INBORN (The Sagas of Di'Ghon) (34 page)

“Are you alright?” The look in his eyes cut her to the quick.

Jorel was right. Thaniel would do anything for her. Go anywhere. Brave anything. She saw that before, but the significance of it dawned on her in a way that sent spikes of shame into her heart.

The things she’d said to him...   

“I’m fine.” She lied, nearly choking on the words.

Elycia suddenly noticed Thaniel was ignoring her. His eyes were locked on something over her shoulder.

Elycia’s head whipped around to see people running in panic straight for them. Behind them, debris strewn water crested over the top of the dam. People thrashed, trying to catch hold of anything they could as the knee high surge drove them before it.

Thaniel grabbed her arm. He had the horse
’s reins in the other hand and one of his feet already in a stirrup.

“Can you ride?” He asked.

Calling

Amazingly, Thaniel and Elycia were still on the back of the horse. They were stranded. Thaniel stared at the deadly brown current as it raced by.

The horse, a chestnut gelding, danced nervously, eying the advancing water as the small island slowly shrank. A mother, clutching two small children in her arms, was screaming out over the water, repeating her husband’s name over and over. There wasn’t anyone answering.

A huge man in a shredded slicker, covered in bloody scrapes and mud, leaped off a section of floating roof as it slammed into the rise. He took one look at them and lunged, desperation plain in his eyes. He grabbed hold of Thaniel’s cloak with both hands, trying to pull him off the saddle with hard, stiff jerks. Thaniel yanked the horse’s reins to one side. The spooked gelding wheeled, and sent the man flying backwards into the rush of muddy water. The current swept him right over the side of the gorge.

Thaniel swallowed, still shaking.

There was nowhere to go. As they watched, a wave of water continually washed over the top of the dam. It coursed over the sides and ran down into the town, before it flowed back towards the gorge and disappeared. The tannery buildings that used to line either side of the street were gone. Only a few pieces of sporadic apparatus remained now, jutting up from the brown water like the bleached bones of a long dead beast through dirt.

Thaniel glanced at a small body floating face down in the swift brown water. It bumped into the
little island they were perched on as if begging for deliverance from the icy flow. Then, struck by a floating beam, it flipped over, a broken hand splashing as it spun. A boy’s blue face bobbed up. The glazed dead eyes of the child seemed to stare accusingly at Thaniel before it slipped back under the murk.

The water was rising fast. In minutes they would all be swept into the current. Suddenly overcome with a wave of exhaustion, Thaniel let out a breath. They weren’t going to make it. He turned in the saddle, eyes already brimming with tears.

“You didn’t know.” She said, holding his gaze for as long as he could stand it.

The hopelessness he saw in Elycia’s eyes cut him to the bone.

If he had any doubts before, Thaniel knew now that this was all his fault. There was a strange ring of justice to the idea that he would die by his own creation. But Elycia hadn’t done anything. Lars Telazno’s words came back to him, asking him what he would do if his misuse of his ability harmed Elycia.

“I’m sorry.” Thaniel could hardly speak around the lump of guilt in his throat.

“You’re sorry…” Elycia shook her head. “No, I’m sorr…”

She never finished her apology as o
ver the rushing din of the moving water, and crying children, a familiar voice boomed right in front of their face.

“Elycia, Thaniel,”

Thaniel and Elycia looked in the same direction simultaneously.

Harkanin’s yellow and green wagon seemed a world away. It sat perched on the other side, the high side, of the gorge. In the misty distance they could make out the figure of Lars Telazno, standing on top of the wagon, waving his hands. Gabril, a big shadow, stood by his side.

“How?” Thaniel asked, wondering how he could hear the man from so far away. It reminded Thaniel of how voices carried down in the cistern way back in Ontar Hold.

“It’s magic.” Gabril’s voice, thick with acidic sarcasm, came out of nowhere.

“Don’t listen to him. Elycia, do you have the meldstone?” Lars Telazno’s disembodied voice asked.

“Yes.” Elycia pulled the meldstone from a pocket. “I have it.” She yelled as it burst into bright azure life in her grasp.

“Good,” he said, “I see it. Now, use the stone like I taught you.”

“For what?”

“First, you will need to meld with Thaniel.”

Elycia looked at Thaniel, fear evident in her eyes.

“What are you waiting for?” Lars caught her attention, his voice assuming command as he added, “Do it or die.”

Elycia stared at the blazing stone for a second, her
fingers trembling a bit. Then, she thrust her hand up towards him.

“Touch it.” She said, eyes averted.

“What?” Thaniel turned in the saddle, “No.” He added, his hands as far from the shining stone as he could manage while still holding on to the reins.

“Trust me.” She said, using the same exact phrase he used to get her moving when
Keriim was hunting her down in the cistern way.

Thaniel felt his head jerk in her direction.

He looked into her eyes. The blue of the sky, even if the stone wasn’t casting its rays in every direction, seemed to live there.

He reached out his hand and carefully placed it over hers.

Time ebbed.

Somehow he knew that it was only his perception of time that slowed, but the effect, from his perspective, was the same. The water seemed to fall over the top of the dam in slow motion.

Iced honey moved faster.

His world, or rather his awareness of it, expanded in all directions. He knew about the mammoth storm down in the lowlands. He felt its raw power as if it
was a part of him. At the same time he felt every little eddy of wind that raced down the gorge. Birds flew in the distance. He could have counted them if he wanted. Seemingly unconcerned with the happenings below, a pair of finches flitted from one branch to the next, barely brushing anything as they spiraled through the sky.

