Unfinished, p.27
Unfinished, page 27
End it.
That was what she was supposed to do, somehow, though Imogen wasn’t sure what that was going to take.
“I don’t know enough.”
Benji didn’t answer.
She held a whisper of the wind, though, and it seemed to her that there was something prodding her, something that was delivering a prompting that came from him. She might not feel that she knew enough, but perhaps she did. Perhaps she had already learned all that she needed, and what she needed now was to find an answer, a way to uncover just what she might be able to do. She needed to find a way to call upon a different kind of power. And she needed to understand that power, to see if there was anything within what she had been given from Benji that she could use now.
Imogen climbed over to Zealar, and she could feel the power coming off him, the energy radiating from his wings, the wind that whipped around him, and the connection that he formed with her. She focused on that energy, on that power, and could feel the surge of it flowing through her. It was considerable, but more than that, Zealar was comfortable in a way that surprised her.
As she sat atop the renral’s back, feeling the energy coursing through them, he took to the air.
“I don’t suppose you have any way of tracking this magic?” she said, though she had no idea whether Aneadaz would radiate his location that well. She didn’t know if there was anything that she was giving off, any way that she might be casting energy outward, or perhaps any way for her to know just what it was that she detected. The only thing that she was aware of was that she could feel something flowing within her.
And there was a pattern that surged into her mind. Could that be Benji?
She used that pattern and focused on it, and she found that Zealar knew how to follow that pattern. And as he did, they circled, the renral staying high in the sky, taking a circuitous route over the flowing of the creatures sprawling below them.
There were too many.
But if she could stop Aneadaz, perhaps there would not be.
Imogen held on tightly to Zealar. He shrieked, and his voice echoed off the mountains. The creatures down below continued swarming, as if unmindful of Zealar and Imogen.
Zealar began to streak higher and higher. He was taking her away from the lands, farther from where she thought she needed to be.
He shrieked.
And as he did, she began to hear the echoing sound of other renral.
They came from all around her. It was an eruption of sound, thundering, but there was no other sign of the renral. Just the echoing shrieks.
She kept waiting, though, half expecting that she would find something more, but so far, she had not seen anything. And as they flew, as they continued to circle, she kept thinking that perhaps she would feel some sense of Aneadaz, but she did not. He was not there.
The renral continued flying, though. He circled higher and higher, shooting through the air, and she noticed that he was angling toward a distant mountain. Imogen had never climbed that mountain. It was a difficult place to reach. It was difficult for anyone to reach. The location of the Heart of the Leier.
And as they headed toward it, Master Liu’s words came back to her. Go to the Heart of the people.
Imogen had no idea how to find the Heart of the Leier lands. Master Liu had gone looking for other answers, and other sacred sword masters, to try to tie the Porapeth power to the homeland, but Imogen hadn’t used all her available options.
She had never asked Master Liu. What could be in the Heart?
She clung to Zealar.
The power continued to flow through him, into her. He circled, swirling in an ever-narrowing spiral, and Imogen could feel the power building within him. Each loop caused power to build, rising upward with a crackling sense of energy.
Then it faded.
When Zealar began to descend, he dropped quickly with his wings outstretched, energy crackling through him and into her. She had to open herself to it.
And then they were through the clouds.
What she saw below her caught her breath.
It was a city sitting atop the mountain.
A city she had never seen before.
And it was empty. Or seemingly so.
There was one person standing amid the city.
Imogen jumped.
Lightning Strikes in the Storm.
It carried her down toward the mountaintop.
She let the energy of Lightning Strikes in the Storm carry her down, and as she streaked toward the ground, and she braced herself, half expecting that she would crash into the stone and shatter herself, but it didn’t happen.
She landed on her feet.
Aneadaz was there.
He had his staff in hand, and he spun it toward her, grinning as he did. “Do you see that the others are gone? Can you see how I have seen that? The Heart has been concentrated, as it should be, and it was meant to be mine, until you arrived. Then I knew I had to deal with you, much like I had to deal with the others. Thankfully, you did exactly what I hoped you would. You brought it here.”
Imogen frowned at him. “What did I bring here?”
“The power that I needed. And now I will have everything I need to contain the rest. Thank you for that.”
He spun his staff, and Imogen reacted, forming Tree Stands in the Forest, adding the connection with Zealar, and it solidified, became electrified, bulging in a cage. She could feel the electrical energy sizzling along Zealar’s wings, and it coursed into Imogen.
She tried to hold on to that power, to brace herself so that she could be ready for the next blast of power, but it didn’t come. She wasn’t sure why it did not, only that as she clung to it, and as she struggled with that power, she could not tell if there was going to be anything more.
Aneadaz spun his staff again, and once again energy crackled along the length of it. “You see, when you have lived as long as I, and when you have conquered as many as I, you begin to recognize patterns. I must admit I wasn’t expecting you to be the one to present me with the pattern I needed to find, but I will take what I need where I need it.” He grinned at her. “I imagine that Benji the Elder,” he said, sneering on Elder, “must be amused by my choice of targets. I chose this for him, you know.”
