Cloud Warrior 05 - Forged in Fire (7 page)

T
an awoke
on the hard floor. His back throbbed, and pain that hadn’t been there before pulsed in his mind. Flashes of light swam around him, almost like elementals. A strange woman leaned over him, looking down at him through deep brown eyes. It took him a moment to recognize Cora.

“You’re alive,” she said.

Tan grunted and rolled over, pushing to his knees. Amia lay next to him, her breathing slow and steady, his connection to her telling him that she was simply asleep rather than injured more seriously.

“I could say the same about you. What happened?”

Cora still sat on the bed and Tan surveyed the rest of the small room. The fire had faded to little more than nothing. With a soft shaping—one that came from her—flames suddenly leapt and danced, and saa was drawn to it. “Where am I?” she asked.

“Ethea. The kingdoms.”

“Ethea?” She said the name with a strange inflection, and her mouth pinched. “How? The last I remember, I was in Par-shon. There was pain… death… I…”

Tan breathed out slowly. His head hammered and throbbed. He felt more tired than he had in ages. What had happened to them as they shaped through the sword?

Then he remembered the voice he’d heard right before passing out. Elle’s voice. Of that, he was certain. It had come from a distance, but there was pain and urgency in the way she called to him.

He glanced at the sword lying near the end of the bed. When he was recovered, he would have to try shaping spirit again to see if he could reach Elle. If she needed help, he had to be there for her.

“You were in Par-shon,” Tan said, getting to his feet and checking on Amia. She stirred as he touched her and her eyes blinked open. A glaze over them told him that she wasn’t completely recovered. He drew upon the elementals for strength—it was one of the gifts of his bond—but she had no elemental to pull on. He ran his hand across her hair, soothing her as he looked up at Cora. “And now you’re not.”

“How is it that I am no longer there?” Cora asked. “How is it that I’m in the kingdoms? How is that any of this has happened?”

“Because I brought you out of there.” He faced the flames, feeling the draw of saa. He let the sense of the elemental fill him, the power rejuvenating. Some of the fatigue he felt faded. Soon he would be strong enough to shape safely again. He bent and picked up the sword, sheathing it quickly.

“You’re a warrior, then,” she said.

There was a firmness to her voice, a confidence that was so different from the woman he’d rescued. She was not afraid of the fact that he was a warrior. If anything, she seemed irritated that she had required the help of someone from the kingdoms.

“As are you,” he said.

Cora blinked and looked away. “Once, perhaps, but that person is no longer.”

“Who is that person?” he asked. “You’re not of the kingdoms, but where are you from?”

“You think the kingdoms the only place where shaping exists?” she asked. She stared at the fire dancing in the hearth.

Saa twisted and flickered, moving in ways Tan didn’t shape. Cora did. She pulled on the fire, the flames sliding and swirling, and he recognized a familiarity with fire that was different than anyone he’d ever seen. There was only one way she would reach the level of skill needed for what he saw.

“You’re from Incendin?” he asked.

She lifted her chin almost in defiance as she looked away from the fire. Tan recognized a stark confidence that told him he’d guessed right.

“It has been many years since I claimed the Sunlands as my home.” she said.

“How long were you in Par-shon?”

With the question, her shoulders sagged slightly. She touched her hair, smoothing it down. “I… I do not know. We have fought Par-shon far longer than we’ve fought with the kingdoms. The danger there forced some to shapings that are unsafe, even for those drawn to fire.”

“You were never interested in becoming one of the lisincend?” he asked, pressing a shaping through the summoning coin in his pocket, as well as through the ring he now wore. Roine would need to know what happened.

“You speak as if you understand the reason for the transformation, but there are many reasons to embrace fire.”

“Embrace fire? That’s what you would call it? How many are lost during the transformation? There are those in the kingdoms who suspect it’s close to half. Is it worth the price? Is it worth allowing fire to consume, to control them?”

Her head tilted slightly as she pronounced, very clearly, “Yes.”

