Shadow Soul

by R. Michael Card

  “That’s what I’ve heard, but it’s true. You’ll see the wounds for yourself.”

  Elria nodded and they continued quickly to the inn.

  It was only as they neared their destination, that Caerwyn felt the call of the other drahksan again. She looked up to the roofs on her left and saw a man there, crouched low in the shadows of a chimney. He was looking at her. She knew from the pull within her, he was the man she was looking for. Meeting his gaze, she nodded. But she didn’t have time to pursue that now. She needed to ensure Elria saw to her friends.

  4

  Volfard’s heart nearly stopped.

  She’d seen him.

  She’d looked straight at him. Her gaze had locked with his for just a moment… and she’d nodded at him.

  But how had she known? Unless she felt him the same way he felt her. He’d felt it for some time now. Not knowing what it was, it was simply a call to some deep part of him. Only that evening as he’d felt it draw incredibly close, had he ventured out and seen… her.

  But he hadn’t expected her to see him. The fact that she had, scared him more than anything had in a long time.

  He scampered down the other side of the steeply slanted roof and threw himself off, flying over the alley behind the building to land on the roofs on the other side.

  Then he ran.

  He had no fear of those within these houses hearing him. He’d always been light on his feet. Even when running, he padded along like nothing more than a mouse. Yes, a mouse, that’s what he was. As invisible and unassuming as any small rodent. Even though his name meant wolf’s heart, he’d never felt like much of a predator. Though perhaps he was a mouse with the heart of a wolf? Even that didn’t feel right. He might be cunning and fearless like a wolf, but wolves were also predators and aggressive, and he wasn’t like that at all.

  He scurried down the side of the row of houses into another dark alley then ran along the dark streets, keeping to the shadows, hidden from everyone until he reached his home. It wasn’t much, but it was secret and safe, and that’s what he prized most for his dwelling.

  He’d spent his life sneaking into the homes of others. He would only take what he needed to survive, a little food, supplies, other such things. He didn’t steal for pleasure or gain. It wasn’t his fault that he could easily slip into their homes, through open windows or bypassing simple locks. It wasn’t his fault if they kept their dwellings so easy to get into. He thought it much better to have a hidden place, a secret place, where the door didn’t look like a door. That was how one kept to one’s self and didn’t get pilfered from.

  But once he was settled into the one chair he had, he found he couldn’t relax.

  Who was this woman?

  No one had ever seen him before; he’d made sure of that.

  More than just her having spotted him, there was… everything else about her. She wasn’t like any woman he’d ever seen. That healer she’d brought back to her inn came close to being as… odd. Both were foreign and tall and possessing of qualities which were not inherently womanly. But even more so than the healer, who still wore dresses and filled them out well enough, this new woman wore leathers and armor and carried a sword and shield. She was a warrior. That was altogether different than the hard-drinking healer with her strange accent.

  He had to know who she was.

  It ate at him, her difference, and how easily she seemed to have spotted him. He needed more information. Luckily, he had sources.

  He slipped out of his tiny ramshackle home and slid like a shadow through the night. Out of the town proper, he went, and across the small field to the sentry wall around the town.

  As he suspected, Aric the night gatesman, was sitting out on the road on a small stool, leaning against the gate, looking up at the stars.

  “Aric,” Volf whispered. The corresponding shudder of shock through the man was always fun to watch.

  “By the gods, man! Stop doing that.” Aric put a hand over his heart. “I’m not as young as I used to be. You’ll scare the life right out of me one of these days.”

  Volf chuckled, just a little. “Sorry.” He stepped out of the shadow in which he’d hidden himself, allowing himself to be seen. “I’m curious about some people that came into town today. A woman with two men in a wagon.”

  “Aye, yes, they came in just as the gates were closing for the night. Didn’t seem that curious to me. Though the woman did look ready for anything. Can’t say I seen too many women carrying a sword and shield, ’cept when those Northerners come down for supplies.”

