A Baron of Bonds (Conduit of Light #2)

61. Karus

Chapter 61

Karus

Rain splattered my cheeks in the late spring downpour. Parvus was not particularly great-smelling when he ran in the rain, but he was getting wet where we were headed anyway.

Moira flew in front of us, skillfully dodging some of the fatter droplets. Six channelers rode behind me.

Ilyenna and Talon followed at a slower pace in the rear. Ilyenna insisted she was well enough and early enough on to be able to ride a walking lumen to the Great Stream. I agreed with her, though Talon moped, insisting she ride one of the oldest and slowest lumens.

Rauca ran beside Parvus, no rider on her back, and she sprang over log after log with ease. I’d found only a few curled vines around her tail this morning.

Parvus, however, was now sporting what looked like black seed pods from his inner hind legs.

“I hear it!” Moira yelled in front of us, over the sound of pounding feet. “We’re almost to the stream!”

I looked behind me to check on the four channelers keeping pace. Rell and Renn were hunched down low, giddy grins on their faces as their lumens bounded forward. Mychael held a similar stance with a smirk on his lips.

Philius, however, looked practically green, the night’s celebrations for the coming baby hitting him hardest, and I rolled my eyes.

He claimed to be too hungover to come with us, and I claimed if he didn’t, he’d be sent to be Pompeii’s personal assistant the rest of the day.

We arrived at the bank of the stream, and the rush of water hit my ears as Parvus slowed. It was less a stream and more of a raging river—Great indeed.

I pulled my hair from my face, tying it back and hopping down from Parvus. As the four channelers stopped as well, I addressed them. “Baron Revich would like you to feed your lumens today.”

They looked at me in question.

“Feed them what?” asked Rell, petting her lumen’s head.

I shrugged, remembering this task years ago. “Whatever they’ll eat. The point is, you don’t leave until they are full.”

Baron Revich had led Clairannia, Figuerah, and myself to the middle of the forest during our training, giving the same few instructions.

This was an iumenta magic challenge, and it had not taken Figuerah long to catch and kill a quiphit for her lumen while Clairannia and I scrambled to find something our lumens would actually eat.

Revich and I had decided we could combine this lesson with what I wanted to try for Parvus and Rauca, taking the channelers to the Great Stream while he worked on the conduit trials.

“How do we catch something for them to eat? We didn’t bring weapons.” Mychael looked out at the raging stream and then down to his lumen.

“Your magic is your weapon. Find a way to catch some meat and your lumen will eat.”

Philius slid down from his lumen, running to a bush to be sick.

“As soon as your lumen has filled their belly, you may go, and the rest of your time before lunch is yours.”

That set Rell and Renn into action, and they set out between the trees with masses of red curls bouncing along.

Mychael walked up to the stream and bent down to peer into the water.

Philius continued to be sick.

When Talon and Ilyenna finally arrived, I filled them in, adding, “Talon, you cannot find something for Ilyenna’s lumen.”

“I can do it myself,” she said.

“I know you can, but I also know he’ll try to help you.”

He frowned and helped her down.

“You go that way, I’ll go this,” she ordered.

“Don’t go far,” he muttered, reluctantly turning away from her.

She put her hands on her hips and watched him leave. Her blonde curls fell into her bright blue eyes, and she brushed them away, huffing. “He’s become overprotective. I hate it.”

“Don’t be too hard on him. You’ve only just bonded as companions and now he has two lives to worry about. I’m sure he’ll settle down soon when it becomes more routine.”

She sighed and stretched her back. “Can you meet with me tonight after dinner? For an embroidery lesson?”

“Of course. I’d love to. I’ve started your first moon, so you can finish it. You’re going to love the color of the band. It matches your eyes.”

She blushed, red rising to her pale, slightly freckled cheeks. “I’d better get on with it. Do lumens eat fowl?”

“Yes. But I’ll give you a hint. I said you needed to feed your lumen. I didn’t say you had to kill anything yourself, but if you lead your lumen to a quiphit burrow or she happens to catch a flock of geese,”—I shrugged—“she’ll be full, won’t she? The trick is helping her catch them. That’s where the iumenta magic comes in.”

“I’ll do my best. Thank you, Karus.” She turned to leave, giving a wide birth to Philius who sunk against a tree, pressing on his temples.

I looked around for Moira, finding her flying above the raging waters, sticking her hand in the stream and laughing at the spray.

“Don’t let it sweep you in, Moira! I’m not coming in there to fetch you out!” I called across the rush.

She laughed in her tinkling, light way and dove.

“Moira!” I ran to the water’s edge, both Parvus and Rauca beside me watching where she went under. Cursing under my breath, I pulled off my boots, tossing them to the side of the bank and took two steps into the water before she shot above the surface, now naked and laughing at me.

“That was not funny. I was ready to dive in after you and probably drown.”

“I thought it was very funny, Karusss.” She spoke my name in that mocking way, a reminder that she and I were very different creatures.

“How did you manage to not get swept away?” I folded my arms and stepped back up onto the shore.

