Aster Wood and the Book of Leveling (Volume 2) (13 page)

“You see,” he went on, “Earth is made
primarily
of gold. The core of that planet, your planet, spins wildly with the stuff, spittin’ it out into the rocks an’ seas when the weight of it becomes too great.

“The spell to summon the elements was one Jared knew well. But now he had to summon somethin’ no one would believe. If he’d told ‘em, they would’ve called him a lunatic. So he didn’t tell, an’ one bright night on the top of our very own Mount Neri, Jared stood and took the last of his precious gold, playin’ with the stars as if they were marbles in a child’s game. He pulled the fabric of the universe where the Earth lay so tightly towards us that the effort of the thing killed him. His body lies now, up on that mountain, waitin’ for someone to come and undo the harm he brought to our lands.
 

“An’ then, of course, the real trouble began. You speak of droughts on your planet, an’ droughts we also endured, but they were not so simple. The fiber of the worlds we live in had been changed, forever yearnin’ now for the gold of Earth, drawin’ it ever nearer. An’ with every day that passes, with every mile closer the Earth travels, the desire in the lands, in the winds, for its nearness grows. Soon, it’ll be so close that the sorcerers who remain, an’ the Corentin, will be able to exploit its magic, to exploit the imbalance in the Fold, an’ to control every movement of every being that inhabits it.”

He fell silent and stared at me, both anger and sadness in his eyes. I was stuck to my post like a statue, unable to move or think clearly. His story was of the end of worlds.
My
world included.
 

“The book stayed, for a time, in his caverns,” he went on. “The Solitaries, descended from Jared, didn’t know about the hidin’ spot until millennia after Jared died. It took the first thief, Zaromir, to attempt to breach the great room before we realized. Once Zaromir was defeated, the Solitaries took the book from this place, hidin’ it far from here, so that no one could use the knowledge inside it to make things worse.
 

“We,” he gestured around at the villagers, “are the last of the descendants of Jared. We been ridiculed for as long as any can remember, mocked for our understandin’ of what is to come; what we know can only be the end of all. When Earth arrives, we’ll all perish. We prepare here in our mountains, driven from Riverstone by the madman you call your friend, an’ wait for the Corentin to come for ‘im. The Corentin can feel all power, an’ he cannot allow others to hold power such as his own. The Corentin, he draws Earth ever closer, privy to Jared’s secret not because of his knowledge of it, but because he has witnessed the power Earth’s nearness produces. He uses the imbalance of the Fold, warps it, twists it around an’ kills the lands with it, drives the people mad with it, an’ laughs as the planets around him shrivel an’ rot while he grows and thrives. Here we wait for his arrival, trapped next to the maniac in the tower while the Corentin is drawn to him like a magnet. An’ maybe,” he glanced at Erod, “he is drawn to this very place now as well. Our only safety for these thousands of years has been our removal of power from our people.”

Erod shifted uncomfortably.

“But I already killed the Corentin,” I argued, clinging to one clear thought. “I told you, Cadoc
was
the Corentin.”

Erod spoke before Druce could.

“The Corentin is not one man,” he said. “The Corentin has long extended his tendrils of power to affect all men, though there are a handful he keeps closer than the rest. This Cadoc, he was but one of the pillars of strength in the Corentin’s arsenal. He overtakes them, you see, takes their minds and drives their actions. He sees through their eyes, hears their every thought, fills them with a horror we can barely contemplate. It is a hell beyond any we could imagine.”

“The Corentin possesses people?” I whispered.

“Yes,” Druce said. “Even you can’t escape his reach. I wonder, how far into your own soul has he extended his barbs?”

I put my hands over my chest reflexively, and a shiver ran down my spine.
 

All at once, the scattered puzzle pieces of my world seemed to arrange themselves into an order I never could have expected. Cadoc, an arm of the Corentin, bent on sucking the hope from the spirits of everyone he came in contact with. The brothers Cadoc has spoken of, the other pillars of the Corentin’s base of power. Almara, twitchy as a cornered animal, defending himself violently against foes only he could see.
 

