The Fourteenth Key (The Chronicles of Terah Book 3) (2 page)

Verna
- Resident sister at the chapel in Timera Valley, helps Sister Brena

Warren
- District Sorcerer of Ragenon, lives in Walnut Springs

Wrenn
- Governor of Camden while Badec was Master Sorcerer, advises Karl, lives in Milhaven

Xantha
- Pegasus, has a mind link with both Myron and Duane, lives in Crinsor Run, North Amden

Yara
- Merfolk representative to the Federation of Terah

Yardner
- Captain of the Guard at Rolan’s castle in Trendon

Yvonne
- Myron’s mother, seer, died shortly after his birth

Chapter 1

Saturday, October 4

As soon as the October meeting of the Council of Sorcerers adjourned, Rolan, the Seated Sorcerer of Brendolanth, grabbed his page’s arm, turned his key, and vanished from Chamber Island. Seconds later he arrived in his office in Trendon. Before his page had recovered from his trip through the energy field, Rolan half pushed, half threw the boy towards the door.

Rolan started pacing before the page could get the door pulled to. Seeing Myron that morning had brought it all back. Rolan had finally managed to get rid of Badec only to have Myron arrive on the scene, and Myron just kept sticking his nose where it didn’t belong. Who did Myron think he was anyway? How dare he barge into Rolan’s castle and demand anything, much less the dragon’s flame pendant.

Rolan clenched his fists. He still couldn’t believe Myron had accepted Landis as an apprentice. By whose authority had those arrangements been made? Rolan was the head of the House of Gergin. He was the only one who had the right to decide her fate, and he’d decided she would die, provided he could find her.

And then there was Taelor. Myron offering protection to that slave made no sense at all. So what if he and Landis had the same mother? He was still a slave, and you didn’t mess with someone else’s slaves. They were property, nothing more, nothing less.

Rolan clasped his hands behind his back and spun around to face his desk. The only way Myron could know anything about Taelor was if the slave was with Landis. And since she was Myron’s apprentice, she would have to go to Milhaven, and more than likely the slave would end up there, too.

Rolan yelled for a page to send for Cpt. Yardner. While he waited, he sat down and drummed his fingers on the desk. With a little luck, he’d get rid of both of those headaches at the same time. And if Myron happened to end up dead too, so much the better.

Cpt. Yardner knocked once on Rolan’s door, opened it, and walked in. “What can I do for you?” he asked as he shut the door.

“I want the six best marksmen we have, and I want to see them today.”

Cpt. Yardner nodded. “I’ll get right on it.”

“And tell them to pack a bag.”

~ ~ ~ ~

One of Rolan’s targets was standing in a small cavern in her bare feet concentrating for all she was worth and getting nowhere. “I don’t understand how to do this!” Landis stared at the ground in frustration. “Stand still and draw the energy of Terah up into your body. Right.”

“Oh, stop fussing,” her best friend, Rhianna, said. “It can’t be that hard. All the other sorcerers can do it.”

“Not all of them.” Landis tossed her red hair out of her face. “Myron doesn’t have to.”

“He’s part elf. He doesn’t count.”

“That’s why he’s so powerful. He doesn’t have to stand around pulling energy up through his toes.”

“And you won’t either once you learn how to do it. You’ll do it automatically, just like he does.”

Landis shook her head. “He gathers it like you do, like all elves do, directly from nature.”

Rhianna stood up and stretched her long, lean body. “I don’t know whether we gather it or not. It flows through us, but I don’t know how.”

Landis shook her head and glared at the ground. “I’ve spent two months trying to do this and I’m no closer now than I was when I started. Maybe I’m not meant to be a sorcerer.”

“It hasn’t been two months. We’ve only been here five weeks.”

“Seems like years,” Landis grumbled. “Isn’t it time to call it a day? My head hurts.”

“We’ve got several more hours before we have to head up to the house. Stop whining and get back to it.”

“How will I know when it works? Am I going to start glowing or something?”

“You’ll feel a warmth inside and it may tingle the first time you draw the energy in,”
Glendymere, the huge gold dragon who had agreed to teach her to harness magical energy, answered.

“Sorry. I don’t mean to complain,” Landis said. “I’m just tired.”

“You’re frustrated. Every apprentice goes through this.”

“Even Myron?” Landis asked.

Glendymere nodded.

“He was a complainer, too?” Rhianna asked.

Glendymere hesitated a moment before answering.
“Everyone expected him to learn a lot and do it quickly. He didn’t think he was progressing fast enough, so he was frustrated on a daily basis. It came out as complaining.”
Then he looked at Landis.
“Give it time. It’ll get better.”

“If you say so.”

Glendymere chuckled.
“You sound just like him.”

“If they’re that much alike, I don’t know if I can take it,” Rhianna mumbled. Then she turned back to Landis. “All right. Let’s get back to work, but let’s try a new approach since yours doesn’t seem to be working.”

