The Light of All That Falls, page 8
“The last set of visions in the Journal show Ilin Illan in ruins, abandoned. Irreparable without years of work. Structures melted to the ground, the Builders’ creations destroyed.” Dras kept his gaze on the ground as he spoke. “Other correlating visions show that the south survives. One in particular suggests that it all happens close to the Festival of Ravens, which is why we got the Houses to leave before the festival last year. We don’t know the exact year it will happen, but as Prythe is Andarra’s second-largest city, and easily its most important in the south, we made the assumption—and the Council continues to believe—that the capital will shift to there, at least temporarily, after it does.”
Another heavy, shocked silence greeted the words.
“And if Ilin Illan falls, the north is presumably either lost or suffers greatly.” It was Laiman, the first of them to recover enough to speak; even so, his voice had an uncharacteristic quaver to it. “Withdrawing from the Assembly leaves the southern Houses with no obligation to provide manpower, supplies, other resources—if they’re not part of the government, then they are simply wealthy families with vast holdings. King Andras would have no legal way to compel them to contribute to a defense. And be in no position to enforce such demands, even if he tried.”
“Yes.” Dras’s confirmation held no emotion. “This way, we get to form a government with allies who still have much to offer. The surviving part of the country will stay strong.”
The words ignited a dark fury in Wirr. “And everyone in the north is… what? Unimportant?”
“To an extent,” conceded Dras.
Wirr gaped at him, not knowing how to respond. This year’s festival was only two weeks away.
Though Laiman, Taeris, and Driscin immediately began firing related questions, Dras knew little more than he’d already said: Ilin Illan would be completely scorched, leveled by fire, but there was no indication of how or why it would happen.
After a few minutes, Driscin shifted, eyes glinting as he glanced up at the position of the moon and then in the direction of Tol Shen.
“We are out of time. In fact, we should already have started heading back. Someone will be checking on him very soon.”
Wirr gave a short nod. He wanted nothing more than to keep Dras here, or better yet to force him to return to Ilin Illan and admit to all he had done. But Tol Shen would just drown out the truth with claims of a forced, false confession. For now, the information they had gained would have to be enough.
He stretched cramped, cold muscles as he rose from his seat, the others following his example. The surrounding forest was blessedly silent except for the occasional rustle of leaves in the breeze.
“How did Tol Shen find out about my ability to bind people?” Wirr asked Dras suddenly. It was by far the least of their concerns, right now, but it had been vexing him. This would be his last chance to find out for a while.
“Rethgar told us,” said Dras. “It’s why we tried to have you assassinated during your dinner at the Tel’Rath estate.”
Everyone froze, and Wirr heard Driscin muttering a disbelieving curse under his breath.
“You were behind that?” Wirr asked, though his tone was more weary than angry now. Any other time the information would have shocked him; on the heels of learning about the destruction of Ilin Illan, it seemed like little more than a footnote.
Then he cocked his head to the side, registering the timing. “Wait—you knew about my ability before I did? How?”
“Rethgar told us,” repeated Dras.
The name meant nothing to Wirr, but Laiman and Taeris both wore utterly stunned, horrified expressions. “Rethgar Tel’An?” clarified Laiman, his voice hollow.
“Yes.”
“Sire, we really need to go,” said Driscin, apologetic urgency in his voice. “You need to bind Dras now.”
“Just wait.” Wirr glared at Dras. “Who is this Rethgar? How did he find out, then?”
“He was one of the sig’nari, and a Council member for Tol Athian,” interjected Driscin quickly before Dras could respond, tightness increasingly threaded through his tone. “Taeris can probably tell you more about who he was; I’d assumed he’d died in the war. I have no idea how he’s been communicating with anyone in Shen—I’ve been kept in the dark about far too many things, apparently.” He sounded nauseous. “I’ll find out what I can from Dras on the way back, but we truly have to go. Now.”
