My Shadow smiles at me. A soft lift of one cheek. Shadows swirl within my soul, my power looking to connect with…
What?
Not her power. She doesn’t have any. Silvari blood, maybe. A resistance to glass, definitely. But nothing there for my power to find.
She shouldn’t even be sparking my power – drawing it out. And she does draw it out. The kind of rush that only compares to battle. To fight. She’s lucky she was in shock last night – even luckier that she tried to kiss me and not Roarke. I don’t mind the pain of containing my Darkness – the way my chest contracted when I had to push her back from me.
Forced myself to.
Forced. Because as far as the Darkness is concerned – she is not a mortal.
Impossible. Even the air around her tastes mortal.
My power wants her. Seeks her with the slip of icy shadows from under my tight grip. Holding my power in check around her is a challenge – and one that is laced with a hint of pain. That pain reminds me why I’m doing this. Because this bond she has with Pax is already breaking all the rules. But with me… unless she’s magically a DarknessSeed or something bigger and badder than me…
Breaking is exactly what my power would do to her, I remind myself.
Those soft lips. The gentle way she smiles – even at me. She barely reaches my shoulders, and when she stands in front of me and tilts her face back to look into my eyes, I can see every vein of courage in her.
So much strength. I want to wrap my hands around her and see how far she’ll let me push her body.
But even if she were Saber, I would still break her. Without a desire inside of her to feel that kind of pain, I would hurt her too badly. And I couldn’t bear the way she would look at me after that.
So I turn and ride away.
We ride through the day and into the dusk, moving the horses with full awareness that they might need their strength for a quick escape. We’re riding into the belly of the beast.
Straight to Tanakan Prison.
The place is dark, deep within a dark forest and the black of a cloud-filled night. Nothing but ancient stone and silence.
The solid Saber-proof steel gates are locked, but there’s no guard in the office next to them. No guards pacing the walls either. Last I heard, Tanakan had seventeen triunes on rotation. Seventeen of the strongest, stationed here permanently.
But I haven’t been here in over a century.
My magic sprawls out over the grounds, almost lazily – over the fortress on the surface, then searching into the levels of cells stacked over cells built straight down into the bowels of the earth. The nothingness poses no challenge.
This place was a nightmare for a power like mine – when it was full. Pain and broken souls resided in every open space. Bringing my Darkness to life with thread after thread of all things best left to rot… but it’s far from full now.
“I’ll get us in,” Seth says, and with one leap the guy’s over the wall.
“What are you doing?” I demand.
“Saber-proof bars, I’ll pick the lock,” he says, and he’s already on one knee using something he probably had hidden in a belt loop, or the high leather ankle of his boot, to open the gates.
Then he pops open the guards door and fishes around for a long forgotten set of keys.
Pax is bristling, the wolf shimmering over his muscles. He pulls at his shirt, considering taking the thing off, I guess.
“Are you going to behave?” he asks himself.
I’m not sure what Thane’s response is, but the shirt stays on.
We leave the horses in the courtyard. My gelding skitters suddenly at a leaf being blown in the wind. There might not be anyone here, not a thing of Darkness that my power can lock onto, but there was darkness here, and a lot of it. I stroke my hand along his neck, waiting for him to stop jumping around, before fastening his reins to the tethering post.
“I’m going to need to buy more clothes,” Pax mutters, walking past me – his horse is already secured.
Seth puts the correct key from his chain of a hundred into the lock, first try. Chaos really pisses me off.
I rub at my shoulder, feeling the almost-healed break from my recent experience with Saber bars and too many keys.
Still no sign of a single person.
Some Seeds are pretty hard to contain, those were the ones kept in pure Silvari glass.
Were pretty hard.
Were kept.
We walk towards the front doors with our weapons sheathed. My senses pick nothing up. Dead air. Empty cells. The barest trace of the Veil having been opened – there’s a burned and decaying taste to the Veil.
And maybe it’s that taste that masks the presence of Sabers in the shadows until it’s too late.
“Fuck,” I curse, getting Pax and Seth’s full attention.
We turn to face the gate and the five approaching Sabers.
Daryan is in the lead. The other four I’ve never seen before. Three women and one man. Warriors. Fighters. Not Sabers from the White Castle – they smell of darkness and the Veil. Sabers that belong within these walls.
And I’ll happily put them in the ground.
They funnel into the courtyard, swords drawn and sneers on their faces. As if they think we’re cornered.
That their victory is even an option.
Daryan runs his tongue over his sharpened teeth before speaking.
“I’ve found a way that I can forgive you,” he says.
“Forgiveness won’t make you a better man,” Seth shoots back.
But it’s already too late for Pax. Thane is fighting for dominance, the two of them beyond making small talk.
He lunges forward, drawing his sword as he covers the short distance. Shimmers of fur appear then vanish.
“Control,” I can hear Pax growling as I run beside him.
Seth is just as quick, Allure pooling around us even though our final brother is far away. To these Sabers, it would look like we’re moving in unison. Fast and deadly.
