The Elder Stones Saga Boxset: Books 1-3

by D. K. Holmberg

  He needed to take advantage of that fact.

  It gave him time. How far was Eban from Asador?

  Rayen had given him that information, too. It would take days on foot, though not quite as far by horse. He’d never ridden a horse, but he suspected it would take her some time to find a horse and get there.

  Now that he was in Asador, he needed to find Lareth, but how? He didn’t have the same connection as Rayen, and having discovered that she had betrayed him left him less inclined to trust anyone, though maybe he could use that. He knew about the Binders, and the way they gathered information. Was there any way he could use that information to get deeper into the network and see what they knew?

  They might not trust him. As a man, they probably wouldn’t at all.

  But maybe he could use that, too.

  Daniel Slid. He circled the city, keeping it in view as he Slid, and each time he emerged, he reoriented himself so he was facing it. He headed straight toward the water, knowing that if he reached the shore, he’d be able to determine from there where else in the city he could go.

  When he reached the shore, he stopped Sliding.

  The water crashed along the shoreline. It reminded him of Elaeavn, though it had been quite some time since he’d wandered along the shore. There wasn’t much there other than docks and warehouses, nothing he had any interest in. He was more interested in the forest and the powers within it, but then he was most interested in the forest because of Lucy.

  Thinking of Lucy left a pain in his stomach, and he considered Sliding to Eban to reach her. But if he did that, would he alert Rayen somehow? He didn’t know how fast information traveled within the Binders.

  He figured he had maybe a day, and then he would need to go after Lucy.

  When he reached the edge of the city, he slowed. Dozens of ships moved in and out of the harbor, quite a few more than were ever found within the Elaeavn harbor. All of them had different shapes to their hulls, and even their sails had different shapes and colors, some of them plain white while others were bright and bold, and still others completely black.

  Activity along the dock caught his attention. Merchants moved up and down the docks, pushing carts one way and the other, while fishermen carried baskets laden with their catches. Sailors strode along the shore or the docks, some with strange tattoos and others with odd piercings, nothing like he’d ever seen in Elaeavn.

  It was nothing like he’d even seen in Eban, and that had been a strange city.

  He’d known nothing other than Elaeavn his entire life. It was home, comfortable, while Asador was strange and unique. Even though he’d been threatened by Rayen, he felt strangely drawn by the city.

  He could get lost here, and though he knew she would have ways of finding him, at least he had the hope that he might find Lareth before she came across him.

  How was he to start?

  Maybe the Binders were the key, but in order for him to use them, he needed to get the word out to them before Rayen did.

  He wandered along the shore until he found what appeared to be a tavern, ducking inside. He kept his head down, not wanting to draw attention to his height. If it was anything like Eban, they would have experience with his kind, and perhaps they would not react kindly to him.

  He took a seat at a table, looking around . It wasn’t nearly as busy as the one he’d just been in with Rayen, but that wasn’t a bad thing. He noted that it seemed to be occupied mostly by merchants. Three women meandered around, carrying food or drink, and one of them—a short, brown-haired woman—stopped at his table, smiling widely. Daniel couldn’t shake the thought of Kasha and her servants and suspected she was a part of the Binders.

  What had Rayen said? Asador was one of the first strongholds of the Binders. Every place here would be run by them. At least, that was what he was counting on.

  “What can I get you to drink?”

  “Some ale.” She nodded and disappeared back in the kitchen. When she returned, carrying a mug and setting it on the table, he smiled at her. “I’m wondering if you could help me. I’m looking for a friend of mine who came through here.”

  “We get lots of travelers through here. This is Asador, after all.”

  “I’m sure, but this man has deep green eyes, and he might have been traveling with someone else.” Lareth wouldn’t have left the city on his own. He would have had some protection, though Daniel didn’t know who would have come with him.

  “Like I said, this is Asador. We get all kinds here.”

  She turned away, and he didn’t say anything, because there really wasn’t anything to say. If she was right, and they got people from Elaeavn coming to the city, it might not be all that useful to draw even more attention to himself.

  How was he going to find Lareth?

  He sipped his ale slowly, fatigue beginning to wash through him. It had been a long day of Sliding, carrying Rayen, so he wasn’t entirely surprised that he would begin to feel drowsy.

  The suddenness of it was a bit jarring, though.

  Daniel looked down, struggling to keep his eyes open.

  What was this?

  He took another sip of his ale, and his eyes felt even more heavy.

  With a sudden clarity of thought, he realized why.

  His drink.

  He didn’t get a chance to wonder why or what it might mean. He dropped his head down to the table, passing out.

  26

  Lucy

  The tavern was quiet, and Lucy stayed in the back corner, tapping her foot to the sound of music steadily building. She hated waiting, but the idea of going with Daniel scared her even more. It was best that she remain here, that she not go with him, not in her current state. There was no way to control the overwhelming sound of voices all around her.

