CHOSEN (3 page)

“There are enough people up there to manage. Melgan Lon and your father are there. They aren’t going to drop us.” Colin smiled to reassure, put his arm around Dynan as if it were a clamp, and then called up, “Ready here. Pull.”

~*~

Chapter 2

Carryn Adaeryn looked out from the tower window of the Sanctuary Temple at the glistening night. To her right, the lights of Rianamar fanned outward and to her left the vast blanket of the Wythe Sea extinguished them. There were clouds coming in to obliterate the moon.

Her gaze lifted from the darkness of the water. The Telaerin Palace stood in a blaze of light on a jut of land carved out a few million years ago from the Wyvern River’s run through the middle of what was now the Capitol City of Cobalt. The churn of waves against the shore came in a rhythmic cadence and the more distant boom of the sea striking the cliffs a large drum. Carryn took a deep breath and pulled in salt saturated air. The bitter cold felt good to her.

Carryn leaned against the stone windowsill, letting her thoughts wander. When she needed to calm her mind, this room, with its spectacular view was the place she came. After hearing about the harrowing ordeal Dynan had survived in the mountains, in a shifting of all things, she definitely needed calming.

She should have seen the danger. She was a Seer. Since the time she was ten and Dynan was five, it was her job to look after him. When there was trouble, she saw it before it happened, and could avert the danger. An anonymous note to the Palace with a warning, and both boys found whatever scheme they dreamed up - very usually an escape attempt - undone. Usually, anyway.

There wasn’t anything they did in all those years that she wasn’t aware of if there was even the remotest possibility they’d be hurt. The pod crash on the mountain; she’d seen and a message went to the Palace, telling them about the stolen pod. There was an attempt on their lives last year that even the King didn’t know about, thwarted by the secret order she belonged to. No, Ambrose Telaerin wouldn’t let his sons out of his sight if he knew the extent of peril they faced, much less allow them to go up onto a mountainside, even if it was a mountain just behind the Palace, for a day of archeological digging.

She should have seen. She didn’t understand why she hadn’t. Carryn pulled in another lungful of the frigid air.

She waited through the day after the shifting that only affected that one mountain range Dynan was on, for the announcement that the King would postpone the oath taking ceremony his son was set to take part in – tomorrow. She found herself questioning the wisdom of His Majesty’s decision when the bulletin stated the ceremony would go on as planned.

She supposed it couldn’t be avoided unless Dynan was very seriously injured. He wasn’t – a relief – and cancelling wasn’t practical when three thousand of Cobalt’s most prominent leaders were set to be in attendance.

She wondered if Dynan would make it through it, considering his aversion to being in public.

Sudden pressure behind her eyes jolted her out of her thoughts and warned her of a coming vision. She tried to prepare herself like she did every time these bits of the future ripped into her, and reached blindly for the stone sill to steady the room.

The King of Cobalt knelt before his throne, shackled to the floor. Blood dripped from his wrists where metal dug into skin and then down his fingers. He watched, powerless, while his young daughter was raped.

They weren’t men responsible for her torture. They weren’t human, but creatures of the dark, some reptilian, some bestial, on all fours, salivating as they waited in line for their turn at her.

Carryn recoiled from it. Pain blossomed as a result and she fell. The vision shifted.

The city below her appeared on an overcast day. The pristine white buildings it was famous for stood in twisted ruins. Plumes of black smoke billowed up to choke her. Coiling darkness wound around the tower, like a living thing, tightening its grip until the stones began to crumble. The walls crashed to the floor and then through it.

Carryn fell with the tower, the wave of rubble carrying her to the Temple altar.

A thousand pieces of colored glass shards from the great seal spread through the apse like a carpet. On the altar, one of the King’s twin sons lay tied by undulating coils piercing his skin. A man stood over him, a thin blade in hand. For a moment, Carryn thought he was the High Bishop, but then she recognized her brother, Maralt.

To her horror, he cut into the wrist of the Prince, took his hand and raised it. Maralt held a cup to catch the flow, but it wasn’t blood that streamed from the wound. A white, radiant liquid ran from wrist to elbow and into the cup to fill it. She realized what it was – the essence of a telepath’s soul.

