Chains of Mist (23 page)

“The tale of the Helion is a warning never to turn away from the gods. But it is also a warning never to kill in haste. We do not know where you have come from or why you are here. All we do know is that you possess a power that is beyond us. The fact that you were captured so easily confuses us. The
to’laka
do not think that you are a god…but the fact remains that we do not know what you are. In the end, we will probably kill you. But we think that it would be a good idea to find out what you are first.”

Lerana fell silent, her eyes watching Roger carefully for a response. Once again, however, Roger was struck speechless. His mind raced, trying to internalize everything that Lerana had said…and to turn it to his advantage.
If Lerana had never come by, or had told me nothing at all, I would’ve been all but dead. But now…now I’ve got something to work with. And that’s all I need. I’ve gotten out of worse situations that this.
“I appreciate your generosity.”

“But certainly,” said Lerana. “The Traika are not animals. You may be our prisoner, but that does not mean you do not still deserve respect.”

“Yeah, I guess.”

Lerana tilted her head, looking at Roger with curious eyes. “It occurs to me that this respect need not simply extend to granting you a humane execution. As I mentioned before, the
kat’ara
is very busy. They have many demands on their time. They do not want to waste their energy debating what to do with you. And the support for your death is not universal. There are those on the
kat’ara
who do not wish to see you dead. If you were to prove your usefulness to the
kat’ara
, to offer them something of value, it might convince them to spare your life.”

Roger looked up sharply. He sensed a trap, but his options were somewhat limited. He might as well see where this led. “Like what?”

A subtle change came over Lerana’s expression—a slight flushing of her cheeks, a glimmer of greed in her lavender eyes. Roger knew immediately what she was going to say, and a chill spread through him. “Your power,” breathed Lerana, her voice soft and eager. “Show us how it works. Reveal to us its secrets, and we will give you great honors.”

Roger didn’t know what to say. It wasn’t even a question of whether or not Lerana was telling the truth about her end of the bargain. He could not possibly comply with the shaman’s request, because he had no idea how the ring’s magic functioned.

He glanced back at Lerana, who was eying him intently, that same voracious hunger in her eyes. When she saw that he wasn’t going to reply, she raised a finger as if in musing. “I will make you an offer, Roger,” she said. “If you show me how the secrets to your power, then I will show you ours.”

Roger was not particularly surprised by this turn of events. Once you got past the fact that he was being held captive by a tribe of magic-wielding natives on a backwater planet in the middle of nowhere, the situation was not significantly different from two con artists haggling for stolen goods in the side alleys of Vellanite. Given the circumstances, Lerana’s move was fairly predictable. However, the Traika shaman didn’t realize that they weren’t bargaining. He wasn’t holding out for a better price; his tongue would not suddenly become loosed if she promised him the sun, the moon, and the starlit sky. He simply did not have the information that she wanted, no matter how much she sweetened the deal.

On the other hand, Lerana
was
offering him a way out, a chance to save himself. He doubted that he would get another. Besides, he had the feeling that she was just going to keep pushing until he agreed to her proposition. If nothing else, this would buy him time to come up with some kind of explanation for his own power. “All right.”

“Excellent!” Lerana clapped her hands together, and her demeanor turned as giddy as a child on her birthday. She scooted herself along the ground until she was only a handbreadth away from him. “The world around us is full of energy. In the air, in the water, in the earth. In the trees and animals.” She spread her arms in a slow circle around her. “We call this energy
ko’sha
. It is invisible, intangible. It is pure power, untainted and untapped, waiting to be put to use.” She paused. “You have felt the
ko’sha
, have you not?”

She said the question very casually, but her eyes narrowed slightly as she spoke. She was testing him. Roger kept his thoughts deliberately blank. He had absolutely no idea what she was talking about. When he was in the strange fire-world of his ring’s power, he could sense other sources of magic, but only very large sources like Nembane Mountain or the shadow creature on Pattagax. Nothing close to what Lerana was describing. But by this point he was committed to his bluff; he had no choice but to play along. “Yeah, I’ve felt it.”

