Bladesorrow (The Agarsfar Saga Book 1)

by D. T. Kane

  “I must act on this information. If Val... Valdin is indeed the Grand Father, the Grand Master Keeper is no longer safe here. I had hoped we had longer, but this forces my hand. I must go prepare the place for him to hide while I search for a way to help him. Figure this all out.”

  Nellis looked up at him. “If the Grand Father is like ye, and he’s against us, Taul may not be safe anywhere.”

  Devan wished he could oppose that statement. But even he couldn’t muster the fortitude to lie to the dwarf about that. Val was formidable, even if he didn’t possess his full powers.

  “Won’t teh others help?” Nellis asked.

  “Others?”

  “The rest o’ the Angels. Seems serious enough teh warrant their aid.”

  Again, Devan didn’t have a good response.

  “It’s not quite that simple, master dwarf. For now, at least, I’m all the help you’ll be getting.”

  Nellis made as if to say more, then seemed to decide he might not like the answers Devan would have. He shut his mouth. Devan spoke quickly before the dwarf changed his mind.

  “I need you to give the Grand Master something for me.” He returned to his bag and withdrew a dagger, a smaller twin to the ebon blade he’d given Bladesorrow earlier, yet somehow different. Nellis reached out to take the weapon, but recoiled before he touched it, as if burned.

  “It’s a Link,” he murmured. “A shadow Link.”

  “Indeed,” Devan replied. “As I said. We must help him however we can.”

  Nellis eyed the dagger, dry washing his hands for a moment, before taking it. He cradled it like a newborn for a time before sliding it into is belt.

  “Ye show great trust giving this to me, Aldur Devan. There be some who’d kill to possess an item of such pow’r.”

  “Well, it’s not like you can hide from one such as I.”

  This brought a smile to the dwarf’s face. “I will give it to ’im. Will do all in me power to help ’im, even forego such a treasure as this.”

  Devan smiled at the dwarf, clapped him on the shoulder.

  “These are dark times, master dwarf. But at least you too live up to historical expectations.”

  Devan peregrinated before the dwarf could answer, leaving Nellis to ponder the enormity of what he’d just learned.

  21

  Valdin

  The Shades, they come to getcha

  At night’s fall, creeping in the dark

  The Seven come you betcha

  Take children Elsewhere, snuff their spark

  -Old Agarian Folk Song

  VALDIN STOOPED OVER the gasping form of the shadow-attuned boy, hand over the wound that Raldon’s deflected hex had torn in his neck. Warm blood coated his palm as he reached out to the four elements he could still reach. For an instant, the possibility of healing the child crossed his mind.

  He discarded the idea. Though Valdin wished the lad no particular ill, he was already beyond saving. And Valdin had a far more important use for the lad’s dying breaths.

  Valdin shaped his channel of four elements into a hook that latched to the essence of the boy’s shadow attunement. The edges of the gash at the child’s neck began to glow an opalescent violet.

  For several moments Valdin thought it was working. After so many failed attempts over the past fifteen years, his powers were about to be restored. His elemental hook was catching, shadow power trickling up his arm. It tickled a long-dormant sense in his mind, like the phantom twitching of a severed limb.

  Then a rattle issued from the boy’s chest. He convulsed once, back arching, then was still. The sense of power was immediately gone. Like a snapped branch, Valdin was cut off.

  He let out a grunt, part frustration, part rage. Then he willed the elements deeper into the boy. The body flopped like a fish on land, a bony wrist flailing, cracking onto the floorboards. Nothing more came.

  “Gah!”

  He released his channel, becoming aware of his surroundings for the first time since he’d reached into the boy. A low, sobbing whimper came from the study’s corner. One of the room’s many shelves had snapped and an array of tomes lay scattered about, open to various pages. Amongst them the other child was crouched, tear-streaked eyes staring at the boy’s still form. Her brother, Valdin supposed. He’d never really thought about it before. He reached to her, intending to offer what little comfort he could, but she cowered back, burying her face in her hands. Surprise quickly turned to realization. Her sibling’s blood dripping from his hand was likely a strong deterrent to coming anywhere near him.

