Shattering the Ley (58 page)

A moment later, it swept downward, Kara’s control lost.

Both Bryce and Allan flung themselves forward, hitting the stone of the street and rolling beneath the wave of light. It struck the ground behind them and rebounded into the wolves slavering on the guards’ heels. Those in the lead yelped and twisted back, but they were too late. The light caught them and through the haze of green and streaks of yellow Kara saw their bodies contorting, smearing and changing into impossible configurations. Legs bent and fur shifted from wolf to human skin and back again. Bones cracked and popped. Howls rose, then changed to whimpers and snarls. The wolves behind pulled back from the shimmering light and paced, snapping at the air in frustration as Bryce and Allan both scrambled to their feet and lurched toward Kara with the rest of the guards.

Before anyone reached her, though, a piercing whistle cut through the air, and the wolves beyond the veil of light fell silent, ears pricked. Kara watched as they halted their pacing and bounded toward a man emerging from the confines of the buildings beyond, circling him in excitement. He was dressed in armor, his body distorted like Devitt’s, his face twisted into a snarl, half human, half wolf. He glared at the retreating guards, one hand held out to the wolves that capered about his feet. His eyes were locked on Allan.

The Dogs and remaining men from Devitt’s group tore past, Bryce and Allan slowing as they reached Kara.

“Did you do that?” Bryce demanded, chest heaving as he gasped and tried to recover from his run. His hand waved toward the shimmering wall of light.

Kara shook her head. “I didn’t cause it, but I did push it a little. It was too strong for anything more.”

Bryce broke into a hacking cough and leaned forward onto his knees; Allan also sucked in huge gulps of air. The ex-Dog she’d rescued shook his head and said hoarsely, “Doesn’t matter. You used it. Saved us all.”

Kara didn’t respond to the praise, merely nodded toward the far figure. “Who is he?”

Allan turned with a frown, still recovering—

And then he stilled, his entire body going tense. Kara saw him consider lying, the muscles of his jaw twitching, but then he said grudgingly, “His name was Hagger. I don’t know what he is now.”

Then the ex-Dog headed toward the open gates of the University with a tight, “Where’s my daughter?”

“W
HAT’S HAPPENED?”
Bryce demanded. “What in living hells happened?”

The mentors and students who had rushed them through the gates of the University walls had led them to a room deep inside the main buildings on University grounds, where Kara and all of the rest collapsed. Of the fourteen people who had stumbled from the Amber Tower with Kara, one had vanished on the way here and three had died at the hands of the wolves. Two of the six survivors they’d met had fallen. Everyone else had collapsed into chairs in exhaustion, accepting water and food brought by the students at the mentors’ orders. Blankets and clothes appeared. The Wielder Kara had found sobbing in her cell in the tower, and who had remained in shock the entire trek to the University, finally broke, rocking back and forth with the blanket clutched tight to her shoulders, her expression lost. A few of the University people were attempting to soothe her.

As she drank from her own cup, Kara had searched the people entering and leaving, but she had not seen Cory or Hernande. After a while, she stopped looking, and noticed that not everyone was a student or a mentor. Some of those helping them settle in had obviously found sanctuary at the University, just like Kara and the others. Men and women, even some children, drawn to the beacon. All of them appeared haggard.

At Bryce’s sharp words, a few of the helpers looked up. But it was one of the mentors in dun-colored robes who answered, handing off a bowl of soup to Devitt’s wife before standing and facing the Dog.

“We don’t know the particulars, but I think it’s safe to say that it was a catastrophic failure of the ley system.”

Bryce’s anger shifted toward the mentor. “And who are you?”

The man’s brow furrowed. “I am Sovaan, mentor here at the University.”

“Are you the one in charge?”

Sovaan bristled. “I am one of those in charge here on University grounds, yes.”

Before Bryce could respond, Artras said briskly, “I think what the Dog is trying to say is thank you.” She shot Bryce a glare. “For bringing us into the safety of your walls. And I believe, like all of us, he’s shaken by what’s happened and would like to have any information you have about . . . about Erenthrall.”

Sovaan appeared mollified, even if Bryce did not. The Dog remained silent, though.

“We likely know as little as you. The explosion destroyed nearly the entire city, only the outskirts spared as far as we can tell from our walls. Those outside the radius of destruction appear to have fled into the surrounding lands. Those who survived inside the city have been struggling to leave, even as they become victims of the chaos the ley network has unleashed. Once we realized that the survivors were being attacked and needed shelter and food, we set up the beacon in hopes they would come here. So far, it appears to be working. We have brought hundreds behind the walls, although it is obvious that many, many more are simply abandoning the city. We’ve seen thousands leaving by wagon or horse, in groups as large as a hundred, most of them farther away from the center of the explosion and not inclined to head deeper into the devastation. And those were during daylight. Who knows how many left in the dead of night? Who knows how many more are simply hiding in the ruins, afraid to move at all?”

