“Why are you frowning? We haven’t done anything yet.”
Isandra pulled her attention back over to Alison. “I’m sorry. I’m distracted.”
“You should focus. I need to know if this works as we expect it to.”
“Why do you expect it will work?”
“You aren’t the first Mage that we’ve attempted this with,” Alison said.
Isandra glanced from Alison to Alriyn, but neither elaborated.
“Get it over with,” she said. She had little faith that it would work. If all it took was a connection to the metal, then she would have expected the Yahinv to have known about it. That they did not made it less likely that the metal would do anything to heal her. Isandra had long ago moved past the belief that she would find actual healing. There was a hope, but that was all she had. She did not believe that she would find restoration.
Alison brought the rod of metal up and touched it against Isandra’s ankle. Her skin was exposed, revealing the scars that had healed, the work of the women of the House of the Yahinv enough to prevent her from continuing to lose any more of her abilities. What remained was weak, enough that she was able to sense the presence of manehlin, but could not use it herself.
The metal touched her skin, searing.
It was a burst of cold and heat mixed together. There was a flash of pain that was brief yet piercing, and then it disappeared. Alison brought the slender rod of metal over to her other leg before she had a chance to react. She pressed it against the flesh of her ankle. This time, there came another burst of pain, another mix of heat and cold, though it faded more slowly than the last.
“Well?” Alison asked.
Isandra studied her breathing, tears streaming from her eyes. “Well, what?”
Alison slipped the length of metal into her pocket and shot Isandra a quizzical look. “Have your abilities been restored?”
Isandra tried reaching for her connection to the manehlin. It had been a while since she had effectively reached it, and part of her forgot what it was like to delve into that deep part of her mind. As she attempted to do so, she allowed herself a twinge of hope, little more than the barest sliver of belief that she might succeed. Could it be possible that Alriyn and Alison had discovered a secret to restoring those who lost their abilities, stolen from them by the Deshmahne? If any of the Magi could have managed that, she wasn’t surprised that Alriyn would be among them. He nearly rivaled Jostephon with his intelligence and depth of understanding. As chancellor of the university, Alison would likely have a similar intelligence.
The connection was not there.
She shook her head. “Nothing has changed.” She sat up, pushing the hem of her long dress down, and shifted to dangle her legs over the edge of the bed. Pain throbbed in her ankles, a surprising sensation considering all Alison had done was touch the teralin to her skin. “Did it work on others immediately?”
“Most were able to regain at least a portion of their abilities,” Alriyn said from behind Alison. “They did not regain the strength they’d once had, but they did not describe the continued oozing of their abilities away from them.”
Isandra sighed. Oozing was as good a description as any. That was very much what it felt like when she was first branded. There had been the sense that her connection to the manehlin, that connection to a greater part of herself, what she believed was born to her, had oozed away.
She stood and stepped over to the table near the door that held her cloak and her sword. She worked quickly, buckling her sword back around her waist. Alison watched her with an interested expression, but she said nothing.
“If others were healed more rapidly, I suspect they weren’t injured for as long as I was. I traveled for weeks before I reached the Antrilii lands, and even once I was here, it took a while for them to discover how to halt what had happened to me.”
Alriyn took a few steps toward her and looked down, staring at her ankle. “How is it that they knew how to halt the damage done to you?”
“Because they’ve faced the groeliin for centuries,” Isandra said.
Alriyn looked up. “What do the groeliin have to do with the Deshmahne?”
She studied him. “How is it that you don’t know?”
They had fought the Deshmahne, and they had come north with Endric, a man who knew about the groeliin. How could they not know about the connection between the Deshmahne in the groeliin?
“There is a connection?” Alison asked.
Isandra pulled her dress up, revealing the branding on her ankle. “There is a connection. The Deshmahne learned what they did about their dark magic from the groeliin. That’s how they’ve been able to steal from others. That’s how they were able to steal from me.”
She dropped the dress once more, hiding her brands. Her ankles still throbbed where the teralin had touched them. How long would that last? Was there something in the way that they used the metal that had irritated her skin? Or was it something else? Could they have healed her in some way that had yet to manifest?
Isandra doubted that was possible. It had been too long since the injury for her to recover. It had been too long since the Deshmahne had branded her, stealing her birthright.
“It’s possible that time is a factor, Alriyn,” Alison said. Isandra looked over and noted the chancellor staring up at the Eldest of the Magi. “Those we worked on in Vasha had all been injured for days.”
“Some were injured for longer,” Alriyn said.
“Some were,” Alison agreed. “And those were the ones who recovered the least. Don’t you remember?”
“We thought that was because we hadn’t understood how to restore them,” Alriyn said.
“What if it’s because they were injured for longer? That has always been part of the question. Seeing how Isandra responded to the healing lends evidence to that theory.”
“There’s another possibility. What if what the Antrilii did interrupted the restorative nature of the teralin?”
Alison tapped the side of her face with one short finger. Her mouth was pinched into a tight line, leaving her jaw clenched. “It is… possible. More likely, I think, is that the duration of time between her injury and our attempt to restore her has been too long.”
