The Lost City (The Lost Prophecy Book 5)

by D. K. Holmberg

  “Why have you come here?” the Deshmahne asked.

  “Why are many in Paliis?”

  “Many are not questioned. You are questioned.”

  “I came to Paliis for trade.”

  The Deshmahne’s eyes narrowed slightly. “And yet you had nothing to trade. When you were captured, you had nothing on you, yet you were leaving the trading square.”

  “Nothing caught my attention.”

  “No? You found nothing out of all the booths to capture your attention? For a man with a pocket full of coins, you have an interesting trading strategy.”

  “As I said—”

  “You didn’t find anything that interested you. Not even the young of Paliis?”

  Brohmin held his breath. Did the Deshmahne know why he was here?

  “You have been observing the school. Is there a reason for this?”

  “I have been observing nothing. I came to Paliis to trade.”

  The Deshmahne chuckled. “To borrow your phrase, let me tell you what I know. Our children have been disappearing, taken by someone from the north, and taken from their families. Now a northerner has been found renting a room within sight of the school, and in the trading square at the same time a child disappeared. You would have me believe that you know nothing of this?”

  What the Deshmahne said echoed concerns Brohmin had about the Lashiin priest. Brohmin would have to choose his words carefully. “The children have been taken from their families?”

  The Deshmahne tipped his head. “This child’s father is a particularly high-ranking Desh. When word came that he was abducted, we discovered you. A northerner. And one who had been seen hurrying through the streets, coming from the school.”

  Brohmin took a steady breath. It could be that the Deshmahne was the one lying to him, but something told him he was not. That meant the priest had lied to him.

  “I didn’t abduct the child, but I might have a way of finding him.”

  The Deshmahne considered him for a moment, then handed Brohmin his sword. “Good. Then you will help us find him, or the woman with you will die.”

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  The path through the city took him to the edge of Paliis. Brohmin glanced over his shoulder, flanked by two Deshmahne. He was uncomfortable with them following him so closely, but the other Deshmahne that was heavily marked had made it clear that he would have them accompany him throughout the city. These two priests both had heavy markings, with tattoos along both arms, and the faint beginning of tattoos tracing along their necks.

  He might be able to escape them, but doing so would require a confrontation, and would risk Salindra.

  He hadn’t discovered where they held her but worried about her state of mind. She’d already been the captive of Deshmahne before and had lost nearly everything. Would the difference with the way that her ahmaean was used be enough to make it difficult for them to identify her?

  Hopefully, Salindra would know enough not to reveal herself. If she exposed herself, if she demonstrated her ability with ahmaean, he suspected the Deshmahne would once again attempt to steal it from her. She would be unlikely to survive a second branding.

  So far, the Deshmahne didn’t seem interested in trying to harm him. They needed him. They either believed that he was responsible for abducting the child, or that he knew who had, which gave him an advantage.

  Brohmin also had his sword.

  Now that he was with the Deshmahne, he didn’t restrict his access to the ahmaean. He used it, straining for the sense of the Lashiin priest, searching for where the man had gone. Surprisingly, he was still in the city.

  The Deshmahne gave no indication that they could detect his use of his ahmaean, but he suspected they did. Brohmin could detect when they used theirs, and there was always a subtle radiation of power from them, leaving them so that they pushed it away. It was that power that created the space around them.

  There was a darkness to it. It oozed from them, and left an unpleasant sensation that Brohmin was forced to push against using his own connection to the ahmaean.

  This part of the city was less crowded than in the center of the city where the trading square was found. There were still too many people, far more than in most of the northern cities, and they pressed along the streets, their dress and facial features indicating that they came from all different lands. Most ignored Brohmin, but the Deshmahne they gave a wide berth to.

  There was a part of him that marveled at that. The Deshmahne might be easily identifiable, but they moved through the city unencumbered. There were times when Brohmin would have enjoyed such freedom of movement, though most of the time he preferred to move in anonymity.

  He struggled to formulate a plan as he trailed the priest.

  He still wasn’t entirely certain the Lashiin priest was taking children from their parents. That seemed more likely to be a Deshmahne tactic, and he wouldn’t put it past the Deshmahne to attempt to use him to find the source of this network. If that were the case, he would have to discover a way to prevent the Deshmahne from reaching this network while at the same time rescuing Salindra.

  He thought that he could find her the same way that he found the Lashiin priest. He had a connection to her, and it had only grown in the days that they traveled together. He thought he could use that, and track her, but every time he attempted to do so, the trail of ahmaean led him back toward the Deshmahne temple.

  Attempting to press through there was dangerous. If the Deshmahne held her within the temple—and there was no reason to think that they didn’t—Brohmin would have to rescue this child.

  Was Salindra’s safety more important than the safety of a child?

  He knew what she would tell him. It was the same answer that he came up with, as much as he hated it.

  Someone tapped his shoulder, and he had paused. When he turned, one of the Deshmahne was watching him, his dark brown eyes nothing more than hollows in his face.

  “Where now?” the man asked. He had a hoarse voice that reminded Brohmin of all the other high-level Deshmahne he’d faced over the years.