“He passed on information mostly through Lyrus,” added Dras. “I haven’t heard from him since Lyrus’s death. I don’t know how he knew about you. Lyrus knew even before the Blind attacked, but he didn’t want to take action until you’d changed the Tenets.”
Wirr groaned in frustration. There were so many more answers he wanted from Dras, and simply not enough time to get them all from him.
“How in fates did you convince former Administrators to—”
“Sire.”
Wirr gritted his teeth, but he knew the mounting panic in Driscin’s voice wasn’t without reason. The portal back to Daren Tel would be running out of Essence soon, too. “Dras, you will return with Driscin and do everything you can to avoid being discovered. You’ll tell him everything you know about Rethgar on the way back. Once you’re in your bed, you will fall asleep and completely forget everything that has happened this evening, believing yourself to have slept the entire night through.”
Driscin gave a sharp, relieved nod. “I’ll send word when I can.”
He grabbed Dras roughly by the arm and dragged him away into the darkness.
As the sounds of Driscin and Dras making their way through the undergrowth faded beneath the breeze, Wirr exhaled, turning to his other companions. The two men were still silent, but it took only a glance to know that something was badly amiss.
“You know who this Rethgar is?” he asked.
Taeris opened his mouth as if to reply, then shut it again and glanced at Laiman, who nodded slowly.
“We do. We killed him more than twenty years ago. An accident,” the king’s adviser explained softly.
“He was our first attempt at a sha’teth.”
Chapter 3
Davian strolled the quiet streets of Caladel, his step light, enjoying the crisp warmth of the early-morning sun as it competed with a fresh breeze sweeping in off the harbor.
Mistress Alita had woken him before dawn to fetch supplies from town, but he found himself not minding today. The walk here along the cliff top, with the sun barely peeking over the horizon, had been especially peaceful as he’d watched Caladel’s fleet of fishing boats far below slide out into the Vashian Ocean for their day’s work. Even now, in the town itself, the rhythmic lapping of waves was still audible over the idle chatter of merchants setting up in the next street. The harborside village felt sleepy rather than its usual, bustling self. He liked it.
He paused, getting his bearings, then ducked down an alley and into a side street. If he was quick enough in completing his chores today, there might even be time to swim before returning to the school.
Footsteps echoed abruptly behind him, and before he thought to turn, a meaty hand was roughly grasping his arm.
Davian flinched, instinctively trying to shrug off the iron grip. He twisted to see a large man with blond hair and weather-beaten skin looming over him, expression sour; two more men stood off to the side, their eyes cold as they watched.
“What are you doing?” asked Davian indignantly, trying again to squirm out of the big man’s grasp. Had these men mistaken him for someone else? The street was empty behind them, he realized to his sudden concern.
“He’s just a child, Tanner,” said the one with a strong jaw and muscular physique, looking bored. They were all fishermen, from the looks of them, though why they weren’t out with their boats already, Davian couldn’t imagine. “Not worth it.”
Tanner—the big man—ignored his companion and stared at Davian, lip curled.
“You working for the bleeders, boy?” Tanner asked, his breathing oddly heavy. Davian’s nose wrinkled at the sharp tang of alcohol. Mistress Alita was always muttering about men who drank early, and this was definitely early.
“Gifted,” corrected Davian automatically. He’d used that other word in Mistress Alita’s presence, once. It was possible that he was physically incapable of saying it anymore.
The polite term was the wrong thing to say here, though, clearly. Tanner’s eyes flashed and he spun, not relinquishing his grip on Davian’s arm, dragging him wordlessly toward a nearby building. A tavern, from the sign. Silent at this hour, but clearly open.
Davian struggled in vain, shoulder aching where his arm had been yanked, protesting vigorously. The two other men trailed after them into the dingy building, looking uneasy.
The tavern smelled of sweat and stale wine. Only two people were inside: an older man sweeping—probably the owner—and another, younger man in a blue cloak, halfway through what looked like breakfast. Davian felt Tanner’s grip on his arm tighten.