“I asked the stream not to.”

“Oh, it’s that simple, is it?” I chortled.

“It is if you’re fae,” she replied, diving back in again.

I huffed, looking down to Parvus. “What about you, handsome? Do you think you can swim in this?”

He looked up at me in his usual wolfish grin, giant tongue hanging out of his mouth before he sniffed the water’s edge and whined.

“I know. It sure is fast. I don’t know how Rauca bathed you in this as a pup.” I patted her head.

Moira surfaced again and flew in circles above the water.

At least it had stopped raining.

“They won’t go in,” I stated bluntly, unsure if I could convince them with magic.

“Why don’t you just calm the stream, Karus?” Philius asked behind me, wiping his mouth of spit.

“I don’t know how to do that.”

“I bet you can though,” he replied, raising a brow at Moira who was now digging her feet just above the surface of the water, causing it to splash up over her sage body.

“Sure, I’ll just wade in there and tell it to calm down so my lumens can take a bath.”

He shrugged. “Okay.”

I pursed my lips and stepped back into the water, unsure if I could really calm a river. That sounded like something a Baron could do, not me. I didn’t even know what kind of magic that would fall under.

I held my hands above the surface, closed my eyes, and steadied my breathing. I thought of calm waters, of still streams, gently gliding over smooth stones. I peeked one eye open. Nothing changed.

“It’s not working. Maybe I need to go farther out.” I took another few steps, soaking my skirts up to my waist, my feet finding a hold on the slippery rocks below.

It was freezing. I knew exactly what Dynah had meant in that book about lumens. I tried again, thinking of calm, peaceful water.

Nothing but raging waves came over me, jostling me in place.

“It was worth a try, but I just don’t have that kind of magic, Philius.”

I began to wade back to the shore and slipped.

It happened so fast, I didn’t comprehend it had happened at all. One moment my head was above the surface, the next it was under, water filling my mouth and nose as the rest of me tumbled through the rush, and I lost my way to the surface.

I only heard the gush of water as I tried to reach for something—anything to grab ahold of so I could find my bearings and take another breath.

The water swept me away quickly, carrying me downstream. My head finally breached the surface for a precious moment before I fell under again. The rage of water in my ears muted for a moment as it pushed me over a ledge and I fell fast and deep to the bottom of the riverbed. My head cracked against something hard, and I fell limp, my lungs screaming for air, my head struggling to form thoughts.

It needed it to stop.

I knew that much.

The stream, the water, the rush and power, the heaviness that pushed me down needed to stop. I wanted it all to stop .

I opened my eyes, coughing, the sweet intake of cold, wet air filling my lungs before I heaved and more water left them. Large round stones, covered in algae sat nestled into their riverbed, suddenly exposed to the open air, just as I was.

I coughed again and continuously, watching water and blood drip down onto my hands as I felt for the gash at my temple.

“Karus!” Mychael was at my side, sloshing through what was left of the stream to get to me, grabbing my shoulders to look at my face. “Can you hear me?”

I nodded slightly, the movement painful.

“We need to move. Can you walk? It doesn’t matter.” He pulled me up, bending and lifting my soaking wet body over his shoulder, running to the shore.

He helped me down gently, the other channelers and Moira at my side. Philius brushed over my wound with the sleeve of his shirt, then ripped a piece with his teeth and pressed it to my head.

I turned and coughed again, somehow more water spilling from my lungs.

“Karus, where are you right now?” Mychael asked somewhere in front of me.

“At—at the Great Stream.” I managed, blinking slowly, shivering before Philius’s shirt covered me.

“What time of day is it?” he asked next, taking Talon’s shirt and wrapping it around my legs, rubbing them up and down to warm my body.

I coughed, the jerking of my torso sending sharp pains to my head. “Morning.”

I saw him nod, the twinkling of Moira’s wings next to his shoulder.

“And what just happened to you?” he continued.

“I…I slipped and got carried away by the stream. I don’t know how I’m not dead.”

I heard Moira’s giggle as she landed on my chest. “I know. Look!”

She pointed behind her back to the water. I lifted myself onto my elbows, squinting at the stream’s edge.

A massive wall of water was forming, higher and higher into the sky. The rush of the river stopped right where I had been, exposing the riverbed completely. I gazed up at the wall of continual water as it grew taller than the trees, waiting for something.

“Tell it to let go, Karus. But slowly or we’re all soaked.” She crawled up to my shoulder and started pulling back my dripping hair.

“I did that?” I asked to no one in particular.

“Yep,” Moira answered. “I always knew there was something strange about you, Karus. From that first day I met you.”

I did what she suggested and watched as the wall of water slowly flowed downstream at the bottom of the wall, more and more of it rushing over the stones I had just landed on. Then the rest of it fell in a loud slap on the surface and the stream continued as if nothing had happened at all.

“I don’t understand. I didn’t use any magic to do that.”

She laughed, the chiming of it hurting my ears. “You didn’t need magic, Karus. You just did what any other powerful fae can do. You asked it to stop.”