Valkwitch (The Valkwitch Saga Book 1) (31 page)

Eventually, she fell and crashed to the uneven surface
of the plateau with a grunt, any disappointment tempered by the satisfaction of
a new taste of power. The blossoming of earth continued within, though the
weight had shrunk from the rapid usage.

“Take off your boots,” Settan said while looking
her over. “It may be easier if you’re barefoot. I’ll clear a patch for you.”

Settan knelt down a couple paces from her and
brushed away a patch of loose rock. He then pressed his palm firmly against the
ground. His arm tensed up in effort, corded ridges and ranges of muscle sprouted
up through his shoulder. Then his hand sank into the ground, as if it were clay
instead of stone. Ripples in the stone radiated out from his hand. The loose
rocks and pebbles melted into the greater whole of the plateau without a trace,
creating an expanding circle as flat as flagstones.

Tyrissa paused with her boot laces in her fingers
and watched the Shaper at work with his element. It must be simple work for
him, but she found it enchanting. The expanding circle reached where she sat
and parted around her, the pebbles refusing to fall into the whole.

Wind into Earth. Earth into Wind.

Flows of air distinct from the riftwinds rippled across
her skin. The leashed and attendant currents ruffled clothes and tugged gently at
her hair. Her fingers felt defter, and flew through the unlacing of her boot in
a display of excessive grace. Tyrissa gave herself a small, satisfied smile,
but soon her head swam and stomach roiled as the once controlled core of earth
splintered and spread chaotically through her body. The two opposing elements
clashed, the earth within rejecting the air flowing around her. The violence of
the internal conflict went beyond the clash triggered by Vralin that night at
the mills.

Away! Push it away!

The winds complied, gusting away in an outward
blast that scattered small rocks and pebbles in a wide radius around her.
Tyrissa wrapped both arms around her stomach and focused on willing the
rebounding shards of earthen energy to gravitate back to her core. Inside, the
bundle of earth magick gradually coalesced to its neutral state, though errant
shards of magick still drifted through her body and caused her muscles to twitch
in anticipation.

Settan said nothing through the entire display, body
still as a statue and face a mask of thought.

“Two at once,” Tyrissa said to break the silence,
“especially opposites, might be a little advanced for me right now.” Sweat
soaked her brow and back, but within she felt the calm again, the core of
energy once again awaiting her will.

“I see,” Settan finally said, rising from his
mostly cleared circle. “Shall we continue?”

“Yes.” This was what she asked for, after all.

Time passed in a blur of tumbling and dodging
interspersed with moments of stillness spent listening to the constant whispers
of the riftwinds and bathing in the lingering, endless magick in the air. After
the fourth break Settan returned the stone barrel and began to dress. Tyrissa noted
that his skin had deepened into what she guessed was a healthier color, less
pale gray and more brown, and there were fewer flecks of stone scabs clinging to
him.

“That is enough here for today,” he said. A
partial twilight had come to the plateau after the sun passed over the western
side of the Rift. “Keep it short. You did well. You learn quicker than an
initiate though I must be cautious when Shaping near you.”

“We’re done?” Tyrissa stood, but placed a hand on
her stomach. “I still have some left.” She didn’t want another loss of
consciousness from disuse. Not yet, anyway. Not when she was unsure where the
boundary between a slow release and unconsciousness lay. She walked over to
where her coat was pinned down. The gloworb still burned and should have enough
for the return journey.

“Good,” Settan said, now dressed. “You’ll need it
for the trip back up the tunnels. For the rest of the lesson.”

He smoothly turned in place and broke into a
sprint towards the gaping cavern entrance. “Try to keep up,” he shouted over
his shoulder as the darkness of the earth swallowed him.

Tyrissa swore and darted after him, feet striking the
earth with more certainty than ever before.

Khalanheim’s night sky was once again lit by pockets
of orange and red that brightened the gloom of the first night of winter. Despite
the recent mayhem, the Khalans weren’t tired of flames and the Skyfire Festival
was in full swing. The festival was a burst of revelry and reflection carried
out in defiance of the coming winter and in celebration of a new year. Fireworks
launched from the Sunset Span rocketed into the air above the Rift in brilliant
white arcs and exploded in fiery showers of every color imaginable. The fading
remnants of each explosion swirled on the riftwinds above the city, creating
multi-colored trails of fading stars that drifted through a nebula of smoke.

