Storm Rising (49 page)

Authors: Mercedes Lackey

BOOK: Storm Rising

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Precisely as it needed to be, to keep any harm from coming to the Plains outside.

Silverfox and Lo’isha watched anxiously; Firesong knew that the shaman would be able to see the energies they had raised, but the expression on Silverfox’s face suggested that he, too, saw them, which meant that they were powerful enough even for non-mages to see. That meant he had been right; Urtho had built a mechanism of amplification into the design of the floor.

But there was no chance to gloat over this triumph of instinct and artistry over intellect and reason. It was
time. He
knew
that, as if he were a water-clock and the last drop had just fallen.

“Karal,
now!
“ he shouted, and Karal’s face spasmed as his fingers closed convulsively on the trigger points of the device.

The center of the design exploded soundlessly into power. Karal was somewhere in the midst of all that—more power than any Heartstone, more power than Firesong had ever seen in his life, power that made Aya shriek and flee into the next room, that was so bright the shaman and Silverfox shouted and hid their eyes.

Somewhere in the heart of that inferno of energy, Karal struggled to hold it, to transmute it—he struggled—

And Firesong felt him failing. Not failing to
hold
, but failing in his grasp on the world, on himself, on his life. He was thinning, vanishing, evaporating in a little microcosm of his incandescent God. In a moment, he would be lost, and if anyone dared try to help him, the circle would break and they would all perish.

Over my dead body!
Anger finally penetrated his drug-born and aloof indifference. Though—if instinct failed him, it might well be just that—

“Everybody! On my count, take human-sized steps forward, follow your compass point!” he shouted into the roaring silence. “
One! Two! Three!
“

The circle contracted around Karal, tightening in on him, and having the effect of focusing the energy he controlled as the rays’ edges flanged and flared.

“
Four! Five! Six!
“ They were all within touching range now, if they had all had hands. But that was not yet what Firesong’s instincts cried out for.

“
Seven! Eight!
“ They were practically on top of Karal now—the pyramid was gone, completely, and Karal was as transparent as one of the Avatars, his head thrown back, his mouth open in a silent cry, surrounded and encased in a pillar of white-hot, ice-cold fire.

“
Nine!
“ He reached out and seized one of Karal’s arms—without prompting, each of the others did the
same, except for Florian, who touched the young man’s breast with his nose, and Altra, who reared up on hind legs and placed both paws in the middle of his back.

The light!

It flared up in his face the moment they all touched Karal, he closed his eyes, but it scorched through his eyelids and flung him physically back! He felt his hand discorporate, turning into vapor—he lost his grip on Karal’s arm, and felt himself tossed backward through the air, to land against the wall and slide bonelessly and helplessly to the floor.

It was over.

He couldn’t see; couldn’t hear.

They had won—but they had lost Karal.

Firesong fell back into darkness as profound as the explosion of light, and all feeble remaining awareness left him.

Firesong wasn’t unconscious for very long, but it was certainly the first time in his life that he had been knocked out by magic—and the searing pain in his head told him just what price he had paid for tampering with such powers. He wouldn’t be able to light a candle for the next week until he healed—and the next day or so was going to be pure hell. But with a shiver of glee, he realized he was
alive.

He couldn’t move for a moment; couldn’t even think past the pain except for that tangle of elation and grief.
We did it—I shouldn’t have done that, he might have been all right if I hadn’t told everyone to close in, it’s my fault—

And—oh, gods, but who else had they lost? He forced himself to roll over and sit up, forced his eyes to open, but they were watering so heavily he couldn’t see. He wiped at them frantically with his sleeve, as Aya scuttled back into the room and settled against his side, crooning.

“What in the name of Kal’enel happened?” he heard the shaman croak.

But the voice that answered was not Silverfox—nor anyone else who had been in the circle.

“I haven’t a clue,” Karal said, in a weak whisper. “I don’t remember anything but pressing those ten trigger points.”

Firesong managed to get his eyes clear, and to his utter astonishment, they confirmed what his ears had told him.

Lo’isha and Silverfox were bent over Karal, helping him to sit up. There didn’t seem to be much of him inside those black robes of his—he looked as if he’d been undergoing a thirty-day Vision-Quest fast. Both of the others were handling him gingerly, as if they felt he was as fragile as spun glass.

Well, Firesong wasn’t feeling any too sturdy himself at the moment….

But before he got a chance to build up even the faintest feeling of resentment, help arrived, pouring in through the tiny doorway, in the form of black-clad Shin’a’in Sword-Sworn, who quickly and efficiently gathered them all up and carried them bodily out through the tunnel and up into the scarlet light of the setting sun. He let his body stay limp, simply cargo.

