The Shadow of What Was Lost

by James Islington

  “Very well,” he said quietly. “The truth is, I was in Caladel when I saw Davian being tailed by a group of men. There weren’t any Administrators around, so I followed at a distance to make sure nothing happened to the lad. When he passed the tavern, the men grabbed him and dragged him inside.

  “There was an Administrator coming out just as I went to go in. I asked him to help, but he said the boy wasn’t Gifted and so there was nothing he could do.” Taeris’s mouth curled in distaste at the memory. “So I went in. They’d already started roughing him up.”

  Wirr nodded. Davian never spoke of that day—Wirr knew his friend had blocked out the memories—but from what he’d heard, Davian’s injuries had been many and severe.

  “I pleaded with them to stop, but they held me down, too. Told me there was nothing I could do to stop them, that by the Tenets I couldn’t take action against them.” Taeris winced. “Your friend was a brave lad. He took the punches and the kicks in silence.”

  “Then one of them noticed the Mark on Davian’s arm. I don’t think it was there until the beating; I assume his body had never needed to draw enough Essence to activate the Tenets before. But once they saw it, the mood changed. They were only roughing him up a bit when they thought he was just a servant. When they saw he was Gifted…” He trailed off for a moment.

  “One of the men who’d had too much to drink brought out a knife. A big man, not the kind of man any of the others would have tried to stop, even if they’d wanted to. He was screaming something about his father dying at the hands of the Augurs, and that anyone even associated with them was… diseased.” He looked sick at the memory. “He started cutting into Davian’s face. Davian was screaming, but everyone else was just watching. Silent.”

  Wirr shivered. He’d always known that what Davian had been through must have been awful, but he’d never envisaged it this graphically before. “Then what happened?”

  Taeris hesitated. “Then the man stopped. They all just… stopped. The ones who were holding me down let me go. The one holding the knife turned it so that the edge was against his own face and… started cutting.” He drew a deep breath. “Then we all started doing it. All at once. Those of us who didn’t have a knife went and found one from one of the tables. None of us made a sound, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t agony.” He touched his cheek absently.

  “Davian just stood there, watching us, the blood pouring down his face and neck onto his shirt. I could see it, though. He was doing it. He was controlling us, somehow.”

  “What?” Wirr exploded. He felt his face grow red with anger. “You’re going to blame Davian for what happened?”

  “You asked for the truth,” said Taeris softly, checking to see none of the others had woken. “My Reserve saved me, but everyone else died. All at the same time, just dropped to the floor; as soon as they did, I could control my body again. I checked them but there was no heartbeat, no breath. Nothing. And when I went back to Davian, he’d fallen unconscious from the loss of blood.

  “I had to make a choice, so I used Essence to save him. That drew the Administrators, and once they saw the bodies they wanted an explanation.” Taeris shrugged. “I knew what the penalty was going to be, regardless of how it had happened or who had done it. I was an old man already, Davian just a child. It was an easy decision to tell them the lie.”

  Wirr felt a chill run down his spine. “And Davian never remembered?”

  “Thank El,” murmured Taeris. “Knowing him as I’ve come to over the past few weeks, I don’t think he would ever have forgiven himself if he’d found out.” He leaned forward. “This is important, though, Wirr. I don’t believe he knew what he was doing. The look in his eyes… it was vacant. Like he wasn’t even really there. I think what he did was from a pure survival instinct, nothing more.”

  Wirr gave a slow, reluctant nod. “And your scars? What I saw in Thrindar?”

  Taeris sighed. “Since that day… I’ve been linked to Davian, somehow, and it’s as if there’s some remnant of that moment in my mind. I wake up sometimes and I’ve cut myself. Or I have the knife in my hand. I never remember any of it, but I’ve always been able to sense where Davian is, so it seems likely that there was some sort of connection still there. After Deilannis…” His gaze dropped to the fire. “It was like a pressure inside my head disappeared. Now Davian’s gone, I don’t think it’s going to happen any more.”

