Shadows Within the Flame (The Elder Stones Saga Book 2)

by D. K. Holmberg

  “You fear it.”

  She shook her head, not turning back to him. “I don’t fear it, I just know that it doesn’t fit me.”

  “Perhaps not, but if you were to return to that land, to draw upon the power of a Great One they called the Great Watcher, you would find that you had more strength than you could ever imagine.”

  “The Great Watcher? That was one of the Great Ones?”

  “One of them, but separate from the rest. There were those that lent power to the land—those Great Ones that are often referred to as Elders—and then there is the Great Watcher. Different, much like his power is different, though some conflate the two.” He smiled, staring at the wall. It was almost as if he could read it. And, Ryn pondered, perhaps he could. If he could read what was written, then maybe that was how he understood so much about this Great Watcher. “The people of your homeland believed that the Great Watcher was one of the Elders and that his power was one of his stones, but I know differently.”

  “Is that what this place tells you?”

  “This place, and others like it. They are remnants of a time when those who lived understood a different sort of power. Much can be learned in places like these, though you have to be able to open your mind.” He turned his attention away from the walls, meeting Ryn’s gaze. “Are you willing to open your mind?”

  “I am,” she said without hesitating.

  “I know that you are. There are times for soldiers, and there are times for believers. Which are you?”

  It was a strange question, not only because she didn’t feel as if she were anything like a soldier. Then again, was she a believer? Olandar Fahr might talk about Great Ones and gods and things like that, but she wasn’t sure if she knew enough about them to even believe.

  “You don’t have to answer now. Perhaps you don’t know the answer yet.”

  “I—”

  He took a step toward her and, taking her hands, he squeezed gently. There was something in his smile that made her want to believe, that made her want to please him. “For now, you can watch. Observe. When you decide, then we will discuss the next step you can take.”

  “Is that why you brought me here?”

  “Not entirely,” he said. He continued to make a circuit of this small room, and after a while, he stopped in front of one section of the wall and reached out, taking one of the tiles off the wall. It left a blank section, but the surrounding pieces were difficult for her to interpret. There had to be something about the tile that he had wanted, though from the others alongside it, she wasn’t able to determine what that might have been.

  “Now we can go.”

  “We have to climb back down?”

  With a smile, he nodded. “As I said, sometimes it’s the journey that matters more than the destination.”

  She worried about the journey back down, but she had made it this far—couldn’t she make it a little farther? And besides, she had survived something that should have killed her already. She would survive again. Eventually, she would learn what she needed. Eventually, she would get the revenge she sought.

  7

  Lucy

  Movement in the distance caught Lucy’s attention. She stared, struggling to make out the source of the movement, straining against the distant darkness, but despite the augmentation granted to her by the implant in the back of her head, she couldn’t tell much of anything. It reminded her of the tower at the stronghold of the C’than.

  “What’s out there?” she asked Carth.

  They had been traveling, Sliding from place to place, searching for more and more evidence of the C’than. There was a time when Lucy would have been tired from the number of jumps she had made, but Sliding no longer fatigued her as it once would have. Now it was a matter of exploring places she hadn’t been before. Once she had traveled to these places, Sliding back became much easier. As it was, for now she had to Slide more slowly, taking her time as she transported herself.

  “I don’t see anything,” Carth said.

  Carth didn’t have her enhanced eyesight, and without that, there was very little she could do to keep up with what was taking place in the distance. Carth’s knowledge made her powerful, but she was limited in what she could do and see. That wasn’t Carth’s strong suit anyway. Her strength was more to do with her mind and the way she could plan. It wasn’t all about her abilities, though they were considerable.

  “There’s something like a haze out there. It’s fuzzy, difficult for me to make out, but…” Lucy wanted to Slide out there, if only to determine what it was.

  “We need to be cautious here,” Carth said.

  Lucy looked around. They were in a vast expanse of land, little more than jungle around them, and somewhere far to the east, the ocean crashed onto sandy shores. It was warm here, the heat and humidity sweltering, and yet Lucy kept her heavy cloak on.

  “What are you concerned about?”

  “I don’t know much about these lands.”

  “I thought this was a place of the C’than?”

  “This is a place where we don’t have much influence. As much as I’ve tried over the years, we haven’t been able to infiltrate it as well as I would’ve liked.”

  “Why not?”

  “There’s an innate power to this place.”

  “You think it’s an Elder Stone?”

  “I always did, but now I don’t know. There are other places where the Elder Stones exist that don’t have a similar power. In this case, it could simply be natural protections that prevent me from understanding what’s here.”

  Lucy stared, considering the jungle. The haze seemed to rise up from the center of it, and it obscured the trees and everything within it. She couldn’t tell if the haze was artificial, and the longer she stared, the more she questioned. Perhaps it wasn’t enhanced in any way, but even if it was natural, it still made it difficult for her to See anything clearly.

  “What now?” Lucy asked.

  “Now we head in there.”

  “Just like that?”

