Heart of Shadra

by Susan Faw

  “Do not let it touch you!” screamed Shikoba. “If you contact a prayer not meant for you, it will kill you!”

  Obsidian rolled to the left to avoid another trailing black finger, but this one changed directions as though it had locked onto Obsidian as its true recipient. Shikoba flung a look over her shoulder. The wisp curled around and grew fat, gathering other lost prayers into its trajectory, gaining speed and strength.

  Sarcee groaned, hopping onto Shikoba’s other shoulder. “Do you see that? It’s following us!’

  “Yes, I see it!” Shikoba’s focus returned to the churning chimney-like opening. “We must go through the barrier. There is no other way. If it is the will of the spirits, they will grant us access. They will make it possible to pass. Obsidian, do you see it? Head for the brightest light on that tower of rock. It will be the ceremonial fire. Go!” she yelled.

  Obsidian needed no further urging. She pointed her nose at the impossibly small opening and dived.

  They tumbled out of the sky, spiralling toward the opening. Wind whipped Shikoba’s robes, flattening them to her body, and her sleeves flapped with the pressure. Sarcee tucked himself into Shikoba’s hair and hung on. He could always shift into a bird or some other creature, but this was the safest way to travel until they were within the barrier. As they approached, the aperture cleared and the opening was revealed. Sharp crystals, like the teeth of a monstrous shark, protruded into the opening. But that was not the worst of it. The opening was closing.

  “Obsidian! Hurry!” urged Shikoba. The dragon put on a burst of speed and shot like a javelin into the opening, just as the black-fingered thought touched her tail. Obsidian roared. Her wings spasmed, flopping limply at her side.

  “Obsidian!” screamed Shikoba, as they fell through the opening. Obsidian’s right wing caught on one of the crystal teeth, tearing the toughened flesh and ripping through scales. There was a blinding flash and a clap of thunder. They slammed onto a hard surface, skidding along the flat stones. Obsidian slid unconscious across the tableau, leaving behind a sickening trail of purple blood. With a final thump and roll, she came to a rest and did not stir.

  Shikoba was tossed from the saddle with the force of the impact, tumbling over and over before colliding with a rock wall. Sarcee leapt from Shikoba’s hair just before she hit the ground. Shikoba’s head struck the stone, hard, and all went black.

  ***

  “Who is she? Is she dead?”

  “Never mind about the girl. Look, a dragon! Is it still alive? I didn’t know that dragons could be hurt. Maybe we should cut its throat right now to make sure.”

  “You really think you could cut that throat? Look at the scales! They shimmer like the barrier. No knife we have would be able to get through that hide!”

  “Maybe we should go get an elder.” The girl’s voice trembled, betraying her nerves.

  The boy snorted. “What, and tell them we have been playing with the prayer pipe? You know that this rock is sacred. It is forbidden to light the ceremonial fires. They will have our hides stretched in the sun if we tell them about any of this!”

  “Then what should we do?” squeaked the girl.

  Sarcee shifted into his human form, behind Shikoba, where he had landed when he’d jumped. In his human form, he appeared to be a boy of fifteen or sixteen. He was hoping it was about the same age as the children in front of him. He stood up.

  “If I were you, I’d help them. They are hurt. And your fires may have just saved their lives. For this, we are grateful.” At his voice, the pair jumped, surprised by his presence. The boy snatched up his spear and thrust it out in front of them, its bladed tip pointed at Sarcee.

  “Where did you come from? You were not there a minute ago.” The finger the raven-haired girl pointed at Sarcee shook slightly. “Who are you?”

  “I am called Sarcee. And this,” he touched the shoulder of his unconscious bond mate, “is Shikoba. Shikoba of Shadra.”

  The boy was of an age with Sarcee with tousled red hair curling in all directions. He lowered his spear in response to Sarcee’s words, and his brown eyes widened. “The Shikoba? Of Shadra?” His eyes flitted over to the woman on the ground. “She is a legend. She has been gone for a very long time. We know of her from the stories.”