Cora slipped off the bed, and leaned in front of the hearth, pausing to stare at the flames that danced within. Her hair appeared healthier, the gray completely gone. Tan had thought her older, possibly at least his mother’s age, but this woman could not have been more than ten years his senior.

When he had learned that she was from Incendin, he hadn’t meant to start a debate about the merits of the lisincend. Tan might be the only one who understood what it meant to touch that power and return, but there was no question in his mind that Incendin had a reason for turning its shapers into the lisincend. The threat of Par-shon had driven them to it. What would happen when the kingdoms got their first taste of the power of the Utu Tonah? What would their shapers do?

He’d already seen what the ancient shapers had done. Tan didn’t want to repeat the past.

He knelt next to Cora and placed his hand on the flat of her shoulder. She felt warm, more so than the flames in the fire could account for. The Incendin shaper did not turn to him.

“What did you lose?” he asked softly.

“Does it matter to you? I have gone from one prison to another, haven’t I?” She met his eyes. “If you’ve brought me to the kingdoms, I am no freer here than I ever was in Par-shon.”

Tan started to tell her that she wasn’t a prisoner here, but that might not be true. Could they let an Incendin warrior shaper free?

“When I was in Par-shon, I met another man, one from Doma.” He watched her as he spoke. Would she remember what had happened in Par-shon or had the trauma been too much? “A water shaper, one who had once been bonded to the udilm. He is safe now, too.”

“I remember…” she started, and then shook her head, “nothing. There are snatches of shapes and colors. Mostly pain.”

“There was another man,” he went on. “In worse shape than you, though I have hope that we will be able to heal him in time, too.”

Honesty would be needed. And Cora deserved to know. He might not have been able to get through to the lisincend he had once tried to heal, but he would get through to Cora.

“When I found you, it was in a place the Utu Tonah used for separation. They wanted to sever the bonds formed between shaper and elemental. I have not shaped long, and I have been bonded for only a little longer than I’ve known shaping, but that was possibly the worst pain I have ever known.”

Cora watched him for a long moment before speaking. “You know the bond?”

“I speak to the elementals.”

“Which?”

“All of them.”

The ring on his finger tightened at the same instant a heavy pounding on the door made them both jump. Roine had come.

Tan opened the door, surprised to see Roine hadn’t come alone. Cianna stood behind him, red hair wild and a tight maroon shirt flowing over her curves. She offered him a wide smile. Even more surprisingly, the First Mother leaned against the wall behind them both. When Roine moved to his right, the First Mother craned her neck, as if to see inside the room. She nodded and tottered away without speaking.

“Tan. You summoned,” Roine said.

He stepped to the side to let Roine see Cora. She straightened, pulling away from the fire, and faced him. Her face revealed nothing.

Roine stepped into the room. “I am Theondar Roardan, king regent.”

Cora glanced past him to Cianna. She seemed to hesitate as she saw the bright red hair. “And I am Corasha Saladan.”

Cianna sucked in a breath. Tan felt her shaping as she readied it.

“You have heard of me?” she asked Cianna.

Roine gauged Cianna’s reaction before answering. “I have not. But that my fire shaper has tells me you are from Incendin. Did you know?” he asked Tan, not removing his focus from Cora.

“Only since she’s been healed.”

“What happened to Amia?” he asked, glancing to where Amia still slumped unmoving on the ground.

“The shaping got away from us,” Tan explained. “As we healed Cora, there was a void.” He explained a little of what had happened, leaving out what he’d sensed of Elle for now.

“And you thought to seal it?” Roine asked.

“She didn’t deserve what happened to her in Par-shon. You know how they nearly took my bond. What would have happened had the Utu Tonah gained control of one of the draasin?”

Cora gripped his arm and jerked him around.

Cianna was there in a heartbeat, standing next to Tan, a shaping building quickly. Roine simply watched. Tan waved Cianna off. Perhaps he should, but he didn’t fear Cora, not as he did the other shapers of Incendin, and not as he did the lisincend. He knew what she had been through. What she needed now was understanding, not violence. They could use Incendin. They would have to if they were ever to survive an attack from Par-shon.

