The Study Series Bundle

by Maria V. Snyder

“I promised to come back. I didn’t promise to take you into the sky.”

  “Then you and Moon Man will stay here in misery and I will use your power to reach the sky.” He advanced and grabbed my arms.

  My skin boiled as searing daggers of pain spread throughout my body. I screamed, but he didn’t have the ability to take what he wanted. I had to give it to him.

  He tried another tactic. Waving with an arm, a window opened and I could see Roze and her Warpers. Leif, Bain, Ari, Janco, Gale, Cahil and Marrok all were staked in the sand.

  “They lost. There are a few more left, but when they are captured, the fun begins. However, if you lead me to the sky, I will stop Roze and release all your friends and family.”

  I looked at Moon Man.

  “If you do not help the Fire Warper,” Moon Man said, “we are stuck here and Roze will send each of them to suffer in this world with us.”

  This was the one scenario I had hoped to avoid. “Are you saying that’s what I should do?”

  “No. I am merely pointing out the consequences.”

  “Then what should I do?”

  “Your decision to make. You are the Soulfinder. Find your soul.”

  I wanted to strangle him, but he was already dead. “Do you think you could give me a straight answer one time?” I demanded.

  “Yes, I could.”

  I gazed out as frustration and futility twisted tightly around me. Sensing I was conflicted, the Fire Warper let the souls draw near to me so I could see the fate of my friends. Their cries grew shrill in my ears and the heat baked my skin, making it difficult to concentrate. The fetid odor assaulted my senses.

  “Watch,” he said, and pointed to the scene beyond the fire. “Roze has ensnared Irys in a cocoon of magic. She will force her to lie upon the sand and be tied down.”

  Sure enough Irys walked toward Roze. She knelt before her. Irys’s eyes glanced to the side before the other Warpers secured her in the sand. I followed her gaze and spotted Valek.

  He fought four Warpers with swords, but I knew they threw every ounce of magic at him. And by Roze’s intent gaze, she aimed all her power against him. Even though the magic didn’t work, he still felt the presence and it slowed his movements. A soldier waited nearby with a blowpipe, seeking the first opportunity to hit Valek with a dart.

  “And Valek will be next,” the Fire Warper said. “What do you want to do? Watch your friends and lover die or guide me to the sky?”

  I held out my hand to Moon Man and to the Fire Warper. “Come,” I said.

  34

  A TRIUMPHANT GRIN SPREAD on the Fire Warper’s face. Moon Man remained unflappable. He held my hand. Even though it appeared to be made of smoke, his hand felt solid in mine. Moon Man looked at me. The oval shape of his eyes matched Roze’s. Why hadn’t I noticed the resemblance before?

  Roze’s comments replayed in my mind. Could I reanimate Moon Man’s body after I took him to the sky? According to Roze, soulless bodies were unaffected by magic. Could I create a small force to help Irys and Valek?

  My bat flew around my head. Odd. How could he be here?

  Moon Man sighed. I missed the point. It didn’t matter how the bat had gotten here, but why was he here at all. Bats. Opal’s glass bat. I reached for my pocket, but the answer halted the motion. Opal’s sister. Tula!

  When Ferde had stolen Tula’s soul and strangled her, I had used my magic to breathe for Tula, but as soon as I had stopped, she had stopped.

  I didn’t possess the power to raise a soulless army.

  The magician born one-hundred-and-fifty years ago wasn’t a Soulfinder, but a Soulstealer.

  I was a true Soulfinder. And I knew what my job entailed. The Fire Warper grew impatient with my delay and reached for my free hand; I yanked it away. My bat cried out with joy and disappeared.

  I sought Roze with my mind, seeing her soul and the souls of all her victims trapped within her. Their blood had been injected into her skin to bind them to her. I pushed at the blood, sweeping and forcing it through her pores, pulling the souls free, sending them to the sky.

  She yelped and rolled up her sleeve. Black liquid oozed from her arms, dripping onto the sand. The putrid smell of rancid blood surrounded her like a fog. Each one I removed weakened Roze until only her own power remained.