Tyrissa stood on an open veranda that wrapped
around the third floor of a Heights mansion, the fire-lit city stretching out
below. A string of party-goers lined the stonework railing in front of her. Another
series of bursts in the sky drew gasps of awe, and Tyrissa could hear the
cheers of the crowds thronging across the city beneath the false thunder
rolling across the sky. Down the hillside, many other mansions were similarly
lit up with private parties hosted and attended by the city’s elite. The view
from this Heights manor was superb, but Tyrissa couldn’t help but think the
festivities along the Rift would be more fun. For that matter, she’d rather be
in
the Rift training with Settan. They’d only had two sessions so far and she
had already improved her handling of elemental earth magicks to the point where
she tried to conserve a small amount whenever possible, the steady presence in
her core making her more surefooted. She was hungry for more practice, for more
familiarity with the flows and interaction of the elemental powers.

‘The wind drives fire’s dance’
. The
display in the sky made her think back to Ash. She felt that she needed to help
her, that the girl was caught up in a fight that would grind her down to
nothing. Perhaps that could be her contribution to the group: to break whatever
tie Ash had to Vralin. A decent idea even if she had no idea how to accomplish
it. Their meetings thus far were more chance than anything else, as unpredictable
as Ash’s elemental patron.

Tyrissa scanned the rooftops of Khalanheim, her eyes
catching little bursts of fiery light from smaller celebrations. The Skyfire
Festival was a stark contrast to the Morg equivalent, a subdued, even solemn
mid-winter feast when the days were all too brief. The difference must have
been a result of the mild, soft winters this far south. Liran had said that
they
might
see snow this year. Might! In any case, Tyrissa was working
tonight and was in no position to celebrate. She wore the full formal Cadre uniform
and cut a fine figure, Caliss having worked her magick once again, though this
time there was far more red than white to suit the occasion.

Olivianna Alvedo stood a short distance away
along the handrail, watching the fireworks with a young Khalan man. She wore
red, of course, with a string of garnets around her neck that dipped low
towards a generous neckline. It was her typical flaunting of the Khalan style,
an attention grabber among the similarly brilliant colored outfits of the
locals. The couple moved in a pattern: watch a burst of fireworks, he would
lean in and whisper some comment, she would laugh. It felt as scripted as a
stage play but, to be fair, she actually seemed to like this one.

The winds jumped higher and turned the cool night
air from refreshing to biting. Olivianna and her suitor turned from the railing
for the warmth of the party inside. Tyrissa followed, her charge’s red shadow.
Two waist-high decorative braziers flanked the double doors that led into the
mansion from the veranda, the flames within dancing wildly in the winds. Another
couple stood over one brazier and dropped a pair of tightly folded pieces of
paper into the fire in unison. Their wishes or goals for the new year would be
written on the paper, another aspect of the Skyfire festival wholly different
from the Morg version.

The chill followed for a few paces inside,
grasping at their clothes but foiled by the warmth of the massed attendees and
the dozens of torches, braziers, and candles spread around the ball room that
made up the entirety of the third floor of this mansion. Round tables lined
opposite walls of the hall and near the stairs stood a short stage occupied by
a band that was currently on a break. A single violinist filled the break with a
rambling, unrecognizable tune. Arched windows encased the entire room, each lit
by its own small flame. The steadier elchemical lights were put away for the
sake of tradition tonight, and all lighting was done with actual fire, shading
the ballroom in the warm, shifting orange glow of the collective flames. With
all the fire, wind and drinking going on across Khalanheim, Tyrissa marveled at
how the entire city didn’t burn down each year.

Olivianna guided them to their table where Jesca sat
alone in the guise of Joyce d’Haute. She’d been cold and quiet all night,
drinking perhaps too much wine given that she was on duty. This was their first
joint assignment since the Night of Thieves, as the papers called it, and the
first since Olivianna’s return from the falconry trip with the Van Brauns.
Security was airtight tonight, and the hosts hired the Cadre for the event. She
had seen not one member of the Talons tonight, either here or outside the
dozens of other events. The Thieves hit them the hardest that night, with the
majority of the fires set on Talon chapterhouses or the personal homes of their
leaders. More than any actual thievery, that night had one true purpose:
revenge. They were thoroughly successful. Since that night, there hasn’t been a
single kidnapping or high profile robbery. The Thieves were in hiding, recovering
from their orgy of law-breaking and murder. The damage was still being tallied
and Central had caught only a few possible culprits, the rest melting away into
the underground and shaded corners of the city like ghosts.

“Devoss, you should get us more wine,” Olivianna
said as she sat down across from Jesca. Tyrissa took up her watch next to one
of the arched windows where a line of tall candles scented the air with
cinnamon.

