Читать книгу: «Element. Flame of Elisar», страница 5

As they touched me it felt like electricity running through my body, and then I realized that I could make no slightest movement.

But suddenly the beast lost all its interest in me. They both mover toward my sister, then one of them bit her arm and started dragging her away. Elcha moaned with pain. The other at that time was moving its head to Elcha’s neck, as if trying to pick the right spot for an assault.

They are going to tear her apart, flashed in my mind. Tears were streaming down my

face, yet I could do nothing. I screamed, but I could not hear my own voice. Despair, rage and fear overwhelmed my head and were burning me from inside. I was rushing through that inner heat looking desperately for a way out of that all, and then it came to me… It was the way out! The heat that I could feel with my entire soul was the way out. There was a fire tearing me apart as if trying to get out… a flame of incredible power… a flame, pure and naturally primitive. And I could no longer tell where it was me, and where it was the fire! I was the fire.

The beasts turned sharply to see what was going on. As our eyes met, their tentacles began to move feverishly; they were both raging around the same spot, greedily catching air with their nostrils. One even began to whine with excitement.

But I took no notice of that already; I was all burning from inside. I glanced at my hands – they were all in flames looking more like scarlet tongues, and then the fire spread all over my body, sweeping me from head to toe. My hair sprang up filled with a force struggling to break out. The grass around flared and crumbled in ashes, spreading the fire further down the slope.

Some unearthly sensation of euphoria and invincibility filled me. There was nothing burning from inside – I myself was burning, just like anything else around.

I stood up, stepped toward the monsters, and, imitating Elcha’s movement, sent all this fire their way, charging it with all my rage, despair and fear.

A flash lit up all around. The light was so intense it looked like daytime for a moment. The space around seemed to be ringing and buzzing, and a deafening bang followed… and then darkness shrouded it all.

That very instant, all the unearthly sensation vanished as if it had never been there, giving way to some deaf emptiness and complete impotence. It felt like I was going to turn into ashes and get scattered around like burnt grass.

Semiconscious, I sank to the ground, curled up and drifted off.

The Accident

I came round feeling water poured on me. They must have poured more than a few glasses, actually. And then I felt on my lips that very nasty bitter taste that always made me sick, after which I saw Nargara’s face, all worried, looking me right in the eyes.

“She’s back! Praise to the Worlds!”

She waved her hand to somebody and I got seated. I spat out that sickening stuff and looked around. Mours again! Then I got surprised seeing I was covered in a blanket, and further then got terrified realizing there was nothing else covering me under that.

Next to me I saw Truvle, who was keeping me from the back and expressing some smile that was too shy to be a real one, actually.

The field around that was green once, was a desert, with all the ground cracked and burnt down to the last straw.

A bit further aside, I saw my sister lying on the ground and covered with ash. But I could not see her face. Nargara and Yoos bent over her and were busy doing something. The only green piece was around her body. Unlike me, she had still the same clothes on, even though much shabby.

“Elcha,” I sighed getting shocked with my own voice, or what was left of my voice, to be exact.

“Alive, lost lots of blood though’” Truvle said sadly.

“The beasts?” I continued huskily.

“Dead,” the smith said and hugged me, which was quite unexpected. “It’s all over, calm down.”

The sky was already getting bright as the first rays got out from behind the horizon.

Mammy approached us quickly and helped Truvle get me up on my feet.

“You can walk, can’t you?” she asked giving me a look full of concern.

I shook my head.

“Truvle, take her then. We got to leave right now, fast. Got to leave before a soul sees us,” the witch snapped, and that very moment the smith’s strong arms took me up.

Yoos was already standing nearby, holding Elcha in his arms.

She was unconscious, all pale, with sunken eyes and bluish lips. One of her arms was wrapped with a narrow strip of white cloth.

“Sorry, Truvle. I lost your gift,” I complained as I buried my face into his shoulder, “lost the blades near the river…”

“You really care about that sort of rubbish, baby? There, look! Your blades, I mean,” and he pointed at Yoos who was carrying Elcha. I looked out from behind his powerful shoulder and saw my weapon dangling at the old warrior’s belt.

“Where did…” I was baffled.