  Then I projected my mind to Gede and did the same to him. One by one I plucked souls from the Warpers, weakening them.

  The Fire Warper cried an oath and lunged for me. Moon Man intercepted and fought him so I could return my attention to the Keep.

  Roze’s magical hold on Irys had slipped when I extracted her power. Freed from the magic, Irys used her own skills to draw a knife close to her and cut the rope. Once loose, she ran to a few others who had not been pricked with Curare but who, like her, had been captured by magic.

  Gale and Marrok joined her and they attacked Roze. Valek’s opponents had been distracted by the scene around them, giving Valek the opportunity to dispatch them. The man with the blowpipe ran off. Valek turned his full attention to Roze.

  Satisfied all was well with my friends, I focused on the Fire Warper. He held Moon Man in a tight grip, compressing Moon Man’s soul to bind him to the fire world.

  “Stop,” I said. “You’ll gain no more power today.” I pulled at Moon Man with my magic and he popped from the Fire Warper’s grasp. “I find souls and ensure they arrive at the proper destination. He doesn’t belong here. But you do.”

  I moved past him. He tried to stop me, but he was a soul just like all the others and I controlled him. Moving through the fire world, I found those who didn’t belong and released them to the sky. The Fire Warper screamed at me with each one, but I ignored him. A long time passed as I freed them all, but my energy increased with every rescue.

  “Why aren’t I tired?” I asked Moon Man.

  He smiled. “Think about what you have learned today.”

  I glanced around. The Fire Warper’s power had diminished with each freed soul. Perhaps stealing his power had increased my own?

  “No.” Moon Man looked a little exasperated, as if he couldn’t believe how slow I was. I did take some pleasure from his expression. To alter his calm demeanor required much effort on my part.

  The Fire Warper glowered at me. “It is only a matter of time before I regain my strength,” he said. “There is always someone who desires more power and I will be waiting for them.”

  “Not if I can help it,” I said.

  “Then you will have to spend eternity with me to prevent it. The knowledge is out there now. Another fool will figure out how to contact me through the flames.”

  He had a point. But I was the Soulfinder. In order to do my job, I would have to stay in the underworld and send the souls to their proper places. Thinking about my job, I remembered a promise to Moon Man.

  “Can you guide me to the shadow world?” I asked him.

  “No. But you can lead me.”

  “And you call yourself a guide?”

  He smiled serenely.

  “I hate you.” I clasped Moon Man’s hand.

  I thought of the shadow world with its gray plain and sky. The red glow faded and soon the featureless expanse spread in front of us.

  “This is only the corridor between worlds, Yelena. Look deeper to see the real shadow world.”

  Another cryptic instruction. For all my abilities, I still couldn’t get Moon Man to give me a straight answer. I pushed away my frustration and focused on who I was trying to find. The Sandseeds who had been killed by the Vermin in the Avibian Plains.

  The flat area began to undulate and transform into the plains. Small outcroppings of rocks grew and the smooth gray ground sprouted grass and a few bushes. A cluster of canvas tents popped up and circled a fire pit. The scene before me resembled a Sandseed camp. Yet there was no color. Only black and white and every shade of gray.

  Sandseeds huddled together in this camp on the altered Avibian Plain, living in the shadow cast by the real world. T
hey clung to their memories of life, not realizing peace awaited them in the sky.

  I walked among them and talked to them. Their numbers grew and I had to stop myself from reliving the horror of the Vermin’s attack and massacre. I made promises to watch over the living Sandseeds who had hidden during the attack. Days and weeks could have passed while I convinced them to move on. I had no concept of time.

  Again, as I sent each one into the sky, my strength grew. “There are many more souls clinging to the shadow world,” I said to Moon Man, thinking about all the towns and cities in Sitia and Ixia. “Let me return you to your body and you can tell the others my fate.”

  “I can not return,” he said. “My body has died, unlike yours. And even if you heal me, I would be unhappy and would wish for death.”

  “Like Stono and Gelsi?”

  “Yes. Eventually both will find their way back to where they belong.”

  “Then I will send you to the sky. You deserve to be there.”

  “Not until you understand.”

