She smiled. “You are very good at this. I am impressed. But here’s something you missed. What drives the Prime Minister is something more primal than what he suggested in his analysis of the situation.”
“He’s angry?”
“No, Paxon. He’s afraid.”
EIGHTEEN
“CONCENTRATE,” LARIANA URGED HIM, STANDING OFF TO ONE side, safely clear of any blowback from losing control of the magic.
Reyn tried hard not to look at her, although looking at her was what he wanted most to do. Instead, he stared out into the bleak emptiness of the rocky terrain that spread away from the ruins, poised atop what remained of one wall. Arbrox was behind him–or at least what remained of it was, its cluster of shattered buildings with walls and roofs collapsed in rain–dampened heaps barely recognizable for what it once had been. There was nothing here for him to look at save her, but he knew that doing so in the midst of a summoning was dangerous for them both.
“Concentrate,” she repeated patiently.
They had been working at this exercise for two days–today for almost six hours, the sun by now gone so far west it had disappeared into the mountains, the light dimming as the clouds lowered and the rain increased. He was cold and miserable, but there was no help for that. He must keep practicing. He must try and try again until he found the key that would allow him to master the magic. But it was hard. And monotonous and discouraging. And now, after so many of hours with no success, it was beginning to seem pointless.
If he could just look at her once, he thought. Just once. Then he would feel encouraged enough to continue. He had been staring at nothing for so long that his stamina and his focus both were beginning to waver. His efforts at imagining something coming alive and taking form were losing strength. Six hours, and he had almost nothing to show for it but weariness and despair.
How could he ever hope to aid Arcannen against whatever was coming for them if he could not do what was expected of him? How could he hope to protect her–she, for whom by now he would give his life if it were required?
“Close your eyes,” she told him.
He did so, happy to close out the cold and the gray, the rain and the dark–happy to be somewhere else, if only in his mind. Anywhere else.
“Now picture it. Find it and hold it in place. Then use your voice. Make the image come alive.”
Her words so calm and steady, her voice so determined. She seemed to know what to tell him, almost as if Arcannen had trained her to do so. Was that possible? He had not thought so before this afternoon, yet now he was beginning to wonder. She seemed so certain of what was required of him and of how to go about securing it. Yet Arcannen had not once appeared to witness her efforts. He was inside, away from everything that was happening–or not happening–so that they were left alone to carry on.
Reyn did as he was told, humming softly, making the man become real enough to move about in his mind, turning him this way and that, an image of what he would create. But the process felt cumbersome and awkward, and he could not quite get comfortable with it.
“Relax, Reyn. I can feel you straining. You can’t make it happen that way. You have to let it come naturally. Just breathe in and out slowly and steadily and let go of your tension. Just see what it is you seek. Envision it as real.”
Lariana, I would do anything for you.
He settled deep into himself and began to form the image he was seeking, the tonal vibration of his voice building it piece by piece. A man. No one he knew–a figure identifiable only as any of a hundred anonymous men. He shaped him slowly, building his body and then his clothing and finally his features so that he was real and measurable and present. He turned him about, examining him from several angles, making sure he was perfect.
Then he put a weapon in his hands, a long knife, slender and deadly, and poised him for an attack.
Ready?
Crouching.
Now!
But when he opened his eyes to brace himself against the attack, the man was gone. Just as before. Just as it had happened every time. There was no one there. The image had died inside his mind. Whatever was real or might become real had been left there.
“I can’t do it!” he screamed in frustration.
Instantly Lariana was standing beside him, arms about his shoulders as she pulled his face close to hers and kissed him hard on the mouth. “Yes, you can, Reyn. You can.” She spoke the words with her mouth pressed against his, still kissing him, still holding him tight. “Look at me.”
She backed away and waited until he met her eyes. “I saw him that time. I did. But he wasn’t where you thought he was. He wasn’t in front of you. He was behind you. He was real. As real as you or I. He was there, and he was whole and complete. You did it, Reyn.”
“No.” He shook his head emphatically. “I didn’t do anything. I couldn’t make it work. I would have known. I didn’t feel anything. You’re mistaken. There was no one there.”
“No one coming at you? Even now, behind you, where I can see him and you can’t? No one, you think? A man with a long knife, ready to plunge it into your back? Creeping closer?”
She took a slow breath and let it out slowly. “Better turn around, Reyn. He’s getting closer.” He didn’t move, staring at her as he might a crazy person, wondering what in the world she was talking about. “Reyn, turn around. Right now.”
“Why are you doing this?” he asked in disbelief.
“Reyn!” she screamed. “Turn around!”
A slash of fear ripped through him, and he whirled about in spite of himself–just in time to see his attacker coming for him in a rush, a big man carrying a long knife, all fury and brute force, his face crushed in on itself with unspoken rage. Reyn knew–and at the same time wasn’t sure–that he had done this. And while it wasn’t real, somehow it was, and he lashed out with his voice in defense, ripping into the man and exploding him so that nothing remained but a darkened swatch of air.
Gone, just like that. As if it was never there.
Which, in fact, was true. Yet he had seemed as real and certain as the rubble in which Reyn stood.
Lariana was holding him again, arms wrapped tightly about him. “You see?” she whispered in his ear. “You thought you couldn’t control your magic, but you did!”
“But it wasn’t … ,” he started to protest, wanting to be sure she understood his control over the creation wasn’t complete, but seriously lacking.
“Do it again,” she said quickly, not letting him finish. “Right now, while you remember. Don’t think about it. Just let it happen.”
So he did. He wasn’t sure how he had managed it the first time, what he had done to make it possible, and he wasn’t sure how to do it now. What he remembered at the end of it all was how when he opened his eyes nothing of what he thought he had envisioned was there and he just sort of let go of everything in his despair. So he approached it that way again, humming softly, making the man come alive in his mind until he was fully formed and then just opening his eyes.
Sure enough. Nothing. The image he had created wasn’t there. At least, not where he was looking. But when he turned upon hearing Lariana’s excited gasp, there his invented adversary was, behind him once more, coming for him again, a re–creation of the last one. He exploded this one, too, filled with euphoria and satisfaction at the result.
“Reyn!” Lariana screamed with glee.
Without waiting for her to say anything more, he closed his eyes and did it again, changing the look and feel of this new image, giving it a more animal–like appearance, a creature crooked and feral and hunched over. He let it wander through his mind for a moment until he had a feel for its movements, for its smell and taste–pungent and foul–all the while using his wishsong’s magic to animate and build on it. He could hear Lariana trying to speak to him, shouting something, dancing at the edges of his vision, but he blocked her out, concentrating on his creation.