Pursuit of Shadows (The Keeper Chronicles Book 2)

by JA Andrews

  He felt more than heard her laugh.

  “There’s not going to be a later if you keep making noise,” she breathed.

  “You’ll know when they’re coming,” he pointed out. “I’m just trying to determine if it’s the sentiment or the timing you’re objecting to.”

  “I’m objecting to the volume,” she whispered. “And don’t even think about using your creepy magical skills to read how I’m feeling.”

  “There’s no need for that. I’m quite good at reading people even without my amazing magical skills.”

  “Then you know that Hal is about to betray us to Killien?”

  “No, he’s not.”

  “The moment Killien sees him, he’ll know you’re here.”

  Will let out a long breath. “Maybe, but that’s hardly the same thing as betraying us. Hal can hardly help Killien while he’s creeping around tunnels with us. You have to admit that today is a significant day for the Morrow. And Killien could use some help.”

  “Yes, with the murders and the threats and the slaughter.”

  “I’m not saying I approve of it,” Will said. “But Hal has a level head, and adding him to the situation can only improve it. It’s not like Killien’s going to listen to me if I ask him to stop.”

  “It feels wrong to do nothing.”

  “I agree.” Will leaned his head back against the hard stone. “I just have no idea what to do. He’s taken his revenge on Ohan, and he’s called the frost goblins. Anything we wanted to stop has already happened.”

  “They’re coming,” she whispered.

  Will cast out and felt a jumble of vitalle coming closer down the hallway.

  “Ohan’s dead.” Hal’s voice echoed loudly. “The Torches are discussing the future of the Sweep.”

  Hal passed their alcove, facing away from them down the tunnel, followed by three other Roven. Will drew in a breath and pressed himself back against the rocks, but none of them looked into the alcove. In a moment they were out of view, and a dozen heartbeats later, not even Hal could be heard.

  Sora motioned him to stay still and crept out into the tunnel. In a matter of breaths, she was back. “Empty.”

  He followed her out and around the next turn into the long tunnel with doors lining the right hand side along what must be the face of the mountain.

  “If Lukas is in there with Ilsa,” Sora said, “We’ll have to keep him from leaving and telling Killien.”

  Will nodded. Lukas’s scowling presence wasn’t going to make this discussion any smoother. At the end of the hall, he pushed gently on the Morrow’s door and it swung open enough to let him see a sliver of a stone room, well-lit with sunlight. The shushing sound of the endless wind filled it. He pushed the door farther to reveal a small common room with a wide, open window looking out over the Sweep. Several small tables sat near the back and a fireplace was carved into the outside wall. A few closed doors filled the wall to his left.

  Alone in the room, standing in front of the fire with her back to him, stood Ilsa.

  Chapter Forty-Five

  Will’s breath caught in his throat.

  There was something achingly familiar about the way she stood. He was young again, standing in his home, watching his mother cook. The longing that emotions evoked in him took his breath away.

  Ilsa pulled a shallow pan out of the fire and the Roven smell of roasting sorren seeds cut through his memory like a rusted knife.

  He stopped in the doorway, unwilling to make a sound, suddenly terrified she would turn around and see him. He spun his ring. Ilsa stood at a wooden ledge in front of the fire, mixing the seeds into something in a clay bowl. The wind outside gusted past, filling the room with its irregular shushing sound.

  Giving him a little push, Sora stepped into the room and positioned herself just inside the door, scanning the room, probably wondering where Lukas was, and keeping watch down the hall. The wind filled the room with a sound more like the ocean than the Sweep.

  Sora looked expectantly at Will. When he didn’t say anything, she said quietly, “Ilsa?”

  Ilsa glanced over her shoulder. Her eyes widened at Sora, but when she saw Will she spun around, clutching a rag to her chest.

  “You!” Her face grew pale.

  Will opened his mouth to say…something, but her surprised look shifted to outrage and the words stuck in his throat.

  Sora waited expectantly for a moment before sighing. “Ilsa, we’re not here to hurt you.”

