The Stone Wolf (The Chain Breaker Book 4) by D.K. Holmberg (digital book reader TXT) 📕

The Toral nodded. “I detect one in the city.”

“What do you mean you detect one?” Gavin asked.

She held her hand out and slapped it on the table. The Toral ring on her hand looked like a band of pale white stone. As he watched, it started to glow softly.

But that was it. It did nothing else, and he saw no sign of magic. He still held on to his core reserves of magic, though, because he had no idea what she might pull.

“I have a Toral ring,” she said. “And when I first came… there was a trail. We followed it. And we kept running into you.”

“Sorry about that. It seems we’ve had a misunderstanding all this time. Probably about the ring you’re looking for. I was once hired to steal one, but I failed. There’s not one in the city, though, so unfortunately, your information is incorrect.”

“Not information. It is what I detect.”

“Then what you detect is wrong,” Gavin said. “I’m not exactly sure what you think you’re going to do, but I don’t have this Toral ring. If I did…”

Gavin had no idea what he would do if he had one. Certainly not try to use it. That would be dangerous. Probably suicide, especially as he had no clue as to the kind of power within it, or how to use it.

Instead, he watched her, trying to figure out what to do or what to say to her, but he didn’t come up with anything. She simply stared at him, an unreadable expression in her eyes, something that suggested a dark intention. Smoke swirled from Eva, and it headed toward the Toral again.

“It is here,” she said. “Within the city. And everything has led me to you.”

“Why don’t we talk through this step by step? You weren’t sent by Tristan,” he said, and she shook her head. “And you aren’t working with Cyran. But you are working with somebody named Ceran?”

She nodded.

“And this Ceran is your Sul’toral.”

She nodded again.

“Let me guess. Your Sul’toral instructed you to claim this Toral ring from me.”

She didn’t make any expression.

“Or you received word that I had it,” Gavin said.

She pressed her lips together in a tight frown before finally nodding.

Gavin leaned back, and he chuckled.

“I fail to see what is so amusing to you,” the Toral said.

“Jayna,” Eva said.

Gavin smiled to himself. At least he had a name now. He was tired of calling her the Toral. “Obviously, Jayna, you have a misconception. And, unfortunately, I think you’ve been used.”

“I have not been used,” she said.

“I’m sure you didn’t want to be, but the type of power that has guided you here is obviously using you against me.”

He thought that he could piece things together, though it wasn’t clear.

If it was about a ring, maybe it was still about Tristan’s pursuit of a ring.

If there was one in the city, it would explain why everything kept coming back to Yoran. Magic was here. Powerful magic.

The kind that would make Tristan nearly impossible for Gavin to stop.

Anna had said he wouldn’t be able to use it, though. Why chase it if he couldn’t?

“Why would that be the case?” Jayna asked.

“Because I’ve upset powerful people,” Gavin said.

What was worse was that the people he had upset were clearly powerful enough that they could send even more magic at him. He would’ve expected Tristan to have pulled that. Why wouldn’t he? Why wouldn’t Tristan use somebody like her, somebody who had even more power than Gavin could summon? To force it upon him, making him struggle with figuring out a way to stop it. He knew what Tristan was capable of doing, and Tristan knew that Gavin had come to understand his innate magic. That was exactly the kind of thing Tristan would do.

“Why don’t we work together?” he said to Jayna. “We can figure out where this Toral ring is, and then maybe the two of us can figure out how to call my old mentor here. And perhaps—”

“You can’t be serious,” Gaspar whispered through the enchantment.

“Why not?” Gavin asked, looking over to him. “It’s a perfectly sensible thing for us to do.”

“You and sensible don’t go together very well,” Gaspar said.

“Fine. Maybe it’s not perfectly sensible, but it makes sense.”

Having somebody like the Toral, with the power he’d felt from her, would be a boon when it came to dealing with Tristan. Not only her, but this Eva as well. He had no idea what she had other than the smoke magic, but he’d seen it in action and knew that it was different than sorcery, which made it powerful.

“I’m afraid I cannot be of use to you and your vengeance,” Jayna said.

Gavin grunted, shaking his head. “It is not my vengeance. I’m simply trying to help protect the city.” He frowned as something that he’d seen in Nelar came back to him. He was increasingly certain he was right about it. “You protected Nelar.”

She was more like him. Powerful, but she wanted to protect her city.

“What do you know about that?”

Gavin realized he had the right of it. “Just what I saw when I was there,” he said, shrugging. “There was an attack.”

He watched her as he said it, and her eyes twitched. Maybe it was more than just an attack. Whatever it was, she’d been involved, and it must have been significant enough—and violent enough—that it had upset her. Gavin could tell that from her demeanor as she looked at him and from how she touched her Toral ring.

“If you don’t want the same thing to happen here, you will help me,” he said.

She grinned. “I doubt the same attack will happen in the city.”

“Really? We’ve dealt with a sorcerer by the name of the Mistress of Vines, also known as the Tanran. She was a powerful creature and had nearly overwhelmed us; nearly destroyed others in the city who she saw as an obstacle to her rule. Then there were the Fates.”

Her eyes narrowed.

When he’d mentioned it