Isandra found the communication between Alriyn and Alison amusing. The Eldest had always been so serious, a focused Mage. This was the Mage who had traveled north and had seen the desolation of the mining villages and had felt that it was necessary for them to discover more about what was taking place. This was the Mage who had long fought for the rest of the Magi to leave the city, to expand their reach. This was the Mage who had resisted her joining the Council, thinking her sister Karrin was a better fit. Perhaps he was right in all of those things.
Karrin was a better fit for the Council than she was. That had been the case long before she had lost her connection to her Mage abilities. Karrin was more like Alriyn, though she had a little more anxiety than Alriyn ever exhibited.
“Maybe it’s both,” Isandra said.
The other two paused in their conversation just long enough to look over at her before returning to their discussion.
Isandra shook her head and left the room with a smile, leaving them there. There was no harm in her having tried, much as there was no harm in the fact that they had failed. What mattered was that Alriyn and Alison had a way of restoring the Magi if they managed to get to them soon enough. And that there was a way of halting the progression before they lost too much of their abilities.
She paused in the street, glancing toward the edge of the city and the House of the Yahinv. She considered heading there, searching for Rebecca or others of the Yahinv, thinking that perhaps she might find answers there, but decided against it.
Instead, she left the city and traveled toward the lower foothills. The walk was good for her. Her legs throbbed. The pain from her ankles where Alison had placed the teralin seemed to be working its way from the brands up into her calves, but it was not an unple
asant sensation. It was more of an ache, the sense that she had over exerted herself, rather than any real pain.
She passed a few other Antrilii along the road and waved cordially to them. Isandra had been enough of a presence within Farsea that she no longer drew attention as she once had. She didn’t think they had accepted her as one of their own, but they didn’t view her in the same way that the Antrilii had been viewing the Magi, as well as the Denraen, since their arrival.
She heard movement near her and glanced over to see the massive form of the merahl approaching. Isandra smiled, reaching out until the merahl pressed up against her, and she could ruffle the fur on the back of his neck. “You don’t have to come with me,” she said.
The merahl made a soft whine that she interpreted as a slight annoyance.
Isandra chuckled. “Fine. You can come with me. I’m not sure that you will approve of where I’m going.”
The merahl sniffed at the air but made no other sound.
They continued along the road, following it until it reached the rocky lower slopes. The path would continue up into the mountains themselves, taking an ever increasing slope upward, and ultimately toward the south,. That was the way she had traveled with Jassan and the others of his Antrilii warriors as they sought the groeliin breeding grounds. There were other paths that led different directions, but she had not taken the time to explore them. She suspected one of them was the path the Antrilii had followed into Farsea when they brought her here the first time. She had come with Jassan seeking protection, not much else. She hadn’t known what to expect when she had accepted his invitation and had found something much greater than she could ever have imagined.
A few dark caves dotted the slopes. One of them had once held Jostephon. She knew from the merahl and from Jassan that there had been no sign of him. Isandra had not expected any, especially if he had discovered some way of transporting himself without walking. That would make him dangerous, and unpredictable. They had been lucky to have captured him the first time.
She passed the cave that had held Jostephon and followed along the slope until she reached the cave holding the groeliin.
As she started toward it, the merahl ran in front of her.
Isandra scratched the merahl’s ears/ and started to make her way around, but he moved to block her once more.
“What is it?”
He remained there, unmoving.
A flutter worked through Isandra. She reached for her sword at the same instant she noted a mist moving out of the cave mouth.
Not a mist, but manehlin, similar to what she had seen around Alriyn.
This was dense, a thick fog that reminded her of what she had seen around the groeliin, but without the same darkness and without the same sense of bleakness from it.
What was this?
She unsheathed her sword and patted the merahl. “It’s okay. I need to see what this is.”
She took a careful step forward. The merahl stayed alongside her, padding silently. His ears were perked, but the hackles on his back were not raised, not as they had been when she had been attacked in the past. Whatever was here, whatever the merahl detected and caused this strange fog, she didn’t think she needed to fear it.
A streak of movement drew her attention, and her eyes followed it. The movement headed up the mountains, away from the mouth of the cave. It moved quickly, but not so quickly that she could not follow it.
“Can you trail it for me and let me know where you are?” she asked.
The merahl stalked off, leaving her alone.
Isandra knew that it was a bad idea for her to enter the cave by herself, but she needed to know what had come out of it. Had someone harmed the groeliin inside?
She wouldn’t put it past the Magi to think the groeliin needed to be destroyed. Possibly even Endric would have attempted to destroy the creature. The Antrilii had been willing to give her time, but Isandra wasn’t certain how much time they were comfortable with granting her before they decided it was time to put an end to the groeliin.
The fog lifted from the cave, and she entered.
When she did, the first thing she noticed were the damaged bars of teralin near the back. They were bent, twisted into an opening, and the groeliin was nowhere to be seen.