“What is this?” The Administrator had stopped eating and stood, studying the scene with a frown as the sweeper halted his work and disappeared silently into the kitchen. The door locked behind him with a firm click.
“He works for the bleeders,” Tanner said roughly, a slight slur to his words. “You going to make trouble?”
Davian locked eyes with the Administrator, silently pleading for him to help. The man wavered, then walked over. He reached down and pushed back Davian’s left sleeve, revealing clear skin.
“No Mark. Not my place,” said the blue-cloaked man. Davian thought he saw something approaching shame in his eyes.
The Administrator gave a slight nod to Tanner and the other two men, then headed for the door.
Davian was watching him go, mouth agape, when the punch took him in his stomach.
Air exploded from his lungs and he went to the floor, wheezing from the blow. A vicious kick followed that clipped him on the chin, snapping his head back, sending his vision spinning and ears ringing. There was laughter, then shouting, then more blows followed by a confusion of angry voices as he curled up into a ball, his world red and hazy.
Then, miraculously, it all stopped.
Davian rasped and moaned; there was someone else in the room now, furiously protesting what was happening, though he couldn’t lift his head to see who. His arm dangled uselessly at his side, and something—multiple things—in his chest felt broken.
As he lay there, though, some of the pain began to just… dissipate. He was doing something. Something natural, something he’d done his entire life but never deliberately. Like a child recognizing for the first time that they could control their breathing, purposefully drawing in deep lungfuls of air.
His head cleared a little.
“This has gone far enough,” the new voice was snarling. “Let him go.”
Davian forced his gaze up to see a handsome, middle-aged man clad in red at the door, bodily restrained by Tanner’s two companions. He looked a mixture of furious and terrified.
Tanner gestured, not noticing that Davian had recovered enough to observe. “Too late for that, bleeder,” he said, words slurred, a wild glee in his eyes. “You shouldn’t have started this. When you came to me, did you know that my father was murdered by your people? He did nothing wrong, but the fates-cursed Augurs said he’d killed someone. They muddied his name and then they hanged him. He cried at the end, you know? Begged for mercy? But they didn’t give it to him. I even believed that they were telling the truth about him.” His eyes were red rimmed and he jutted out his jaw, teeth bared. “And then three years later, we found out that they were all frauds. Just making it all up. They were criminals, and all of you who were helping them are just… evil. This thing you can do makes you that way. It needs to stop.”
The Gifted man had paled under the onslaught of drunken words, desperation in his eyes now.
“He’s just a boy,” he said, more to the two men holding him than to Tanner. “Do what you need to with me, but let him go.”
There was silence, and the burly, bearded man on the left hesitated, looking like he was about to agree.
Then the one on the right started, staring at Davian.
“Tanner,” he murmured. “His arm.”
Everyone turned to look at Davian and the red-cloaked man gasped, suddenly renewing his struggling.
It took Davian a second, woozy as he was, to realize why.
Tanner had drawn a knife from somewhere on his person. Short but with a wicked edge, the kind used to gut fish. It didn’t look as if it had been cleaned since its last use.
A surge of panic went through Davian as he comprehended the threat, but his shout was cut off by Tanner’s massive hand across his mouth.
Then the knife was large in his vision, blotting out the rest of the world.
The sharp steel started biting into his cheek, slow and deep, tracing a burning line down his face. He bucked, trying to tear himself away, but he may as well have been trying to shrug off a building. Fear and panic and helpless rage all coalesced in his chest, a feral tangle of wild emotions that balled up inside him, tight and hot.
Everything… dimmed. There was something else there. Something dark and powerful and violent.
Something that could help.
He reached out.
The cutting stopped, and Tanner’s suffocating grip on him loosened.
Davian wrenched himself free and stumbled away before tripping gracelessly, taking great, heaving breaths as he collapsed on the dirty wooden floor, vision blurred by tears and blood. When hands failed to grasp at him again he summoned the courage to lever himself up and twist back toward his assailants, teeth bared in defiance.
