A Gathering of Souls

by Dianne Keep

  A Gathering of Souls

  World Walkers

  Book One

  Dianne Keep

  A Gathering of Souls © 2019 by Dianne Keep

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system without permission in writing from the publisher.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, places, characters, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, organizations, events, or locations are entirely coincidental.

  Cover and map design by Soma Bohannan

  www.DianneKeep.com

  To my family. For loving me and being by my side. I love you, always.

  CHAPTER ONE

  Bree drummed her fingers against the worktable, leaving spots of sparkling gold on the scuffed wood. The lines of her fingerprints glowed against the dull finish for a few seconds before the magic faded.

  After sitting for hours, she still hadn’t deciphered a single incantation held within the pages of the Seyh mesomatrix. A five-year-old Seyh would have absorbed the enchantments from the book in ten minutes and been able to perform all the basic spells.

  Not her. The magic in her veins ignored all her requests.

  “You’re not concentrating,” said her rehabilitator, who sat across the table. Superior Ehre Homrei was the perfect Seyh specimen. Her purple alhor haloed her body exactly as it should. It barely glittered her smock and pliers as she linked silver chains together for a charm piece.

  Bree's unruly alhor decided to spread across the floor. “I am concentrating. I think that’s the problem.” The dirty tiles shone like stained glass as her golden light edged toward the bookshelf on the other side of the room. Come back. She pictured her magical luster hovering just above her skin, but when she opened her eyes, it had engulfed the bottom shelf.

  “Your alhor wouldn’t be all over the place if you focused,” said Ehre. She nagged like a mother, even though she couldn’t be much older than eighteen. She and Ehre were too close in age and power for Ehre to be a rehabilitator, but the Resh commanded it, and his subjects obeyed or died.

  Bree returned her attention to the mesomatrix. In order to regain her talents, she had to learn the spells. Which she would do, if the squiggly Seyh script would stop skittering across the pages.

  “Be still,” said Bree, and for once, the letters obeyed. A brief smile tugged at her lips for the small victory. She stared at the words. Even paused, the text remained incomprehensible. She whispered a few conversion charms Ehre had taught her, hoping the letters might change into something legible.

  Nope. Nothing.

  Her fingers skimmed over the prose, releasing the warm, sugary-scented magic hidden in the fibers of the paper. The magic seeped into her pores, tingling, and taunting the power in her blood, while remaining completely uncontrollable. She swore the mesomatrix laughed.

  I can’t help that I don’t know how to be a Seyh.

  The letters of the mesomatrix resumed their dance. Her alhor covered the book, entwining with the black letters. Bree sighed and resumed tapping the table.

  Follow the rules. Study the book.

  Her body had other ideas. Without wanting to, she gripped the amber pendant she was forced to wear. The stone held a memory-erasing charm that kept something precious from her, all the memories from the time when she controlled her magic.

  The jewel zapped her hand, reminding her of the additional pain it would cause if she tampered with its function.

  I’m not trying anything.

  The jewel flashed—it didn’t believe her. A burst of heat scorched her chest. A warning.

  I just want one.

  A single memory to reassure her she’d once lived outside of the strict rehab schedule. She searched for a picture, something small and insignificant, a sunrise maybe, anything that might slip through the necklace’s defenses. Nothing to do with people, or her family. No, they had abandoned her, wiped her name from their histories and tribe. To them, she was a blighted curse.

  The pendant seared her palm and redirected her thoughts to her first permissible recollection—the pine forest near a blackened battlefield. The place where she had killed over a hundred thousand of her countrymen with enchanted fire.

  The acrid smell of burnt flesh filled her nose as she relived the one memory the Resh approved. Her face was wet with tears. Cold metal shocked her skin. Heat raced across her chest from the amber pendant, erasing all that she had been. She blinked and became a new person, a foreigner inside her own body. She met a stranger’s dark eyes—her first contact with Ehre.