Isandra clutched her sword more tightly, prepared for the possibility that the groeliin might attack her. She had thought she was getting to the creature, that by working with it, and offering it the positively charged teralin, it would not harm her. Had she been wrong?
She scanned the inside of the cave and saw nothing.
Where were the merahl?
Much like with Jostephon, there should have been three merahl standing guard, but she saw no sign of them.
She approached the bars of the cage and touched them. They were warm, and the metal had a bright sheen to it that matched her sword, the creative form of teralin.
What had happened here?
A low howl came from outside the cave, and up the mountain. The merahl called for her.
Chapter Twenty-Four
The island of Salvat was situated off the coast of Gom Aaldia. A salt wind whipped across, plucking at Jakob’s cloak and whipping his hair back. He stood on a sandy shore, with waves crashing around him, the sound a soothing rhythm. Were there not for his need to understand more about the Conclave, Jakob might have simply sat on the shore, enjoying the sound of the waves and the feeling of the sand beneath his feet.
Novan stood behind him, staring out toward a distant cluster of rocks, what appeared to be nothing more than ruins similar to what he’d seen in Vasha, or even similar to the ruins that were in the daneamiin lands, the remains of their ancient city.
“The Conclave meets here?”
Novan nodded slowly. “Most of us only meet here. Reaching it, as you have seen, is difficult, especially back when Salvat was enslaved. We should have moved, but there was value in remaining here.”
“What’s the value?”
Novan shifted his staff and tapped it once in the sand. It didn’t ring out as loudly as it did on the stones, but the teralin worked into the staff took on a soft glow, what appeared to be a reflection of light from the sun. Power surged, and ahmaean flared from it. Jakob wondered how much of that effect Novan was aware of. He had control over his ahmaean, but Jakob still wasn’t certain how much Novan was aware of what he did.
“Not all born within Vasha have Mage abilities,” Novan said carefully.
“Lendra was one born to Magi parents without any abilities.”
Novan nodded, a hint of a smile coming to his face. “Yes. I think it bothered her parents, as it does many of the Magi who have children without gifts. They struggle with what it means for their family when their children are not able to reach for the same abilities they have. Lendra was lucky in that her parents took her from the city, and they sought to provide her with opportunities that she would not have had in Vasha. As someone not Mageborn, she would have been offered an education, and she would have been tolerated, but she would never have been fulfilled.”
Jakob took a deep breath, enjoying the salty air. A particularly large wave crashed behind him, sending spray moistening his neck. His father would have enjoyed standing on this beach. He suspected his mother would have, as well.
“You’re talking about the Teachers,” Jakob said.
“Very good. Yes. Teachers are often exiles from Vasha, those who have left because they were not born with Mage abilities, though that is not the only reason. Some are simply scholars who have taken a love for education. Others come from different areas.”
“Such as the Guild?”
Novan shrugged. “Few leave the Guild in order to search for an opportunity to teach.”
“Why did you leave the Guild?”
“What makes you think that I have?”
Jakob shrugged. “It’s not any single thing. It’s that you have never spoken of the Guild in all the time that I’ve spent with you. I think that somethi
ng happened a while ago that pulled you away from the Guild, at least far enough away that you feel a greater connection to the Conclave than you do to the Guild of Historians.”
Novan sighed. “I feel a connection to those who seek knowledge and understanding, and as you have seen, I’m not content with simply recording.”
Jakob laughed. “I don’t think anyone would ever accuse you of doing anything simply.”
Novan tapped his staff, and light surged from it once more. “I suppose not. Too often, I have chosen to become involved, even to the detriment of myself.”
“Your detriment?” Jakob asked with another laugh. “What about those you push, forcing to do as you request?”
Jakob thought of how Novan had forced himself along with the Magi, the way that he had pressed his will upon Haerlin, back when Jakob was impressed by such things. It had surprised him that the historian had been willing to push around one of the Magi, almost as much as it surprised him that the Magi had allowed it. Then there had been the way that Endric had treated Novan. There was a sense of respect, and of mutual admiration.
“Where is the Conclave headquartered?” Jakob asked. “I see nothing here other than sand and the waves and the ruins in the distance.”
“What you see as ruins are the beginning of the Conclave headquarters.”
Novan stood with one hand out, waiting on Jakob.
Jakob shook his head and took the historian’s hand, shifting them forward.
The distance was much greater than Jakob had expected. From the shore, it had seemed as if the rocks were close, and that they were a cluster of debris, the remnants of the city, or perhaps even some sort of display of artwork, a creation much like he had seen atop Vasha, the Lashiin ruins.
From here, there was no sense of ruins. There were rocks that had tumbled and fallen, but behind them, there were solid buildings, a series of them in a pattern that reminded him of the markings that the Deshmahne used when creating their tattoos.
Jakob stood atop the rock, looking down upon it. He frowned as he studied it, trying to make sense of the shape of the buildings. Where he higher, he thought he might be able to better perceive the shape, but from here, there was nothing clear, and no obvious way for him to recognize what shape these buildings had been set in.
The Last Conclave (The Lost Prophecy Book 6) Page 19