  “I do understand. I’m doing my job. I’ve resigned myself to living here to keep Sitia and Ixia safe from more Warpers!” I clamped my hands together to keep them from wrapping around Mr. I-know-everything-and-you-don’t Man’s thick neck.

  “Have you truly resigned yourself?” he asked.

  “I…” I huffed in frustration. I would rather be back with Valek, Kiki, my parents, Leif, Irys, Ari, Janco and my other friends. I had learned my true job, but there were still many aspects of my magic and others’ magic to explore. I thought about Opal’s unique ability. Then I remembered my glass bat.

  Had it survived the fire? I felt inside my pockets. Odd how my clothing had survived the flames. My fingers touched a smooth lump. I pulled the animal from my cape. The inner core glowed with magic. Staring at the light, I saw Leif’s sad face. He peered at me in sorrow, then disbelief when I smiled at him.

  “Hello from the underworld,” I said.

  “Yelena! What the…? Where are…? Come back!”

  “I can’t. Tell me what has happened?”

  He gave me a quick sketch of how the battle had played out after I jumped into the fire. Most of the Warpers were dead, only Roze, Gede and four others remained alive. They were in the Keep’s cells, awaiting trial.

  “They will be hanged for treason and murder,” Leif said. He grew somber. “We buried Moon Man last week.”

  “Last week? But—”

  “You’ve been gone for weeks. We keep the fire burning, hoping you’ll return. Also Valek will not let us quench it. He’s been helping the Councilors and Master Magicians recover from their ordeal and to smooth out relations with the Commander via Ambassador Signe. Valek went from the scourge of Sitia to the hero of Sitia.” Leif smiled sardonically.

  Valek. The one person I wouldn’t mind spending eternity with.

  Leif continued, “And the rest of us are coping with the aftermath. Many students were killed by the Vermin. We’re still sorting out who is left. Your friend Dax is okay, but Gelsi died resisting a Warper.”

  Moon Man was right, Gelsi found her way back. I hoped Stono wouldn’t suffer too much before his soul found the sky.

  He paused. “The Sitian army’s hunting down the remaining Vermin who escaped. The Sandseeds have moved back to the plains to repopulate.” Leif sighed. “You’re missed by everyone. Why can’t you come back?”

  “Someone needs to keep the Fire Warper from regaining power.”

  Leif frowned as he thought, then looked hopeful. “Bain has burned those old Efe texts to stop someone from learning about the blood magic.”

  “But there are others who know how to perform the ritual, and, even though you will execute them, they will be here in the fire world and able to communicate to someone who is determined to seek them out.”

  “You’re a Soulfinder, can’t you send them somewhere out of reach?” Leif asked.

  “They don’t deserve to be in the sky.”

  “Why not?” Moon Man said.

  My mind thought over what I knew of the sky, which was very little. “I think they would taint it. It’s pure and their vile deeds would soil it.”

  “Finally. What is the sky?”

  What indeed? When I sent souls there, I felt refreshed, energetic even though I used power, which usually caused me fatigue. I added souls to the sky. Adding to the power blanket surrounding the world.

  The source of magic!

  The world’s soul.

  Moon Man beamed at me. “Now you can send me there! And then you can return to your life.”

  He chuckled at my dubious expression. “You will find a way, Yelena. You always do.”

  “Last piece of cryptic advice?”

  “Consider it my farewell gift.”

  I hesitated for a moment. Once Moon Man was gone I would be all alone.

  “All the more reason not to stay,” Moon Man said.

  “There’s one thing I won’t miss.”

  “And that is?”

  “You reading my mind all the time and making me figure things out for myself.”

  “All part of being your Story Weaver. It does not stop, you know. You will hear my voice in your mind from time to time, giving you my unique advice.”

  I groaned. “And I thought living in the underworld for eternity was bad!”

  Before sending him to the sky, I stared at him, trying to hold his features, including his sardonic grin, in my mind. When he disappeared, his absence felt like an icy coating on my skin. I realized I still held Opal’s bat, but my connection to Leif was broken.

