Rise of the Elder Read online

  Rise of the Elder

  The Dark Ability

  D.K. Holmberg

  ASH Publishing

  Copyright © 2016 by D.K. Holmberg

  Cover by Rebecca Frank

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

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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

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Epilogue

  Author’s Note

  About the Author

  Also by D.K. Holmberg

  Chapter 1

  Rsiran Lareth crouched on the rooftop, staring down at the darkened street below. Lights flashed throughout the city, ones that would only be visible to him, and his connection to the lorcith. One of his knives hovered over the ground, sweeping through the streets as some sort of lantern that he used to pierce the darkness between the other bright lights that he saw.

  With his cloak around him, he was nearly invisible. Not quite as invisible as Haern would be with the strange shirt of Venass that he possessed, but still dark enough that none but the strongest Sighted would be able to notice him.

  As he sat on the rooftop, he focused on the sense of lorcith, listening for it. To this, he added his connection to heartstone, searching for both. When it came to Venass, he didn’t know which they preferred to use.

  The streets around him weren’t as familiar as those of Elaeavn, but then Elaeavn was no longer the city he knew. The council had made certain he didn’t feel the same welcome within the city, and ensured he was considered a threat. It was a position he knew all too well.

  “I don’t see anything.” Jessa crouched next to him, completely silent. Were it not for the heartstone charm she wore, he wouldn’t have any way of knowing she was there. She barely moved—barely breathed—her training as a sneak making her practically invisible. Rsiran didn’t need to see her to know the lines of her face, the way her brown hair swept down to her shoulders; he could see those without opening his eyes. Neither did he need to see her to know she was worried. Each night spent here left her more anxious.

  “You don’t need to see anything. They’re down there.”

  “I know you think this is how we’re going to get access to Venass, but it’s dangerous.”

  Rsiran turned toward her. “Everything’s dangerous these days. Living in the trees is dangerous. Training the others to fight is dangerous. Everything.”

  “I thought you liked that we were back in the trees.”

  Rsiran thought of the simple structures that had been built in the Aisl Forest. There had been a time when he wondered what it would be like for his ancestors, back at a time when their people still lived within the branches, close to the Elder Trees, but now that he’d had the chance to experience it, the thought of his smithy and the warmth of the forge or even the regular heavy weight of the hammer as it struck metal appealed to him. He missed those comforts.

  First, they had to stop Venass.

  A flicker of lorcith, barely more than a fluttering, pulled on him.

  Rsiran tapped Jessa’s hand—their signal for her to remain where she was—and he Slid after it. When he emerged, he was near the center of the city. A wide-open courtyard surrounded him, one that he’d been to several times before. A dark shape moved along the edge of the courtyard, and from that person, he sensed the lorcith.

  He pushed one of his knives so that it floated toward the other man, giving him enough light to see by. The man seemed to notice the knife and spun around, a crossbow aimed at him.

  Damn!

  Almost too late, he Slid, emerging near the man. Rsiran pushed on the lorcith that he detected, sending the man slipping along the cobbles and away from him.

  “Lareth,” the man said in a soft whisper.

  Rsiran couldn’t tell if he knew this man. He wore a long, black cloak with a hood that covered his face. A band of metal pierced him. That lorcith would be what gave him abilities much like what Rsiran possessed.

  “You were foolish to come to Cort,” he said.

  “I have my reasons.”

  The man chuckled. “Reasons? Did you come to die? Because that’s all that can happen here.”

  All he wanted to do was to capture one of the Venass fighters. He needed information.

  Rsiran ignored him, pushing on a pair of knives and sending them streaking toward the man. Neither struck. He vanished in a Slide so fast that Rsiran struggled to follow it.

  When he emerged, he did so behind Rsiran.

  “You don’t think I can handle one of you with the ability to Slide?” Rsiran asked.

  “One?” The man flickered as he Slid forward, no more than a step.

  Rsiran readied a pair of knives, but had a growing uncertainty rise within him as well. Had he underestimated Venass? There were plenty of their agents moving through Cort, enough that it gave Rsiran an easy reason to justify the amount of time he spent here, but those he’d found had been easy to subdue.

  “If there were more than one—”

  A chill worked up his spine and he Slid, emerging on the edge of the plaza. Another Slide took him to the far side, and then one more took him back to the opposite side. Each time he emerged, he felt the uncomfortable sense that others able to Slide appeared, but Rsiran couldn’t see them.

  Pulling on five of his knives, he sent them away from him, bringing them back as soon as they reached the pits of darkness pooling around the courtyard. Something flickered, and Rsiran hesitated, pushing one of the knives in that direction.

