The Dark Ability: Books 1-4

by D. K. Holmberg

  And if they had been wrong, if the Elvraeth learned that he was the one who had been there, the others were in danger.

  Worse, it was clear Jessa was right. Something other than the crates was bothering Brusus. He was hiding something from them. After what they’d all been through, Brusus owed it to him to share, but if he didn’t want to say anything here, Rsiran wouldn’t push—not yet—but he needed to know.

  “What can we do?” Rsiran asked.

  Jessa looked over at him, but he ignored her. Thankfully, she didn’t let go of his hand.

  Brusus sighed, blinking slowly. He ran a hand through his hair and scratched at the back of his head. “Would you take Jessa and go look in the warehouse? Let me know if you see anything?”

  Firell looked at Brusus and laughed. “You sure it’s smart to send those two? I mean, they had to take a stop off on the way down here! Great Watcher knows I remember what it was like to be that age, first in love…”

  Jessa stiffened. “How many flippers did she have?”

  Firell frowned and pinched his chin. “I can’t remember, but I’m certain that it was no more than two.”

  Haern laughed softly before turning to Brusus. “You don’t think you should go yourself?”

  Brusus shook his head. “Jessa can see better than I can,” he started. “And there is something else I need to do.”

  Not for the first time, Rsiran wondered how much any of the others knew of Brusus’s secret heritage. Jessa knew. Della too. But did Haern? Did Firell? The secret was not his to share, any more than his own secret should be shared by them, but Rsiran was learning to trust the others, learning to accept that they would keep him safe. If he still kept secrets from them, dangers that Haern had Seen, he wondered when Brusus would feel the same?

  “What are you going to do?” Jessa asked Brusus.

  “There is something else that I need to check on. Haern will come with me.”

  Haern hesitated a moment and then nodded. The long scar on his cheek twitched.

  “And me?” Firell asked.

  “Find Shael. That damn man knows practically everyone along the docks. If anyone knows what might be going on, it would be him.”

  “Shael’s not in Elaeavn,” Haern said. His eyes took on that faraway expression again.

  Brusus frowned. “I saw him two days ago. No transports since then. He’s here.”

  Haern’s frown deepened.

  “I’ll see if I can find him. He owes me, anyway.” Firell said. He looked at Jessa for a moment, a wide smile crossing his face, and then started away from the dock at a quick pace.

  Brusus looked after him for a moment and then pulled Rsiran aside. “Need you to Slide to the warehouse. Look for anything that might be missing or out of place. See which crate might be gone. I’ve been through quite a few, but there are too many there to sort through all of them. But if one of those crates was here,” he started, flicking his eyes to Haern, “then we need to know which one. And why. Jessa will help.”

  “I don’t know that I will even recognize if anything is missing, Brusus. You’ve been handling the transactions there. I’ve been focusing my energy on the forgings, trying to get enough for you.”

  Brusus rested his hand on Rsiran’s shoulder and squeezed. “And know that I appreciate what you’ve been doing. You’ll get your cut soon. Jessa has been there enough that she should be able to tell if something is out of place.”

  “That’s not what I’m getting at.” Rsiran didn’t want Brusus to think that he wanted only the money.

  “I know, but I don’t want you to think that I’m taking advantage of you.”

  Jessa stepped up next to him and grabbed is hand. A playful smile split her lips. “No. That’s my job.”

  Brusus just shook his head. The urgency never left his eyes, not like it once had. Rsiran didn’t know what it meant, but it was significant somehow.

  “Don’t worry, Brusus. We’ll help you figure out what’s going on.”

  Brusus’s eyes flashed deep green for a brief moment. “Probably nothing,” he said, “but with what we’ve been doing, can’t be too careful.”

  He turned away from them and made his way toward the shore. Haern followed after, watching Brusus’s back rather than walking alongside him.

