But it’s beautiful up here. I suck in long breaths – scanning out over the people and across a sea of ropes and bridges and buildings dotted with the golden glow of lanterns. And the real world so far below.
This doesn’t feel real – houses in trees is not part of my world.
Or wasn’t.
Is now.
I try to slow my breathing, and the way my mind is jumping around.
One breath.
Two, I inhale.
Three, exhale.
Four.
I relax enough to realize I actually like it up here.
It’s just a pity that there’re all these other people up here – destroying my ‘up is safe’ mentality. Making things swing and sway and bounce.
I wait until Roarke’s off the bridge, grip the ropes on either side, and start moving.
“I really do want to know how you people die,” I say, because my mouth loves giving my brain distractions.
“Mortal wounds,” Roarke says.
“Like a sword through the heart, or deep enough that it can’t heal before your organs fail,” Seth adds, stepping onto the bridge behind me.
The thing shudders, and I let out a squeak.
“How else?” I ask.
“If someone fell from the top, it would kill them. Or fell badly from this height. A broken leg isn’t much consequence. Even Silvari heal faster than mortals,” Roarke says.
I make it to the other side, and I have to force my fingers to unfurl from the rope because I’m sure Seth is deliberately making the bridge bounce around.
“Are you okay?” Roarke asks.
I nod.
We’re on a much wider deck. The thing spans between two trees, and at the far end, a set of stairs leads up to double doors and a building almost as big as the inn we were in last night. Hoists, ladders, more bridges, they all crisscross through the trees. Stacking higher, to more buildings that stretch up in narrow stories either between the trees or with a tree growing up the middle of them.
“Are you scared of heights?” Seth asks, a little teasing in his tone.
“No, not normal heights. One or two or even three stories up. This is not a normal height. And I’m not scared – I’m cautious. How is that even staying up here?” I demand, waving at the building before us.
Seth shrugs.
“Ingenuity and a few millennia to perfect it,” Roarke says, moving toward the doors. “Come on, Pax will be waiting.”
A tall, and way too bouncy, Silvari passes us.
He taps Roarke on the shoulder, saying, “I love your fashion.” Then keeps walking straight into the inn.
Roarke straightens his shoulders, reveling in the compliment. I swear the guy even holds his head higher.
I start to giggle.
Seth puts his bag down and slips his hand over my mouth.
“Shhh,” he whispers in my ear.
Shhh is harder than it sounds, but I swallow the noise down and nod my head. Then I slide my hand under his and pull it down from my face. Pretty sure it doesn’t need to be there anymore. He’s smiling at me, a dimple on one cheek, barely containing his own laughter, as he threads his fingers through mine then gives my hand a little squeeze.
Inside, the inn is very similar to any other. Thin stools instead of seats. Narrow tables that will barely be able to fit Killian and Seth’s legs underneath them, and no walls between us and the kitchen. Light, that’s what the design is – as little weight as possible.
Pax is near a narrow spiral staircase, looking back in our direction.
“No sir, we don’t have the kind of laundry service that could care for your unique garments,” says a male servant with broad shoulders and less than lean muscles, giving him a disproportionate look.
“Fine. If you can’t have our clothes washed, we will take one room, one bed, and one bath.”
The guy nods as we approach – then we all turn to hear Killian thunder into the room.
“Why did a stranger just ask who my tailor is?” he demands – his gaze boring into Seth.
Seth throws his hands up, a complete surrender.
I scuttle a few steps to the side, getting out of the way.
“Honestly, I have no idea,” Seth says, his smile too big for honesty.
Pax turns to the frightened-as-bralls servant.
“Why did you say my clothes were unique?” Pax demands, while Roarke runs his hands down the front of his shirt – looking for anything out of place.
Then finally looks over his shoulder and tries to glimpse his back.
He stretches one hand around and plucks a brilliant purple feather from the fabric.
“How many of these are on my back?” he asks, flicking the thing at Seth.