“When you got beyond the valley,” Truvle started, “Nargara could feel that right away. I had just come to Karun and was approaching your home when I met her. Then we called Yoos as we were rushing here. He was on watch, at the eastern gate. And then we followed your footsteps down to the meadows, and then got down the river still with no single where you went afterwards. We saw lots of prints, all mixed, and then found your claws and bag. When Yoos could make sense of it all, he said that the beast was not alone, and we went on to finally end up at the crack in the rock… and then there was an insane explosion that left the mountains buzzing,” he fell into silence for a few moments, and then drew a tight sigh, “Nargara rushed that way, and we still had to roam through the rocks before we could finally come out of the maze to find you,” he stopped again, and then, piercing me with an extremely intense look, added, “and the very thought something could be wrong with you two… We had real frights of our lives.”

“It was creepy,” I confirmed, still surprised with the severe looks on his unshaven face, which, in a moment, gave way to sorrow.

“When we got closer, you both were on the ground, not a single movement. I thought you were dead,” he had real trouble uttering the last words.

I gave a sob and buried my face in the shoulder again.

“Okay. C’mon, girl. Everyone is alive, and that’s what matters.”

“Alive…” I echoed still not sure it was true.

Strangely enough, but there was no pain in the body, and yet I felt broken, which must have muted all the sensations somehow. Nor could I realize clearly what had happened.

It came later when we were at home. They gave me a whole bunch of healing elixirs and put me to bed. I slept the whole day. When I woke up, there was no one around. The previous day’s images spun around in a vivid dance, leaving a clearly cut and indelible impression in my mind.

And there I lay, living through every single bit anew. Trying to understand what had happened out there in the field. I was perfectly aware that my power had broken the blockage, yet it still remained total mystery what the explosion was, and where that strength came from to fill me.

As Truvle was carrying me through the field, I saw that a huge part of the valley was burned down to the remotest slopes. The ground was burnt and cracked. The rocks in the distance were charred, and one – the one that was closest – had cracked and split apart.

No, it couldn’t have been me! How was that any possible?

The thoughts made me uncomfortable, to put it mildly. I had never met fire sorcerers, nor had I known anything about their powers or its manifestations. But even the little that I had heard and read about was very much different from what I saw that day.

I knew that every Element had its Strongest sorcerers, and they, in turn, could possess spells of the Highest Level…

The people of water had Ertar, a huge wave that could sweep away anything that came its way, and destroy cities; or Inglas, an enormous whirlpool that would draw in anything it came by. The thing was it could occur not in the ocean only, but could take a walk on the shore looking very much like a waterspout.

The Earth sorcerers knew how to create monstrous earthquakes, to crack apart the ground or turn it into quicksand that could suck in one whole army of people.

The strongest spell for the sorcerers of air was that of Sartun Hurricane, which swept

away any life from the Earth’s surface, or even worse – Jansoul spell. Once they cast it, all the air around disappeared and all the living beings simply choked.

I read a lot of stories about the Division of the Worlds, with numerous descriptions of the effects that the disasters inflicted by ancient sorcerers had had. Not everyone had wanted any change in the World order, which finally brought them all to a civil war, while many opposed the Division. Of course, it all seemed more like a fairy tale in our times, no more than an epic narration of a sequence of events through history, an exaltation of ancient sorcerers’ powers. But the charred land and the vast destruction left in the valley brought to my mind the fiery spell of Armaron that I once had read about in some book.

Overwhelming and destructive fire, of monstrous power, that could leave behind charred earth only, all covered with ash. The only “but” there was that I did not know the spell! No single clue what that could be. As the description said, the flames devoured anything it came across, the sorcerer no exclusion. It was something disposable, to be used only once, and the fiery man who dared use it was nobody but a self destroyer!

As for Elcha and myself, we were left totally intact, which, of course, could not but make us happy yet brought about even more questions.

Not able to stand all those thoughts anymore, I sighed deeply and stood up. I could hear some voices coming from the first floor. They were engaged in rather heated an argument, once getting louder, and then going quiet.

I got dressed and went down the stairs.

“Guess we all got to calm down,” a female voice threw. Nargara was definitely not in her best mood, so her voice bore some steel shade.

“Yeah, you’re right,” a man said, and I could instantly tell it was Yoos.

“I’ll get us a drink,” Mammy added in a softer way and, judging by the steps I could hear, she left the room.