  Part of her wished she had the bracelets Jessa had lent her, but another part told her that she needed to come to terms with her abilities and master what had happened to her. If she could do that, she wouldn’t be so dependent upon others. Not only did she need to master her ability to Read so that she wasn’t overwhelmed by everyone around her, but she also needed to master Sliding. With that gift—and as much as she hated to admit it, it was a gift—she could Slide far more effectively than anyone other than Rsiran. It was possible that her other abilities were augmented beyond what anyone else possessed within Elaeavn as well, though without really being able to control her connection to them, she wasn’t able to fully test that.

  A tray of food in front of her sat untouched. The women in the tavern had been kind to her, and she should be more thankful for that, but she didn’t want to eat. Her stomach fluttered nervously, the same way it had ever since Daniel had brought her here. There was no danger, but the various voices all around her continued to intrude, and it took every ounce of concentration to push them away.

  It was all she could do to ignore them altogether. As much as she might enjoy the idea of fully grasping how to use the ability to Read practically everyone around her, she didn’t know that this was the place for it.

  “You haven’t eaten anything,” the proprietor said, standing with her hands clasped behind her back as she leaned toward the table. Kasha had been friendly to her, and she was appreciative of everything the other woman had done in facilitating her rescue, but there was something not quite right about her that was more than simply Lucy’s inability to Read her.

  As her gaze drifted around the inside of the tavern, it was more than just the women she was unable to Read that left her troubled. It surprised her that they had some way of suppressing even her ability to dip into their minds, but at the same time, she was thankful. She didn’t want to be able to delve too deeply into their thoughts.

  Besides, it was something she was familiar with from her time in Elaeavn. There, she had been a middling Reader, certainly not as powerful as some, including Cael Elvraeth, widely regarded as the most powerful Reader within Elaeavn thanks to her gift given to her by the Great Watcher when she held one of
the sacred crystals. Within Elaeavn, Lucy had never been able to Read anyone very well, most people being able to place mental barriers so that she wasn’t able to overcome them. It was something that she actually appreciated. Knowing what someone was thinking at all times would be exhausting, and as she had seen with Daniel, there were times when it could be embarrassing.

  “I’ve been eating,” Lucy whispered.

  “You need to keep your energy up. We don’t know how often they fed you when you were captive.”

  “They didn’t refrain from feeding me,” she said.

  “That’s surprising. Tern often likes to withhold food and water, thinking that he can buy compliance by forcing you to want for the necessities.”

  There was something about the way she said the other man’s name that suggested she knew more than she let on.

  It was more than that, Lucy realized. There were whispers coming from Kasha that she could almost pick up on, though they were faint, a stirring, nothing more. And as she focused, listening, hoping she might be able to pick up on what Kasha was thinking, they faded into nothingness.

  The other woman watched Lucy, her gaze burning into her.

  “I’m not sure that it was Tern who had me captive at all,” Lucy said.

  Ever since Daniel had left, Kasha and the others had tried to understand more about where she had been held and who had captured her, but no one had known anyone who had gone by the name of the Architect. Perhaps that was for the best. She didn’t want anyone risking themselves thinking to go after him. It would be unlikely they’d be able to do anything, anyway. It was a wonder that Daniel had managed to rescue her, and she thought he’d only succeeded because the Architect had been elsewhere, though she didn’t know where.

  When she thought of him, she shivered. He hadn’t done all that much to harm her, and yet the idea of him terrified her every time she considered him. It was the helplessness. There was nothing she could do, and because of that, she had felt as if she would never escape. In the moment she had awoken, those fears had continued, building within her. And yet she had escaped.

  “Lucy?”

  She looked up to Kasha, shaking her head, forcing those thoughts away.

  “Are you still with me?”

  “I am. It’s just…”

  “I understand. We’ve seen others like yourself who have suffered, and it can take a while before those memories fade.”

  Fade? Lucy wasn’t sure if what she had gone through would ever fade.

  And now that she was freed, a significant part of her wanted to return to Elaeavn. If Daniel hadn’t gone off on her behalf, she thought she might.

  Perhaps she still should. He could return for her when he found Rsiran, bringing the other man to the palace and helping to free her. As much as the metal implant in her head might grant her increased connection to her abilities, the longer she had it, the more she hated it.

  “We could use your help,” Kasha said.

  “How?”

  Kasha swept her hand around the inside of the tavern, motioning to some of the men sitting around. Occasionally, the women would go over to them and engage them in quiet conversation before moving on. Even without being able to Read them, Lucy knew their flirtatiousness wasn’t sincere.

  “Anything you might be able to uncover would be helpful.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “We collect information, Lucy. That information allows us to help others like yourself, women who were taken. We do other things, but that has always been our first mission.”

  Kasha watched Lucy, an unreadable expression in her eyes, matching Lucy’s inability to Read Kasha.

  “And I suppose you want me to see what I can Read of the people within the tavern?”

  “Anything you might detect that has value, we would take.”

  “It’s… it’s difficult.”

  “I understand.”

  “It takes all my effort to suppress what was done to me,” Lucy said.

