Tears coursed down her cheeks. Yewin was saying something, but she chose not to hear it. What she saw was too marvelous, too beautiful to comprehend. She could see the guiding hand behind it all, and its angels. But she was also vaguely aware of something dark hovering at the edge of her awareness. Like a biting fly in paradise. Jak found herself turning away from it, turning away from the dark truth.
A thought came to her, a memory. She was supposed to do something here, in this ocean of truth. She was here to learn. What was it? Why did she come here?
No sooner had she asked the question, then she was given the answer. Naem! She was here to save Naem. But how?
Again, the answer came swiftly to her mind. There was a way to save him, but it was not what she expected. Doubt entered, and she almost slipped away from this great reservoir of light and truth. But no, she knew that if she saw it here, it was true. She was capable.
In the room, nothing seemed to happen. All remained as it was. Naem lay, still unconscious, on the wooden table. All was as calm as the moment before Yewin began the connection with Jak.
Then white light exploded from her eyes as well as the brand on her left hand. Light so bright, it even caused the Bright Fae to shield their eyes. It continued for seconds or hours, filling every corner of the room, seeming even to push past the so-called boundaries of matter. Jak clutched at the form in front of her, her hand connecting with Naem’s.
Just as suddenly as it appeared, the light faded. Jak instantly collapsed to the stone floor. All strength was gone. It took her a moment to realize that Yewin had collapsed as well, his natural light faded somewhat. The others quickly surrounded him, lifting him up and forgetting about Jak. They sat him down in a nearby chair.
Summoning all her remaining strength, Jak rose to her feet. “What happened?” she asked Yewin.
“I don’t know,” the Bright Fae said. His speech sounded slurred and tired. “Suddenly all my energy was gone, drained through you. If you hadn’t stopped when you did, I’m not sure I could have held on.” He still held a slight glow, but it was considerably fainter than his comrades.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t know this would hurt you.”
“Nor did I, I knew there was risk, but I never considered that risk was to myself. But it seems like you did something.”
Jak turned to face Naem. He was still lying there on the table, but something was different. His face seemed to have more color. His leg, though still gruesome, looked less swollen.
But it was Naem’s left hand that caught Jak’s attention. New lines had formed. Extending above his brand of Grace, further up his arm. There, she saw two new brands embedded into his skin. Jak quickly identified them as Toughness and Healing. The former made the user more resilient, the second allowed him to heal faster.
What had she done? No one could live with more than one brand. They either died or became a demon. And yet, Naem was still very much alive, and with no signs of transformation. His chest rose smoothly with each breath, and he seemed at peace.
She could hear the others whispering, marvelling at what they were seeing. Yewin was smiling, tired as he was in his chair. Light bounced around the cottage as the Bright Fae realized what had happened.
Naem had just become the first person to possess more than one stable brand.
And somehow, Jak had been the one to gift them.
19
When she awoke the next morning, she was ravenously hungry. She had eaten nothing the day before, and only went to sleep because she had been more tired than hungry. Now, however, she was ready to eat a whole sheep if she got the opportunity.
It took a moment for her to get out of bed and take in her surroundings. Her body ached all over from the arduous journey the day before, and she barely remembered climbing into bed. Thinking back brought the memory of what she had done. She honestly didn’t know what to think about it. Though a part of her now wanted to check Naem to make sure he was still human and hadn’t turned into a demon.
She opened the door to the small room, and was greeted by several glowing faces. Blinking her eyes against the light, she eventually made out Yewin, whose light still looked faded, but better than it had been the night before. The others were all looking at her, the concern and caution still evident on their faces. But Jak shrugged that off the moment she saw…
“Naem!” she exclaimed and rushed to embrace him. He was sitting at the table eating breakfast and looking better than ever. He stood, and as she wrapped her arms around him, she felt his arms gingerly return the embrace, and they stood that way for a long while.
When they parted, Naem spoke, “You’re looking good.”
“Me, you’re the one who almost died!”
“Yeah, well, you did all the work to get me here and probably needed that rest more than I did.”
Well, she had done all the work. Points to Naem for recognizing that.
“How long have you been up?”
“Not long, maybe an hour before you. Though I admit I received a rather peculiar shock when I opened my eyes and realized I was surrounded by these guys.” He indicated the Bright Fae. “They looked like angels. I thought I had died and gone to heaven.”
Jak laughed. The thought of angels reminded her of something she had seen when Yewin had connected with her. But now as she thought of it, she couldn’t remember what it was. In fact, she could hardly remember anything that she saw last night.
“Dig in!” Naem said, indicating the food. There was a large bowl of soup and some potatoes. Jak did not need telling twice. She loaded up a bowl and tore into the food like no one was watching.
They sat in silence at the table, the only sounds were of Jak and Naem enjoying their food. The Bright Fae said nothing yet, but Jak could tell they were anxious. They were patiently waiting a turn to speak.
Eventually, Naem broke the silence. “We need to talk about what happened last night.”