“The beacon was Hernande’s idea,” one of the undergraduate students near Sovaan added.

Sovaan grimaced, as if Hernande’s name pained him. “Yes, Hernande.”

Kara caught her breath, then blurted, “Hernande’s alive? What about Cory? He was a graduate student here.”

“Yes, yes, they survived. They were in one of the practice rooms when the explosion occurred.” Sovaan dismissed Kara with a wave, but then his attention jerked back to her, his eyes narrowing in recognition. “You were the one the Dogs came for, right before this happened.” His gaze flicked over Bryce and the others, then returned. “What did they want? What did
you
have to do with this?”

Kara scowled. “I had nothing to do with this. The Dogs captured numerous Wielders, not just me, and took us to the tower. I don’t know why. But that’s why we survived. We were in the cells beneath the Amber Tower.”

Artras, Nathen, and Dylan nodded, but not the woman, who had begun mumbling to herself under her breath, the same phrase over and over. Kara couldn’t tell what it was she said and didn’t care.

Instead she winced in memory, then sighed. “But I think I know who may have caused it. Or at least played a part in it.”

Everyone’s attention was on her, but it was Sovaan who straightened and asked, “Who?”

“Another Wielder. A . . . friend of mine. His name was Marcus.”

Kara felt something in the room shift, an uncertain and tremulous fear solidifying as it latched onto someone to blame. She could feel it transforming into anger, knew that it could escalate if she didn’t stop it somehow now. Blaming Marcus was fine, but they couldn’t let thoughts of revenge or justice or retribution distract them from the real problem: the distortion that hovered over Grass. Marcus was more than likely dead, but the distortion continued to feed. They had to find a way to stop it.

“How it happened isn’t the issue right now,” Kara said, setting her cup aside and standing. “The distortion is.”

Sovaan snorted. “We have no hope of stopping the distortion. The ley field is in chaos. Nothing is working as it should. That’s why we are leaving. Preparations have already begun. Wagons are being loaded with whatever supplies we can take with us even now.”

Kara traded a look with Artras. The older Wielder shrugged.

Kara turned back to Sovaan. “Where is Hernande?”

The mentor huffed. “In the training room, where else? He’s spent nearly all of his free time there since this happened.”

Kara stilled, her heart pounding harder. The only reason she could think of for Hernande to remain in the training room was because of the sands.

“I need to see him,” she said sharply, hope burgeoning in her chest. “I need someone to take me there now.”

Sovaan didn’t have time for her, but the undergraduate student who’d told her that Hernande had suggested the beacon led Kara and Artras through the labyrinthine corridors and halls of the ancient manse to the training rooms. She chattered nonstop as soon as they were out of Sovaan’s hearing, but Kara wasn’t paying attention.

She wanted to see Hernande,
needed
to see Cory. She needed to verify for herself that they were alive, needed to touch them, hug them.

Artras followed silently behind.

As soon as Kara recognized the stone of the corridor and the long hall with the doors to the training rooms opening off one side, she shoved past the student and charged down to the room they’d used before the disaster. When she flung the door open, both Hernande and Cory started, the mentor pacing on the far side of the sand pit, Cory kneeling at its edge on one side. The dog she’d rescued from the distortion leaped to its feet with a low growl and yip in the corner.

Cory stood, confusion crossing the weariness that lined his face, but that was all Kara allowed him to do before she ran across the room and embraced him, clutching him to her. Tears coursed down her face, even though she wasn’t sobbing, but she didn’t care. She breathed in his sweat and the stench of an unwashed body, felt his arms wrap tentatively around her. The dog began barking excitedly and she could feel his paws against her legs as he yelped and bounced around them.

Then she drew back and looked up into Cory’s face. “You stink,” she said. Her voice cracked.

He smiled, his expression haggard and drained, but filled with an indescribable happiness. “And you’re dirty.”

She laughed and without thought leaned forward and kissed him, long and hard, emotions she hadn’t allowed herself to feel since the collapse of the Nexus—no, since long before that—giving the kiss urgency. Cory returned it hesitantly at first, then his grip tightened. Kara’s body hummed and she tasted the salt of her tears and Cory’s lips and for a moment the terror of what the world had become vanished. All of the strange tension between them since that night on the roof before the horror of the Kormanley attack in the park that had killed her parents died, swept aside,
burned
aside.