“What is this place?” Imogen asked.
She held on to Tree Stands in the Forest, unable to react fast enough, she thought, to stop him. His staff moved in a blur, a fluid movement that made it seem as if he had learned the sacred pattern himself. Perhaps he had.
There was flow to it, the same flow that Master Liu had always wanted her to achieve, and the same flow that she had never managed to accomplish nearly so well as she had hoped. And by holding on to Tree Stands in the Forest, supplementing the pattern with what she could from the renral, Imogen couldn’t help but feel she was close to what she needed to do. She couldn’t help but feel this was how she would withstand another attack.
“This is a place of power. A place of history. This was the place they once called home.” Aneadaz looked over at her, locking eyes for a moment. “It was where power flowed to the people, but it was a place that the so-called sacred sword masters controlled. And then they split it up.” He sneered at her. “And now it’s gone. It’s nothing more than the Heart of the Leier.”
Imogen regarded him for a moment. “It’s more than that. Isn’t it? It’s not just the Leier.”
It couldn’t be. It was not set in the middle of the Leier lands. It was set between the Leier and the Koral lands.
Aneadaz laughed. “And now, once I claim his power from you, it will be the last sacred temple.”
As he brought his staff around, Imogen felt something within that pattern and within that flow. He had known Benji.
She recognized the pattern.
It was one Benji had shown her during her meditations.
Imogen did not move.
She had to hold on to this pattern, though the strength would eventually fade.
And he seemed to know that.
Of course he did. He was a Sul’toral, and he had been at this far longer than Imogen. He had known about her kind of power, and he had understood the Porapeth, and the dynamics that they had, longer than she had.
But what did she have?
“You must be trying to decide what it will take to defeat me. And you must realize that I trained with your Benji the Elder. I suppose he didn’t tell you that, did he?”
Imogen didn’t bother to respond.
“Of course he didn’t. That doesn’t surprise me. It’s exactly the kind of thing that Benji the Elder would have avoided sharing. His own fault. His own flaw. And trust me when I tell you that he has many.” Aneadaz swung his staff around, and it crackled up against the cage of Tree Stands in the Forest, which barely blocked the thrust. “Or he did. When he was alive. He’s gone now, from the way I understand it. And he thinks he can still influence.”
“He can still influence. And he can still defeat you,” Imogen said.
He chuckled at her. “So confident. I find that fascinating, especially as you yourself are not nearly as skilled as so many that have come before you. Do you think you can succeed where others have failed? Even others who have trained alongside me have fallen.”
He darted back, spinning the staff, the movements so fast, so fluid, that Imogen could barely follow them.
And as she struggled, she realized that she might not be fast enough or skilled enough to stop him. She would try.
And in all likelihood, she would fall.
Chapter Thirty-Two
The staff came swinging toward her, and Imogen braced for impact.
She was holding on to Tree Stands in the Forest and augmenting it with a hint of the power of lightning that flowed through her, the power of the renral. That energy coursed through her in a way that left her entire being crackling with power. Imogen could feel that power working its way through her, but even that wasn’t going to be enough. As she held on to that energy, filled with that power, she felt the way that it spilled out of her.
Aneadaz took a step toward her.
She could only block for so long.
“And here you must’ve thought you were the only one he had ever instructed.”
“I didn’t know if I was or not, but it doesn’t really matter,” she said.
He started laughing, his voice a low and horrific sound. “I have lived far too long to fall. You have only uncovered the truth now?” He brought his staff around, and once again it crackled before it slammed into her Tree Stands in the Forest. “You have given me the strength that I needed. All this time, and I could have directed someone else to take care of the others, and instead, I thought to protect them. It was a mistake, and now all that power will be mine.”
Imogen braced again, and the staff swung, whistling through the air, before crashing into her.
“Now there are only a few remaining, and it will be a simple matter for me to remove them as a threat.”
“They will have absorbed just as much of this power as you,” Imogen said. Somebody else must be targeting Sul’toral. Not Gaspar, and unlikely Gavin, the Chain Breaker. Maybe the Toral Jayna? It might explain why Timo had gained such strength as quickly as he had. “So I imagine they will make it difficult for you to stop them.”
Aneadaz laughed, and he brought his staff down.
This was an attempt Imogen was ready for. She had felt something like this, and as soon as he brought his staff down in a sharp arc, she braced. She could feel the energy coursing through her, a hint of that power that suddenly slammed through her Tree Stands in the Forest, attempting to overwhelm her.
And she used a similar technique, pushing out with the power that she possessed, and she struggled, testing whether there would be any way for her to fight off this attack.
“Most are too ignorant to recognize the change.”
He brought his staff up again, and she noticed the slight squeeze as he did. She reacted, shifting, wanting to catch him off guard as she had before.
