A City in Ruin (The Dark Sorcerer Book 2)

by D. K. Holmberg

  “What do you remember?”

  “Pain,” she whispered, an anguished look on her face.

  “If you remember pain, then you must remember how that pain started.”

  She glanced over at Jayna. “No.”

  They fell into a quiet silence for a while, and Jayna looked back at her. “What is it about this fire that worries you?”

  “I’ve seen something like it before. I don’t remember all the details, but I remember pain. That’s all I recall. I don’t know why, but that memory sticks with me. Pain. Whatever happened before, whatever was tied to this sort of power, is filled with pain.”

  “And it’s the same as your magic.”

  “Not the same, but they share some ancestry.”

  Eva pressed her lips together in a tight frown and clenched her fists. A bit of blood dripped out from her palms, dropping to the stones. Jayna had never had a chance to fully explore the type of enchantments Eva held in her hands, but she knew there was something to the power they called, especially considering the way they let her blood drip outward from them. Somehow it was all connected to her kind of magic, to the energy she possessed.

  “I can help you,” Jayna said. “I can help you find the answers and understand what was done—and whether there’s anything we could do to stop this.”

  “It must be stopped,” she said. “I’m just not sure I can stop it.”

  If Eva really were concerned about the magic out there and how it was being used, why wouldn’t she want to help? Why wouldn’t she get involved so she could learn more about it?

  Fear.

  That was something Jayna understood. Maybe she could share that with Eva and help her to see it, as well.

  She turned to Eva, but the other woman had turned away, ignoring her.

  “When I was studying at the Academy, I learned something that shook me,” Jayna started. “I had gone there, wanting to learn about magic, thinking my natural tendencies could be focused.” She shook her head. “When I was younger, I’d always known I had magic within me. It was something that had bubbled up from deep inside of me. All I needed was to find some way to grasp it, to access it, but I had never been fully able to do that on my own.” She glanced back at the people huddled along the wall, noticing Topher crouching down, talking to some of the injured, along with Rosal, who stayed where she had told him to sit. She appreciated that he hadn’t gone running off, but still feared he might disappear, and then they would lose their opportunity to try to understand more. “For a while, I thought I would be little more than a dular. In my city, we called them enchanters. Such a basic term, but descriptive enough. Even an enchanter is more than what many get the opportunity to become. It’s a chance to use power, to create.” Jayna smiled, wondering why she was going into so much detail, but she could tell Eva remained tense next to her, her hands clenched at her sides, the smoke drifting out from her. “My brother wanted to use that ability. He didn’t have any magic of his own—at least, none that he ever admitted to. I wonder now if he might have. It tends to run in families, after all. Jonathan would never acknowledge it though. He felt magic was unnecessary for the kinds of things he liked to do.”

  “Your brother is a thief,” Eva said.

  “Yes. A thief. And he thought if he were to pull me into his work, he might be able to use my abilities.” Jayna shrugged. “Maybe he could have. Maybe I should have allowed it.” She shook her head. “Or maybe I should have pushed back earlier on. I tried to do what Jonathan wanted. I tried to make enchantments, but I didn’t have any unique talents.” She nodded to Topher. “As he would tell you, enchanters—the dular—have unique abilities, yet I found I didn’t. That was when I realized I had potential to be more than just one of the dular.”

  “None of this matters,” Eva said.

  “It does matter.” She was starting to get angry and tried to suppress it. “I’m getting to the point. I applied to the Academy despite my brother’s insistence to stay with him. We had lost our parents when we were younger—an accident, according to everyone who was there. Neither of us had seen it, but the building they were in collapsed. They had visited that shop dozens of times before, and we had no reason to think it was anything other than an accident. Jonathan promised to take care of me, and he stepped up his work, beginning to take on even more complicated and dangerous jobs than before—not that he would ever acknowledge they were dangerous, but I didn’t need him to admit that. When he would come home, he’d have far more money than he should have had from the kinds of jobs he had been pulling before.” Jayna smiled, shaking her head slightly. “I got into the Academy. It was a great honor, and one I’d never expected. Not only because it involved having a chance to study, but it was also a matter of payments. I didn’t have the money to pay for tuition.”