  Sarcee nodded. “She was hurt in the return, as was her dragon. This is Obsidian. She is not a threat to you, unless you intend harm to us. Do you?” Sarcee tilted his head in a birdlike movement. The two teens shifted uneasily, exchanging excited glances. Their gazes kept returning to the dragon. Obsidian trumped any forgotten hero in their book.

  “What would you have us do?” they asked in unison, their words coming out in a rush.

  “Keep our presence secret. We have a mission to perform here that is important and urgent. But they are hurt and need time to recover. The sacred tower here, it is secluded and private. Will you help my friends? They will reward you.”

  The pair exchanged glances again and nodded agreement.

  “We were worried the elders would see the smoke and come, but if they haven’t arrived by now, we may have escaped notice. We didn’t know the pyre would burn so hot! Everyone is asleep. It’s only an hour or so before dawn. The last patrol in this area was hours ago,” volunteered the girl. She stepped forward and held out her hand. “I am called Tesha. This is my brother, Deshi. We will help you as long as you don’t report us.” Tesha glanced over at Deshi. Their eyes met. “We were not supposed to light the pyre, but no one else would do it.” Tesha’s eyes fell on the pyre. “Only the queen is to light the pyre, but…” Her voice trailed off. She bit her lip.

  “Agreed,” said Sarcee, considering the pair standing before him. “You need to return to your home. When you come back, do so only at sunset. We will treat all other approaches as hostile. Do you know any bird cries?”

  “How about this?” Deshi whistled a bird call, and Sarcee nodded.

  “Use that call when you approach the tower. We will know it is you. Now, can you gather some supplies for us? Food, some bandages? And a map if you can find one.”

  Tesha nodded. “I can get them from the pantry in the long house.”

  “Okay, you should go. I will tend to our friends here. I know what they need and can heal most of their wounds.”

  “Then why do you need the bandages?”

  “For those we might injure defending ourselves,” said Sarcee, grimly.

  “Oh.” Tesha’s mouth fell open with surprise. Deshi nudged her, and she closed it with a snap to stem the questions trying to worm their way past her lips.

  “Go!” commanded Sarcee in a stern voice. They ran over to the staircase that led to the summit on which they all stood.

  “One last thing,” called Sarcee. “Magic is forbidden, or at least it was when we left. I can’t imagine that has changed. Breathe a word of any of this, and all of our lives may be forfeit. Shikoba has powerful enemies, even among her own people. You would be wise to guard your tongue. Speak to no one about us. Not a living soul. Understand?”

  Tesha and Deshi both nodded, then hurried down the staircase. Sarcee watched them exit the base then head across the sand. His eyes followed them until the gloom swallowed their shapes. They were alone at last.

  Chapter 2

  The First Clues

  OBSIDIAN FLEXED HER MASSIVE WING, testing the stitches Sarcee had sewn into the leather. A burning pain saturated the area when the sutures stretched, but her face remained impassive.

  A dragon would not acknowledge pain, she thought. That is for lesser beings.

  Sarcee chuckled at their shared thoughts and then knelt beside Shikoba, placing a hand on her forehead. She had taken a good blow, but it should not have kept her unconscious for this long. Gently, he shook her shoulder to wake her.

  “Shikoba. Wake up, Shikoba. Stop being so lazy.”

  “It’s my turn to sleep in. Leave me alone,” she muttered as she turned over and threw an arm over her eyes.

  “Shikoba, I
am not your mother.” Sarcee sat back on his haunches, grinning, waiting for her to rise to his bait.

  Shikoba opened one eye and glared at the Djinn. “Thank the spirits. You are way too ugly to be related to me.”

  Sarcee clutched at his heart in mock pain. “Oh, the words! They are sharp enough to wound this morning.”

  “It would take more than words to get through your thick hide.” She pushed to a sitting position, glancing over at Obsidian. “Sorry, Sid, didn’t mean to insult you. Your hide is gorgeous, of course.”

  The dragon curved her neck, showing off the glossy scales from which her name derived. The first rays of sunlight stabbed across the clearing and bounced off her neck, tossing rainbows across the stone wall of the alcove. Obsidian huffed and a curl of smoke rolled past her nostrils, to float away on the frosty morning air. I told Sarcee you were fine. I would know if you were not.

