Free Born of Fire (The Cloud Warrior Saga Book 8) by D.K. Holmberg

know what we face,” Roine said.
    “Not if you intend for us to provide rule over another nation. And I know that Tannen might think he’s doing what’s best, but he should not be the one—”
    “ I am the one who defeated the Utu Tonah.” Tan stepped forward as he spoke, placing himself between his mother and Roine. “You may think we are the victors, but in Par-shon, I am the victor.”
    “You can’t think—” his mother started.
    “I can,” Tan interrupted. “You would have shut down the borders, you would have barricaded the kingdoms and abandoned Incendin and Doma, thinking that Chenir had already been lost. So please do not presume to tell me what to do.”
    He took a deep breath, already regretting the way that he’d spoken to them and fearing the way that his mother would react. Since the destruction of their home village to the lisincend, she had been an angrier person, fueled by a drive to defeat Incendin, but also one who wanted to protect Tan as much as she could. The problem was that there wasn’t anything that she could do to protect him, not as she wanted to. There were things that he had to do, and learn, on his own. They were the things that had brought him the knowledge and skills needed to defeat Par-shon. Without his connection to the elements and the elementals, everything and everyone would have been lost.
    Roine started laughing.
    His mother shot him a hard glare, but Roine shook his head and nodded to Tan.
    “Whenever I think I know what I’m doing, Tan comes along and shows me how little I’ve figured out,” Roine said. “The boy is right, Zephra. We would have lost had it not been for him. Maybe not yet. We would have secured ourselves behind the barriers, but eventually. It would have been slow, and painful, and many others would have suffered before we fell. And now he’s no longer my Athan. He’s my equal.”
    Zephra studied Tan, her head shaking slightly as she did. “And he’s not a boy,” she said softly. “So I must stop thinking of him as one.”
    Roine chuckled. “I think you’ll struggle to see him as anything different than the child you raised, but I can see him as the man he’s become. Much greater than anything I had ever thought to find when I came to Nor. It seems so long ago that I came looking for the artifact. What I found was so much more.” he sighed. “So Tannen. You are the Utu Tonah. Is that what you came to share with me?”
    Tan struggled to process the sudden change. “I don’t want to be Utu Tonah,” he answered.
    “And I don’t want to be King Regent, so I guess we are well matched, then.”
    “Which means you both are better suited for the job than most,” Zephra added. “I would be more concerned if either of you wanted the job.”
    “I don’t want to be Utu Tonah,” Tan repeated, “but I don’t know that I can trust anyone else to rule in Par-shon until I understand their lands.”
    “You won’t find those answers here,” Roine said.
    “There was something else I discovered. I intended to see if I could find answers in the archives.”
    Roine nodded slowly. “You didn’t intend to come to us at all, did you?”
    “I would have eventually. But the archives were locked.”
    “Until we come up with a plan for all those texts, I thought it best to keep it locked. There are some who have come forward, wanting to resurrect the archivists, but I’ve been careful with them so far.” Roine paused and glanced to Zephra. “Besides, it is good that you’ve come. We have news to share with you.”
    Tan readied himself for whatever awful news they might have, but what his mother said next still surprised him.
    “Theondar has asked me to marry him. And I’ve said yes.”
    Tan looked from Roine and then to his mother, smiling. “Good. Maybe then we can have a joint wedding.”
    Roine smiled, but his mother’s mouth twitched, and whether from irritation or another emotion, he couldn’t tell.

6
    Honl’s Search
    T he lower