“We must return and warn everyone. It will take time for the Binder to reach our world so we still have time to act.”
“Why would it take him longer than us?”
Dreamer swung around and the stars blurred. “We are beings of pure energy and can move at the speed of thought. The Binder is a physical being and must travel at a greatly reduced, though still tremendous, rate.”
Yet another thing Al Elan didn’t understand. The more he saw and the more Dreamer told him, the less he thought himself up to this task. But, up to it or not, there was no one else to do what needed to be done.
Some force jerked them to a stop with such strength Al Elan nearly lost his seat on Dreamer’s back. “What?”
He gaped at the shadowy giants surrounding them. They didn’t have a distinct form, but what Al Elan could make out appeared humanlike, two arms, two legs, a misshapen face. Their eyes glowed with a sickly emerald light. The ghosts towered over Dreamer and the dragon’s spirit form was bigger than anything Al Elan had ever seen.
He stared at the giants and they stared back, silent and unmoving. “What do we do?”
“We wait.” Dreamer bit off the words. “A group of dark walkers wandered into our path. Until they move we’re stuck.”
“Can’t we go around them? We’re in a hurry after all.”
“Try to move.”
Al Elan frowned but did as the dragon directed. He willed himself to lift up off the Dreamer’s back and nothing happened. His arm went up and down when he lifted it, but otherwise he was frozen.
“I don’t understand,” Al Elan said.
“No one does. The dark walkers are older than time. Our legends say that the giants existed before the Creator imagined this universe and that even the Destroyer couldn’t harm them. Until they turn their attention elsewhere, we won’t be able to move and there isn’t a thing I can do about it.”
Dreamer sounded bitter and Al Elan didn’t blame him. They finally knew the threat and couldn’t do anything to warn everyone. Meanwhile the Binder drew ever closer to their home.
If they were too late, perhaps they’d find nothing but ruin waiting for them.
Chapter Eighty
Damien flew back to the pit where he left Lizzy and Dahlmis in record time. His shield remained untouched and neither sword nor Builder had moved in his absence. That was both a good thing and a bad thing since neither of them had miraculously recovered on their own.
He sat beside Dahlmis and stroked Lizzy’s hilt. She was still cold and silent. “I know you’re still in there somewhere. If you can hear me, I need your help. Please, give me a clue, something I can do to get you out of there.”
No reaction to his words, just cold silence.
Wait, something vibrated against his leg. It wasn’t Lizzy. The crystals were reacting to something. He pulled both stones out. They buzzed in his hands like a pair of trapped hornets.
Damien inched away from his unconscious companions and the vibrations died down. He moved back and they picked up again. They didn’t react when he held them toward Lizzy’s blade, but when he moved them over beside Dahlmis they went crazy. Good or bad, he had nothing else to go on.
Damien touched the crystals to Dahlmis’s head. The moment they made contact a bluish mist oozed out and flowed into the Builder’s ear. When the last of the mist left the crystals, they crumbled to powder.
He tossed the dust aside, never taking his eyes off Dahlmis. Come on, damn you, wake up! Damien needed help and if Lizzy couldn’t offer it, Dahlmis was the next best option.
A muscle in Dahlmis’s face twitched, the first sign of life he’d seen since finding the Builder unconscious. More muscle spasms shook his arms and legs. Finally, a dull groan was followed by, “Where am I?”
Dahlmis sounded different, his voice flat and emotionless, but he was awake and nothing else interested Damien. “You’re in a pit far beneath your observation post. Looks like the heretics jumped you and sucked your brain out. I just put two-thirds of it back.”
“Thank you.” A spasm curled his lip into a snarl. “I do not seem to be myself yet. Will you excuse me a moment while I attempt to order my thoughts?”
“Go ahead. Check on Lizzy while you’re in there. The heretics trapped her in your brain and I can’t get her out.”
Dahlmis sat up and folded his legs under him. Damien wished he could see inside the Builder’s head, find out what he was doing in there, see how Lizzy was holding up. Instead all he could do was sit and wait. Two things at which he didn’t excel.
After an eternity that was probably only ten minutes Dahlmis shuddered and said, “Your sword spirit is unharmed, though her presence in my mind makes it difficult to think. Combine that with the absence of my id core and it is a wonder I am capable of speech.”
Damien blew out a sigh. She was okay. Thank heaven for that.
“Any thoughts on where we might find the final heretic and your id core?”
“Yes, in the village. The elders betrayed me. They hid the heretics’ approach allowing them to take me by surprise.”
“Why? I mean I know they were angry I acted without their permission, but selling you out seems excessive.”
“Yes, and out of character. Whatever their faults, the elders’ sole purpose is to safeguard our race. Betraying me goes against everything they hold dear. I fear something is very wrong. I hesitate to ask after everything you have done for us already, but would you consent to helping me one last time?”
“I intend to kill that last heretic and free Lizzy. Is that a problem?”
“They fragmented my mind and threw me in a pit to rot. I have no pity left for them. Do what you will.”
“In that case, I’d be delighted to lend you a hand.”
