The Lost Prophecy Boxset

by D. K. Holmberg

  Alriyn had to believe that Endric knew what he was doing and that he had control over that energy, but how?

  Likely the same way that Novan seemed to have control over the energy that swirled around him.

  Both men possessed more power than what they should. Both men hid something from him. Alriyn would determine what it was.

  When Endric finished, the pedestal started sliding out of the ground, rising into the air.

  Alriyn gasped. “How did you—”

  The pedestal had never done that before. As far as Alriyn knew, the pedestal had been secure, practically built into the floor of the chamber since the palace was constructed.

  But Endric had known.

  The pedestal continued to climb, rising out of the ground, but more than that, a section of the floor started rising as well. As Alriyn watched, the pedestal rose nearly to the peak of the ceiling. A dark opening appeared below it, one that led down into the floor.

  Alriyn looked from Endric to Novan. Neither man seemed surprised by this.

  “How long has this been here?” he asked. At least now he understood why Endric seemed unsurprised by the mahne, and seemed to know its contents, though he should not.

  “Long enough,” Endric said.

  “Where does this lead?” Alriyn asked.

  As he did, he could feel where it led. Heat billowed out of the opening in the floor. It was a dry heat, one that was born of the mines deep beneath the city, and of the metal that ran through the mountain. With certainty, Alriyn knew this led deep beneath the palace, down into the tunnels that had long been closed.

  Why would there be tunnels that led directly into the palace? Why would there be such access to the most important work the Magi possessed?

  “Come with me, Second Eldest, and you will learn more of your Founders.” With that, Endric ducked underneath the pedestal, and down into the darkness. Novan quickly followed.

  Alriyn stood before it, hesitating. Then, holding onto the connection to his manehlin, he followed them into the heat, beneath the city.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Jakob awoke from the dream, separating himself from it slowly.

  Like the others, it had been vivid. Real. He had been there—had been Aimielen. What did that mean? And what did it mean that he’d seen the beginning of the daneamiin? He’d had visions before, some so real that he felt he’d been there, and but this was less him watching like an outsider and more that he’d been living it.

  Was the power of the Great Forest so much that he would have those visions?

  Stranger still, Aimielen had recognized his presence, going so far as to silence him.

  What was happening to him?

  Those thoughts plagued him as they made their way through the Great Forest. Traveling on foot made the trip much harder than when they had been on horseback the last time he’d been in the forest. They had to avoid roots attempting to grab at their feet, skirt around prickly bushes, and occasionally jump across streams. Jakob wondered how Brohmin even managed a sense of direction.

  The man was injured and limped through the thick underbrush at a careful pace, but one that seemed to pick up speed as the day went on, seeming to know exactly which direction to head. Salindra had done what she could now that her abilities had returned, but had said he would need time for his body to do the rest. Brohmin pushed himself, and a strained expression stayed locked on his face as he walked.

  Jakob felt a slow throbbing in his arm and an irritating itch that he struggled not to scratch. It would do no good anyway. His injury was minor; at least, Salindra had told him it was. There had been no major damage to the tissues, but as it was, his arm felt weak, and he wasn’t sure how he would do if he needed to use it in another fight. He held onto a slim hope that he would not need to.

  It was not the only thing that bothered him.

  Since they had returned to the Great Forest, he had felt a sense of unease. At first, he had thought it due to the Deshmahne, but after they had been destroyed, the feeling remained. The sensation pulled at him, almost a physical force, a strange nagging sensation that made him anxious and his stomach queasy.

  “I don’t think you should hurry, Brohmin,” Salindra said, finally breaking the silence that had grown up around them. “You need to recover.”

  Jakob was glad for the distraction. His attention had been fixated on the unease that he felt, trying to determine its source but unable. Salindra stood tall, her confidence restored, and a level of authority to her voice that dared a challenge. Her statement carried a tone that demanded a response.

