The Elder Stones Saga Boxset: Books 1-3

by D. K. Holmberg

  What would happen if they tried to use him?

  There might not be anything he could do.

  Worse, he didn’t know how—or why—they would try to use him, but if nothing else, he would be ready.

  “And once we’re there?” one of the Binders asked.

  “Once we’re there, I will find those I promised my protection to, and if anything or anyone gets in my way, I will destroy them.”

  He swept his gaze around the room, fully intending all of them to take the brunt of it, and when he was done, he looked lastly to Mindy. For some reason, he had a feeling she was the one he needed to worry about the most.

  “When will we start?” he asked.

  29

  Haern

  The Slide carried Haern to the street outside the temple. Darkness swirled around him, almost as if the shadows were alive, but that didn’t seem quite right to him. He remained motionless, looking over at the Binder who had carried him here, half expecting her to disappear, but she didn’t.

  The effect of the Slide was no different than when he’d traveled with those from Elaeavn. There was a stirring sense of movement, and when they emerged, standing outside the temple, the air had a strange stench to it.

  “What now?” he asked.

  “This was your plan.”

  “The plan was for me to get here, and then to go from there to find the others.”

  “Then find them.”

  “Do you intend to abandon me here?”

  “We promised our help, didn’t we?”

  “You did, but I have a sense you aren’t thrilled about it.”

  “And why should we be? We sacrifice much doing this, and we draw attention to ourselves.”

  “It seems to me that you already have attention drawn to you.”

  “Not like this.”

  “I promise I will act quickly,” Haern said. He pushed away the sense of lorcith he felt all around him, including what he felt from this Binder, and focused on the sense of the coin he’d forged. Not only the coin, but he honed in on the sense of the knives and the sword. All of that connection filled him, drawing to him, and he fixed the location in his mind.

  He stared at the temple. Up close, there was an energy to it, though even from a distance, Haern had felt as if there were a bit of an energy radiating from the temple. Whatever energy there was seemed dangerous to him, and he worried he would end up trapped inside, or possibly worse, experimented on by the Forgers within. If that happened, he didn’t think he’d have any way of getting free.

  And it was possible these Binders would end up trapped as well. He’d seen the way Forger magic worked and wondered if perhaps they had some way of holding them, confining them. If they did, he ran the risk of entrapping others while trying to save these girls. Was that a trade he was willing to make?

  He could be upset that they had taken Elise, but in doing so, they had moved her away from the Forgers, protecting her from the possibility of an attack. He should be thankful, not angry.

  And he was thankful. Now, all he wanted was to find a way to get beyond here.

  Holding the lorcith coins in his hand, he prepared for the possibility he would need to push them. Though with Forgers involved, and in a place that they controlled, it was possible he wouldn’t be able to use the coins in the way he was accustomed.

  Pushing off on one of his coins, he hovered in front of the temple. He didn’t want to go in through the front door, and as he floated, he realized the rooftop might provide the best entrance. Shooting higher into the air, he dropped down on the roof, searching for signs of any other movement around him.

  A door led inside, and Haern tested it, surprised to find it was unlocked.

  The moment he went into the temple, a strange power seemed to envelop him, leaving him with a sense of emptiness.

  He strained to ignore it, and on a whim, he used the same technique his father had taught him about sealing off his mind using lorcith, trying to protect himself from the emptiness he detected.

  The sense began to fade. He could ignore the hollowness he felt.

  Stone steps greeted him, and darkness threatened to swallow him, but thankfully with his Sight, he was able to make his way down. He watched for evidence of any of the Forgers but saw none.

  Continuing down the stairs, he paused every so often, focusing on the sense of lorcith, but it didn’t seem to be moving. It was still there, and the longer he focused on it, the further into the temple he realized it was located.

  Descending rapidly, Haern took the stairs two at a time. He tried to go as softly as he could, trying to keep his footsteps from thundering along the stairs, wanting to reach the girls before anything else happened to them.

  At one point, he heard movement and paused.

  Where were the other Binders?

  They were supposed to have come, but they hadn’t followed him, or if they had, he saw no sign of it.

  Another few steps, and he noticed movement.

  He stopped, looking around him, realizing he wasn’t alone anymore.

  Wrapping himself with his connection to lorcith, he took a few more careful steps down. He circled around and around, and then came face-to-face with a dark-robed Forger.

  Without giving the man a chance to react, he pushed on one of the coins, slamming into the man’s forehead and all the way through.

  It was brutal and bloody, and he’d had little choice. Haern regretted having to be so brutal. It didn’t feel right attacking like that, and yet, if he hadn’t, he would have been the one injured.

  Continuing down the stairs, he could still feel the sense of the lorcith below him. He wasn’t sure how far he would go, or even how far this temple extended, but the stairs seem to be leading him forever downward.

  Something was wrong.

  The Binders should have joined him by now.

  If they abandoned him, he didn’t like the chances of making it out of here successfully—or alive.