  Rsiran waited, worried about when the Elvraeth would learn of him, learn how he Slid into the palace, killed one of their own, and now used lorcith in ways they had forbidden. Or whoever remained of Josun’s rebellion discovered he had killed their leader. Unless they already knew. And then it was too late to do anything but run.

  Jessa studied his face, almost as if Reading him. He forced a smile as he squeezed her hand, but didn’t say any of that to her.

  Chapter 4

  The Slide took them to the outside of the warehouse. Rsiran had been here only a few times before and never alone. The first time he had come, Brusus had nearly died. It had taken Rsiran exposing his abilities to save them. And, because of that, he had learned Brusus’s secret, one that was more shocking than what Rsiran hid. The second time he’d come, he had met the Elvraeth Josun. He had not known it at the time, but he had just met the only other person he knew about who shared the ability to Slide.

  Since then, he had come here only a handful of other times. Each time, he’d come with either Brusus or Jessa, and often both. Because of his earliest experience, a gnawing unease chewed at his stomach as he emerged from the Slide, a sense of immediate fear that something would go wrong, or worse—that one of the Elvraeth would find him. The last few times had been uneventful, but that didn’t mean his luck would hold.

  The energy required for the Slide taxed him enough that he wavered for a moment. From his experience, he would regain the necessary strength to Slide with a little more rest, but he wouldn’t be fully restored without a good night’s sleep. Nothing like the nuanced ease he’d seen Josun manage.

  They stood just on the other side of the door to the warehouse. His Slide could have taken them anywhere inside the building, but he didn’t dare push his luck too far in case there was someone else inside the warehouse. Besides, he didn’t know what would happen if he went too far and plunged into one of the crates.

  Jessa started forward. From here, she would lead.

  “Let me know if you see anything,” he whispered.

  “Don’t worry. I’m not letting go of you.”

  Only a little light streamed into the warehouse from windows cut into the massive roof overhead, but nothing more than the light from the crescent moon filtered through. Rsiran would have an easier time searching the warehouse when it was lighter, but he had not argued when Brusus asked him to come, willing to do whatever was necessary to help his friend.

  Shadowed walls rose up around them. Dozens of crates stacked atop each other, some reaching as high as the ceiling. A narrow walkway separated the stacks of crates. The farther they went, the older the crates became, until some were at least as old as the city of Elaeavn itself. Near the center was where Brusus had first shown Rsiran the warehouse, had demonstrated the oddities and fantastic items that could be found hidden within some of the crates.

  “What do you see?” he asked.

  “Nothing here. Just footprints in the dirt. Most are old. The newest look like ours. Crates look undisturbed.”

  Rsiran felt himself relax. Without Jessa, he would not have risked coming at night. Too many with Sight could surprise him. Though he could Slide to safety, a single blade or arrow could injure him enough to prevent him from moving anywhere. But with Jessa guiding him, he felt a sense of ease, knowing that she would keep him safe, just as he would do anything to keep her safe.

  They went on. Fumbling through the dark with Jessa leading him by his hand, he felt every bit the babe she often teased him of being. Worse, he could not help but remember the other time he knew such darkness, when he wandered the mines of Ilphaesn. At least there, he had the sense of the lorcith in the walls to guide him, almost drawing him forward. Her
e, he felt only distant sensations of the ore.

  Rsiran paused. Had he always felt lorcith here? He couldn’t remember. The first time he had come to the warehouse, he had not been as acutely aware of lorcith. The second time, he had been more focused on Josun Elvraeth and the fact that he had stolen the sword Rsiran had forged. Any other times he had come had been light, so he’d not had the same sense of the darkness as he did now. Maybe that mattered.

  “What is it?” Jessa whispered.

  He shook his head. “Probably nothing.”

  “But it might be something?”

  “It’s just… I sense lorcith. I don’t know if I’ve always sensed it when we’ve come. I never really paid much attention to it before.”

  She squeezed his hand and continued forward more slowly. “Let me know if it changes.”

  “Changes?”

  “Moves.”