  Bree was the only traitor in the nation of Rysa to receive a pardon for war crimes. She’d received the acquittal in part because her actions weren’t entirely her fault. The Antheans had captured and brainwashed her.

  The Resh’s memory-reset wasn’t showing her favoritism. She was simply the only Seyh left in his army who possessed the magic to energize the ancient machines he needed to win the war. Her altered mind was a lenient sentence.

  Be grateful. Act grateful. You’re alive. Bree’s hands shook. Stop it. Ehre will notice.

  “You’re not studying,” said Ehre, not looking up from her work.

  “I don’t see how I can learn anything when I can’t read it.” Bree closed the mesomatrix and pushed it aside.

  “You aren’t supposed to read it. Absorb it. Magic has a mind of its own. A life of its own.”

  Bree had lost count of how many times Ehre said those sentences. “Then why are there words?”

  The chain in Ehre’s hand glowed purple for ten seconds as her lips moved silently, fusing an incantation with the metal.

  “Could I help you instead?” asked Bree.

  “The Resh didn’t assign you to me to make evoc pieces.”

  No, he hadn’t, but so far, nothing Ehre taught her had tempted Bree’s talents to function properly. Her blood magic was elated to remain just outside her grasp. She pulled another book from the study pile, Basic Charm Weaving.

  She had just started reading about how to cast a repellent charm when three knocks tapped the door.

  A female palace messenger entered and bobbed a curtsy. “His Greatness arrives.”

  The moment the Resh invaded Ehre’s workshop, all available air seemed to evaporate. Bree’s wandering alhor retreated from the tabletop and floor to hover just above her skin as if the Resh ordered it to attention, which was impossible. No magic ran in his veins.

  Bree admired Ehre’s convincing look of surprise at seeing her master amid the room’s clutter. Bree didn’t try to act shocked, mainly because she was a bad liar, and he was expected. Resh Osling Satrov left the main palace and visited the Seyh annex at least once a day to check her progress.

  She marked her place in the book and stood. Staring at her feet, she bent her knees in a poised curtsy. Silent seconds ticked by. Pine and rosemary scents drifted from Resh Osling, filling the space around Bree. A soft patter broke the quiet until she realized it was her foot tapping. Her body tensed.

  The awkward stillness continued for one hundred seconds, at which point Bree stopped counting. Osling’s routine never wavered. Anytime she showed signs of impatience, he made her wait longer. Why couldn’t he simply state his business like an ordinary person? He was far from normal, but still.

  Bree breathed slowly, reminded herself to be patient, and studied the cracks and splats of who-knows-what on the tile floor. One of the larger stains transformed into a woman’s face. Scuffs and grout lines became landscapes of plains and plateaus. The scene came a
live under the influence of her golden alhor, and she forgot about the Resh.

  Biting cold smashed into Bree’s animation. Her alhor retracted, and the tiles faded into a dirty floor. She glanced at a frowning Ehre.

  “The Resh asked you a question,” Ehre said softly.

  Bree focused on Resh Osling’s sapphire collar button. “Forgive me, Your Excellence, I did not hear.”

  He dismissed her apology with a wave of his hand and placed a small metal disk on the worktable.

  “Bree?” Ehre’s voice urged her to sit and pick up the ancient device.

  Bree bit her lip and sat. She weighed the object in her hand. It was surprisingly light. “What is it?”

  “I’m not sure.” Ehre sat across from her. “See if you can activate it.”

  Bree’s magic roared inside her. Maybe today. Please, make it be today. Closing her eyes, she asked the disk to talk to her. Her alhor rustled ever so slightly. Her stomach coiled. The seconds ticked by.

  “Concentrate.” Resh Osling’s coldness slithered up her back.

  Her power retreated. No, no, no. Please. Why do you flit away every time I need you?

  “I’m sorry.” Bree cringed, keeping her eyes shut. “I can’t make the device work.” She couldn’t stand to watch disappointment overtake the faces of the Resh and Ehre. She could already taste their frustration in the air.