“Maybe thirty,” Seth says.
That bright sparkle in his blue eyes momentarily steals my attention – before Killian growls and pulls his shirt over his head. Abs… damn… fine…
I swallow hard.
With his chest bare, and his second big scar on full display, the servant blanches and practically runs from the room – from the whole damn building.
Pax acts like he’s too mature to look at his own back, like all of this is below him, but by the twitching of his fingers I’m pretty sure he wants to.
Killian scrunches the shirt up and pegs it at Seth’s head.
“I didn’t decorate you two,” Seth says, catching Killian’s shirt then throwing it at me.
“Don’t try to blame her,” Pax growls.
“This has your Chaos written all over it,” Roarke says.
I start plucking the feathers from Killian’s shirt. Every muscle in my face is too busy being amused to say anything.
“You expect me to believe she threaded feathers into my shirt without me noticing?” Killian growls.
“And why not?” I demand, dropping his shirt, but keep a hold of the feathers I’ve pulled out.
“Because you have the speed of a mortal, the stealth of a mortal-child, and the dexterity of a mortal-infant,” Killian says, crossing his arms over his chest and never once looking from Seth to me.
“Oh, wrong thing to say to a woman, my friend,” Seth says, feigning fear as he dives for cover.
Killian turns slowly, and I wait until I have a clean target before throwing one of several feathers in my hand at his forehead.
He doesn’t even bother trying to catch it – and I’m pretty sure he could. The pointy end hits between his eyes and for a moment, it sticks. The guy goes cross-eyed as he looks up at the red feather.
I smile.
“Pick a spot, and I’ll hit it,” I say, tossing my words at Seth.
“Left wrist, left shoulder, right ear, right nipple,” he says.
I start throwing as soon as he starts giving directions. Left wrist, done. Killian remains frozen. Left shoulder, perfect hit. Right ear, the thing bounces off his earlobe and flutters to the floor. Right nipple –
“What? No,” I tell Seth.
“Too small a target?” Seth teases.
So I throw the feather at him instead, wedging it into his hair. He’s laughing, not bothering to pull it out.
Roarke is smiling. But the other two are not.
“You can throw?” Pax asks, his brow drawn in a curious mix of why-didn’t-I-know-this and I’m-impressed.
“Everyone can throw,” I tell him, tossing a feather toward his top button.
He catches it mid-air, uncurling his fingers to inspect the thing.
“It’s just a feather,” he says. “No shaft, no weight.”
“You. Can. Throw,” Killian says.
I roll my eyes, considering picking up the guy’s shirt and arming myself with more feathers.
“What? Did you guys think my whole life was dishes and bubbles?”
“Yes,” Pax and Killian say in unison.
Then Pax quickly adds, “No.” Running his hand down his face. “Let’s find that servant and get our room.”
I almost growl at him. Onl
y Pax could take something I’m good at and make me want to… slap him.
Wylym is a Sigils Apprentice with his two front teeth missing and an empty scabbard on his belt. His past smells of betrayal, and his hands begin to shake at the sight of Pax and me.
We did let ourselves into his house – standing around outside people’s doors is not something I do.
So the guy did look up from his dinner to an AlphaSeed and a DarknessSeed. Spoon dropped. Stew splashed.
Which burnt him and led to some amusing cursing.
Pax and I seated ourselves at his dining table and waited until he could control himself once more.
No family. No love. Just this empty-hollow of a Saber.
“We need a sigil. A very specific sigil,” Pax begins, struggles. “I need to null a MateBond.”
“That’s not possible,” Wylym stutters.
“Then make it possible,” I say.
The runt of a man swallows hard before straightening with an air of stupidity masquerading as ego.
“I am the only Sigils Master in Lackshir, and I’m telling you this can’t be done,” he repeats.
“Apprentice,” I correct.
