The Shadow Wand

by Laurie Forest

  Vothe’s black eyes fly open and spark with lightning.

  He’s got fire, this Mage. And water. Practically a whole tumultuous ocean of it—a veritable storm locked inside this Level Five grandson of the Black Witch, threatening to come unleashed.

  Vothe falls into step behind Trystan Gardner, his resolve solidifying as he catches the incensed looks of his fellow military apprentices lined up on either side of the path. He sends them back a reassuringly savage look of his own.

  He’s as dangerous as he is beautiful, this Trystan Gardner.

  And Vothendrile is determined to drive him out of the Wyvernguard.

  * * *

  Trystan Gardner meets Ung Li’s gaze unflinchingly as she stares him down in her circular command chamber, her hands splayed on the obsidian desk before her, Trystan’s subversive will to be here as entrenched as her will to see him gone.

  Go ahead, Trystan silently conveys to her, his gaze unyielding. Do your best to get rid of me. I’m staying, and I’m fighting with you.

  Slim onyx carvings of dragons bracket the huge windows at Ung Li’s back. The arching glass offers a panoramic view of the broad Vo River, the glittering city of Voloi visible to the northeast and the dark Vo Mountain Range hulking against the river’s western bank. Everything in the room is fashioned in the Wyvernguard’s signature colors—sapphire, onyx, and bone.

  “A guard will accompany you wherever you go,” Ung Li informs Trystan as her dark gaze bores into him. Four black-clad Vu Trin soldiers bracket Ung Li and carefully study Trystan with hard-edged glares that mirror Ung Li’s own.

  A few additional Vu Trin apprentices have fanned out behind Trystan. He can sense their incendiary glares burning into him.

  “Am I under arrest?” Trystan calmly asks Ung Li, unable to keep a trace of sarcasm from his tone. Bordering dangerously on insubordination.

  Trystan immediately regrets the slip as Ung Li’s eyes sharpen on him, as if she’s sizing him up more closely only to find her worst suspicions confirmed.

  Trystan holds her intimidating stare. It’s clear that the Wyvernguard hierarchy and the Vu Trin apprentices don’t want him here. Clear that he’s here only because Vang Troi, the Vu Trin’s brilliant and unpredictable High Commander, has ordered that he be allowed admittance into the Wyvernguard and given a chance to prove himself.

  “You’re a Level Five Mage,” Ung Li answers, her tone low and simmering with animosity, her dark gaze unblinking. “You’re also the grandson of the Vuulnor. And the threat of war between our people is in the air. If you wish to be a Vu Trin, Trystan Gardner, you will have a guard everywhere you go.” Her gaze turns combative as she thrusts out her palm. “Hand over your wand.”

  Trystan’s whole body goes taut, his water power caught up in a roiling current as Ung Li keeps her hand doggedly extended.

  Invisible lightning spits through his lines as Trystan reaches down, unsheathes his wand, and surrenders it to the commander, feeling the lack of it acutely the moment the wand leaves his hand.

  Suddenly, he’s feeling the absence of Tierney Calix even more intensely than the loss of his wand, and wishing she were assigned to be here with him on the North Twin Island. He’s grown close to Elloren’s cynical Asrai-Fae friend these past few weeks as they traveled east together. But Tierney’s been assigned to the Wyvernguard’s South Twin Island, the two of them cast into confusion by their abrupt separation this evening.

  Tierney protested vehemently, clearly sensing, as Trystan did, an ulterior motive at play, but Ung Li was unmoved, tersely informing them both that Tierney was to join the Fae Vu Trin apprentices stationed on the Wyvernguard’s South Twin Island, where all the Fae divisions are located, while Trystan took his place on the Wyvernguard’s North Twin Island.

  Ensuring Trystan’s complete isolation.

  A test, Trystan supposes with bone-deep cynicism, to see exactly how much the grandson of the Black Witch can take.

  Trystan’s chest tightens with apprehension, but he tamps down the useless pining for friends, for family. Even though he’s a renegade, he knew there would be no open-armed embrace here for the grandson of the Vuulnor.

