Serpent of Fire (23 page)

Deep within his mind, he sensed Asboel’s strange chuckling laughter.

“I don’t think I’ve learned anything others can’t learn,” he said.

A bloom of fire pulsed the north and he turned them in that direction, making certain to stay clear of the hounds.

“Because you’re too dumb to see how unique your ability is,” Cianna said. “Even Seanan, the kingdoms’ best fire shaper, would have much he could learn from you.”

“Seanan wants to bond to the draasin. I think he’s jealous of what you have.”

“He is more skilled than me,” Cianna said.

“Maybe. But he also wanted me to force the bond. He has no understanding. Without a willingness to listen to fire, he will never understand how to reach it.”

They started down toward the ground. Before finding Cora, he needed to know if kaas was already here. Tan couldn’t tell what he sensed. It was massive, and fire was a part of it, but only a part. Not the hounds. They had drawn on his fire sense in an uncomfortable way. Could it have been the lisincend?

Cianna snorted. “Now you sound like a priest.”

“Better than being stupid,” Tan said, touching them down to the ground. The rocks here were free of any of the dangerous Incendin plants. There was nothing here, nothing but rock. Still, he sensed massive fire.

“The priests are stupid,” Cianna said. “They go blathering on about reaching the Great Mother through prayer when those of us with the ability to shape already know that the way to the Great Mother is to allow her to come to you.”

“
Now
who sounds like a priest?” Tan asked.

Cianna grinned. “Helps that I was raised by one.”

“Your father was a priest?” Tan crouched low to the ground, staring at it and trying to get a sense of what had drawn him here.
Could
it be kaas?

Cianna looked at him askance, as if trying to understand what he was doing. “Not all of us can be descended from prolific shapers.”

“I didn’t even know my father was a shaper when I was young. It wasn’t until hearing from Roine that I learned what he could do. My mother never shared with me that she was Zephra, the wind shaper, either. So I guess you could say that
I
didn’t really grow up with prolific shapers.”

Cianna watched him as if trying to determine if he was upset. When Tan smiled, she returned it and slipped closer to him, making him all too aware of the heat radiating from her body. She burned with shaped heat, so different and yet so similar to what he had done when he nearly transformed. Cianna did it naturally, with an ease that he found enticing.

“Is this it?” Cianna asked, surveying the ground with a cautious eye.

“I don’t know. I thought I picked up on… something.”

A low howl echoed behind them and Tan tensed, memories flooding back of the last time he’d faced the hounds. He’d been a different person then. Less capable, and armed with only a bow. Now that he could shape, the hounds shouldn’t be quite as terrifying. For some reason, they still were.

“Probably have twenty minutes before they reach us,” Cianna observed. “Hounds move pretty quickly, especially through Incendin.”

Tan nodded and stepped past her, ignoring the way she eyed him. He held onto his connection with fire, sensing and mixing it with spirit, tracing along the fire bond. Here in Incendin, fire burned more brightly than anywhere else. Everything seemed connected to fire, but whatever he’d detected here had moved.

He grabbed Cianna and lifted back into the air on a shaping. “Do you see anything?”

Cianna’s eyes seemed to glow as she turned her head, focusing on the ground. She nodded toward the west, and Tan turned. Flashes of grayish brown fur raced toward them.

“I thought you said we would have twenty minutes,” he said.

“They move quickly. And sound travels funny in Incendin. Besides, I thought you were the one who said you could connect to the fire bond. Shouldn’t you have been able to pick up on them, too?”

“I thought I did,” he said and focused on the hounds making their way toward him. Like the other group, these pulled on fire. It was twisted and pressed on him with an almost nauseating sense. There was something different about them than he’d picked up before, and it took Tan a moment to realize the reason: this was a different
pack.

Streaking into the air, he tried to push away the frustration he felt. He needed to reach Cora. And then find kaas.

Before he had a chance to move, fire converged on them. Too late, Tan recognized that what he sensed made him uncomfortable, that there was a clear twisting of fire to it.

“Tan—”

Cianna called his name at the same time that he saw what moved overhead. Five winged lisincend surrounded them. Tan pulled on a shaping to travel, not wanting to risk a confrontation. He added spirit and readied to leave Incendin, but nothing happened.

Tan tried again, this time reaching toward the draasin, straining for elemental assistance, but again he failed.

Asboel,
Tan sent, reaching for the draasin, hating that he had to do so already, especially after the hatchling was only recently returned to them, but Asboel would be needed to stop kaas regardless.

There was a faint connection, but it was weak.