  Ilsa turned accusing eyes on Will. “Haven’t you done enough to the Torch?”

  The strangeness of the accusation freed his voice. “To Killien?”

  “He’s been furious since you left, stealing some valuable book.”

  Will stepped forward. “Left? You mean when I escaped from the prison he was keeping me in? While threatening to kill you if I didn’t cooperate?”

  She paused at his words, her eyes narrowing suspiciously. “The Torch has never threatened me.”

  “When he brought you with him to the rift,” he said, his anger at Killien pushing its way to the surface, “he had a warrior behind you with a knife drawn, just so I wouldn’t say anything he didn’t want.”

  She shook her head. “Those warriors were there to control you.”

  “By threatening you!” he shouted and Sora hissed at him to be quiet. Will rubbed his hand over his mouth and pulled it down into his beard. This was not the way this conversation was supposed to go.

  “Will you please just leave?” Her face was still hard, but there was a note of pleading in her voice. She wrung the rag. “He’s so angry with you.” Her eyes flickered to Sora. “And with you. If he finds you two here...I don’t know what he’ll do.”

  Will took a step forward and she flinched back, pressing herself against the ledge. The fear that flashed through her eyes stabbed into him like a knife, pinning down his next words—the words he needed to say. His heart pulsed in his ears with an almost feral thrumming as he shoved the words out.

  “I can’t leave without you.”

  She dropped her hands to her side and her eyes went flat. “Leave.”

  “I’m your brother, Ilsa.”

  She leaned away from him. “He said you’d say something crazy. That if you ever talked to me, you’d try to make me come with you. But you’re a liar. You spent weeks with the Morrow lying to everyone.”

  “I’m a Keeper, from Queensland.” Will wanted to step closer but Sora put a hand on his arm. “I did lie about that, for obvious reasons. But I’m here on the Sweep because I’ve been looking for you. For a very long time.”

  Ilsa’s eyes flickered toward Sora. “The Torch trusted you,” she accused. “And you’re here, with him.”

  Sora nodded slowly. “Will’s not what Killien says he is. He’s a good man, and he really has been looking for you.”

  “How could you know he’s telling the truth?” Ilsa’s tone was scathing.

  Sora paused. “I believe Will thinks you’re his sister.” She gave a small shrug. “And you two do resemble each other.”

  Ilsa let out an exasperated huff. “That means nothing.”

  “You were two when they took you,” Will said and Ilsa’s gaze snapped over to him.

  “Anyone could have told you that.”

  “I was eleven. Do you remember anything about home?”

  Her jaw tightened and she shook her head slightly, and Will felt a jab of both heartache and relief. It must have made it easier for her not to remember, but it felt like a whole new theft, a violation to have also robbed her of those memories.

  “We lived in a one-room cottage with our parents on a very small farm with a goat and a dozen chickens.”

  Ilsa shook her head quickly, raising one hand toward him. “Stop, you could say anything, and I have no way of knowing if you’re telling the truth. What I do know is that you lied to people that I respect, so I have no reason to believe you. Please,” she pleaded with him, “you two are in terrible danger. Leave befo
re the Torch returns.”

  Will squeezed his eyes shut as the memory of her being pulled out the window came back with perfect clarity. Vahe’s furious eyes, Ilsa’s terrified face, her hand clutching her doll. Will’s eyes snapped open. “You had a doll.”

  Ilsa stiffened.

  “The night they took you, you were holding a rag doll. It was…really ugly. It had no hair and the face had rubbed off. The head was squished to the side because you slept with it every night.”

  Ilsa’s hands clenched the rag against her chest, her face pale.

  “It was so ugly, but I couldn’t bear to tell you that because you loved it so much. So I told you it was hideous, because I knew you wouldn’t understand the word. You thought I’d named her, so you called her Hiddy.”

  Ilsa flinched.

  “A man named Vahe took you.”

  At his name, Ilsa drew in a sharp breath.

  “He wasn’t coming for you.” The pressure of it grew in his chest until he could barely speak. “He was there for me.”