  His brother, Rafe, has fared much better, becoming Lupine during the first full moon on their journey east and casting off his Gardnerian heritage, his fierce amber eyes indisputable proof of his new allegiance. And Tierney was instantly embraced by the Vu Trin, as well—all the Fae Vu Trin military apprentices have been welcomed, their fierce loyalty to the Vu Trin unquestioned.

  The Vu Trin hierarchy had initially assumed that Trystan would be eager to relinquish the echo of Black Witch power in his lines and would become Lupine during that first full moon under their protection.

  They assumed wrong.

  Trystan’s storming, elemental power has become an intimately valued part of himself, vital as the blood that runs through his veins.

  Now the Vu Trin seem unprepared to be faced with a Black Witch descendant with overwhelming fire and water magic who has no intention of being anything other than what he is—a powerful Level Five Mage.

  Trystan stands there, unmoved, as Ung Li’s formidable gaze sears into him.

  “Vothendrile Xanthile has been assigned to guard you,” Ung Li finally says, a sly look that raises Trystan’s hackles slinking across her expression.

  One of the Vu Trin apprentices behind Trystan strides into view.

  Trystan’s breath hitches, all his storming thoughts flying right out of his head as he’s faced with the most dazzlingly beautiful young man he’s ever seen.

  The tall, dark-eyed apprentice’s stance is regally assured, his sapphire Vu Trin apprentice uniform perfectly tailored to accentuate his muscular frame, the image of Vo, the starlight dragon goddess of the Noi people, emblazoned on his broad chest. He has the sculpted features and dark eyes of the Noi, his black hair short and slightly spiked, but the spikes are resplendently tipped in glittering silver, and a series of silver hoops rim his pointed ears.

  And there are thin threads of lightning crackling all over his midnight-black skin.

  Actual lightning.

  Trystan meets Vothendrile’s dark gaze and their powers collide, a flash of energy coursing through Trystan’s firelines, his invisible lightning striking out in response to the palpable storm power that lives inside the young man before him.

  That’s in his gaze.

  And...Vothendrile’s pupils are vertically slitted. Dragon-shifter slitted.

  He must be a Zhilon’ile Wyvern, Trystan dazedly realizes, having read about them. A Storm Wyvern of the Eastern Realm, his people’s domain to the far northeast of here. The Wyvern shifters who, along with some scattered Fae, control the weather in these lands. Who used to control the weather in all lands.

  Before the Black Witch drove them out of the Western Realm.

  Vothendrile’s lips lift in a slight, hostile sneer as lightning flashes between them and Trystan snaps fully back to the situation he’s in.

  One of the reviled.

  Trystan urgently presses down his completely unnerving attraction to Vothendrile Xanthile and holds the Wyvern’s overpowering stare, the shifter’s lightning now spitting through Trystan’s lines in what feels like a purposefully stinging rush.

  The ache that rises simply galvanizes Trystan’s resolve.

  Go ahead and try to drive me out. Trystan glowers at Vothe. So I’m reviled here. So be it. I was reviled there too. But I’m staying. And I’m going to fight the Gardnerians alongside all of you, whether you like it or not.

  “Vothendrile will show you to your barracks,” Ung Li informs Trystan, cutting into their staring contest.

  Trystan staunchly salutes Ung Li, slamming his fist against his heart, as is their way here, as he meets the commander’s withering stare. “Hoiyon, Nor Ung Li.” There’s renewed challenge in Trystan’s emphatic falling in with their
protocol and in his pointed use of their language.

  Ung Li is unmoved. She knifes another glare at Trystan, then sets her fierce gaze on Vothendrile and flicks her finger toward the door, as if wanting, more than anything, to be completely rid of Trystan Gardner.

  * * *

  Vothendrile Xanthile keeps smart pace with Trystan Gardner, their boot heels echoing over the stone floor of the hallway that bores straight through the Wyvernguard’s North Twin Island mountain, circular dragon emblems marked on its surface. Black dragon carvings mark the ceiling above them, carved into the obsidian stone in bas-relief, their huge reptilian forms washed in guttering blue light that emanates from rune torches affixed to the walls.

  Vothe takes in the surreptitious, encouraging stares being sent to him by every Vu Trin apprentice and soldier they pass, their expressions conveying unspoken solidarity—Drive him out.

  “So, I have a guard,” Trystan Gardner says, his words edged with the slimmest trace of derision.