A new worry surged through him: Had Incendin learned how to separate shapers from their abilities?

Tan touched the sword sheathed at his side. He could draw it, but that might mean killing the lisincend. For the kingdoms and Incendin to find any measure of peace, he couldn’t do that. For them to withstand kaas, he didn’t dare. He would have to find some way to work with them.

But how?

T
he winged lisincend approaching him each had thickened skin, made leathery by the transformation. Their eyes were sunken into their skulls, and their hairless heads reflected the light of the sun gleaming overhead. Thin, papery wings that reminded Tan of the draasin beat against the hot wind. One, larger than the others, lowered to face Tan.

“Tan,” Cianna whispered, “I can’t shape!”

“I know. The lisincend have learned from Par-shon,” he said.

But maybe they hadn’t learned everything.
Honl,
Tan started, reaching for the elemental.
Can you get word to Zephra if we are captured?

Of course,
Honl said, briefly becoming more distinct.

At least he could still reach the wind elemental.

One of the lisincend dropped closer to him. “You are not of Par-shon,” he hissed.

Tan met his eyes. As he did, he reached inward, straining for the fire bond. Whatever happened, he wanted to be prepared if the lisincend attacked. He might believe that the kingdoms needed to work with Incendin, but that didn’t mean he had to be foolish about it. If Incendin refused, or if they attacked, Tan needed to be ready. If he was lost, he wasn’t sure the kingdoms would be strong enough to stop kaas, not without the loss of significant numbers of elementals.

Whatever they did to separate him from his abilities needed to be dealt with first. So far, he could use his abilities within the area confined by the lisincend. Otherwise, he would have fallen back to the ground. But they blocked him from escaping. Did the lisincend create the separation, or was there something else to it?

“Not of Par-shon. We face them the same as you.” He thought about what he would say to the lisincend, but he’d never expected that he would need to speak to them directly. Cora was to have been a buffer, a way to reach the lisincend without Tan needing to risk himself. “There is a wild elemental, a danger to us all.”

The lisincend hissed. “We do not fear the elementals.” He fixed eyes that glowed with orange light at Cianna, taking in her hair and the defiant way that she stared at him. “Not Par-shon. And not Doma. Doma has no shapers able to fly.” He circled around Tan, studying him. Heat radiated from him, but it was a twisted sort of fire, the kind that pulled angrily upon Tan’s senses. “Then the kingdoms,” he spat. “Even worse. You would have us distracted when we face Par-shon. Now that you have gained their attention, you think you understand them?” He hissed again, this time steam escaping from his nostrils.

It reminded Tan of the draasin. Like the draasin, Tan wondered if their fire would harm him or if his connection to fire offered him protection. “I do not think we understand them the same as you.” He took a deep breath, knowing what he said next might not work, but he had to try. He had to find a way to bridge the connection with Incendin, even if that meant that he would work with the lisincend. “I seek the aid of the Sunlands. There is a threat that we cannot manage unless we face it together.”

The lisincend stared at Tan. His eyes were unreadable.

Tan didn’t attempt to shape him with spirit. These lisincend had been created using a sacrifice of spirit. Tan tried not to think of what it had taken to create five winged lisincend, knowing that it meant Aeta lives were lost. Possibly archivists. That was not much better.

“The Sunlands will not assist the kingdoms. The kingdoms have never assisted the Sunlands.”

“No?” Tan asked. “Does it not matter that I saved Corasha Saladan?”

The lisincend hesitated then. It was the opening that Tan needed.

“She was captured by Par-shon, separated from her bond pair. I rescued her, brought her back, and healed her. It is because of me that she still lives.”

As he spoke, he realized the comment could go two ways. He didn’t know how the lisincend felt about Cora. For all he knew, they disliked her, hating the fact that she had not needed to risk the transformation to use her abilities. Or perhaps Cora had regained her position within Incendin and led them.

“Corasha Saladan is gone,” the lisincend said, studying Tan.

There was something to the way that he hovered, hanging in the air, that told Tan that there was more to this. Maybe Incendin had some internal struggle, the twisted shapers struggling against those who had not made a transformation, but Tan remembered the way that Cora had spoken of those risking the transformation. She spoke about them with a measure of respect. She knew what they sacrificed, as well as what Incendin gained.

Regardless of whether he would find Cora, he needed to convince the lisincend of the threat kaas posed. More than anything else that he had ever done, that might be the hardest.

“Tell me,” Tan began. “What will you do when Par-shon attacks?”