Jak didn’t really want to discuss it. Just thinking about it made her head hurt. But she couldn’t deny Naem this. “Okay, what do you want to know?”
Naem lifted his sleeve to reveal the two extra brands located there. “As far as I know, I haven’t transformed into a demon. And they’re working too. I can feel the Healing brand making me stronger by the hour. How did you do it, Jak?”
Jak honestly did not know. It had seemed clear at the time, but now, thinking back to that moment, it was like trying to remember a star that you wished on as a child.
“She looked into Truth, and found the answer there.” Yewin spoke from his chair in a corner. “But even we are not sure how it was done. One of our number was a Gifter before our transformation, and she cannot say why it worked. Almost everything has been tried to imprint more than a single brand on an object, but with no results. What you did, should not have been possible.
Jak shook her head. “I knew so much when we were connected, but I can’t remember any of it. Just a few images and impressions.”
“It is as we suspected,” continued Yewin. “There is something unique about you.”
“Oh, there’s nothing special about me. I’m sure any Gifter could have done the same while connected to you.”
“Perhaps, but perhaps not.”
“If you wanted to connect with me again, maybe I could find the answer.” She offered.
“I’m afraid that won’t be possible.” He shook his head. “The act of connecting with you nearly killed me. It drained me of all energy. A second attempt surely would kill me, and I don’t think my comrades are particularly eager to try.”
Jak nodded, but she would have to find a way to make that connection again. Someday. There was too much knowledge there for her to pass up. And if she could somehow discover how she had added multiple brands to Naem’s arm, it would revolutionize the entire Kingdom. It would allow for the development of super soldiers that would change everything about warfare, regulations would likely come to keep people from becoming too powerful, it could spark revolutions.
Relics, but she needed her journal right now. She wondered where it was. Had someone kept it for her, or had Kuldain simply tossed it away. That thought made her shiver.
Yewin continued speaking, “But all of us are curious to know what your story is. Just who exactly have we invited into our...temporary living quarters.” He indicated the abandoned cottage.
Jak nodded and began to tell the Bright Fae everything. The Fae gathered around, listening intently to every word. She started at the beginning, with the demon attack on Riverbrook. Naem would occasionally chime in with an added detail, or to tell his side of the story for when Jak had been lost in the mountains. But he also listened very carefully when Jak described her time in the caves. That part seemed to interest everyone more than the rest. The Bright Fae asked countless questions about their cousins in the mountains. Jak shared all she had learned, about the copy of the Annals of Adam that the Shadow Fae had found, how it had changed them into what they were. This seemed to interest Yewin, who informed her that there was no such Relic that had changed them. Their transformation had been spontaneous and recent.
“So Kuldain took my mother and one of the other Shadow Fae and killed the rest. Naem and I managed to escape and came down the mountain as fast as we could looking for help. And that’s when I found you,” she said to Yewin. “You know the rest.”
“So this band of Watchers, they should be arriving here soon, yes?”
“They probably have another day’s march at least,” said Naem. “But yes, they’ll be here soon.”
Several of the Fae frowned and glanced at each other. Jak saw their discomfort but asked, “We will need to find a way to free my mother and Vander once they arrive. Anything you can do to help would be wonderful.”
The Fae stirred, and Yewin paused for an uncomfortable silence. “We do not trust your Colonel Kuldain. We have had dealings with him before. If he even knew we were here, he would hunt us down and kill us.”
“What exactly happened between you and him?” Naem asked. “We’ve heard his story. He claims that he found you in an abandoned town, that you had killed everyone there. And that you nearly killed him and all his men.”
Yewin chuckled solemnly. “Well the town was certainly abandoned by humans, because we had all become Fae. The entire town changed, hundreds of us. When Kuldain and his men arrived, he accused us of murdering the villagers. He did not understand that we were the villagers. Somehow he convinced his men to attack us, claiming that we were demons.”
Naem nodded. “He gave the same speech to all of us.”
“Yes, well we fought back, but there wasn’t much we could do. Most of us...died on their spears.” Jak saw the anguish on his face, and a silver tear began dropping down his lightened face.
But he continued. “The twelve of us were the only ones to escape. We were spared by a few of the Watchers who felt guilty about the slaughter. I guess when we couldn’t fight back, many of them questioned Kuldain’s insistence that we were demons.”
Something didn’t add up for Jak. “But then, how did his men die, if you didn’t kill them?”
“I do not know. Kuldain is hiding something. But what? Who can say. There is a lot we don’t understand. And now with a demon army on the horizon.”
“Wait, what?” Jak and Naem said together.
“Ah yes, I forgot that we haven’t told you that yet. We thought it best not to disturb you further after everything that happened last night. Yes, there’s an army of demons waiting just a few miles outside of the stronghold.”
“But demons don’t have armies, they travel in small packs, like wolves,” Naem countered. “I’m not even sure there are enough of them to make a whole army.”
“As for that, we are convinced that someone has intentionally been building an army for years, possibly decades. There have always been reports of people going missing, but in small enough quantities that the queen and her Lords don’t take notice. Travelers, beggars, people most others don’t miss.”