  There he saw three others, all with crossbows.

  Bolts loosed at him.

  Rsiran Slid, emerging on top of one of the nearby buildings. His heart raced. If there were that many Venass near him, he needed to be more careful.

  As he emerged, he realized that they had followed him.

  Damn.

  Another Slide, and this time, he emerged near the heart of Cort, with dozens of towering buildings on either side of the street. Lorcith lingered along the street in places where he’d left it, giving him more light than he’d otherwise have in the darkness.

  The sense that others trailed him remained.

  Rsiran spun, looking for signs that they had, but found nothing. That did nothing to settle his racing heart. He should have expected Venass to begin hunting him; after all, he’d been the one hunting them for the last few m
onths, searching for those with heartstone and lorcith buried within them so that he could trace it back to his grandfather. So far, none knew how to find him.

  And worse, they didn’t know how or where to find the crystal.

  More than anything else, that was what he wanted to find. The other crystals were still safe, protected by the way that he’d used the energy of the Elder Trees to seal them off, but he needed to find the missing crystal to secure the seal. Not only secure it, but to find some way for him to stop Venass. That was all that mattered now.

  The others of Venass might be out there now, but that didn’t mean that he could do nothing. Stepping into a Slide, he paused in the space between.

  As always, the smells of lorcith and heartstone swirled around him, almost as if this place fed on the energies of those metals. The air had a muted quality, one that made it seem both lessened and strangely more real than when he was on the other side. From here, he could access the power of the Elder Trees, and could use that power.

  There was another benefit to standing in this space between, one that only he could reach. The power of the Elder Trees refreshed him, filling him with their energy, building his strength. As he bathed in that, he didn’t worry about injury or pain or fatigue from Sliding. All of that went away. It was in this place that he’d seen Della healed, where he’d helped Haern, and where he never feared those more powerful than him. It was not a place he could live—he didn’t even know if he would be allowed to remain for much longer than his brief visits—but it was a place where he felt connected to the Great Watcher.

  Rsiran drew on his renewed energy and then Traveled.

  Traveling as he did, separating himself into two, allowed him to leave his physical body behind while his mind could then Travel anywhere in the outside world, invisible and undetectable by most. Traveling while in-between was the only way he was able to use the power of the Elder Trees. This time, he emerged in the courtyard where he’d found those with the crossbows.

  Two Venass soldiers lingered in the shadows, hiding near the long walls surrounding the courtyard. Using the power of the Elder Trees, he pushed against them, securing them to the ground so they couldn’t move. They wouldn’t cause him any more trouble. There were others who would take it from here.

  Rsiran needed to find the others.

  Connected as he was to the Elder Trees, he sensed the pull of heartstone and lorcith like a sharp tugging at him, drawing him through the city. Traveling to the next place where he detected the metal, he found two more Venass soldiers. He incapacitated these men the same as he had the others.

  How many remained?

  He still hadn’t found the lead Venass. That was who he wanted to find, and once he did, he hoped that he could take Rsiran to Danis. Once he stopped his grandfather, he could end the war, bring the guilds back into Elaeavn, and perhaps finally have peace.

  He noted a surge of heartstone, and it was near another, one that he was close to.

  Even in this insubstantial form, his heart raced.

  He Traveled toward it.

  There, Jessa stood with eyes wide, her body stiff as the Venass fighter held a knife to her back. When Rsiran appeared—Traveling, not Sliding—the man smiled broadly.

  “I know you’re here, Lareth.”

  “If Rsiran is here, then you’re in trouble,” Jessa said.

  Rsiran admired the steel in her voice, and the ready way that she stood, prepared to dart forward, and away from the knife. How could he have left her alone like this? Of course Venass would come after her. They knew how important she was to him, and they knew the lengths to which he would go to get her back safely.

  “Mr. Lareth seems to think that he is safe wherever he Travels. He will find we have learned, and that we will not be so easy to dispatch.”

  Rsiran drew upon the connected energy and pushed. Power surged from him and slammed into the man from Venass. It washed over him, dissipating as if there was nothing to it.

  The knife pressed forward. “As I said, you will find that we have learned, Lareth. Too bad that you have not.”

  The man’s knife started forward, and would stab into Jessa. Traveling would give Rsiran no way to help her. He needed his physical body.

  In a heartbeat, he returned to the in-between and Slid back to Jessa, emerging behind the Venass fighter.

