The Infinite Expanse (The Journals of Krymzyn Book 2)

by BC Powell

  “If it’s not too painful, take your shirt off,” he says.

  I lift my shirt, gritting my teeth as I pull it over my head and slip it off my arms. Larn and Tela both pour sap into their hands and gently rub them across my back, neck, and shoulders.

  “Drink your flask,” Tela says. “All of it.”

  I take one of my flasks from my belt and drain everything inside. Still sitting on the ground, I gingerly shake my arms and legs. “I’m feeling better now,” I say. “A little sore, but definitely better.”

  “Why don’t we end this session for now,” Larn replies.

  As I stand, my shoulder and arm still ache, but the pain is gradually subsiding. “No, I want to try again. I almost had it.”

  “Are you sure?” he asks. “Your arm hasn’t healed yet.”

  “I’m sure. The pain is almost gone.”

  Larn looks at Tela. “His determination is much like yours.”

  “Is this self-mutilation a common thing?” I ask.

  “It often happens the first few times,” Larn replies. “Tela broke both of her legs.”

  “You’re kidding!” I exclaim. “Sorry. You’re serious?”

  “It was quite painful,” Tela answers. “It took two morrows to heal.”

  “That’s it? Two morrows to heal a broken leg?”

  “Two broken legs,” she replies.

  “By the morrow,” Larn says, “your arm will feel as though it were never broken. Arms mend much faster than legs.”

  I closely examine my arm, finding that the skin has almost healed, and there’s really no swelling around the break. When I shake it a few times, dull throbs pulse through my nerves, but I don’t feel anything severe.

  “Is this is why you brought the canister of sap?” I ask Larn, also now understanding that Maya’s comments about broken bones weren’t quite as ridiculous as I thought at the time.

  “I believe in being prepared,” Larn says. “If I’d told you, it might have discouraged you from trying. Let’s return to the top of the hill and see how your body feels before you make the decision to try again.”

  “I definitely want to do it again,” I stubbornly reply as we walk towards the Traveling Hill. “I was just blown away that I did that.”

  “Blown away?” he asks.

  “Stunned,” I correct myself.

  “That’s the moment you need to increase your concentration,” he says. “If you lose focus at all, your particles automatically return to their normal state. It often happens the first few times.”

  “You’ll grow accustomed to the sensation the more you do it,” Tela adds.

  The three of us eventually climb to the top of the Traveling Hill. I feel mild discomfort in my shoulder and arm, but it’s not enough to stop me from another attempt. I know how quickly sap heals our bodies, so I want to try again while the experience is still fresh in my mind.

  “Are you sure you feel up to this?” Tela asks when we reach the crest.

  “Never felt better,” I say.

  “Remember to maintain focus across the meadow,” Larn says. “Don’t be startled by the blend. Keep your running motion fluid and constant at all times. Use the uphill slope to slow yourself and gradually retract your particles.”

  “Got it,” I reply.

  After a deep breath, I sprint down the hill, concentrating only on separating my particles. When the world snaps into interlaced beams, I rocket forward. My body bursts into fine grains and I funnel them into the beams of light.

  In a breathless second, I zoom across the flat meadow to the side of the next hill. With my pulse racing and eyes wide open, I draw my particles back into my body. Rising up the slope, I gradually shift my focus from the light to my running motion. The beams around me start to fade away at the same time I feel solid mass reassemble inside my skin.

  With a huge smile hitting my face, I try to slow to a jog, assuming I’m completely out of the blend. I know that my assumption is wrong when my face slams into the ground.

  * * *

  When I open my eyes, I’m flat on my back. I know I was unconscious, but I have no idea for how long. Larn and Tela are kneeling beside me with their faces hovering over mine.

  “I’ve already reset your nose and rubbed sap on it,” Larn says. “It was rather badly broken, so I took advantage of your lack of consciousness to spare you the pain. You also re-broke your arm, so I tended to it as well.”

