From Cold Ashes Risen (The War Eternal Book 3) Read online

  Contents

  Title Page

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  A Word From The Author

  Newsletter

  Books by Rob J Hayes

  Copyright

  From Cold Ashes Risen

  (Book 3 of The War Eternal)

  By

  Rob J. Hayes

  Prologue

  There is an inherent negativity to life and growth, perhaps as a sort of morbid way to balance some grand scales. I don't mean literal scales, of course, but instead I speak of the opposite forces within our world that balance each other out. The Rand and the Djinn are perhaps the best example of this. They cannot exist without each other. The rules of our world bind them together inextricably. When a Rand dies, so too does a Djinn, and the same is true the other way around. They exist in tandem, equal forces, and balanced. It is a fact that made their eternal war even more idiotic. Both peoples knew the only outcome could ever be mutual destruction, yet they fought anyway. They ripped holes in Ovaeris, shattered an entire continent, and even tore open a portal to another world, and they did it all over a slight neither side could see the truth of. The Djinn created the Other World, Sevoari, and asked the Rand to fill it with life. They probably expected luminous beings full of glorious purpose. The Rand gave them nightmares. Literal nightmares plucked from the dreams of the people of Ovaeris. I don't think it was ever meant as a slight, but more likely a consequence of the Rand having very little in the way of imagination. They made up for their lack by searching the minds of us lesser peoples. So much of our world, shaped by a misunderstanding that our gods refused to reconcile. Let me assure you, regardless of whether you give your war a fancy name like The War Eternal, it is still a war; and the people who will suffer most from it are those caught in the middle.

  I have been drawn off my original topic. I often find my mind wanders when I consider the impact the Rand and Djinn have had on our lives. On my life. I believe it is anger that does such a thing. I can never forgive them for the things they have taken from me. I refuse to try.

  Back to the negativity of life and growth. It is perhaps somewhat fitting that we learn more from our defeats than we do our victories, as though the world is somehow set up to give the losers a better chance next time. We grow more from failure than we do success. I am a prime example, I admit it. My successes have only ever led to stagnation, whereas my failures have always driven me to greater effort. It is no surprise that I have failed so much more than I have succeeded. And we are forged less so by our fortunes than we are by our tragedies.

  I had just lost. I had been beaten. I had failed. And I had just committed the second worst tragedy I have ever experienced. Silva was dead, killed by my own hand. She put me in that position, gave me no choice. One way or the other she had committed herself to dying, and all that remained was for me to choose how. How could she do that? How could she claim to love me as I loved her, and yet force me to be the instrument of her death? Perhaps the greater tragedy was that neither of us realised that there was another way. A way that would not only have kept Silva alive, but also set her free. I have mentioned that I hate the Rand, and Mezula most of all. Well, this is why. She asked Silva to do it, to die for her, to die in her place. Mezula knew full well what she was doing by sending me to Do'shan, and the fucking bitch did it anyway.

  Despite my losses and failures, or perhaps because of them, I had grown powerful. Ssserakis, the ancient horror that possessed my body and soul, had learned to lend me its strength and even manifest itself within my shadow. It fed on fear and leaked that power into me, and I had used it to form shields and blades, and even wings of shadow. I had absorbed the fury and raw power of an Arcstorm. It flashed in my eyes like lightning, and I could release its power even without the aid of an Arcmancy Source. I had attained four Sources, almost as many as I could sit in my stomach at one time. Pyromancy, Arcmancy, Portamancy, and Kinemancy. It's true, I had also just learned that they were the bodies of dead Rand and Djinn, crystallised magic only Sourcerers, those of us who are the descendants of gods, could use. I cared little where my ability to wield magic, or the magic itself had come from, but instead only what I could do with it. Only what I could achieve with whatever power I could muster. I have always been ambitious, perhaps a little too much so. I still don't know whether it was that ambition, or my grief, that made me test myself against a god. Whichever it was, I came up short.

  After venting my full rage and power against the Djinn, Aerolis, all I managed was to stagger the creature and elicit a threat of destruction should I continue. Then came the Iron Legion, the man I had admired for years. A hero in my eyes. Never meet your heroes. Mine turned out to be the architect of my demise. As powerful as I had gotten, or at least as powerful as I believed myself to be, I realised then that I was out of my league. Loran Orran, the Iron Legion, was perhaps the one Sourcerer who had ever lived who could make a god shut up and listen. And he did. In his presence, even Aerolis was cowed.

  Chapter 1

  Prophecy is a foreign word, the meaning lost in translation.

  - Belmorose

  "The Auguries are not signs the chosen one has come. They're instructions on how to create one." The Iron Legion's secret. The fruits of a lifetime of research, and he dropped the revelation between us so easily. I struggled to understand at first. My mind was still reeling.

  "You experimented on us at the academy." I was still so exhausted my voice lacked the condemnation it should have held. The Iron Legion had taken children into his care, children who trusted him, and he had experimented on us. Altering our bodies with crystallised magic to suit the purpose of a millennia old prophecy uttered by a mad god.