  Brohmin slowed and turned to face them. He adjusted his sword belt and grimaced as a lance of pain moved through him with the gesture. The man steeled his face, and the expression faded, replaced by simple determination. “I told you Alyta was the last,” he said quietly.

  Salindra nodded. “If she’s captured, you’ll need your strength. And what makes you think we’ll even reach her in time?”

  “I can’t explain it fully,” Brohmin began. “I have an… uneasy feeling. It’s growing the more we travel. I think she calls me.”

  Jakob thought he understood the source of his unease. “Her time is short,” he said, not meaning to speak it aloud.

  Brohmin’s eyes hung with an unasked question of whether Jakob could feel it too. Instead, he said, “She’s old, and was weakening even before she was captured. She was nearing an end and knew it. Just not this end. Not this way. Raime can’t claim her as he has claimed so many others.”

  “That one’s history stretches back farther than most,” Anda added. “She has lived a long time, seen much.” Anda’s voice became distant as she spoke. “We lose much more than Alyta when she is gone.” She spoke the name with a musical accent, the hint of the ancient language to it.

  “How?” Salindra asked. “She is a goddess. How can she die?”

  “She is still mortal,” Brohmin said. “And there are limits to what she can do. Even in her prime, there were limits. If Raime has captured her, I’m not sure what she is capable of doing. If anything.”

  “Can we stop him?” Jakob asked.

  “We have to,” Brohmin said. “With what’s coming, we still need her.”

  “I’ve seen this man, Brohmin. I felt his awful power. How can we stop him?” Salindra asked. The confidence that had returned to her voice faded as she spoke of Raime.

  “We must free Alyta. Only she can truly stop him. We must hope she has enough strength remaining to do so. Otherwise, I don’t know what we will do.”

  “How, if she was overpowered by him already?” Salindra asked.

  Brohmin sighed. “Alyta must have known we would find the key,” he said slowly. “Neamiin was a unique creation,” he started, looking at Jakob, at the sword strapped to his side. “With that, she can use it and stop him. We need to get to her and do what we can. It will be enough.” He fell silent. After a while, he whispered, “I must believe it will be enough.”

  He turned away from them then and started off again, Salindra quickly on his tail with a quiet question on her lips. Jakob watched Brohmin’s back as he limped onward, chewing his lip as he thought about what the man said. Would the sword be enough? There was something special about Neamiin, he knew that every time he touched the hilt and felt it faintly buzzing with energy, but would it be enough to help the trapped goddess?

  “You are troubled.”

  Jakob was startled from his thoughts and looked over and saw Anda staring at him strangely. “I don’t know, Anda,” he said, flicking his eyes toward Brohmin. “Alyta is powerful, but the High Priest still captured her. I worry that even with Neamiin, she won’t be able to stop him.”

  She touched his arm. A wave of peace slipped through him as she did and he sighed, finally relaxing and letting the worry about the goddess fade. With it faded the strange pull upon his senses and the hint of anxiety that came with it.

  “Come,” she said, leading him after Brohmin. “We can do nothing until
we reach her.”

  He followed, watching her exotic face, the long eyelashes, her strangely slanted eyelids, and hairless head. She was unlike anyone he had ever known. A peace and serenity emanated from her, granting him the sort of peace he had not known for years. It was something he had not realized had been missing until now.

  “Will the sword be enough to save her?” Jakob asked Anda.

  Anda smiled again. “I do not see along the fibers the same way as the damahne, but I think you were meant to wield it,” she answered.

  “Damahne?”

  “The damahne are—were—what men called gods. Alyta is damahne. You must save her and the sword…” She paused as she considered her next words. “When you were facing that man”—she said the word with a hard emphasis—“you did something I have not seen before. You pulled upon the ahmaean of the forest.” She said the last softly, and it did not carry to Brohmin or Salindra. “I do not know what that means. Perhaps it has something to do with Neamiin. Perhaps it is something more.”

  She didn’t offer anything more on the subject, but he had used the ahmaean of the forest. To stop the Deshmahne, he’d pulled on all the power that he could find around him. His mind had shattered—he still felt a throbbing pain from what he’d done—and something had changed.

