The hidden elemental the.., p.1
The Hidden Elemental (The Binding Trials Book 3), page 1
The Hidden Elemental
THE BINDING TRIALS BOOK 3
D.K. HOLMBERG
JASPER ALDEN
Copyright © 2024 by ASH Publishing
Cover art by Damonza.com
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
Contents
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
Author’s Note
Series by Jasper Alden
Similar Series by D.K. Holmberg
Chapter 1
The silver pool of energy radiated a sense of cool.
Lathan stood before it, though wasn’t sure if there was anything within that pool he was supposed to detect. There was an energy to it but nothing more than that. Still, that was not what took the focus of his attention.
It was the figure seemingly standing above the silvery liquid.
Behind him, he could feel Jef and Marin creeping toward him, though neither of them moved any closer. They were waiting. He appreciated that they were and appreciated that they gave him this space—and this time—to try to make sense of what was happening here.
“Father?”
The figure seemed to hover, and for a moment, there was a shifting of the wispy quality of the figure, something that made it seem almost smoky. Then that solidified, taking a dark shape, solidifying even more. The color began to change, draining out. Contours that Lathan remembered all too well began to appear. His face formed, the familiar hard edge to his cheekbones. His black hair that hung down to his shoulders, looking for a moment as if it were formed out of the shadow itself, but even that began to take on increasingly prominent characteristics to the point where Lathan could see strands of hair that seemed to catch the wind. And after that, there was the shifting darkness that formed a jacket and pants, even boots.
It was his father. Lathan’s memories of him were strong, and he recalled the way his father had looked all too well. He could see him in his mind, almost as if this figure were taking on aspects of Lathan’s memories.
Could that be what it was?
As he stared, Lathan felt a moment of doubt, wondering if perhaps this really was his father. Why would his father have left him, abandoning him to wonder what had happened to him?
There was no answer. The figure just hovered. And as it did, Lathan began to feel the strange cold within it, but within that cold he began to feel something else as well. Some aspect seemed to tug at Lathan’s awareness, an aspect that seemed prominent and significant. Lathan had to find some way to understand just what it was and what the sense meant for him.
“Are you sure this is him?” Marin asked, sliding up close to him and dropping her voice to a whisper. Her pale-blue cloak seemed to catch a hint of unseen breeze, and it tugged at her golden strands of hair, as well. “If the elementals have a way of taking different shapes, it’s possible that it’s not even him.”
“Why would any other elemental try to take on this shape?” Lathan asked.
“I don’t know. There is so much about all of this that I don’t know. I just want to be careful here, Lathan. If this is not him, I don’t want you to end up getting hurt by whatever this is. Whoever this is.”
Lathan inhaled deeply, but he realized that she was right. What if this was not his father? The idea that his father was part elemental was still difficult for him to fathom, but they had seen too much to suggest that was true for him to believe otherwise. And everything they had encountered lately had brought him to believe that there was some bridge to the elementals that his father had been bound to.
“It has to be him,” he said. “Otherwise…”
He didn’t know what to say about it otherwise. He didn’t know what to make of this, but the cold that lingered deep inside of him suggested that he had to pay attention and listen, needing to know what the cold tried to tell him. It was a connection to that power, even if Lathan wasn’t sure what that connection was, and did not know what to make of that.
“I just want to be careful,” she said. “That is all. Just don’t ignore the possibility that this is not what you think.”
He took another deep breath, and when he let it out, he turned his attention to the figure. Lathan continued to try to make sense of what was here and whether there was anything about this figure that he could understand. He felt something.
“Are you him?”
There was a little more solidification to it, but barely that.
Then the figure turned to him, seemingly swiveling in the pool of silvery liquid.
“Lathan,” a strange, almost musical voice said. It seemed to ring out, but then it carried on the wind, mixing with something more that he could not quite place.
“You aren’t him,” Lathan said. He tried to hide the disappointment that he felt but wasn’t sure that he could. He was disappointed that this was not his father, at least not the father he remembered. “If you aren’t him, then who are you?”
There was another moment of hesitation, little more than a moment. The figure seemed to take on even more characteristics, contours that struck Lathan as if the silver were trying to reveal more of its presence.
“I am your father,” the voice said. “But not your father. A reflection, transmitted through this place of power.” The figure looked up—Lathan had a hard time thinking of him as his father—and swept his gaze around.
Even without following the direction of this figure’s gaze, Lathan could feel the strange energy that was here, and was all too aware that something had changed. And he had been responsible for it. Lathan had helped release the elementals here. Had he not, he didn’t know what would’ve happened. The Derithan would’ve succeeded in whatever they had planned, and Tolinar would’ve acquired whatever he was after.
He looked back to see where Henash remained seated, his face drawn and weak. He’d struggled since defeating Tolinar.
“You did well following the instructions I left for you.”
Lathan pulled the book out of his pocket, and he held onto it tightly. He had studied the book, looking for answers and trying to make sense of what his father had wanted to teach him. Yet, as he had done that, Lathan had never expected there would be anything within the book that would help him know his father quite like this. Even searching, Lathan still wasn’t entirely sure that he understood what he had accomplished.
“You wanted the elementals freed. Why?”
“You see why,” the figure said.
Lathan looked down at it. He could see the silvery pool that had formed, where there had been nothing before. The Black Rock had been an empty void here before, and now it seemed to radiate some strange energy that suggested to Lathan which elementals were here. Was that all that his father had been after? Had he wanted Lathan to release the elementals so he could somehow use them? If so, what reason would there be for that?
“I don’t understand why you wanted this,” he said.
“Because it will be necessary. I can’t explain it now, but you must trust that what you have done here—what I did when I was here—was necessary. A plan set into motion longer than you can know.”
“I don’t understand.”
“I know. But do you feel it?”
Lathan looked over to Marin, who stayed by him. She frowned, and he could feel her attempt to reach for the elementals, primarily wind, though she had discovered how to reach for earth and water through what Lathan had been doing.
“We felt the elementals. Is that what you mean?”
“There is a connection to this place.” The figure’s voice dropped off. Though it still sounded musical and still reached Lathan’s ears, as if he were meant to hear it, or perhaps as if the wind intended to carry it to him. “But these places have long struggled. They have been corrupted by the Derithan. They have been taken. It’s time the elementals are freed. Truly freed.”
“How?” Jef asked, striding up and looking over to Lathan. “If that’s you, help us understand how.”
The figure turned to Jef. “You’ve grown quite confident, Jef. It’s good to see. And I suspect you have helped take care of Lathan as I asked.”
Lathan shot Jef a look. Jef remained quiet and made a point of keeping his gaze fixated on the figure, not looking in Lathan’s direction. Lathan’s father had asked Jef to keep an eye on him? What else had Jef not shared?
“Lathan needs to understand what happened here.”
“He does,” the figu re said. “But not this way. I can only show him so much here. He must find his way to a place where he can learn.”
“We’ve stopped the Derithan, and Tolinar is gone. I’m not going anywhere.”
“Unfortunately, the Derithan are only delayed. Knowing what you have accomplished here, it’s likely that they will return. You do not know enough to defend this place or these lands. And it is unsafe for the elementals to remain here.” He turned, and the figure seemed to stare off into the distance, which made it so that Lathan stared off as well. And as he did, he began to notice something. The strangeness that he felt around him from the elementals seemed to have changed, shifting somewhat. There was still some aspect of it out there, but the more that Lathan focused on it, the easier it was for him to feel that something there had shifted. “Which is why the others will depart. This place of power is temporary, my son, and it will disappear once again.”
“I don’t understand,” Lathan said. He looked back to Henash, who still hadn’t gotten up. “If it was better for the elementals to remain trapped—”
“Not better. Necessary. But no longer necessary. Not this way. Now I can rest.”
The figure seemed to shimmer a little bit, and the color of the hair started to fade into something almost silvery, before solidifying once again. As that happened, Lathan started to realize what was going on. His father—or whatever this figure was—faded. He wouldn’t be able to remain much longer. Either that, or he retreated, as the figure claimed the elementals were doing.
“You must find your destiny. The journey is challenging, but I believe you can do it.”
“The journey?” Lathan asked. “My destiny? Where am I supposed to go? What am I supposed to do?”
“You must follow the shadow. You must find where it leads. And you must learn the truth. You need to do so before the Derithan and worse reach you.”
The figure started to flicker again. It solidified once more.
“I cannot stay any longer. But do not lose who you were born to be. Find the truth.” The figure started to drop down into the pool of silvery liquid.
And then it fell silent.
Lathan looked over to Jef. Jef was looking down into the liquid, seemingly watching and still making a point of not looking toward Lathan. Lathan tore his attention away from Jef and studied the pool. Something was changing.
“The wind is talking to me,” Marin said. “And I can hear it telling me that we need to get moving. I’m not sure how long Henash has here.”
“Derithan?” Lathan asked.
“Not Derithan,” she said. “At least, the wind doesn’t seem to think so. At this point, though, I just don’t know. Whatever it is, we have to get moving.”
“If this pool is some way to reach them, then why can’t we just use that?” Lathan asked.
“Because it’s disappearing,” Jef said.
“What do you mean?”
“Well, can’t you see it?”
Lathan regarded Jef, looking to see what he might do or say, if anything. Instead, he found Jef studying the liquid, almost an intensity there. Lathan wondered what was happening, but somehow, he felt the answer deep inside of himself. It was an instinctive answer, one that seemed to come from some place deep, and an answer that struck him as significant.
“The pool is changing,” Lathan said.
Which meant that whatever power he had released was starting to fade. It was strange for power to fade so quickly but what else was happening here?
His father wanted him to find something more, but how?
“We should keep moving,” Marin said. “Whatever is here is starting to shift. And that means that we should not remain any longer than we have to. Listen,” she said, and she tilted her head to the side. Lathan recognized that posture as she had done it many times before when she had started to listen to the wind. “You can hear the wind talking to us. It’s a warning. The wind wants us to keep moving.”
And it wasn’t only the wind, Lathan realized.
The ground had started to tremble as well. That trembling came from some place deep, a signal of the earth elemental that was talking to them, Lathan suspected. Though he wasn’t sure what to make of that earth elemental, nor did he know what it was trying to tell them, only that he could hear and feel something coming.
What about the other elementals?
The other elementals were harder for him to feel. Some of them were faint, partly because they were less present, as in the case of water which Lathan did not feel nearly as prominently, and sometimes in the case of fire which Lathan just did not feel as often.
He tried to make sense of that feeling but could not. He could feel a little bit of the cold from the shadow, but it was a faint sensation deep inside of him, as if it were buried there with him.
His father had been here. His father had wanted him to be here. Lathan had to focus on that and on what it meant, even if he didn’t understand it. That mattered, he knew.
He stopped at the edge of the pool, ignoring Marin telling him to back away and Jef whispering something to him. The pool. That was what he needed to do and what he needed to understand. This silvery liquid had formed in response to Lathan helping release the other elementals. This was what his father had wanted him to come and find. This was what was significant. Shouldn’t he focus on it?
But as he struggled to make sense of it, he could not.
There had been some sort of connection to his father through this, but Lathan could not tell what it was and did not know what happened to him. As he leaned forward, he felt a surge of cold deep within him. It was almost as if there was a warning, something pushing him back, suggesting that getting any closer than he already had was dangerous. Lathan leaned away from that pool of liquid, instinct warning him.
“Henash?” Lathan asked.
Henash looked up at them. “Sorry that I’ve been a little out of it.”
“Don’t apologize. Can you get up?”
Henash started to stand, then wobbled. “I can. Not sure how long I can hold out, but I think I can do it for a bit. I might ask the wind to get me back to Gorawl.” With that, the wind started to swirl around him. Henash let out a soft sigh. “That’s better. I will see you back home. Don’t let the Derithan chase you.”
With that, he disappeared.
“What about us?” Marin asked.
“We get away from here,” Lathan said. “We did what we were supposed to do, and now…” Now he didn’t know.
“I’ll call the wind,” she said.
He looked over to Marin. A gust of wind lifted her, then Jef, and finally Lathan, pulling them off the ground. They hovered, and Lathan took a moment to look down. He saw the liquid rapidly draining off, dispersing. There was nothing he could do, everything he had done here seemed to be gone.
“That’s all there is?” he whispered. “Just this?”
“What do you mean that’s all?” Marin asked. “You had a chance to speak to him. You know your father isn’t gone. And you had confirmation of something else.”
He nodded as he stared, looking down. Confirmation of something else, but Lathan still wasn’t sure what to make of it. He had no idea how to think of the fact that his father was an elemental.
And yet what other answer was there? That was the truth. He had seen it, and yet, even seeing it left him uncertain and unsettled.
The wind continued to carry them, lifting them higher and higher. Lathan ignored the effect, staring down as he noticed the silver gradually draining away, the ground trembling beneath him, and something else, something more that he could not quite place.
There was power, he knew. But what kind of power?
And more than that, what did it mean for him?
Chapter 2
The wind guided them to the edge of the forest. Somewhere distant, Lathan could hear the sound of waves crashing, and there was a faint part deep inside of him where he could feel those waves crashing, as if he were somehow connected to them. Lathan thought that was probably more imagined than anything else, but he felt something there.
The wind dispersed, sweeping away from them. He and the others were simply deposited, which gave Lathan the chance to look around and try to make sense of what was here, even though he did not know what he might find. Perhaps nothing.
