Endless Night (23 page)

J
asn Volth stood
on the outskirts of the small village of K’ral, staring at the collection of buildings in the early morning sunlight. Dew glistened on grass and on the slate roofs, and a cool breeze pulled on his cloak. The air smelled of earth and the fresh rain and life, a stark difference to what he’d experienced while in Rens. There, all he’d known had been death and the hardness of the lands.

The draasin sat on the other side of the hill. Even from where he stood, Jasn could feel the heat radiating from her body, the power of fire that flared in her lungs. The ride had been exhilarating and terrifying at the same time. Somehow, Ciara had handled it easily.

A part of him wondered if he should have remained in the barracks rather than attempting to travel to Hyaln, but he had agreed. And Ciara seemed to think he needed to speak to the old woman here. She seemed to know something about the darkness, the shadows that Cheneth and the others from the barracks understood.

Jasn made his way down the gentle slope, his boots slipping on the damp grass, and reached the flat area around the village itself. Ciara had asked that he wait, that he give her time with the woman first, and he had been willing to do so, but now he went, knowing that it was time that they continue onward.

Which home would be hers? Knowing that she was some sort of leader to these people did nothing to help him find her.

Using earth sensing to guide him, he focused on the village. Once, he would never have claimed much strength in earth, but that was before he’d studied with Alena. There was no doubting that she had increased his skill and that because of her instruction, he had managed to develop a level of proficiency he never would have thought possible in Atenas. Not only strength, but subtlety with shaping as well, a way of shielding his work. Using earth, he reached throughout the village, searching for the sense of Olina and Ciara.

At the edge of the village, he found them.

Jasn walked to Olina’s home. He could have used a shaping, but he wanted to think about what he would say when he arrived. There were questions he’d wanted answered for the past year, and if she had any answers, he wanted to know them.

As he reached her home, the door swung open.

The old woman stood in the doorway, leaning on a gnarled cane with carvings set along its length. She wore a simple white dress, and her gray hair was pulled back in a braid. When he neared, she tapped her cane twice on the ground, making a loud
snap
, and something like a shaping built, reminding him of the way Ciara summoned her power.

“You are later than I expected.”

“Where is Ciara?”

“She has returned to the draasin. You and I must speak first.” She tapped her cane twice more, and again it snapped loudly against the ground.

Jasn touched the hilt of his sword before following her. This was why he had come. What might she know that could help him find answers?

The inside of her home was modest. A plain, stout wooden table with three mismatched chairs around it took up most of the space along one wall. The wide hearth at the other end of the home crackled with a soft fire. Stacks of ceramic jars were shoved into another corner. A simple pallet to sleep on took the other.

“Sit. Sit.” She took a pot of water from the hearth and poured a bitter-smelling, steaming liquid into two mugs.

“I’m fine,” Jasn said.

She offered one of the mugs to him. “You have traveled during the night to reach me. You should sit. And drink.”

Her voice carried the same command he’d heard from officers within the order. Jasn sat with a smile and took the mug.

“Traveling at night is more dangerous than any other time?”

She tapped the side of her nose. “You have seen him, so don’t think to play coy with me.”

“Tenebeth?”

She nodded. “Those who serve him prefer the darkness. Better to hide their shadows. Tenebeth cares little for such things, but it’s his servants who do. Best to make certain that you’re protected.”

Jasn pulled the mug to his nose and sniffed. As she poured it, he had thought it bitter, but there were hints of mint and sweetness mixed in as well. “What is it?”

“Only something to take away the chill.”

“I haven’t been tainted, if that’s what you fear.”

She tapped her cane on the ground. In the confines of the small house, the
crack
that erupted nearly split his skull. “You don’t know what Olina fears, now do you?”

Jasn frowned and had started to set the mug down when Olina cracked her cane against the ground again. He looked up and saw her standing only a few steps away, now with the cane outstretched. The carvings along the side reminded him of the runes used on the draasin pens, the same runes that secured earth within the shaping. As he stared at the cane, he realized that some of the shapes glowed.

With a nod, he brought the liquid to his lips and took a careful drink. It was hot and nearly burned his throat, and tasted about as it smelled. Not unpleasant, but he would have preferred a mug of ale or glass of spiced wine instead.

As he drank, Olina nodded. “Now. You have returned to K’ral, warrior. What is it that you want?” She settled into one of the wooden chairs and kept her hand on her cane.

Did she use it to augment shaping in some way? When she tapped the cane, Jasn felt the way the shaping built from it, though he had none of the ability to detect what element she shaped. That alone was unusual, especially after the time he’d spent in the barracks studying.

“I thought you were expecting me. Not able to tell what I want, too?”