He picked Lizzy up and found she didn’t feel as heavy as last time. No power flowed through the dead steel, but at least he wouldn’t have to leave her behind. Killing two of her captors must have weakened the bindings. That boded well for eventually freeing her.
Damien slid Lizzy into her sheath, conjured a bubble around him and Dahlmis, and flew up the tunnel to the observation room. The only opening was the disk he’d cut out of it earlier. He glanced at Dahlmis who shook his head.
“With my mind in disarray I cannot use my powers. You will have to open the doors. Do not worry about the damage. When this is over I have no plans to resume my post as Protector.”
That made it easier. A tendril of soul force shot out and probed the wall. When he found the staircase, Damien blasted a hole through. The professor would have had a fit, but patience was in short supply.
“Can you navigate, or do I need to conjure some transport?”
“My perceptions are sufficiently restored to make the walk. In truth I could probably make the journey in my sleep so many times have I followed this path.”
Damien set out in the lead. He refused to let anything happen to Dahlmis lest Lizzy share the injury. The long dark walk went smoothly enough. It was as though fearing an ambush held it at bay.
The village looked exactly as he remembered except all the people were out of sight. Perhaps the elders had sensed their approach and ordered everyone inside. That would simplify things if it came to a fight. Damien hoped it didn’t, but he was ready either way.
“The people are afraid,” Dahlmis said. “Some have sent a hesitant thought my way. Something has happened and they are not certain what. For them to defy the elders and attempt contact with me means it is serious.”
“That’s not terribly encouraging. Let’s head for City Hall and get the story straight from the source.”
“A wise course, though I fear what we might find.”
Once more Damien led the way. The streets were as empty as the abandoned city upstairs. He sensed the Builder’s life forces so at least they were still okay.
At the base of the elders’ tower the door was shut tight and sealed by a circle of runes. “This is new. Can you open it, or do I need to start blasting?”
Dahlmis raised a hand and his face scrunched up. “It is too blurry in my mind. I cannot say for certain, but the runes feel wrong.”
“Blasting it is.” Damien summoned soul force and hurled it at the wall ten feet from the rune-guarded door. Stone and dust blew inward and when it settled revealed an empty room. “No welcoming committee, that’s a relief. I half expected to find a bunch of goblins waiting.”
“My people would not stand for it. Even the elders could not convince them to refrain from killing a goblin that entered our home.”
“Good to know you can think for yourselves about some things.”
They entered the building and made straight for the stairs. Damien conjured an invisible shield around Dahlmis. While he didn’t really expect violence from the ancient Builders, better safe than sorry as long as Lizzy was riding around in Dahlmis’s head.
The stairwell was quiet and in perfect condition. No one had fought through here, that was certain.
“Have they tried to contact you?” Damien asked.
“No. I have reached out, but it is like slamming my head against the cavern wall. They will not let me in.”
Stubborn or not, the elders were going to let Damien in or he’d bring the tower down around their ears.
Chapter Eighty-One
At the top of the final flight of stairs Damien and Dahlmis faced closed and sealed double doors. No runes gleamed on their surface so opening them should present no problem.
“Do you want to knock or should I?”
“The elders will not open for me,” Dahlmis said.
“They’ll open for me.”
Damien pointed at the doors and a burst of soul force shot out, blowing them off their hinges and sending them crashing to the floor. He strode through into a scene of carnage. Four of the elders lay in bloody pools, their bodies pierced by multiple stone spears. At the end of the table, the surviving heretic along with the final elder sat facing them.
Dahlmis pushed past Damien. “What have you done?”
“I did what was necessary for our people to move forward,” the surviving elder said. “They refused to see that we have become stagnant. For long years we fought against the inevitable at the cost of thousands of lives. I tried to explain, but they wouldn’t listen. Their belief in our connection made it simple to take them by surprise. It wasn’t even a fight.”
“You accused me of betraying our people yet now you have murdered four of us that could have been your own brothers. Why?”
“As I said, it was necessary. With the others out of the way, Jahan and I will guide our people into the future. A future free of limits. We will make of ourselves and of our world whatever we wish.”
“If you think the others will accept a heretic and a murderer as their leaders, you are mad.” Dahlmis raised his fist. “They will never accept you and neither will I.”
“Powerless fool,” the elder said. “You cannot stop us. As to our people, the weak-willed followers will never question my orders. I can shield what happened from their minds and none of them can see Jahan and so will never know he was a heretic.”
“I will warn them,” Dahlmis said.
“I hardly think so.”
Dozens of stone spears shot out of the floor and shattered on the shield Damien had conjured around Dahlmis. Two angry faces turned to scowl at Damien.
“Do you wish to surrender?” Damien asked.
The answer was a wall of stone springing up and cutting the room in half.
Damien shot a look at Dahlmis.
“Do what you must,” the Builder said.
A pulse of soul force blew the wall to gravel. Behind it Jahan and the elder were gone. A moment of concentration and Damien located their life forces.
“They’re outside.” He blasted a hole in the wall and flew through.
The traitors were shaping handholds in the stone and crawling like spiders down the face of the tower. Damien went straight for the heretic. He needed that last crystal.