The lisincend lowered a little more, dropping down so that he could meet Tan’s eyes. His wings beat at the air, threatening to distract Tan, but he held his focus. Cianna remained silent. He couldn’t tell if she was scared or if she let him lead. Knowing Cianna, it was likely not fear.

“Par-shon will not step within the Sunlands,” the lisincend said.

“Can you prove that they have not?” Tan asked.

That caught the lisincend’s attention.

“They can hide themselves, masking with an earth shaping. Have you discovered a way to reveal them?” Tan surveyed the barren waste all around them, making a point of doing so slowly and deliberately. “They could be anywhere. They hid in Doma. They reached the kingdoms. And they have already come to the Sunlands. You should have heard of the attack on Lashasn. That was Par-shon.” Tan spread his hands, trying to make himself appear relaxed. “Do you really think they could not still be in the Sunlands?”

The lisincend might simply choose to attack him. If they did, the only hope Tan had was to draw upon his sword.

“Lashasn was attacked by the kingdoms.”

“Not the kingdoms. I was there. I
helped
the Sunlands to stop Par-shon. I saved your shaper.”

Something like recognition flashed across his eyes before fading. “There is nothing Par-shon can do to hide themselves from us. The Fire Fortress reveals their shapers,” the lisincend said. “As I said, we have faced Par-shon far longer than the kingdoms. We are aware of their tactics.”

“Then you are aware that they thought to unleash a violent and dangerous elemental.”

The lisincend smiled, his mouth twisting into a dark line. “Perhaps dangerous to the kingdoms? We welcome the kingdoms understanding the risk Par-shon poses. It is too bad that neither of you will be there to observe it.”

“You don’t fear the return of the Great Serpent?” Tan asked.

“Why would we fear a child’s story?” the lisincend asked.

It stared at him a moment and then flipped its wings and joined the others. Together, they formed a ring around him, flying in a strange pattern. It took Tan a moment to realize that the pattern formed a rune. This rune separated him from shaping.

Tan didn’t want to attack, but the swirling movement of the lisincend slowly dropped them to the ground, as if whatever they were doing was gradually tearing his shaping from him. Much longer, and they would reach the barren waste below.

A low howl erupted, followed by others.

Tan glanced down. A circle of hounds waited below, as if the lisincend drove their captives down toward the hounds. For a moment, Tan was reminded of the first time he’d encountered hounds, treed and armed with only his bow. He’d escaped then, but there had been a moment when he wasn’t sure that he would.

“Tan,” Cianna said. “If you have some trick to save us, now would be the time.”

Tan hated that he might have to attack the lisincend. Doing so would do nothing to help the kingdoms and Incendin find common ground, but if he fell, there would be no one else willing to work with Incendin. Tan needed to forge this connection. Not only to stop kaas, but also to defeat Par-shon.

But if he did nothing….

His feet touched the ground. Hounds all around him howled. He reached for shaping, but the lisincend blocked him. Tan strained for it, feeling the ability just beyond him, and then, reluctantly, reached for the spirit that pooled deep within him.

As he did, he felt a burst of fire again, this time closer.

The hounds sensed something as well. Three of the hounds that had been stalking toward him stopped, the short brown hair on their backs rising. One of the hounds whined and pressed his nose to the ground. Another crouched on his hind legs. Three other hounds began braying loudly, their voices disappearing into the air.

“Tan?” Cianna asked.

Connected to spirit as he was, he reached for the fire bond. This time, he combined them, needing to sense deeply. He’d done this when shaping with Amia, but this time, he did it on his own. He stretched out with his awareness and felt the massive sense of kaas surging toward them from below the surface.

Tan reached for his warrior sword.

Fire erupted around him from above. The lisincend attacked.

Cianna screamed and Tan covered her with his body, uncertain if he could deflect lisincend fire as he could draasin flame. They would either die together, or this would work.

Flames split around him, leaving him unharmed.

He let out a shaky breath.

Kaas slithered closer. Much longer, and the fire elemental would reach the surface.

Whatever he intended had to happen now. They would have to capture it, if they were going to do so at all.

Asboel. Sashari. Enya.

Tan called out to each of the elementals. The fire bond allowed him to reach them, but kaas recognized what he did. There was a renewed urgency to the sense writhing in the ground.

He pressed spirit, the only element he could still shape, through the Athan ring. At least he could summon Roine. With another shaping of spirit, he surged power through the summoning rune coin.

How many would answer? He and Cianna wouldn’t have much more time. Not enough for the other shapers to arrive to form the trap. Not enough for Tan to survive.

“Cianna,” he started. “I don’t know if—”

He didn’t get the chance to finish. The ground exploded around him as kaas burst through.