The Spirit Binds Read online

  The Spirit Binds

  Elemental Academy Book 5

  D.K. Holmberg

  Copyright © 2019 by D.K. Holmberg

  All rights reserved.

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  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Author’s Note

  Also by D.K. Holmberg

  1

  The library was supposed to be quiet and was meant to be a place of solitude, a place of scholarship and study. These days, Tolan Ethar found it provided anything but solitude. Part of that had to do with the lack of master librarians around the library, which meant the students were more rambunctious. There were always two librarians at any given time. They took shifts, sitting up on the dais, working diligently on whatever project they were immersed in. In all that time, they managed to remain mostly silent, reserved even, but they kept noise to a minimum.

  At least, that had always been Tolan’s impression. In the last few weeks, he’d changed that impression. Part of it had to do with the fact he’d been studying with them—and Master Minden in particular. She had been working with him, and it had been detracting him from his scheduled studies, but at the same time, she’d also been adding to his studies and knowledge.

  He looked up from the book he was working through, rubbing his eyes. Trying to decipher the ancient language was causing him to grow tired. There were many different works, in many different languages, and Tolan struggled to interpret the ones Master Minden had brought him. Many of them were so old, he struggled to even make out the ink on the page, regardless of the shaping used upon the books to preserve them.

  Looking around the library, he realized the source of his agitation. A couple of first-level students sat near the door, talking more loudly than they should have been. He glared at them but doubted his glare did anything to dissuade them. What he needed was one of the master librarians to approach them, but where were they?

  The dais was empty today. That wasn’t completely uncommon, though it was uncommon when there were this many people in the library. Typically, the librarians preferred to keep visible when they had a considerable number of students in the library. When it was emptier, that was the time the librarians thought it was safer to wander, to roam about and either re-shelve books or occasionally, they’d be found sitting at some of the student desks while reading.

  Maybe he was overreacting. He was still only a second-level student, despite the fact he had participated in so many events at the Academy in his time here. What authority did he really have?

  None, but that didn’t change a certain sense of ownership he had developed when it came to the library. Partly, that stemmed from knowing quite a bit of peace here in the short time he’d been studying at the Academy. Partly that had to do with his growing sense of responsibility when it came to the library itself.

  Turning his attention back to Master Minden’s books, he tried to focus on the words on the pages, but it was difficult. The voices were boisterous and loud, obnoxious in how they disrupted—and distracted—him.

  Swearing to himself, he debated whether or not he should get up and say something. It really wasn’t his place, and as he was still only a second-level student, not elevated nearly as highly as he needed to be in order to feel a sense of comfort when it came to disciplining others in the library, he wasn’t sure he should be the one to intervene.

  Besides, his saying something would only serve to worsen some of the conversation around the Academy about him. Already there was enough. Not only had he come to the Academy as someone with no shaping ability—something that had changed in the time he’d been here—but he’d also been through an Inquisition. Because of that, he had become somewhat notorious, and not for good reasons.

  When the voices picked up again, and when there was no sign of either of the librarians who had been here when Tolan had arrived, he got to his feet and made his way toward the table.

  Five students sat around the table. He recognized two of them as Velthan’s lackeys but didn’t know either of their names. There weren’t too many of the first-level students he knew by name, which was probably something he should know. Given how often he had to interact with the first-level students, it would be good for him to get to know them a little bit better than he did.

  He cleared his throat as he approached. They all looked up at him, and one of Velthan’s two lackeys grinned.

  He had high cheekbones and his wavy hair was neatly brushed, giving him an almost regal appearance. “Ethar. What are you—”

  Tolan leaned close. “There’s a protocol in the library. Even if the librarians aren’t here, the upper-level students prefer quiet. Most of us here are researching.”

  “I’m sure you are researching,” the man said.

  Tolan glared at him. “And what’s that supposed to mean?”

  He grinned at Tolan again. “It’s not supposed to mean anything. It means we know you went through an Inquisition. You don’t get put through something like that unless you serve the Draasin Lord.”

  Tolan suppressed the irritation threatening to bubble up within him. He’d been through this enough, usually with people of his own level, but hearing it from a first-level student—and one who was friendly with Velthan—irritated him more than it probably should. Tolan needed to keep control of his emotions and suppress them, along with the urge to rage at him. It would serve no purpose.

  “Regardless of my Inquisition—or the fact I was fully cleared—protocol demands you are quiet within the library.”

  The man stood up. “What are you going to do about it, Ethar?”