“The
ko’sha
is very strong here, in the shadow of Kil’la’ril,” said Lerana. “What follows is quite simple. First, we draw the
ko’sha
into ourselves.” She closed her eyes and inhaled deeply. A sudden chill wind whipped around Roger, and a back part of his mind realized that
ko’sha
was simply the heat energy contained within the air surrounding them. “Then we focus it through our own bodies, shaping it, honing it into a manifestation of our will, and…
release
!”

Fire ignited at Lerana’s fingertips. They were definitely real flames, not merely some clever illusion or arcane ephemera—Roger could feel their heat licking at his flesh. The bitter taste in the back of his throat—which he now realized was a sign of magic being employed, and which was a constant during his conversations with Lerana due to the power that allowed for their telepathic communication—intensified. Lerana held up her burning hand for a few moments, wiggling her fingers so the flames twirled and spun like tiny dancers. Then the fire abruptly extinguished. The Traika shaman gave a soft sigh. “I apologize, Roger. Enclosed spaces have little energy from which to draw. And I am still young, inexperienced in harnessing
ko’sha
and quick to tire. The elders of my clan are capable of much more. And when we join our numbers…” A euphoric, slightly crazed smile spread across her face. “When we combine our strength, there is nothing we cannot do. Such a sight it is, Roger. Such a
feeling
!”

As Lerana spoke, her violet eyes were full of rapture and wonder, almost certainly recalling the very thing she had just described to him. Her entire body trembled in a shudder of raw, unbridled ecstasy.

Roger suddenly felt very uneasy. Lerana was no doubt telling the truth about why her fire had lasted for only a few seconds. The temperature had dropped so much that their breath puffed out in icy clouds; if Lerana drew out any more heat from the air she would freeze them both where they sat. In addition, he could see the signs of physical exhaustion on the Traika shaman—flushed skin, elevated breathing, shaking limbs. But he suspected that there was more to it than that. He suspected that there was another reason why she had stopped…and a far more sinister reason at that. His gaze fell on her hands, at the tiny lattice of burn marks and scar tissue discoloring her fingers and wrists.
Yeah, those might be magic flames. Pretty damn impressive, too. But they’re still heat. They’re still fire. She might be conjuring them, she might be controlling them…but she’s not immune to them.

Roger hesitated, wondering how to approach what was surely a very delicate subject. “Does it…hurt?” he asked carefully.

Lerana brushed the question aside. “It is nothing, Roger.” The shaman smiled as she spoke, but not before Roger saw the truth in her eyes. Nor did he miss the slight flexing of her fingers, the faint grimace that touched her face. He certainly did not miss the acrid smell of burnt flesh that suddenly soured the air. Lerana was definitely in pain. He felt a burst of sorrow for the shaman. It seemed like a cruel cosmic joke—to grant someone such a gift, only to force pain upon her each time she used it.

Some of Roger’s sympathy must have shown in his expression, for anger suddenly tightened Lerana’s face. “There is a cost, yes,” she snapped. “But such is the way of the world. Do you think such power would come without sacrifice? It is a small price that we pay. A price that we
gladly
pay.”

Roger said nothing. Lerana’s violet eyes were sharp, and she seemed almost to be daring him to defy her. The Traika shaman sounded exactly like a drug addict, like the dustfiends and ore-sniffers he had seen on Vellanite, Pattagax, and dozens of other planets throughout the galaxy.

Roger felt a touch of fear shiver down his spine. Up until now, he hadn’t considered that the use of magic might come at a cost. The few times he had harnessed his own powers, there hadn’t been any side effects other than a minor and temporary exhaustion. But he had only barely begun to scratch the surface of the ring’s capabilities. For all he knew, the more powerful magics came with a cost as great as the one Lerana incurred. Or greater. And if that were the case, what then? Would he be able to turn away, to stop using it? Or would he, too, become like Lerana—addicted to the power, unable to stop drawing on it no matter what it cost him?