Cora stared at him with hot intensity. “You said draasin.”

“I did,” he said.

“They have been lost for centuries.”

At least now he knew she had been in Par-shon long enough to have missed him freeing the draasin. “They were lost,” Tan agreed.

“No longer?” she asked. Tan tipped his head in assent. “And you have bound one?”

“When I told you that I understood what you experienced in Par-shon, I told the truth. The Utu Tonah tried severing my connection to the draasin. He tried taking that bond for himself.”

Her face contorted, her lips forming odd shapes something like multiple words that wanted to be voiced simultaneously. “How is it you escaped?”

“The same way you were healed. The Utu Tonah cannot bond spirit.”

Cora stared at Amia. “She saved you?”

“
I
shape spirit, Cora,” he said, pulling her attention to himself.

She spent a moment in thought, studying both Roine and Tan but ignoring Cianna. “I have been held in Par-shon long enough for the Order of Warrior to return?” she asked, laughing bitterly. “And now you hold me here, hostage in another land of my enemies.”

Tan attempted a shaping of spirit to soothe her. Now that he’d recovered from the shaping that he and Amia had done, the elemental power refreshing him, he drew upon it easily. Cora rebuffed him, pushing back with a shaping of her own.

She knew how to block spirit. Knowing what the First Mother had done with the Doma shapers, it made sense that she would know. Perhaps he should have tried soothing her before revealing that he shaped spirit, but likely she had already placed protections around her mind when she awoke and saw Amia.

“We’re not your enemies,” he said. “We share a common threat.”

She frowned at him. “Common? Has Par-shon attacked your borders for the better part of a century? Has Par-shon taken all who bond to the elemental power? Has Par-shon stripped you of all your protections, leaving you with no choice but to embrace shapings that lead your most talented shapers to perish rather than remain able to serve their people, with those who do remain changed into something else, driven in ways you can never understand? Is that the enemy you face?”

Roine’s silence became somehow commanding. Tan bit back his answer and waited for the King Regent to speak. “You describe many of the kingdoms’ experiences with Incendin,” he said.

“The kingdoms? You cannot know what we face, the dangers that we have kept from our shores. Because of what the Sunlands has done, your kingdoms have remained safe.” She shifted her attention to Tan. “You didn’t even know the threat of Par-shon existed and now suddenly, you think to stop them?” She snorted, then sneered at Cianna. “And you, too weak to make the desert crossing, abandoning the ancient ties of our people.”

“Enough,” Tan said. He infused a shaping of spirit into his words.

They all looked at him.

“We did not heal you for you to insult our people,” he said.

“Then why did you heal me?”

“I…” Tan paused. He had healed her thinking she could help, that by healing Cora, they might better understand what drove Par-shon, perhaps find an ally in a warrior shaper. Now that he knew she was from Incendin, he wondered if he would even be able to get through to her. The divide between the kingdoms and Incendin might be too wide for them to reach agreement, but if they didn’t, both would eventually fall to Par-shon. “I saw what happened to you in Par-shon. I know what you’ve been through. I only wanted to help.”

“Help?” snorted Cora. “Help would have been the kingdoms offering aid rather than attacking centuries ago. Help would have been leaving me to die in Par-shon rather than bringing me here.” She raised her chin, a smug smile playing at the corners of her lips. “If you would really help, then you would release me so that I might return to the Sunlands.”

“You will have the freedom of this place,” Roine said. “But no more than that until I decide what will become of you.” To Tan, he said, “She will be your responsibility, your first as Athan.”

He took his leave before Tan could reply. Cianna lingered just long enough to shoot Cora one more glare. Fire seethed from her skin, practically leaving her body glowing with heat as she made her way out of the small room.

Tan sighed and closed the door with a shaping of air.

Cora turned back to the hearth and said nothing more.