  Shikoba grinned at Obsidian and then squinted at the rocks encircling them.. “This place is exactly as I remember it except that now they seem to be laying the pyres once again. When I was growing up, they were forbidden by the emperor. I wonder what has changed that they would defy his edict.”

  “It is curious,” said Sarcee. “What are the pyres for?”

  Shikoba got to her feet and walked over to the burnt remains that had guided their path past the barrier. “They are set by the Shaman of the Tundra during times of strife to act as peace offerings. This place,” she waved her hand at the stone fortress, “is a peace tower, a safe zone where all tribal and personal conflicts are left behind. No clan can harm another while within these walls. It is a sacred place for prayer and reconciliation. Treaties are formed in such places. If the emperor were not so evil, the Citadel would be the greatest peace tower of all. He already has the councillors of the provinces gathering in one place.”

  It is an honourable thing that your people do, said Obsidian through the bond. Peace is always the best solution. I like your people.

  “Not everyone seeks peace. I would that it were so.” Frowning, Shikoba walked over to Obsidian and released the buckle of the saddle bag. She reached inside and retrieved the parcel that had been given to her by Madame Cherise just before they left the shores of Jintessa. Brown leather wrapped around the bundle and it was tied with a cord. Shikoba rolled the end between her first finger and thumb. “Maybe there will be a clue in this parting gift that we can use to find our way. We know we must take down the barrier, but how? Where do we start? Maybe the spirits will help us? Or maybe we should seek help in the village?” Her gaze floated over the stone wall of the peace tower, in the direction of her home. Anxiety over her mission and the lives that were depending on her success, threatened to overwhelm her. It would be so easy to seek the elder’s help, her mother’s help. Any of them could do this better than she.

  Obsidian snorted, smoke curling from her nostrils as though she knew her thoughts. Jet black irises stared back at her, daring her to voice her fears.

  “Open the package,” said Sarcee with a grin, watching the exchange. “Delay is for the weak.”

  Shikoba shot him a look of annoyance, then sank to the floor and rested her back against Obsidian’s belly. She placed the parcel on her lap and pulled the cord. The wrappings parted and fell away, revealing the strangest collection of objects she had ever seen in one place. Several knuckle bones of some unknown beast rolled away, seeking the lowest spot in the bottom of the tanned hide. A slender, fluted bone was lodged inside the opening of a pair of leather moccasins, decorated with gemstones and glossy feathers. A perfectly preserved raven’s beak, complete with skull and of a size to be worn, sat on top of the pile. It was hand-painted. The artist had used vibrant blue and green paint to create storm clouds over an angry sea. The image was so realistic, Shikoba felt as though the image moved.

  Shikoba stared at the objects, willing them to speak to her, but nothing happened. Sarcee peered over her shoulder at the objects. “What are they for?”

  Shikoba shook her head. “No clue. I would guess they are ceremonial but for what ceremony, I have no idea. I have never seen anything like them.” She picked up a knuckle bone, rolling it around in her palm. She held it up to Obsidian, who sniffed gently at the bone, lest she suck it up into her nose. She wrinkled her nostrils then turned her great head away.

  “Hey, there is writing under the moccasins.” Sarcee pointed to the right where the corner of a piece of parchment peeked out from under the footwear. Shikoba tugged it out from under the slippers. Yellowed with age, the edge crumbled at her touch. Shikoba gently unfolded the parchment. It smelled stale as though it had sat in a dark, damp room for a very long time. She exposed it to a sheltered daylight, for the first time in a very long time. A spidery hand had moved across the paper forming shapes and letters with the tip of a quill. The sides of the parchment were decorated with pictures of short-winged birds, and sabretooth cats, a foxlike creature with a bushy tail and wolfish snout, and a many-headed sea creature. The sea drake was clearly identifiable as a creature of legend, but the colouring of its scales were all wrong. Shikoba scanned the page, but she couldn’t read a word of it. She sat back, annoyance thinning her lips.