  “Henry—” One of the other first-level students—a dark-skinned woman with a round face and full lips, reached for Henry’s arm, trying to pull him back down.

  Henry shook her off. “Don’t get in the way of this, Sarah.”

  Tolan merely stood there. Regardless of how he might have come to the Academy, he had the advantage in that he could shape in the library, something very few others could do. It wasn’t something he planned on revealing to Henry or the others, but it was something leaving him feeling far less concerned about this confrontation.

  “You might want to take your friend’s advice, Henry,” Tolan said. “Whereas I may have gone through an Inquisition, I’ve also passed beyond the first level. How many of you will be able to make the same claim? If you continue to disrupt the quiet of the library, you might find your access to it disappears. And then I seriously doubt you’ll be able to progress beyond this level.”

  Tolan let the words hang in the air. It was what most first-level students feared. Few spoke about it, and fewer still would say anything other than the fact they recognized their position within the Academy was tenu
ous as a first-level student, but all felt that concern. Tolan had known it himself, and though he didn’t have the same abilities as so many others and had come to the Academy without any ability to shape, he had managed to pass beyond the first level.

  Getting to the third level was a different story.

  Henry glared at Tolan, and for a moment, Tolan thought he might say something. As much as he hated to admit it about himself, Tolan would have welcomed Henry to do so. It would have amused him far more than it should.

  Instead, Henry dropped back down into his seat, muttering under his breath.

  “What was that?”

  Henry looked up. He opened his mouth as if to snap at Tolan before biting it back.

  Tolan tapped on the table briefly and spun, returning to his place. He took a moment to clear his mind, breathing in and out slowly and steadily, trying to remove the agitation from himself. It was difficult to do, far more difficult than it should have been. Then again, he should have known better than to allow himself to get caught up in the taunting of students like this. He had gone through more than enough, and certainly knew he attracted the wrong kind of attention. How could he do anything else?

  Turning his attention back to the book, he focused on the writing. According to Master Minden, this was in an ancient language called Rens, one he thought he might be able to work through, but processing it, finding the key to it, proved far more difficult than he had expected.

  “You were probably a little harsher than you needed to be with them.”

  Tolan looked up and realized Master Minden stood over him, a stack of books clutched in her hands. “I’m sorry. I should know better.”

  “There are ways of silencing unruly students that don’t involve antagonizing them, but then again, there are ways of studying in the library that don’t involve quite as much chaos as many of the earlier-level students seem to think is necessary.”

  “Not all students think that,” Tolan said.

  Master Minden smiled at him. “No. Not all, but even the most studious still find ways of being a little unruly at times.” She set the books down on the table. “How are you finding this particular volume?”

  Tolan glanced down at the book, flipping the pages. “Not as good as I would like.”

  “No? What about it do you struggle with?”

  “It’s the language, Master Minden. I’m having a hard time reading ancient Rens.”

  Master Minden glanced around the library, and her brow furrowed for a moment. As it did, Tolan looked up to see the group of students getting up from the table and heading toward the door. They were a little louder than they had been before, almost as if ignoring there was a master librarian here. He doubted any of them, Henry included, knew just how foolish it was to irritate a master librarian, but then, they likely viewed her as beneath them. Even some of the upper-level students who should have known better often viewed the master librarians in such a way, including Draln.

  Taking a seat, she reached for the book, turning to a specific page and tapping on it. “One of the things you will learn about the ancient languages is that many of them have similarities to the one you speak. Languages are like people. They change over time. Many of the terms you use were used back then, though often they had different meanings and purposes. It is much the same with Rens. The advantage you have when trying to understand what you’re seeing is that at least they use the same alphabet that we do.”

  “Some of them are nothing more than symbols.”

  “Yes, some of the older languages are little more than glyphs, which makes interpreting them difficult.”

  “It would be a lot easier if we could simply shape the knowledge to each other.” There’d been a book like that, though she hadn’t brought him any others like it.

  “Wouldn’t it, though?” She tapped on the book again. “Take a look at this passage, Shaper Ethar.”

  Tolan looked at where she was pointing. He had pored over that one before. It was the beginning of a new chapter, and there was an image depicted at the top of the page, something like an enormous wolf. For some reason, Tolan couldn’t help but feel as if the shape of it was important. It reminded him somewhat of hyza, though the appearance of the wolflike creature was quite a bit different than the fire and earth elemental he knew.