And, maybe, my father, long since driven mad by the voices only he could hear.
 

But that was too wild, too unlikely, too much to hope that the insanity my father wrestled with was anything but his own doing.
 

“Why won’t he take the pills?” I had sobbed to my mother eight years earlier.
 

“I’m so sorry,” she said through thick tears. “I’m so sorry I can’t make him.” The side of her face was swollen; a welt had risen from the place on her cheek where he had struck her.
 

“Doesn’t he love us?” I asked. My fear at hearing the answer pushed down on my chest like the weight of a thousand hands, suffocating me.
 

“Yes,” she said softly. “Yes, he loves us, but—Aster?”

The tightening in my chest was increasing, and I stiffened at the effort to breathe. I tried to talk, but no sound came.
 

“Aster? What’s wrong, baby?” She was alarmed. In an instant she was at the door to the bedroom. “Jack!” she screamed. “Jack! Call an ambulance!”

I slumped down onto the bed, torn between the panic I felt and the fear of my father. Would he hear her? Would he come to help? I didn’t want him to. I didn’t want him anywhere near me after what I had just seen.

“Jack!” she yelled again, but no answer came. Then, her voice from the other room, “Yes, my son can’t breathe. Send an ambulance. His lips are blue! What do I do? What do—”

“How is it that a boy,” Druce’s voice tore me from the scene in my memory, “from, of all places, Earth can keep his heart pure against such power? Maybe you’re here to fool us all. You’ve worked your words on our Erod here.”

I felt dizzy. For a moment I thought I would fall from the tree stump, but somehow I managed to keep my footing. My mind raced as I tried to understand.
 

“I—I don’t know,” I said, dazed.
 

“You do not
know,
” he sneered. “You have your story,” he said, straightening up and squinting at me. “You’ve heard what no one else across the ages has heard. So tell us now, Aster Wood. What say you?”

I stood, trying to blink away my confusion. Erod stood close by, still pulsing with blue flashes. What could I do now? What remained? Was it possible, what this ogre of a man was telling me? Was it possible to “level” the Fold?

“Where is it?” I finally asked.
 

Druce laughed, a furious, mean sound. “I’ve told you the story of Jared, an’ all you can think to say in response is, ‘Where is it?’”

His laughter continued for a moment, but when his people didn’t follow his lead, he stopped abruptly.

“The book,” I choked. “Where is it now?”

“I ain’t telling’ no stranger the location of the book,” he said. “You ain’t got no right to it, or the means to use it, even if you were able to breach the gates into its tomb.”

The crowd grumbled, in my defense or his I couldn’t tell.

Erod stepped towards Druce.

“This boy is the only one, over seven thousand years, who has had the right
or
the means to use it. He alone has taken life from the one who destroys
all
life. Will you sit on its location and watch the Great Evil continue to spread over our lands, spread to the planets beyond the Triaden, until we have all fallen hopelessly to its power?”

Druce’s gaze drifted to the fire.
 

Erod continued, addressing the crowd now.

“Will you, my Solitaries, follow this lead to your graves and the graves of all? For you know as well as I that if the Fold is not leveled that we will all soon perish. And those who do not perish will be forced to serve those who benefit from the imbalance. But you deny the boy with the power to do it. Why?”

Druce mumbled for a moment, so quiet that I couldn’t hear him. Erod continued.

“Ah!” he said. “As I suspected! You are fearful of further thievery? You think that this boy intends to exploit the power as well.”

Druce found his voice and stood up tall.

“Traitors before now have come before us with the slightness of this boy. They’ve seemed unthreatening, truthful. But have we given in to them before now? No. The boy carries gold, you say, but who’s to say that it’s true gold? Who’s to say he—”

“Enough!” Erod growled through the still night. He stomped his foot to the ground, and from it a dome of blue power radiated out. Several people stumbled to the ground. The light traveled through the village and up the sides of the mountains that surrounded it, finally dissipating into a mist of sparkling crystals.
 