  Grimacing, Valdin rose from where he still crouched over the corpse, knees popping. He’d never imagined aging would be so painful. Or inconvenient. He shook his hand, blood splattering the floor beside Raldon’s body. His eyes were glossed over, staring into oblivion.

  Mouth tightening, Valdin considered the body for some time before sighing and stooping once more to close the eyelids. A quick glance around the room told him he’d nothing to cover either body.

  This had not been his intent. When he’d taken control of the Senate after Riverdale, sending Raldon as far away as possible had been necessary. He’d known too much and suspected more.

  But Valdin had been sure that once he’d told Raldon of Stephan’s dying command that even he would have understood. Valdin’s true reason for coming all this was to Ral Mok was not a senseless shadow hunt driven by the Temple’s narrow-mindedness. He didn’t care about hunting shadow attuneds generally. Just one in particular.

  A powerful shadow attuned in the South during Constant Bladesorrow’s time will be the Aldur’s downfall if not stopped. That had been Stephan Falconwing’s dying command, part of it, anyway, spoken has he’d died in Valdin’s arms.

  Valdin would never have imagined himself the sole witness of Falconwing’s dying moments. To say he’d detested Stephan in life would have been an understatement. Stephan had been so obsessed with his need to protect the Path he’d ordered the death of an innocent for a crime she hadn’t committed. He had been the driving force behind Valdin’s acts at Riverdale, his plan to annihilate Taul Bladesorrow, create a new Path where she need not die.

  But Falconwing had been their leader, and despite the fantasies Valdin had entertained in the months after his love’s execution—of submitting Falconwing to the slowest and most painful of deaths—watching him die had held no joy. In fact, once he’d realized what was happening, Valdin had tried to heal Stephan, though it’d been far too late by that point. Gasping his final breaths in Valdin’s arms, Stephan had delivered his final order. It had driven Valdin ever since, despite everything he’d done to set the Path astray. The image of Stephan and the rest of his people dead on the Conclave floor still haunted his dreams. He had to stop it.

  Of course, just minutes after receiving Stephan’s last testament, Valdin’s ability to search for the shadow attuned who threatened the Aldur’s existence had become unconscionably difficult. Devan, Path’s flame take him, had robbed him of his shadow power, and with it his ability to peregrinate. His once-friend had robbed him of both his love and his very identity as an Aldur.

  So Valdin had done what little he could without his true power, drafted the Edicts to aid in his hunt for the shadow attuned Stephan had foretold. Blocked off the North so whoever it was couldn’t escape that way. Then he’d begun rounding them up, killing any who showed even average affinity for the fifth element. But despite all the time and effort, he’d never found one who seemed threat enough to match Stephan’s dying words. That is, until he’d found Ferrin.

  He’d explained all this to Raldon. Well most of it. Stephan had always spoken highly of Raldon, though Valdin had never been clear why. Regardless, Valdin had been certain Raldon would understand.

  But if anything, Raldon had become even less compliant after hearing Valdin’s explanation, as if Ral Mok’s master had known something that made Valdin’s explanation ring untrue. And now he saw why, after what the elemental seer had revealed of the boy
. This Ferrin. He was the one Stephan had spoken of, no doubt. Raldon must have known it. And not only known, but thought he could protect the boy. Fool. Raldon had been strong, no question. Nearly as strong as some Aldur. But still no match for Valdin.

  The traveling portal crafted from shadow had been a surprise. Valdin’s sniffers—the two shadow children—had discovered that almost as soon as they’d entered the study for the first time. It’d been his one mistake, not factoring the portal into his plans. But traveling portals were difficult even for Aldur to make. Devan was the only one he’d ever seen create a portal. Valdin had just written it off as some artifact of the past, doubted Raldon even knew of it. Imagine his surprise when the boy, Ferrin, had not only been able to use it to escape, but taken Raldon’s daughter with him.

  It mattered little, though. The portal exited into Falume—the now-dead shadow boy had been able to tell him that. He’d have Ferrin and Jenzara recaptured soon enough.

  “Valdin.”

