Free Endless Night by D.K. Holmberg Page A

before.
    “You can call spirit, but I caution you to practice before you have need. This might buy you time, but against a skilled shaper… Well, let’s say that even this has its limitations.”
    Oliver thought about what was asked of him. Could he really do what Cheneth wanted? Could what Cheneth claimed be real?
    But if it was, and if the Seat had been compromised, then Cheneth was right. Much more was in danger than he realized.
    “I will stay,” he said softly.
    He stared at the metal rod for a moment, and when he looked up, Cheneth was gone.

11

Ciara
    Atenas is compromised, but we have allies I had not expected. The extent of the threat remains unknown.
    —Rolan al’Sand, Enlightened of Hyaln

    “ W hy don’t we start again?” Cheneth asked.
    They stood in a mountainous area, far from where Ciara had been for the past few days, brought there by a shaping Cheneth had worked, traveling leagues in nothing more than the blink of an eye, almost as if traveling on lightning, but no thunder had followed. Nothing but silence.
    When the shapers of Ter had attacked in the past, they had always come on lightning with thunder trailing. That was how her people knew they came. And if there were no way to detect them, how would the people of Rens be safe?
    “I’ve tried all that I can,” Ciara said. She grabbed a branch and pulled on it, dragging the branch closer so that she could pluck the leaves off it.
    “I think you’ve tried all that you are willing to try. There is a difference.”
    “Why? What do you think this will do? What do you want me to do?”
    Cheneth stopped in front of her. In the days since she had first met him, she had begun to see he was nothing like the thin, elderly man she had first assumed him to be. There was strength behind his eyes and in the way he watched her. In some ways, it intimidated her. In others, knowing that he had such skill and knowing that he had no intent to attack Rens, it made her feel better.
    “I want you to remember what it was that you did when you began your…” He frowned as if searching for the right word. “Your dance. Now we are here to see what else you might be able to summon. You have shown earth, draasin, and supposedly nobelas.”
    “The lizard? Why do you and Olina both care so much about the lizard?”
    Cheneth glanced behind him, eyes narrowed, then he motioned for her to follow as he made his way through the trees and up the slope of the mountain. The earth had a mixture of rock and loose dirt that she slipped over as she made her way behind him. Tall pine trees grew too close together, as if they tried to squeeze out everything else that attempted to grow here. The air was heavy with their aroma, and the dried needles crunched beneath the boots Cheneth had given her, boots so different from the thin-soled leather sandals she had worn throughout Rens.
    He stopped near a small stream, one she hadn’t even sensed. What did it say about her water-sensing ability if she couldn’t even detect a full stream ? When she had been in Rens, this much water would have managed to keep her entire village alive indefinitely, but now she struggled to detect it. All the water around her made it difficult to detect anything with much clarity. She picked up the steady thrumming of Cheneth’s heart and the blood in his veins, and she sensed the way water moved through the trees, drawn up through the ground. The presence of water was so pervasive that it seemed to obscure everything else she attempted to sense.
    And then there was the chill on the air. She hadn’t been so attuned to the temperature before going to Tsanth. But the night that Olina had chained her outside the village, leaving her exposed to the darkness and the night, she had become very aware of the currents of heat and cold in the air. Had that come from riding the draasin?
    Or was it more?
    Olina seemed to think she could control fire, but Ciara doubted she could do anything more than summon the