So Despiris made the first move. She made as if to charge through their formation, provoking an attack. Blades rang as they met her blow for blow. Playing suddenly defensive, she turned and bolted toward the cathedral, drawing them after her lest she manage to force her way inside.
Inside to where the king and any number of valuable, vulnerable nobles sheltered.
But her intentions weren’t to gain access to the cathedral. She veered instead straight toward a pillar, running up its vertical ascent to flip over the converging guards.
Landing behind them, she turned and sprinted for the manhole.
At first, she was relieved not to hear the sounds of pursuit behind her, and she dared hope she just might make it in spite of the odds. But then she realized the lack of pursuit was out of place. Why weren’t they coming after her?
Puzzled – and decidedly uneased – she paused long enough to peer back over her shoulder once she reached the manhole.
The bloodhounds sat lined up in eerily stony formation between two columns, staring straight ahead without any interest in her. The guards, as it turned out, had disregarded her to gape in awe at a chilling phenomenon taking place on the roof.
Following their gazes, Despiris stumbled backward across the cobblestones, the manhole forgotten, but trailed to a halt to stare transfixed. Before her eyes, the statues lining the dome ledge transformed one by one into live creatures of flesh and blood – gargoyle, Pegasus, gryphon, dragon, archangel, and another gargoyle. Color spread like the illumination of sunrise over the dull gray of their stone origins, limbs cast for centuries in rigidity crunching and popping and giving way to movement.
A human silhouette could be seen in the backdrop behind the incredible spectacle, and for an instant Despiris thought frantically it might be Clevwrith, still up there, now with no place to hide. But then it registered that the figure was much too small and scrawny to fit the Shadowmaster’s profile.
In a breathtaking show, the fantastical creatures of myth and legend spread their rubbery and feathery wings alike and left the roof for the air. Despiris backed up a single, pathetic step as they swooped down out of the night sky, gazes locking squarely on her. She had known this was coming, but couldn’t have imagined the paralyzing reality that was the manifested threat staring her in the face with open jaws and reaching talons.
I can’t escape this, she accepted, really just an affirmation of what she had already known. And so she didn’t try – even as fear ravaged her and screamed at her to flee.
The live statues landed all around her, the great gusts from their wings leaving her windblown as they cut off all avenues of escape.
Could she have gotten away if she hadn’t hesitated? If she’d dived into the manhole instead of gaping at the spectacle on the roof?
But then she remembered the way the gargoyle had torn clear through the street in pursuit of them in the Cob, and she knew it wouldn’t have mattered. They would have come after her. Tracked her through the city. Hunted her down like Clevwrith had said.
With slow, deliberate footsteps that shook the ground, a gargoyle broke from the formation to approach her. He looked just like the first, with his charred, bruised-purple tones, brutish musculature, and wicked pairs of fangs and horns. A breath like that of a grunting bull whuffed out his slitted nostrils. “Surrender,” he uttered in a deep, furnace-like voice.
They speak. That was one feature she hadn’t expected.
Although everything in her wanted to cry, “I will not be imprisoned again!”, she knew better than to pretend she wasn’t caught. Again. But that didn’t mean she would fold like a fawn on weak legs.
She brandished her weapons. “Unless you want to die on the same day as your birth, I suggest you give me a better offer.”
The archangel stepped forward, a beautiful, tall woman with severely straight flaxen hair and striking, angular features. Chiseled, high cheekbones over gaunt cheeks. Slyly arching pale brows over glittering black eyes. Full, sultry lips to match the hourglass figure highlighted by a skintight, scalloped red bodysuit. “The Lady Verrikose sends an offer,” she purred in an exotic, demure accent. Despiris perked toward her words. “You are to be assured your previous captors have seen the pointlessness in imprisoning your ladyship. They instead wish to extend an invitation.”
Despiris frowned, naturally suspicious – but admittedly the smallest bit intrigued. “An invitation?”