Tanner hadn’t moved to follow him. Instead his eyes were wide, staring at the bloodstained knife in his hand.
“Tanner?” The bearded man, still holding the Gifted back, looked increasingly anxious. “What are you doing?”
Slowly, Tanner raised the knife to his own cheek. His hands trembled as they began slicing an unsteady line down his skin. The cut was deep; blood spilled silently from the wound, gushing onto the collar of his shirt.
Everyone else watched in frozen, wide-eyed disbelief.
“Please,” Tanner whimpered, confusion in his eyes.
Then he began to scream, even as he continued to cut.
Davian scrambled madly backward with a cry, unable to look away from the horrific sight. Behind Tanner, the other three men—including the Gifted—had started to move, too.
One drew a blade from his belt; the other two fetched knives from the settings at nearby tables.
And then they started to cut themselves too, their panicked, pained cries creating a nightmarish chorus with Tanner’s.
“Stop!” Davian screamed, putting his bloodied hands over his ears to blot out their shrieks. “Just stop!”
An abrupt quiet, almost as shocking as the screams.
All four men crumpled to the ground, blades clattering from their hands. Davian stayed scrunched up where he’d collapsed beneath a table, breath coming in short, sharp gasps. His three attackers weren’t moving but the Gifted was stirring, dragging himself over to where Davian lay cowering. Blood streamed freely down his face, dark red and glistening. He reached out gently, but Davian couldn’t help but flinch away.
The Gifted swallowed as he forced his hand to Davian’s chest.
“I never wanted this. Not this,” he whispered as a trickle of healing Essence began to flow into Davian, tears of shame in his eyes. “I’m so, so sorry.”
Everything faded.
Davian woke to find the featureless darkstone roof of his cell staring back at him.
He gazed at it, steadying his breathing. For so many years, that one day in Caladel had been nothing but a blur; his mind had shied away from touching on it, even his dreams of it nothing more than a hazy mélange of events.
Since Rethgar’s visit, he had relived it in excruciating detail… five times, now? He knew what was happening, too—that it was more than a simple memory. His ability to See had started taking him back to that moment in his life, again and again. Just as had happened to Malshash with his wedding day.
He rubbed his face and then hauled himself up into a sitting position, swiveling to perch on the side of his small cot.
He had killed those men, instinctively Controlled them and then drained too much of their Essence—he’d been certain of that since the first time he’d relived it. There was still a lingering horror at the thought: not guilt, necessarily, but certainly regret.
More to the point, though, it meant that Taeris had willingly taken the blame for what Davian had done.
Wirr had told him that he needed to give Taeris another chance, the last time they had spoken. Had he known, somehow?
And were Taeris’s scars—his ongoing cutting of his own face—a result of what Davian had done that day? Some remnant of the Control he’d used?
Davian shook his head with a heavy sigh, levering himself to his feet. Tanner’s form had been the one he had accidentally taken on when he’d shape-shifted in Deilannis, too. He had thought long and hard about that—suspected he knew what it meant, now. It would certainly explain why Malshash had seemed so horrified at the time.
There was little point in dwelling on it now, though.
It was just another problem for after he got out of here.
He began his daily routine. Walking the perimeter of his near-empty, twenty-foot-wide cell to loosen his muscles, then dashing from wall to wall for a few minutes, then a series of strengthening exercises he knew from his memories of Aelric’s training. Those drills had been hard, the first few months. Now he barely felt a mild burn in his muscles after he finished.
Food came next. As it did at the same time every day, the small section in the darkstone wall slid away around dawn, a steel bowl and fresh bucket pushed smoothly through the slot on a rotating shelf before the opening immediately ground shut again. He didn’t bother trying to thread kan through that brief gap anymore. It had taken six months for him to gain enough control here to attempt that—only to discover that the meals were delivered through some sort of interconnecting chamber, and that there was a secondary darkstone barrier between him and his guards anyway.