  “I don’t think she’s a Northerner.” Though Volf didn’t want to say how he knew. He’d sensed her coming from the west, not the North. He hadn’t been close enough to hear her talk, so he didn’t know what her accent was like. “Did she sound like one?”

  “No, didn’t have that same lilt as the Northerners do. Though she was looking for that Northern healer that’s in town. But I suspect she wasn’t so much looking for a Northerner as she was just for a healer. Those two men with her looked pretty rough. Can’t believe bandits are threatening the roads again.”

  Volf didn’t much care about bandits. He’d spent his entire life in this town and didn’t plan to go anywhere.

  “What did she sound like? Western?”

  Aric shrugged in the darkness. Volf’s eyes were quite good at picking out details even in all but complete darkness. “Can’t say as I know what westerners sound like. We get so few through these days. But she did sound a little odd. Don’t know how to describe it. There was an accent, but I couldn’t place it.”

  Volf nodded.

  He was starting to form a picture of her: a foreign warrior woman, tall and sure.

  He thanked Aric and slipped back into town.

  He climbed to the roofs opposite the Setting Sun Inn, hoping to see her again, but curtains were drawn over the window of her room.

  He didn’t know if it was her in the room or not. There was a second call. He hadn’t been able to discern that there were two until she’d gotten into town, but when she’d gone for the healer, he’d still felt something calling to him which remained at the Setting Sun as well. And now, he could sense one of them moving about the inn, while the other remained still in one of the rooms.

  As night drew on and he saw no more of her, he eventually began his nocturnal routine of slipping in and out of people’s houses to gather bits and pieces of food and supplies. Never enough to draw attention, only enough to meet his needs.

  Then he retired to his small abode to ponder this new woman… and what she might mean for his life.

  He had a feeling something was about to change.

  But he liked his life, and the thought of change worried him deeply.

  5

  Jais blinked a few times as he woke.

  Then he winced as someone dabbed the shoulder with the dagger-wound. It was a cooling, wet cloth, but it still stung against the injured flesh.

  “Caer?” He rolled his head to one side and saw… a rather stunning woman sitting next to him.

  “Aye, no. Elria am I, a healer.” The woman nodded her head in greeting. Waves of red hair tumbled about her head, glinting like true fire from the light of the single candle in the room. If that wasn’t strange enough, her eyes were the clearest, purest green Jais had ever seen. For a moment, he lost himself in that tender gaze. Any words he’d been about to speak flew from his mind as his mouth hung open. It was only after a long moment staring at her that he realized he was being rude and snapped his mouth shut.

  He also became aware that his shirt was off, and he was half-naked in front of this woman.

  “Ah… hello,” he said then cleared his throat.

  She laughed, and it was a light and free sound, like music.

  “A tough one, you are,” she said softly. “Most men of these parts would be right blown down by such a wound as this.” Her accent was odd, light and lilting, but her turn of phrase was even more odd. He’d never heard anyo
ne speak like her before.

  “He is a special one, yes.” That was Caer’s voice. But being on his back with the red headed woman so close — what had she said her name was… Elria — he couldn’t see much of the room.

  “Caer, are you there?”

  “Yes,” came the reply. She moved toward the foot of his bed and came into view. She looked tired, though that could have been the candlelight at an odd angle against the planes of her face.

  She nodded to the woman tending him. “I sought out the healer in town to take a look at you and Barami. If we encounter… bandits… any time soon I wanted to be sure you were in fighting shape.”

  “I doubt you’ll be finding many bandits in Cold River,” Elria said offhandedly.

  Jais knew what Caer was saying though. Caer still mouthed the words ‘dragon hunter’ probably to be certain he understood. He nodded. Bandits probably wouldn’t be seen inside the city, but a single man might easily sneak in. They needed to be on guard.

  “How is Barami?” Jais asked.