  Wirr processed what Taeris had told him. It made sense. Davian’s Augur powers had saved him, somehow. Taeris, believing the boy was meant for something more, had taken the blame.

  “You finding us that night in the forest wasn’t a coincidence,” he realized.

  Taeris shook his head. “I was in the area because of Caeden, originally… but when I realized Davian was so close, I started tracking you. Trying to figure out why you’d come to Desriel,” he admitted. He gestured to his face. “Honestly, I’d hoped he was there for me. I thought perhaps he was tracking me down so he could sever the connection. But when I realized he didn’t know what had happened, didn’t have control of his Augur abilities… well, he’d been through enough already. There didn’t seem any benefit to adding to the poor lad’s burden.”

  Wirr was silent for a long time.

  “You did the right thing, Taeris,” he said eventually.

  Wirr had more questions, and he knew that Taeris probably had more for him, but after the revelations of the evening they were both content to just sit, mulling over what they had learned. Wirr had been staring into the fire for so long that he started at a sudden tapping on his shoulder.

  It was Aelric. “My turn,” he said with a tired smile. “Get some rest.”

  Wirr tried to sleep, but for a long time all he could think of was Davian and what Taeris had said. For some reason Wirr believed him, though there would be no way of ever proving the story.

  His last thought before he finally slept was that he wished Davian could have known just how much Taeris had sacrificed for him.

  Chapter 31

  Asha reclined in the armchair across from her bed, smiling as she listened to Fessi’s idle chatter.

  It was late, but for once Asha didn’t mind. She’d arrived back at her rooms to find the youngest of the Augurs waiting to deliver another vision to her, but it hadn’t taken long for the slightly awkward formalities to turn into a more relaxed, friendly conversation. They had been talking for a while now; the other girl had an open, laid-back personality that had put Asha immediately at ease.

  Asha hadn’t yet read the slip of paper she’d been given, but judging from Fessi’s demeanor it wasn’t urgent. Despite the hour, Asha hadn’t pushed for Fessi to leave so she could look at it, either. She had no desire to interrupt the first pleasant conversation she’d had in what felt like months.

  And more than that, it was helping to keep her mind from what had transpired the previous afternoon.

  Between Davian’s appearance yesterday and the ever-looming threat of the Blind—which no one in the city yet seemed to be taking seriously—she’d been distracted all day, much to the vexation of an obviously frustrated Michal. All she had been able to think about was Davian. Whether his presence had been a dream, a vision… or real. Whether he was alive, or whether her subconscious was somehow feeding her false hope. Every time she had almost convinced herself of one, she began to vacillate.

  “So you said it was through one of your visions that Elocien found Kol?” she asked, before she got caught up in her own thoughts again.

  Fessi nodded. “Several of them, actually. It wasn’t until I saw him drawing Essence from a forge that I realized why I was Seeing him so often.” She hesitated, a smirk and a slight blush spreading across her face. “Before that, though, a few of the visions were… interesting.”

  Asha gave her a quizzical look. “How so?”

  Fessi coughed. “The visions didn’t always show him when he was… appropriately dressed, I suppose you would say.”

  Asha stared at her fo
r a moment in surprise, then laughed.

  “Don’t tell him I told you that. I was never able to bring myself to admit it to him.”

  Asha shook her head in amusement, then sobered a little as her thoughts turned to the big man. What he’d Seen. “How is Kol?” she asked tentatively. “I know he wasn’t happy when I showed up…”

  Fessi made a dismissive gesture. “He’s fine. He knows we needed a Scribe, and he knows Erran wouldn’t have chosen you unless you were absolutely trustworthy, no matter what happened with the Shadraehin.” She shrugged. “He can be a bit of a storm cloud when you don’t know him, to be honest. He doesn’t tend to open up to people until he’s known them for a while, and until then, he just comes across as big and grumbly. But once you get past that… he’s a good friend.”