  The Iron Legion nodded, his smile gone and face grave. "Yes. I tried it with animals first, even monsters from Sevoari, but none were compatible with Sources. Still, the research was not wasted, I did discover the exact value of a life in terms of the energy it contains."

  I saw Aerolis rumble closer, the rocks that made up the Djinn's body grating as they shifted against each other. "How did you force creatures to absorb my brothers?"

  "Ahh, that was my first challenge. No terran Sourcerers could answer the question, and even the great library of the tahren had no useful suggestions. I had to get inventive. Simply swallowing a Source wouldn't work, obviously, that's how all Sourcerers use magic and it's only a matter of time before rejection makes our limitations so apparent. And that's where the hammer comes in." The Iron Legion waved towards the hammer discarded in the centre of the amphitheatre. "Not for nothing is it called Shatter. Truly such a remarkable item. It is capable of breaki
ng anything. Even a Source. What couldn't be achieved by conventional means, was made easy. I injected Source dust directly into the blood. I admit, it took some trial and error. A few subjects were lost."

  The implication of those words certainly made an impact. How many of my classmates had died at this madman's hands? This man who we trusted to protect us, to teach us. This man I had idealised as a hero. "Who?"

  "Ah, names. Not my strongest talent. There was a young boy, a Vibromancer and Photomancer both. Quite rare. I've never actually met anyone able to control quite so well the stresses that pairing of attunements put upon the body and mind. I will admit I was a little overzealous and I overtaxed him by using the same pairing of Sources to alter him. I can assure you it was the last time I tried it with two Sources at once."

  An image flashed into my mind, something I had long ago forgotten, or perhaps something I had been forced to forget. Barrow Laney, a classmate at the academy and a friend I had spent countless hours with, locked inside a cage. His face was a ruin of gouged flesh and wrecked eyes, his ears long since ripped away. I shook my head to rid myself of the memory, but I couldn't help but see it now. I knew it wasn't my imagination. I remembered it.

  "You bastard!" I spat the accusation with as much force as I could muster. "You moon-damned fucking arsehole!" Fresh tears welled up in my eyes and rolled down my cheeks as I struggled against the magic that held me. I'd known Barrow had been driven mad by his attunements, we all had. The tutors announced it to us after he went missing. But I had always assumed they had found some way to comfort him, or at the very least ease his suffering. Now I remembered the truth that had been hidden from me for so long. It wasn't Barrow's attunements that had driven him mad, he'd always been so careful to manage them, it was the Iron Legion's bloody experiments. And even after the madness had taken him, the fucker had kept poor Barrow locked in a cage to study him. All my rage, grief, and struggling came to nought. The Iron Legion's magic held me tight and I sagged against it, watering the ground with my tears. "Bastard."

  The Iron Legion cleared his throat. "Yes. Well, advancement is built on the back of failure. That young man's sacrifice paved the way for others to flourish. Most notably, yourself and Yenhelm. What I discovered was really quite fascinating. The absorption process is incredibly painful for the subject, and rejection occurs quite quickly, but if the subject accepts the Source dust within themselves…"

  "How many?" I asked through gritted teeth. "How many of us did you torture?"

  I glanced up just in time to see the Iron Legion shrug. "All of you, I suppose. Though torture really isn't a correct term for it. In many ways it was no different to testing you for attunements. Yes, there was pain, but the lasting benefits more than made up for any discomfort you felt."

  "What lasting benefits did Barrow receive?" How could he not see it? How could he not see the pain he had caused? How could he not understand he was a fucking monster? "You didn't even put him out of his misery."

  "Must we focus on the failures?" The Iron Legion asked, then sat up straight and glanced over his shoulder to where Ishtar approached, sword drawn. "That's far enough. Tamura, would you mind joining us?" Another stool grew out of the dirt.

  Tamura sauntered over with a smile, glanced at the stool, and then sank down onto the floor, gathering his legs up beneath him. "Only a fool fears knowledge," the crazy old Aspect said. "But the knowledgeable often fear wisdom, for it is sometimes hidden behind the guise of foolishness."

  The Iron Legion smiled. "It's good to see you, old friend." His gaze shifted to me. "I'm glad you found a suitable teacher, Helsene."

  "Eskara?" Ishtar asked as she braved another step forward. I shook my head at her, unable to find the energy for words.

  "Tell us about the Auguries, if you will, Tamura," the Iron Legion continued.

  Tamura turned sad eyes my way. "All my fault. I didn't see the madness. Hard to see the ocean when you're drowning in it."

  "It is not madness I suffer from, Tamura," the Iron Legion said. "It is purpose and an unshakable will to see that purpose brought about. No matter the cost."

  Tamura ignored the Iron Legion and kept his eyes on me, an unfathomable sadness there. "I gave him the Auguries. I didn't see. All my fault. I'm sorry."

  "Life and death, together." The Iron Legion shook his head at Tamura. "At first, I thought I would have to inject one subject with both Necromancy and Biomancy, but after my experiment with that young Photomancer…"

  "Barrow!" I spat.