“Got to do something about it. Rather soon!” Truvle insisted.

“I said earlier it is too dangerous to stay here,” Yoos was irritated. “They know the girls are in the valley. The longer we stay here the more we tempt the fate.”

“Now, where are you going to hide them?” Truvle’s question was full of irony.

“I would say Ozeron,” Yoos replied not a slightest bit confused with the dig.

“What?!” Truvle gagged. “In capital! You nuts?”

“That’s where nobody will ever come to find them. Besides, there are lots of people of fire, and water, and air. Just get lost among them all.”

“Never,” Truvle snapped. “I think Karun is a safer place. And there is nothing but two handfuls of ashes left from the Goortans. None to come after us again.”

“You know that there may be more of them. Many more. And those behind them – they will never stop trying,” Yoos’s voice was sulky. I could easily imagine him frown with his lips curved with anger. “They’ve been trying to get us for so many years… I doubt they will give up now.”

“Anyway, they won’t get into the valley, the magic is too strong; even the ground is soaked with it, so the mountains around are just one huge shield-artifact. And Nargara was good covering the tracks. It’s like our fortress now. So even if they do know the aim is here none of those wishing us ill can get through. They try, they die,” Truvle sank into silence for a moment

and then added, “and as for the capital, it’s too far, not much of a chance to get their alive. I was out in the square today…”

“Any news? What are they saying?” Yoos asked again.

“You know people! Thanks to the Worlds, they can invent stories, each better than the previous one,” Truvle chuckled, “and that’s all full of buzz. Some are saying it was a fire sorcerer who got lost in his experiments getting his own powers to kill him, others argue they know better – it was two fire guys engaged in a fight eventually killing each other. Some even say they witnessed it, yet never mention how come they survived. Yet others scream arguing it was a scourge from above, and all that stuff, you know. But I bet it’ll finally be the second option. I guess Karun will love it best.”

I froze with my left foot in the air as I was going downstairs, listening to the conversation, my breath held. These two were talking as if they had known each other for a hundred years. But I had never seen them before even being mutually friendly. They would only talk to each other when necessary – just nods, Hi’s and quick handshakes. Occasionally, when Truvle was in Karun, they met in our house. Now it turned out that they knew each other. Had known for a long time, yet had always just acted. But why?

Surprised by the discovery, I stepped back a little and in the darkness got something with my foot, sending a flask down the steps. As if that was not enough, it got followed by a pot – a traitor that fell down with a crash, thus announcing there was a shy listener in the dark staircase corridor.

Silence fell on the room.

“Ricka or Elcha?” Truvle’s voice broke the silence.

“It’s Ricka,” I squealed and went down.

Truvle was sitting by the fireplace looking at the fire, his face all reflective. Yoos was standing a little aside, silent, too, with his hands resting on the back of the chair. I was desperate. Of course they could guess immediately I was eavesdropping, and that made the whole situation extremely uncomfortable.

“How long you been there?” Truvle spoke first, stretching his lips into a smile and turning to me.

“Well, since around ‘it is too dangerous to stay here’, I tried to be honest.

The men exchanged glances. Truvle gave a short hum as Yoos drew in air through his nose a couple of moments letting it out just as slowly, obviously to subdue some strong language as long as I was there.

“You mean the entire place knows?” I was full of emotion.

“Yes, my girl, they all know about it but don’t know who that was, actually, which is good. The valley is sealed. Goortans are dead. Now all you and Elcha got to do is just never even bat an eyelid. Just live the way you used to.”

The glance Yoos gave to Truvle who was trying to reassure me was too skeptical and yet he said no word.

“We got to discuss it with your Mammy, she knows better. And, Ricka …” Trawl hesitated, as if pondering over something, and went on, “we have to tell you something else. I do not want you to learn it from people on the street…”

“What?” I sat on the bench at the wall getting prepared.

“You just…” he paused, “…just don’t take it too close to your heart.”

“I don’t get you,” I turned my eyes to Yoos who was still silent with a stony face expressing completely nothing.

“There is more…” Truvle hesitated and ran his hand through his hair as if collecting his thoughts. But Yoos stepped in there, “The explosion rolled all over the northern part of the valley and reached… It got to Mount Eagle…”

I felt a chill of some bad premonition crawling inside my chest, but I remained silent, waiting for more.