  “Thank you,” I manage to say, feeling globs of dried blood clogging my nostrils.

  “After your face made impact with the ground, you flipped through the air and landed on your back. I’m not sure if you have any other injuries, but I don’t see a compound fracture.”

  “Well, that’s a positive,” I murmur.

  The two of them carefully help me sit up. My left shoulder and arm are thumping again, but I don’t feel the sharp pain of any new broken bones. Slowly standing to my feet, aches pulsate through literally every part of my body.

  “Perhaps we should stop until the morrow,” Larn says.

  “Yeah, I think I’m done for now.”

  “You’re putting your body through a tremendous amount of stress,” he comments, handing me the canister of sap.

  “I’m sure I’ll be fine,” I say. “Do me a favor and turn your backs to me.”

  “Why?” he asks.

  “I’m going to take my clothes off.”

  “Why do you need us to turn around?” Tela asks.

  “In my world, we don’t take our clothes off in front of others,” I say. “Men may take their shirts off, but not women, and no one takes their pants off with others around.”

  “Then we’ll adhere to your custom,” Larn says.

  After they both turn away, I unclip my rope belt, lift my shirt over my head, and slide my pants down my legs. Emptying the canister, I rub sap on my body from head to toe. While slowly redressing, I pause several times to take long drinks of sap from my flask. Even with the fresh energy in my blood, I feel like I’ve been run over by a truck—a truck full of bricks that immediately dumped them on me.

  “You can turn around,” I say.

  They both look at me like they’re waiting for me to say something.

  “When I tried to stop, I think I slowed too fast or something.”

  “There’s a bit of trial and error for the return of your particles,” Larn says. “It’s a gradual process transitioning from your travel back into a run.”

  “When your particles recede,” Tela says, “it’s an opposing action to your forward motion. You’ll sometimes feel as though you’ve slowed to a run although your body is still partially blended with the light. You have to maintain a sprint until you’re certain you’re out of the blend.”

  “How many tries did it take you?” I ask Tela.

  “I only crashed once. I didn’t particularly care for the feeling of breaking my legs. After they healed, I achieved it the next time I tried. I stumbled a few times but didn’t have any serious injuries.”

  “I’m impressed,” I reply.

  “Most suffer from eight to ten falls before finally mastering a smooth stop,” Larn says. “Some have taken as many as twenty with numerous broken bones along the way.”

  “I don’t even understand how we can break a bone if our particles are partially separated and moving all the time.”

  “When we’re not blended with the light,” he explains, “energy binds the particles of our bones together into almost solid mass. Although the particles are in motion, if the energy connecting them is broken, the bone snaps much like a twig from a tree.”

  “Same as in my world. But where I come from, third time’s the charm.”

  “I don’t understand your expression or use of the word ‘charm,’” Larn says.

  “It means on the third try, you’ll have success at something.”

  “Third time it will be, then. We’ll see you on the morrow.”

  Chapter 18

  They never returned. Five cr
eatures so thoroughly trained, allowed as much sap as they could drink, and with only one task to complete. Many hundreds of morrows were spent widening the passage, the man alone in the dark tunnel while others in the Delta slept. And many more morrows wasted as he patiently waited for a Serquatine to swim into his trap. Such tedious labor and impeccable planning, only to result in failure.

  He’ll never know what happened behind the wall. The events that had transpired inside the Delta will forever be a mystery to him, and the passage is now gone. While she stood on a distant hilltop in the wasteland, his beautiful woman of the Barrens watched as the rope was discovered by the Traveler and the Hunter. The man shakes his head, realizing he only has himself to blame.

  He was wrong to focus so much effort on an attack inside the Delta. The opportunity had presented itself when he found the tunnel leading from the river to a hidden cavern. The plan had taken shape while he’d still been an Apprentice. Standing guard on the black marble wall, he’d watched the Serquatine use the pool as a place of rest.