“Just because Cheneth sent word that you were coming doesn’t mean that I knew
why
, warrior.”

Jasn hid his surprise behind the mug, taking another drink as he did. With each sip, the steaming liquid scalded his throat. He considered shaping it cooler but suspected that would only upset Olina. “I want to know what happens to those he claims,” he said softly.

She grunted and lifted her cane as if to tap it on the ground again, but instead poked his chest. “You think it’s safe for you to ask these questions, Wrecker?”

She knew who he was. Jasn shouldn’t be surprised. And, likely if she spoke to Cheneth, then she also spoke to the elementals and knew he had been tainted at one time.

“I think there are questions I need to ask and answers I need to find,” he said carefully. “That’s the reason he sends me to Hyaln.”

“What is it that the Wrecker of Rens would like to know about Tenebeth? Does he think to call to the darkness? Does he think that will make him stronger as he faces Rens?”

“If you speak to Cheneth, then you know the answer to that already.”

She grunted. “Cheneth shares only what he chooses. And he only shared that you were coming, nothing beyond that.”

Jasn chuckled. At least they had that in common. “I think Tenebeth claimed someone I cared about.”

Part of him still couldn’t believe Katya might live. He’d spent a year—more than that—thinking her gone, willing to die himself. And maybe she
was
gone. Maybe if Tenebeth had claimed her, she was as good as dead, but he didn’t want to believe that, not if they had managed to heal a tainted draasin.

Olina tilted her head to the side and studied him with her deep blue eyes. She settled her cane on her lap as she stared and tapped at it with her fingers. “It explains much, doesn’t it?” she said softly. Jasn realized she wasn’t speaking to him but didn’t know whether she spoke to herself or the elementals. “That is why you went to Rens.” She looked up and met his eyes with a hint of sadness in her expression. “You didn’t know of your connection to water then, did you?”

Was it compassion or pity in her eyes as she stared at him? Either way, it didn’t matter. He had come to terms with his fate long ago. “I didn’t know,” he said. “I wanted revenge for what happened to her. For what I thought had happened to her,” he said, correcting himself. And now he had no revenge and didn’t know what had happened to Katya. Alena didn’t even know. That might be the hardest part of it.

“You will not find revenge with Tenebeth,” Olina said. “There have been others who have tried, and all have suffered the same fate.”

“And what fate is that?”

She lifted her cane and set it on the ground next to her. “He turns them.”

They sat in silence for a few moments until Jasn broke it. “What can you tell me about those he turns? Where do they go? What do they do?”

She sighed. “Some become the riders. You saw a rider twisted by Tenebeth.”

“Thenas,” Jasn said. “His name was Thenas. He trained with Cheneth as well.”

The corners of Olina’s eyes wrinkled. “Cheneth came too late to understanding the real risk, and now there is only so much that he can do.”

“Why did you not help?

“There is nothing that the exiles from Hyaln could do. Not with
them
.”

“Them?”

“You will learn soon enough. If Hyaln accepts you, you will learn.”

Jasn sighed. “How can I find her?”

Olina turned to the fire and took a drink from her mug as she shook her head. “There is no finding Tenebeth.”

“I don’t want to find Tenebeth. I need to find
her
.”

“As I said, there is no finding Tenebeth, for he will find you. And that is why Cheneth sent you here. Now rest, Wrecker, and we will learn if you pose a risk by going to Hyaln.”

J
asn awoke
to find Olina staring down at him. She watched him with her bright blue eyes, leaning on her cane as she did, the crooked fingers of her left hand caressing the runes on the cane.

“You have been here long enough.”

Jasn slid back and looked around. The fire had faded, leaving little more than glowing embers. The mug he’d been drinking from rested near the wall, the steam still drifting from the top of it making him wonder if she had shaped what she’d brewed for him. “How long has it been?”

Jasn rubbed the sleep from his eyes as he worked to clear his head. Dreams had haunted him while he slept, memories of Katya and of their last few days together, mixing with the fear of what he suspected had happened to her. If she had been claimed by Tenebeth, was she even his Katya anymore?

In the dreams, other questions had come, but one had bothered him the most: had she ever been his Katya?

She hadn’t told him about the barracks or what she did there and the way she learned about the draasin. Jasn doubted he would have understood anyway. Before he’d lost her, he had been committed to water and the healers. The idea of what he would become would have been too foreign for him to understand.

“Long enough, Wrecker of Rens.”

Jasn stood and leaned against the wall. He felt as if he’d slept for weeks rather than for hours. His head throbbed, almost as if he’d had too much ale.

His gaze drifted to the still-steaming mug. Was this what Cheneth had wanted?

The old man told him that Olina could offer a way to Hyaln, but Jasn hadn’t expected anything like this. This… He didn’t know
what
this was.