  Carth glanced over to her. “There’s a reason I haven’t explored this place before. With a jungle like this, it’s dangerous for us to try to break in. If something goes wrong, we would be trapped.”

  “You needed someone who could Slide.”

  “We needed someone like you.”

  “I don’t know if that’s a compliment or not.”

  “With what Olandar Fahr is after, we have to push ourselves as much as he’s pushing. If he’s trying to uncover the key to the Elder Stones, then we need to be prepared for what he might unveil. At this point, he knows more than we do, and that puts us in a precarious situation.”

  There was something to the Elder Stones that Lucy hadn’t yet determined, and the more she studied and learned, the more she questioned. That had to be the point of what Carth was trying to show her. There was so much more to the world than what she had experienced in Elaeavn.

  And wasn’t that what she had wanted? When she had been in Elaeavn, working as a caretaker in the vast library within the Elvraeth palace, hadn’t she wanted to discover more of the world, to understand it, to experience it? That had been her goal, and Haern’s. Together, they had wanted to see more of the world, to experience the things his father had experienced, and now she was doing it.

  The one thing Lucy hadn’t counted on was how difficult it was going to be. She had grown up around those who knew about the Forgers and the dangers they posed, but they had been something distant and almost unreal. After seeing them firsthand—experiencing the torture they inflicted—she could no longer view them the same way.

  And she no longer viewed the journey outside of the city with the same lightheartedness. The world was hard, and it had forced her to become hard. There was torture and torment and pain and suffering, but she had seen goodness. The Binders were a testament to that.

  “Hold on,” Lucy said, taking Carth’s arm, and the two of them started to Slide. She reached the edge of the jungle,
but as she attempted to Slide into it, she hesitated. She needed to be able to See clearly during a Slide, and the haze made that difficult.

  “I can’t Slide us safely through here,” she said. “I can Slide us out once we’re inside, but I need to be able to see where we’re going.”

  Carth looked around, seeming frustrated. Carth rarely let her emotions show, and yet this time, it was less that she showed her emotions and more that it seemed Lucy could detect them.

  Perhaps it was only her imagination. She shouldn’t be able to Read anything. She had tried to Read Carth many times since meeting the woman, and she had never succeeded. In all that time, Carth had managed to conceal her mind from Lucy, keeping her thoughts suppressed, and she was far too skilled for Lucy to uncover anything.

  “I don’t know that we have the time to waste wandering through the forest.”

  Lucy smiled to herself. “Would it be squandering if we did that?”

  “We’re attempting multiple moves at the same time,” Carth said, keeping her gaze locked on the forest. “In each of them, we need to get a handle on what the Ai’thol are doing, the role of the C’than in all of it, and whether there are other pieces moving around.”

  The forest pressed on Lucy, and she tried to determine whether the effect was artificial or simply a naturally occurring haze rising up from the forest. If the latter was the case, then she would have no reason to fear wandering through the trees, yet part of her didn’t want to do so. Ever since gaining the ability to Slide, she’d grown accustomed to the freedom and safety that granted, to the ease with which she could travel from place to place, never having to worry about anything happening that might cause harm to her. In a place like this, that safety wasn’t there.

  “What would you have us do?”

  “There are other strongholds we need to visit.”

  “How many?”

  “Dozens upon dozens. It took me a long time to come to grips with how many places the C’than have gained power over.”

  “I didn’t think the C’than acted out of a desire to gain power.”

  “They don’t, and perhaps I misspoke. The C’than operate out of a desire to establish peace.”

  “How long have you been a part of the C’than?”

  “Ever since I defeated the first attempt of the Ai’thol to gain power.”

  “How?”

  “I outmaneuvered them. At the time, I didn’t know about Olandar Fahr and how powerful he was, but I have come to appreciate his ability. The C’than, along with the Binders, have managed to restrict his movement, but he continues to gain strength and influence. Eventually, I suspect he will overpower any protection that we can place. When that happens, he will have access to as much power as he wants.”

  “And that’s not a good thing.”

  “You don’t know him like I do. Even those he lets close to him see only what he wants them to see. Everything is an act for him, a maneuver. I don’t think we have even experienced the man in full.” Carth held her arm out. “How do you feel about traveling south?”

  “Will it be as hot as this?”

  “Probably.”

  Lucy stripped her cloak off her shoulders. She had a jacket and pants, and a short dagger strapped to her waist in a sheath that the Binders had given her, but no other weapons. Her abilities were her weapons. That might be dangerous. If she ever lost those abilities, she would be defenseless against an attack.

  She had her ability to Slide, and though the Forgers had shown they had some way of influencing her mind, they had rarely inhibited her ability to Slide.

  Taking Carth’s arm, she Slid them, emerging near the shore, and then made a dozen quick short Slides, each time bringing them further along the shoreline. This entire stretch of shoreline was sandy beaches. The water was crystal-blue, clear and beautiful, and some other time, Lucy would be tempted to wade out into the water, splash in the ocean, and enjoy the warmth of the waves as they swirled around her ankles.

