The Elements Bond (Elemental Academy Book 7) Read online

  The others near him looked up, following the direction of his gaze, but Tolan doubted they would even be able to see anything.

  He watched as the Draasin Lord drifted down to the ground, landing not far from them. He was aware of him in a way that left him with an understanding of the Draasin Lord and how he was filled with a sense of his power. There was nothing more to him.

  He studied the Draasin Lord, and with a flicker of energy, the shimmering illusion he placed over himself disappeared.

  “The others really wouldn’t be able to see you, would they?”

  “Not unless I choose it.”

  “You called the draasin here,” the Grand Master said.

  “Given everything he went through to bring her back here, I thought it was appropriate.”

  “It’s risky,” the Grand Master said.

  “Risky. I think it’s risky we don’t allow people to understand the elementals. Even if we don’t pull them out of the element bond”—and Tolan wondered whether or not that was necessary, though he could feel the sense of some of the elementals straining against the sense of the bond, crawling for that release—“we still need to try to understand the nature of the elementals. We still need to allow others to know that the elementals aren’t what we have been taught to believe. They aren’t anything to fear.”

  Master Minden joined Tolan, looking over at the Draasin Lord. “It will take time.”

  “I know.”

  “You will be needed, Master Ethar.”

  “I know.”

  “You will stay at the Academy?”

  Tolan glanced toward the waste. He could feel it, and he knew there was something waiting for him beyond the waste, a sense of something else out there. The elementals were across the waste needed help, and they needed for him or someone to help them with their connection to spirit. It was part of the reason they struggled.

  Eventually, he would need to do that.

  Time. His sense of time was so different than that of the elementals. His sense of time was one where he felt as if they would need to act in order to know what else there was for them.

  Tolan understood that the elementals in that land didn’t struggle with that sense of time quite as much as he did. What was time to a creature that lived as long as they did?

  “I will stay.”

  Ferrah slipped her hand into his. “You know what that means, don’t you?”

  “That I have to stay around you?”

  “No. That you’ll have to deal with Draln more.”

  “You don’t know that. He might choose not to stay at the Academy.”

  Ferrah arched a brow. “Do you really think that Draln would elect not to stay at the Academy?”

  Tolan grunted. Unfortunately, he did not. Knowing Draln as he did, the other man likely would thrill at the idea of teaching. Tormenting.

  “Master Sar has agreed to remain and work with the first-level students,” Master Minden said. “It would be good if there was an… alternate opinion.”

  Tolan laughed softly. “I suppose there would be.”

  He looked from Ferrah to Master Minden and finally to the Grand Master. “What would you ask of me?”

  “We do have a need for a master of spirit.”

  Ferrah started to laugh. Tolan glanced at her, and then shook his head. “I’m not sure I’m the right person.”

  “Even after with what you claim your mother gave you?”

  He focused on those memories. They were like a pocket within his mind. It didn’t take much to delve into them and grasp for those memories, to know the gift she had provided. They were there, bright and blazing within his mind.

  “I don’t want to be an Inquisitor.”

  “We will have to give some thought about the purpose of the Inquisitors. In the meantime, having someone who has as much potential as you do with spirit would be beneficial to our earliest students. You might be able to help us determine if there are other spirit shapers.”

  “I might need to leave from time to time.”

  “As would be your prerogative as a master shaper.”

  Tolan glanced over at the Draasin Lord. He focused inwardly, thinking of the sense of hyza. From both of them, he had an awareness, and there was pressure. They wanted him to do it.

  He could influence shapers in this way. He could help them learn that there was no reason to fear the elementals. He could have the time he needed.

  After a while, he nodded slowly.

  Ferrah squeezed his hand.

  The others all backed away, moving away from the stone his mother rested upon, giving him space. Tolan took a deep breath and built a shaping. He used fire and air, adding wind and water, all of them mixing together. There was a blast of power as the flames and the shaping began to consume his mother. His father used a bondar, and power flowed out from him, joining in. Ferrah did the same, though without the bondar. The Grand Master and Master Minden stood to the side, observing but doing nothing. After a while, even the Draasin Lord added his power, breathing a streamer of flame upon the funeral pyre.