  Rsiran tried to focus on the sense of the lorcith, but it felt muted. As if distant. Usually, he had a more distinct awareness of it, even from distances. Were he to focus, he could feel the sword hidden in his smithy or the knives he had recently forged. He had the constant awareness of other lorcith, like that found in the Floating Palace, but this felt different.

  His awareness of lorcith gave him another ability, but one that only seemed to work on items he had forged, granting him the power to push or pull the lorcith. The pair of knives hidden in his pockets felt like a gentle presence in his mind. Were he to have the need, he could send the knives spinning away from him. This ability had saved his life once already.

  “Up ahead,” Jessa whispered.

  “What?”

  “Clearing. Crates look like the last time Brusus was here a few days ago. Side split open. Most of the contents gone.”

  He hadn’t known that Jessa had been to the warehouse a few days ago with Brusus. Not that he knew where she went all the time, but it seemed strange to him that she hadn’t mentioned it. More reason to question Brusus about what he planned.

  “Can you tell if anything is missing?” Trying to determine if one crate was missing out of the hundreds stored here would be nearly impossible. How would they know if just one had moved? And, without carting a wagon down to the warehouse, how would someone take one of the crates out of here in the first place?

  “Not yet. Come on,” she urged, moving forward.

  When she let go of his hand, he felt a moment of panic. The lost connection meant he couldn’t Slide her away from the warehouse, not without knowing where she was. He heard a rustling of cloth and tensed. A soft blue light suddenly filled the warehouse around them.

  “Where did you find that?” He recognized the lantern as one of the Elvraeth lanterns. He had seen one when Josun had been here and again when they had Slid to the Floating Palace. The steady blue light was like nothing found anywhere else. The only thing he could compare it to was the orange lantern from the Ilphaesn mines.

  “Brusus found it. One of the crates.”

  “How do you work it?” he asked.

  She shook her head, leaning over the lantern. “No working. It’s either on or it’s not. The cloth keeps the light covered.”

  Rsiran took the lamp. Made of a strange metal, it took him a few moments to realize that part of it was made of lorcith, though not entirely. An alloy, and one he had only experienced one time before—when he had Slid into the palace. Until that time, he had not known that lorcith could be forged as an alloy. He still didn’t know how it had been done.

  Rsiran ran his hand over the lantern, admiring the craftsmanship. The metal was shaped in such a way that it seemed to draw the light out but left the lantern itself cool. There was something to the forging that he could almost understand. Could he recreate it if given enough time? If he concentrated, he thought that he might be able to feel how the lantern had been made.

  “You should bring it with you,” Jessa said with a laugh. “Neither Brusus nor I need it.”

  He looked up and smiled. “How did you know?”

  She shrugged. “You get this intense concentration across your face and your eyes sort of squint.”

  If he could make another lantern like this… he wouldn’t have to worry about the dark. Eventually, he would need to return to Ilphaesn to mine more lorcith; he’d used almost all of the supply he’d taken from the boy. Better to have some lighting than to risk injury in the dark, or worse, to worry about a mining pick or hammer suddenly slamming into his back, leaving him too injured to Slide back to Elaeavn.

  “They had a lantern like this in the mines,” he whispered.

  “Like this?”

  “Well… not quite like this. More of an orange light. The only time I have seen this blue light was when we were in the palace.”

  “I remember.” Jessa said it with a hint of bitterness.

  Rsiran swung the lantern so that he could see the rest of the warehouse. It appeared little different from the last time he had been here, though bright sunlight had streamed through the dirty skylight overhead that time. A wide clearing of the crates created a sort of circle where they stood. They were stacked at least three high, reaching high over his head. A few stacks reached the ceiling, and not for the first time, Rsiran wondered how they had been lifted into place. The crates in this part of the warehouse were older than the others. Most no longer had anything written on them, and on those that did, the writing was in a language he didn’t understand.

  “Can you tell if anything is disturbed?” he asked.