Lerana’s voice broke through Roger’s thoughts. “I have upheld my end of our bargain, Roger. I have told you of the
ko’sha
. Perhaps you do not realize how rare a gift this is. By custom, the secrets of our power are forbidden to all who are not
to’laka
. Yet for you I have broken this tradition. I have done so in good faith. Now it is your turn.”

She still spoke evenly and matter-of-factly, but something dangerous lurked behind that calm. Roger recalled the flames she had summoned, and knew with utter certainty that she could very easily kill him where he sat. His throat was suddenly very dry, and his mind raced to come up with something to say.

Lerana waited. Slowly her smiled faded, her mouth tightening to a thin line on her face. “Reticence is ill-advisable, Roger.” The shaman’s voice dropped to barely more than a whisper, a low and threatening growl in Roger’s mind. “The
to’laka
are the only ones who stand between you and death. It would be unwise to test us.”

Lightning flashed in the shaman’s violet eyes.
Just say something!
Roger berated himself.
Something,
anything
. Otherwise she’s gonna give you a smackdown worse than that Valancian back on Mentex.
“Uh…alright.” He cleared his throat, still thinking furiously. “My power works a lot like yours, I think. But first I have to relax—to go into a kind of trance.”

Lerana twitched, and a knowing expression came to her face. “The
e’tana
,” she said softly.

That word meant nothing to Roger, but he nodded as if it did. “Yeah,
e’tana
. Once I’m in this trance, I can feel the…uh…the
ko’sha
. I can’t absorb it or release it like you can. But I can see it, everywhere, just like you described. And I can sense other magic-users, and tell when they’re using their powers.”

Lerana studied Roger intently as he spoke, her expression unreadable. “You can…
see
…
ko’sha
?” she asked slowly.

The way she asked the question made it clear that she could not. Perhaps she could only feel it.
She did describe it as ‘invisible’, after all.
“That’s right.”

Awe touched Lerana’s face. “What does it look like?” she whispered, her eyes wide, her voice heavy with longing.

Roger cast his thoughts back. The memories washed over him, as vivid and powerful as if he were experiencing them for the first time. “I see fire. Flames dancing everywhere, around everyone and everything. Soaring rainbows of it, twisting and whirling as far as the eye can see.” As he spoke, he found his voice turning wistful, almost reverent. Both times he had found himself in that strange place, he had been too preoccupied by other thoughts to appreciate what he was seeing. But there was beauty there, an awesome, haunting beauty like nothing else he had ever seen. “It’s quite something, I’ll tell you that.”

Lerana barely seemed to hear him. She was staring past him, her thoughts clearly far away. Her eyes were still wide with wonder, but there was sadness there too. It was the sorrow of someone who had spent her whole life in darkness hearing a description of sunlight…and knowing that she would never be able to see it.

Then the Traika shaman suddenly straightened. Her eyes refocused, and a stiff mask seemed to drop across her face. “That is interesting, Roger,” she said formally, like a lawyer in court. “And you say that you can sense when another individual
is harnessing
ko’sha
?”

Roger pulled himself away from the beauty of the fire-world and back to Lerana. “Yeah.”

The shaman’s voice softened. “What does it feel like, Roger?”

Roger was not sure whether this was a genuine question or whether she was testing him again. Either way, the truth was his best option. “Bitter,” he replied. “Like fire in my throat.”

Lerana inhaled sharply. “That is what I feel when I harness
ko’sha
.”

Roger did not let his surprise show on his face or in his thoughts. He had just been saying whatever came to mind in a desperate attempt to come up with
something
to placate Lerana. But now he was beginning to wonder if his explanation might actually be brushing up against the truth. If
ko’sha
was simply thermal energy, then maybe the flames that he saw when in the strange other-world of the ring’s power were literal flames—the heat that was given off by every living creature. Even inanimate objects had thermal energy stored within them. Not as much as living beings, generally…but that would explain why, back on Pattagax, the flames surrounding the people had been much fiercer and brighter than those emanating from the buildings and vehicles. Maybe the ring was simply giving him a sort of infrared vision, enhancing his senses like an advanced thermal imaging system.