Of Blood And Fire by Ryan Cahill (best color ebook reader txt) 📗

The hardest part was learning how to sustain them without constant attention and a drain on Calen’s energy. He hadn’t quite gotten there yet, but he was determined.

Without responding to Calen, Gaeleron sought out Therin with his eyes, finding him by the fire with a rabbit leg in his hands. Gaeleron simply raised an eyebrow, opening his arms out towards Calen.

Calen let out a resigned sigh when he saw Therin nod, not even bothering to speak as he returned to his food.

“Right then,” he puffed as he dragged himself to his feet. “First to yield?”

Best just to get on with it.

Gaeleron nodded, raising his blade up in front of himself. With no warning, he sprung off his back legs, launching himself at Calen.

Calen was immediately on the defensive. Twisting and pivoting, he swung his blade wildly to try to stop the elf’s barrage of ferocious blows.

One got through: a back swing with the pommel of his sword. Calen saw stars as it cracked him in the side of the head. He fell forward and dropped to one knee. He attempted to spring back to his feet, only to feel a boot catch him in the ribs. He coughed as he gasped for air, spinning onto his back. It was only a warning in the back of his mind from Valerys that allowed Calen to sling his sword up into the air in time to stop Gaeleron’s downstroke.

What if I hadn’t stopped that?

Calen rolled to his side, then bounded to his feet. Without time to take a breath, he was back-stepping again. Gaeleron probed his defences. In the middle of a forward step, the elf lunged. Another warning from Valerys allowed Calen to deflect the blow downward. He slid his sword up and caught Gaeleron on the chin with its hilt. The elf looked jarred.

Everybody was watching them now. Even Therin cast a sideways eye as he feigned disinterest. Dann was perched atop a large stone, an excited grin on his face. Calen certainly didn’t feel as confident as Dann looked.

Gaeleron recovered from that surprise blow and redoubled his barrage. His sword flashed, far too quick for Calen. The empty feeling in Calen’s hand was shortly followed by a metallic ringing as his sword crashed against the stones at his feet. The tip of Gaeleron’s blade pressed against his neck.

The elf tilted his head curiously at Calen, as if measuring him, weighing him up. The blade did not move. Calen felt a slight sting as it pressed into his skin. He breathed a sigh of relief when the elf finally lowered the tip of the sword from his neck, sheathing it in one motion.

“From now on,” Gaeleron said, “you will spar with me. I will talk with Aeson. You can still practice your forms with him, but when it comes time to spar, it will be with me.”

Calen raised his eyebrows, not quite sure what to say.

Gaeleron must have read his mind. “If you are going to carry an elven blade at your hip, you will learn how to use it.” The elf did not wait for a response before returning to his seat by the fire.

“Don’t worry,” Dann said as Calen sat down beside him, grabbing his waterskin. “You’ll get him next time.” Calen wasn’t sure whether Dann’s wink was meant to be mocking or reassuring; it was almost certainly mocking.

As expected, it did not take Calen long to get to sleep. His lack of energy overrode the aches and pains that plagued his body. He wondered if that was what life was going to feel like from now on – constant pain followed by the loving embrace of dreams. He hoped his body would get used to all this training, eventually.

It was the chill that woke him. The hairs all over his body stood up as a shiver ran from his head to his toes. It seemed a darker night than usual. Even with the fire still spitting embers, Calen struggled to see more than two feet past his face. In his mind, he knew Valerys was still fast asleep at his side, a slight rumbling noise escaping his mouth as he dreamed.

Calen wasn’t quite sure what it was, but something wasn’t quite right. Slowly getting to his feet, he reached out to the Spark. He saw the elemental strands. Pulsing, twisting, forming the spiralling ball of energy that was the Spark. It radiated power. The warmth licked his skin as he drew on thin threads of Fire and Air, shrouding them in Spirit as Therin had taught him. He formed the baldír just in front of him, careful to control its glow. He didn’t want to wake everybody up.

He let out a sigh of frustration. No matter how much energy he pushed into the baldír, it didn’t get any brighter. It was as if everything he pushed into it was drawn into something else. It should have been bright enough to light up the whole campsite, but it barely gave off a glow to rival a dying flame.

“Interesting…” hissed a voice, like nails dragged across stone. It did not seem to come from any one fixed place.

Calen almost leapt out of his skin. “Who’s there?” he whispered, a little louder than intended. The darkness pulled back, revealing the outline of someone standing only a few feet away, in the middle of the path they had come down that day.

“Who are you?” Calen whispered, stepping towards the figure.

As he got closer, he saw the silhouette of a black cloak adorned with pale blue spirals and shapes. A step closer and the man’s face came into view. It was as pale as the porcelain from Vaerleon, almost as white as Valerys’s scales, but as thin as the finest paper. Calen stopped in his tracks as it clicked into place. Set in the middle of the man’s sickly pale face were two bottomless wells of black.

The Fade!

Panic set in. Calen screamed at the top of his lungs. “Wake up!