I take down the woman on the right, a clean thrust through the chest. The movement sends pain shooting through my arm – but I ignore it. Pulling her dying threads and ramming them into the next guy. He chokes on the raw energy – the strangled look in his eyes more than satisfying to watch.
“Sit, doggy,” Daryan says, shattering my moment. My small victories.
Pax growls. Resists. Drops to one knee. Obeys.
All of Pax’s panic translates into Thane trying to surge forward and take control.
“Seth,” I shout, but I’m way over here and Seth is way over there and Pax is in the middle. Seth can’t get to him, he has a Saber on either side of him.
Daryan leans in, whispering in Pax’s ear. Slow, deliberate words.
Shadows envelop my hand. A small blade from the Aeons forming in my grip. I toss it hard, embedding the knife in his thigh. But at the same time, I’m already running – throwing my whole body into Daryan and sending the man flying. He crashes to the cobblestones nearby. Rolls. Lies on his back and laughs.
“Now he can feel the pain of losing a brother,” he says through the laughter.
The only other sound is of Seth’s sword blocking and being blocked by the cold steel of the other two Sabers. Then a scream as he cuts one down.
I turn slowly, making sure I can still see Daryan, as I seek out Pax.
He’s kneeling on the stones, shoulders hunched. Thane is partly in control – the glowing eyes and molten metal through his skin is a dead giveaway. I don’t need Daryan to tell me that he ordered Pax to kill us.
Told our brother to fight until one, or all, of us are dead.
I half smile at the idea – it’s almost something I would do.
Seth drops his last opponent, but Daryan isn’t paying attention to that. He wants Pax to attack us, and he wants to watch. Absorbed in his blood lust with his sharpened teeth sneering at us.
Thunder cracks and the sky opens up. Rain falls as if in one sol
id sheet, heavy and blanketing.
Pax grips his sword in his fist, fingers flexing. Then he releases it. The blade falls to the stones.
He’s fighting the order. Fighting Thane and the control Daryan has over them.
Thane withdraws and in one sharp motion, the small metal token is out of his pocket and pressed to his chest. Light flashes and he grunts in pain, doubling forward. The token, used and burnt out, falls to the ground. Small wisps of smoke slip from the metal.
Daryan begins to shout, something pained and disappointed, but Seth finally reaches him and buries his weapon deep enough into Daryan’s stomach to pin the dying asshole to the ground, spluttering blood. Gasping. Giving up.
Seth doesn’t know what Pax just did, doesn’t understand it, but in a moment of clarity that only the bringer of Chaos can have he turns his full attention to our brother. Seth’s body rolls with ash-scented fear and a hint of the threads of regret.
I leave Pax to his pain, to his success, and walk the last few steps to Daryan, kneeling beside the dying Seed.
“Lithael sent you?” I demand.
He chuckles, blood bubbling in his mouth. “It’s not that simple.”
“Then simplify it,” I growl. “Who opened the cells?”
“The grimm,” he chokes out.
“Are they all hunting us?” I demand.
He barely shakes his head, “The grimm are hunting no one.”
“Where are the prisoners?” I demand, gripping the hilt of Seth’s sword.
Seth, whose full attention is on Pax still kneeling on the stones.
“Evil is hunting you, and will never stop. The rest of Tanakan will bring the mortals to their knees. Our border is coming down.”
“And what of the Cataclysm?” I demand.
“Lithael put her in there – see for yourself.”
“And the weapons, the ones being stolen by bandits. Was the MagnetSeed in here?”
He laughs again. Like he knows his time is up and he’s weaving this information into our lives to cause one last piece of destruction to our world.
“If you’re not stealing the Crown’s weapons, then I don’t know who is,” he says.
Slowly I turn the blade, while asking, “What else do you know? What kind of weapons? Talk.”
“I failed, but evil won’t. Run, run far away, or die.” He gasps. Then stops.
I turn the blade a half-inch more with no reaction. The man’s dead.
Seth doesn’t care, he’s advancing slowly on Pax.
“What did you do?” he demands.
“I,” Pax gasps, “bought us some time.”
Seth’s on the guy before he can catch his breath. Pulling him to his feet and holding him in the air. The collar of Pax’s shirt is scrunched in Seth’s hand.
“What. Did. You. Do?” Seth demands, fear and anger licking through the words.
Five dead bodies lay around us in the storm.
I wait to see who’s going to hit who first, my arms folded over my chest, with just a little relief at taking the weight off my damaged shoulder. It’ll be solid in a day or so, if I stop trying to fight people.
Not likely.
Pax just looks at him. He’s waiting too.
The sigil is clear on Pax’s exposed chest. A circle, a cross, six slashes, two dots, and the half swirl of a moon phase, though the edge is sizzling like the phase is already being burned through.
“Tell me what it means,” Seth demands.
“You tell him,” Pax gasps.
“It’s a leash,” Thane growls through Pax’s vocals.
Pax’s body, but Thane’s voice is canine, hungry, deep, with a beast’s quality.
“We just killed the BeastSeed,” Seth growls.
“I almost killed her. In the markets. I almost killed her. It’s too much of a risk. I’m too much of a risk,” Pax gasps.
