Sisters of Shadow and Light

by Sara B. Larson

  Halvor put both of his hands on my shoulders and turned me to face him, his gaze as intense as I’d ever seen it. “Inara, you are the strongest person I’ve ever met in my entire life,” he said, as if he somehow could hear even my unspoken words. “I know you can do this—for Zuhra. And as soon as you do, you’ll never have to do this to yourself again. I promise.”

  “How can you make a promise like that? As much as you might want to protect me, you can’t always be—”

  He lifted one hand to press a finger over my lips, silencing me. “I will be right here, at your side, for as long as you wish me to be. I can promise that. And as long as I’m by your side, I will do what I can to make you happy—to keep you from having to hurt like this ever again.”

  The way he said it, the way he looked at me—it was as if he knew, truly knew, what I was feeling, what I was experiencing. Was it possible? Since I’d healed him, I’d felt as though I could sense him in new ways … amazing but somewhat alarming ways. The closer my proximity to him, the stronger it grew—that sensation that I could feel what he was feeling … that I was connected to him in some way. He stared down at me, his finger still on my mouth, and I wondered if he knew that a roar was building within me, rushing through my blood—but not from my power this time. A different, heady roar, made of heat … and want … and that pull thrumming in the small space between our bodies. I hardly knew what I wanted, only that I did, and that he was the cause of it.

  “Inara.” This time my name was not an apology, it sounded like a prayer … like a plea. His eyes were molten and it didn’t take any Paladin power for them to burn through me as we stared at one another. His finger moved at last, but only to allow the rest of his hand to slide across my jaw, his thumb brushing my cheekbone, sending a ripple of heat through me. The power building within, that I’d held trapped for so long, leapt inside me, flames igniting everywhere—in my chest, in my belly, in my hands that burned to reach for him, in my skin where he touched me, in my lips that ached for him to touch them again—

  “Inara.” This time my name was a low groan that somehow vibrated straight into the deepest part of my belly and then he did touch my lips, except he didn’t use his finger this time. He bent and his mouth brushed mine and the flames exploded and everything was white-hot heat and I was consumed—

  And Halvor was blasted off of his feet with a howl of pain, to land flat on his back.

  I stood unmoving for one long, terrible moment, in petrified shock. Then I rushed forward.

  “Halvor!”

  I dropped to my knees at his side, terror pulsing through me. He hadn’t moved, hadn’t spoken—

  He was staring up at the sky, touching his lips—lips that were bright white with thin ribbons of red—and when he saw me he laughed. He had the audacity to laugh.

  “I … I don’t know what you think is so funny,” I mumbled, unsure if I should be concerned that whatever had just happened had affected his brain, or if I should be humiliated that he found it funny. That kiss—I knew that’s what it was called from some of the stories Zuhra had read to me—had touched me to my core, had done something to me that I didn’t even fully understand, but I did know it hadn’t made me want to laugh.

  “Apparently you can do more than just heal with your power,” Halvor managed between great, gulping, shuddering gales of laughter. “And that will teach me to kiss you when you are trying to hold it all in.”

  “My power…” I hesitantly touched my own lips that still tingled—from his kiss or from the explosion of power that I’d had no control over, blasting him off of his feet? “Your mouth … I hurt you,” I finally pointed out, a riotous mess of emotions swirling within me like the clouds above us. Somehow I’d failed to notice it had begun to rain in earnest until that moment. My hair dripped down my back, raindrops sluiced down my face and landed on his wounded lips.

  “Yes,” Halvor agreed, finally sitting up with a wince. “But you didn’t mean to.”

  “That doesn’t change the fact that I did!” I reached out toward his face. “Let me heal you.”

  “No.” He jerked his face away, clambering to his feet. I quickly did the same, but he backed up. “You already used some of your power unwittingly just then—if you heal me, it will be too much. It will set you back days. Zuhra is more important. I’ll heal on my own.”