“Of course, Via.”

When Devoss was out of earshot Jesca asked, “Via?
What happened to ‘every syllable, every time’?”

“I like him enough to let it slide.”

“He looks like a fox, ready to steal from you.”
It was an apt comparison, with his pointed nose and reddish-brown hair. But he
was also well placed in a Major-tier guild that specialized in hauling cargo
along the Rilder River between Khalanheim and Rilderdam. A natural, strategic
choice for Alvedo, all in all.

“That’s hardly different from anyone else in this
city. What’s with you tonight Joyce?”

“Just doing my job,” Jesca said, heaped bitterness
into her words but Tyrissa suspected that Alvedo was one glass of wine past
noticing or caring.

Olivianna turned to Tyrissa. “Jorensen, I…” cast
her eyes around, struggling for a second. “I never thanked you for your
support. At the theater. It helped
so
much.”

Tyrissa gave Olivianna a hard, appraising stare.
Her face was flushed from the wine, redder than the make-up would account for.
It must be the drink talking. Tyrissa said nothing and waited.

“Thank you.”

There we go.

“You’re welcome, Miss Alvedo.”

“We don’t have to be so formal. I’m going home
soon, after all. May I call you Tyrissa?”

“No.”

“Very well,” she said, a flicker of disappointment
flashing across her face like a burst of light from the fireworks outside. She
still had trouble with being denied.

“But, really,” she pressed on, “Why did you help
me at all?”

“Because I’m a better person than you,” Tyrissa
said without hesitation.

“Well,
that’s
debatable, but I’ll let you
have it for now.”

Devoss returned and regained Olivianna’s entire
attention. Tyrissa tuned out their chatter and watched as a band of six
harlequins took to the center of the room, their checkered motley in appropriately
festive red and orange. Five set about tumbling and cart wheeling about to the
delight of the attendees. The sixth juggled flaming pins at the center of the
swirling, acrobatic performance, his feet a blur of little capers and dances.
Tyrissa gave him a close look, seeking out that mental tug of pact magicks.
There was no rhythmic beat at each contact with a juggled pin to be found. He
was normal. As much as she watched for unlikely mundane threats, Tyrissa also felt
out for any hint of Pactbound magicks nearby. But there was nothing and the
area was clear

The harlequins finished their act and cleared out
from the center of the room, pursued by applause and cheers. The band resumed
playing and struck into a tune that Tyrissa recognized as a version of
The Song
of Spirals
, though this version was decidedly more upbeat. Olivianna pulled
Devoss to his feet and the two headed for the dance floor. The dance was heavy
on spinning, the hems of dresses forming the spirals in the song.

Jesca continued to be a dark cloud over the
festivities. She intermittently floated around the mansion, acting as an on-site
manager for the band of Cadre members guarding the party.

“Joyce, are you quite well tonight,” Tyrissa said
in an attempt to soften Jesca’s attitude when she returned from another circuit.
Olivianna and Devoss conversed with a group of other couples a few tables away.

“Let’s say I had other plans for tonight than
watching ‘
Via’
enjoy herself. There’s no reason for me to be here.
You’re more than enough for the Alvedo job tonight. This is punishment in the
guise of duty. Thanks in part to your recklessness. I ‘displayed poor
management’ and now must manage this contract as well.”

Tyrissa had received word that any Cadre members
not on a contract were to lay low that night. She didn’t even think about
obeying those orders. Jesca had given Tyrissa a thorough dressing down when she
ran into the Cadre hall many hours late. That had apparently moved on up the
chain of command and Jesca in turn received a similar talk.

“I’m sorry.” She was sick of apologizing, but
what was one more?

Jesca sighed. “It wasn’t just you. Katarine and
Pharlain got up to some trouble as well.” She swirled her glass, now filled
with water, thinking for a moment. “There’s a lot of talk about Pactbound
fighting across the city that night. Including sightings of the one you were
so
interested in.”

Tyrissa said nothing. That night felt like it
occurred in a void, as if all the action had been out of sight from the
collective eyes of the city. Of course she could have been seen in the baker’s
plaza.

“I was worried, especially when you didn’t show
up until the afternoon.”

“Worried over nothing.”

“Bullshit. He’s Pactbound. The fact you’re alive
is a blessing.”

Tyrissa couldn’t argue there. She still thanked
the Ten for whatever reason that caused Vralin to stay his hand that night.

“Was it worth it? Whatever you were after that
night?”

“Yes.” Tyrissa said, knowing that should would do
it all again.