Seth lets him go. Turns to pace. Running his hand through his wet hair, then smoothing down the front of his shirt, then back through his hair.
“If you put her in more danger,” he finally says, furious but restraining himself.
He always got along better with the wolf than with the man. Thane has a respect for impulse – or idiocy, not sure which.
“I need to check the glass wing,” Pax says.
“We need to,” Seth agrees.
48 miles to Potion Master Eydis
Roarke makes a light clicking sound, and I pull my attention to him.
“What’s wrong?” I ask, but he just smiles.
“We need to get to Eydis as quickly as we can. We can’t be out in the open like this. So we need to ride hard.”
I hold my reins out to him, to be fastened to his saddle, because me going any faster than a walk on my own is likely to end with me riding straight into a solid-bubble-wall.
Roarke shakes his head. “We need to keep some distance. It could be a few days before the others get back. You and I can’t spend that whole time within arms’ reach of each other.”
“If I ride faster than a walk, I’m going to smack into a wall,” I say.
“I won’t let that happen.”
He turns and pulls a length of rope from its coiled position behind him, then fastens it between both our saddles.
“I can’t get any further back than this,” he says, waving to about eighteen paces worth of slack rope. “Click your tongue, relax the reins, and swing your legs. Your horse isn’t used to being in the lead, but he’ll work it out.”
I do as I’m instructed, and the horse lunges forward. A canter, I think this is.
Fast is another word for it.
Roarke stays at the end of the rope, and as my horse’s rhythm becomes steady, I relax. The forest grows thick and dark around me, and, once I know the horse isn’t going to run me into a tree, my mind begins to wander.
Sweet Roarke, with a past full of death and the ability to make people do whatever he wants them to. Sure, the guy ordered me to strip my clothes off in his bedroom once, and he likes walking around with his shirt half unbuttoned. He flirts, a lot, and a lot of people flirt with him too. But he’s gentle.
So very gentle.
And we’re all stuck in this mess.
Such a giant, chuckin’ mess.
The one thing to fight a grimm is something that’s finally dead.
Wait until your grief has passed then – Seek the remnant beyond the border,
Speak to a man named Martin but believe the word of a bird.
Let your reflection go hazy in clear waters and see instead through a gray lens.
In Silvari glass is a blade that can pass, a soul that can kneel and a world that can heal.
This is not a battle that can be won. Before this time can pass, the mortal soul from its beginnings cannot last. There is no way a soul can rule and live.
Because I heard what the Origin spring said to the tallest forest tree – the key will be in the last of me.
At first I ignore the subtle change in the forest, or not really ignore it, but deem it less important than holding on and thinking about life. But the hours pass and the further we ride, the clearer it is – the trees are getting taller. I can’t even see the tops of them anymore.
Then, without warning, we run out of path. It just stops.
Roarke catches up, coiling the rope as he moves closer.
“Keep riding,” he says.
“Which way?”
“Straight, I’d think.”
I nudge the gelding forward, around a tree, a log, and then a bush. Time passes.
We amble down a slope that looks just like any other. My skin prickles, but before I can stop or say anything, pain slams into my skull. My head pounds in time with my pulse. I squeeze my eyes shut, grip the saddle, and hold my breath. The horse takes two more steps, and as quick as the pain hit – it’s gone again.
“You okay?” Roarke asks, looking me over with a concerned crease around his eyes.
I nod a little as the pain washes away.
We’re no longer in the middle of a nondescript forest; we’re in a really big clearing with a narrow stream flowing right through the middle of it. At the bottom of the slope is a two-and-a-bit story wooden cottage on stilts. The windows are closed, and I can’t see any movement inside. Behind it is a chicken coop made from tree branches and wire. Nearby, a yard for stock sits empty. On the other side is a large square of cleared land that might have once been a crop of wheat or corn, but it’s just dirt now.
The sun is streaming straight in, bright and beautiful. There was probably grass at one stage, but the whole circle inside the trees is brown and dead. It’s peaceful and sad at the same time, which unsettles my nerves. Not hard on top of the conversation that’s been left unfinished since we separated from the others.
Roarke rides past me saying, “Let’s find Eydis.”
“Yes, let's find the white-haired woman who may or may not have drowned me as a baby,” I mutter.
“I’m pretty sure drowning you wasn't her intention,” Roarke says.
“In that case, putting a taco in Pax’s boot was never my intention either.”
A smile cracks into one corner of his mouth, mission accomplished. We turn and continue toward the little cottage, and freedom.
I hope. Please be freedom.
Who am I kidding – probably not freedom. I’m not that lucky.
But maybe food, possibly chocolate, and definitely answers.
Then his gaze brushes over the top of my head, and his expression drops into hard lines.
“Get down,” he says, dismounting and drawing his sword at the same time.
I swing clumsily to the ground, hobbling for a second before I get my balance and get my legs to straighten. I wrestle one of Killian’s blades from my bag, which takes longer than it should, because I’m too busy searching the windows of the building for whatever danger has put Roarke into warrior mode.
He grabs his horse’s reins and guides the animal to walk just ahead of him. Shielding us both.
Shadows and Shade Box Set Page 65