  Eva looked over to her. Jayna had rarely talked about this side of herself, but if she wanted to know more about Eva, and if they were going to stay together any longer, she was going to have to share a bit more of her own story. “I still don’t know who helped me. Somebody did, though the instructors at the Academy never shared their name with me. I learned it wasn’t uncommon for benefactors to take on a student, thinking to help somebody who might one day join the Society and then owe them.”

  “You were bought early on,” Eva said.

  “That was what I feared, as well, but in the time I studied at the Academy, no one had stepped forward to claim they were my benefactor.” The night was quiet around them. She didn’t hear any more moaning, which suggested the rest of the injured had been gathered together, and any remaining injuries would have been minimal. The burned boy and the woman with the broken leg had been bad enough. It was a wonder that there weren’t more injuries than that. “I was two years into my studies when I discovered something.” Jayna’s voice trailed off a little bit, and she shook her head slightly. “I learned how dark magic worked—the pain and violence required to create that kind of power. I learned that stories were sometimes true, I learned how dark magic would spread, and I learned the way dark sorcerers would often attack, making it appear like an accident.”

  “You assumed your parents were attacked by dark sorcerers?”

  “Not at first. It didn’t strike me at first.” She stared into the distance, the darkness making everything difficult for her to see, yet perhaps that was for the best. “I would never have thought anything of it, but one of our instructors began to talk about the type of attacks dark sorcerers would use. Then he began to share known instances of attacks.”

  Eva looked over. “Somebody knew about the attack.”

  Jayna nodded. “Somebody knew. I don’t think my parents were the target, or if they were, I don’t know if I will ever know for certain. The shop itself was the target. The dark sorcerers had gone after it, though I never really found out why. My parents’ timing of going to the shop was nothing more than an unfortunate accident.”

  She figured that was putting it mildly, but at the same time, it truly was an accident. Her parents had arrived at the shop just before it had collapsed. They’d been caught underneath the debris, trapped by it, and had died.

  “That’s what brought you into your search for dark magic.”

  “Not even that,” she said. Jayna took a deep breath, letting it out slowly as she looked over to Eva. “If it were only losing my parents, I probably would’ve stayed at the Academy. I would have been saddened, but I had already grieved the loss of them. Learning that their deaths had been the result of a dark sorcerer’s actions, and that they had simply been at the wrong place at the wrong time . . . I hated it, but it wouldn’t have drawn me to learn more. It was only when my brother disappeared, when I discovered Jonathan had gone missing, captured or killed on a job, that I decided to take up something more.”

  “You told me that.”

  “I have.” There were other things Jayna didn’t tell her, such as her desire to find the dark sorcerers involved in her parents’ deaths, despite her claims oth
erwise, and her desire to save Jonathan so he could help her. She suspected she would need him to bring down the dark sorcerers involved, and maybe even to find them. Ceran had given her the ability to take on dark sorcerers, but she hadn't known how quickly she would be asked to do so. It was far more dangerous than taking on dark creatures. “I told you what happened to me, and now I’m hoping you’ll tell me what happened to you.”

  “If only I knew,” Eva whispered. “Do you remember what it was like when you found me on the road?”

  Jayna nodded. “I remember. I remember you lying there, seemingly uninjured, but noticing there was something wrong with you.”

  “And you used sorcery on me.”

  “Does that upset you?”

  “You know how I feel about it,” Eva admitted. “At the time, I probably would have told you not to. At the time, I probably would have wanted to die.” She took a deep breath and squeezed her hands. More smoke began to stream around her. “That’s one memory I remember most of all: the desire to die.”