“Apprentice is all these people need. They’re simple Silvari. They need a Fertility Sigil, or a Stop Fertility Sigil, or something to help a baby sleep. What you’re asking me to do is impossible.”
“Why are you only an apprentice?” Pax asks.
The guy runs a hand over his almost bald head before deciding which words to speak.
“We struggled as a triune for three hundred years – then an assignment went wrong, and I was the only survivor. That was four hundred years ago. I spent another two hundred years training with Sigils Master Arrentas, until he vanished.”
“And you decided not to complete your training?” Pax asks.
“I decided the gods put the wrong blood in my veins. I wanted to be a rope maker – I never wanted this power or the call or to fight, so when the exit door opened, I walked through it.”
Truth.
Even if it is laced with self-centered fear.
“What can you do?” I demand.
This is already taking too long. We’re on the other side of Lackshir and it’s a twenty minute dash back to the inn even with Roarke’s speed. She’s eating dinner with Roarke and Seth, and you’d think that would be a safe activity for her – at least Roarke has some sense about him. But those other two, Seth and Shade, they’re just trouble.
And Roarke, his power smelled off before. The lingering scent of lilies and roses when I entered the inn – which could surely only have come from him.
And that makes me nervous. I curl my toes in my boots, tapping out a rushed tune on the table before realizing I’m doing it and stopping myself.
The guy shrugs.
“I made a Stop-and-Think Sigil for local enforcement a few years back. It’s designed to guide youth with too much energy and not enough sense into making better choices. That was before the Crown sent new Sabers and mercenaries to run the enforcement here. They have a new way of doing things now.”
“When?” Pax asks.
“Two phases back. They arrived on a Wednesday morning, and it was made clear that my assistance was no longer needed by that afternoon.”
I watch the threads of truth and the lick of morning dew that he barely manages to keep from filling my nose.
“There was a young woman, Teryl. She was barely eighteen when she moved here with her aunt, and within a week she discovered she enjoyed being chased, then scaring the crap out of people as she defied gravity. Jumping from rope to rope, level to level. She was a fledgling EddySeed, but her use of air currents was becoming destructive. To start the chase, she’d usually steal something. A hat off a lady’s head, the coin purse from a man – she always gave it back.”
“Your Stop-and-Think Sigil worked?” Pax asks.
“It has a lifespan of a phase – if a person doesn’t burn through it quicker – and gives the wearer a ten minute pause in which time they can’t do anything that might harm themselves or another,” Wylym says.
“That would leave the wearer vulnerable,” Pax says.
“Needing to use the bathroom all of a sudden or sneeze, that’s not a problem. But anything linked to a surge in adrenaline or endorphins will trigger the sigil. The effect takes a second, so the wearer gets enough time to jump out of the way of a runaway horse, for example. In terms of your MateBond, in theory it should put a ten minute gap between your desires and your actions.”
“Will I be able to defend her?” Pax asks.
Wylym’s lips pull into a thin line. “If you know something is coming, I suggest you plan ahead, so your actions are no longer impulses – in which case you can probably just plan –” The guy stops to awkwardly clear his throat. “Um, whatever it is you desire romantically, ahead of time too. Making the sigil useless.”
“Not the issue. If I am wearing this, and someone attacks her, I will have to watch for ten minutes before I can help her?”
He moves his head in a deliberately slow nod.
“If that is your fear, then perhaps she should stay in his company,” Wylym says, pointing at me.
Then, seeming to realize he’s pointing, he quickly pulls his hand away – as if I might bite it off.
“I can give you the seal, and any Saber can activate it – I designed it that way so enforcement didn’t need to knock on my door late at night.” He stands and shuffles out of the room as he talks, returning a moment later with a small metal token painted with the fine gold symbols for instinct, control, and time – among others. Deciphering this thing would be easy for Roarke, but on my cursory glance, all I know for sure is that it stinks of power and yet, still feels like the lesser of two evils.
Pax folds the disc into his left hand and pays the man with his right.