 Black, rough-hewn pillars surrounded her as the vision shifted again. Crushing terror dimmed Carryn’s eyesight. She heard herself whimpering. A contained area of darkness stood framed by an archway of stone like the entrance to a cave. She knew the Void lay on the other side.

Another altar stood at the heart of the encircling pillars. The other twin writhed upon its surface. Another man stood over him. His back was to her, but again, he seemed like her brother. He held a thin knife in one hand, and in the other a brilliant white light streamed through clenched fingers.

More coiling strands rose from the stone floor by the altar, plunging into the struggling prince. The will to fight slowly ebbed until he was motionless. At first Carryn didn’t understand why his blood ran red, but then the answer came. He’d been brought here alive.

Here was the cause of the destruction of the world. The soul of the Chosen had been taken, his soul held in the hand of a monster. The blood of the Chosen flowed on the demon’s altar at the gateway to his realm. It was the prophecy come true. It was the prophecy she’d been born to stop. She and her brother both.

The veil boiled outward toward her. Consuming darkness reached a hand to her. The ground shook as the drops of blood ran down the face of the altar. The face of evil was coming. The anti-God. A thing of such power, it would split the ground it walked. It was the demon, Belial.

Carryn turned from the horror that preceded it, trying to escape. Her arms were pinned to her side and she struggled against the smothering wave of darkness that held her.

“I’ve got you.”

She found her voice and heard herself screaming, the sound echoing around the small space of the tower.

“Carryn, it’s all right. I’ve got you. It’s all right.”

She opened her eyes to find her brother beside her, picking her up into his arms from where she’d crumpled under the window. She shook and her heart pounded against her chest. She couldn’t catch her breath.

“It’s all right,” Maralt said again, giving her another squeeze before loosening the grip he had on her. Slowly her vision cleared, returning her to the tower.

“I was at the gate,” she said, leaning against him. She clutched his brown monk’s robes in her fist. “It’s happened.”

“Nothing has happened,” Maralt said, and propped her up against the wall. “Look around you. We’re here. We’re safe. No creepy crawlies running around.”

Carry shook her head at his tone. “They were raping her,” she said. “And Dynan and Dain—”

“Carryn, it hasn’t happened. Shalis is fine. Her brothers are fine—”

 “It’s going to,” she said. “It’s going to happen.”

“I’m not going to let it,” he said, making her release the grip she had on him before enclosing her hand in his. “I know what you saw. It upset you, but you’ve seen it before.”

“Not like this.”

“Exactly like this, but you don’t remember. I’ve taken it from you, Carryn,” Maralt said, tilting his head as he looked at her, raising his eyebrows the way he did when he knew he was right. “The memory of it.”

Carryn gasped and knew the truth. Sometimes the future she was shown was too terrible to endure and not go insane. Her brother’s telepathic talents were different from her own. Countless times before, he removed her memory.

“Did you see the demon?” he asked, watching her.

“No,” she said, remembering now how many times he’d asked the same thing. She pushed herself up against the stone, wincing. Sometimes she felt an old woman when she was barely twenty-one. “I saw enough. I saw you.”

“Same as always, having a nice drink,” he said and smiled. “Well that’s something. You didn’t see the evil nasty. I won’t take the memory this time unless you want, but you know, he’s likely to insist.”

Maralt meant the High Bishop, Gradyn Vall, who was probably on his way up the tower stairs. He might yell at her for that. It was a long way to climb for a man of his extreme age.

“I already told him you were all right,” Maralt said, answering her thoughts. “He’ll want to see the vision for himself, but I can show him.”

“I don’t know how you stand it,” she said, knowing already she didn’t want to keep the vision.

“It’s what big brothers are for.”

“You’re barely three minutes older,” she said. “I don’t think that counts.”

“Of course it does,” he said and smiled.

She shuddered as she saw Shalis Telaerin again, splayed across her father’s overturned throne, her eyes distant. She wasn’t screaming or struggling to get away anymore. She knew she couldn’t.