  Many times, the man had walked the path through the hills of the Delta to the Hunter’s habitat just to be certain the trail was hidden from the Watchers’ eyes. He was well aware of the habits of the Watchers, their attention to the riverbanks during Darkness. But even with the precautions he took, there was complexity to his plan, too much room for error. When using the Murkovin, he reminds himself, he needs to simplify.

  The man was blessed with great powers of perception, a gift that will now prove its value. He first noticed the bond between the Hunter and the Traveler when the young man from another world was still a Teller. He saw the two hold each other’s hands at a Ritual of Purpose, an apparent display of affection never seen in the Delta. The Hunter had shown overwhelming determination to save the young man’s life during the Murkovin raid near the Empty Hill that the man had orchestrated. He’d also watched as the young man and the Hunter pressed their lips together before departing for the Mount, just as the man does with his beautiful woman of the Barrens. Even without the influence of wild sap, carnal desires seem to have evolved between the Traveler and the Hunter.

  But when the young man from another world leapt from the bridge into the rapids of the river, displayed his willingness to sacrifice his life for the Hunter, the man understood the true depth of their bond. The man now realizes he doesn’t need to enter the Delta to kill the Hunter. He needs only to lure her into the Barrens.

  Travelers often soar through the stark wasteland believing they’re at little risk from the Murkovin because of their speed. While it’s true that a Murkovin can rarely match the speed of a Traveler, with the number of creatures the man now has under his command, they won’t need speed in order to capture only one. Once the Traveler is trapped by the man, the Hunter will venture into the Barrens to find him. Even if the Traveler happens to die in the process, as long the man lets no one from the Delta know the young man born of another world is dead, the Hunter will believe him to be alive and imprisoned in the badlands.

  The man slowly turns to the black-veined creature waiting behind him. “I want two men watching the road to the Mount at all times. As soon as the Apprentice Traveler makes a journey to the Mount, I want to know.”

  “The one with brown hair?” the creature asks in a husky voice.

  “That’s the one,” the man replies. “The two on watch should change their locations on a regular basis in case they’re seen. We don’t want them to be obvious to the Travelers. Make sure they have plenty of sap so they maintain their focus.”

  Although the five creatures failed inside the Delta during the long Darkness, the transports in the Barrens were filled with sap. Not only the one acquired from the attack near the bridge, but also several others the man found scattered across the Barrens. Stolen over the Eras when Murkovin attacked the road, they were discarded after the contents were consumed. A shortage of sap is no longer an obstacle for the man. Darkness will inevitably return to a normal pattern, and depleted supplies will never again disrupt his plans.

  “I also want you to collect large straight limbs that have been torn from trees,” the man orders. “Straight, strong limbs—not brittle. Take as many men as you need. Hide the branches in a ravine close to where the road to the Mount steepens. As close as possible to what the Travelers call the blind hills. Do you know them?”

  “Of course,” the creature replies. “How many branches will we need?”

  “Twenty should do,” he says. “They must be well hidden from the view of Travelers. Make certain they’re not in a place where they can be seen from the road.”

  “What should we do with them after they’re near the road?”

  “Nothing until we know that he’s traveling to the Mount,” the man firmly replies. “I’ll explain the rest to you when it’s time. For now, get the watch set on the road and collect the branches.”

  “We’ll start immediately.”

  The creature sprints away towards a nearby camp of Murkovin. His most loyal servant, the first to join the man and his beautiful creature of the Barrens, he’s one of the few who knows the scope of the man’s plans—many of the details, that is, but never enough that the beast could attempt to execute the plan on his own. Only the man has the vision to oversee the demise of the Delta, the skills to properly fit the pieces together into a coherent structure. But for his own protection, the man must keep much of that knowledge to himself. The only person he can truly trust is his beautiful woman of the Barrens.

  I will waste no more time trying to kill the Hunter inside the Delta. Apprentice Travelers always lag near the rear when they journey to the Mount. I know the ways of the Delta well, and I’ll use that knowledge against them.