He hurled a lance of golden energy.
A stone barrier sprang up and took the hit.
Damien snarled, drew deep, and conjured a dozen spinning blades.
The blades streaked in, slicing through every sort of defense the heretic could conjure.
Jahan reached into his robe, pulled out the purple crystal, and threw it.
“No!” Damien dove as fast as his soul force could push him, catching the crystal only feet from the ground. “That was close.”
He conjured a bubble around the crystal and sent it flying back to the council room. Dahlmis would know how to restore himself.
Time to finish things with Jahan.
Damien turned his focus back to the tower, but the heretic was nowhere to be seen. Slippery devil must have crawled around to the opposite side.
He soared around to the other side and found Jahan leaping to the ground. Damien sent a sphere of soul force streaking toward him.
Another defensive wall sprang up at the last moment, absorbing the blast so it did no harm.
Damien?
“Lizzy! Heaven’s mercy is it good to hear your voice. Are you okay?”
The trap didn’t harm me, it only kept my spirit bound in Dahlmis’s head. He set me free as soon as he regained full control.
“I’ll have to thank him. Want to help me deal with the last heretic?”
I certainly do.
The chill in her voice made Damien shiver. Good thing she never used that tone with him. It might put a man in an early grave.
He drew Lizzy from her scabbard and pointed at the fleeing heretic. A gray and gold sphere formed and shot out.
No wall appeared to save him this time. The orb struck Jahan full in the chest and exploded. There wasn’t enough left of him to bury.
That was most satisfying.
“Got that right. Remind me never to get on your bad side.”
You could never get on my bad side.
“How come he didn’t try and block that last attack?”
I shielded your mind, so he didn’t even know it was coming.
A vibration ran through the floor. It felt like it came from the tower.
“Dahlmis!”
Damien spun and rushed back. He twisted around the tower and found Dahlmis standing over the elder who lay on the ground, a stone spike through his left thigh.
“You okay?” Damien asked.
“As okay as possible under the circumstances.” Dahlmis never turned away from his prisoner. “This disloyal rat is going to show our people what he has done.”
“Kill me if you wish, but I will not be made a spectacle,” the elder said. “Everything I did, I did in the best interest of our people.”
“We will see if they agree.” Dahlmis tilted his head back.
He’s calling the others telepathically.
By ones and twos and occasionally in a larger group, the Builders emerged from their homes. They gathered around, silent and fidgety.
Dahlmis is showing them the elder’s crimes. They seem more shocked than angry.
“Getting betrayed by one of the people you expected to lead and protect you will do that. I know they’re against killing their own kind, but I don’t like the elder’s chances of getting out of this intact.”
The gathered Builders grew tense and more than one’s lips had turned into a hard scowl.
Finally, Dahlmis spoke. “You have seen everything. Now we must decide how we will respond to this grave betrayal.”
The elder laughed, a humorless, bitter hack. “You think to stand in judgement of me? Me! Who has always done your thinking for you? You pathetic weaklings aren’t qualified to judge me.”
“Does he want to die?” Damien asked.
The answer came a moment later when a stone spear pierced the elder through the back, bursting through his chest in a shower of blood.
Dahlmis turned his way, but Damien shook his head before remembering the Builder was blind. “Wasn’t me.”
He killed himself. His ego couldn’t accept the idea of another controlling his fate.
“Well, good riddance. What happens next?”
Dahlmis shook his head as the other Builders drifted away the same way they’d arrived. When it was just the two of them Dahlmis said, “I do not know what we will do. The elders have guided us for my entire life.”
“You’ll have to lead them until they learn to think for themselves.”
“Me?” Dahlmis seemed genuinely taken aback by the idea. “They know me as one banished by the elders. A failure unworthy to join the collective. Who would follow me?”
“You’re also the one who exposed the elder’s betrayal. I bet that’ll buy you some goodwill. I’d love to stay and help you figure all this out, but I need to get back to the surface. I think I can speak for the king when I say the kingdom would welcome you and any of your people that wished to visit the surface. There are ruins under one of our largest cities to the west. A change of address might do you all good.”
“Perhaps. If nothing else you have given me much to consider. Thank you, my friend, for everything.”
“You’re welcome and good luck.”
Damien stepped back and took to the air. He needed to collect Al Elan and see how Jen was doing. Babysitting an army couldn’t be easy.
Chapter Eighty-Two
Damien landed outside Dreamer’s lair and stepped through the door. Al Elan lay right where Damien had left him. If not for the subtle rise and fall of his chest Damien would have thought he was dead. The dragon was no more responsive.
“Can you tell what they’re doing?”
No. All I get is a sense of great distance. Whatever’s happening it’s happening far from here.
“Good. We’ve got enough stuff happening here at the moment. Any idea when they’ll wake up?”
None. Could be hours, could be days. The dragon’s power is sustaining them both. With strength like that their sprits can survive forever.
“I’m not going to sit here watching them sleep for heaven only knows how long. Al Elan should be safe enough with Dreamer. Let’s get out of here and check on Jen.”
Dreaming in the Dark_Chains of the Fallen Volume 1 Page 28