  A man’s voice, placid as a lake on a calm day. It radiated dread through every particle of him, his loins turning to water, knees quaking.

  It came from the girl, face spotted with her dead brother’s blood, streaked with tears. But her expression was relaxed, black eyes studying him with a shrewdness impossible for one of so few years.

  “Too. Long.” These words also came from the girl’s mouth, but in a different voice. The rasp of an unstable man who’d dragged too long on a pipe, utterly distinct from the calm voice that had spoken his name. Valdin drew himself up, seeking some semblance of confidence.

  “Too long,” the second voice repeated, this time with more fluidity, as if it were rediscovering how to speak after a long time of silence. “What of the note? Did it lead to what we seek?”

  Panic washed over Valdin like a plague. What we seek? Had they found out? Somehow discovered Stephan’s last words? That he wasn’t truly trying to help them?

  He steadied himself on the edge of Raldon’s desk. No. They couldn’t know—he’d never spoken the secret aloud. Too dangerous. They just thought him a lost soul bent on revenge, ready to obtain it no matter the cost. That had certainly been the truth at one point, before he’d watched his fellow Aldur die, helpless to stop it.

  “The note,” he muttered, stalling for something more useful to say. With all the events of that morning it’d all but slipped his mind.

  It was incredible he was here at all. He could still hardly believe the circumstances that had led him to travel to this backwater. Ral Mok’s Master at Elements showing up to Tragnè City unannounced, claiming to have been invited to a conference at the Temple. That was preposterous, of course. The Temple would never invite an individual from outside the Parentage to anything.

  Even more preposterous had been the note Valdin had received the same day the Master at Elements had shown up. He still kept it with him, determined to discover who had sent the thing. He removed it from a pocket in his robes and unfolded the now well-creased parchment, reading it once more.

  The Master at Elements possesses the answers you seek.

  All you must do is ask the right questions.

  Surely you can handle that?

  That was all. No salutation, no signature. Just those twenty-three words, written in a flowing, but hurried hand that somehow seemed familiar in a way he couldn’t quite place. The final line taunted him from the page. He’d read the note dozens of times and still his blood heated when he read the words.

  When he’d first received it, he’d irrationally thought it was from Devan. But that was impossible. His once-friend must be dead—otherwise, he’d have tried to stop what Valdin had done to Taul Bladesorrow. And if Devan had done that, without knowledge of the deal Valdin had made with the monsters now speaking through the shadow girl, the Path would already have fallen into chaos.

  Yet, whoever had written the note had been right. The Master at Elements, Robertin Windstorm, had babbled on and on about a shadow attuned Raldon was harboring. Valdin had interrogated the man for hours, submitting him to certain... techniques under which no man could lie. And once Valdin was satisfied that he’d wrung every last stone of information from the man, he’d immediately assembled a covenant of Parents and set out for Ral Mok. And he’d found this Ferrin. The one of whom Stephan had warned, and also strong enough in the shadow for the dark ritual Valdin would use to regain his power.

  “Well?” Now a petulant woman spoke from the girl’s mouth. Valdin started, nearly having forgotten the vile presence of the things inhabiting the girl’s body. “Were you led to one ripe for harvest? Are you finally ready to remedy the mess you’ve made of our release from bondage?”

  “I’ve told you before,” he growled. “I did it all right. You must have—”

  A coil of icy darkness suddenly snaked about his neck like a noose, cutting off all breath. He grasped at the maleficium, trying to claw his fingers beneath it. Immediately he pulled them away in shock, fingertips burning.

  “He’s regained nothing,” said the girl in a mellifluous tenor of ambiguous gender. A sound like corpses dragged across a rock-strewn road. “The fallen Angel can’t even sense the strength of this shadow channel.”

  A giggle emanated from the girl’s mouth. Never had a titter of laughter sounded so evil. Gasping for even the suggestion of breath, Valdin managed to choke out a few words.

  “I found him... Just need... Your agents.”

  The girl studied him with the cold neutrality of a farmer choosing the next hog for slaughter. Blood trickled from one of her nostrils, but she gave no sign of notice. Then the binding about his neck was gone, the sudden intake of air suffocating. Valdin dropped to all fours.