  Vothendrile swivels his head toward the Gardnerian and is met by a quick glare, the air charged between them.

  A crackle of lightning sparks through Vothe. “Of course you have a guard,” Vothe shoots back, suppressing a snarl. “I’ll guard you throughout the day and you’ll have another guard stationed at your barracks through the night.” Truly, Vothe is amazed by the contempt radiating off of this Mage. And his sheer audacity in questioning the need for a guard.

  Really, how dare he? After shouldering his way in here. The grandson of the Black Witch, of all people. Here, at the esteemed Wyvernguard. Despite the protests. Despite the petition Vothe quickly organized and sent to both the Vu Trin Tribunal and the Noi Conclave. All of it ignored by High Commander Vang Troi, their highest-ranking military sorceress.

  Even though close to no one wants the grandson of the Black Witch here.

  “You’ll shadow me, then, everywhere I go?” the Mage asks coldly as they walk.

  Vothe smiles charmingly at him, even as lightning spits in his vision. “I will, Gardnerian. And if you stray one inch from the orders set down by the Wyvernguard and Ung Li, I will drag you to the Vu Trin Tribunal by the scruff of your refined Gardnerian neck.”

  Trystan Gardner smirks at this as they both slow to a stop, a spike of hard anger flaring in the Gardnerian’s eyes as he faces Vothe, and Vothe is instantly taken aback by the sudden sense of this Mage’s water power swelling, fierce and implacable.

  Trystan looks Vothe up and down, and there’s a flash of the Mage’s own lightning in that look. “You could try,” he counters, lip lifting.

  Oh, that’s rich. Vothe grins at him with cool amusement as he lets his gleaming black horns spiral up from his head. “Did they tell you who I am?” he purrs.

  “I’m guessing a Zhilon’ile Wyvern-shifter of the Eastern dragonkin,” Trystan states with matter-of-fact severity. “Quite powerful, I’d wager.”

  “That’s right, Trystan Gardner, and don’t you forget it,” Vothe croons, leaning in, filled with the sudden urge to release his wings in a potent display. “I’m clear that you’re a Level Five Mage. Of extraordinary power. Growing power. But don’t think for a second that I can’t best you.”

  Again, the Gardnerian dons that look of icy contempt with a blistering defiance riding just underneath it. Trystan’s lip lifts in another slight, frigid smirk. “I’d never presume to have anything but the utmost confidence in my new guard, Vothendrile.”

  Vothe narrows his lightning eyes on Trystan as the Mage resumes his pace and Vothe falls in beside him.

  My, this one keeps himself carefully under wraps, Vothe seethes as he pulls his horns back in. The sense of being faced with something completely unexpected settles over Vothe, and he’s disturbed by it.

  He’s going to have to keep a closer eye on Trystan Gardner than he thought. It’s clear that Mage Gardner answers to no one but himself, no matter how insistent the threats leveled against him. No, he’s not easily intimidated, this one.

  I’ll just have to try harder.

  “You’re not wanted here,” Vothe informs him with open venom.

  Again, that wry smirk. “I’m well aware,” Trystan replies. “But I am here, and I’m not going anywhere, so you’d best get used to me.”

  Vothe can’t keep the caustic sarcasm out of his own tone and doesn’t want to. “So, you want to be somewhere where everyone hates you?”

  Trystan’s face remains calm, but fire flashes in his eyes as he slows once more to a stop to face Vothe.

  When it comes, Trystan Gardner’s voice is controlled, almost polite, but Vothe can sense the guttering flame riding through it. “I want to be somewhere where I can join an army and fight the Gardnerians and the Alfsigr and every last one of their allies with every last shred of power in me.” Trystan takes a confrontational step toward Vothe. “I don’t care if you hate me. I don’t care if every last person in the Wyvernguard hates me. You have no idea what you’re up against.”

  The Mage turns and begins walking again at a faster clip, as if he can’t wait to be rid of Vothe so he can get settled here and get on with it, and Vothe has, in that moment, a disturbing sense of the true, unbreachable, single-minded purpose in this Gardnerian.

  As they ascend a large, spiraling staircase, an unpleasant edge of conflict roils in Vothendrile because the flow of this Crow’s power and the emotions he can scent on him are not at odds with his words.

  What if he’s telling the truth?