  “I tried looking through this passage, but I haven’t been able to uncover anything I can understand, Master Minden.”

  “Perhaps not yet but give it time. I would start with this section. I suspect you will find it of particular interest.”

  “Because of the elemental depicted here?”

  “What makes you think this is an elemental?”

  “The appearance, mostly. I don’t know if it really is or not, but something about the shape suggests to me it’s an elemental.”

  She smiled at him. “Perhaps that is all it is. Take your time, see what you can uncover, and when you have an idea, find me and we can talk about what you have discovered.”

  She got up then, leaving him to his studies once more. Tolan turned his attention back to the book, staring at the page, as he had for the last hour he’d been here. In that time, he had uncovered nothing of any use.

  Master Minden wanted him to understand the elementals. It was for that reason she pushed him, encouraging him to continue his studies and his research, trying to get him to find his own answers, much the way she’d encouraged him from the very beginning. She hadn’t said so, but he suspected she had always known he’d have some potential to reach the elementals.

  Studying the image, he still couldn’t shake the sense it reminded him of hyza. It wasn’t quite the same. The wolflike creature depicted on the page was considerably larger than the foxlike hyza, and though he knew the elementals were of variable size when they escaped the bond, he still didn’t think there were more than a few quite that large. He could only imagine how an elemental like that would be greeted if it were seen having escaped the bond. Already, the elementals were at a disadvantage, striking fear into people—unnecessarily, as far as he was concerned—and yet, very few people really understood what role the elementals had in the world. Tolan included.

  “I thought I’d find you here.”

  He glanced up and smiled at Jonas. His friend was lean and lithe, no different than so many wind shapers. And Jonas was predominantly a wind shaper. The wind had called to him from the very beginning, seducing him and giving him the ability to shape. Tolan had often wondered whether someone’s predilection impacted their appearance or whether they were unrelated. It was difficult to think they were completely unrelated. Far too many wind shapers had builds like Jonas, just like far too many water shapers were larger of stature.

  “I was just trying to see if there was anything I could uncover as I prepared.”

  “Prepare? You don’t need to prepare for the next test.”

  Tolan smiled. It was the excuse he had given Jonas ever since he had begun to spend even more time in the library. Only Ferrah knew the real reason he was here, and in that, he still didn’t know how she felt about it. He trusted Ferrah in a way he didn’t trust anyone else and didn’t think she’d be upset by what motivated him, but at the same time, it was difficult to admit he was drawn to the elementals.

  “You never know. One thing they’ve told us”—they being the master shapers who administered the next test—“is the testing will be unpredictable. It’s based off of everything they taught us, and in those first few months, I wasn’t able to shape at all.”

  “But you’ve become so skilled.” Jonas threw himself into the chair and leaned forward, resting his elbows on the table. “I wish I had improved as much as you.”

  “You’re a much stronger shaper than you were when you first came.”

  “That’s not really what I’m questioning.” Jonas glanced down at the books, pulling one toward him and flipping through the pages. It was one of the books Master Minden had brought, and Tolan had yet to go through it to see why she had broug
ht it over to him. After a moment, Jonas pushed it back, flipping the cover closed. A part of Tolan winced at how rough the other man was being with the book. “I look at you, and I see the things you’re working on, the kind of things you’re studying, and I don’t know. You’ve grown while you have been at the Academy. I… Well, I just haven’t. Not like you.”

  “I didn’t have a whole lot of choice,” Tolan said.

  “It really makes you wonder, doesn’t it?”

  “Wonder about what?”

  “It makes you wonder about what they’re able to see when they perform the testing. What did they know when you went in for a Selection?”

  “I wondered the same thing. I don’t know that I should have been Selected.”

  And from what he’d uncovered about himself, and his family, he had a sense his parents had tried to protect him from a Selection. They had wanted him to have the choice and had allowed him to stay in Terndahl so he could decide what he did and who he became, not wanting to force him into serving the Draasin Lord. That was something Tolan actually understood now he had a better sense of the Draasin Lord. He probably wouldn’t have understood it had he not experienced it firsthand. And as strange as it was, he appreciated his parents hadn’t forced that decision upon him. If they had, he’d have immediately been considered an exile to Terndahl. He would have been hunted, the same way so many others had been hunted.

  “I’ve often wondered whether it had anything to do with somehow using spirit to determine what elements you might have the potential to shape.”

  “I don’t know that spirit shaping works like that.”

  Jonas shrugged. “Since I don’t have any ability with it, I don’t know.”