The Dark Ability: Books 1-4

by D. K. Holmberg

  Rsiran shivered at the idea, remembering what Haern had said about his ability to See with his implant.

  Thom shook his head. “See? As I said, you know so little. That you returned at all tells me that you are not ready. And probably will never be ready.”

  “Ready for what?”

  Thom tipped his head to the side, as if listening. His mouth pinched into a thin line and he shook his head. “Better not linger, Rsiran, not if you want to help them.”

  Rsiran focused on the lorcith, pulling on the connection to Jessa’s charm. It was still within the city, still where it should be based on where they had been the last time. The knives Brusus carried were there as well, neither moved.

  Thom watched him, his eyes unreadable.

  Thom would not tell him what he needed to know, and he didn’t want to risk leaving Jessa and Brusus alone for any longer than needed.

  Flipping one of the knives to the flat end, he sent it spinning toward Thom. It struck him between his eyes and he fell, letting out a soft gasp as he did.

  Rsiran hesitated before returning.

  He now could sense the heartstone within Thom, just beneath the surface of his skin, covering the bone of his cheek. Had he wanted, he thought he could remove it, but he’d need the help of a Healer to make certain that it worked.

  But why hadn’t he sensed it before?

  Questions he didn’t have time to ask.

  And if he had more time, he would have bound Thom so he couldn’t move. He would have to hope that he remained out long enough for Rsiran to get to Brusus and Jessa and return to him.

  Without waiting any longer, he closed his eyes, focused on the inn where they’d discovered Thom, and Slid.

  Chapter 20

  Rsiran emerged to chaos.

  Brusus stood in the hall outside the room, both knives spinning as he darted forward, attacking as best he could. Jessa crouched inside the room, her long knife held out like a sword, but Brusus blocked her from getting too far into the hall. For that, Rsiran was grateful.

  Jessa let out a relieved sigh when he returned. “Rsiran. What happened to Thom?”

  “I left him.”

  “Where?”

  Brusus grunted as she asked and stepped into the doorway. “Glad you’re back, Rsiran. I could use a little help.”

  Rsiran pulled on the knives in his pockets and drew them out. “On the rocks outside of the city,” he said. “I hope he’s there when we return.”

  Jessa’s brow creased in a worried frown, but she nodded.

  Rsiran Slid forward, moving past Brusus.

  Five men were in the narrow hall. Three held unsheathed swords. Two had crossbows.

  He went after the men with crossbows first, sending two knives streaking toward them. The nearest man fell as one of Rsiran’s knives pierced his chest. The other man managed to avoid the knife, stepping out of the way so it hit the wall. Rsiran pulled, Sliding as he did, and sent the knife crashing into the back of the man’s head. He fell in a heap.

  That left the three men with swords.

  Brusus parried with one, moving quickly with his knives, dancing with nearly the deadly grace of Haern. But his shirt was already stained with blood from more than one injury, and Rsiran realized he was moving more slowly with each passing moment.

  How badly was he hurt?

  He shook away the question.

  Rsiran could see the other two swordsmen moving into position on the other side, attempting to pin Brusus against the wall. Sliding, he emerged behind them. The nearest man spun, flashing his sword toward him. Rsiran sent two knives spinning toward it to block. The man slapped the nearest out of the air and raised his sword to attack.

  Rsiran sent another knife out, but the man easily dodged it as well. He had a few remaining, but they weren’t working, not here in the hall.

  That left the heartstone sword.

  Rsiran had never held it with a real intent to use it. All that he’d done was spar with Haern. This man moved with a deadly sort of speed, comfortable with his sword.

  He unsheathed his sword, and the blade glowed with a dark blue light.

  The man stepped back for a moment, then darted forward to attack.

  Rsiran didn’t have time to think, only to react. He caught the slender steel blade with the edge of the heartstone blade and deflected it. Drawing on his connection to the heartstone, he pushed the sword, sending his attacker’s sword toward the wooden floor.

