“You think I’m telling the truth?”
“I think what you’re saying has merit.”
“I don’t know. It should be able to be done, but it’s a matter of timing.”
“Timing?”
“How long did the bondars last when you held them?”
“Only a few moments. Once we finished them, the bond shifted.”
“That’s what I thought. It is difficult with that timing.”
“How would we do this? You’re talking about connecting to the Convergence from here. You’re talking about stepping across a distance that should not be accessible.”
“I think I’m going have to use the warrior shaping the moment you think they are going to form, land on the Convergence, and form that connection.”
“You think you can?”
“I think I have to try.”
His father locked eyes with him. “It can’t hurt. What’s the worst that would happen?”
His father likely thought all that would happen would be failure, but in Tolan’s mind, there were other dangers. By making a mistake with the nature of the connection, he ran the risk of not only destroying the bondars, but he also ran the risk of harming the Guardians. He had no interest in damaging them, and he also had no interest in doing anything possibly adding to what his mother wanted. But if he didn’t do this, then he didn’t think they’d be able to do anything else to protect the bondars. That was what they needed to do.
“Let me get to work. You could help.”
“I think I’m going to need to save my strength.”
His father nodded and hurried off. The activity within the waste around the Guardians began to increase. There was a general murmuring energy. It was strange hearing and feeling that energy with so much absence all around him otherwise.
“If this fails, you worry there’s going to be something else that could take place,” Ferrah said.
“I think it’s going to work.”
“But if it doesn’t?”
He gave a confident nod. “I think it’s going to work.”
The villagers acted quickly. There were five to each elemental, and they formed the bondars. Tolan paced around the perimeter of the clearing, looking at their work. They had been quite far along by the time he had arrived, and he suspected regardless of what he told his father, they were going to attempt this anyway.
What he needed was to act quickly.
It was going to involve a warrior shaping of considerable power. He wasn’t going to be able to bring Ferrah with him, so if something went wrong, he wasn’t going to have anyone there to help him.
Not he thought anything would go wrong within the Convergence. He had now been inside the Convergences several times, and each time he had been able to draw upon that power. He suspected he would be able to do it now equally well.
By the time he finished his circle, he could tell the villagers were ready.
“You’re going to have stay here,” he said to Ferrah.
“I figured you were going to say that.” She pulled the orb bondar out of her pocket, holding it up. “I’m going to follow you. I won’t be able to reach you quite as quickly, but I think I can get to you if something were to go wrong.”
He nodded. He was thankful she was willing to go after him but knew even if she came after him, it would take her quite a long time to be able to reach him. With the orb bondar, she could chase after him, drawing power through it in order to shape, and while Ferrah had enough control over the elements that she would be able to move quickly, it still wouldn’t be nearly as quickly as how he traveled using the warrior shaping.
“Stay outside of the Guardians.”
“Why?”
“Because I don’t know what it’s going to take.”
He had an idea of what he was going to try and needed to try to prepare himself for what would be involved, but it was going to be difficult.
Ferrah headed outside the circle of Guardians. He remained where he was, waiting for a moment.
When his father came toward him, Tolan nodded to him. “Are you ready?”
“I think we’re ready. We only have to add a few more symbols. I can give you the alert when we are down to the last one?”
“Good. When you do, I’m going to use the warrior shaping to carry me over to the Convergence, and then you and your people need to get out of here.”
“What do you think will happen?”
“I don’t know. Possibly nothing. It’s possible the shaping will be violent.” That was the one thing he didn’t really know. The nature of the shaping was such that once he pulled upon it, he didn’t really know what would be involved. The Convergence contained so much power he had no idea whether what he intended to do would even work, but if it did, he would be sending an enormous amount of power this way.
His father nodded, then headed away.
Tolan went to the center of the clearing, where he could feel the Convergence deep beneath him. As he stood there, focusing on that sense of energy, he waited.
He didn’t want to draw upon this Convergence, and he had to be careful that anything he might do would damage this Convergence. It was unlikely he would have enough power to do so, but he knew drawing upon the other Convergence from afar could cause something to shift here.
He waited. Baking heat from the sun overhead pushed down on him. There was the sense of the energy from the shapers of the village all working on the bondars. There was that of Ferrah, standing with the orb in hand, prepared to move.
His father looked up at him, nodding.
Tolan shaped.
The warrior shaping came quickly, and even as it did, he worried he was not fast enough. He latched onto it, blasting himself straight into the far Convergence. When he landed, he could feel his clothing melt away. He embraced the power. Having been here so recently, it was familiar. Had it not been, Tolan wasn’t sure he would have been able to draw upon that power as he wanted to. He let it fill him. He called upon each of the elements, adding spirit, and thought about what he needed to do.
