Leaves of Flame

Osserin spoke the truth. The Faelehgre around the Well were agitated, flashing and spinning over its waters. As he drew closer, he caught the edges of their conversation, the air humming with its pulse.

Osserin never got the chance to announce him. When he reached the stone lip of the Well-made from rounded river stone, not the stone used to build the city-the nearest of the Faelehgre noticed him and shot toward him.

Is this your doing? Have you awakened the Well to the east?

The air throbbed with the light’s anger, prickling along Colin’s skin. He glared at the Faelehgre.

“Of course not. Do you think I would be so stupid as to upset the balance it took me nearly thirty years to achieve?”

Then who was it? Who has awakened the Source?

And what do you intend to do about it?

More of the Faelehgre had darted toward him, so that he was now surrounded by at least ten, a few others remaining at a distance. All of them were pulsing with anger or concern, a strange echo of the light from the Well beneath them. Colin’s gaze shot from one to the other where they hovered.

“If I didn’t awaken this… this Source, then it must have been one of the Wraiths,” he said, trying to keep his voice level, reasonable. He hadn’t expected to be attacked by the Faelehgre when he arrived.

Walter.

Not necessarily, Ulyssa, Osserin replied.

He’s the one who started all of this! He’s the one who broke the Shadows free!

“But we know he has used the other Wraiths to awaken other Wells. Even so, I still believe that Walter is behind this new awakening.” A wave of satisfaction flooded the air, followed by disgruntlement.

Colin brushed it aside. “I’ve come from the northern wastes, where I felt the new Well through the Lifeblood. I know that it lies to the east, beyond the dwarren plains in the Thalloran Wastelands, but that is all. The currents flowing from these Wells to it were too strong for me to discover more than that. What can you tell me about this new Well? Why do you call it the Source?”

Because it is so powerful, one of the Faelehgre moaned from behind the front ranks.

At least three of the Faelehgre flared in annoyance, Osserin darting to the front of the group directly before Colin.

When the Well was first awakened, the pulse from the Lifeblood shook the entire city. Towers collapsed, columns cracked, and streets buckled. It was the strongest pulse any of us have ever witnessed. Its magnitude indicates that the Well that was awakened is large, much greater than any other Well since Walter began the process.

We sent Faelehgre to the nearest Wells to confirm what we found here: all of the Wells are connected, and all of them are now part of this larger source of Lifeblood to the east. Somehow, the two systems were separated in the past, our system blocked from the other. But that blockage has been removed. We’re now all part of the same system, feeding off of the mingled Lifeblood. But the removal of the blockage has thrown the two systems off-balance.

“I know all this,” Colin cut in, frustrated. “I sensed it all through the Well in the north. I’ve seen the effects in the storms on the plains and the resurgence of the Drifters. What I need to know is what needs to be done to stop it, to restore the balance.”

All of the Faelehgre hovered in uncertain silence for a long moment.

Until the one Osserin had called Ulyssa drifted forward.

There are only two options we can see, he said. Either the blockage that was removed needs to be restored.…

Or someone must go to the Source and restore the balance from there.

13

“‘Someone’ needs to go to the Source and restore the balance,” Colin muttered as he stalked away from Terra’nor and the Well and into the forest beyond, time slowed once again. “Guess who that’s going to be?”

He’d been on his way to the east already, to find out whatever he could about the sea of Lifeblood he’d sensed beneath the earth and how it had unbalanced what he’d so carefully wrought with the Wells in the west. The Faelehgre had simply given him more information about what to expect when he arrived: another Well, perhaps, one much larger than the one in Terra’nor. How he was to find the Well was a different matter. They didn’t know precisely where it was, only that it was beyond dwarren lands, in the wastelands farther east, and that he should be able to follow the flow of the Lifeblood deep within the earth to find it.

But that was what galled him: the assumption by the Faelehgre that he would do it. There had been no question; they simply expected it of him. They’d said “someone,” but they, and he, knew there was no one else who could. And they both knew he would have to face the Wraiths and the Shadows once there, perhaps even Walter himself. There would have to be a confrontation. The Wraiths would not awaken the Well and then simply let him repair the damage. They needed the Well for something. The Faelehgre could now travel to the east-the awakening of the Well expanded their sphere of influence-and they could deal with the Shadows, but they could not handle the Wraiths. The Alvritshai, dwarren, and humans could not manipulate the Well to achieve any kind of balance.

It had to be him.

He slowed and bowed his head, the weight of the responsibility suddenly too heavy. There was too much to do, too much to handle: the new Well, whatever was forcing the dwarren to Gather, the ambiguous threat he’d been given by the Wraith in the north, and whatever Lotaern had planned for the Alvritshai and the knife Colin had forged. The world had felt steady and stable for decades. He hadn’t been idle; he’d been working, traveling, studying, looking for a way to destroyWalter and the other Wraiths.

He thought he’d have more time.

A few days ago, he’d accused the races of being complacent, but he’d behaved in exactly the same way. The Seasonal Trees had only bought them time. He’d known that the moment he’d planted them, known that they would not keep Walter and the others at bay forever. Even so, he’d allowed himself to relax, expecting them to last for hundreds of years.

And now the Wraiths were active again. He was being forced to catch up, to wake up.

Everything was happening so fast.

He shook himself and tried to shove aside the weight that pressed against him, but he could feel it draped across his shoulders, like the bar of a penance lock.

He shuddered at the old memory, then struck out grimly again into the forest. The dark boles of the cedars closed in around him, the red-tinged bark scenting the air, their roots making the unmarked path treacherous. They grew larger as he neared the heart. He passed close to one, rested his hand against its bark for support, and felt the deep thrum of the wood beneath his hand, the life-force that pulsed through the tree even with time slowed. He unconsciously drew strength from it, and the melancholy mood brought on by the Faelehgre’s expectations lifted slightly. He pushed away from the comfort and continued.

Moments later, he slipped around another trunk, letting his hand brush its essence as he did so, and found himself at the lip of a small, empty hollow.

Cedars lined the space, the ground dipping down and leveling out, littered with fallen needles, small cones, and twigs. Faint moonlight sifted down through the branches overhead, everything in various shades of gray and black. The ridge that surrounded the hollow was natural, although startlingly circular, composed mostly of exposed cedar roots. Colin stood at its edge, letting the soothing light surround him, then stepped down to its center.

As he moved, he saw the first signs of the dwarren’s return. When he’d come here before, the hollow had been empty save for the trees and their leavings. Now, he spotted a dwarren spear thrust into the ground at the lip of the hollow, ceremonial feathers tied to its end. Other offerings were scattered on the ground among the cones and twigs-a carved scepter, a tangle of leather strands woven into a band, a latticework of beads and bone. He