  Her eyes snapped open, but Will couldn’t meet them.

  “All these years, it should have been me here, not you.” The words strangled out. “If I’d have just gone with him, he would have left you alone.” He forced himself to meet her eyes. “I didn’t know.”

  Ilsa stood with her hand over her mouth, her eyes wide, her other hand clenching the rag to her stomach.

  “I’m so sorry.” Will almost opened up toward her, but he couldn’t tell if it was hatred or hope in her eyes, and if it was the former, the feel of it might kill him.

  Footsteps rang out and Sora spun toward the door.

  “Will can pluck memories out of your mind,” Killien’s voice came from the hall. “He knows exactly what you want to hear. Don’t believe anything the man says.”

  Chapter Forty-Six

  A wave of relief washed across Ilsa’s face, fueling the rage growing in Will. He turned to see Killien standing in the doorway, his silver seax unsheathed, his face burning with the anger that always filled him. Behind him two servants stood, their swords drawn as well.

  “No, I can’t,” Will said, fighting to stay calm. “I’ve never even heard of anyone who could pluck memories from your mind.”

  “So it’s just emotions you can read?” Killien asked.

  The words caught at him, leaving him feeling exposed, like fingers pulling open his cloak and letting the chill of the cave seep in against his skin. It hadn’t taken Hal long to fill Killien in. “Yes I can read people’s emotions. If I try.”

  Ilsa’s eyes were on him, wide with disbelief. When he met her gaze she stumbled back against the ledge.

  “Everyone’s?” Killien asked, a tight curiosity in his voice.

  Will nodded. Killien didn’t ask the real question. “Everyone I’ve ever met. It’s not like magic that can be countered. I can just feel people’s emotions all the time. Unless I work to close myself off. It’s like an extra sense. I can see you, hear you, smell you, and feel what you’re feeling.” He glanced at Ilsa’s pale face. “But I’m not doing it now.”

  Killien studied him, his anger seething into coldness. “A useful skill.”

  “Sometimes,” Will answered. “But in normal life, people express their emotions clearly enough for anyone to see.”

  Killien shook his head. “Everyone has secrets.”

  “Maybe.” Will shrugged. “But you’d be surprised how hard it is to suss out a secret based purely on emotions.”

  Killien stepped into the room, and the two slaves blocked the door. “I’m sorry I left you alone, Ilsa.” Killien walked past Will and Sora without a glance. Ilsa was still backed up against the ledge, gripping the rag so tightly tendons stood out on the back of her hands. “I had a suspicion the Keeper would reappear, but I didn’t think he’d follow us here.

  “There is no reason you need to be subjected to whatever lies he’s spun,” Killien continued calmly, motioning to the nearest door. “You don’t have to stay. You’re welcome to wait in the other room while Will and I finish something we should have finished long ago.”

  She hesitated a moment, the rag still clutched in her hand. She fixed her eyes on Will as though expecting him to lunge at her, or as though she finally saw a horrible monster she’d never believed was real. Her expression lit a mixture of gut-wrenching pain and rage in him.

  “Ilsa—” Will stepped forward, desperate to get that look off her face.

  Killien brought his sword up and leveled it at Will’s chest, the Torch’s face frigid and controlled. “No more talking to her.”

  At the coldness in Killien’s words, a flicker of something crossed Ilsa’s face, but she ducked her head, and hurried into one of the side rooms before Will could figure out what it was. The door shut behind her with a grim finality.

  “The sword that you said was too serious for a mere fight.” Will motioned to Killien’s blade. “Should I feel honored that you’re using it against me?” The blade was rougher than he’d expected, more primitive. The handle was sanded wood, the blade pockmarked near the hilt. The runes carved into the blade were roughly made. Naj. “What does Naj mean?”

  Killien ignored the question. He motioned to one of the slaves. “Bind them.”

  When it was done, he ordered them to stand guard at the door. “You picked a very bad time to come back, Will. I only have a short time. Hal and the slaves are holding the Torches, but I need to return.”