Starting toward the door, he staggered, needing to hold on to the wall to keep himself from falling. Had she poisoned him?

Olina watched him, not making any effort to help.

He should have been more alert. What had he been thinking coming here, risking himself by appearing at this woman’s home, not knowing anything about her other than that she seemed to know Cheneth. And he didn’t even know if that were true.

Reaching for water, for the elementals, he sensed them distantly. Calling to them still didn’t come naturally to him, not as it seemed to for Alena and Wyath.

Am I poisoned?
he asked the elementals.

He attempted to shape water, to direct it inwardly, but shaping didn’t come to him as it should.

The elementals surged, and a cold flush washed over him.

You are unharmed.

Unharmed. Then what had happened?

When he reached the door, he threw it open and looked outside. Bright sunlight streamed in and he shielded his eyes against it.

“What did you do to me?” he asked, turning back to see Olina standing near her hearth. A soft glow surrounded her.

“Do? I do nothing, Wrecker. Only what was asked of me. You would pose a risk going to Hyaln if you were not tested.”

His legs began to give out, and he pulled on an earth shaping to strengthen him. “Cheneth had you do this to me?”

She snapped her cane against the ground. A shaping surged over him. “He is enlightened, but he does not always know what he asks.”

Jasn staggered back into her home. His legs wouldn’t carry him even were he to risk venturing outside her home. Shaping might help, but in his current condition, he didn’t dare risk attempting to travel that way. Not until his mind cleared more.

“Why? Why would you do this to me?”

“Why?” She snapped her cane again, and again a shaping washed over him.

Jasn still couldn’t detect the intent of the shaping or what it did to him. Was it the shaping that incapacitated him? If it did, where was the water elemental that had always healed him in the past?

“If you are to go to Hyaln, you must be free of any darkness. If you are not, even those you care about will be in danger.”

“Then I won’t go to Hyaln. I’ll find Katya…”

Olina sniffed. “As I told you, you cannot search for Tenebeth. He comes to you. And if you intend to return your friend, you must be ready. Not only your ability to shape, to use the elements to protect yourself, but your mind. That must be safe.”

She took a step toward him and snapped her cane on the ground again. “There is a reason Tenebeth cannot touch my mind. Much like he cannot touch Cheneth.”

She grunted and suddenly was right in front of him. How had he missed her moving so quickly? With a sharp
snap snap snap
, she made a circle around him. Jasn went rigid, unable to move. “There are things Cheneth cannot teach. Even he knows this. At least he recognizes that he must seek help.”

“Now. You have gone through the first of the cleansing. This is the second. I will not promise that it won’t hurt, but if you come through, you will be stronger than you were before. Only then will you be allowed to travel to Hyaln. Only then will you not pose a danger to others.”

She danced around him again, her cane quickly snapping along the ground. Jasn lost track of it, the steady rhythm as it struck the wood floor. Each time it struck, there came the pressure of a shaping that washed over him. He fought it at first, but realized quickly that he could do nothing to oppose it. It slammed into him with the same rhythm of her cane, tossing him around in the confines of the circle she made.

Flashes of color swirled around him.

The pain and fogginess in his mind began to clear and he reached for a shaping. Whatever Olina intended with him, he would stop. Earth came to him, answering his call, but when he attempted to shape against what she did, he found that nothing changed, as if what he attempted bounced off the shaping Olina worked.

For a moment, he contemplated unsheathing his sword. He even reached for it, but when he attempted to pull it from its hilt, the sword wouldn’t move.

There was nothing he could do.

The tapping of her cane against the ground came louder and more steadily, the pace of it increasing as she circled around him.

Shaping after shaping spilled over him, slamming into him, rocking him from side to side until he no longer resisted the effect. What good would it do him to fight? The shaping struck him again and again. His mind cleared, but was that because of his fear of what was happening or because of what Olina actually did?

Then she stopped.

She tapped her cane another three times. Each
snap
came louder than the one before. With the last, the shaping exploded from her and settled over him, pushing downward as if attempting to slide through his body.

When the shaping passed, the confines of the circle lifted.

He stumbled forward, trying to keep his footing. The weakness that had overcome him had lifted as well. Now he was left with a sense of fatigue, but not as he’d had before. This was the sense he had when running for a long time, or shaping for hours, nothing like the strange lack of clarity he’d had before she began shaping.

What had Olina done to him?

He attempted a shaping. Water first. Always water.

Power surged from him, stronger than it had in some time. He strained for the elementals and found the connection to them just at the back of his mind. Attempting to reach the other elements found them equally accessible.

“You are clear, Wrecker. At least that much is in our favor. But I do not know what will happen when you reach Hyaln.”