  There was violence in these men—Brohmin could practically feel it from them—but there was also something else. It was a sense of understanding, a desire to know more. It left him with more questions than answers.

  He had come seeking to understand, and hoping to bring down the Deshmahne influence, but he couldn’t do it until he knew exactly what they might be facing. From the few Deshmahne that he’d encountered in Paliis, he didn’t have the same impression that he had when facing them in other places.

  It seemed impossible to believe that the Deshmahne had changed. They prized violence, and demonstrations of power, and their ceremonies were dark and dangerous and tormented the lives of the creatures from whom they stole their power.

  But… maybe there was more for him to understand here.

  “North, I think.” The sense of the ahmaean was still there. To the north was the beginning of the mountain range, the slopes rising out from the edge of the city, and peaking above the clouds. The homes that were built there were quite a bit different from those within the city. Most had a slightly arched roofline, and they all appeared to be built into the rock.

  The Deshmahne nudged him again, and Brohmin continued forward. He pressed out with his ahmaean, holding on to that distant connection, the awareness of the Lashiin priest. It was still there, but weak, and faded.

  If the man hadn’t left the city, how had the sensation of him faded?

  There was something about it that troubled Brohmin. The priest smuggled the children, and had used the trading square as a way to hide his activities, but how did he get them out of the city? Wasn’t that the intent of grabbing the child? Hadn’t the priest claimed that he wanted nothing more than to save them, take them north with their families?

  He had to be missing something, but what was it?

  Thunder rumbled in the distance. It was a sound he had grown accustomed to during his time i
n Paliis. Storm clouds always seemed to gather in the north, crashing against the mountain peaks. There hadn’t been much rain during his time in the city, but the greenery of the city spoke of a reasonable amount of moisture. The air was humid today, and bordering on hot, making his cloak far too warm for the weather.

  Brohmin let the sense of the ahmaean pull him along.

  They climbed, the slope gradually leading away from the city, and up to where the houses were less frequent. Most here had a view of the city but were far enough away that they had their own space. The homes looked down over the valley, and some were larger, more decorative, which surprised Brohmin. Some had wooden fences built around their yards, as if animals grazed within them.

  “I thought you said he was still in the city,” one of the Deshmahne said.

  Brohmin resisted the urge to look back. “He is.”

  “These homes are outside of the city.”

  Now, he did glance back. The larger of the two Deshmahne, who had a youthful face and wide set eyes that on another man might have been compassionate, watched him with suspicion. The other simply glared, the expression unchanged.

  “The homes might be outside the city, but this is where the trail goes.” He began to suspect that the Lashiin priest left the city below ground. That would explain why his connection to him had faded.

  The two Deshmahne glanced at each other but then nodded.

  As they reached the last home on the hillside, a sprawling manner with an enormous fence surrounding the yard, Brohmin paused.

  The home was larger than many others, and from here, he could make out most of the city, with the dark stone of the Deshmahne temple rising in the center of Paliis. Light glittered off the stone, catching the dark flecks within it, scattering it like a blackened haze.

  Brohmin frowned. Could that be ahmaean?

  He had never been able to see the Deshmahne ahmaean, not like Jakob claimed that he could. He had felt it many times; he felt it now, radiating off the two Deshmahne. Was that how they had recreated the same effect as the damahne had when they imbued the Tower of the Gods with power?

  If so, it spoke to a greater control over the ahmaean than he had anticipated. If they had this level of control in Paliis, what would it be like in other places?

  Somehow, he had still underestimated them.

  “Where now?” the younger of the Deshmahne asked.

  Brohmin nodded toward the house. “The trail ends here. The man that we’re following will be here.” Before going up to the home, Brohmin considered a moment. “Do you know who lives here?”

  “Most of the manor homes outside of the city belong to merchants. They prefer to have more space, considering it a luxury since space is at a premium within the city.”

  Brohmin understood that. When he’d been in the city, he’d only been able to rent a single room. The streets were so crowded that he barely had space to walk. It would be a luxury to live outside of the city and to have the expansive room that these merchants must have.

  “Do you know which merchant owns this home?” Brohmin asked.

  “We don’t keep track of the merchants.”

  Brohmin started. “Perhaps you should have.”

  He made his way to the door and knocked. It was made of a thick wood, heavily stained and lacquered, with ornate carvings along the side of the door. A small window set with colored glass was at about his eye level. The home itself was painted a faint blue, covering the stones, creating a contrast with the rest of the rock rising up toward the mountain peak. Two sculptures stood on either side of the entryway, both made of a dark stone, neither flecked as the stone within the temple had been.

  There was no answer to his knock.

  As he raised his hand to knock again, the larger Deshmahne with the youthful face stepped forward and grabbed the handle. With a surge of power, the handle snapped free from the door, and the Deshmahne stepped inside.

  Brohmin chuckled. “I suppose that is one way to get in, isn’t it?”