“The fortress is intact,” he said hastily, “but those who were on the gate and the walls at that moment…” he stopped short and fell silent again.

“What… what happened to them?!” I squeezed out the words still not knowing what they were getting at.

The men exchanged glances.

“They’re dead,” Trawl turned away.

I froze, staring at them my eyes open wide.

“How many?” I said with a voice that was not mine. Tears caught my throat.

“Eleven… And five more are with the healers now. Burnt badly.”

I could not hold my tears.

I killed eleven people! Eleven innocent people! How could this ever be possible? What was it going on with me? This is not right, no… it can’t be like that. Like I … I am a monster!”

Apparently, I involuntarily pronounced the last part loud since Yoos was right there next to me. “Listen! You are not a monster! Look at me, Ricka. You aren’t to blame for this. You had nothing to do with all that.”

I raised my eyes, full of tears and obedience, and looked into his weather-beaten face. As our eyes met, I realized he was lying to me. Both to me and to himself. It was my magic power that killed them, and nothing else. Our lives, Elcha’s and mine, had cost them theirs. And Yoos had known many of those people. I could read lots of pain in his gray eyes. And Captain of the Karun guard could not hide it, no matter how hard he was trying. I could also see he blamed himself. Not only he, by the way. Truvle was biting his lips every time he thought that no one was looking at him.

“Ricka, it’s all my fault!” Nargara entered the room, “and please…”

“No!” I jumped up, driven by anger and despair. “Don’t you ever lie to me! It’s all me! I killed them! I’m a monster! A killer!”

All of a sudden I could see my closest people’s faces get filled with fear. Truvle stepped forward stretching out a hand in a warning gesture.

But Nargara’s cold voice stopped him, “Truvle, don’t even try!”

I looked down at my hands and saw fire tongues crawling along, getting bigger and bigger. I tried to shake the flames off yet they went on spreading stubbornly over the skin, as if sticking to its master.

Suddenly, the room got freezing, and a white frost pattern crept across the floor and the walls. It was approaching me, stretching forward its curls as if begging for help.

“Ricka, calm down!” Mammy’s tough voice ordered. “Ricka, can you hear me, my girl? Please, don’t…”

I took my gaze off the fire and looked at her. Nargara’s eyes glowed somewhere deep

inside. His hair swayed as if supported by an invisible air stream. And only then I noticed that the same was going on with my hair, only my curls were sparkling with golden flames. A flow of heat was running from me to her outstretched hand, and turned into ice as it approached her.

Nargara is using her magic against me, I realized. And as I got it, I felt my anger and indignation taking another surge and kindling the flame anew. It enveloped me all over again, the euphoria was growing and spreading through my entire body.

It felt like it was not me but someone else. All my senses got dull, there was no more fear, and only my power was increasing. I felt fear coming off the people standing in front of me, and I saw confusion on their faces. However, for some reason I didn’t care a spit about it… My new self could no longer put up with anyone daring to suppress me with magic, and it stirred another wave of indignation inside me.

“Don’t? You really mean it?” my voice sounded mocking already as a wry smile touched my lips. “Don’t what?”

“We don’t want anyone else to die,” her quiet reply came.

The witch’s words seemed to freeze me and turn into an ice cube, even without magic. The fire went out instantly, and I slid down the wall, burying my face in my hands.

All the three rushed to me. I felt strong arms take me up and seat in a chair.

“Water,” Nargara ordered, and Yoos arrow-dashed to the kitchen coming back a couple of seconds later with a glass of water in his trembling hands.

“Okay, it’s over, my girl. You calm down, everything will be fine,” Mammy said while giving me a hug and stroking my hair.

“Block it… block the flow, like you did before… Please, do. I don’t want it again!” I began to scream through sobs.

“Can’t do it anymore,” she said softly, hugging me again and pressing my head against her chest, “your source is too strong. You have to learn how to control it. It’s all… All that happened in the Fortress was just an accident. Don’t blame yourself,” her quiet voice came.

I clutched at her arms, as hard as I could, and gave way to my loudest sobs, as if it would bring any salvation from all the horror I had gone through.