T
an touched
Amia’s fingers as they laced through his while she watched Cora. The Incendin shaper sat in the chair near the window, staring out upon Ethea. Her face was blank and she had not spoken since the confrontation with Roine and Cianna the day before. A warm breeze blew in, as it so often did around Tan, especially now that he had bonded to Honl.

“We were right to heal her,” Amia said.

Cora’s hands were clasped on the table and she twisted her fingers every now and again. It was the only thing that told him she wasn’t as mute as when he had first found her. The breakfast he’d set in front of her was uneaten.

“I know that we were,” he said. “I only wish that the others would see it the same way.”

Roine had not returned. Tan knew that meant nothing in particular. Roine would often be gone for days at a time, but this felt different. He had expected to hear something by now, if only to send word of what he planned with Cora. This silence felt almost stifling.

“The others think of what they’ve been through at the hands of Incendin,” Amia said.

“You’ve been through the same.”

“Had I known that she comes from Incendin, I don’t know that I would have worked as hard to save her. Perhaps it was best that I didn’t know. This way, she was given a chance. No one deserves what was done to her.”

“You still would have tried to heal her,” Tan said.

Conflicting emotions crossed over Amia’s face. “Maybe.”

“We can use them,” Tan said softly. “We will have to if we intend to survive Par-shon.”

“Only a few know what Par-shon is capable of doing, Tan, but all have seen what Incendin will do. They have seen the way that they attack, they have seen the city nearly fall, and the way they hurt and kill and twist…” Amia took a deep breath and shook away the tension that had started to fill her. “It’s why you’re the only one who can do what’s needed.”

He sighed. “I’m not sure that’s even true. I don’t even know what’s needed. We’ve healed Cora. The Aeta summoned… someone. The First Mother claims she called them here for safety only, but I no longer know what to believe with her. And we still need to worry about what Incendin might do. In spite of all of that, it’s Par-shon I fear.”

“As you should.”

Tan jumped.

“You are a shaper,” Cora said. “You understand what it means to use the power of the elements. But you are also bonded, so you know too what it means to share in that power, to have your elemental burn through you, to
choose
you.”

If Tan had any question about what type of elemental Cora had bound to, the way she described the power as burning through her erased it. Which elemental had she bound? Saa was found throughout the kingdoms and he’d sensed it while in Incendin, but the elemental had greater power in Par-shon. Possibly even greater power elsewhere. Tan hadn’t seen evidence of inferin or saldam, but that didn’t mean they couldn’t exist in Incendin. From working with wind, he knew that different lands had different elementals. It was only in places like Ethea, places of convergence, where all the elements came together.

“I know what it was like to have my elementals nearly taken from me. That’s why I wanted to help you. Others need to understand. They might not be able to reach the elementals, but they need to understand why the bonds can’t be forced.” It was no different than what Althem had done when he’d used spirit to force the kingdoms’ shapers to do what they would not otherwise have done. They might not understand the elementals, but they could understand that.

Cora frowned. “You said elementals.”

“Yes,” Tan answered.

“You have bonded more than one?”

“I speak to all elementals,” he reminded her.

With a soft summons to Honl, he drew upon the power of the wind elemental ashi. Warm wind gusted through the window, drawn from the south, from the heated lands of Incendin. Ashi were elementals of warmth and sun, drawn to the draasin. Tan was no longer surprised that he would bind to one. Were he ever to bond to an earth elemental, he suspected it would be much the same, tied to fire in some way. Everything about his shaping was tied to fire.

Cora breathed in the air, letting it trail over her face. She shaped wind, pulling on it, and the shaping danced across her skin. “How is it that ashi is here?”

Tan decided against sharing that Ethea was a place of convergence. He needed to convince Cora to trust him, but that didn’t mean placing the kingdoms in jeopardy. Sharing every secret he had would do that. “It is my bond,” he said simply.

“But you are of the kingdoms. You should bond ara.”

Tan shrugged. “I may be of the kingdoms, but I’ve bound ashi.”