  The two Deshmahne moved into the home, leaving Brohmin standing on the step, waiting for a moment. He could take this opportunity and run, return to the temple, and see if there was anything he could do to free Salindra, but he was curious. Why would the Lashiin priest come here? Did he have a connection to the merchants that would allow him to use the merchants to move children out of the city?

  If the priest worked on behalf of the Urmahne, Brohmin might be sacrificing his ability to protect children by revealing that connection. If he did not, perhaps Brohmin was doing those children a favor by revealing what this man had planned.

  As he stood there, contemplating entering the home, he heard a shout.

  Brohmin quickly unsheathed his sword and leapt into the manor house.

  Inside, the light was dim, barely enough for him to see. Brohmin had experience fighting under darkened conditions, and wrapped a layer of his ahmaean around his eyes, augmenting his vision. If he had the enhanced eyesight of the Magi, this wouldn’t be necessary. Even the damahne didn’t need a trick like this. It had taken years of practice before he managed it.

  The house was stark with minimal decorations. The floor was little more than planks of wood. Nothing about it matched the impressive style that he’d seen from the exterior.

  A body lay on the floor, and Brohmin nudged it with his boot, noting that it was the older of the two Deshmahne. One arm was missing, and blood pooled around the stump.

  He slipped toward the wall, wanting to keep in the shadows, and wanting to maintain a safe distance. Where was the other Deshmahne?

  He heard the muted clang of metal on metal, the distinct sound of swords.

  Down.

  Brohmin moved carefully, sliding along the wall, keeping his back to it so that he wasn’t exposed. As he did, he caught sight of someone on the far side of the room creeping toward a hidden stairway.

  Moving as silently as possible—and his centuries of experience had allowed him to move quite silently—he reached the figure. It wasn’t the Lashiin priest, at least not the one he’d trailed from Polle Pal, and it wasn’t the Deshmahne.

  Brohmin slammed the hilt of his sword into the back of the man’s neck. He crumpled, falling in a heap.

  He rolled the man over and saw the same twisted metal ring on this man’s finger. A mark of Lashiin, but there had to be something more to it. Brohmin slipped the ring off the man’s finger and stuffed it into his pocket. It was heavier than it looked, and was teralin made.

  The clang of metal grew more distant. Brohmin hurried down the stairs, padding silently. Three figures faced another.

  Brohmin observed for a moment, taking stock of the situation.

  The Deshmahne faced three swordsmen. While they were good, he was even better. There was a grace to his movements, and power behind each swipe of his sword. Had Brohmin needed to confront the young man, he questioned whether he would have been successful.

  Yet, one man against three was unfair odds. Brohmin imagined the Deshmahne surprised by the attack, the reason the one above had died so easily. Blood stained his dark clothes, nearly a dozen different gashes on his arms, and even his legs. It was a wonder that he still managed to stand.

  Power pressed away from him, and it was filled with the dark ahmaean. He attempted to use it to repel the attackers, but they sliced through it, ignoring the dark energy.

  Even Brohmin doubted that he would be able to so easily ignore the ahmaean. Did that imply these men were somehow powered? He didn’t think so; he didn’t detect any ahmaean from them.

  Brohmin reached for the ring in his pocket. If it was teralin, there was a possibility that they used that for access. It wouldn’t be the first time teralin would have been used in such a way. Brohmin’s own sword was designed to store ahmaean, augmenting his strength, honing it in such a way that he could accomplish more than he could otherwise. It was much like the historian’s staff allowed him to use his power, though he had innate ability.

  The Deshm
ahne managed to take down one of the attackers, leaving him with two, but as he did, one of the remaining men managed to get close, and sliced him deeply along the leg.

  The Deshmahne nearly collapsed, but somehow managed to stay standing.

  Should he help the Deshmahne—or the other attackers?

  He felt conflicted. He no longer knew which side he needed to help.

  The answer came to him. He could help neither, and both.

  He darted forward, drawing on power through his sword, and smacked one man with the flat of his blade, dropping him. The Deshmahne flicked his gaze to him, and Brohmin spun, catching the remaining attacker, and striking him on the temple.

  The Deshmahne attempted to slide forward, his sword flickering down, but Brohmin caught it and deflected it up.

  “No.”

  The Deshmahne wavered a moment. He was weakened and drew on the power of his ahmaean to keep him standing. How much longer would he remain upright?

  The dark blade sliced toward Brohmin, and he turned it, twisting it back down. He didn’t counterattack, merely defended, not wanting to do anything more until he had answers.

  The Deshmahne attempted to attack again, but it didn’t have nearly the same effort behind it as he had before. Brohmin stepped back and leaned on his sword as the tip of it rested on the ground.

  He watched the man a moment, taking in the numerous cuts, blood oozing from them, and the ashen color to his face. He was bleeding heavily, and it was only through force of will that he remained standing. The man would not last much longer.

  “Did they actually abduct a child of a priest?” Brohmin asked.

  The Deshmahne sagged, dropping to his knees. He met Brohmin’s eyes. “They have abducted many children.”

  There was pain in his voice, and it was a pain that Brohmin recognized, one that he had tried to forget about, but there were some things that, despite centuries of life, were difficult to forget.