“You show promise,” the archangel said. “Promise you might not fully understand. Insights and passions which you may find more fulfilling if redirected. The king would like to sponsor your education.”
Despiris blinked in surprise. “My education?”
“There is only so much of the world you can see from the shadows. His Majesty merely extends an invitation for you to view it from the light. To foster new perspective, so you might expand your mind and make informed choices for whatever illustrious future you so choose.”
The king wanted to…sponsor her? Educate her?
Too cautious for her suspicions to evaporate into thin air, Despiris nevertheless found herself drawn to the idea. To the prospect of furthering her tutelage. Expanding her mind, as the archangel put it.
It was why she had so enjoyed being Clevwrith’s pupil. The promise of always discovering something new, learning a new trick. She was hungry for that, a lover of learning.
And the notion that Clevwrith might have stunted her growth in some areas had nagged at her since she allowed it to take root in her mind. Whether intentional or not, there were things he had left out. Gaps in her understanding of how everything connected. Ideals ingrained in her that left no room for anything else, that cut her off from the diversity that colored the world.
What would she know of color, when all she knew was night?
“I’m being given a choice?” she asked, thinking that was surely too good to be true, but what if…
“The choice is yours,” the archangel confirmed emotionlessly. “But you would be the honored guest of the king, treated as nobility, extended all the luxuries of the palace. No book or tutor or answer would be denied you. You would have full access to the libraries, the archives, the scholars, no curiosity to go uninvestigated. His Majesty implores you to recognize you have a mind worth developing. That it would be a shame not to explore your potential. In exchange, of course, you are suspending all acts of terror against the kingdom.”
Despiris was left stunned. And torn. The offer was unexpectedly tempting. But that would mean…
Something drew her eyes to the roof. Clevwrith crouched at the edge, watching. Where were the guards? Or the other scrawny figure present when the statues came alive? They mattered little, however. Her thoughts were only on Clevwrith. Across the distance and through the dark, Despiris thought she could still make out his features. Perhaps she only imagined his face, but what she saw left her even more indecisive than before. He seemed to know somehow what she would choose, even as she stood there struggling with her response.
He always had claimed to know her better than she knew herself, hadn’t he?
His expression was just so dismayed and knowing, eliciting a pang of guilt within her. She wouldn’t go as far as to say he appeared sad, just…alone.
Oh, Clevwrith. What am I about to do? Distressed, she teetered back and forth on that fateful precipice. Torn between two deviating lives, two separate worlds.
Even as she found herself leaning in one direction, deciding what she wanted for her, she was held back by what it meant for Clevwrith. Suddenly, he seemed more alone than anyone else in the entire world. How could she leave him, knowing that? The man who had given her a life?
Who had given her everything?
But therein lay the answer. He hadn’t given her ‘everything’. Everything she had, certainly, but it was a sheltered, defined existence. He preached limitlessness, and yet her world was small. Finite. Constrained in ways that were beginning to make her feel trapped. Stuck. Cut off from countless o
ther wonders, discoveries, and new experiences.
And it wasn’t just that. Living as though they were the only two people in the world had blinded her to the plights of humanity. It had stunted her heart.
Deep down, she yearned for something greater than the shadows. Something that mattered more than a legacy. Because deep down she remembered pain, and hunger, and other people she loved who were suffering. And that pain left her more breathless than the beauty of night. Than the thrill of the chase.
Not everyone is invincible, Clevwrith. Some of us starve to death. Some get caught stealing a meal and rot in prison. It isn’t fair for us to do what they can’t, enjoy what they don’t, again and again, and play it like a game. Like we’re bragging. And all the while the rest, the ungifted, those who aren’t strong enough to scale walls and fly across rooftops and tangle with the guard… They get dragged away while we’re laughing in triumph where they fell short.
She didn’t need to tell him that, though. He already knew her decision.
In that moment, she knew it, too.
You saved one of them, once, she thought. You saved me. And that’s a legacy I can get behind. Thank you – for being my example. You really did show me the way. And really, I am just returning the favor. After all, those present were still under the impression that she was the Shadowmaster. If she surrendered, they might not have enough reason to continue the hunt for Clevwrith.