  “But … your mouth…” I flushed even as I said it, as I thought of the delicious, heady heat of that kiss—for the instant it had lasted before I’d exploded and done that. His mouth was obviously injured—and no ordinary injury, either. How would he explain it, if he refused to let me heal him and hide the evidence of what we’d done?

  “How bad does it look?”

  Lightning carved through the tumult of clouds overhead, as white as the skin of his lips. “Pretty bad.” I grimaced. “Does it … hurt?”

  He paused a half second and then nodded. “I think you burned me,” he admitted. “But luckily, I think it’s just my lips. It didn’t … go inside me or anything.”

  “I’m … I’m sorry,” I mumbled, my cheeks the only part left in my body still hot. Everything else went cold with guilt, with shame. He’d touched me, offered to stay by my side for as long as I wished, had kissed me, and I … I’d attacked him—hurt him.

  “Inara, don’t.” Halvor finally stepped toward me, reaching out and gently taking my hand in his. “You didn’t mean to. And now we know—when you’re holding in your power, that’s not a good time to … do other things.”

  “Like kiss?”

  Halvor blinked, then laughed again and I flushed even hotter. “Yes, like kiss,” he agreed, pulling me toward him, until he could wrap his arms around me. “But I think this is safe.”

  Thunder crackled across the sky, and Halvor just held me, until the wild thrumming of my heart calmed and I relaxed into his arms—even hesitantly lifting my own to encircle his waist and hold him back. He’d been right. Even that one accidental expulsion of my power had been enough to release a bit of the pressure building within me … which meant it would take longer before the roar overcame me and I could try to open the gateway and get to Zuhra. As much as I wanted to heal the damage I’d done to him, his selflessness in choosing to deal with the pain so I could get to my sister sooner was only further evidence of … of what? How much he cared about her … or me?

  I wasn’t sure, but as I stood in the circle of his arms, with the memory of his hand on my face and his lips on my lips, my eyes closed and I let myself dream of a future … a future with him.

  A future where I could use my power daily, and always be me, and kiss him again—and this time keep all that heat and power inside, where it belonged, so I could find out what happened next.

  But first … I had to get to Zuhra. And that meant no more accidental slipups.

  “We’d better get back inside.” Halvor finally pulled back enough to look down at me, the sight of his lips—ghost-white and cracked—enough to make me wince. “We’re getting soaked.”

  “What will you tell them?”

  “Maybe I won’t say anything and just let them guess.”

  This time I laughed as we turned, hand in hand, and ran back through the rain toward the safety of the citadel.

  THIRTY-FOUR

  “Inara…”

  Inara, Inara, Inara. A shout, a buzz, a curse. Through the roar, through the dark, through the light—

  That is who I am.

  Is who I am.

  Who I am.

  Who am I?

  Who am I?

  Flesh made pain, pain made flesh. Roaring and howling. Inside me—crawling, creeping, crying.

  Skin stretched tight, too, too tight. Light too deep, too heavy, too loud. Roaring and roaring and ROARING.

  A familiar voice, a deep voice. A kiss in the rain. A monster in the night. Flashing teeth, tearing flesh.

  I try, try, try to focus, but the light is blinding and the roar is deafening and she’s gone. Why is she gone? Why doesn’
t she come?

  Who am I?

  Where is she?

  Where am I?

  The roar is worse and I need her. I feel blindly, I see but don’t; I hear but can’t understand … and the roaring is worse, worse, worse …

  And pain. Shooting, blinding, breaking. Screaming—the screaming is mine, it’s me, but inside and I can’t … I can’t … I am hurt. Am I hurt?

  That deep voice, an image that swims through the blinding light, through the roaring dark, eyes of umber, of richest soil between my fingers, of edges of leaves curling and burning, and I must heal them, must help them …

  But it’s not her.

  It’s roaring, blinding, deafening.

  Who I am.

  Who am I?

