The Elements Bond (Elemental Academy Book 7) Read online

  Once he found it, returning should be relatively easy and straightforward. With the warrior shaping, he could travel in little more than a blink of an eye. He could return if there was any danger.

  With his mother there, there would be danger.

  Tolan had focused on a shaping, letting it come to him, and had prepared to use the warrior shaping to carry him out to the waste when something came to him.

  At first, he wasn’t entirely sure what it was. It was a strange sensation, a connection, almost as if he could feel something within him.

  That something called to him, familiar and powerful.

  That power came from the Draasin Lord.

  Tolan opened himself up to that power, embracing it.

  For a moment, he wasn’t entirely sure what it was he was detecting, only that there was something of the Draasin Lord within the connection. More and more of that sense came to him.

  It was an image.

  He had never connected to the Draasin Lord like that before. Never before had he had such an experience, something where he could feel such energy.

  In this case, he recognized what the Draasin Lord was trying to do to him, and what he was trying to do for him.

  That power involved Tolan embracing a sense of spirit, and he did so, trying to use it to know just what the Draasin Lord intended to share with him.

  He could feel that power, and he could feel the energy within it.

  Within the image the Draasin Lord showed him, there was the sense of fire.

  It wasn’t just the sense of fire he detected, it was something else. Something he had never expected to see before. It was something he had never thought he would find quite like this.

  The image was clear, and it reminded him of what he had made here. He thought about the nature of power all around him, the power filling him, and about what the Draasin Lord was trying to show him.

  Fire filled his mind.

  Within that fire was a shape.

  Within that shape was a draasin.

  The sense of spirit connected him and the Draasin Lord; it was energy bridging them, bonding them together.

  A message came through that connection. It was as clear and loud as if the Draasin Lord were standing right next to Tolan. He could do nothing other than acknowledge it.

  “Come.”

  “When?”

  “Soon. It’s time for us to go to the beyond.”

  7

  Tolan stared out upon the vast expanse of the waste. There was a sense of energy here that had never been here before. He was able to reach through his connection to the elements, along with the elementals, and could feel that power surging around him. It filled him, giving him an awareness of the power now existing here. It was life, in a place where there should be none.

  He closed his eyes, breathing in that sense of energy, focusing on what he was able to detect. The new life and energy there filled him, rolling within him.

  For the most part, he was able to detect the elementals. The Guardians. They sat in a circle, unmoving, once again bound to this land through the bondars his father and the people of the elemental village had formed. Using those bondars tied them to the land, holding them in place.

  “Are you just going to stand there, or do you intend to do anything?”

  Tolan glanced over at Ferrah, who stood at the edge of the circle. She wasn’t able to shape without the orb, but with it, the sense of power coming from her was incredible. “I’m trying to decide what else we need to do.”

  “We’ve reformed the bondars. Isn’t that enough?”

  “Is it? With what the draasin detected, we need to do more.”

  “That’s what I’m asking.”

  Tolan shook his head. “I don’t even know. Not anymore. The bondars held the Guardians in place should have been harder for my mother to have disrupted.”

  “Only, she didn’t disrupt them herself.”

  Tolan glanced over. There was a cluster of people standing near the earth Guardian. He didn’t have a name for the elemental, and it was the only one like it he had ever encountered. The sense of earth emanated from it. He struggled to try to understand the nature of that power, searching for what it represented. Earth, but if he was right about what he detected, there was another sense within it, too. Another hint of elemental energy. The elemental was connected to one of the other bonds.

  As he swept his gaze around, he realized all of the elementals forming the Guardians were connected to other element bonds. Some of them were obvious, like the fire elemental, which was connected to earth in a way he could feel flowing from it. That connection was powerful. The energy radiated outward, sweeping toward the center of the waste where the hidden Convergence was located.

  “She didn’t, but now she knows the trick of it.”

  “So do we,” Ferrah said, taking his hand.

  They stood together, looking out over the waste.

  “I never would’ve imagined there would be so much activity within the waste,” she said.

  There was movement overhead, as there often was these days. It wasn’t a Shapers Path. With the nature of the waste being what it was, Tolan wasn’t even sure a Shapers Path would be possible. Instead, it was a sense of power and movement. He could see the other shapers coming toward the heart of the waste, using orbs to carry them. Those orbs gave them the ability to reach a place long separated from them.

  “It’s time,” she said.

  “I know it’s time. It’s just…”

  He squeezed his eyes shut, thinking about the waste, about the power here, and about everything he was able to detect. Was it fear that made him hesitate?

  Tolan didn’t think of himself as someone who was scared. In the time he’d been at the Academy, his confidence in his ability to shape, to control the elements, had increased, and because of that, it had taken away the fear he experienced when it came to thinking about the natural power within the world.

  Maybe it was the idea of confronting his mother. Perhaps it was finding the other draasin. The image lingered in his mind, a gift from the Draasin Lord.