  Resh Osling didn’t speak, and a million wild cats couldn’t scratch another word from her lips. The faint squeak of the Resh’s heel announced his departure. Several footsteps. The door latch lifted. His visit was over.

  Another day. Another failure. She was useless.

  How much longer would he let her live without her talents?

  CHAPTER TWO

  Ehre followed the Resh into the hallway. Soft whispers strayed to Bree’s ears. She strained to hear what was said, but her ears plugged thanks to one of Superior Ehre’s silencer incantations.

  Bree inhaled and exhaled in measured breaths. You tried. That’s all you can do.

  She took the disk across the workroom and placed it on the shelf with the other ancient devices she’d failed to activate. Osling Satrov left the relics as a reminder of why she was still alive.

  New weapons and machinery were built by Seyhs now powered by a green liquid called thanum that Osling’s grandfather had discovered. The relics from before the Changing couldn’t operate on thanum, but the Resh could bring the machines of the past back to life using her activator magic. If she fueled the ancient technology, Osling would become the most powerful man on the continent, and the war would be over. All would bow to Rysa, to the Resh.

  She wouldn’t wish that on anyone, but she didn’t want more people to die. Peace under one ruler was still peace. And Osling did some good things. He built walls and special fences to protect the people from the mutated animals roaming the countryside. The other nations had their own monsters, and he had implemented similar safeguards for them once he conquered them.

  Will he stop once he controls the continent? There were places beyond the sea where people hadn’t ventured since the Changing.

  Bree banned her mind from wandering further in that direction. She returned to the bench, folded her hands in her lap, and willed her muscles to relax.

  Sparkles from her alhor zigzagged over the pale-yellow fabric of her dress, drawing lines that looked like the face of the woman she’d seen in the tiles earlier. Was she seeing her mother? Or someone she once knew? She stared at the woman on her gown until her corset pricked her ribs and waist.

  The mental jail holding Bree’s emotions threatened to spill over. She pressed her tongue to the roof of her mouth and squeezed her eyes shut.

  Breathe in. Breathe out. Calm down. You’ll get another chance tomorrow.

  The thin blue book of charms offered to distract her. She was curious about the repellent spell, but that wouldn’t expel the energy building inside her. She needed to do something that didn’t require her to think.

  Several orders for evoc pieces were piled on the table and scattered about the floor. Bree picked up Ehre’s pliers and pulled a basket of medium-sized silver links in front of her. She dug in the box but couldn’t find a gem that would contain the charm. Maybe the client hadn’t decided on a stone yet. Or maybe it was a temporary evoc piece.

  Plain metal conducted Seyh magic well enough but couldn’t hold a spell for more than a day or two. When a Seyh poured their power into a gem, the manipulation lasted longer, a lifetime even, depending on the strength of the Seyh.

  Bree had connected the final link in the chain when her ears unclogged.

  Ehre returned to her seat and said, “It’ll come back to you. You must keep trying. Study harder.”

  Apparently, the Resh had said nothing new to Ehre. He hadn’t canceled rehab. The Resh wasn’t going to slit her throat or use her as target practice. Today.

  Don’t go there. “I’ll try harder,” said Bree. The stays of her corset prevented her from sighing. “Maybe the mesomatrix will suddenly make sense tomorrow.” She held out the chain for Ehre to inspect. “I finished this necklace. Is there a pendant ready? I didn’t find one in the box.”

  “Ah, no, that’s for Zeir Bayan,” said Ehre.

  “What’s the Zeir going to do with an empty chain? He wears more than enough protection spells.” As the only child of the Resh, Zeir Bayan Satrov was allotted charmed pendants for every contingency imaginable from food poisoning to warding off gnats.

  “I didn’t ask about the purpose of the piece.” Ehre snatched the chain from Bree. “I just agreed to make it for him.”