  Rsiran pushed on the knives he carried, pulling on the heartstone piercing the Venass fighter at the same time. His knives met resistance. This man was strong—stronger than most of the Venass he faced—but Rsiran had learned tricks while facing Venass that he could use.

  Holding onto the sense of lorcith within Ilphaesn, a sense he could detect even here, he pushed. The knives sliced forward, slipping through the resistance, slowly moving toward the other man.

  The Venass fighter’s face tightened in a mask of concentration as he resisted.

  Rsiran pulled on the heartstone piercing the Venass fighter, and pulled on the lorcith he had, as well, dragging him away from Jessa. She jerked free and stumbled away.

  The Venass man fought a moment longer before releasing the resistance in a soft snap of power. As he did, he flickered, and faded from view, Sliding away from them.

  “That… was a little too close,” Jessa said.

  “They were expecting me.”

  “You knew it would happen. How many Venass have we taken out since we came to Cort?”

  Rsiran closed his eyes, trying to remove the image of the knife in Jessa’s back. How much longer would he have to worry about her, and worry about the next attack, or the next? He’d lost her once, and vowed not to let that happen again, but what if he couldn’t prevent it? What if he wasn’t strong enough to stop Venass? They continued to progress, to find newer and newer ways to use powers they siphoned off the connection to the metals, and he didn’t progress nearly as quickly. They had more experience and more time working with the metals than he had, and he didn’t doubt that they would eventually find some way to hurt him—either directly or through Jessa. His battle against them had changed him. He’d now killed, over and over.

  Was that what he was to become? Was that what it would take to defeat Venass?

  “Rsiran?” She rested her hand on his, and he opened his eyes, meeting her deep green eyes. “I’ve seen that look from you before. I know what you’re thinking.”

  She probably did. Jessa didn’t need to be a Reader with him. With her Sight, she managed to catch the worried lines on his face or the pull of the muscles in his cheeks, or countless other ways that she had of knowing him that he didn’t understand.

  He took a deep breath, his gaze flicking to her sharp jawline that softened as her hair framed her face, falling to her shoulders, so much longer than when they had first met. In that time, she had changed, getting both softer and harder than she had been. Rsiran had changed, as well, no longer the fearful boy afraid of disappointing his father. Now he had others he was responsible for, more than just Jessa and his friends, but all the guilds.

  “I’m thinking that we need to get back to Aisl.” That was the name the guilds had given to the camp they had made within the Elder Trees. They had named it after the forest and the trees, a name that felt both fitting and simplistic. Rsiran hadn’t objected, though they had asked his opinion. He had the sense he could have overridden it, made a suggestion to the rest of the guilds that would have been listened to and acted upon.

  “That’s not what you’re thinking. You have that look, the one you get when you think you need to keep me safe. I know that look, Rsiran.”

  “I… need to find a way to draw them out. If they’re still here, it means they still search for the crystal, and if I can have them chase me, that takes away from their ability to search.”

  “Isn’t that what we’re doing? Isn’t that the reason that we came here so that you can get connected with whatever other groups are needed so we can find the crystal?”

  “That’s why we came, but that’s not what we’re do
ing. I’ve been using this time to hunt Venass.”

  “And the guilds are thrilled you have.”

  Rsiran nodded. The guilds had suffered under Venass. Many had died, fighting a war many within the city didn’t even know existed. Now those who remained trained, learning skills to better fight, ignoring their guild abilities for now. “As much as I want to find the crystal—and I think we have to find it—there’s a part of me that’s angry about everything Venass has done and wants only revenge.”

  “If this is all about revenge—”

  “I know. It can’t be. I understand, but that doesn’t change the fact that is what is driving me. And now… now it seems Venass has discovered a way to resist the power of the Elder Trees. That was the only advantage we had. What happens if they figure out a way to keep me from Traveling? What if they keep me from reaching that power in the first place?”

  They had so few advantages when it came to Venass that they needed every one they did have, which was why Rsiran and his abilities were so useful. Or had been.

  “What are you saying?”

  “I don’t know. There’s just so much to accomplish. I need to find the crystal quickly. That can’t be out there unprotected. We need to take back the city. And then we need to destroy the rest of Venass.”

  “I know this.”

  Rsiran nodded. “You do. The others… they grow comfortable in the forest. To them, there’s safety there, and they’ve separated themselves from the rest of the world, letting the power of the Elder Trees keep them protected. But they can’t be safe there indefinitely. Venass has already destroyed one of the Elder Trees. If they manage to destroy another, if they find a way to overcome even that protection—or worse, reach the crystals—we’ll lose.”