  Ferrah squeezed his hand, almost as if she could read his thoughts. “Someone else is there, controlling her.”

  “What if there’s not?”

  “Then she acted how she acted,” Ferrah said. “Either way, we have to go and figure out what they intend.”

  That was the challenge. They had been waiting long enough. Most of that time had been spent trying to reestablish the Guardians. They had needed to seal them once again with bondars. The elementals had wanted to be sealed there. They had needed to be. Not only did that seal help feed them from the Convergence, the connection formed in the place of the free elementals, but that connection helped the other free elementals. Once the bondars had been formed, Tolan was able to tell, much as he was able to tell now, that the waste served as a protection.

  “How long have we looked out on the waste as something to be feared?”

  “I still fear it,” Ferrah said.

  “But it’s something that protects us as well.”

  “I know it does. I can feel it does. It’s just that it’s difficult for me to look past what I’ve known my entire life.”

  “You’ve known the elementals were something to be afraid of your entire life as well.”

  “I’m still not completely convinced they aren’t.” She glanced up. A dark shadow in the sky swirled over their heads. The draasin flew, casting a shadow on the ground. “Have you known he was coming?”

  “For a while.”

  “You were able to detect it?”

  “It’s strange. With hyza, I feel something all the time. A bond, though I don’t really know what that bond means. Only that we are connected. With the Draasin Lord, it is something else. I can feel him, can feel the power he possesses, and it’s almost as if I can tell it should be shared with me. At the same time, I don’t have the same connection to him as I do with hyza.”

  “I wonder why y
ou have a connection at all.”

  “I think I have a connection in order to help the elementals.”

  She tore her gaze off the sky, turning back to him. “The Draasin Lord will be seen easily.”

  “He claims he won’t be.”

  “Do you think he won’t be?”

  Tolan wasn’t entirely sure. The Draasin Lord was able to hide himself, using fire and spirit to mask his presence. He claimed he was able to do that and had done for nearly a thousand years. It was how the draasin had not been seen.

  He waited for the Draasin Lord to drop to the ground. The shapers working near the heart of the waste turned toward him. More than a few stopped and stared, their gazes lingering on him. Tolan understood that feeling they must have. It would be wonder, but it might be similar to how Ferrah felt. Fear.

  How could they not fear the draasin?

  More than that, how could they not fear a creature known as the Draasin Lord?

  Tolan nodded to Ferrah, and they started toward the Draasin Lord. One of the other shapers near the earth Guardian turned toward them, nodding. Tolan nodded back to Master Jensen, debating whether he should go and speak with him before deciding against it. Master Jensen had been one of the most curious about trying to understand the considerable energy and power here. Many shapers had, more than just the librarians. That surprised Tolan, though he knew it should not. The librarians were curious about the archaeology, the history, whereas the other shapers were more curious about the idea they could shape in a place where they had never been able to. More and more of them carried the bondars that allowed them to shape. His father and the others from the free elemental village had created those bondars, allowing them to be distributed freely.

  “Are you ready?” he asked, turning to the Draasin Lord.

  “I am always ready.”

  “I can—”

  A burst of energy caught his attention and Tolan frowned, looking all around.

  For a moment, he thought that energy came from somewhere near the other shapers, but that wasn’t the case.

  It came from out across the waste. Away from Terndahl.

  “Did you detect that?” He directed the question toward the Draasin Lord, not to Ferrah, but it was Ferrah who answered.

  “What was I supposed to have detected?”

  “There was a shaping nearby.”

  “It was probably just one of these shapers.”

  Tolan shook his head. “It wasn’t one of these shapers. If it had been one of the shapers, I would have recognized it.”

  Still, something about it struck him as far too familiar.

  It was troubling. He needed to chase it down, to see what it was, but if he were to do that, it would take them away from what they had planned.

  In that case, perhaps it wasn’t the worst thing that could’ve happened. He would rather know he wasn’t leaving anybody in danger. He would rather know they were still safe.

  Tolan took her hand and they jumped onto the Draasin Lord’s back.

  “We need to go and see what that was,” he said.

  “I can tell you what it was,” the Draasin Lord said.

  The image surged into his mind again, that of a draasin. The creature was enormous, larger than the Draasin Lord. Powerful.

  “You saw it?”

  “I caught something. A glimpse near the outreaches of the waste.”

  “Where was it?” Tolan focused on the sense of energy he had detected. Even as he did, he wasn’t able to uncover anything. He was aware of the residual power existing, but there was nothing more he could pick up on. He tried, thinking if there was some sense of power out there he could uncover, he might be able to use one of his elements to reach for what was out there. Perhaps earth, or even spirit, though using his elements and the element bonds in this place was limiting.

  “Danger,” the Draasin Lord said. They took to the air and the Draasin Lord flapped his massive wings, guiding them higher into the sky. Tolan held on, squeezing tightly to the spikes protruding from the draasin’s back. Heat radiated off the draasin, rolling toward him. There was incredible power coming from the elemental. He struggled to maintain his grip as the draasin streaked higher and higher into the sky.