  The man pulled it back, slipping beneath the attack, and swung his sword back up.

  Rsiran somehow caught the blade again.

  The man twisted, and Rsiran dropped his sword.

  With a dark laugh, the man spun toward Rsiran who stood unarmed.

  With his sword lying on the ground and a pocketful of useless knives, he realized Hearn was right, and he would fail because he hadn’t practiced enough. It would not be because he wasn’t hard enough, or that he hadn’t been willing to do what was needed to protect himself. He’d proven that he would. But it would be because he wasn’t skilled enough.

  With one final effort, he pulled on the sword using his slippery connection to the alloy, and felt it slowly move toward him, easing off the ground. Rsiran jerked on the connection, and it struck the man’s leg.

  Dropping to one knee, the man stabbed forward with his sword.

  Rsiran Slid back a step, barely missing the attack.

  He sent out one of his knives, and it embedded in his attacker’s shoulder. Rsiran pulled on the knife, jerking it free, then flipped it around and slammed the hilt against the man’s forehead.

  Finally, the man crumpled to the ground and didn’t move.

  Rsiran picked up the heartstone sword and wiped the blood off the blade. The dark blue glow persisted. Rsiran had never seen it glow like that before, and wondered why it suddenly would.

  Brusus finished off the two men he faced, stopping two in the time it took Rsiran to handle the one. His gaze swept over the fallen men in the hall and he nodded. “Haern was smart to work with you.”

  “I should have listened better,” Rsiran said.

  Brusus snorted. “Probably. Haern is often right.” He leaned around the open door and then swung it wide.

  Jessa crouched, holding her knife out from her. When she saw Rsiran standing there, she jumped to her feet and ran to him, throwing her arms around him. “Stupid. You should have let Brusus handle this,” she said.

  “Brusus isn’t sure that he could have handled this on his own,” Brusus said. “And he’s plenty glad that Rsiran decided to help. Now,” he went on, leaning to grab the knives that Rsiran had used during his attack and cleaning blood from the blades, “we really need to get moving.”

  “Thom knew that they were coming,” Rsiran said.

  “He told you that?”

  “Not in so many words, but I think he was trying to buy time. I don’t think he expected me to drag him to the rocks above Thyr.”

  “Did you bind him?”

  “Didn’t have anything to use. I hit him with a knife, though.”

  “Is he dead?”

  “Not dead. Out. He won’t be a problem for us now.”

  Brusus tossed the knives that he’d collected to Rsiran. “As long as he lives, he’ll always be a problem for us. He’s nearly as bad as Josun that way.” Brusus turned to Rsiran. “I think it’s time we get back to Elaeavn. We can stop and grab Thom, and see what he might know.”

  Rsiran shook his head. He wouldn’t be able to carry all of them back to Elaeavn, not without risking them in the Slide. “Can’t do that.”

  “We can’t stay here,” Brusus said. “Too many men, especially for a place like… Damn,” he finished in a whisper.

  “What?” Jessa asked.

  “Why would Thom need so many men here?” Brusus asked. “Look at this. It’s nothing more than an inn. He has some of his belongings here, and a place to stay, but he wasn’t even here when we appeared.”

  “He knew we were
coming,” Rsiran said. “He sensed us.”

  “Did he? Seems to me, if he was able to Read that you were here, he would have been able to Compel you as well.” Brusus shook his head. “No, I think there was another reason all these men were here.”

  Brusus stepped around them and made his way down the hall. Rsiran looked at Jessa, who only shrugged.

  They followed Brusus, waiting as he stopped at the end of the hall. The hall ended at a staircase that led both down and up.

  “Which way?” Brusus asked.

  Rsiran shook his head. “Does it matter? Thom isn’t here to tell us what he might have been hiding here.”

  “Which is why we need to search,” Brusus said. “That’s why we’re here, isn’t it? You wanted to see if there might be some way you could reach your father and find out what happened to your sister. Well, now we have Thom out of the way, so you have the chance to find out what he might have been hiding here.”