  Power exploded from all of them, lifting into the sky, a surge of energy that carried away the remains of Tolan’s mother.

  They poured power out of them, and Tolan continued to do so even after the Draasin Lord stopped. Even after Ferrah and his father stopped. Tolan continued to pour power until he began to feel his stores weakening. He could delve into the power that would connect him to hyza, or perhaps even to the power that would connect him to the Draasin Lord, but there was no point in it. His mother was gone.

  He released the shaping.

  The Grand Master watched him, and Tolan sighed. After a moment, a warrior shaping took the Grand Master, lifting him away and carrying him back toward the Academy. Master Minden used the same shaping, though her gaze lingered on Tolan a little bit longer, her pale and milky eyes staring at him, almost concern within them, though when it came to Master Minden, Tolan wasn’t sure.

  His father stayed there for a moment longer. “I don’t know what I should do.”

  “The village needs you,” Tolan said.

  “I suppose it does. We have to help others understand bondars.”

  “You will teach?”

  “Not at the Academy. Others can come to us, if they choose.”

  “The village will be truly open, then.”

  “I suppose it will be. I wonder how your mother would have felt about it.”

  Tolan shook his head as he stared at the blackened section of earth. “It doesn’t matter how she would have felt about it. All that matters is how you and the other villagers feel.”

  His father nodded slowly. “We think it’s necessary.” He turned, his gaze drawn toward something in the distance, likely mountains they couldn’t see. On the other side of the mountains, the village and the elementals waited. The sense of the Convergence was there, faint enough that Tolan could only just detect the pull upon it.

  “You will bring me back?”

  “I will carry him back,” the Draasin Lord said. He settled his head to the ground and Tolan’s father looked at the Draasin Lord for a moment, his eyes wide as he studied the draasin.

  “I’ve never ridden on a draasin,” his father said.

  “Your people have,” Tolan said. Turning to the Draasin Lord, he smiled at him. “Be nice.”

  “You want me to be nice?”

  “I was saying that to the draasin. You should be nice as well. You wouldn’t want him to have any reason to throw you off.”

  The Draasin Lord rumbled, almost a sense of amusement.

  Slowly, his father climbed onto the Draasin Lord’s back. He held tightly to the spikes, and Tolan was reminded of the first time he had climbed onto the Draasin Lord, the fear he had felt. His father would be fine. The Draasin Lord would protect him. Tolan was certain of that.

  The Draasin Lord took off, leaping into the air, and his power swirled away from him.

  When he was gone, it left Tolan and Ferrah
together.

  He held onto her hand. She squeezed him, giving him a moment of silence before she leaned forward and kissed him on the cheek. “Are you ready?”

  “I don’t know if I’m ever going to be ready for this.”

  “Don’t worry. I’ll be there.”

  “So will Draln.”

  “Draln. Jonas. All of the other students. But one thing will be different.” When he frowned at her, a smile spread across her face. “You’re a master shaper. You get to help with the testing.”

  “You seem far too eager about that.”

  “Shouldn’t I be?”

  “I don’t know. Should you be?”

  She laughed, and Tolan took one last look at the charred remains of the ground, the last memory he had of his mother. It was time to move past her. It was time to move past everything she had done to him. It was time to embrace the gift she had given him.

  Wrapping each of the elements together, he added a hint of spirit. The warrior shaping streaked from the sky in a bolt of lightning, carrying Tolan and Ferrah up and away and back toward the Academy.

  Want to read more about Tolan and the Academy? Keep reading to find out how!

  First I’d love for you to check out a brand new series: The Dragon Misfits series begins with Ice Dragon!

  When a mysterious stranger brings word of a dragon, Jason’s whole world changes.

  The northern mountain village offers protection from the threat of dragons, but is a difficult place, especially for a misfit like Jason Dreshen. His days are spent hunting for food for his family, praying for warmth, and trying to hide his strange silver eye that grants him dragon sight.

  When a stranger visits during the local Freedom Festival searching for a different kind of dragon, everything changes.