  This place was similar to where she had been brought by the Architect, and it served as a reminder of what she had gone through—far more than she had ever imagined she could withstand. Even now, Lucy wasn’t sure she could endure through a similar experience and come out of it again. Part of it had been luck, and part of it had been the fact that they had underestimated her abilities, even though they were partly responsible for them. Not completely, though. Those abilities had been granted by the C’than—or an arm of the C’than who should have known better.

  “You ever worry that I’m still controlled by them?” Lucy asked as they stopped. Scrub brush rose to her knees all around, and small crabs scurried along the shoreline. There was no other movement. She looked out to the water, half expecting there to be ships navigating out there, but there were none. This seemed like an ideal place to fish, but she had seen no sign of a city here. As beautiful as it was, that surprised her.

  “The fact that you worry tells me there is a possibility,” Carth said.

  “I never would’ve thought there was, but they forced me to act on their behalf,” Lucy said.

  “That is, unfortunately, one of their talents.” Carth pulled her boots off, wading out into the water. Lucy followed, stripping her boots off, hiking up her pants, and standing in the warm water. “For as long as I have known about the Ai’thol, they have possessed the ability to control others. There are some from Elaeavn who refer to it as Pushing, and I suppose that is as apt a description as any.”

  “Why Pushing?”

  “Because they are Pushing their intentions upon another. In doing so, they control the other person, forcing them to serve, though I have yet to determine whether there has to be a willingness in the first place.”

  “I wasn’t willing to serve them.”

  Carth looked over to her. As they often did, shadows swirled around her. It was subtle in the sunlight, but even as brightly as the sun shone down on them, there still came the steady swirling of darkness. “Were you completely unwilling?”

  “What are you suggesting?”

  “I’m only suggesting that they wouldn’t have been able to use you so effectively if you hadn’t wanted something from what they taught.”

  Lucy turned away. It was hard for her to deny that she had wanted something from the Forgers. When they had placed the implant, it was the promise of control that had drawn her. Nothing more than that, but then, she also hadn’t minded the power she’d been granted. How could she, when it was so much more than what she had ever known?

  “Did you chase power when you were younger?” Carth asked.

  “I never wanted power,” she said.

  “It’s easy for those who have it to say so, but still, few would refuse additional power were it offered to them.”

  “I didn’t refuse it,” Lucy said.

  “And yet you wanted it removed.”

  “I think I knew I needed to have it removed, but…” She didn’t know how to finish. It was hard for her to acknowledge that, even though she had left Elaeavn with Daniel Elvraeth, she hadn’t entirely wanted to have the implant removed. It had been overwhelming, but a part of her had been thrilled at the idea that she could Slide as powerfully as she now did. That she could Read everything and everyone around her still amazed her. The other enhancements to her abilities that continued to evolve were equally impressive. “It gave me an opportunity to be more than what I was.”

  “That’s what you wanted?”

  Lucy shrugged. “I wanted to experience more of the world. It’s difficult for those who don’t live in Elaeavn to understand how isolated we are. The Elvraeth council has imposed a certain isolation on our people, keeping the rest of the world out, and in doing so, we shut ourselves off from others. I wanted to know what other places were like. To travel beyond the borders of the Aisl forest. To know what some of the other great cities were like.”

  “When I was young, my family traveled extensively. I longed for stability. A home that we wouldn’t uproot and m
ove. And then I lost everything, and I found that my home was where I made it. But then, I also realized that, had I not had the experiences I did, my understanding of the world would’ve been different. I needed to have those experiences and become the person I became so that I could help others.”

  “I didn’t know that I wanted to help others.”

  “Do you now?”

  “I saw how people suffered when I was captured.”

  “They used you. They used others like you, forcing them to attack.”

  “To discredit Rsiran.”

  “That’s part of it,” Carth said. “They acted long enough to force the C’than. It was another game to them, a maneuver that very nearly worked. I think that were it not for you, and for the fact that the C’than essentially created you, the Ai’thol might have succeeded. In this case, they were a little too clever for their own good.”

  “Unless this was all part of some other plan.”

  Carth’s eyes narrowed. “I have given that considerable thought. It’s possible that this is all part of a ploy on their behalf. If it is, I struggle to see the next move. Even with the Wisdom Stone, I haven’t been able to determine what they’re after.”

  Something about how she said this told Lucy just how much that bothered Carth. This was a woman who was accustomed to knowing what was taking place around her. She was used to success, and yet, when it came to the Ai’thol—and this Olandar Fahr in particular—she continued to struggle.

  “We talked about Olandar Fahr before, but what do you think he’s really after?”

  “I think he’s after all the Elder Stones, and yet, even if he acquires them, I still wonder what he thinks to do.”

  “You don’t think that’s his endgame?”

  Carth smiled at the phrasing. “I wish that were all it was, but I don’t think the Elder Stones are his ultimate goal. There’s something more, and yet, until we play these moves, I’m not sure I will be able to uncover what he’s after.”