My mouth hung stupidly open. I had seen such a thing once before, months ago on a desolate, snowy planet. It had been a powerful defense put forth by the wolf who protected me from a pack of snarling monsters. Jade had told me that the wolf had been a member of the White Guard. She said that to see one, much less be aided by one, was exceedingly rare.

Erod?

“I will show you its truth,” Erod said. He thrust his hands towards me, and I felt the gold chain sliding from my fingertips and into his palm. I grasped for it, falling from the trunk as I did so and nearly tumbling into the fire. But the chain was already hovering over the topmost flame, and it spun around and around above the heat, right where Erod had tossed it into the blaze. His fingers pulsed as his power held it in place, until suddenly the medallion exploded with light. Everyone fell to the ground, covering their eyes from the glare. Muffled noises made it to my ears, and I realized that a fight was taking place next to me, though I was blind to see between whom. A deep yelp came from the scuffle, and the sound stopped.
 

Strong hands rested on my shoulders and pulled me up from the ground. Erod, though I couldn’t see him, was holding me aloft, whispering hoarsely into my ear.

“I have taken it from him. Your key. My patience with this is at an end. Take it and go. You must run, Aster. Run back to the castle, save your people if you can. Then follow this to the book.” He placed something hard and heavy in one of my hands that he pried away from my eyes. My eyes watered with the pain of the brightness being let through by only one hand. “It lies deep in the Fire Mountains, though without this, entry to the mountain is impossible. I will move you now, point you in the right direction. When I give the command, you must run. Do you understand? They will be immediately upon you. Do not forget the speed of my people. You will have little time.”

I nodded, squinting hard.
 

“What about you?” I said. “They’ll attack you. They’ll—”

“He was not to be convinced. I gave the fool the chance, but I see no other way. Do not worry for me. I will prepare them for the battle to come,” he said. “Stay here a moment. When the light goes out, and you feel the chain in your hand, run.”

His hands released my shoulders. I held the object in my left and kept my right hand over my eyes. Despite his assurances, my whole body rattled with worry over Erod. What would they do to him after such a betrayal?

Then, everything went black, my hand was wrested from my eyes, and the chain was dropped into it.

“Go now!” Erod shouted into my ear.

I didn’t need telling twice. With my eyes completely blind to the night, I ran.

In moments I had made it to the top of the closest hill. I turned back just long enough to see the chaos I had left behind. Erod, glowing brightly with his strange power, was fighting off Druce, who had taken his ax and was trying to butcher him with it. Few seemed to realize that I was gone, and only those on the outskirts of the group were looking around, trying to see which direction I had headed. I turned and ran over the precipice, barreling down the other side towards Riverstone.

What had I just agreed to?

The day-long trek took me maybe twenty minutes. I was banking on the hope that the other villagers couldn’t run like Erod could. But I couldn’t take too many chances. I had maybe an hour to spare comfortably. I had to move.

But as my feet flew over the dark, rocky fields, panic filled me for a different reason.
 

I had gone to Erod’s village to get answers about why Almara had gone mad. But instead of answers, I had been given a task. An impossible task that not even talented wizards had been able to complete. Almara’s task. To level the Fold.
 

The tall stone gates hovered over me in the moonlight as I sped towards the city. Everything was quiet. Jade and Almara, if they were still here, weren’t making their presence known.
 

I stopped, looking behind me. Occasional blue flashes burst up from behind the mountains that surrounded the Solitary village. The battle between Erod and his people still raged. But some had broken away. Barely visible at such a distance, like a cloud of tiny fireflies falling from the sky, the faint flickering of torches streamed down the steep hillsides on the outskirts of the village.

They were coming.

My stomach dropped. Their speed, while not so fast as Erod, meant that we didn’t have much time, not even the hour I had hoped for. I bolted, careening towards the castle at top speed.
 

When I burst through the entry, I didn’t dare shout out for them. The last thing I needed was for Almara to launch a Torrensai now, when I, we, were being pursued by a horde of angry villagers.
 

“Jade?” I hissed into the open, empty space. “Jade? Are you here?”
 

There was no answer. I bolted up the staircase and into the room where I had last seen her.