  “Ooohhh,” chirruped a fifth voice from the girl. “Do you need us to help you?”

  The enchantment in the tone slid over his brain like a thick liquor. The space between his legs tightened with desire. But he knew succumbing would bring anything but pleasure. They often tested him this way.

  Taking a deep breath, he pushed himself to a kneeling position. Beg if you must, but never grovel. One of Stephan’s many phrases.

  “There was a boy,” he said as soon as he had the breath. “Stronger in the shadow than any we’ve seen since my search began. Perhaps than I’ve ever seen.”

  “Where is he?” This the lecturing tone of a mature woman.

  Valdin gulped.

  “He escaped. But only to the Woods of Falume. Just send some of your...” His voice broke and he swallowed back bile. Even after having gone so far down this path, he had trouble asking for their help. “Your minions. Bring him back to me.”

  “You give no orders here.” This seventh voice was a basso so low it seemed to shake the earth. “You gave us a taste of freedom at Riverdale, only to shackle us in the dark, confined to a worthless Linear body. And now you presume to give us orders?”

  Valdin thought his very soul trembled.

  “It is necessary,” he stammered. “I need him, this boy Ferrin, to restore my power. And you need my power if I’m to remedy what went wrong at the Dales.”

  For several heartbeats he fully expected the noose of shade to materialize about his neck once more, and this time not let go until he was dead as Raldon.

  “We’ll supply the help you require, Valdin.” This was the first voice again. The stoic, all-knowing elder. That it hadn’t pronounced his death sentence ought to have calmed him. Instead, it twisted barbed wire about Valdin’s heart, drove needles into his veins.

  “You have, after all, rid us of this.” The girl prodded Raldon’s corpse with a filthy, bare foot. Her lips curled liked a bloody fishhook. “A not insignificant service to us.”

  Valdin gave a curt nod and was ashamed at the sense of pride that welled in him to have pleased this monstrosity.

  “But you’ll do well to remember that it was you who came to us, begging for help. Pleading to break the Path’s cruel repetition.”

  The girl stared at him with eyes embodying the very
distillation of fear. He bowed his head, nodding. For now, he needed them. Every day he moved further from Riverdale, the more it seemed releasing them had been a mistake. But he needed his full power to entrap them again. And to regain his power, he needed them.

  “Yes, Messorem.” When he’d first asked their names, that had been the only one supplied. Perhaps the only one that remained. Stephan had gone to great lengths to wipe all trace of the others from the Path.

  “Let us hope you’re right about this boy. So you can begin your true work for us.”

  The shadow girl’s warped smile shown a moment longer, then her eyes rolled back in her head and she collapsed to the floor. Her chest still rose and fell. Valdin felt relief, though the feeling quickly turned to disgust when he realized it was because he needed her to hunt the boy, not from any true concern for her wellbeing. Rocky paths covered in scorpions! He wasn’t any better than the monsters who’d just spoken through the girl.

  The girl.

  A fear he didn’t understand yanked at his heart like a dulcimer’s broken string. He’d said nothing of Raldon’s girl to them. And she’d be with Ferrin when their... things came for him. The image of her eyes gazing at the stars in the chapel would be forever pressed into his mind. And now it was likely he’d sent her to her doom.

  Stop that, old fool. He’d no use for such sentiments now. Any capacity he’d once had for affection had long since been stolen from him. He stomped to the desk, leaving the shadow girl shaking on the floor, curled beside her brother’s dead form. The chair was hard as stone and twice as uncomfortable. The tightness in his chest didn’t dissipate.

  Why hadn’t his plan at Riverdale worked? He’d done everything needed to release them, including killing Bladesorrow. The Path ought to be forging in a new direction now without one of its Constants, or at least falling into chaos. But neither seemed to be happening. True, the peace at Riverdale had failed, North and South remained at war. And there was the ever-reddening sky. It was said the fires of the Path had shown in the heavens during the Great Chaos, the Aldur’s civil war, when time itself had nearly ended. Valdin had hoped it was a sign that his plan was working. But nothing else seemed to have changed.