  Another few stairs, and someone suddenly appeared in front of him.

  He hesitated, frowning as he realized that it was a woman.

  In all the time he had faced the Forgers, he’d never encountered any women among them.

  “What are you doing here?” she asked.

  “Where are they?” he asked.

  “Where are who?”

  “Where are my friends? I know they’re here.”

  The Forger continued to look at him, and then she began to shimmer.

  Haern pushed forward, the coin starting to rip toward her, but she managed to avoid it. She Slid away from him, forcing him to chase.

  Only how was he going to chase her? She had Slid away from him, and now they knew he was here.

  Haern raced down the stairs, still holding on to the connection to lorcith. It was there, faint and vague, but he knew he was getting close. He had to be.

  Only… first he had to get to it.

  Another few steps, and voices nearby caught his attention.

  They came from above, one of them female, and likely from the Forger he had just encountered. Haern ran down the stairs, no longer trying to be silent.

  At the base of the stairs, he froze. There was the sense of lorcith, but it was no longer near him.

  Had he gone too far?

  He should have been able to detect lorcith he had a hand in creating, but the further he descended the stairs, the harder it was for him to detect where it was.

  And, strangely, there was no other way out other than through the base.

  Which meant he would need to either go back up the stairs, or he would figure out another escape route.

  Haern hurried forward. Doing so brought him into the heart of the temple, which made him uncomfortable, but what choice did he have?

  A door blocked his way out, and Haern tested it, finding it locked. He shoved a coin into it, as he had when reaching the Binders, and forced the door open. It came open with a loud crack, which now would give away his location more than a
nything else. Haern hurried down the stairs, and at the base of them, he looked around for anyone else but didn’t find them.

  It was just him.

  Taking a deep breath, he thought through how he was going to find the girls. They had to be here, but where would he come across them?

  Nothing but walls of stone surrounded him.

  A shimmering came from one side of him, and then from another.

  He looked around, trying to find a way out, holding on to his connection to the lorcith coins, but each time the shimmering appeared, another Forger emerged from their Slide.

  He was trapped.

  One of them was the woman he had seen. He tried to send the coin, but she held out her hand, and the coin stopped in midair.

  More and more Forgers began to surround him, the majority of them women.

  What was going on here?

  The woman waved her hand, motioning to the others, and they Slid toward him, surrounding him on all sides, holding him in some sort of confinement, and he couldn’t move.

  A part of him was tempted to continue to fight, to attack, but if he did that, he would end up dead. At least this way, there was the possibility that he would find out something, though what could he learn here?

  One of the Forgers grabbed him, and they Slid.

  Haern braced himself, and they emerged inside a brightly lit room. Walls of shelves surrounded him, all of them stuffed with books. A brightly glowing hearth occupied one end of the room, comfortable-looking chairs beside it.

  This didn’t strike him as some sort of torture room, but he wasn’t entirely sure what it was. The Forger said nothing, though at this point, considering what he had done, he supposed there was nothing for the Forgers to say. He had already shown what he was willing to do, cutting them down, showing no mercy. Other Forgers appeared, all of them emerging in this room. His time was short.

  One of them was the woman. When she arrived, she looked at him, making a steady circle before taking a seat at the far end of the room. “Why have you come here?”

  “I came for the people you abducted.”

  “That we abducted? You have it wrong.”

  “I don’t have it wrong. I know they’re here.”

  “I’m not denying the fact that they are here. What I deny is that we abducted them.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Who are you?” the woman asked.

  “It doesn’t matter.”

  “Oh, but it does. It matters a great deal. Who are you?”

  Haern looked over at her, shaking his head. “I said it doesn’t matter.”

  “The less inclined you are to answer, the more inclined I am to force an answer. Is that what you want?”

  “How do you intend to force an answer?”

  “The same way you intended to force your way into our temple.”

  “I’m not alone.”

  “No? What help do you have?”

  At this point, seeing as how the Binders had abandoned him, he felt no remorse about sharing anything about them. Would it make a difference? Probably not to this woman. He had a sense that she didn’t care. Still, he said nothing.

  “I would like to know where your help is.”

  “Why? So that you can attack them and abduct them, too?”

  “Again, we have not abducted anyone.”

  “There are several young women trapped within your temple that would say otherwise.”

  “Do you believe we are responsible for trapping them?”

  “I know you are.”

  “You know nothing other than violence. I’ve seen it in other men, and I recognize it in you.”

  “I’ve seen the violence from your kind, too.”

  “My kind? And what is my kind?”

  “Forgers. Ai’thol.”

  Haern looked around him, knowing he had to get out of here as quickly as possible. The longer he was here, the more likely it was that something would happen to the other women.

  At the same time, he couldn’t shake the thought that the Binders had somehow betrayed him. He focused on the sense of lorcith. There was some nearby, though not nearly enough for him to reach it and use it. Without access to lorcith, how was he going to get out of here?

