The Coming Chaos

by D. K. Holmberg

It reminded him of how he’d felt when the Forgers had pierced his palms with their bars of metal, the attack that had changed him, turning him into something else.

  Haern didn’t know what it was.

  Why was he thinking about that now?

  He should be thinking about getting away from here. He should be thinking about getting the others he had come with away from here.

  And maybe there was something he could do.

  He still had the sphere in his pocket. He pulled it out and sent it rolling. The awareness of lorcith filled him, near enough that he knew he could push on it, trigger the nails to explode away from him. In doing so, he thought he could get to safety.

  It wasn’t just him needing to get to safety. It was figuring out where the others had gone.

  He had no idea, and with his vision hazy, his mind foggy, he wasn’t sure he would find them.

  Somehow he would have to.

  “Haern?”

  Someone said his name again, and it seemed almost as if he should recognize the voice, but that couldn’t be. It wasn’t Jayna, and it wasn’t Stacy, or…

  Who else was with him?

  Haern could no longer remember. All he was aware of was the pain.

  His body throbbed.

  He took a step toward the sphere.

  It might mean sacrificing himself, but wasn’t he willing to do that?

  “Go, Jayna,” Haern said.

  At least, he thought he said it. It was possible nothing came out other than a mumbling.

  “Haern?”

  Who was there? Someone knew his name.

  Or they were using him.

  He wasn’t about to allow anyone to use him. He wasn’t about to allow anyone to harm him or the others he was with. He could defend them.

  Trigger the sphere.

  He could do that.

  Haern pushed.

  It required what he thought was left of his connection to lorcith. It flowed outward from him, striking the sphere. When it did, there came the faint sense of him doing something.

  Would the nails fire?

  If they did, he could stay low. It was possible he could come out of this.

  Power flowed from him.

  And then the sphere exploded. Lorcith streaked outward.

  Haern smiled to himself, looking up. As he did, his breath caught.

  Rayen?

  15

  Lucy

  The inside of the library was cool, the lantern flickering with just enough light for Lucy to see, but she didn’t even need that.

  She sat with her arms resting on the table, staring straight ahead. There was nothing else in the room, and she was left alone, with the library and herself. She didn’t have any books in front of her, but she didn’t really want any. At this point, all Lucy wanted was to have time with her thoughts.

  She needed to Read herself.

  And in this place, protected as she was, she knew she wasn’t going to be in any danger.

  At least she was away from the Architect’s influence.

  The more she thought about him, the more she realized she’d gained something from the proximity to him.

  And more than likely, he hadn’t known it.

  He would have thought he was too powerful for her to reach into his mind and gather anything, so for her to have grasped anything from him was a great gift.

  Now they needed to use it. She would have to continue to focus her mind, trying to find anything of value.

  Doing so would be difficult, and yet she was determined to continue to search, straining through her mind, willing to look deep within herself for those answers.

  She would start with where she had felt that influence before. She closed her eyes, looking inward, tracing back through where he’d Pushed her. It had been a subtle influence, much different than when he had done it the first time.

  This time he had been gentle, as if he hadn’t intended for her to know he was there as he tried to Push on her thoughts.

  The other difference was that this time, she’d recognized the nature of the influence.

  Regardless of what he was trying to convince her, she had grown in the time since she’d been with him. Her control and knowledge had increased. She had learned how she could look inwardly and could use that in order to protect herself.

  It was going to take her digging within her mind, and given everything she’d experienced, she wasn’t sure if she wanted to go that deep into her thoughts.

  As she Read herself, she found where he had attempted to Push her.

  Why with those thoughts?

  The important question was why would he want her to doubt herself. Did he think that would make her look away? He’d been digging, searching, as if he’d wanted to come up with names.

  And perhaps that was what he had wanted. He might have been looking for answers, thinking if he could uncover who she was working with, he could target them. The names she’d revealed had to have been Ras and Carth and Galen. All of them highly skilled individuals, people she didn’t worry about.

  But then there were others. Eve and Marcy and Olivia.

  Their names trailed through her mind, a memory of what she’d thought of. Thankfully, she hadn’t focused on the village and hadn’t revealed anything more than their names, but the fact that she had used those names meant he had access to people she had wanted to protect.

  And if she couldn’t protect them in this way, how was she going to protect them at all?

  Somehow, she would have to find a way to prevent him from doing them any harm.

  Lucy focused, looking through her mind for anything that might help her understand what she could uncover from the Architect. His mind had touched hers. A connection would have formed, and she could use that connection to find some way to dig through what he was doing to her and uncover what he wanted.

  Names. That was why he had dug at her mind, but why would he care about names?

  Unless he was going to target them.

  She didn’t give him the village. Because of that, there was no reason for her to be concerned about them getting discovered, unless he had managed to rifle through her thoughts and find it, though she didn’t think so. She hadn’t come up with any image of the village.

  What benefit would the names provide?