Lightning Strikes in the Storm, which flowed into Stream through the Mountains and then into Petals on the Wind before gliding into Snow in the Wind.
She struck nothing.
He laughed, bringing his staff back toward her.
Imogen had to jump, shooting into the air briefly before coming back down to land. She tensed, using Tree Stands in the Forest in order to defend herself, and as she did, she could feel something within her, some energy building, and then she pushed that out in order to try to detect what was taking place around her.
“You really could have been an impressive fighter once,” Aneadaz said. “Perhaps, had you come around in a different time, you might have been able to prove yourself, and perhaps you might even have made yourself useful. Now, unfortunately, the only thing that you will be useful for is dying.”
He spun his staff around, and when he brought it up, then back down, there came a crackling in the air, and then there was a rippling.
Imogen was tossed back. She slammed into a building, and her back throbbed where she had struck it. She tried to move, to get to her feet so that she could get back up. In the sky, she heard the sound of Zealar shrieking, his call indicating he knew that she was injured.
Imogen dragged herself away from the wall. When she did, she felt the pain coursing through her. Pain that filled her. Pain that exploded within her.
She had known pain.
Imogen was a sacred sword master of the Leier. Of course she would know how to withstand pain like that. She took a step toward Aneadaz again, and as she did, she began to form Tree Stands in the Forest. She was going to have to find a way to call upon the power through herself, and a way to center herself so that she would be able to hold on to that power and wouldn’t have to fall, but even as she tried, she could not draw upon nearly enough.
The renral crackled, and that power came through him, but it wasn’t enough.
Imogen could practically see the renral energy flowing along his feathers, flowing through the connection that they had formed, and shooting down to her, but then it dissipated. Aneadaz brought his staff around again, and he swung it toward her. Imogen ducked, trying to avoid the attack, but she wasn’t sure if she was fast enough.
Something struck her.
It was fast, and it blasted at her head.
She barely managed to get beneath the onslaught of the attack, and as she did, she could feel something swirling toward her.
Power, energy, and the ferocity of his attack.
He laughed.
“Not much longer now,” he said.
He darted toward her.
And he slammed into Tree Stands in the Forest.
Imogen was thrown back.
She struck her head on stone somewhere nearby.
The air was cold. The wind whipped around her.
Her vision started to fade. She could see nothing, could feel nothing but pain.
Imogen had not even been struck, as far as she could tell. Still, the pain that was throbbing within her was more than what she could withstand. She had no idea how he had managed to hit her so thoroughly, but he had, and somehow, as he had struck her, as he had overwhelmed her, she could not even tell what he had done to her. The only thing that she could tell was that he had overwhelmed her.
Aneadaz took another step toward her and drove his staff at her.
Imogen tried to bring her blade around, but even as she did, she was not fast enough.
A whistling came all around her.
It was the wind. It was an energy that struck her.
And within that, it was almost a message coming from deep within her.
A whisper.
Imogen rolled, trying to get to her feet, but she wasn’t able to move quickly enough. He stood over her.
He looked down and sneered at her.
“And you thought you could come here, claim what was mine. You thought you could take what I had earned. We suffered under him. Did you know that?”
Aneadaz brought the staff toward her, and it took every bit of Imogen’s power to hold Tree Stands in the Forest. She pushed down and out, holding on to some of the power of the renral to let that power course through her. It deflected the blow, but barely.
“We dealt with his derision. We were less than him. Did you know that? Did you know that was how the Porapeth viewed us?”
He brought the staff up again, then back down, and slammed it into her. Imogen had braced as much as she could, trying to protect herself, but even as she did, she could not deflect the attack. She could feel energy filling her and could feel the power of Zealar flowing through her, but it wasn’t going to be enough.
That power was there, and as it came through the connection that she shared with the renral, she sent it crackling out of her and tried to use it to shoot upward to deflect the power that he was drawing upon her. She managed to push back some of the power. She tried to push outward, but she did not have enough strength.
Aneadaz slammed the staff down again, then again. Each time he did, the air crackled, and he managed to push through her connection. Each time he did, she could feel the barrier formed by Tree Stands in the Forest beginning to fade. It was the very first of the sacred patterns that she had thought that she understood, and now it was the sacred pattern that would collapse upon her.
She tried to reinforce it, and as she did, she could feel that power pushing through her. He brought the staff up again, and Imogen spun, sweeping her leg toward him.
She kicked, tried to drive outward, but could not catch him.
Sacred patterns had been the key to everything she’d done since learning how to use them, but now they were not going to be enough. She doubted the traditional patterns would help, though she hadn’t tried. A man like this would know how to defend himself against magic, so she couldn’t overwhelm a sorcerer with sacred or traditional patterns. He could summon far more magic than she.
But she would try.
She jumped to her feet. Rather than flowing into one of the sacred patterns, when Aneadaz brought his staff around, Imogen shifted her feet, bringing her blade up, and marched through a progression of traditional patterns.