  “I came for my father, not for what Thom might be hiding.”

  “We’ll take what we can find, Rsiran. Then we grab Thom and find your father.”

  Rsiran closed his eyes and focused, listening for lorcith. If Thom hadn’t used his ability to detect him, then there would have to be some other way that he masked his presence. Only, Rsiran hadn’t noticed him even when he had returned.

  But then, he’d been focused on lorcith, hadn’t he?

  With his attention on lorcith, he lost the connection to heartstone. It was possible that Thom had been there the entire time. Somehow, he needed to sense both lorcith and heartstone at the same time. Trying to split his focus like that put him in danger, and he risked missing things—sometimes important things.

  But he didn’t detect anything.

  “I don’t know,” Rsiran answered.

  “Down,” Jessa suggested. When they turned to her, she shrugged. “Which way would you go if you wanted to hide something. Besides, look at the floor down there, Brusus. It’s hard-packed dirt, not wood. Down is below ground.”

  “Damn,” Brusus said. “Didn’t even pay any attention to that.”

  “Yeah, well you’re Sight isn’t as good as mine.”

  Brusus laughed. “Keep telling yourself that.”

  “Just as you keep telling yourself that you can sneak as well as I can.”

  Brusus shot her a glare and then started down the stairs. He moved more silently than Rsiran could manage and reached the bottom of the stairs where he paused. “Careful here,” he warned.

  “What do you see?” Jessa asked.

  “Nothing. That’s what worries me.”

  Rsiran reached the bottom of the stairs and paused, too, listening again. For a moment, he thought he sensed a flash of lorcith, but then it was gone. Nothing more than a flicker, it might have been imagined rather than real.

  Jessa grabbed his elbow. “I’ll keep you safe here. You might have gotten some Sight, but you’re still a babe in the dark.”

  He bit back the laugh, and followed as she led him through the hall. Brusus stopped every few feet and tipped his head. With his Elvraeth blood, he might have been Listening.

  When they stopped, Rsiran took the opportunity to focus for lorcith. He didn’t get another sense of it, not as he had when he reached the bottom of the stairs. The darkness reminded him of the Ilphaesn mines, only in the mines, he had the sense of lorcith all around him. Here, there was nothing but blackness. At least he could tell where Brusus and Jessa were from the connection to the lorcith they carried. Had it not been for that connection, Rsiran might have Slid away.

  “The hall narrows,” Brusus whispered.

  “Narrows?” Rsiran asked. “It’s pretty narrow already.”

  “Yeah, and then it stops.” Brusus pulled up and slapped his hand against something solid. “Damn. This goes nowhere.”

  “Then why is it here?” Jessa asked. “Doesn’t make any sense for the hall to be here, to lead us into the dark.”

  “Unless it’s some sort of trap,” Rsiran said. Thom studied in Venass. Could they have placed something here thinking to draw Rsiran to it? “You said it, Brusus. There were too many men here if it’s just an inn where Thom resides when in Thyr. What if they thought to draw us to him and then trap us here?”

  “Can you Slide?” Brusus asked.

  Rsiran attempted a short Slide, moving back two steps. Nothing restricted him, and he emerged where he intended.

  “Yes.”

  “Then not a trap,” Brusus said. “If it were a trap, they would find some way to prevent you from Sliding. They’re not worried about the rest of us.”

  “Then why would they have so many men?” Rsiran asked.

  Brusus slapped his hand on something again. Rsiran suspected it was the wall, but couldn’t see anything clearly enough to know.

  “They’re protecting something here,” Brusus said. Jessa squeezed Rsiran’s arm, though he didn’t think that they would have been holding his father here. The scholars had him, so there would be no reason for him to be out in the city. “Have to be,” Brusus went on. “Only, how are we going to find what it is?”

  Chapter 21

  Rsiran stood before the wall, running his hands across its surface, feeling for anything that might indicate a door. The hall led somewhere, so there had to be a door, only he found nothing.