  “Seriously? These objects,” she rattled the fragile parchment. The knuckle bone rolled off her lap and onto the dirt at her side,” are the items passed on by my ancestors to help me on my quest?” She folded the paper and put it down then picked up the deerskin wrapping by the sides and placed everything on the ground. “What the—” She stopped just short of swearing, but it was a near thing. Annoyed, she got to her feet. “I am going for a walk.” She stalked off toward the staircase and reaching the top, ran down the stone slabs to ground level. Once her feet were on solid soil, she broke into a run, sprinting across the rocky tundra. Running cleared her mind.

  The rush of the wind, the throb of her quickened pulse, the push of air on her face all helped to clear her thoughts. She breathed deeply, enjoying the sharpness of the cold. She was home, but she was not home. The world around her, so familiar to her youthful memories, had changed. Her eyes absorbed the images and her mind processed them automatically, yet it took a while for her to realize what she was seeing. Her steps slowed to a walk. On the surface, the land appeared to be the same but underneath, she sensed that it was rotting. The colours were off, dulled and blurred. Her tundra was a stark environment, of that there was no doubt, but even in the winter, there were hints of spring. Scraping back the snow, green grass and shoots of living plants were always present, simply sleeping under their blanket of winter.

  Shikoba dragged her booted foot through the snow, scraping back its frozen crust. She cleared a patch about a foot by a foot, then knelt on the hard ground. There was nothing present but hard packed earth. No grasses, no weeds, no fingerling roots of bushes. The earth was barren. Shikoba sat back on her haunches and peered around her, studying the terrain. She spied a low bush a few feet off, sticking above the crust. She got to her feet and walked over to it, snapping off a couple of twigs to check their cores. They crumbled to dust in her hand. There was no vein of life pulsing in the fragile limbs, branches that should have held promise of the spring to come.

  What is going on? The land is dying. Shikoba’s thoughts skittered along the bond, the words trembling with concern. It wasn’t long before she received a reply.

  Can’t you sense it? said Obsidian. There is no magic left in this land. It has dropped away from the earth. I cannot detect any signs of it. Cold would not hide it from me. A shadow passed over Shikoba, and Obsidian landed a short distance away to a spray of snow that drifted into the sky like smoke. Obsidian lumbered over to where Shikoba crouched in the snow. Sarcee was perched on her neck, back in bird form. The land is cold, lifeless. Magic has been leeched from the soils. There is nothing left to feed normal life. Obsidian dragged a claw through the snow, plowing the soil into a frozen furrow. She dipped her muzzle and breathed on the earth, melting the frost. It liquefied into a muddy mass. She took a long sni
ff, nose wrinkling with distaste.

  What could cause this? said Shikoba. I don’t understand. It’s one thing for the emperor to forbid magic, but to wipe it away completely? How could he possibly control the elements of magic? It is against nature. Shikoba stood up, her gaze sweeping the silent world. The stillness was eerie, like walking through the ancestral mounds where the Shadrian buried their dead.

  Sarcee launched himself into the air then shifted into human form as he touched the ground, walking over to Shikoba. “The clues are important, Shikoba. Do not dismiss them out of hand. Perhaps we should seek some help. Who do you know that could shed some light on the artifacts? Is there someone you trust that we could talk to? Someone with knowledge of magic?”

  Shikoba frowned, thinking. “There was an elderly Shamankas healer who used to live in the hills. There.” She pointed off to the southeast, toward the sea. “If she still lives, she would be very old now. She was old when I left. It could be a wasted trip, travelling that far to find that she has joined the spirits.”

  “It is a place to start. Travelling there will take many days. We can’t fly as we normally would, unless we want all of Shadra alerted to our presence.”

  “The last time I heard her spoken of, she was living near the swamp flats. She had a small farm there, where she raised goats. My mother used to take me to see her. Casper used to come with me.” Her eyes glazed over as a memory returned of her childhood companion, her best friend. She shook her head, to clear the image. She didn’t want to think about Casper. That was a puzzle for another time. “Let’s speak to the Shamankas. I think I can find the place, and it’s as good a plan as any for now. But first, we need to rebuild the pyre. It would be best to leave no clue to our presence, just in case some hunters decide to check the summit.” A few quick strides brought Shikoba to Obsidian’s side. She climbed into her saddle.