  Will searched for a hint of the man he’d thought Killien was, but found barely any resemblance. “What happened to you, Killien?” The ropes dug into Will’s wrists.

  The Torch paced across the small room to where Ilsa had stood. “Where’s my book?”

  “Far away.”

  “Why aren’t you far away? You’d escaped. And then…you came back.”

  “I couldn’t leave my sister under the control of a man like you.”

  Killien spun to face Will. “I have been nothing but generous to that woman. As has Lilit.”

  “She’s lived as a slave her entire life because of you,” Will flung at him. “And you’re using her to control me. What happens if you suddenly latch on to the mad idea that she’s a threat to the Morrow? Then anything’s acceptable, right? You can suck the life out of her as a demonstration of your power, without a second thought.”

  “That man”—Killien slammed his hand down and shoved off the ledge, coming face to face with Will—“killed my father.”

  Rage burst up from somewhere old and chained, a place that had smoldered for twenty years. He leaned forward until his face almost touched Killien’s.

  “You killed mine.” Will’s heartbeat pounded in his head, almost drowning out every other sound. “You sent Vahe to sneak into my home like a coward.”

  Killien pushed him back and looked away dismissively. “And if you’d ever had the chance to kill me, you would have. Grand ideas of peace evaporate very quickly in the face of a chance to make your enemy pay.”

  The memory of Lilit on the floor of the stifling tent, her life bleeding out into the ground rushed into Will’s mind. Her vitalle weak, dying like old embers.

  Will thought of Killien’s face, his desperation that night. “You’re blind.”

  The Torch’s face twisted in anger and he raised his sword.

  “Killien.” Sora sounded tired. “Stop acting like Will is something you know he’s not.”

  Killien’s sword froze and he turned toward her. He studied her for a long moment before letting out a harsh laugh. “It’s all true, isn’t it? You decided to help Will, and from that moment, everything he tried succeeded. He escaped me. He convinced Hal to help him.” Killien raked his fingers through his hair. “He escaped a dragon.”

  The Torch shook his head and paced the room. Sora watched him, her face stony.

  “I hadn’t thought it was true, Sora, but you are actually blessed.” He stopped in front of her, staring her in the face. “Until the night Lilit almost died, I doubted. But
the cursed part is coming true too, isn’t it?”

  Sora’s eyes hardened.

  “You’ve come to care about Will.” Killien considered Will for a long moment. “And here he is, at my mercy.”

  Will held his gaze. Beside him, Sora’s breath quickened.

  “I met hunters from your clan. They told me how you held the power of life and death. How you passed on judgment from the Serpent Queen to your people.”

  Will didn’t need to open up towards Sora to recognize the fury growing in her.

  Killien continued, his tone low and inexorable, “How being close to you was to court death…They told me about your little friend.”

  She flinched.

  “They told me about your mother…”

  Next to him, Sora’s shoulders strained against her bonds as she stared at the floor.

  “I didn’t believe them. It took me a long time to see what you really are,” Killien said, his voice dripping with disgust.

  “Sora,” Will said.

  She kept her face down, her shoulder drawn in.

  “Sora, please look at me.”

  She turned enough that she could just meet his eyes.

  “He doesn’t see you,” Will said, leaning forward to hold her gaze. “There’s no truth to what he’s saying. He only sees what he wants.”

  “On the contrary, Will.” Killien leaned back, satisfied. “I think I’m truly seeing her for the first time. I should thank you, Sora, for keeping yourself so distant from the people in my clan. And from me.”

  She closed her eyes and started to turn away.

  “I see you, Sora,” Will said, and she twitched to a stop.

  She stood frozen. He could see her brow drawn and her lips pressed together. She stared at the ground, her face hollow.

  “I see you,” he repeated. “You are intelligent and strong and independent and kind.” She didn’t move. “And a little bossy.”

  She twitched at the word, a flicker of surprise crossing her face, clearing out the haunted look.

  “There is no power that controls you and kills those you love. It’s not the truth. It’s just people grasping for power.”