Whether it was an excuse to pursue the direction her heart was tugging her or genuinely a noble realization that cemented her decision, she found she was no longer able to entertain the alternative. I’m sorry, she whispered in her mind, and then she brought her gaze back down to earth.
“Then I come willingly,” she declared, the words rolling heavily off her cruel tongue.
The gargoyle clamped her arm in his strong, rough grasp, black claws digging into her flesh – but he was careful not to puncture, this time. The other creatures parted to make way, and as the beast led her toward the cathedral, Despiris glanced up one last time toward the roof.
But Clevwrith was gone. Somewhere out in that big, ever widening world, he walked the dark paths of his legacy, night as his only companion, all by himself now on a road that would go on, never changing, even as the world changed around him. A solitary figure, a legendary figure, brilliant and cunning and aloof – at least to the outside eye, those who revered and feared him as the unhuman shadow-man.
But if only they knew…knew that his gift no longer completed him. No longer came without a price. If only they knew the glory of his destiny had in that moment become a burden.
Somewhere out there, a lonely legend stepped into a shadow and disappeared, swallowed by the one thing that would accept him into its embrace and never let go – the darkness of a cold night, welcoming him back when the rest of the world left him more alone than ever.
20
Palace Pleasantries
“Though we feel disdain, we must abstain. Pleasant is pretty. Beauty is pain.” – Nobility’s Etiquette, page two.
*
“Make yourself comfortable, my lady,” King Isavor invited, and Despiris glanced around at the plush accommodations.
After her surrender at the cathedral, she had been held in a carriage while the king was informed of her capture and things were wrapped up at the meeting, and then she had been transported back to the palace and allowed to wait and ‘refresh’ herself in a vacant bedchamber while his Majesty prepared for an audience with her. Now, that audience took place in a cozy yet opulent sitting room off of the throne room. Present was the king, regal and composed in a green velvet chair; Lord Mosscrow standing just off of his left shoulder, intense as ever and yet strangely restrained; a guard positioned just off his right shoulder; and Lady Verrikose, sitting prim and poised on a mauve chaise lounge.
A quick double-take brought Des’s eyes back to the statuesque lady, where a furry shape draped over her lap turned out to be a fifth being in the room. A sloth.
Lady Verrikose stroked the animal with an elegantly gloved hand, eyeing Despiris coolly from behind her net veil. It was impossible not to feel inadequate with a lady such as she in the room, everything about her perfect from the curl of her raven locks to the artful way her silver gown cascaded off the chaise lounge and trailed like a river of silver across the patterned burgundy area rug.
Despiris was suddenly hyper-aware of the fact that she hadn’t taken advantage of the time they allowed her to ‘freshen up’. Then again, such a concept was not really her style.
So she held her head high in her worn leathers and scuffed old boots, staring proudly through the loose locks that fell limp in her face, not bothering to try to hide the grime of the city where it was evident across her scrappy form. And since he had offered, she sat her slum-sullied bum down on the spotless, plush cobalt seat offered to her, legs splayed in a decidedly unladylike fashion.
She was who she was. That was why they wanted her, was it not?
Wrong. This is about what you could be. It was difficult – still so difficult – to separate herself from what she had been with Clevwrith. To remember she wanted more. That identity was just so ingrained in her, along with the pride and arrogance that came with it.
“I would like to start by stressing you are not a prisoner here,” Isavor said. “You are a guest, to be extended every luxury and amenity as any other guest. You will be given a room; allowed to take meals as served or make special requests of the servants; have access to the gardens, the libraries, the observatories, the stables… This is to be your home while you stay with us here.”