  It was Elria who answered him. “Well enough. There be a wound there, sure as day, but it be mostly healed. More of a concern are you. I’ll look in on your friend in a moment.”

  Caer nodded, her gaze moving off to something else in the room and her face growing a little more drawn.

  He could just imagine her thoughts. Blaming herself for Barami’s injuries, for bringing the dragon hunter down on them. Though Jais had no idea how anyone could have found them, in the middle of nowhere as they were. There had to be something else at work here. It couldn’t be Caer’s bad luck that had somehow summoned the dragon hunter. Yet she’d blame herself anyway. He might not have known her for much more than a month, but spending every moment with her had given him a fair view of her mindset. Somehow, she thought she could control the world around her by sheer force of will and when things went wrong, it always seemed to be her fault. She carried far too much on her shoulders.

  “It’s not your fault you know,” he said softly.

  Elria looked up from tending him, a brow raised questioningly, but she said nothing. She must have seen he was looking at Caerwyn. Caer turned to him. He wasn’t sure if she’d heard him.

  “It wasn’t your fault, you know,” he repeated. “The… bandits. No one could have seen that coming.”

  She sighed and shook her head. Her gaze flicked to Elria. “We can talk about this later.”

  Jais nodded.

  Caer paced around the room a little more then finally spoke again. “I’m going out.”

  “Out?” Jais asked. “Is it not still night?”

  “Yes, but I get the feeling that… the man we came to see? I think he is quite active at night. I figure now’s as good a time as any to go talk to him.”

  Jais didn’t miss the specificity of her words. ‘Man’ and ‘him’ suggested she already knew that the drahksan here in Cold River was male. How she knew, Jais had no clue.

  “Have you made contact already?” he asked.

  She quirked her lips. “In a way. I caught sight of him.”

  Jais sensed her need to be active, doing something. “Go on then.”

  Caer nodded. She put a hand on Elria’s shoulder as she passed, on her way out of the room. “Take care of him.”

  “I will,” Elria said and watched her leave. There was something odd in the way Elria made sure the door was shut and even seemed to listen for Caer’s footsteps to recede down the hall.

  “Good, now I can really get to work.” She turned a smiling face on Jais. “But it will be easier if you be sleeping.” She put a hand on his forehead and said, “Sleep.”

  A warm and relaxing sensation filtered into him from where her hand rested on his forehead. This was new. He felt it wash down over his face and instantly his eyes drooped shut. Yet a part of him did not surrender to the slumber. It watched and simply felt the sensations, curious and a bit amazed. No ordinary healer should be able to put people to sleep. His aunt had been able to, and often did, as part of her healing. It was a lot easier to work on a slumbering patient if she didn’t want to explain her magic to them. It seemed Elria had a similar thought.

  Jais felt the sensation move through his body, relaxing him. He went limp on the bed, his breathing soft and steady.

  “That be better,” Elria said, though her voice sounded a bit muffled and distant.

  Jais didn’t know how his mind had escaped the effects of the sleep even while his body hadn’t. He was physically at rest, but he was still aware and partially awake. He didn’t resist what had happened to his body, but instead he tried to feel it, observe it.

  If this woman was like his aunt, then perhaps he could learn from her. He didn’t know the finer points of healing and would be quite intrigued to know more.

  Yet… Caerwyn seemed quite certain that the drahksan they were looking for was a man and was somewhere else. How could that be? As far as Jais knew, only drahksani could be true healers. Humans could get close with medicines and herbs, which mimicked some of the effects of a drahksani healing, but they’d never be able to do the accelerated healing, the laying on of hands, like a drahksan.

  But if humans couldn’t then… what was Elria?

  For the moment, he let that question lie as he felt her begin healing his shoulder. It was a different sensation than the sleep. That had been warm and relaxing, this was… soothing and more specific to his shoulder. He let his awareness simply observe and feel the whole process. It was slow, unlike the healings he’d done in the past. But he’d been under pressure, in battle. She didn’t seem to use the same amount of energy he had. She was more direct and careful. It was like she was inside the wound, knitting together the muscle and flesh, unhurried and precise.