  “Why?”

  “You’ve never pushed me about why I drink.”

  “I push you all the time on why you drink. I tell you all the time you don’t need to, and that you shouldn’t be drinking nearly as much as you have been.”

  “You push, but at the same time, you don’t. There are reasons people drink,” she said.

  “I understand,” she said.

  “I try to forget the pain.” Eva turned to look at Jayna, and there was anguish in her eyes. “That’s all I can remember. That’s all I can see when I close my eyes at times. I can see the pain. I can feel it. I don’t know the reason behind it, but when I sit by that fire, drinking that wine, the pain begins to fade, leaving me with a much less severe feeling than what I sometimes feel otherwise.”

  “There are other ways of moving past that pain,” Jayna said.

  “Other ways? How would you suggest I forget?”

  “Well, there’s a woman at this market who sells enchantments that store memories. Maybe you could use one of those.”

  Eva inhaled slowly, breathing in the smoke she had created through the droplets of blood that dripped out around her. “I wonder if that would be a mistake,” she said softly.

  “Why would it be a mistake?” Jayna asked.

  Eva looked over and shrugged. “What if I need those memories? What if that’s how I change?”

  “And what if it keeps you from changing?”

  Eva shook her head. “No. You keep your enchantment. I will find my own way past it.”

  “I can help.”

  “You have already helped, Jayna Aguelon.”

  Eva strode away, heading toward the gathering of the injured, and left Jayna standing there, trying to come up with a response.

  There wasn’t one—nothing she could do or say.

  At the same time, she knew she needed to help Eva. She had to find something, some way to help this woman, some way to give her the answers she obviously needed, and some way to find peace with what had happened.

  Perhaps peace would only come by learning more about herself and what had happened to her, but what if that knowledge did something else? What if learning about what happened to her only made the pain worse?

  Jayna didn’t know what to do.

  As she struggled with that, the dragon stone ring began to vibrate.

  She looked up. Ceran was here.

  10

  She didn’t have to go very far to find Ceran. She moved slightly away from the now destroyed market, following the steady pulsing of the dragon stone ring as it squeezed around her finger, a rapid constriction that left her with a bit of uncertainty as to why he would suddenly arrive. It was always after events like this took place, never in the midst of them. When she had faced Gabranth, she had hoped Ceran would help, especially as Gabranth had far more power than Jayna thought she would've been able to handle alone. Still, she had survived, though she certainly could have used her Sul'toral to help.

  She found him in the darkened alleyway, the outline of his figure clouded by shadows, or perhaps a bit of smoke—or, more likely, simply magic used to conceal his presence. She suspected he used magic most of the time to conceal himself, wanting to keep anyone from knowing he had come to the city.

  “You called me,” she said. “Though I have been trying to reach you—for a while now.”

  Ceran chuckled, which only inflamed her irritation more. “You haven’t needed me, and there have been things I’ve needed doing.” He had a deep voice, tinged with power—and while others could evoke power through song, chanting, or even their vocabulary, the power in Ceran’s voice came from deep within himself and the way he used his words; it emanated from his speaking voice, unique to him alone.

  Ceran watched her for a moment, then stepped back into the darkness of the shadows, moving along the alley. Jayna hesitated a moment. She wasn’t sure what Ceran wanted from her, but she had a feeling she was to follow him. When the dragon stone ring started to pulse again, she knew her suspicion was correct.

  She headed along the alleyway with him, and began to feel a tight constriction along the ring, squeezing in upon her finger. The pressure built, rising with a painful intensity, and the darkness continued to press in upon her, more and more of the shadows squeezing.

  She found herself drawn to the ring, drawing upon its energy. When she did, there was a shimmering and a hint of power at the edge of her vision, the darkness that loomed, squeezing in on her. It was power that looked as if it were available to her—all she had to do was reach for it.