“However,” Lord Mosscrow stipulated, “it is probationary. There are rules. You are under–”
“Thank you, Crow,” Isavor politely cut him off. “I was just getting to that. There are rules. You will be provided with a comprehensive document covering the details, but suffice it to say we expect our guests to be law-abiding, non-hostile, and discretionary when taking advantage of the hospitality we offer here. We expect you to be civilized. And to not go pilfering…gold candlesticks and priceless paintings to cushion your own fortune. Those kinds of shenanigans. Do I make myself clear?”
“You forget, your Majesty,” Lady Verrikose piped up coyly before Despiris could answer, “she might not know how to act civilized.”
Despiris was a bit surprised that someone so new to the scene would contrive to interject herself into the king’s dialogue, but the fact that she was there at all suggested she’d been put on some kind of pedestal. At least in relation to the matter of the Shadhi.
“It would be unfair,” Lady Verrikose continued, “to bring a wild animal into a caged setting and expect a domesticated creature.”
Despiris’s eyes narrowed at the comment, recognizing the layered implications. Somehow, in the same breath, the woman had managed to play herself off as the sympathetic ally, while deftly insulting Despiris in the process.
And highlighting her specialty to stay relevant at the same time. Hopefully they don’t intend to study me like some creature while I’m here…
More than likely, though, that was exactly what they intended.
“Of course,” the king acknowledged. “Matters of etiquette shall be one of your studies. You will be allowed time to adapt, certainly, but then I don’t believe you will find our expectations unreasonable. Are we in agreement?”
Despiris hesitated, mulling it over, but had to agree it seemed reasonable enough. She could behave. For a little while, at least. “We are.”
“Very good. First rule of etiquette, then – a proper introduction. We are not barbarians, grunting at one another in apathy and incoherence. My title precedes me, but for the sake of the exercise, you are addressing King Isavor Guildheart of Cerf Daine. On my left, may I present Lord Mosscrow – my trusted advisor. And upon the chaise lounge, which has never seemed so complemented a piece of furniture, Lady Verrikose of Rovanda. And her pet. Slasher.”
Despiris eyed the sloth, noting its alarmi
ngly long claws. But she was sure the name was ironic, because the sluggish creature looked no more ready to slash than a snail was likely to run off with her knickers.
“And you are, my lady…?” Lady Verrikose prompted, once more playing the helpful cohort while simultaneously coming across as patronizing.
Well, what would it hurt? She had already sacrificed a great deal of the mysticism surrounding her identity. They might as well have her name.
“Despiris,” she said, and the king nodded.
“Pleased to make your acquaintance, Lady Despiris.”
*
As promised, Despiris was assigned the same bedchamber she had ‘refreshed’ herself in. A servant appeared with the sun to draw her a bath, and a page brought a memo inviting her to breakfast. She dined alongside the king and Lady Verrikose and a smattering of other nobles there on business, as well as a scrawny little man who could barely reach his chalice over his plate. She eyed him suspiciously, instantly connecting him to the small silhouette she’d seen on the cathedral rooftop. Was he responsible for bringing the creatures to life?
After breakfast she was given a tour of the grounds, and then it was straight to her first lesson in etiquette. While she was tutored, a seamstress took her measurements for a new wardrobe the king was to gift her. Despiris had begun to insist it wasn’t necessary and she was quite comfortable in her familiar garb, but evidently one of the first rules of etiquette was not to refuse a gift from the king.
Also that ladies wore dresses.
So she resigned herself to the primping and preening, and when her measurements were finished, Lady Verrikose was waiting along the sidelines to trade whispered fashion insights and suggestions with the seamstress. Sighing, Despiris forced herself to focus on the lesson at hand, wondering when she could move on to more interesting subjects.
After her lesson in etiquette, she was invited to sit in while the king held court, and then afterward as he rallied his panel of advisors to consult with them about various other affairs on his plate. She listened with interest to how he handled matters with the people, but quickly became lost as the secondary meeting delved into a slew of political jargon she was helpless to follow. Her ignorance became glaringly apparent; it was as though the men before her were speaking a foreign language.
Girl of Rooftops and Shadows (The Shadow's Apprentice Book 1) Page 18