Cora released her shaping and looked back out the window, again falling silent.

When she said nothing more, Amia touched his hand. “She needs time. Most of us do, Tan.” She caught his eye. “Yes, myself included. What you suggest… it is difficult to move beyond what has happened in the past. Even Roine finds it difficult to understand, and he’s faced Par-shon.”

“We don’t have time,” Tan said. That was the problem. “And somehow, we have to find a way to use Incendin against Par-shon.” He said the last softly, quiet enough that only Amia could hear. With a shake to clear his thoughts, he rose to his feet. “I need to walk. Can you stay with her?”

Amia smiled tightly, understanding the request he didn’t make. Should Cora attempt to shape and overpower her, Amia would need to separate her from her shaping ability, much like the First Mother had once separated Tan.

“You restored me. I will not harm her,” Cora said without looking back at him.

He considered telling Cora that Amia was probably too strong for her to harm. After watching her work with the First Mother the last few days, he’d seen the way her spirit shaping had grown. He doubted that there was another shaper who would be able to overpower Amia were she to attempt to confine them. “Thank you,” he said.

Tan left Amia sitting with Cora, neither speaking.

He hurried from the small house and out to the street. The day had grown long, the sun already well past its zenith and starting down again, leaving a slight chill to the air. The people he passed were all dressed in heavier clothes. Some still wore scarves wrapped around their faces, though the smoke and dust from the attack had long since dissipated.

Pausing at an intersection, he surveyed the street. The homes here had not been damaged in the attack, not from the draasin or by the lisincend coming into the city. That didn’t mean there weren’t signs that the city had changed. Even here, workers replaced wooden framed buildings with stone, working by hand rather than shaping it into place as happened elsewhere. Most felt stone would have withstood the attack better. Tan doubted it would have made much of a difference. Had Enya chosen, she could simply have melted stone. Only the golud-infused stone would have survived.

What would it take to convince the others to look beyond Incendin? Roine may have placed a title upon him, but that didn’t mean the other shapers would suddenly look to him for guidance. He was too new, too young, and he suspected there were some—perhaps even his mother—who distrusted him because of his bond to the draasin. Few knew how he had nearly transformed into one of the lisincend, but had they known, that would give them even more reason to distrust him.

Yet he needed to try. How could he manage to convince them if even those closest to him—his friends as well as the one he loved—weren’t certain that what he suggested was right? Worse, if they learned that he housed the draasin, the creatures that had once attacked the city, in the tunnels
beneath
the city, he might lose any credibility he had.

Tan let out a frustrated sigh.

And then there was what he had sensed when the shaping had gone awry. There hadn’t been the time to try and see what had happened to Elle since then. What if Elle really was in danger? He had sensed her, that much he felt certain about, but his mother hadn’t been able to reach Doma to know if she was safe. Didn’t Tan owe it to her to learn? She was more than simply his friend. She was family, and he’d lost enough family already.

That, more than anything, decided for him what he needed to do next.

He made his way to the archives and quickly reached the lower level and the tunnels. He wanted to be in a place of safety were the shaping to get away from him again. With Amia needing to watch Cora, there was only one place he could think of that would provide what he needed.

When he stopped at the massive door and pressed a shaping of fire and spirit onto the rune, he waited for Asboel before entering. The draasin had been hunting before but had returned. Had Asboel known that Tan would need him? Did the bond grant him that strong of a connection to understand what his bond pair required of him? Or had Asboel simply planned his return?

Can it not be both?
Asboel asked as the door came open. Bright golden eyes stared out into the tunnels, the weight of his gaze taking in Tan and seeming to pass judgment.

Will you do this?
Tan asked him.

You were reckless. I felt the effect of your shaping. It is good that you can draw upon the others for strength.

Tan entered the draasin den, the door closing behind him on a shaping of wind. He glanced around, noting that as before, the other draasin were not visible.
Do they fear me?

Not you, Maelen. Sashari prefers they rest. Besides, I would not want you tempted to name them.