  THIRTY-FIVE

  ZUHRA

  I jerked awake, my sheets sticking to my sweaty skin, my hair damp on my neck, and my breath trapped in my lungs from a half-swallowed scream. The dream had been so real. The thick gray fog so dense I could still feel its cold slickness on my skin, the terror of being lost within it, the sound of Inara calling for me but being unable to find her no matter how fast I ran, no matter how much I shouted back for her …

  I threw off the bedsheets and hurried over to the washstand, where tepid water still sat in the basin from last night. The stone floor was cold on my feet as I leaned over to splash some of the water on my flushed cheeks. Outside my windows the sky was steel gray, a sheet of impenetrable clouds stretched from one side of the valley to the other, swallowing the peaks that encircled us entirely from view. A dismal dawn after another dismal night.

  The nightmares were relentless, growing more frequent with every passing day, so that I now dreaded going to bed and did everything I could to avoid it as long as possible. The only thing that distracted me from the growing anxiety was training—sparring—pushing myself so hard physically that there was no room for thought, or fear, or panic. There was only sweat and pain and burning muscles and frustrating emptiness where my supposedly latent power was supposed to be. And so I spent nearly all my waking hours at the training ring—with Raidyn and Loukas, or without. I trained, and trained, and trained, until I was so sore, so tired, I could barely even move to drag myself back to my room and collapse into bed, hoping, pleading, praying for a dreamless sleep.

  After I scrubbed the sweat of my nightmare from my body, I quickly braided my hair back and pulled on clean sparring clothes—a secure binding to hold my breasts in place, a loose blouse, fitted breeches with enough stretch to allow for kicking and jumping, soft, supple boots that Sharmaine had given me (it turned out we had the same size feet), and leather wraps to protect my bruised knuckles. My skin was cracked and mottled blue, black, and yellow, but I’d refused to let Raidyn heal them. The pain was welcome, it was distraction.

  And I didn’t want him in my head again.

  Within a few minutes, I was already making my way out of the castle, forcing my stiff, sore legs into a light jog as I hurried toward the training ring. I already knew from experience that it took a little while to warm my muscles up, to stretch the soreness from the previous day’s training out before I could begin in earnest on today’s.

  When I entered the ring, only one other Paladin was already there. His hands were also wrapped, but he had his shirt off. He was punching a bag filled with straw over and over again, sweat slipping down his spine, his muscles bunching and contracting as he moved: dodging, weaving, punching, punching, punching. Despite myself, I paused at the threshold, watching him. He had the grace of a dancer, but the strength and brutality of an assassin.

  I wondered what nightmares stole his sleep and drove him here. Because no matter how early mine woke me, he was always there first.

  Watching Raidyn fight his own demons, though I still had no idea what they were, made me ache. He was beautiful, he was fierce … he was a healer with the heart of a warrior. Hands that could be so gentle, so kind … or so brutal. With a cry that ripped its way out from the deepest part of his soul, he hit the bag so hard the leather split, spilling the straw onto the ground. He stopped, grabbing the broken bag with both hands to still its swinging, his head dropped forward, and even from where I stood I could see him trembling, his entire back glistening with sweat.

  Not wanting him to catch me standing there watching, I retreated silently to the door, opened it, and let it fall shut loudly, as if I’d just walked in. He startled and glanced up. When he saw me, he wiped a hand over his face and walked over to where his shirt lay on the ground, pulling it over his head, but not before I caught sight of the sculpted planes of his stomach, the lean muscle that corded his arms and shoulders. My neck grew warm, the heat radiating from a strange, thrumming spot deep in my belly.

  “Good morning,” I said in Paladin. I’d spent an hour or two each day working on learning their language, and though I’d managed to memorize a few key phrases, I was still dismally terrible at it.

  Raidyn nodded at me as he walked over to a basin of water and splashed it over his face and head, dousing the top of his shirt. “Couldn’t sleep?”

  “No.” I paused a few feet away. “You?”

  He shrugged. “I like getting up early.”

  I knew there was more to it than that. Thanks to the sanaulus, I could feel it in him—a pain that haunted him, buried so deep it only arose at night until he beat it out of himself in the mornings. But I didn’t dare push him. “Oh.”