  Amazing.

  Once she was done with the wound on his shoulder, she reached across to his other shoulder. That was closed quicker. Then he heard her shifting down to begin on his side. He’d stopped the bleeding from where the arrow had cut him, but as with a stinging cut from a sliver or razor, the pain was acute and lingered.

  Again, he simply felt what she did, soothing the pain, slowly encouraging his skin to heal and close the wound.

  It was a little time later when she breathed a heavy sigh and he heard the scrape of something on the floor. Perhaps she was standing.

  He was tired, nearly fully asleep now. Healing took a lot out of the person being healed. He saw that now. What he’d learned was that it didn’t need to take as much from the healer. If a healer was careful and precise, the injured person’s body could be encouraged to do most of the work, such that the one doing the healing expended little energy . It was a glorious revelation.

  He needed to talk to her about this before she finished up with Barami and left.

  He forced himself awake, using his own limited body-awareness to siphon energy from his limbs and other muscles to his mind, then punching through the fog of relaxation his body was under to force his eyes open.

  “Elria,” he said softly. His voice was a little hoarse and weak. He wasn’t sure how much longer he’d be able to keep this up. He rolled his head to one side to look over at her.

  Her brows were raised in surprise as she turned back to him. She had been about to work on Barami who was lying on another small bed across the room.

  “How in the Sacred Breath are you awake?”

  He grinned. “I’m tough, remember? Also, I’m a healer, like you.”

  Her eyes went wide. “You cannot be like me.”

  “I didn’t think there were many like me either. My aunt was, but she never got a chance to teach me before she died.” It still stung a little to say those words. His Aunt Sarelle had been like a mother to him for his entire life.

  Her expression changed from shock and disbelief to one of sorrow and compassion. “I am sorry for your loss.” She rose from her stool and came to kneel next to his bed. Her voice was hushed, a whisper. “Were you touched by a sacred being?” she asked quietly.

  T
hat was not what he’d been expecting at all. “No, but I guess you could say that my ancestors were?” He didn’t really know how drahksani came to be. Perhaps it was a similar process. Though again, if she was a drahksan, or something similar, why hadn’t Caerwyn been able to sense her? Yet if it had been a different type of ‘sacred being’ that had given Elria her abilities, perhaps Caer wouldn’t be able to feel it.

  Elria nodded as if that explained it. “I have never met one not of my clan who was touched. It is an honor to meet you.” She put a hand over her heart and bowed for a moment.

  “Can you find my sword?” Jais asked. He wanted to be able to at least sit up to talk to her, but that would require more energy. “The one with runes on the scabbard and gold on the guard.”

  She looked confused but nodded. She rummaged around near the bed for a moment then lifted his sword up and laid in on his chest. He lifted his hand, slowly. It took a lot of effort, like moving through water against a current. Then he finally set his hand on the grip. He struggled for a moment to pull the blade just a little out of the scabbard and touch the metal.

  Father? I could use some more energy, just a little to revitalize myself.

  As you wish, son.

  Energy filled him. It wasn’t a flood like he’d felt in the past, but a slow wave.

  He sighed as he felt the heavy sluggish feel of his body slip away. “That’s better.” He put the sword aside and sat up, rotating to sit on the side of the bed. He smiled at Elria’s slightly wondering look. To put her at ease, he said, “My companion probably didn’t tell you that I can heal myself. I had already done so earlier today, but it had taken a lot out of me. It didn’t help that I’d tried to heal Barami over there as well. It also doesn’t help that I don’t really know what I’m doing. That’s why I was so happy to feel your healing touch. I… I was hoping you might show me how to use my healing.”

  Elria stared at him for a long moment before she nodded. He didn’t know what she’d been thinking but she’d come to some decision. “Yes. I will teach you. Come over next to your friend.”