  His capture should be simple. Once he’s forced off the road, he’ll be outnumbered. He won’t yet have developed the speed to escape the number of Murkovin I’ll have waiting nearby. After he’s my prisoner, she’ll search for him in the wasteland. The Barrens, which I now control, will be where she finally meets her death.

  Chapter 19

  Soon after waking up, we’re right back on top of the Traveling Hill. Sash was, of course, nurturing and sympathetic when I returned to our habitat at the end of the prior morrow. After massaging more sap into my body, she thoroughly explained the process of successfully retracting my particles while transitioning to a sprint at the same time. I ended the morrow with an hour of relaxation in the waterfall before finally passing out in bed. When I woke up, I felt no residual pain, soreness, or lack of mobility.

  Sash stays on the Traveling Hill to watch me, offering tremendous encouragement before I begin. I’m reminded of the confidence I found in her words before my Ritual of Purpose, although I’m sure part of the reason she wants to be nearby is in case I suffer a severe injury. I’m hoping with everything inside me to master traveling on my first attempt of the morrow, if only because, like Tela, I seem to be developing an aversion to broken bones.

  On my initial sprint down the hill, with Larn on one side of me and Tela on the other, I catapult forward as soon as I reach the bottom of the slope. Concentrating on the beams moving in my direction, my particles flash into the light. A split second later, as I flow up the side of the other hill, I gradually retract the grains of my body back into their natural shape.

  When I feel the moment of limbo Tela warned me about, I continue to churn my legs at full speed without trying to slow. Glancing at my arms, I see shafts of light recede into my skin, but I still maintain my sprint for another fifty yards. Once I’m finally certain that I’m out of the blend, my body completely intact, I begin to slow. Unable to control my excitement, the sheer joy and thrill, I leap into the air. After tumbling to the ground and rolling across the grass, I quickly spring to my feet with no injuries at all.

  “Yes!” I scream. “That was unreal!” I jump up and down while pumping my fists.

  His face stoic as always, Larn nods his approval. “Very well done, Chase.”

  I spin to Tela
. “Double high five,” I say, raising my hands.

  Her facial expression never changes, remaining solemnly blank, but a glint of approval flares from her eyes. She lifts both her hands into the air and I slap them with mine. A loud clap echoes through the hills.

  I look behind me at the top of the Traveling Hill. With a huge smile on her face, Sash stands up from the grass. As she pounds a fist against her chest, I wave my hands high over my head.

  “You’re now a Traveler,” Tela says.

  “Thanks to you and Larn,” I reply, turning to them.

  “Thanks to your own determination,” Larn says. “I’m impressed by how quickly you’ve achieved this. Only Sash and Tela have mastered traveling in less time than you have.”

  “It feels incredible!” I exclaim. “I want to do it again!”

  “Go ahead,” Larn replies.

  I immediately speed down the slope. Near the bottom of the hill, I stream into the beams and slingshot across the meadow. In less than one beat of my heart, I reach the base of the Travelling Hill. Coasting up the side, I stumble during my transition to a sprint but don’t suffer any injuries while skidding across the grass. After leaping to my feet, I run straight to Sash and throw my arms around her. She excitedly returns my hug as I lift her off the ground.

  “I’m so proud of you,” she praises in my ear.

  “I really can’t believe I did it,” I say, setting her feet back down on the grass.

  “I never doubted you,” she replies.

  “I know,” I say, smiling at her. “That’s what keeps me going.”

  Again and again, I zip across the meadow. I gradually realize that, once I’m blended with the light, staying focused on the beams isn’t as mentally or physically strenuous as the start and stop. Pulling the particles back into my body soon becomes no more difficult than slowing from a run to a walk.

  After five round trips without a crash, Larn suggests I try going farther. With Sash, Tela, and Larn behind me, I travel to a hilltop about two miles away. From a rough count I keep in my head, I know we cover the distance in less than ten seconds, including acceleration and slowing time.