understand where the Aeta were headed and how the archivist had come to join them.

Tan stopped in front of the archivist. He lay unmoving, though his eyes were now open. Tan sensed the other man’s tension, like a coiled snake waiting for an opportunity to strike. He sensed the intent hanging within the archivist as well.

“Use the knife or don’t,” Tan said. “You will find that you won’t reach me if you try.”

The archivist jerked his head around so that he could meet the Daughter’s eyes. “Do not trust him. He is of Incendin. My family’s caravan was attacked by one like him,” he said.

The Daughter clutched her dress in her hands and her neck drooped. “You would do this?” she asked Tan

Tan restrained the urge to kick the archivist but allowed himself the small pleasure of a shaping of earth so the man couldn’t move. “I’ve seen too many Aeta die already. This man is one of the archivists, sent to Ethea because of his ability to shape spirit. His kind have caused more destruction than any deserve. Where did you come across him?”

“Archivist?” she asked, blinking.

“He joined us in Doma.” An elderly woman stood leaning on a twisted cane of oak. She had hair so gray as to be nearly white, and a sickly sheen left her skin glistening. A wide band of silver circled her neck. “His family was lost, he said. He is one of the People so we provided shelter.”

“Mother,” Tan said bowing to her. “The wagons are safe now.” He glanced at the archivist, still wondering what to do with him. Leaving him with the Aeta was risky, especially if he escaped, but it seemed particularly cruel to release him to Incendin. “I’m sorry for your illness.”

She swallowed and licked a dry tongue across her lips. Her voice came out weak and wavering. “You are from the kingdoms?”

“I am Tannen Minden, Athan to the king regent.”

“You are young to be named Athan,” she said and coughed. A thick bubble of blood-tinged phlegm came to her lips.

Tan used a soft shaping of spirit and water. She would need healing, but the illness he sensed was beyond him. He wondered if a water shaper skilled in healing would be able to help her or if she’d gone beyond the point where anything would help.

“Perhaps I am undeserving of the title,” he said.

When the coughing fit passed, the mother regained her composure and took in the scene: Tan before her and Amia kneeling over the fire shaper. “You’re a shaper, are you not?” the Mother asked.

“I am.”

“What can you shape?”

“I am a warrior shaper,” Tan answered simply

“And the Daughter?” she asked.

“You recognized her?” Tan asked.

The Mother pushed herself forward, using the cane for leverage. She coughed as she approached, then wiped her hand across her mouth. “You really think I should not have?”

He suspected that she sensed Amia working with spirit. Would she know when he did the same, or had she thought it only Amia? “She chose to leave the People,” Tan answered.

The Mother stared at Amia. “A loss, then.”

“You knew her?”

“Not her. I knew her Mother, and knew how proud she was of the blessing the Great Mother had bestowed upon her. Tell me, what happened to separate her from the People?”

“This is a long tale. Let’s sit and we can talk,” Tan said, taking her arm. She was frail and sickly and he feared her falling and injuring herself. Tan hadn’t learned enough of water shaping to help her if she were to collapse.

When they reached the shadows near the wagons, the Mother took a seat on the nearest steps. The Daughter stood near her shoulder, and Kayl stayed near them both. Others of this group had managed to fully shake off the shaping the archivist had placed upon them. Some studied Tan discretely, or at least they tried to, while the remainder set about to going through the wagons.

“The lisincend attacked them,” Tan said when the Mother was settled. He felt Amia’s work on the fallen fire shaper as she steadily layered spirit over and over in an attempt to release him from the archivist’s work. “They were captured. Most killed.”

The Daughter cupped her hands to her mouth and gasped. “They would do that, Mother?”

The way the Mother watched Amia told him that
she
believed. “Did you know that he could shape?” he asked.

“He had some talent. Most sent to the university have some talent,” the Mother answered.

“He was going to let the fire shaper destroy the wagons.”

The Mother snapped her head toward him. Her hand quivered on the cane. “He is one of the People. He would not—”

He nodded to the daughter. “She has some skill, doesn’t she?” he asked.

The Mother’s mouth tightened.

“I am bound to a woman once Aeta. I’ve attended the Gathering. And I’ve learned from the First Mother. There may be secrets of the Aeta I don’t know, but that isn’t one of them,” Tan said.

“You… you learned from the First Mother?” the Daughter asked, her voice dropping in reverence and her eyes widened.

Tan thought he understood: they traveled for the Daughter to learn. How would they react when they discovered that the First Mother was gone?

“I think he feared you reaching the Gathering with someone able to shape,” he said.

“We answer the summons,” the Mother said. “We’ve been called. The Gathering has been called. It is rare for the People to convene so often. Tell me, Athan, why are
you
here?”

“There was another caravan destroyed near the border,” he said. “Made to look like Incendin or the draasin did it.”

The Mother coughed into her hand. “Then the stories are true.”

How far had word of the draasin’s return spread? Far enough for the Aeta to have word. Far enough that Par-shon knew to send bonded shapers here after them. “They are. The draasin have returned. But they did not do this. For whatever reason, the archivist intended to destroy your wagon in a similar manner. Had we not arrived, you would all have been killed.”

“You have prevented him from shaping us?” the Mother asked.

“He is bound. He cannot shape you now.”

“Good,” she said and then sighed slowly. “You have given me much to consider. When we reach the Gathering, we will seek guidance from the First Mother. She will help decide what must be done with him.”

“I am not certain that it’s safe for him to remain with you,” Tan said.

“You are not of the People.
He
is. We will see that he’s confined.”

Amia came over to him then, wiping sweat from her brow as she walked. She shook her head slowly. “The shaping is complex,” she said softly. “I can remove it, but it will take the better part of a day. Maybe more.”

Tan considered their environment. They couldn’t remain beneath the heat of the sun, and he didn’t want the caravan delayed further. They deserved to reach the mourning ceremony for the First Mother in time. “Taking him to the kingdoms will make him a prisoner, and he hasn’t done anything to warrant that.”

The Mother’s forehead wrinkled. “You attempt to heal the Incendin shaper?”

“He wasn’t complicit in this,” Tan said. “Anything that happened was shaped on him.”

The Mother’s mouth turned in a confused expression. “You seem almost… angry.”

“This isn’t the first time we have experience with spirit shaping,” Tan answered. “Think of how you’ve hidden this ability from the world. Think of all the things the Aeta were once accused of doing. And now think of how the archivists were willing to use this ability.” His voice rose as he spoke, but he didn’t care. The Aeta needed to know. Tan glared at the archivist and made a point of speaking loud enough for him to hear. “The kingdoms’ shapers have all learned how to protect their minds from spirit now. And a warrior shaper able to shape spirit has emerged.”

Amia sent a soothing shaping through their shared connection. “I could stay—”

“I’m not leaving you alone in Incendin,” Tan said.

“Let her travel with us,” the Mother said. Her gaze went from Amia to the Daughter, and Tan could see the wheels turning within her mind. “We make our way toward the Gathering. The First Mother said we would be welcomed in the kingdoms, that we could hold the Gathering openly.”