  “Why suppress it?”

  “Because I don’t want it,” she said.

  Kasha nodded, a flicker of understanding in her eyes, but then it faded. “Whatever help you can offer would be appreciated,” she said.

  Lucy took a deep breath and looked around the tavern. She focused on the men, searching to see if there might be something she could Read of them. When she did, voices slammed into her.

  It was difficult to have so many different voices cascading within her mind all at one time, a torrent of them, almost unrelenting. The more she listened, the more they came, deeper and deeper secrets that were buried within these men’s minds, secrets from their entire life. Some came here planning to cheat on their wives, while others came for darker purposes, and still others came merely for companionship and company.

  She focused on one such man, an older one. As she Read him, she realized that he’d lost his wife and children and now was alone, coming to the tavern simply to have someone pay attention to him. There was sadness within him, and yet he was the one the women avoided, offering no flirtation as they did to so many of the others.

  “Him,” she said to Kasha.

  “Him?”

  “He needs someone to talk to him.”

  “He doesn’t have anything to share with us,” Kasha said. “We make sure he has food and drink, but he’s really not worth the time.”

  As Lucy scanned the inside of the tavern, picking up on details from everyone else that she allowed herself to listen to, she didn’t think any of the others had much of value either. If she told Kasha that, would she ignore the other man altogether? She wasn’t sure she wanted her to do that. She wanted the man to be given an opportunity to visit with others, to have the same attention paid him as so many of the others in the tavern. And she could tell he needed it.

  “He knows something, but… it’s hard for me to pick it out.”

  Kasha stared at the older man. “Are you sure?”

  Lucy nodded slowly. “I’m not able to distinguish much from anyone here,” she said. She reached for the metal buried in the back of her head. “This makes it difficult for me to focus on anyone for too long.”

  Kasha glanced over to her. “I will send some of the girls over.”

  “That would be good.”

  Kasha smiled, tapping the table. “You should eat.”

  Lucy’s stomach fluttered nervously again as Kasha walked away. Why was she lying to someone who had helped her? She knew she shouldn’t. She should keep her focus on Kasha and what the other women were willing to do to help her, rather than trying to deceive them, but she couldn’t help it.

  The door opened, and another woman entered, one Lucy didn’t recognize. She tried to Read her, but there was nothing.

  One of them, then.

  She continued to pick at her food, taking slow bites as she scanned the inside of the tavern, letting her focus wander. She pushed out the sense of everyone else around her so that she wouldn’t have to listen to the cascade of voices, not wanting to hear from men who came with darkness buried within their hearts.

  She thought back to the Architect. He was responsible for what had happened to her, and she couldn’t shake the idea that there was more taking place than what he had let on. There was some plan he was working on, and what had happened to her was a part of it, though it was a part that she didn’t fully understand.

  More than that, she wondered if perhaps she wasn’t the one they had targeted for abduction at all. The fact that she had been caught by the metal had troubled them, but the Architect had decided to use her regardless.

  If it wasn’t about her, then could it have been about Daniel?

  He might have had more value to the Forgers, with his father sitting on the Elvraeth Council. Considering Daniel’s analytical mind, he likely would have been better equipped for such a gift.

  After a while, Lucy got tired and made her way up to the room. She sat on the bed, glancing at the other bed, the one that Daniel had somehow mana
ged to Slide here, a reminder of everything she’d been through. The women had offered to take it away, but Lucy had wanted the reminder.

  She closed her eyes, focusing on the various possibilities that existed, thinking that if she could See something valuable, maybe she could use it. Perhaps she would figure out some way for Daniel to succeed. She had tried it before he had left for Asador but hadn’t been able to See anything that would be of any use to him. That frustrated her. If only she had more control over her abilities, she wouldn’t have to worry about him racing into danger. And yet, knowing Daniel, there would be no racing into anything.

  He was deliberate in the way he approached things, sometimes annoyingly so. It was why she was surprised that he had raced to her rescue. It was so unlike him.

  And yet, she was also thankful that he had.

  Flickers came to her, but they were faint, faded, nothing that would be helpful in understanding where to find Rsiran.

  If only it were easier.

  A faint scraping caught her attention, and Lucy opened her eyes.

  When she did, the Architect stood in front of her.

  She scrambled back, trying to Slide, but she couldn’t react quickly enough. The Architect reached for her, and she jerked her hand back, trying to strike.

  “Help!”

  The Architect smiled, stalking toward her. He held something in his hand, and it took her a moment to realize that it was a long, slender rod similar to the one he had used when they had attacked her. He pointed it at her. “You will find that no help will come to you.”

  “It will. They—”

  “They betrayed you.”

  She shook her head. “They didn’t betray me. They wouldn’t do that.”

  The Architect smiled. “How do you think I found you in the first place?” He Slid to her, joining her on the bed, grabbing her wrists. “Unfortunately, Lucy Elvraeth, you still have much to learn.”

  With that, they Slid.

  27

  Daniel