  Ferrah held on to him.

  She was using the orb, shaping through it to be able to withstand the heat coming off the draasin. Tolan found he didn’t need to use a shaping in quite the same way. He was able to withstand the heat without holding onto one. There was enough power within him, or enough of a connection, to be able to do so.

  He held tightly, squeezing the spikes, waiting as they streaked even higher.

  There was no sense of wind. He could feel the air as it blasted past him, and the heat all around him. Some of heat came from the Draasin Lord himself, but some of it came from the waste. He also could feel the earth far below, the awareness of the entirety of the waste pressing upon him. There was no sense of water, though there was the dryness within his mouth, the pulsing of blood through his body.

  The elements were there.

  They had always been there.

  That was the part of the waste that had been difficult to grasp. Everything had always been around him, and despite the difficulty with reaching the elements out on the waste, it wasn’t as if it was a place without them.

  They soared higher and higher into the sky, the Draasin Lord beating his wings against the dry air, carrying them up and up. Then the Draasin Lord stabilized. He streaked forward. The wind whistled around them and Tolan ducked down, staying out of the wind.

  He held on tightly, prepared for the nature of the wind as it whistled toward him.

  “Where are we going?”

  “You wanted to see the edge of the waste,” the Draasin Lord said.

  “I wanted to see it, but I’m not sure we can do that now. If there is some sort of problem, then we need to be prepared for what it is and whether there’s anything we can do to stop it.”

  The Draasin Lord rumbled. Smoke and steam whispered from his nostrils. “They will not attack.”

  “How do you know?”

  “Because the Guardians remain intact.”

  They circled and, far below, Tolan was able to make out something different. He used a shaping of wind, drawing upon his experience early on within the Academy, turning the wind into a magnification, swirling it in front of him. Wind alone made it difficult to detect what was out there, and had he water, he might have been better able to see what else was out there.

  The ground down below was green. It was undulating, hills leading toward mountains in the distance. Water was somewhere. He could feel that sense pressing upon him, and he could feel the breeze shifting, much like he could feel the earth pressing up against him. The only thing that didn’t change was the sense of fire, though that had likely as much to do with the Draasin Lord.

  “What is that?” Ferrah asked.

  “I can only guess it’s what’s beyond the waste.”

  “It looks so… Harmless.”

  “The land is harmless,” the Draasin Lord rumbled. “Something else here is not.”

  “Are there people here?”

  “Something is here. I cannot tell what,” the Draasin Lord said.

  “I thought you hadn’t been here.”

  “I haven’t, but a connection to fire reveals many things.”

  Tolan detected the image of the other draasin again, brief and with a surge of power, and he focused his awareness on fire, focusing on what he might be able to learn. He closed his eyes, thinking about the connection to fire, using hyza to help him reach the element bond more rapidly. As he did, he reached through that bond, hand strained outward, searching for whether there was anything more.

  He felt a presence far below him.

  That presence was strange.

  “What am I detecting?” he asked.

  “You are detecting these lands.”

  “I understand that, but what is it about these lands I am detecting?” He
wasn’t entirely sure what he could feel, only that there was a sense of power down there. It was different than he detected within Terndahl. It reminded him almost of…

  “Those are elementals.”

  “There aren’t elementals,” the Draasin Lord said. “They are different.”

  “How?”

  “They haven’t merged with the bond.”

  “Why?”

  The Draasin Lord rumbled, letting out flames from his nostrils that filled the sky. “Because they have changed.”

  “How have they changed?”

  “I can’t take you close enough to show without revealing myself.”

  “What can you show me?”

  The Draasin Lord rumbled. It sounded like thunder echoing across the sky before fading into nothingness, but it was a power surge, one carrying away from him. As it did, Tolan felt a new connection to him, an awareness of the Draasin Lord in a way he normally was not. Not only was he connected, but he could feel the Draasin Lord. He could see what the Draasin Lord saw.

  There was a sense of the ground below him. It was a sense of power, and through that, he was able to make out details far below.

  It was almost as if he were looking through the draasin’s eyes. Everything seemed to be ripples of fire. Orange and yellow. They blended together, smearing in a way making it difficult to see and know what was down there. As he stared, something about that shifted.

  It seemed as if it came from within him, some part of his mind shifting what he was able to make out, and then he was able to see something else.

  There was power down there. Not only was he aware of it, but he could practically feel that sense of power. Tolan focused on it, struggling against it, trying to better understand what he detected. The Draasin Lord’s sight made it so he could see, but he wasn’t able to know just what he was seeing.

  Perhaps it was power.

  Tolan focused again, and as he did, there came another shifting.

  Everything blurred again and the colors cleared up. For a moment, he was able to make out something other than the red and orange and yellow. It seemed as if there was brown and green. Almost as if the Draasin Lord was trying to help him be able to see it the way he normally would. It was like a blending of his eyesight and that of the Draasin Lord’s.