  Bree scrutinized Ehre’s face. A faint blush graced Ehre’s bronze cheeks. “You liar. You know exactly what it’s for.”

  Ehre blinked, and Bree read the silent curse on her lips.

  Leaning in, Bree said, “What spell does he want on it?”

  From what Ehre told her, most non-possessor royals were allowed access to the Resh’s Seyhs for an array of purposes. Resh Osling hoarded the best Seyhs for his army and to guard the palace within the capital city of Stav.

  “It’s for the Zeir’s Honor to wear during his time in the Ranking. No magic from me required.” Ehre tucked an ebony curl behind her ear. “His lady will bring him luck.”

  “Who is she?”

  Ehre rolled her eyes. “He wants to string Rysa’s flag colors through the links and his lady will wear it. That’s all I know.” She opened a container and pulled out a black cord and a strip of blue satin. Rysa’s national flag was black with a blue circle.

  The Ranking was Rysa’s way of recruiting for the military. All eighteen-year-old boys were forced outside of the capital’s protective walls for three days to face the wilds contaminated with mutated animals. Survivors received a place in the army with enough pay to support themselves and their family.

  “Is it Karra Serine? He danced with her four times at the ball last week,” said Bree. Any of the royal Karras could be his wife at any time. Bayan wasn’t required to qualify for marriage like the other Ranking candidates.

  “I don’t know who she is,” Ehre said, twitching her nose slightly to the right, which meant she did know, but wasn’t going to tell.

  A list of possible Karras formed in Bree’s mind, despite her desire to think of anything other than the noble lady Bayan planned to marry.

  “Have you forgotten your job?” Ehre pointed to the stack of books on Bree’s side of the table. “You didn’t activate the device. You haven’t absorbed any knowledge from the mesomatrix. Do you want to fail again tomorrow?”

  “No. I just. Never mind.” Bree plucked the next book from her study pile entitled Antiquities of the South. The first page showed it had been printed well over two hundred years ago, before the Changing. Ehre must have brought it up from the palace library vault. “This is in excellent condition.”

  “Mm-hmm.” Ehre focused on finishing the necklace.

  Bree gently turned the wispy white pages, being careful not to tear t
he paper. About halfway through, she started skimming. She wanted to get back to the slim blue volume of charms and learn the intricacies of casting a repellent spell. As she flipped through the last pages, a flash of gold passed her vision. She thumbed back to find the picture.

  A gold necklace rested on a bust. A pendant of three concentric gold rings hung from the chain. Next to the necklace, lay a bracelet made of the same circles. The items were on display at the Historical Museum in Yenn. The extraordinary craftsmanship was credited to a man named Tyras of Ara. The name Tyras seemed familiar.

  The necklace and the bracelet might still on display. “Did you ever go to the Historical Museum while you lived in Yenn?” Bree asked. There was something about those pieces.

  Ehre raised an eyebrow but didn’t look up. “I visited it hundreds of times. Why?”

  “Did you visit the jewelry displays?” Bree’s alhor covered the picture, making the circles on the pendant spin to life.

  Ehre opened her mouth to answer, but Bree couldn’t hear. Or breathe. Or move.

  Scalding tentacles from the amber pendant stretched across Bree’s chest.

  The charm’s defensive mechanism had tripped.

  CHAPTER THREE

  Heat like burning coals spread to Bree’s arms. In a few seconds, the fiery network would cover her entire body. The invisible lines crisscrossed and singed without searing her flesh, leaving her skin unmarked, as if nothing was happening.

  Sweat broke out on her forehead. A scream stuck at the back of her throat.

  Ehre reached over and touched her hand. She glanced at the picture Bree’s finger rested on. Ehre’s mouth opened.

  Please, please, please say the authorization code! Bree’s eyes stung with tears.

  Ehre’s lips moved, and the charm released its hold.

  “Thank you.” Bree peeled her hand from the page and clutched the throbbing amber pendant. Her muscles twitched for exactly thirty seconds before relaxing.