“This was the first time I saw it,” Toren said. “All my life I’d known nothing but endless stretches of grassland. When I saw this, I knew just how small my world was.” He looked over at her. “A little like now.”
“Thank you for showing me this. I’ve never been.”
She asserted her will, returning them to her mother’s kitchen.
A string appeared in her hands. “This will help the two of us stay connected. I wish I knew a better way to train you, but hopefully this will allow you to sense what I do. But the connection runs both ways. I will feel your emotions as well. Are you comfortable with that?”
Toren looked uncertain, but he nodded. Alena wondered what motivated him. Orders from his elders? Curiosity? Whatever pushed him, she envied his courage. In a similar situation, she wasn’t sure she could summon such trust of a stranger.
She tied the string to his wrist and to her own. As soon as the knots were formed she felt the connection between them grow stronger. “Do you feel it?”
Yes, he signed.
She pushed them out of their soulwalk, back into the world of flesh and bone. Toren blinked, regaining his bearings.
“You connected yourself to him,” Jace observed.
“I didn’t think you’d be able to feel that.”
“It’s slight, but he’s there.”
Toren looked up at the two of them. He frowned, puzzling something out. When he spoke, he was hesitant. “I feel both of your spirits.”
Alena hadn’t considered that, but a glance at Jace revealed he didn’t mind.
Toren continued. “I can feel your love for your sister.”
Alena’s eyes widened. That was a problem she hadn’t considered. But it made sense. Toren picked up on Jace’s emotion through her. She wondered if Brandt, hundreds of leagues away, now suddenly felt a deep unintended affection for her.
She hoped not.
Dunne’s angry words came back to her. For all she’d learned, Alena still knew nothing about this power. Her continued meddling, even with the best of intentions, didn’t come without risk.
There was nothing for it, now. She needed to examine the gate and she didn’t dare do anything that dealt with the Lolani queen without Jace’s connection. So that was that.
They turned to the gate and Alena stepped forward. Her curiosity pulled her ever closer to the exposed fragment, but fear slowed her steps and made her heart beat like a drum. The forces balanced when she was two paces away. She couldn’t bring herself to step any closer.
Toren stood several paces away. This close to the gate Alena could almost see the connection between them with her eyes open.
Jace followed her, step for step. When she hesitated, he leaned closer. “I’m here. I’ll always be here.”
Alena nodded, took a deep breath, and took the final two steps toward the gate. She reached out her hand and touched it before she could convince herself it was unwise.
Nothing happened. Alena channeled no affinity at the moment, so it felt much the same as touching any other stone.
Except it wasn’t any other stone. Though thousands of cuts had formed the gate, it felt strangely smooth under her fingertips. She ran her finger gently over the surface, awed by the craftsmanship. No skill like this existed today. Even if Hanns ordered something similar built, it would never compare.
And it thrummed with energy. At times she could feel the vibration strong in her fingertips. Then it would fade until it was barely discernible, no stronger than a weak pulse. Perhaps Toren wasn’t so wrong. Perhaps it was alive.
Alena closed her eyes and dropped into the soulwalk, ready to explore what damage the queen had done.
She rode the wave of power, this connection with the gate made easier through her previous experiences. Her imagination shaped the dreamscape, resolving into the plains of Etar. Behind her, in another world, she felt Jace, and to a lesser extent, Toren.
And nothing else.
Alena scanned the horizon and searched the sky, searching for any sign of the queen. Where the Lolani ruler struck she left blackness and despair, sometimes obvious, sometimes less so.
Alena searched and found nothing. She searched harder, remembering the thin tendrils of power the queen had relied on in their last encounter. But even those couldn’t be found.
Frowning, Alena changed the landscape to the rooftops of Landow, then to the tent she and Jace had slept in last night. Each change flowed without resistance, and in no place did she sense the queen’s presence.
If the queen was responsible, her working on the gate was more subtle than any Alena had so far encountered.
Suddenly, her world bulged and erupted, a bubble of pure energy popping directly in front of her. The energy threw her into the air, reality warping like a blanket being shook free of dust.
She was helpless against the forces. Her own image was a part of this reality and it bent and warped the same as the rest. She felt molded and squeezed by inexplicable powers.
Alena screamed, the sound rising and falling in pitch as her world collapsed and expanded.
Smells assaulted her nose, some sweet and fragrant, others rancid.
Time lost meaning. One heartbeat passed quickly, then froze in the next.
Overwhelmed, something in her mind finally snapped. This was beyond understanding, beyond explanation. It simply was.
And then the disturbance passed. Alena crashed face-first into the ground. Her entire body quivered. Somehow she felt both cold and hot.
She broke her connection to the gate.
Beside her, Jace vomited on hands and knees, a small pool of bile created between his hands.
She wobbled, only to lose her balance a moment later.
Toren was there and she fell into his arms.
17
The Falari warleader introduced himself as Weylen. He appeared to find Prince Regar’s entourage an endless source of amusement, but for what reason, Brandt couldn’t tell. The man had an easy smile, but Brandt suspected that smile hid a dangerous mind.
Any worries about Regar’s composure in the face