  Jessa stood near him, staring at the wall. He sensed her from the charm and the knives she carried. She breathed softly, and every so often would walk up to the wall and tap on it again, before stepping away.

  “There’s nothing here,” she said softly. “We should go. We can go up the other stairs and see if we find anything. But staying here only puts us at risk.”

  “Why risk?” Rsiran asked.

  “There were too many men up there,” she said. “And we made too much noise in the attack. How long before someone else comes?”

  “Then we handle it,” Brusus said.

  Jessa sniffed. “You might be able and willing to handle it, but what if we don’t want to fight again? Haern may have trained Rsiran, but he didn’t help me, and if there are too many—”

  “I’m not going to put you in danger,” Brusus said. “We’re going to find out if this leads anywhere, and then we’ll go.”

  “The longer we remain, the more likely Thom will wake up and escape before we get back there,” Jessa said.

  “Rsiran said he was out.”

  “He is,” Rsiran said. “But not bound.”

  Brusus grunted. “Can’t go anywhere up there, anyway. He’d have to walk, which gives us the advantage. Let’s find out what’s here, and then we can go.”

  Could they have hidden Alyse here? That might be the reason for so many men, especially if they worried about Rsiran coming for her. But where would she be?

  He turned to the wall and ran his hand along it once more, not really expecting to find anything. As far as he could tell, it was a solid wall. “Maybe this was something they were digging out,” he suggested.

  “Still doesn’t explain why there were so many men,” Brusus said. “Think about what you know of Venass. They would hide something like this. We need to figure out what they would have used.”

  Not lorcith. He had sensed nothing of lorcith to tell him that it might be here, but what of heartstone? Thom had proven that Venass were skilled with heartstone and that they would use it in ways that Rsiran might not have thought of.

  He pushed away the sense of lorcith, that of the charm hanging from Jessa’s necklace, the bracelets she now wore, and the knives all around him. Then he pushed away the sense of the alloy, that of the sword and the chain holding Jessa’s charm. He was left with nothing, an emptiness.

  He listened for heartstone.

  Pure heartstone was different from both the alloy and lorcith. It called to him in a subtler way. There was a quiet intensity about it, a draw, and a demand for his attention.

  It was here.

  There was not much, barely more than a fingernail’s worth, bu
t Rsiran was certain that was what he detected.

  And it was on the other side of the wall.

  He considered where Jessa stood. If he told her what he needed to do, she would grab on and Slide with him. This he would do alone.

  It would be risky. Sliding to unknown locations often was, but he’d done it once today when he’d appeared in Thom’s room. Now he would risk himself a second time, but only himself. He would not put Jessa or Brusus in danger for this.

  And he couldn’t step into the Slide, not without knowing what was on the other side. Pulling himself would be much safer for him, and might even allow him the chance to escape if something went wrong with the Slide.

  “I’ll be right back,” he whispered.

  Then he anchored to the heartstone on the other side of the wall and pulled himself to it.

  Rsiran rarely used heartstone to anchor. Lorcith was stout and gave him strength and a reassuring sense when he Slid. This Slide was difficult, but no more so than pulling himself through alloy.

  When he emerged, he sensed the small lump of heartstone, but couldn’t see it. Everything around him was dark. For a moment, he panicked, fearing that he might have trapped himself somewhere, but he could move freely.

  He needed light, something to give him a way to see.

  The heartstone sword. It had glowed before, would it still be glowing?

  He unsheathed it. The blade glowed with the same dark blue light that it had before. The light pushed back some of the darkness, enough for Rsiran to see around him. He was in a small room, barely more than a dozen paces across, and all stone. Other than the sense of heartstone, he detected no lorcith. Nothing else moved in the room.

  Rsiran turned, preparing to leave, when the light from the sword reflected off something in an alcove along the wall. He leaned toward it and touched the reflection.

  Metal, and cool to the touch.

  He frowned, pulling the metal to him, and nearly dropped it. It was a square sheet of metal—probably steel mixed with streaks of silver leaving it with an undulating pattern.