  Other than knowing that they were all working together.

  Carth believed this to be some sort of game, believed the Architect was one piece Olandar Fahr was using, which meant they could use him to get to Olandar Fahr.

  What she needed was to figure out what he was up to.

  Always before, he’d been planning. She knew he’d been a part of Olandar Fahr’s strategy and had great influence with the man.

  It was the same thing Ras had wanted from her. He’d believed tracing through the Architect’s goals would bring them to Olandar Fahr, but perhaps they were working separately.

  She paused within her mind, Reading where he had attempted to Push, and searched. There had to be something there, some reason he’d focused on that part of her mind. As she looked, listening, searching, she couldn’t come up with anything.

  She opened her eyes, looking around the library. He’d been planning something.

  She closed her eyes, thinking back through all the times she had worked with him, all the experiences she had with him, from the very beginning.

  She’d never given much thought to all those experiences, had never tried to trace through them. Now she thought she needed to. The longer she focused on him, the more certain she was those answers were there.

  What had he told her?

  At first, she’d been so focused on escape that she hadn’t been able to think of anything else. Still, her ability to Read had been there even then, and she had to believe she would have uncovered something.

  Then again, the Architect hadn’t come to her all that often at that time. She’d been overwhelmed by not only thoughts, but visions. Even now the visions continued to press upon her when she t
ried to think through them, to the point where Lucy had abandoned any attempt to use them in a meaningful way. There was no purpose in painfully trying to strain through them, to dig them apart, until she better understood whether there was anything useful about them.

  But the Architect had stayed near her.

  He had Read her then.

  It was as if he had wanted to test her.

  He had been pleased with her development, her growth, the nature of her abilities.

  That was what it was.

  He wanted to better understand the augmentation.

  She remembered his surprise at how effective it was.

  He was working with Olandar Fahr, and with the augmentations the Ai’thol had used. Not the Ai’thol—the C’than.

  Had they used any other technique, she would’ve been left with a terrible scar.

  She never would’ve taken an augmentation voluntarily. They would have had to capture her first, and she never would’ve left Elaeavn. She would have stayed until Haern came back, if he ever did. Had she not received the augmentation, she might never have left the city, and then Daniel wouldn’t have either, and Carth might not have been brought back into the fight.

  Why was she thinking about those things?

  It seemed almost as if she were guided along that way.

  Was somebody else trying to influence her thoughts?

  Lucy focused, looking through her mind for any sort of influence, Reading herself.

  But she found nothing—those had been her own thoughts.

  She wasn’t much of a planner. She’d always been a scholar. When it came to Olandar Fahr and everything he wanted, she was going to have to be more than just a scholar. She was going to have to be something more than she had ever been before. She might even have to become something of a soldier.

  It was the kind of fighting she didn’t want to be involved with, and yet she wondered if she might need to have some role in it.

  The more she thought about it, the more certain she was she would have to take a greater stand.

  The Architect had wanted to know about her augmentation—how it was placed, where it was placed, and what it did for her.

  That was why he’d not pushed her at first.

  She felt that, which meant she had those memories somewhere within her mind.

  She had to find where they came from. If she could, she might even recognize the familiarity of his mind. Then she might be able to trace him, latch on to his thoughts—even Slide to him.

  Why would he have been watching?

  Unless he didn’t know how this augmentation had been placed.

  Then again, the Ai’thol wouldn’t have known. It was something of the C’than, not the Ai’thol. They had surprised the Ai’thol, suddenly appearing with abilities and augmentations that the Ai’thol didn’t understand. Now that Lucy thought about it, she was certain that was the key.

  The augmentation was what he wanted to know about.

  That was why he’d been there, waiting and listening, searching for any information he might be able to uncover. He’d used that, hoping she might reveal what had happened to her and how it could be replicated.

  Lucy had no idea what had been done to her, but he had tested, using her experiences.

  Because he’d wanted to recreate it.

  That was what the Ai’thol wanted. They wanted the knowledge of the C’than.

  Could that be why he was in that town?

  They needed to go back.

  Lucy got to her feet and started pacing.

  She needed to slow down, to think things through, to ensure what she was uncovering was accurate. And if it was, then she had to dig a little deeper, be prepared for the possibility there was something more than what she had already uncovered.

  Perhaps she was wrong. Perhaps this was different than just a search for the knowledge of the C’than. Where had the C’than gained that knowledge?

  She looked around the library, searching through the books. From what she’d gathered, the knowledge here was different than what was in other places. The books stored within this stronghold were restricted even from those within the C’than. There were places like the university in Asador that were places of study, and yet even there, there wasn’t nearly the same type of knowledge stored here.

  The fact that they kept some of these books here, restricted from anyone other than very high-ranking Ai’thol, suggested there was danger within them.

  Lucy surveyed the books. The only person who really knew what was here would be Ras, and in order to get him to talk about it, she would have to convince him she was right.