  The ring constricted even more, and with each passing moment, Jayna started to fear that whatever he intended to do would tear the ring away from her, stripping her of its power, and making her more prone to dark magic attacks.

  Then it passed.

  She blinked. The pressure from the ring had eased, and as she opened her eyes, a hazy daylight spread around her. She looked at her surroundings. Small twisted trees rose in front of her, along with stunted grasses running along a narrow path. Ceran stood on the edge of a ridgeline, staring away into the distance.

  She approached him, moving carefully. “We aren’t in Nelar anymore.” It wasn’t even nighttime anymore—at least, not where they’d traveled.

  He chuckled. “No.”

  “How did you do that?”

  “There are many ways of using power, Jayna Aguelon. I used but one.”

  “Why did you bring me here from the city?”

  “Because you needed to see something.”

  When she had followed Ceran before, he had rarely guided her outside of the city, and when he had, it had involved messages demanding she follow his direction, but she had never traveled with him like this. Jayna had suspected Ceran had some way of transporting himself, moving from place to place without needing to take horseback or travel by foot, but she had never experienced it.

  Something like this would be incredibly useful. And powerful.

  Maybe it was something only the Sul’toral could do. Maybe she had to wait until she understood the nature of her power more, and only then might she have that ability.

  “Come up here, Jayna Aguelon.”

  She joined Ceran. In the hazy daylight, he still cut something of a shimmery sort of figure, as if the light didn’t like to surround him the way it should. His black cloak hung limp around his shoulders, and there was no wind. No air movement. Nothing.

  There were no smells either.

  Jayna frowned. “None of this is quite real.”

  “You don’t think it’s real?”

  He didn’t turn in her direction. She had never seen Ceran’s face in broad daylight. The only times she’d ever seen him had been in the shadows, concealed by night, or in situations like this, where a certain haziness around him kept her from getting too close to him, despite any attempt she had made to try to push past that.

  “There’s no smell. No sound.”

  “Very well. I suppose I could ch
ange that so you can experience the smells and sounds of this place.”

  He pushed his hands outward, his palms cocked back, and something in his posture reminded Jayna of the way Eva had squeezed her hands into fists, pouring out blood to form her smoky magic. In Ceran’s case, however, it was more about how his power flowed out from him.

  The haze still persisted, but now she heard cries. Shouts of pain. Clangs of metal. Explosions. And through it all, there was a flash of bright light and a shimmering of smoke. Gradually, smells came to her as well—smells that drifted from the dead and dying. The odors of shit and sweat and fear. She detected blood over all of it, and it mingled with flames, hot and burning her nostrils, the smoke drifting from some unseen place.

  “Is that better?”

  “You brought me to a war.”

  She immediately started to reach for the power within the ring, thinking he would leave her here. She had no idea if he had actually carried her somewhere, or if he had merely shown her something. Either way, she wanted to be ready, and she had to prepare herself to fight against the power he had tried to demonstrate.

  “You can relax, Jayna Aguelon. There is no reason for you to ready yourself in such a way.”

  “You brought me here for something.”

  “To show you.”

  “To show me what?” She looked out over the ridgeline, but couldn’t see much of anything. There was the same strange haze that flowed in the distance, a shimmering light, but the sounds of violence from battles and explosions continued to ring out around her. The smells coming from those events filled the air, and whatever was out there happened to be close. “I don’t see anything.”

  “I’m not sure you want to.”

  “You brought me here. You might as well get on with it.”

  The hood of his cloak covered his face, though she had a feeling he looked in her direction. “Very well.”

  Slowly the shimmering in front of her began to ease, drifting, and then it cleared.

  They stood on a rocky ledge, overlooking a valley far below. At one point, Jayna imagined it had been a green valley, filled with lush grasses, but now, instead of being green, the grasses were charred, trampled, burned away, certain areas of them covered with blood. A massive battle waged below her. She felt as if she were watching some violent story play out beneath her. She could feel the power and the violence within it.