Thaniel squinted at the light exploding off the meldstone. A bolt of lightning striking his forehead would have been dim beside it. The cerulean power was so bright that their intertwined hands seemed to disappear in its magnificence.

Yet, there was something else there beyond
air
.

It was Elycia. All of her. Every jumbled bit of confusion and doubting certainty that was a girl. He felt her heart. Every fear. Every hope. She wanted to feel Navillus’ sun on her face again. She wanted to see her father again. She wanted to go to Di’
Ghon. She wanted to believe that he was good, but she had her doubts. Images of the dra were never far from the surface of her emotions. When he called the dra she hadn’t been afraid for herself alone. She was afraid for him too. She still was.

Thaniel and Elycia stared into each other’s eyes. He didn’t have to wonder if she knew how he felt about her. He could see it warm her face. With the glow of the meldstone blazing between them, Thaniel gave in to his desire for her. There was no holding it back. With his neck twisted at an awkward angle Thaniel bent, and kissed her. For a moment he couldn’t think. His mind just didn’t seem to work right. He couldn’t even feel his feet or hands.

“Are you two done?”

Thaniel and Elycia pulled apart. Embarrassment slid through their connection back and forth.

“Elycia, you must hurry. Call the Jen’Ghon to you.”

Both of them felt it at the same time. The
air
responded to a disturbance high in the pass as a wall of white water surged down, heading straight for the dam.

“Ignore that. Elycia, now.” The old man instructed. “Focus, calm.”

Thaniel felt her going through the motions, bristling a bit at his instructional tone, and then she had it. A cerulean blade of
air
stood erect right in front of her.

All at once Thaniel understood. Everything from the way she gathered her senses in layers to how she called the
air
to her and formed it into the little blade.

“Did you see that boy?” Lars Telazno called out to him.

“I got it, but what…”

“The dam. Use it to destroy the dam.”

“That little thing couldn’t break a twig.” Elycia objected, scoffing.

“Make it a little bigger.” Lars said.

“I can’t…”

“Yes, you can. Do you feel that storm behind you?” He paused, “You did that. Now, remember, if you fail, she dies with you.”

“No pressure.” Gabril.

Thaniel didn’t respond. As horrible as it sounded, the man was right. There was no time for hesitation or room for error.
One slip and she was dead.

Thaniel opened himself to the sky.

He called.

Elycia gasped as the stone went white.

Every whisk of
air
was theirs. They owned the sky. Every little swirling
jen
that played in between the clefts of the mountain pass snapped to attention. Thaniel and Elycia could feel it all. Then, with a rush of raw power that felt like the inhalation of a giant, the bright cerulean flows of
air
ripped out of the heavens without hesitation.

The mass of
air
sucked downward, drawing in tight on itself as it raced out of the sky. Thaniel tightened his fist and the entire thing compacted until it was as hard as steel. Thaniel punched down at the wall and the giant axe screamed toward the dam.

In a spray of mud and brown mist, the dam broke open at its base. Water shot out of it like it had been knifed from behind from a hundred spots. Then, it all just crumpled under the weight of mountains of melted snow and ice.

Water spilled down into the gorge like an overturned pitcher. It receded from all around the edge of the ravine almost immediately, pulling with it whatever it could.  Right away the little island they were on started growing.

The mother hugged both of her children. Tears of joy and relief streaked down her grimy face. None of them would be able to fully understand what happened. But, that was fine by Thaniel.

Elycia punched him in the arm. Thaniel winced. Feeling a familiar extended knuckle dig into him. He rubbed his shoulder and smiled, remembering how Jorel punched him the same exact way.

An uncomfortable silence filled the space that stretched between them. When Thaniel looked up at her she was staring at the exact spot that Jorel had gone over.

“I’m sorry.” She said.

“What was that?” Lars yelled.
“I said a little bigger.”

“That’s his idea of a little bigger.” Elycia was smiling as she choked back a tear.

“Thaniel, he’s just mad because yours is bigger than his.” Gabril barely got it out before he was laughing.

“Ride away, boy.” Harkanin chimed in, “I think they’ve lost it.”

“No, I don’t think so.” Thaniel looked into Elycia’s eyes. “I think we know what we need to do.”

“Di’
Ghon calling?”
She asked.

“Yes, kiss, it
is.”

I doubt there ever was a novel written in a vacuum.
This one was no different.
Many people contributed in various ways.
My co-workers and customers were nothing short of a constant source of encouragement. Even if they thought my head was cracked, they never said so. Well, and meant it.

When it comes to thanking people, I think immediately of my four children.
Please remember that you are my inspiration. Kids, as you read this story, as I hope you will, you will see glimpses of yourselves (loosely applied with a creative brush) played out in the lives of my characters.
And before you ask, I will not be divulging who is where or when.
Where’s the fun in that?
Oh, sorry
to
my youngest.
You will have to wait a long while to read it.
This novel is not for young children.

I especially need to thank my precious daughter, Mellissa, who took the time to edit her Dad’s novel. It would have been a typo disaster without her. Note to authors… Encourage your kids to become teachers. Thanks Lissy!

I have always been a lucky guy.
That luck has played out in all kinds of crazy ways.
However, it turned out that my greatest stroke of good fortune was meeting my wife, Tracey, at such a young age.
Even though she was part of the IN crowd and I was a GEEK, we became high school sweethearts.
Eyes rolled when we married young.
Dramatic pause here…. 27 years later, we have four wonderful children, three older and one younger.
My luck could have stopped there and all would have been well. It didn’t. One day, I decided to ask her opinion of a passage I was struggling with. Her insight into my character’s emotions was priceless.
It floored me.
After Tracey’s “magic” this fantasy novel truly blossomed to life.