Asboel kept something from him, but Tan opted not to pressure him. Likely the request for the draasin to bond still troubled him. Tan still wasn’t certain whether it was the right thing for the draasin to do, but it offered protections to them that they wouldn’t have otherwise. Asboel should know how valuable that protection could be.

The draasin made a strange sound, something between a bark and rumbling roar. It took Tan a moment to realize that Asboel was laughing.

You are right about the value in bond, Maelen. It is no longer me you must convince.

Sashari?

Enya as well. She remains distant.
Tan sensed the concern within Asboel.
Sashari might be the easiest. She has seen from you strength and sacrifice. You are much like the draasin in that.

Tan smiled at the compliment.
You know why I’ve come?

Not clearly. Only that you fear for the Child of Water.

I sensed that she was in danger. I need to help her if she is.

She has Water to help.

What if Water has been taken from her?

Then she was forsaken. It is not for you to fear.

Tan couldn’t accept that as an answer.
She is family.

That was a concept the draasin knew about quite well. Family was important to Asboel, the bond between he and Sashari much like what Tan shared with Amia. And then there was Enya. Tan had seen what Asboel had been willing to risk to save her. Not only allowing the bond but stopping her when she withdrew fire, risking himself to save her. Asboel rarely spoke of the importance of his family, but everything he did was to protect them. After a thousand years frozen in a lake, Tan could understand.

Will you help?
Tan could think of no place safer than with his draasin companion.

You are always safe with draasin, Maelen.

Asboel crawled to the back of the den, his massive body curling around in front of the pile of stacked rock, and settled down, wrapping his tail around him as he did. He lowered his head to his forelegs and watched Tan.

Tan moved to the center of the den and unsheathed the sword, resting the point into the stone. He thought about what he had done, the way he had shaped through the sword the last time. This sword was different from the others, probably the reason why he was drawn to it as he was. The runes glowed with soft light that came from within the sword itself.

With a shaping of spirit, he pressed out through it.

The runes on this sword did more than augment his power, they helped him link all the elements, bind them with spirit more easily.

He sent the shaping wide, letting it spread away from him. It washed out through the archives, skimming over the draasin so that he was left with a vague awareness of them. The shaping went out from there, stretching to the streets above, sliding over people in homes or making their way along the streets. With it, Tan had a sense of their hearts, of their thoughts. It was indistinct, but there, and easy for him to touch. Fear simmered near the surface of many, and it did not take much strength to recognize the source of the fear. Memories of the last attack were too fresh and raw. It was this fear that told him that reaching an alliance with Incendin would be difficult, if not impossible.

Tan passed a soothing sense through the city, easing the fears and anxiety of those living within with nothing more than the barest touch. The First Mother had taught him this shaping, though he had not known it at the time. It was the way she shaped her people.

The shaping faltered. Tan pulled on more spirit, dragging it through the sword. He pulled on the elementals around him for strength: Asboel, Honl, the nymid and golud in the walls, letting spirit bubble from him.

The shaping raced throughout Ethea. Tan felt shapers and people. Awareness filtered through him. There was Zephra and Roine. He sensed Cianna and Vel. Amia was there, as she always was, but with spirit shaped as he did, she pulsed brightly within his mind. She seemed to recognize what he did and fed her strength through the bond between them.

It still was not enough.

How had he detected Elle before? Not simply by shaping spirit. What he had done had been more than spirit. It had involved each of the elements, forging them together as he drew through the sword for strength.

Tan added fire and wind to the shaping, drawing both upon himself and his bonded elementals. The nymid aided his water shaping. Golud helped with earth shaping. He bound these together, pressing the shaping through the sword, mixing spirit with it.

The shaping was powerful, more powerful than any he had ever worked unaided by the artifact. With it, he felt that he touched—if only barely—on the power of the Great Mother. The sword flared with blinding white light, filling the den. Tan understood now why Asboel had blocked the entrance to the other part of the den.