When he had been here the last time, he had considered what it would take to reach across the distance. There was only one shaping he knew could bridge a distance like that, but it was a shaping he didn’t know he would be able to form. If it were only one element, he thought he might be able to hold onto it, but what he was trying to do was to split a shaping and turn it into four separate warrior shapings.
To do that, he was going to need an effort in concentration he did not know he had. The Convergence could give him what he needed.
He counted on it.
He drew that power through him. He didn’t have much time, so he focused, pushing it upward. It reminded him of how he had used the Convergence when he had tried to heal the fire Guardian. He had held the fire Guardian within the energy of the Convergence, holding it above the ground, letting that sense of power hold it up. Tolan did the same thing now, focusing on the warrior shaping and using that to try to transport the energy of the Convergence into those bonds.
Hopefully his father and the others had moved away.
Tolan embraced that power.
Then he blasted it outward.
He held onto the focus, splitting the energy. It happened slowly, and there was a sense of connection to him.
He focused on the waste, focused on the Guardians, and thought about what he needed to do to reach the separate Guardians out there. In doing so, he found he recognized their locations. The key was going to be finding the bondars. Having circled the perimeter there, he had tried to keep track of their locations, trying to think about what it was going to take to reach them using the shaping, and he focused on it.
He continued to pour power outward.
When it struck, Tolan was aware of the impact.
There was a strange sensation. It seemed to echo within him, almost as if it vibrated.
The power started to pull, and he was caught, that energy drawing through him, carrying power
out through him. It came from the Convergence, but Tolan was caught up in it. There was a torrent of energy, something more than he was able to withstand. He tried to withdraw it, but more and more power was surging, coming out from him.
Tolan attempted to separate himself, but there didn’t seem to be a way. All he wanted was to climb out of the Convergence. Doing that would free him, and it would keep him from being destroyed by the power he felt around him.
An attempt to move forward failed.
He tried again.
The sense of the Convergence continued to flow through him. There was power, there was an energy, and there was more than he was able to control. He held onto it, focusing, but everything he did was overwhelmed by the power of the Convergence.
In his mind, he could feel that power flowing out. It went from him, using the warrior shaping, bound with each of the elements along with spirit, and crossed the distance over to the waste.
Once there, he could feel it striking.
The elemental Guardians were feeding on it.
That was what he wanted. If this worked, if the bondars held, then he had succeeded.
But he couldn’t succeed by dying here.
He had to separate the shaping he’d formed.
He had used the only thing he knew, drawing upon the warrior shaping, but it might have been a mistake. In doing so, he might have connected too much of himself to the Convergence.
Power was filling him. It was exploding out from him, through him.
As much as he wanted to try to step free of it, he didn’t know if he was going to be able to. Tolan tried to find a way out, holding onto the energy, but he couldn’t.
The power rolled up through him.
Tolan grabbed for anything he could use for control.
He didn’t think he could separate the shaping. If he were to do that, then he would stop the nature of this power. He needed to allow that power to continue to flow.
There were limits to power.
That thought came to him, a reminder of something the elementals had told him. He had limits.
The Convergence had limits.
Anything he was doing would be too much.
He had to release his hold on the Convergence.
He had to release his hold on the shaping.
He couldn’t.
Something hit him.
Was it power trying to flow out from him?
As much as he attempted to hold back, the power striking him was more than he could withstand.
Something struck him again.
Tolan felt himself moving, and he didn’t fight it.
All he wanted to do was find a way out of here.
He sagged.
The Convergence was going to consume him.
When he was struck again, he felt that energy throwing him. It carried him out of the Convergence. The sudden separation was jarring, ripping him free from that power, and he crashed onto the ground nearby. He looked up, and a figure stared down at him.
The only thought he had before blacking out was that it was his mother having come for him.
5
Tolan came around in a soft bed. He rolled over, struggling to remember what had happened. Memories came back to him. The Convergence. He sat up, but the sudden movement hurt. Everything within him ached, leaving him throbbing.
“Easy,” a voice said.
“Ferrah?”
His vision started to clear, and he looked over to see Ferrah leaning toward him. She held a steaming mug, and she handed it to him. “There you are,” she said.
“Where am I?”
He looked around. They were in a small room. The bed was comfortable, but the walls were close together. He could feel shaping around him, so he knew he wasn’t back in the waste, though he didn’t know exactly where he was.
Could he still be in the village?
It was entirely possible he was. If in the village, then he wondered whose room he now occupied. He wondered who had allowed him the place to stay.
“I brought you to the Academy,” Ferrah said.
“This is the Academy?”
The door opened and Master Minden entered. “Awake now?”
“I brought him as quickly as I could.”
“I understand you were successful in reforming the bondars for the Guardians.”
Tolan looked around. “It was successful?”