“Tell me more about this new enforcement,” he says.
“I’ve avoided them. They made it very clear that they are the law, and that pure obedience is required. The trial sands have never seen so much blood.”
“Why?” I demand, the muscles down my back growing tense.
“No crime by a Silvari, no matter how petty, is left unpunished. The Sabers of enforcement, however… I will warn you to circumvent them at all cost.”
Which is about all the useful information this man possesses. I grunt, Pax says something more polite, and we leave.
Once we’re on the dual-plank link between the third tier sleeping district and the more heavily trafficked trade district, I make a sound to emphasize the question on my mind, ‘Can you do it?’
The planks move slightly underfoot, but they’re double the width of my boot – plenty of room. And there’s two other tiers below me – plenty of things to slow my fall.
“The problem is that this beast battles for my skin with nothing but impulse. I can handle watching you defend her. I can’t handle the notion that you have to defend her from me.”
We hop from the dual-plank onto a slow-lower and grip the single strand of rope as it moves in a continual loop between all six tiers. A straight lower. The idea is, as the rope moves past on its way down, pick a knot to grip your hand above and step off the platform. I find a knot near my feet to grip between my boots as well – the rope is doing all the work. Taking us down what would have been tedious in stairs and ladders.
The Silvari men going up have to use two hands and considerable strength to keep themselves from falling. Probably not to their deaths, but certainly to considerable pain and a healer.
Inwardly, I laugh at them – but I’m not enough of an ass to actually let the sound out.
The next guy to pass me on the upward rope has a small bag of carrots pinned between his teeth, his gaze lowered in concentration. He should have taken the lift, but he probably didn’t want to walk that far. There are plenty of slow-lowers, but only a few lifts here and there. The lift wouldn’t have made him sweat with effort and smell of ash-scented fear.
I poke the guy on the forehead. He startles so badly that he lets go of his bag of carrots, and it falls to the ground as he clambers to keep his grip on the rope.
I let out a laugh – maybe I am that much of an ass.
He keeps going up with the perpetual motion of the ropes.
“Stop playing with the locals,” Pax says.
I step to the side on the second tier and make room for Pax to step off behind me. The rope goes to the bottom and bridges down there branch off in all directions, through the food districts and the taverns, but the zip-line from here will take us all the way to the inns. The last time I was in Lackshir was somewhere in the vicinity of a hundred and eighty-seven years ago. The place hasn’t really changed since.
I grab the handle of the zip line, push off, and race toward the inn. The niggling sensation of danger in the pit of my stomach begins to settle its gnashing jaws the closer I get to the girl.
If whatever it is doesn’t hurry up and attack us, I’m going to go hunting for it.
A BeastSeed on our tail should be my only focus, but I know there’s something darker out there.
If we use that Sigil, Pax not being able to fight will be a new disadvantage.
Pax losing any more of his grip on himself and ripping the life from her because of his power is worse.
If I were Seth, and willing to put my money down somewhere, I’d bet that no matter how she dies, my brother is going to destroy this realm in his pain.
Maybe that’s what fate wants – what Mother wants.
Maybe that’s what I’m trying to stand between – winning this with our souls intact, or losing everything because this kingdom needs Lithael dead – at any cost.
I envy Roarke, his world is clear. A line on the same curve will always find itself again. He just has to follow those lines of logic.
All I get is a scent, a color, a sensation, one thread amongst many – there’s too many variations. Too many options.
Too much at stake.
76.5 miles from Potion Master Eydis
I’ve climbed toward what counts as a bed when one is in the trees before Pax and Killian have returned.
The stretch of material is somehow firm and yet still flexible, fixed between four posts in the inn’s room. The room itself is about the same size as the last one. The fireplace has been made from steel, not stone, with a glass door to keep any loose embers contained. The flames reflect around the room and eliminate the need for any kind of lighting even though the night outside is black and heavy.
Shadows and Shade Box Set Page 54