Page 58 of The Sunlit Man

“The voice?” Nomad asked, stepping forward.

“The one who gives commands,” she said, “in my head. Everything was so clear just a moment ago. Now…now I’m confused. Restore the voice!”

“The Cinder King,” Nomad mused. “As you suspected, he has a way of controlling them. A direct Connection.”

Her soul is terribly compromised, the hero notes. That usually makes it easier to control or infiltrate a mind, doesn’t it?

“It does indeed.” The corrupted sunhearts gave the Cinder King some control over his Charred—but Nomad had removed that control, letting Elegy’s natural personality reemerge.

“It’s her voice,” Rebeke said, “but she doesn’t seem to recognize me. How do we get her to remember?”

Nomad didn’t have a good response. He’d seen cases like this before. Elegy’s memories had almost certainly been burned away by the process that had infected her soul. This wasn’t a case of a little confusion after hitting her head. Her soul had literally been shredded, her mind enslaved.

In his experience, the way forward wouldn’t be to restore her memories, but to help her make new ones. He narrowed his eyes as she rattled the heavy chains, still supernaturally strong.

“The cinderheart’s Investiture remains,” he said. “That comes from the source, not the sludge we drew off. Storms. She can probably feel it in there, driving her.”

A human body, crammed with that much power, would beelectricwith the need to move, to act. One would feel a virtually irresistible urge to use the power, to satisfy its demand to become kinetic. In his case, it drove him to constant motion, to avoid sleep, to push himself to keep running. In Elegy, it was clearly of a more aggressive nature.

The frenzied way these Charred acted, always attacking and enjoying the fight…that might not be the command of the Cinder King. He probably just pointed them in certain directions, kept them working for him, channeling their violent energies.

Nomad took some further notes. How could he apply this to the sludge on his soul? Maybe fashion a knife from the sunheart, then stab himself? That might work, but he feared a Connection problem. These people could all share power, and souls, because of where they were from.

Still, it was the logical next step. He borrowed a knife from Rebeke, who was trying to get Elegy to talk to her. He was able to use it to shave off a piece of the sunheart, something he’d heard them describe. It was less like glass and more like resin. The new fragment continued to glow with the same living light.

He positioned the knife to cut into his own skin. He’d make a small incision on his left arm, then shove the piece of sunheart in. For many uses of Investiture, touching the blood was necessary. Ingesting the piece might have worked, but he wanted to be certain—besides, this would be easier to undo if something went wrong.

Um, Nomad, the knight says, hesitant. This seems kind of stupid.

“And?”

And so maybe don’t do it? Choose something not stupid instead?

“I have to try something, Aux,” he said. “The Night Brigade could be upon us at any time—and I need to be able to fight if that happens.”

Still. Are you certain you want to be this brash?

“What about me makes you think that I’d do anything else?”

The knight gives a long-suffering sigh, but is forced to admit the truth. Nomad is at the very least consistent in his stupidity.

Nomad made a small incision on his forearm. He made a fist and stuck the sliver of sunheart into the wound. He said the prayer, with proper Intent, that had worked on Elegy—then pressed a cloth against the wound to stanch the blood.

Nothing happened. He said the words again, trying to maintain the proper frame of mind. He also said them a little differently several times, using variations of oaths from his homeworld, then other Investiture-transferring incantations he’d learned.

None seemed to do anything. Sharing Investiture was much more difficult when you didn’t have Connections to the power or the people who’d created it. Perhaps that was the problem here. Or maybe itwasworking, but he just couldn’t feel any—

Click.

He looked up with a sharp intake of breath to see Rebeke undoing the manacles on her sister’s feet. The ones on her arms already dangled free.

Damnation.

Elegy met his eyes, then leaped at him with a howl of determined anger.

Rebeke screamed asthe Charred shoved aside the table and went for Nomad’s throat. He got his own hands up, grabbing her wrists before her nails dug into his flesh, but her momentum took them both to the floor in a writhing heap.

He grunted, rolling them to the side, trying to get the upper hand. Thisshouldhave been easy. He’d trained extensively in grappling over the years, while she fought with an unskilled frenzy, eyes wide and teeth clenched. But every time he got close to putting her into a secure hold, she shoved free, breaking his grip with a burst of raw strength.

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