  Forced down the mountainside, Jason learns the truth of powers he’d only heard about in rumors. While running from deadly Dragon Souls, he finds he might have more of a connection to magic than only dragon sight. In order to save himself and stop the Dragon Souls, he must learn a truth about himself that leads him closer to the one thing he fears above all others: dragons.

  Somehow, he might be the only one able to protect them from the Dragon Souls, but how can he protect what he hates?

  Ice Dragon is the first book in The Dragon Misfits fantasy adventure series.

  Tolan will return with a new series! Elemental Academy: Spirit Master begins with The Shape of Fire (final cover coming soon).

  A return of a long defeated threat changes everything for a Master Shaper of the elements.

  Serving as the Master of Spirit leaves Tolan with little time for anything beyond teaching. There’s no time for the research he enjoys, no time to explore ancient ruins, and no time to visit the strange elementals in the land beyond the bleak waste where no magic can exist.

  While serving the Academy during a Selection of new students, Tolan uncovers a strange village where the elementals are worshipped, along with power he didn’t believe possible within his homeland.

  When a threat he thought long ago defeated returns, Tolan finds that his service to the Academy will require more than a Master of Spirit, but after so long away from that role, it’s one he’s no longer sure he’s suited for.

  Author’s Note

  Dear Reader,

  Thank you so much for reading The Elements Bond. I hope you enjoyed it. If you would be so kind as to take a moment to leave a review on Amazon or elsewhere, I would be very grateful.

  I’m also always happy to hear from readers! Email me at [email protected]. I try to respond to each message. Don’t forget to follow me on Facebook as well!

  Review link HERE.

  All my best,

  D.K. Holmberg

  p.s. If you haven’t signed up already, subscribe to my newsletter for a few free books as well as to be the first to hear about new releases and the occasional giveaway.

  For more information:

  www.dkholmberg.com

  Also by D.K. Holmberg

  Elemental Warrior Series:

  Elemental Academy

  The Fire Within

  The Earth Awakens

  The Water Ruptures

  The Wind Rages

  The Spirit Binds

  The Chaos Rises

  The Elements Bond

  Elemental Academy: Spirit Master

  The Shape of Fire

  The Cloud Warrior Saga

  Chased by Fire

  Bound by Fire

  Changed by Fire

  Fortress of Fire

  Forged in Fire

  Serpent of Fire

  Servant of Fire

  Born of Fire

  Broken of Fire

  Light of Fire

  Cycle of Fire

  The Endless War

  Journey of Fire and Night

  Darkness Rising

  Endless Night

  Summoner’s Bond

  Seal of Light

  The Dark Ability Series

  The Shadow Accords

  Shadow Blessed

  Shadow Cursed

  Shadow Born

  Shadow Lost

  Shadow Cross

  Shadow Found

  The Collector Chronicles

  Shadow Hunted

  Shadow Games

  Shadow Trapped

  The Dark Ability

  The Dark Ability

  The Heartstone Blade

  The Tower of Venass

  Blood of the Watcher

  The Shadowsteel Forge

  The Guild Secret

  Rise of the Elder

  The Sighted Assassin

  The Binders Game

  The Forgotten

  Assassin’s End

  The Elder Stones Saga

  The Darkest Revenge

  Shadows Within the Flame

  Remnants of the Lost

  The Coming Chaos

  The Depth of Deceit

  A Forging of Power

  A Threat Revealed

  The Council of Elders

  The Dragonwalkers

  The Dragonwalker

  Dragon Bones

  Dragon Blessed

  Dragon Rise

  Dragon Bond

  Dragon Storm

  Dragon Rider

  Dragon Sight

  The Dragon Misfits

  Ice Dragon

  The Lost Prophecy Series

  The Teralin Sword

  Soldier Son

  Soldier Sword

  Soldier Sworn

  Soldier Saved

  Soldier Scarred

  The Lost Prophecy

  The Threat of Madness

  The Warrior Mage

  Tower of the Gods

  Twist of the Fibers

  The Lost City

  The Last Conclave

  The Gift of Madness

  The Great Betrayal

  The Book of Maladies

  The Book of Maladies

  Wasting

  Broken

  Poisoned

  Tormina

  Comatose

  Amnesia

  Exsanguinated