“Carryn,” Maralt said gently. His fingertips brushed against her temple with the touch of his mind inside her own. She turned to the relief he would bring her, sinking into the light comfort of oblivion that came like a blanket.

She was set onto soft ground and a field of flowers opened around her, the earthy smell of them rising to fill her lungs. The darkness faded.

“Rest here a while,” Maralt said.

Carryn turned to look for him, but he wasn’t there. The sky above her was a deep, endless blue. She smiled at it and the drowsy, almost drugged feeling that came over her. She let it take her.

~*~

Chapter 3

The Palace lights spilled through the open spaces in the draperies, cutting through the shadows of the night. Dynan wished time would stop and keep it dark. Dawn only drew the moment closer where he’d have to face the public, swearing an oath of purity before the High Bishop and billions of people watching on the live feed. Every time he thought about it his throat clamped shut.

He stumbled out of bed, moved to the couch that faced the fireplace, and dropped into it, putting his head in his hands. He felt mostly all right after a few injections to repair the torn muscles in his back. His eyes stung though, from lack of sleep. He couldn’t remember a time he had such dark, disturbing dreams.

He retrieved the talon from the table where he left it, being careful to avoid touching the sharp edge. It was keen enough to cut and he’d already spilled enough blood.

“There’ll be more, a lot more, soon.”

Dynan looked up and saw a man beside the fireplace, standing there as plain as anything. Dynan was immediately reminded of renderings he’d seen of the First King of Cobalt, Alurn Telaerin. Alurn died relatively young, not yet thirty, though no one knew the exact time or date. The man before him seemed about the same age. He had long black hair. He was about the right height, several kel taller than Dynan and broader across the shoulder. But while his ancestors always had blue eyes, this man’s eyes were dark, the color indistinguishable.

“Come find me,” the man said and took a step forward. He absorbed the meager light of the room, wrapped in darkness. Dynan shrank away from him.

“Who are you?” he asked, wishing he had a comboard in hand. He could use it to call the guard, but his was across the room on the bedside table.

“We knew that you would...I knew you would come.”

An uncomfortable, almost ravenous eagerness in his gaze made Dynan scramble up and over the couch, and he backed toward the door.

“Come find me, Dynan. You’re the only one who can.”

Dynan met the wall, clutching the talon tightly in hand. The man’s eyes snapped to it and he drew in a breath, smiling in apparent pleasure. He took another step closer, through the couch, not over, not around, and stopped in front of Dynan. He breathed deeply again.

“Come for me,” he said, reaching out his hand.

Even as Dynan shrank away from him, the man shifted his shape, melding into a thing of darkness, stealer of souls, a wraith.

Black clung to its scaled skin. Dragon-like, it had the ability to walk upright, and hold a weapon in its clawed hand, or so the legends said. It was winged and filled the space of the room. From it, an overwhelming sense of evil flowed.

Dynan stood, frozen and unable to move, at the door of his room, wishing it was open so he could get through it. Black eyes focused. A cruel smile spread across a protruding mouth. The thing had fangs.

Its tongue lolled across jagged teeth as if it was licking its lips in anticipation. Acrid smoke billowed into Dynan’s eyes. For an instant, he stood on the side of a hill strewn with rotting corpses. Instead of one nightmare staring at him, there were six of them.

The talon clattered to the floor. Dynan whirled around, meaning to escape. He expected to see more of the monsters, but his vision cleared. There was only his room and the light still coming through the curtains.

The sound of pent up breath cut the silence. He sagged against the door, wondering what just happened. Was he hallucinating? Did the talon cause this? Could it? He looked at the talon where he dropped it, and at the slice across his fingers that oozed a small bit of blood. The way that man-hallucination-apparition-thing had reacted to seeing the blood made Dynan’s skin crawl.

Hurriedly, as if it might hurt to touch it, he picked the talon back up and set it down on the table again. He started wiping his hand off on his nightshirt and then didn’t know why he was doing it.

He stood for a moment, torn between trying to get a few more hours of sleep or giving up for the night. Finally, he retrieved his robe and went down the hall, through a sitting room and the study he shared with Dain, and then the dinning room, aiming for the kitchen to get a mug of tea. That would help wake him up at least.