  She took a deep breath, Sliding within the tower. When she emerged near the main level, she found no one. She Slid again, appearing outside the tower. The sky was dark, and thunder rumbled. Mist drifted down from the sky, mixed with that washing off the ocean. The waves were angry today—chaotic, as Olivia would say. This was the kind of place she would have found relaxing.

  And perhaps that was an answer for Olivia.

  Lucy had been trying to keep them separate, but perhaps that was a mistake. Bringing someone like Olivia here, someone who needed the time to be alone, to understand the nature of her abilities, might benefit her.

  She found a lone figure walking along the shoreline and headed toward them. From here, it was difficult to tell if it was Carth or Ras. Both had dark hair, though Ras’s was streaked with more gray. He typically wore a pale white robe that made him almost seem to glow. And he often spent time outside like this.

  And yet as she approached, she found that the person wearing the white robe was Carth. She was glowing in a way that Lucy had rarely seen.

  Shadows swirled away from her, as if chased by her sudden appearance.

  “Did you uncover anything?”

  “I think the Architect’s after a way of recreating my augmentation.”

  “Why would you think that?”

  “I was trying to think of why he would have been in that town, and it forced me think back to why he would’ve been so interested in me.”

  “He would’ve been interested in you because you are Elvraeth who had an augmentation placed.”

  “True, but I had an augmentation he didn’t understand.” Lucy turned toward the waves crashing along the water. “Mine is different than what the Ai’thol typically place. We all know they generally have scars.” She touched the back of her head, running her fingers over the now completely healed surface. There were no remnants of the metal, and yet sometimes she could still feel it. At times, her head still throbbed, the aching leaving her miserable. “I think they’ve been wanting to know how to do what the C’than have done.”

  “If they manage to uncover what the C’than have done and recreate it, then the nature of their augmentations will make it difficult for us to identify them.”

  Lucy nodded.

  “You want to return to the town.”

  “How did you know?”

  “It’s what I would’ve done.”

  “Would have?”

  “I think you’ll need to go by yourself.”

  “Why?”

  “Because when it comes to this, there is some danger.”

  She nodded. “You don’t want to risk yourself.”

  “No. I think you are better equipped to find the answers.”

  “What if it takes me in search of the C’than?”

  “Then so be it.” Carth turned toward her, and the glowing seemed to ease. “We know there remain others within the C’than who’ve betrayed us. We need to continue to root them out, and yet, we haven’t been able to find anything more about them. I am going to continue to search.”

  “For the C’than or for Olandar Fahr?”

  “For both.”

  “I know how upset you are—”

  “You can’t begin to know how upset I am,” Carth said.

  Lucy watched the other woman. An angry Carth terrified her, but more than that, she worried what Carth might do.
She needed the other woman calm and rational so they could prepare for what they needed to do.

  “Don’t do anything foolish,” Lucy said.

  “I never do.”

  “How will I find you?”

  Carth smiled tightly. “I think I’ve revealed how I can reach you if I need to.”

  Lucy glanced back at the tower. Shadows swirled around it, the way they had since she’d first come here. She still didn’t understand why, or what the tower represented, other than that there was some aspect of the Elder Stone mixed within it. It was something she had never really uncovered, and it was possible she never would.

  “I will let you know if I find anything.”

  “I know you will.”

  With that, Lucy Slid.

  She emerged back at the edge of the town, and there was the overwhelming sense of the others around her. She maintained an edge, worried the Architect might’ve returned. If he had, she needed be careful to avoid his influence, lest he find some way of pushing on her mind.

  She started into the town, not wanting to Slide or look out of place. She pulled her cloak off, tucking it under her arm, and looked around as she entered the town.

  She knew the way Carth would approach finding information in a place like this. She would go to a tavern. Lucy didn’t need to go to a tavern order to find what she needed. She could wander, Listening and Reading.

  She hadn’t come looking only for the Architect; she wanted to know if there was any evidence of the rogue C’than here. If there was, she needed to figure out why and what they were doing here.

  Anything she could uncover would be valuable to her and to the C’than.

  And wasn’t she one of the C’than now?

  She didn’t know if Ras would consider her a part of it, but she couldn’t help but feel as if she were. It seemed as if she belonged, and the more she worked on their behalf, the more certain she was she was a part of what they were doing.

  Reaching the center of the town, she paused, looking around.

  She didn’t need to linger. She wasn’t trapped, since she could always Slide anywhere else she needed to go.

  She found a bench near a clearing at the center of the town. Taking a seat on it, Lucy looked around, watching as others made their way through the town. A man pushed carts loaded with food, likely going to a market. As she focused on the man pushing the carts, she could Read how he was hoping for a good day of sales. A young woman scurried along the street, carrying a bolt of cloth, a measuring tape wrapped around her neck. Three men worked along the street in the opposite direction, all of them slightly dirty; she was able to detect that they were loggers.