Prelude to Fire: Parts 1 and 2 (6 page)

Lacertin ran his hand across the rock again. What would he think were he to climb to the top now? Would he have the same sense of wonder, or even the same answer as when he was young? Like most growing in Nara, he had wondered where he belonged. Climbing to the top of Dholund gave those who made it the chance to see into Incendin. It was after this that those who would attempt to cross would do so. It was when Chasn had crossed.

“Too many,” Lacertin said. Then he sighed. “Probably as many as your children are lost on the ships.”

He continued around the rock but saw nothing else that would tell him what had happened. Lacertin hadn’t expected to, but had hoped to find answers. It seemed that was all that he ever wanted to find.

It took nearly an hour to make it all the way around the rock. When he stopped on the other side, he stared out into Incendin. A haze of heat layered over the ground. Wind moved across the barrier but didn’t gust with the same ferocity as other places within the kingdoms. A low, mournful howl caught on the wind, and was followed by another.

Lacertin’s ears perked at the sound and he shaped water between his hands, drawing what moisture he could out of the air to create something like a lens for him to look through. It was a trick he’d learned from a Doman shaper. Within the kingdoms, the shaping was easy, but here, with as dry as the air was, he practically had to draw the moisture out of himself.

Another howl came, growing sharper than before. The hounds must have acquired their scent. They were creatures of fire, somehow like the lisincend, but also not. They couldn’t shape, but they burned with a simmering fire. Lacertin had always been intrigued by them.

“We should be going,” Veran said.

“You fear the hounds?” Lacertin asked.

“Not the hounds, but we have no need to let them claim our scent.”

Through the shaping, Lacertin caught sight of the nearest hound as it raced across the hard ground. “Will it be able to cross the barrier?”

“I don’t know,” Veran said.

“Then we stay.” When Veran arched a brow at him, Lacertin shrugged. “We need to know whether it would hold out even the hounds.”

“And if it doesn’t?”

Lacertin stared through the lens. The hound was long and sleek. Short, dark hair covered its hide, and long teeth jutted down over its lower jaw. A shimmering sort of haze, thicker than what radiated naturally from Incendin, rose around the hound, as if trying to veil the creature from them. Another ran alongside the first, suddenly joining it, then a third. A pack.

“Then we will have to fight them off.”

T
he hounds howled
as they raced toward the barrier. Lacertin knew that he should ready a shaping, but he was more interested in watching the hounds as they streaked across the hard ground. As a child in Nara, hounds had been rare, but they had hunted, unopposed by any barrier. Most knew to run from them, and there were enough sensers throughout Nara to hide from them, to keep the hounds from capturing the scent, but even then, the hounds occasionally managed to kill. Lacertin rarely had the opportunity to simply observe them.

They were powerful creatures and moved with a sleek grace. Their lean bodies flexed with each jump, leaping almost as much as they ran and chewing up the distance faster than they should be able to manage. The lead hound flicked its gaze as it ran before fixing Lacertin with a steady and determined gaze. He almost took a step back under the intensity.

When the nearest hound struck the barrier, it howled, a loud and painful sound that echoed, piercing through the hot air as it bounced off the rock. The barrier held and the hound paced on the other side, pawing at the ground.

Veran let out a relieved sigh.

“You didn’t know?” Lacertin asked. The other hounds reached the barrier and snarled but didn’t make any attempt at getting closer. They took the lead hound’s direction and dug at the ground. Surprisingly, for creatures so tightly bound to fire, they managed to make more headway than Lacertin would have expected.

“Suspected, but didn’t know,” Veran said. He moved along the barrier, holding his shaping at the ready as he did. “What happens to it if they dig below?”

Lacertin shrugged. “The same as above, I suspect.”

Veran tilted his head back to peer high into the sky, cupping one hand over his brow as he studied the sky overhead. “How far up does it extend?”

“Far enough that shapers couldn’t go over it,” Lacertin said. “But Incendin has no warriors, so we don’t need to fear them making it over.”

“We assume they have no warriors.”

“In twenty years of war, we have seen no sign of warriors. Fire shapers. Earth and wind. Even water shapers.” That was surprising, given that much of Incendin was desert. Usually, shaping manifested where there was the capacity to use it. Water shapers struggled in Incendin. Even wind shapers struggled at times. Lacertin remembered what the wind shaper Zephra had once told him about the wind when she’d attempted to cross Incendin. The hot air had nearly betrayed her, and she was one of the strongest wind shapers the kingdoms had ever produced. “But no warriors. Wouldn’t Incendin send warriors at us if they had the capability?” he asked. “Wouldn’t they rather have warriors than have their shapings limited?”