  I wandered through the shadow world and found lost souls. Every so often I checked in the fire world to make sure the Fire Warper remained as he should be. He cursed, taunted and tried to cajole me, depending on his mood.

  Irys, Leif and Bain all talked to me through the glass animals. They were the only ones who had the ability to use them. Through them I knew Roze, Gede and the other Warpers would be hanged soon. I prepared to receive them in the fire world.

  In the meantime, I stared at my bat, trying and failing to connect to Valek. My desire to talk to him, to hold him, clawed at my body. Frustration at my inability to communicate with him caused a window to open to the real world, and I could view events around my fire. I laughed at my intense feelings of ownership. My fire. But I sobered. I knew after they hanged Roze and the others, my fire would be doused and my window closed for good.

  The Council planned to hang Roze and her accomplices on gallows built in the bloodstained sand then burn their bodies in my fire. An insult given only to traitors.

  The sand would be cleaned up and perhaps the gardeners would plant grass in the space. Or some trees. Flowers. A memorial? Perhaps a structure similar to one of the Citadel’s jade statues or fountains. To remember me and Moon Man.

  Now I was being maudlin and dramatic. Next thing I knew, I’d be designing the memorial, sketching its dimensions in the sand. I wondered about what they would do with all the sand. Send it to Booruby to be melted into glass? So Opal could turn fire into ice?

  I froze in shock as a wild idea formed in my head. Thinking it through, I found many holes and reasons for it not to work. But success or not, at least I could say I tried. And the effort alone would keep Moon Man from nagging me for a while.

  35

  CALLING TO LEIF through my bat, I hoped there would be enough time. He seemed eager to help and rushed off to make the arrangements.

  Events had to happen in a particular order for this to work. I returned to the fire world. The Fire Warper would be our first test subject. Watching out my window, I waited for Leif to return. I didn’t like being in the fire world. The shrill noise drilled through my skull and the putrid smell permeated the air. I preferred the quiet dullness of the shadow world.

  The Fire Warper enjoyed my anxiety. “Look at how you long to return. Your suffering is my only pleasure. And I will enjoy keeping you here. Already I sense an unhappy boy who seeks revenge on
his tormentors. If his desire grows, I’ll be able to talk to him. Unless you prevent it.”

  Doubt flared about what I planned. Was I being selfish? Could I still rescue souls lost in the shadow world? Yet I had done it before with the ghosts in Owl’s Hill. Suppressing all my fears, I ignored the Fire Warper’s comments.

  What seemed like a couple of weeks to me, but could have been a month or more, passed. By my brief glimpses into the Keep, the cold season had ended and the warming season was in full swing. I received updates from Leif, but now that I had a chance to escape, my impatience grew.

  Finally, all the elements were in place. The gallows were built and the needed equipment brought in. My incredible relief at seeing Opal surprised me. Her mouth was pressed in pure determination as she readied her tools.

  Another worry crossed my mind. Within the underworld, I hadn’t felt cold, hot, hunger or thirst. But if I stepped back through the fire, would it burn me? I would find out soon enough. The Fire Warper hovered near me, his amusement plain.

  Opal grasped a long metal pipe and poked it into the kiln. I wondered where they had gotten the glassmaking supplies. She turned the pipe and drew it out. And proceeded to create a glass animal.

  When she moved to blow into the pipe, I inhaled the Fire Warper’s soul. He yelped in surprise and seared my skin as I sent him through Opal and into the glass. He screamed in panic and resisted. But I controlled him. He was a soul after all.

  Opal jerked as if burned, but returned to her task, making the ugliest, squattest looking pig I ever saw.

  Placing the animal into the annealing oven, the wait began. Had our experiment worked? If the Fire Warper was truly trapped within the glass, then we could encase all the Warpers who knew how to perform blood magic, preventing them from passing the information along. And I could go home.

  Twelve of the longest hours passed before Opal withdrew the pig and held the statue up for all to see. It was then I noticed just how many people had come to watch. I expected Leif, the Master Magicians and Councilors, but it appeared that Fisk and the entire Helping Guild members were there. My mother and father lingered at the edges. Perl’s hand was clamped to her throat in dismay, but she looked as determined as Opal.