  What did that mean? What did that make him?

  Anda looked over at him and smiled again, and the question disappeared. He felt a distant irritation in the back of his mind, different from what he had felt in the past, but remembered the sensation. “What is a nemerahl?” he asked Anda.

  The daneamiin’s smile turned into something different. A hint of surprise? “Have you seen one here?” she asked.

  “Not here, but in the Cala maah, I saw a vision of a great creature, a huge cat. In the vision, I had known that it was a nemerahl.” Then there had been the eyes barely seen as they left the forest with the daneamiin, and with it, the strange chuckling in his head.

  Yet… that wasn’t the only time. Then there had been the huge cat that had killed the Deshmahne what seemed like so long ago. Had that been a nemerahl or something else?

  “The nemerahl are ancient creatures, sometimes known as the watchers. Once, they allowed themselves to be seen. That was long ago, during a time when those like Alyta were common. Now, they remain hidden, ghosts among the trees.” She looked at him with the strange, curious expression again. “They are known in my lands, but I do not think they come to these lands. It is too dangerous.” She watched him, studying him a moment. “You seem disappointed.”

  He flushed. “When I was first attacked by the Deshmahne, I thought a huge creature saved me.”

  “Perhaps one did,” she said.

  “But you said the nemerahl aren’t found in these lands.”

  “Not the nemerahl, but their descendants, creatures men call merahl. They share much of the same traits as the nemerahl. Perhaps that was what saved you.”

  Brohmin had mentioned the merahl before and mentioned that they were found in the forest. Perhaps that was all there was to it.

  He expected Anda to say more, but she didn’t.

  They paused for rest at a stream. Anda did not appear to need one. Brohmin appeared as if he needed a few days to recover, but he didn’t allow himself that luxury. Jakob was forced to keep pushing himself after them. Water was drunk while walking, and Anda passed around a delicious flatbread that was strangely filling. Each ate what they could. Progress felt agonizingly slow.

  It was late in the afternoon when they heard the sound for the first time.

  Rain had started hours before, a slow, gentle drizzle that filtered through the trees leaving them wet, dirty, and miserable. A horrible sound echoed from the west and filled the air with its cry. They all stopped when they heard it, and listened. Harsh and shrill, it rang painfully in the air for long moments. Then, as suddenly as it had started, it stopped.

  Jakob shivered violently for a moment. “What was that?”

  He didn’t get a chance to hear an answer. The sound came again, just as loud. It tore again through the forest, as if bouncing off the trees. It lasted longer this time, an occasional pause throughout, yet eventually died off again.

  “What could make a noise like that?” Salindra asked. Her brown eyes were wide, her reclaimed confidence a memory.

  Brohmin finally slowed to a stop. He breathed heavily and stood favoring one leg, but there was no other outward sign that their rapid pace was taxing him. “I have never heard its like,” he answered, as surprised as the rest.

  Anda had a calm expression upon her face and looked toward the west. “I have,” she said, and they all turned to stare at her. “You have nothing to fear. The trees of this land are powerful.”

  “What do you mean?” Salindra asked.

  Anda didn’t answer, though she smiled and nodded to Jakob. He looked skyward, toward the trees around them. The trees are powerful. As he considered her words, he again saw the trees’ ahmaean, saw it as it flowed around everything, and was reminded of the trees of Anda’s land. There was a power to this forest, much like there was power to the daneamiin forest.

  “The trees?” Brohmin asked. A note of skepticism touched his voice as he eyed the daneamiin for a long moment.

  Anda nodded. “There is only one thing that sounds like this.”

  Brohmin considered her carefully with his dark eyes, and his frown wrinkled his forehead. “It’s to the west of us,” Brohmin said. “For now. We must continue.”

  They heard the sound several more times throughout the afternoon. Each time, it startled them, and each time, as harsh as the first time they heard it. The strange itch at the back of his head returned and was different from how it had felt before. No longer was it abrasive. Now there was a strange warmth, almost a recognition, and he did not push it away.