The Secrets Long Past

As I calmed down a little and began to come back to my senses, Mammy gave me a drink of elixir. I could not tell which exactly since a veil of tears had filled my eyes. However, it sent some nice warm feeling spreading all over my body further bringing a slight relaxation bordering on indifference.

“Baby’s sleep,” I realized. If taken in a small dosage, it worked as a sedative, while a full dose turned it into a sleeping drug.

They pushed my chair closer to the fire, which seemed angry as it was cracking and roaring at the wood that would not submit to its tongues. The everlasting fire in our home included thirteen logs – seven in the master fireplace in the hall, four in the kitchen, another two resting in the stove on the second floor. That was good enough to heat the house even through the worst winter colds. In summer though we never put it down either, only removed a few logs, which left us with an inevitable bit of special comfort. I was looking at the fire, feeling much surprised that after all that had happened I could still enjoy its warm and peaceful crackle. Apparently, it was because the fire in the fireplace was different from the magic fire on my hands.

Meanwhile, the conversation in the living room went on – the men were arguing again about what to do next, leave or stay.

Elcha was sitting next to me, looking into the fireplace, too, and biting her lower lip silently.

She already knew about everything.

Awakened with the fuss downstairs, she jumped out exactly the moment I had just been put in the chair. For a while, my sister sat beside me squeezing silently my fingers until the elixir took its effect. Her hand was bandaged up to the shoulder and rested in a sling on her chest. Her face was pale, eyes sunken and shining of some tough determination. She was no longer that very noisy and fussy girl that would chatter incessantly a day before. Now she had her lips tightly pressed, and her gaze totally focused. She seemed to have grown a couple of years over a night. Then, as if making a decision, she got up and addressed everyone sitting in the living room.

“Well, why don’t you start telling us something at least? I still believe you do know much more than we do,” she curved her eyebrows and pierced everyone with one of her most inquisitive looks.

“What is it you wanna know?” Nargara asked and moved her tired glance onto me.

“First,” Elcha started, “who were the beasts? Second, why is it us they wanted to get? Third, how did they find us?” she was walking as if measuring the room as she darted the questions. “And fourth, if it was so dangerous, then what the he… Mammy, why did you ban us from using magic?!” she turned sharply to face Nargara while her eyes were beaming with so

much ferocity that even Yoos, so gloomy a minute ago, started smiling as he looked at the witch expecting her to respond. But she remained silent.

“And another, just one more thing to ask,” she stopped for an instant thinking over something and then went on with the interrogation, “Who of you were there, on the northern slope, the night before last. I could hear and see two of you, and now, after all that happened, I guess it was us you were talking about.”

Mammy’s eyes narrowed as she stared at Elcha, and her confusion was so manifest she couldn’t have hidden it even if had tried. The moment was so ripe that I jumped right in concluding my sister’s shower of questions, “Enough of your secrets. Looks like they may cost us too much.”

The men looked at each other, puzzled, both moving their eyes at Nargara thus giving her a free hand making the decision.

She exhaled trying to pluck up her courage.

“If we answered your questions now, that would bring around even more of them, and we cannot explain everything…”

“Why?” Elcha immediately asked in the most assertive manner.

“Because we are all bound by the oath of Erion,” Mammy replied quietly.

Now it was our turn to exchange glances.

“Any level to it?” I tried to clarify once I managed my shock.

“First,” Nargara answered in even a lower voice, and fixed her gaze on the fireplace.

We were perfectly aware what it meant; read about it in the Book of Elements.

Erion was a sacred oath with three levels and a great conquering power. It was somewhat different for each of the Elements, yet the point was always the same.

The third level oath was an oath given in words, and if broken it would inflict physical cripple on the guilty party. For life.

The second level oath – magic; if broken, would cut off all the sources taking away the magic powers.

The first level – and the most dangerous – oath on blood. It would kill if violated.

Elcha’s emotions ceased immediately and she sat on the bench at the wall, with some absent-minded expression on her face.

“Any time constraints?” unless expressed that question would have blown my mind.

“Seventeen years… Over in a year’s time” Truvle answered, at the same time answering my next question even before I could ask it.

Silence fell on the room, except the fire cracking monotonously. Nargara broke it first.

“The oath was taken in a small circle of folks, and you weren’t there with us then.”

“So we can’t tell anyone else, that’s the worst part,” Yoos added.