“Such as?”

“Close your eyes and relax. Clear your mind. Then picture strands of energy rising up from the ground and flowing into you.”

“What do strands of energy look like?”

“I don’t know. Maybe like waves of heat from a fire, or the steam from boiling water.”

Landis closed her eyes and shook her arms to relax her muscles. She rolled her head to loosen her neck and concentrated on breathing. After she felt some of the tension leave her body, she pictured waves shimmering up from the ground. When nothing happened she focused harder on the flickering waves, trying to force them into her body. As her concentration increased so did the frown lines in her forehead.

“No, don’t tense up,” Rhianna coached. “Relax. Let the picture form in your mind. Don’t do anything else, let the mental image stay there, block everything out. Hold it. Just hold it.” Rhianna’s voice dropped to a whisper. “See it flow. Relax.”

As Landis concentrated on Rhianna’s voice, she felt the tension slip out of her body again. Before long a gentle warmth began to seep into her feet. As it spread up her calves, her eyes popped open, her jaw dropped, and the warmth vanished.

Landis frowned. “Did I do it? Or was it my imagination?”

Rhianna shrugged.

Landis walked out of the small room she and Rhianna used and into Glendymere’s sleeping chamber. The dragon was curled up against the far wall but his eyes were open.

“Glendymere? Do you know? Was it my imagination or did I really connect?”

Glendymere nodded.
“For a couple of seconds. Not enough to do anything with, but a good start. Try it again, but this time, see if you can keep the connection a little longer.”

Landis shook out her arms, closed her eyes, and let the image of energy lines flowing up into her body form again. This time as the warmth spread from her feet to her calves, she pictured it climbing up her thighs into her body. The warmth spread into her stomach and then on towards her head. When it settled in her head, she opened her eyes and looked at Glendymere.

“Yes, that’s the way it should feel. Very good.”

Landis didn’t know if it was from the relief of making the connection or from the energy flowing through her body, but her headache was gone and she felt terrific. With a huge grin, she danced around Glendymere’s sleeping chamber, singing, “I did it, I really did it.”

Rhianna looked at Glendymere. “Did Myron act like that, too?”

“No, but Chris did on occasion. Anyway, I think that’s enough for today.”
Then he turned towards the dancing Landis.
“Monday we’ll work on storing energy as you gather it so you’ll have it when you need it.”

Rhianna frowned and thought,
“Why stop? It’s early, and she’s only done it twice.”

“We don’t want to push too hard,”
Glendymere answered her privately. “
Landis is new to this. If she tries to do too much she could hurt herself. I’ve seen more than one sorcerer burn out by pushing too hard.”

“Burn out?”

“That’s the best way I can describe it. Human sorcerers use their minds to perform magic, and if they try to handle too much energy too quickly, before their minds have a chance to adjust to it, they can damage themselves and not be able to do magic at all. We don’t want that to happen.”

Rhianna frowned again.
“Did Myron have to worry about that?”

“No, but he didn’t have to store energy. It flows through him, so it can’t cause an overload.”

Rhianna turned back towards Landis, who was still dancing around the room. “I’m going to get our stuff together and head back up the mountain. Are you coming?”

Landis nodded and danced back towards their small room to wait for Rhianna. As they were leaving, she looked back at Glendymere. Curled up against the wall with his head on his front feet and his tail wrapped around his body, he looked like a very large cat, as long as you ignored the thin trail of smoke drifting up from his nostrils.

~ ~ ~ ~

The main source of Rolan’s black mood, Myron, also known as Kevin to his closest friends, was in his office in the castle at Milhaven wishing he were anywhere else. Karl, his governor, and Joan, Karl’s wife and assistant, were having a disagreement and they wanted Kevin to mediate. After listening for half an hour, the best Kevin could come up with was Joan wanted to invite the ministers’ wives to an afternoon tea and Karl was opposed.

“We don’t have anywhere to put them,” Karl argued. “When the ministers come for the conference, we use the barracks. We can’t put the wives in there.”

“What are you talking about?” Joan asked with a deep frown.

“They need a place to sleep! We don’t have anywhere to put them!”

“You haven’t heard anything I’ve said,” Joan snapped. “This is for one afternoon. We don’t need housing.”

“You can’t get everyone here, meet with them, and get them all back home in one day.” Karl looked at Kevin. “Tell her there’s no way you can make that many trips in one day!”

Kevin opened his mouth, but before he could get one word out Joan held up her hand for him to stop. “Like I said Karl, you haven’t been listening. For some reason you’ve decided you don’t want me to do this so you’ve tuned me out.” She turned to Kevin. “I don’t want more than six or eight wives at a time. I want these meetings to be small, informal, just friends having some tea and conversation. I want them to talk openly, and that won’t happen with eighty women. Can you get six or eight wives here after lunch and take them back around five?”