  Was it the nemerahl? Probably not, he decided. Anda said the nemerahl avoided these lands. Maybe it was the pull from Alyta.

  The rain continued on through the evening. Brohmin left the camp preparations to the others and lowered himself carefully to the ground where he leaned back against a tree and closed his eyes. His lips moved soundlessly, and a peaceful expression crossed his face. Jakob watched for a little while before turning to help Salindra with the small fire she had started, gathering firewood and clearing the brush around it. Anda did something to the trees and created a small shelter from the rain.

  “Jakob.”

  He turned quickly and saw Brohmin standing behind him, staring at him. He looked calm, relaxed. Almost refreshed. As he moved toward Jakob, there was little remaining of the limp that had slowed them throughout the day. He motioned at him as he approached, signaling him to sit near the fire.

  Brohmin joined him at the edge of the growing firelight and knelt in the soft underbrush. He glanced at Jakob with his iron eyes and stared for a long moment before speaking. “We haven’t had a chance before, but now that we’re here, when did you first start to see the ahmaean? Was it before we reached Avaneam?”

  Jakob considered the question. There had been flashes before, he realized. The dark smoke he saw around the High Priest had certainly been his ahmaean. Had he seen it during the Turning Festival? He didn’t think so but hadn’t been thinking clearly at that time. He had never seen it around the Magi, but what he saw around Salindra was pale even now, so he wasn’t surprised. There had been the dreams, the waking visions, which he was now sure had been something more than simple dreams. The ahmaean had surrounded everything in his dreams, only he had not known what it was at the time.

  Yet it had not been until they reached the Unknown Lands that he had seen it easily. What had happened? What had changed?

  “After Avaneam,” he said. “Since then,” he shrugged, unsure how to continue, “it is hard not to see it.”

  Brohmin nodded carefully. “Not many have the gift. Few men have claimed the ability.” He seemed as if he wanted to say more, but refrained.

  “The Magi?” Jakob ask
ed. He did not know what was happening to him but knew something strange was taking place. It seemed impossible that he had the abilities he did. Could he be Mageborn? He’d told the Deshmahne that he wasn’t a Mage, but how else could he explain the strangeness that had happened to him? What if he was becoming a Mage?

  “I don’t think so,” Brohmin said, and then smiled. “The Magi can learn to see ahmaean, but it is not something they do easily.”

  A strange relief washed through him. Not a Mage. He had not thought it likely, but there had been moments of concern. Still, if he wasn’t a Mage, he wasn’t exactly sure what he was becoming. “What then?” It was the question he had been hiding from himself for fear of the answer.

  “Do you remember when I spoke of the first Conclave?” Brohmin began, and Jakob nodded. “The choosing, that which you saw in the heart of the forest, was the first. They sought a person to unite the people, one to return peace to men. You saw their concern, saw what Shoren struggled against, yet it was not enough. It has never been enough. Raime has seen to that.”

  Brohmin paused as he collected his thoughts and turned to face the sky barely visible through the trees. The darkness of night had set upon them, and the flickering light of the fire pierced it, casting a warm glow around the forest. The man sighed, taking a deep breath as he did, before breathing out slowly. “The Conclave saw that there would come a person, one they called the nemah, a true Uniter, a peacebringer who could restore a long-term balance.”

  It seemed an Urmahne dream to have permanent peace, something his father would have sought, a step along the pathway toward the return of the gods.

  “You’ve told me this before. If this what you think is happening to me? You think I could be the nemah?” Jakob asked softly, starting to understand where Brohmin was leading him.

  “Your time in the Cala maah was a test. Once an integral part of choosing the peacebringer, it was the failing of the Magi to understand that there was more.” He glanced over to Salindra. “You have been chosen as the Uniter. Endric saw to that, selecting you when he tasked you with carrying the trunk. The time in the Cala maah confirmed that you will be the next Uniter, much as I was confirmed.”