  Jessa took a few steps around the clearing, peering at each crate for a moment. She returned to where he stood and shook her head. “Nothing that I can tell. Most of these have all been opened by either Brusus or myself. Can’t tell if anyone else has been here, but nothing I see would make that likely.”

  “Maybe we should look outside. For a crate that size to be moved, you’d need some way of hauling it to the dock.”

  Jessa shook her head. “Not at night. I can see well at night, but don’t want to get caught by one of the sellswords. Sight has limits.”

  “Everything has limits,” Rsiran said.

  Jessa laughed. “Some more than others.”

  Rsiran looked at the stacks of crates around the center of the warehouse. The time he’d come with Brusus, he’d seen a strange crate, one that they’d opened by peeling away the sides to get at the contents inside. Now he didn’t see it anywhere. “Where is the crate Brusus opened?”

  Jessa shook her head. “He took that away a few weeks ago. Wanted to be able to work through those cylinders on his own. And he liked the wood from the crate.”

  The metal used to create the cylinders was valuable. Some were made of gold or silver, enough that Brusus could likely sell them for a significant profit. But he hadn’t. Considering how focused Brusus had been on money, there had to be a reason.

  “How did Brusus move the crate?”

  “Just a piece at a time. Not the whole thing. You’re right—that would be too hard to move without getting caught. I think one encounter with a sellsword was enough for Brusus.”

  Had Rsiran been willing to expose his ability sooner, Brusus might not have come so close to death. But then again, had Brusus shared his secret, he might not have come so close, either.

  “Are there any others that he has been particularly interested in?” Rsiran asked. Jessa had slipped over to stand next to him, close enough that Rsiran could smell the sharp perfume from the flower she wore. “You saw how he reacted when Lianna told him about the crate she saw on the dock, but we don’t even know for sure if the crate was from here.”

  “Haern seemed to think it was.”

  Rsiran nodded. “And Brusus seemed convinced. Something has him worried, more than he’s letting on.”

  “I don’t think it’s the warehouse,” Jessa started. She bit her lower lip, hesitating.

  Rsiran touched her hand and pulled her close, brushing her hair back behind her ear. For a moment, standing in the warehouse with her like this, he could
pretend that they didn’t have a care in the world. And most times, they didn’t.

  “You don’t know him like I do, Rsiran. Brusus has been different since the attack. I think he feels that he should have been the one to deal with Josun. Or maybe he worries that he put us too close to danger.” She took a deep breath. “I don’t know, but I think it’s more than just what’s in this place.”

  “But it’s a part of it,” Rsiran said.

  Jessa nodded. “It’s who he is.”

  She didn’t have to explain more. Neither of them spoke about Brusus’s bloodlines. Neither needed to. It was not their secret to share, but both knew that he was descended from the first Elvraeth, the founders of the city. His mother had been banished from the city—Forgotten—taking the infant Brusus from the palace. Rsiran didn’t know much more about Brusus’s past than that, but that secret would be enough to drive anyone to obsession. He could not imagine what it must be like for Brusus to live knowing what might have been, how he could have been different, if only the Elvraeth had not banished his mother. Since Brusus did not speak openly about that time, Rsiran did not even know what she’d done to warrant banishment.

  “What do you think he intends for all of this?” Rsiran asked.

  “I don’t know.” He could tell not knowing troubled her.

  Carrying the lantern out in front of him, Rsiran made his way to one of the crates. From what he could tell, most looked like they had been opened once and then closed, but he saw one that looked to have taken more of a beating. A line of nails held one of the side panels in place, the edges dimpled where they had been pounded back into place. The pale wood of the crate had splintered in a few places. No writing marked the outside.

  Using one of his lorcith knives, Rsiran pried the panel back. He was not certain what he expected to see on the inside, but someone had taken the time to open this crate more than once. Likely Brusus. Rsiran felt a little uncomfortable opening this crate without him here, especially if he had something in mind for the crates. As one descended from the Elvraeth, Brusus had more right to what was stored within these crates than Rsiran.