  “You expect me to believe that the grandson of the Black Witch is honestly on our side?” Vothe snipes at Trystan Gardner’s back as they stomp up the steps.

  Trystan briefly turns, his expression hard. “I really don’t care what you think, Vothendrile.”

  They step off the staircase and start down another shadowy, arcing hallway, and Vothendrile takes the lead, both of them seemingly lost now in private, heated fuming.

  Vothendrile counts down the barracks-door numbers, growing increasingly suspicious. His lightning gives a chaotic flare as they turn the corner and he realizes what Ung Li has done.

  Trystan freezes at his side.

  Sylla the Death Fae stands before them, her petite, dark figure surrounded by thick, gauzy spiderwebs that course over the walls, ceiling, and floor of the hallway’s end like an impenetrable tunnel. She’s dressed in a black version of the Wyvernguard’s sapphire uniform, a gleaming black dragon embroidered on her uniform’s black cloth instead of the usual white dragon on sapphire, every article of clothing these Death Fae put on instantly turning as black as night. She has tightly curled, short hair, her thickly lashed eyes large, her dark lips full, her face and pointed ears covered in onyx-metal piercings the same obsidian hue as her skin.

  As Sylla stares at them with her unfathomable eyes, a disturbing clarity fills Vothe.

  They’re using the Deathkin to drive the Gardnerian out, lodging him near the three primordial Death Fae who scare most of the Wyvernguard with their close affinity to the terrifying aspects of nature—death, decay, sickness, and fear.

  But it’s wrong to use them as monstrous outcasts, Vothendrile considers, bristling. It’s true that these non-elemental Fae keep to themselves, their reserve and odd ways opening them up to ridicule and superstition, but Vothendrile respects Sylla and Viger and Vesper, not out of fear, but out of the deep-rooted sense that there’s something solid and necessary at the center of their power. Something just as linked to the natural order of things as Vothendrile’s own weather power.

  And he believes that their allegiance rests firmly with the Wyvernguard’s own aims.

  Spiders scuttle across the floor toward Vothe and Trystan then stream up their pants in curious spirals. All kinds of spiders. Wolf spiders and funnel-web spiders, brown recluse spiders, and a black widow or two.

  Trystan calmly raises his head and looks to Sylla Vuul. “My name is Trystan Gardner,”
he says in a stunning display of equanimity, as if oblivious to the spiders swarming all over his body, the black widow now circling the skin of his neck. “It seems we’re to be neighbors.”

  Sylla remains silent but cocks her head, her piercings delicately clinking against each other, her large black eyes unblinking.

  The spiders abruptly circle back down both Vothendrile and Trystan and then scuttle back up the walls and into their tunnel of webs.

  Trystan dips his head respectfully toward Sylla, turns, and unlocks his door, flashing Vothe a slightly indignant look as he pushes the door wide open.

  Vothe freezes alongside Trystan as they peer into the room.

  Bloodred graffiti is splattered on the wall. An angry, violent word that Vothe imagines Trystan Gardner can’t read because it’s in the Noi language. But Vothe can tell, from Trystan’s briefly devastated look, that he understands nonetheless.

  ROACH

  “What does it mean?” Trystan asks, his armor suddenly breached clear through, his voice thick with shock and his eyes haunted, as if by some trauma revisited.

  “It means...” Vothe hesitates, not knowing why. He, himself, was idly tossing around the same word just earlier today, so bitter over being assigned to guard someone too dangerous to have here. And questioning Vang Troi’s sanity.

  “What?” Trystan presses, and the slash of pain in his expression inexplicably shakes Vothendrile. “What does it mean?”

  Vothe fights back against his own unease. Get hold of yourself, he inwardly snarls. You’re a Zhilon’ile Wyvern. Don’t go soft around this Gardnerian. He’s dangerous.

  “It means roach,” Vothe says, forcing an unaffected tone.

  Trystan strides into the room and throws open the paint-splashed door to his black-enameled closet. More slurs are painted on the inside of the doors.

  ROACH FILTH GO HOME

  Trystan Gardner’s assigned uniforms lie crumpled on the closet floor. Slashed to shreds and covered in red paint.

  Trystan is frozen, his devastation clear, and again, it gives Vothe serious pause.