  There was a pause, and then:

  “I’m going to take Naiki out for a flight today. She’s getting restless.”

  “Oh,” I repeated, embarrassed at the disappointment that immediately crashed down on me that he was leaving—that he wouldn’t be sparring with me today.

  Raidyn stared down at his hands and methodically began unwrapping them. “Would you … like to come with?”

  “Really?” As quickly as my heart had sunk, it leapt inside me once more. “Yes—of course.”

  One side of his mouth quirked up at the corner, a hint of a smile. “All right. You can train for a few hours, and I’ll come get you when I’m ready to go.”

  I bounced on the balls of my feet, swinging my arms back and forth to start loosening them up. “Thank you, Raidyn.”

  He nodded and, with a tip of his chin, strode away. “Good training,” he said in Paladin, another phrase he knew I’d learned.

  I watched him go, surprised that he’d even offered, surprised at the look in his eyes that had softened his burning blue-flame irises to azure. As the door shut behind him, I couldn’t help the blossom of warmth that unfurled in my chest.

  * * *

  “Again, Zuhra! But this time, try to visualize that core of power within you igniting with every hit!”

  Grandfather had taken a personal interest in my training once word of my dedication spread, and he’d come every day to shout out suggestions and generally make me incredibly nervous. My father tried to come when he could, but he had many more duties that kept him busy, something he apologized for every time he was able to come spend time with me or help me train.

  Sharmaine was in the ring with me now, going easy on me, I knew, but I still felt as though I’d been battered with two rocks, not mere fists. We wore padding to protect our torsos and thighs, but every exposed part of my body was going to be black and blue tomorrow, I was certain.

  Still, I refused to give up. I tried to remember the stance Loukas had spent an hour making me practice a few days ago, and nodded for Sharmaine to go again. She blew a strand of rich auburn hair that had come loose from her braid out of her eyes, and lifted her fists. Most Paladin only trained on physical combat an hour, maybe two at most, a couple of times a week. They spent much more time on honing their abilities with their power. I’d learned all sorts of ways they could use it. My father, for example, was able to draw enough power into one hand that it created a fireball that he could blast at any opponent, killing most rakasa, all except the largest. Some had additional gifts beyond the Paladin fire—like Shar
maine, who could force her power outside her body in an impenetrable dome, protecting their battalion from attacks. The healers, like Raidyn, my father, and Inara, of course. Sharmaine’s mother was an artisan, she’d told me one afternoon—she was able to control her fire into such small, concentrated amounts she was able to sculpt statues and vases with it. It was rumored my grandmother could even shape her Paladin fire into a bolt, shooting it from her hands like lightning. So many variations and all useful in different ways.

  So Sharmaine didn’t need to spar with me—none of them did. But they did it because I wanted to, because it helped me, because it was all I could do. No matter how many different ways my grandfather or father tried to instruct me on how to access the power they were both sure I possessed, nothing ever happened.

  At least Ederra never came to witness my failures—the one bright spot to her continued ignoring of my existence.

  I’d passed her in the hallway only once since that council meeting, and though she’d misstepped when her eyes met mine, almost a stumble but not quite, she quickly averted her head and marched onward without a word. I’d tried to remind myself of the stories my father had shared with me, but none of it seemed to lessen the sting of her coldness to me—who had no part in any of the things that had hurt her so deeply.

  So I took all of that and channeled it into my arms, my fists, my legs, and I sparred. I got hit, I got knocked down, but I always got back up and I hit back. I tried to remember to reach for my power at the same time, but there was a lot to think about already, to avoid getting knocked down yet again. Loukas and Raidyn were strong but Sharmaine was fast. She couldn’t hit as hard, but that made her no less formidable as an opponent. She’d tried to explain it to me once—how she pictured a snake, the quick-quick lunge and recoil when they bit prey. But I’d never seen a snake attack, I’d only witnessed hers, and that was frightening enough.