  The woman watched him. “What is it you intend to do?”

  “I already told you that I’m going to free my friends.”

  Haern surveyed the inside of the room. It was plain, nothing but stone, and he couldn’t determine whether there was an easy way out. What he wouldn’t give for his father’s ability to Slide now.

  He really had to stop comparing himself to his father. Rsiran had ended up captured no differently than Haern, and in Rsiran’s case, he should have been able to escape. Haern was accustomed to his weakness.

  Turning his attention back to the woman, he met her gaze with a glare. “You were experimenting on those girls.”

  “You have been woefully misinformed.”

  “I don’t think so. I know what the Ai’thol do.”

  “And what do you think that the Ai’thol do?” She leaned toward him.

  There was a certain intensity in her gaze, and Haern was forced back a step, unable to meet her eyes. He couldn’t help but feel as if there was something he had missed.

  “You have come to our place, our temple, and you have attacked. You are lucky I allow you to live.”

  Haern searched for how many other people were in the room with him. What sort of effort would he have to exert to free himself from this?

  Possibly more than what he could manage. He noticed two others, but they were by the door, and unfortunately for him there was no lorcith around them.

  “Are you going to attack me? Are you going to do to me the same as you did to those women?”

  She watched him, a hint of a smile on her face. “You would challenge me. Interesting. Not many come here and are strong enough to challenge, but then, not many are so foolish, either.”

  “I’m not afraid of what you might do,” he said.

  “Not yet, but you will be. Tell me where they are and we can make this quick.”

  “Where who are?”

  “The others who accompanied you. When you share with us their location, we can ensure your suffering is short-lived.”

  “I don’t know what you’re getting at.”

  “Perhaps you understand better than you know. I will give you a little time to reconsider.”

  She disappeared in a flash, Sliding away in a shimmering of color. Movement near the door caught his attention.

  The two people he had thought were guards approached, and each of them grabbed one of his arms, forcing it down onto the armrest of the chair. Haern tried to fight, but there wasn’t anything he could do. He was bound to the chair, ties wrapped around his chest, holding him in place. As he thrashed, struggling to move and get away, his captors jammed something through his hand and into the wood of the chair.

  Haern screamed.

  Pain raced up his arm, hot and throbbing, the kind of pain he could barely withstand.

  He couldn’t even fight. Tears streamed down his face, and he tried to blink them away, to ignore them, but there was no ignoring the pain rolling through him.

  “Why?”

  The word came out as a choked sound, painful, and as it did, he began to feel something else.

  Not just pain, but a strange tugging sensation.

  It reminded him of what it felt like when he was pulling on lorcith, only in this case, it felt as if whatever they had jammed into him was pulling some part of him away.

  Were they pulling off his powers? Could they be using his magic against him?

  The two men held his arm down, preventing him from jerking his hand free.

  Someone else appeared in a flash. There was something almost familiar about this person, though why should that be? A shrouded hood covered their face. A strange odor radiated from them, something of heat and fire.

  He waited, and the newcomer grabbed the two
rods slammed through his hands and bent them over, wrapping them around the armrests.

  The ends of the metal touched.

  It was almost as if an electrical current shot through him.

  Haern screamed again.

  He tried to bite it back, tried to hide the pain he felt, but he couldn’t. There was nothing in him but pain.

  “Do you recognize it?”

  “What?” he cried out, trying to suppress the pain and the tears within him.

  “Do you recognize the agony?”

  Haern blinked, managing to clear his eyesight, and looked up, trying to See through the darkness, but he couldn’t. There was something about that voice that sounded familiar.

  “Does it hurt?”

  The newcomer tapped the metal bars wrapped around his hands, and with each tap, another surge of pain raced through him, an electrical current that left him in renewed agony.

  “I will teach you the nature of pain. You will come to embrace it.”

  The man disappeared, suddenly flickering out of existence, and Haern was left with the other two men standing near him. He waited for them to say something, but they didn’t. They walked away from him, leaving him tied to the chair, the strange metal rods wrapped around his hands forcing him to remain there.

  He looked around. He was alone here.

  He tried to move, but every time he did, pain shot through him once again.

  Trapped. That was what he was. He might not be in a cell, but he could no more move now than were he in the same kind of cell his father had placed the Forger in.

  Haern looked up.

  The Forger.

  That had to be who he had seen. But how?

  Somehow—some way—he was going to have to find his way free, but he wasn’t sure what it would take.

  If he couldn’t move his hands, what could he do?

  He kicked at the chair.

  With each kick, pain throbbed through him, and he realized that he was trapped, wholly and completely. He had to find a way to fight through the pain.

  Either that, or he had to embrace it.

  He was reminded of something Galen had taught him, a warning that he would need to understand the agony he doled out. But could he?

  He had experienced the poisons Galen taught, coming back from them each time. In this case, what he needed to withstand was something else. He needed to withstand torture.