“Many would say their fire shapings aren’t limited,” Veran said. One of the hounds snarled and leapt at the barrier before squealing and dropping back. The lead hound studied the place along the barrier that had been attacked but didn’t make any attempt to charge again.

“Only for the lisincend,” Lacertin said.

“And they have consumed so much fire that even our warriors struggle to contain them,” Veran went on. “We’ve only seen a handful of lisincend. How long before we face a dozen? Two dozen? When do they have numbers that will overwhelm us?”

Lacertin didn’t have the answers. Likely, Veran had heard the same reports as Lacertin about how difficult it had been to create the lisincend. There was a sacrifice involved, but no one really was able to explain exactly what the sacrifice had to be. Even Zephra, who claimed to witness the creation of a lisincend, hadn’t known.

“The lisincend are not the match for our warriors,” Lacertin said.

Veran sighed. “Until they come in numbers. Lacertin, how do you think Pherah and Roln died? Do you think they were so unskilled that they couldn’t handle fire shapers? It was the number of lisincend and the hounds that overwhelmed them.”

Veran turned to the barrier and sent a shaping of earth rumbling through it.

“No—” Lacertin started.

He shook his head. “The shaping doesn’t affect the barrier.”

As it struck the barrier, it fizzled, but the ground on the other side of the barrier heaved slightly, lifting the nearest hound. The lead hound lunged, jumping at the barrier where the shaping had passed through.

Lacertin expected the hound to bounce back, away from the barrier.

Instead, the hound slid slowly through the barrier. It happened slowly, but the brightness to the hound’s eyes told Lacertin that the creature had expected to be able to make it through the barrier, as if waiting for one of them to be foolish enough to shape through it.

Veran wasn’t ready. He scrambled back, a shaping building, but he was too slow.

The hound reached him, sharp nails scraping against Veran’s chest. The wide jaw dipped toward his neck. Veran recovered enough to throw the hound off him and came to his knees. Blood dripped from wounds gaping across his chest.

The other hounds followed the first, pushing through the sudden weakness in the barrier.

“Are you able to shape?” Lacertin asked.

Veran nodded. He fumbled for his sword and managed to unsheathe it. With a shaping of wind and earth, he trapped the hound that had attacked him. Lacertin focused on the other two, using a similar shaping but adding more fire to his than Veran had attempted. He bound the hounds in the shaping and squeezed, pulling the air from a bubble that surrounded them.

The hounds attacked his shaping frantically, but Lacertin held onto it. Moments passed and the struggling grew weaker before they finally stopped struggling. Within the shaping, the hounds fell at nearly the same time.

The lead hound that Veran held trapped in earth stared at them defiantly. Sharp intelligence burned in its eyes. Veran approached and, with a heavy sweep of his warrior sword, beheaded the hound.

He turned to Lacertin, clutching a hand over his chest. “They shouldn’t have been able to cross…”

“You disrupted the shaping,” Lacertin said. He started a water shaping to attempt to heal Veran, but there wasn’t enough water in the air to do much. He might be able to slow the bleeding, but he wouldn’t be able to fully mend the wounds. What Veran needed now was real healing, not what Lacertin could offer.

But before he could do anything to help Veran, he had to repair the barrier. Lacertin listened to the shaping, using the vibrating sense of each of the elements to guide him. He reached the place where Veran’s earth shaping had disrupted the pattern. With a draw on fire—the element opposite earth—he pulled the barrier back into alignment.

Was that why the hounds had been able to cross? Would it have mattered if Veran had used water or wind, or was it that he had chosen earth? Lacertin didn’t know, only that he’d worried about what a shaping through the barrier would do to it. He’d never had the answer before, but now he did.

Lacertin lifted Veran off the ground, ignoring the blood pooling from the hound. Part of him wished they had been able to study the hounds. They had never managed to catch one of the creatures alive. So little was known about them. How did Incendin create them, or were they some twisted form of elemental? How did the lisincend control them? Were the other shapers of Incendin able to control them?

If they had the opportunity to study them, they might be able to answer some of the questions. Once again, they wouldn’t know.

He carried Veran toward the village, using shapings of earth and wind to help him. When he reached the outskirts of the village, he paused. Nassa hadn’t been his village, but he’d grown up near enough that he knew many people here. Now the streets were empty. Had they left because of the attack, sent deeper into Nara and away from the border for safety, or was there a different reason? He could imagine the suspicion the shapers would have and they way that they would wonder and fear whether the people of Nassa would help Incendin. Those shapers wouldn’t understand that those who remained in the village had already made their choice.