  The Iron Legion shook his head. "Names really aren't important at this point, Helsene. I realised that forcing a body to absorb two Sources was simply beyond their physical limitations. We may be the descendants of Aspects, but we are also, for the most part, terran. But that's where you and Yenhelm came in. You shared a bond that went deeper than almost any I've ever seen. I admit, at this point I was relying a little bit on conjecture. No real scientific proof, only hope. I injected a Biomancy Source into Yenhelm, and a Necromancy Source into you. You might have noticed that you feel a connection to the dead even without a Source, and with a Necromancy Source inside your powers are amplified. As I said, benefits."

  I sniffed, tears still dripping from my chin. With my hands locked by my side I couldn't even wipe my face. "If we were your prize subjects, why did you let us go? Why not keep us in cages like Barrow?"

  "I couldn't. I simply saw no way to generate the conditions needed for you to fulfil the second and third Auguries while locked in a cage. And, of course, my brother's war made things difficult. He insisted that all our Sourcerers were put towards victory rather than my research. But don't think I didn't keep track of you. I kept an eye on all of my potentials. Except for Alderson, she truly has disappeared. I suppose it doesn't matter anymore. Young Yenhelm has fulfilled both remaining Auguries."

  "You kept an eye on us?" I hissed the words. "We were sent to the Pit!"

  "I know. I put you there."

  What is there to say to that? I suppose I could have accused the Iron Legion of ruining my life even further, but honestly, he wouldn't have cared. Atrocities of even the most abhorrent kind were nothing to him, not while in pursuit of his research. I have never struggled to find enough hate to go around. Prig, Deko, the Overseer, the Emperor, Mezula, Prena. Silva. The list goes on and on, and I often find myself at the top of it. I think I struggled to hate the Iron Legion at the time. I struggled to comprehend the impact he had on my life. And still, I barely even knew the tip of it.

  "Renewal," Tamura said, his eyes locked on me.

  "Yes." The Iron Legion nodded. "Or rebirth. But those are only two words. The full Augury, Tamura. As you once told me."

  "Confided in you. Secrets whispered from one lost soul to another. Terran kindness repaid and then betrayed."

  "The Augury, Tamura." Judging by the sharpness in his voice, even the Iron Legion had limits to his patience.

  "A resurrection. On the verge of despair, when all hope and love are lost, when betrayal and pain have stripped the soul clean. The flesh and soul are reborn together."

  "Josef died down in the Pit," the Iron Legion said. "I have it by his own account, written by his hand. And yet the Biomancy I put inside of him reknit his flesh. Remade him. Dead and yet alive once more, renewed. Life and death together." He laughed. "Almost two of the Auguries in one. But of course, there is a third. The unity of purpose."

  "Two forces, each separate, each mired in irreconcilable differences. Acting together, cooperating towards an uncommon goal." Tamura nodded sagely, a sly grin on his lips.

  The Iron Legion spread his hands wide. "Your original escape from First Blade Neralis gave me the prime opportunity to create the circumstances needed for Yenhelm to fulfil the final Augury. I placed him with the Knights of Ten and gave them a purpose. You. Together, Yenhelm and First Blade Neralis hunted you across Ovaeris. And when finally they found you… the uncommon goal. One to cause death, the other to preserve life. I did not, however, expect Yenhelm to a
bsorb a second Source, and in such an uncharacteristic method." The Iron Legion looked toward Aerolis.

  "This was your experiment, Loran, not mine," the Djinn rumbled. "Just what are you hoping to achieve?"

  I felt hopelessly out of place. A pawn being pushed about by players in a game I didn't even understand. The exhaustion wasn't helping. It's fairly difficult to compose a solid thought when it's taking every bit of willpower you possess just to keep from passing out. And I couldn't keep my attention from wandering, my eyes from slipping to look at the body. I could see her. Silva. She didn't look dead from a distance, just peaceful, as though she were sleeping. But no. She was dead, and I had killed her. Right then I didn't care about the Iron Legion or what he had done. I wanted to break free of his hold, to run to my lover's side, and weep over her body. I wanted to hold her, to kiss her, to love her one last time. I wanted her to wake up and tell me everything would be alright. Even though I knew it would be a lie.

  "I am trying to correct your mistakes, Djinn. My research will fix the world."

  "And I suppose you gain nothing from it?"

  The Iron Legion stood, facing up to Aerolis. "Well of course I do. You know what I want, Djinn. You tricked that out of me last time we met."

  I felt Ssserakis stir inside me. The horror was as exhausted as I, but there was fear all around us. Within us. I could feel its strength returning bit by bit. And I noticed my shadow extending along the ground, thin tendrils snaking their way towards where the Iron Legion had his back turned.

  I will kill him for both of us.

  I shook my head and whispered. "He doesn't know. You're the one thing he doesn't know about. My only advantage." I couldn't say the rest. I couldn't admit that after everything I had already lost, I couldn't take losing Ssserakis as well. What if we failed? What if the Iron Legion knew some way to rip the horror from inside of me? I could not, would not risk it. I could not face being alone.

  The Iron Legion and Aerolis were still arguing and I was forgotten for the moment, though I could still feel the magical pressure pushing down on me, locking in place. Even if I weren't held tight, I doubt I would have made it close enough to the Iron Legion to strike. Even Ishtar, as stealthy as she was, couldn't move without the man glancing her way.