“It’s not safe outside of our cities, people know that,” Jak countered, though the words felt hollow to her.
“I’m from the other side of the mountains,” another of the Bright Fae spoke up, one that Jak hadn’t heard speak before. He did indeed have an accent Jak had never heard before. His vowels were longer. Jak would have to talk to him later, once she got her journal back, and record what he knew. “And yes, people still go missing there too, but with far less frequency than I see here. It seems the most dangerous profession a man can have is to be a beggar. They, especially, disappear without notice and most do not care because they had no attachments to him.”
If someone was forming an army, then who? Immediately, Kuldain’s face floated in her memory. It might explain some things about his story, such as the disappearance of his band in the north. But even he wouldn’t be that evil, would he? And besides, he wasn’t a Gifter, so how could he create a demon army? At least, not on his own.
Thoughts of a rogue Gifter brought up another image for Jak. What had ever happened to Gabriel, the Gifter that had given Jak her brand. He had disappeared after the demon attack, and Jak hadn’t heard anything about him since. Could he be behind all of this?
“But we’ll achieve nothing in speculation,” Yewin brought the conversation around. “The point is, there is a demon army at our doorstep, and we have no way of fighting them. Our powers do not give us any advantage over them.”
A thought occurred to Jak, but she tucked it away for a later time. “I want to see it,” she said instead. “It’s not that I doubt you, but I want to see with my own eyes what we’re up against.”
Yewin nodded. He glanced at one of the other Fae, the one with the accent. “Urial, take her with you.” Then glancing back at Jak, he added, “Your armor was cleaned and stored beside your bed.”
The Fae, Urial, waved Jak along. Jak finished her breakfast hastily, then rose, found her armor, and was ready to go within minutes. Naem also wanted to go, but when he rose, he winced in pain. The cut on his leg had mostly healed, but he still needed rest. On Jak’s insistence, he agreed to stay.
Jak walked with Urial for several minutes without talking. She enjoyed walking along the foothills, able to see for miles down the plains, though she still couldn’t make out any army. Finally she decided to break the ice with Urial. “So, what’s it like beyond the mountains? I’ve only heard rumors of the people there.”
“It is very different,” he said. “We do not have a queen as you do. We have judges, rulers who meet together to decide the fate of the land. No one person can be trusted with so much power.”
“So why did you come here, to our country?”
“I was curious. I had heard of people in this place who had strange powers we did not know of.”
“Wait, your people don’t have brands?”
“We did not, until recently, when trade opened between our peoples. That is how I arrived, with the caravan. But I ran away from my people in search of adventure.” He said it with some sadness. “I think I would have been better off to stay. Most of your people didn’t trust my kind anyway. We’re too different. In culture and appearance.”
“Why would that matter?” Jak asked. “That has nothing to do with how dangerous you are.”
“In my experience, most people are not as perceiving as you. They see one thing they don’t understand, and they fear it, naturally associating that fear with other fears. Now that I have become one of the Fae, it seems people fear me even more.”
“I hope we can change that. I promised my mother that I would do everything I could to find acceptance for them among my people.”
Urial smiled at her. “I am glad to see that not everyone shares the same primal fears.”
“I mean, I was scared at first, but that was before I understood more about you. That’s all I need to do, I just need to help the others learn, to show them that you’re here to help, not to harm. Because that’s what helped me.”
“I pray it is
that simple.”
At that moment, as they crested a hill, Urial ducked down low. Jak followed suit. He said nothing more but pointed ahead. Jak crawled forward, following the direction he indicated, until she saw it ahead in a nook created by two foothills coming together.
A demon army.
It was like nothing she had ever seen before. Her last encounters with the demons had been in relatively small packs, no more than a few dozen. But there must have been hundreds, perhaps thousands of demons in the field in front of her. She watched them carefully. Thankfully, none of them had seen her or Urial, who was inching backwards to keep his glow from being seen. As Jak watched, she noticed that none of the demons seemed to be moving, or at least, not like she was used to seeing. They crouched on all fours, and their heads moved, violently back and forth, but their bodies were still as statues. What an odd sight. It was as though something was actively keeping them from rushing forward.
Jak watched for a while, taking in the numbers and this new behavior from demons. Of one thing she was sure, her people thought they knew about demons, but now she realized that they didn’t know anything.
Finally, she crawled backwards down the hill until she met up with Urial, and the two began to make their way back to the cottage.
“They’re waiting for something,” Jak said once they were far enough away. “They’re just standing there.”
“Yes, that was our assessment as well. But we do not know what they are waiting for. If they had attacked when they first arrived, it would not have given the farmers and soldiers time to barricade themselves in the fortress.”
“Did the army arrive before or after you did?”
“Before. We saw them on our way here, and went to the stronghold to see if we could help. But they assumed we were somehow connected, possibly leading the demon army, and they nearly killed us when we approached. We haven’t tried to contact them since.”
Out of Shadow: An Epic YA Fantasy Adventure (Roots of Creation Book 1) Page 16