“You mean there are some secrets that concern us, yet we are the ones who won’t learn them, right?”

Yoos nodded.

“That’s the paradox,” Elcha frowned.

“Yes, that’s the side effect we couldn’t have predicted. And there was no need to do so, actually,” Truvle said while stroking the scrub on his chin.

“But there is at least something you can tell, right?” even though the things took quite an unexpected turn Elcha was still not going to give up meekly and unconditionally.

“I can tell you everything in a year, no earlier. But I think I’ll try to explain something…” Mammy said after some thinking, still featuring her typical confidence in the voice. And then slowly, as if tasting every word first, she began it.

“Those creatures… They are called Goortans. They are very dangerous. They’re bloodhounds, and they feel magic with their manes, much like dogs smell with the nose. But they do not act on their own, there serve forces much stronger, and they…” her voice fell silent for a moment.

“I can’t,” she stammered, and a painful expression covered her face.

Truvle came up to her chair, sat down on the floor and took her hand silently thus offering her support.

“Goortans don’t hunt you both, just Ricka. They need the older one.”

“As long as the first is alive, they don’t need the other one…” my sister said, and everyone looked at her in surprise. She smiled shyly and spread her arms.

“There, on the northern slope, it was me, and I want to know now what exactly you could hear from that conversation,” Nargara gave her a look of reprimand.

That made Elcha blush a little, yet she still could give quite a smooth account of what she had managed to eavesdrop.

“Yeah, that’s definitely not that little,” Truvle hemmed.

“Well, it may even be all for the better,” Yoos added.

“The man you spoke to, who was he?” Elcha asked showing the same inquisitiveness as earlier.

“He plays on our side,” Mammy replied evasively and, waiting a little, she added, “A friend, a good’n old friend.”

But there was so much sadness and pain in her voice it was clear immediately that the man was anyone but a friend… They usually talk like that about someone so dear yet lost forever.

Besides, I could see Truvle frown, as if even the mention of that man was too much of a trouble to him. However, he could quickly pull himself up and put some mask of indifference on his face.

“And you, there, you talked something about a gift… Was it about me?” I asked carefully. I don’t know why but that was the part that caught my attention most in Elcha’s story.

“Yes, it was about you. I blocked your gift then, when you were still a child. Not because I was afraid of it, Ricka, no. But because for them it was like a beacon, so that could make us an easy prey to them, in any of the four Worlds. They know the trace your magic leaves.”

“How come?!” my question escaped my lips even before I could know it.

Nargara tried to say something again, but stopped and waved her hand slightly through the air, so making it clear I would get no answer to that one. It was all about their oath.

A moment later she continued, “I hope you get now that the ban on magic is not just my whim. I have kept you hidden for so many years. I muffled down your source, and took you from place to place, and I mixed elixirs for Elcha to drown her magic background… Where… Where did I go wrong?” she uttered with anger and disappointment, throwing aside her handkerchief that she was twisting nervously in her hands.

I searched through my mind and could recall some elixirs she used to give to Elcha. Yes, Mammy gave her, from time to time, some kind of potion, saying that it was just good for overall health. Some bitter and smelly brew that Elcha would not drink anyway, only pretended, and so it

had gone on for at least two years.

I also could remember that my sister’s gift began to grow stronger a couple of years ago, which made her just itching to use it whenever she could grab a chance. She gathered any bit of knowledge that might be useful; she hid books, wrote spells, adjusted them to the Element of Fire, sometimes even trying totally incomprehensible combinations. Of course, most of them never worked. But I could only admire my sister’s perseverance seeing her go on experimenting and studying day after day.

And then it crossed our minds! We could see where Nargara had gone wrong. She gave too much of her care to me, while leaving my sister with none of that, and the latter grew, just like her magic skills did. While up to her ears in other stuff, Mammy just lost the sight of Elcha’s mischief – that which now inflicted a lot of suffering and trouble upon the lot of us.

“We have got relaxed, spent way too much time in Karun,” Captain said, “we believed there was nobody hot on our tails, so we took our guard down. Just failed to recognize.”

“No, Yoos, I don’t think so,” Mammy said in a calm voice and looked at us. “And now, my girls, here is the last question I want to ask you. For fifteen years I have been keeping your abilities secret. Now, how come they found us?