The sunset was a crimson light enhanced a bit with a coruscating rainbow of mage-energy, covering the bowl of the sky, slowly fading as the day itself faded.

He let himself be ministered to, as Aya oversaw everything and scolded if they jostled him too much as they carried him, with the rest, into a warm tent. He was too weak to resist, anyway. It was all he could do to nod when they asked him if he wanted something to drink, and to accept the bowl of hot herbal tea—well dosed with painkillers that he recognized at the first sniff. Those would war unpleasantly in his stomach for a few moments with the energy boosters, but he knew which ones would win, and he was grateful. He drank the bitter bowl down to the dregs, and waited stoically for the roiling in his gut to cease. He gathered from the chattering that the area around the Tower had suddenly lit up like a tiny sun for a moment, though absolutely no physical effect other than the light had leaked over
into the “real” world. Firesong had the feeling that not even that would have occurred if they had not interfered and kept Karal from evaporating….

And if I had not—An’desha might have forgiven me eventually, but I would never have forgiven
myself.

Not all of the effects of their counterstorm had been so benign, however. In ruins all around the rim of the Plains, the gryphon scouts were reporting odd collapses, disappearances of structures and parts of structures; nothing modern, but only those things dating from Urtho’s time.

Including the Gate they had arrived through.

As he faded into drugged sleep, he heard Treyvan sigh, and Hydona make the observation that he was already thinking.

“Well,” she said with resignation. “We shall surrrely take ourrr time getting back—but therrre will be a home to rrreturrrn to.”

Mercedes Lackey & Larry Dixon

The Novels of Valdemar

“Lackey and Dixon always offer a well-told tale”
—
Booklist

DARIAN’S TALE
OWLFLIGHT
0-88677-804-2
OWLSIGHT
0-88677-803-4
OWLKNIGHT
0-88677-916-2

THE MAGE WARS
THE BLACK GRYPHON
0-88677-804-2
THE WHITE GRYPHON
0-88677-682-1
THE SILVER GRYPHON
0-88677-685-6

To Order Call: 1-800-788-6262
www.dawbooks.com

DAW 26

MERCEDES LACKEY
The Novels of Valdemar

ARROWS OF THE QUEEN	978-0-88677-378-4
ARROW’S FLIGHT	978-0-88677-377-6
ARROW’S FALL	978-0-88677-400-4
MAGIC’S PAWN	978-0-88677-352-0
MAGIC’S PROMISE	978-0-88677-401-2
MAGIC’S PRICE	978-0-88677-426-8
THE OATHBOUND	978-0-88677-414-4
OATHBREAKERS	978-0-88677-454-3
OATHBLOOD	978-0-88677-773-9
BY THE SWORD	978-0-88677-463-2
WINDS OF FATE	978-0-88677-516-7
WIND OF CHANGE	978-0-88677-563-9
WINDS OF FURY	978-0-88677-612-0
STORM WARNING	978-0-88677-661-9
STORM RISING	978-0-88677-712-7
STORM BREAKING	978-0-88677-755-0
BRIGHTLY BURNING	978-0-88677-989-8
TAKE A THIEF	978-0-7564-0008-2
EXILE’S HONOR	978-0-7564-0085-6
EXILE’S VALOR	978-0-7564-0221-2
FOUNDATION	978-0-7564-0576-2
INTRIGUES	978-0-7564-0639-4

Anthologies:

SWORD OF ICE:	978-0-88677-720-8
SUN IN GLORY	978-0-7564-0166-5
CROSSROADS	978-0-7564-0325-1
MOVING TARGETS	978-0-7564-0528-1
CHANGING THE WORLD	978-0-7564-0580-9

To Order Call: 1-800-788-6262
www.dawbooks.com

DAW 25

MERCEDES LACKEY
Reserved for the Cat

In 1910, in an alternate Paris, Ninette Dupond, a penniless young dancer, recently dismissed from the Paris Opera, thinks she has gone mad when she finds herself in a conversation with a skinny tomcat. However, Ninette is desperate—and hungry—enough to try anything. She follows the cat’s advice and travels to Blackpool, England, where she is to impersonate a famous Russian ballerina and dance, not in the opera, but in the finest of Blackpool’s music halls. With her natural talent for dancing, and her magic for enthralling an audience, it looks as if Ninette will gain the fame and fortune the cat has promised. But the real Nina Tchereslavsky is not as far away as St. Petersburg…and she’s not as human as she appears… 978-0-7564-0488-8

The Elemental Masters Series
And don’t miss the first four books of
The Elemental Masters: