Aethersmith (Book 2) Read Free Page A

connection, their Sources were the inverse of one
another. Brannis was a stone, almost entirely cut off from the aether; Kyrus
found that it leapt to his call and flowed from his Source like a river.
    For weeks, Kyrus had been wading out into the shallow waters
near the tide line and practicing holding back the sea. At first, he had just
tried stopping the lapping kiss of water that would tickle the toes of walkers
along the beach. It amused him at first to see the water stop weirdly at an
invisible barrier and crash lightly against it, as if he had fashioned a glass
so clear it did not cast any distortion or glare to betray its presence. With
practice, he was able to form his shield farther and farther out into the tide.
He kept the shield arced so that the vast and cunning Katamic Sea did not
simply sneak around the sides, and he stood close to the center of that arc, as
it seemed easiest to keep an equal pressure of aether in all directions that
way.
    With the coming of the storm, Kyrus found both a test and a
purpose. The Denku had taken him in when the notorious pirate Denrik Zayne had
stranded him on their island after expressing concern about potential
retribution in this world for the attack of Denrik’s own twin on Brannis’s
homeland in the other. Kyrus had shared their food, lived in one of their
homes, and had begun to learn their language. In return, he had been able to do
nothing of use for them, save entertain with his magical tricks. Now, though,
with talk of storm surges that might wash away part of the village, Kyrus
intended to keep his new home safe from the storm.
    * * * * * * * *
    “He is brave, our spirit man,” Tippu commented, crouched
behind a palm tree in an effort to shield herself from the worst of the storm
winds.
    Her green-dyed hair was being played havoc by the storm
winds. Clad in just a loincloth and a pair of necklaces—the latter doing little
to either cover or protect her—she shivered against the cool, wet air that tore
past her.
    “Yes, very,” agreed Kahli, her long, scarlet-dyed braids
whipping behind her as the wind gusted. She huddled against Tippu’s back both
for warmth and the shelter of the wind. “And look, he does not even shake with
cold.”
    “He is a northerner. Their winds are always cold. He sweats
like a hunter even on mild days,” said Gahalu, Kyrus’s best friend among the
Denku.
    While the two girls had claimed Kyrus as their own and had
been trying—with limited results—to woo him, Gahalu had been Kyrus’s
interpreter and guide on the island. Worldly by Denku standards, Gahalu had
sailed aboard foreign ships, learned about distant lands, and picked up a few
exotic languages, Kyrus’s among them.
    “This weather probably reminds him of home,” Gahalu said.
    “This is home now for him,” Kahli insisted. “Look how he
risks his life to defend it.” She pointed to the bare-chested northerner,
standing where the water ought to have been chest deep, with the seawater
stopping eerily a few paces from him at well over head height.
    “You said he was not spirit man among his own people, that
they chased him off and wished to kill him. That does not sound like home. Home
is where he is loved. Home is where he will have strong sons who will grow up
to be hunters and elders and spirit men,” Tippu said.
    Despite his scrawny body and skin that refused to darken to
the creamy bronze color the Denku felt looked healthiest, Kyrus was an object
of desire and envy among the Denku women. Tippu and Kahli had gotten to him
first and claimed him, but should he decide to send them away, others would be
quick to fill their places.
    Gahalu sighed and watched his friend fighting the Katamic.
Kyrus spoke more to Gahalu than anyone else, even though he was picking up the
Denku language quite quickly. He knew that Kyrus had other reasons for damming
the tide, though he had no cause to think the lad was being less than selfless
in this particular instance. It allowed him