Near the small well at the center of the village, he stopped and lowered Veran to the ground. The other man groaned but didn’t say anything else. Lacertin used the bucket for the well to pull water to the surface and dripped it into Veran’s mouth and then over his wounds. Using a shaping of water, he probed for the extent of Veran’s injuries. The warrior had lost a lot of blood, and there was a warmth burning within what blood remained, a warmth that was in some ways familiar.

With a shaping of water, he sealed the wound and tried to draw the heat out of Veran’s blood. He could heal, but not with the same deft touch the master water shapers could manage.

Veran rested more easily with Lacertin’s shaping, and his ragged breathing eased.

Lacertin looked around. Within Nassa, had there been anyone here, he might have tried to leave Veran and return to the university for help, but with the village empty, he couldn’t just leave the other warrior here, not without knowing the extent of his injuries.

Returning meant controlling a shaping that would carry them both. Lacertin had attempted it before, but such a shaping would take much strength, maybe more than he could tolerate. It risked both of them.

“Go,” Veran said weakly.

Lacertin glanced down at him. The bleeding that had eased now opened again, as if the shaping had already failed. Were the hounds’ claws poisoned? As far as he knew, none had ever survived a hound attack to know for certain. When shapers encountered the hounds, they made certain to keep far enough away so as not to risk themselves.

They’d grown careless with the barrier, and had assumed it would hold.

“If I go and something happens…”

Veran tried to laugh but winced. “Something already happened. This was my mistake. Don’t let it claim us both.”

“I can get you back to Ethea,” Lacertin said.

Veran grunted. “You really think you can travel so far with another? I’m not sure such strength was even known when the ancients still walked these lands.”

They didn’t really know what the ancients were capable of doing. Most assumed they all spoke to the elementals and that was how they managed shapings that would be impossible now. Others figured it was the fact that those shapers were able to mix spirit into their shapings, an element that had been lost over time, as if the Great Mother didn’t want them shaping it anymore.

Lacertin glanced around and shook his head. “I’m not leaving you. We won’t lose another warrior to this war,” he said.

“We’ve lost so many already. What’s one more?”

“No,” Lacertin said.

He stood and took a few steadying breaths. He would need speed and control for this. Strength would help, but strength would only get him so far. If he could move quickly, he wouldn’t have to hold the shaping quite as long, but moving quickly carried with it other risks.

“Can you shape at all?” Lacertin asked.

Veran’s eyes had fallen closed again and his breathing came out slowly. He blinked slowly and ran his tongue over his lips. “Not well. It burns, Lacertin.”

“Can you hold a shaping well enough that I don’t drop you?”

That was his greatest fear. Speed meant that he had to focus on shaping and couldn’t afford to worry about dropping Veran. The only other time he’d attempted carrying another had been over short distances, barely enough to matter. Even that had been difficult. For this… this would be challenging. And if he failed and they didn’t reach the university, he wouldn’t have the strength needed to summon help.

Veran nodded. “I will try.”

Lacertin lifted him using a shaping of earth. Veran’s shaping took hold, sealing them together with earth and wind.

“Quickly,” Veran urged.

Lacertin pulled on each of the elements, binding them as was necessary for traveling. The shaping lifted him into the air, but slower than it should. Then, pulling the shaping atop him, lightning exploded, dragging him across the kingdoms.

The shaping was painfully slow. Lacertin fed it with all the strength he could summon. They picked up speed, making their way across Nara, and then into Ter, faster and faster. The ground moved past below him, but not as quickly as he would like.

Veran’s shaping failed somewhere over Ter. For a moment, Veran slipped and Lacertin lunged for him, diverting precious energy from his shaping to grab the warrior. He managed to keep him from falling, but now had to hold onto him as well as control the shaping. It wasn’t clear whether Veran still even breathed.

The draw of Ethea pulled him onward, and he finally saw the city rising up in the distance. They continued to pick up speed, now out of necessity. Such speed was dangerous but they streaked toward the capital.

His strength began to fade. With shaping, there were limits imposed by the strength of the shaper, and his were nearly at their end.

Then they crossed the walls of the city, still moving too quickly.

Lacertin didn’t dare ease off on the shaping. If he did, he wasn’t sure where they would land. He wouldn’t risk dropping Veran and grasped him as tightly as he could. The university appeared, and the shaper circle at the center.

Then his strength failed completely.

They dropped. The ground came up at them too quickly for him to stop. Lacertin tensed, knowing it would do nothing to help him survive the fall, but unable to think of anything more.

He struck the stone of the shapers circle with a jarring crack. Veran was torn from his grip, flung across the university yard, and sent sprawling. Lacertin fell and hit his head, and his consciousness faded.