“You didn’t know,” Master Minden said. Her hair was pulled back, and when she frowned, it made the wrinkles deepen along the corners of her eyes.
“I used the Convergence, needing to bridge the distance between them.”
“I suppose that would work,” she said thoughtfully.
“It did, at least I thought it did. There was a sense of connection I could feel as the shaping began to form, and as the Guardians began to feed on that shaped energy.”
“You could feel it?” Ferrah asked.
“I could feel something.” He shifted, moving to the edge of the bed and looking down. At least he was dressed. Having plunged himself into the Convergence, he had half expected he would have been nude when he crawled out of the bed. “I wasn’t sure what was happening at first. All I knew was that I wasn’t able to separate myself from the Convergence. I tried to do so, but the power of the Convergence was holding me there. It was incredibly powerful. Then I began to feel the connection between the shaping I used and the bondars.” He looked over at Master Minden. “The Guardians feed on the Convergence. It’s what nourishes them and keeps them connected there.”
“Were it not for Master Changen, you might have still been there.”
“You went in after me?” Tolan asked, turning his attention to Ferrah.
“I tried, but I couldn’t get close enough. There was too much power in there. I did what I thought necessary.”
“You shaped me.”
She nodded slowly. “Had I not had the orb bondar, I don’t know that I would’ve had enough strength to do so. I had to power through whatever it was you were doing, and I had to knock you out of the Convergence. I’m sorry, Tolan.”
He rubbed his chest. “Is that why I hurt so much?”
“I’ve done what I can to heal you,” Master Minden said.
“It still hurts.”
“Perhaps it should,” she said, smiling.
Tolan got to his feet, wobbling a little bit. He was weak, tired, but if he had been successful, then it meant one of his tasks was done. The next one would be going to look beyond the Convergence, to see what was there. After he did that, then he could work on trying to figure out what his mother was up to and figure out a way to stop her.
All of that had to be a part of what he did.
“You should rest,” Master Minden said. “You just went through a significant healing. It will take you time to recuperate.”
“How long was I out?”
“You arrived yesterday.”
Only a day? He wouldn’t have been surprised had it been longer. It explained why his stomach rumbled and why his mouth was dry. He was thirsty and hungry and needed to recover, but he didn’t have any idea of what he would be able to do after that.
For now, he thought Master Minden was right. He did need to rest and recover. The longer he rested, the easier it would be to restore himself. He breathed in, drawing in the sense of the elements, using the runes along the Academy without even meaning to, letting that power fill him.
In doing so, he restored himself a little bit.
It wasn’t complete. He thought he was still going to need to rest and recover, but with what he had drawn, he had done enough to start.
“Do you feel better?” Master Minden asked, looking over at him.
“Do you know what I did?”
“I could feel how you were drawing power. You use it easily.”
“I wasn’t trying to do anything I am not supposed to do.”
“Who is to say what one is supposed to do and what one is not supposed to do?” She paused lead
ing him through the hall of portraits. “It is your connection to the elements, and to the elementals, you get to decide. If it restores you, then far be it for me to tell you to do anything differently.”
Tolan looked over at the wall of portraits. He hadn’t spent much time here since facing his mother. He hadn’t looked at the portraits in that time and wasn’t surprised much had changed.
Each time he came here, he could see more detail. Now there was one near the end of the hall he hadn’t spent much time looking at, that had something looking like layers of depth not there before. By looking at it, Tolan could practically see the depth within it, almost as if there was something he should be able to reach in and grab. There was an elemental there, but it had a strange shape, almost as if it were standing upright.
Tolan leaned close to it, pressing his face up against the portrait, and stared.
“I don’t think it’s any easier to see up close,” Master Minden said.
“I haven’t seen anything quite like this before.”
“Few people do. It is unusual for any to have much of a sense from this one.”
“There’s a sense of depth from it. I can see something right here,” he said, motioning to where he thought he saw the elemental. “But when I turn away before looking back, it disappears. It’s almost as if I imagine it. When I look away and then back again, it’s there.”
Tolan stared at it, trying to make out the detail within it. It was like a memory on the painting. It was stranger than most of the other portraits. Many of them were unusual in the way they depicted power, and many of them showed what he knew to be elementals, though he wasn’t able to determine anything from those. Some of them were elementals he had seen and worked with before. There was the draasin, there was hyza, there was jinnar, there was saa. He could count the various elementals he had experienced over the time he had been working with them and could put a name to most of them. He knew it was impressive by itself. Most of the people who came here weren’t able to see anything. There were other portraits with other elementals in them he wasn’t able to see quite as well. There was a sense of the elemental within it, but much like with this strange portrait, he didn’t know what was there.
The Elements Bond (Elemental Academy Book 7) Page 5