It lasted until the need to breathe drove them apart. She pulled back, but not far, looking up into Cory’s slightly startled eyes. Muddy brown with striations of a deep gold she’d never noticed before.

She smiled. “I’ve owed you that since that night on the roof, when you first kissed me.”

“I didn’t think you wanted anything more than friendship,” he said roughly, his voice ragged.

“I’ve changed my mind.”

Someone cleared his throat and both of them turned toward Hernande, the mentor as beaten and bruised as Cory looked, his smile as radiant. “It’s good to see you alive,” he said. “We had feared to hope.”

“So had I,” Kara said, fresh tears starting as she pulled back from Cory reluctantly. Emotions surged through her, so intense she felt light-headed, off balance, yet strangely alive. She leaned over and scratched the fur of the little dog’s head as he slobbered all over her hand. His tail wagged so hard his rear end wouldn’t stay still.

Then the soft sound of shifting sand penetrated through the pounding of her heart and the thrumming of her body. She glanced down to see the sand pit moving, channels of sand sifting back and forth, as they’d done before the Dogs had come for Kara.

Except everything was wrong, the patterns unrecognizable.

“Is this Erenthrall?” Kara asked. She couldn’t keep the shock and disbelief from her voice.

Both Hernande and Cory shifted toward the sands with her.

“This is what is left,” Hernande said. “You can see the structures that once formed the ley network here in the city—the Stone node, Eld, Candle, even a few of the ley station junctions—but most of the network is no longer intact.”

Artras and the student had moved forward as well, the older Wielder staring down at the sands in consternation, brow knit. “What are you talking about? What is this?”

At Kara’s nod, Cory drew breath and said, “The flows of the sands here represent the ley lines in Erenthrall. Before the disruption, we could trace the entire network throughout the city, every junction, every node, every branch to the Baronies and beyond. It was a map of the entire system.”

Artras hissed out a breath, eyes narrowed. “But the Primes—”

“We know,” Hernande answered. “Kara made it clear how the Primes would react. But at the moment, the Primes are the least of my worries.”

Artras pursed her lips, then barked a harsh laugh. “Yes, I suppose they are. If any of them are still alive.” She turned her attention back to the sands, her eyes tracking ley lines, picking out features, as Kara was doing. “So this is Erenthrall now? This is how the ley lines have rearranged themselves?”

“Yes. We’ve been studying them since the disruption. After regrouping with those that survived, of course. And we’ve discovered something troubling.”

“The distortion,” Kara said.

Hernande nodded, his lips pressed into a grim line. He pointed toward a chaotic section of the map, where the sands were roiling more than anywhere else, a vague whirlpool swirling around what Kara assumed had once been the Nexus. Except this whirlpool swirled upward, grains of sand lifting from the pit to form an inverted tornado. “It’s drawing energy from the remains of the Nexus.”

“No,” Cory contradicted. “It’s drawing power from something deeper.” Hernande gave him an irritated look. “It has to be,” Cory countered. “There isn’t enough ley remaining in that area to create such an anomaly. You said it yourself: the main lines that fed the Nexus before the explosion have been interrupted!”

It sounded like an argument the two had had before, so Kara cut in. “Cory’s right. It’s feeding off of something deeper.”

Both Hernande and Artras stared at her. “How do you know?” Hernande asked.

“Because when I was younger, before I became a Wielder, one of the wardens of Halliel’s Park tested me using the stones in the central grotto there. I sensed that there was something hidden deeper beneath the city, something that the Nexus had tapped into.” She motioned toward where the spike rose from the sand. “The distortion must be tapping into that lake of ley as well.”

Artras nodded grudgingly. “If this is an accurate representation of the system at the moment—”

“It is,” Cory said.

“—then I agree.” She tilted her head at the sands, then knelt down near the pit’s edge. “In fact, now that you’ve mentioned Halliel’s Park, I’d say that the ley is trying to revert back into its original flows. See there? That’s the park, one of the more stable sections of the map. And this here is Oberian’s Finger, another park with a plinth of stone rising from the hill at its center. Both were considered sacred in ancient times, long before Erenthrall became the city it is—
was
—today.”

“That would make sense,” Hernande muttered. “Now that the strictures we imposed on it have collapsed, it’s settling back into its old patterns.”

“But not quite,” Kara countered. “The distortion that’s forming is disrupting that. Look.” She circled to the far side of the pit, the dog on her heels. “It’s warping the new lines, drawing them toward it.” She stared at the entire system a long moment, then glanced up at Cory and Hernande. “The entire system is unstable. It’s going to remain unstable as long as the distortion continues drawing energy from it.”