  Asha raised a questioning eyebrow at the warmth in Fessi’s tone, and the other girl’s cheeks reddened a little. Asha didn’t say anything, though.

  They sat in silence for a few seconds, then Asha gestured to the piece of paper on her desk. “So. Is this anything urgent?”

  Fessi sighed. “Not unless you’re worried about me getting a scolding from Trae tomorrow.”

  Asha winced in sympathy; Trae was the head cook and from what Fessi had previously indicated, not exactly an affable sort of fellow. In a small way, Fessi’s description of him reminded her of Mistress Alita back at Caladel.

  She pushed down a sudden wave of sadness at the thought, but the association with the school had already dragged Davian to the front of her mind again. For a few seconds, all she could think about was how he’d looked the day before. Old. Tired. Scarred and chained.

  “Are… you all right?” Fessi frowned in consternation. “Did I say something wrong?”

  “No. It’s…” Asha rubbed her forehead tiredly. “It’s nothing.”

  Fessi’s eyes narrowed. “You may know how to shield yourself now, and I may not have Erran’s skill, but I can tell it’s not nothing.” The black-haired girl hesitated, then leaned forward, her expression serious. “Look—I know what it’s like, not having anyone to talk to. Elocien was always too busy for anything more than debriefing, and I obviously couldn’t discuss my visions with Kol or Erran, either. Honestly, tonight is the first really open conversation I’ve had in a long time—and I appreciate that. So if there’s any way I can return the favor, I’m happy to listen.”

  Asha hesitated. She almost refused out of instinct, accustomed as she was by now to keeping things to herself… but she didn’t. She liked Fessi, knew the other girl could be trusted. And Asha hadn’t had the opportunity to talk to someone—really talk to someone—in a very long time.

  She couldn’t let Fessi know about Davian, of course; whether he had been real or not, admitting to anyone that she’d seen him seemed like a bad idea. But everything leading up to that was another matter.

  So Asha slowly, hesitantly told Fessi about Caladel. About her time in the Tol, about what had happened in the Sanctuary with Jin and Aelrith and the Shadraehin. It was hard, at times, but it also felt good to get it off her chest—to be able to share the burdens of the last couple of months with someone who actually seemed to care.

  Fessi listened the entire time in attentive silence; when Asha had finished, the other girl quietly began relating her own story. How someone in her own close-knit village had betrayed her to Administration when they’d realized she was an Augur. How Fessi’s family had refused to even say good-bye to their teenage daughter, who was presumably being taken away to be executed.

  And how terrified she had been, every time she thought of her own death. How she couldn’t sleep some nights, knowing what was coming.

  They talked a while longer after that, but eventually there was a natural break in the conversation and both girls stood, knowing it was getting into the early hours of the morning. They exchanged a warm embrace at the door.

  “No matter what you went through before this, Asha, I’m glad you’re here now,” said Fessi as they parted.

  “As am I,” said Asha with a smile. She meant it.

  Once back in her room, Asha busied herself getting ready for bed. She would have only a few hours until Michal woke her, but for once the thought didn’t make her scowl.

  An abrupt knock on the door made her jump; she shook her head, giving a rueful smile at her own startled reaction. Fessi must have forgotten something.

  She opened the door absently, barely having time to register the black-veined face behind the fist blurring toward her.

  Everything went black.

  * * *

  Asha groaned.

  She was lying on her side on a hard wooden floor; she groaned again as she shifted, her head throbbing. She slowly forced her eyes open, the eyelid on the left struggling to break free of the sticky, semidried blood that she suspected ran all the way down her face and neck.

  There was light, too bright to look at initially. A lamp. With an awkward motion, she twisted and rolled into a seated position against the timber wall. Her hands were tied behind her back, but she didn’t need to check to know she must have a serious gash on her forehead; aside from the pain, there was a brown circle of blood on the floor where she’d been lying. She took a deep breath, trying to focus.

  The small room was lit only by the lamp on the table; there was a seat next to that, but otherwise her surroundings were bare. A door at the far end of the room was shut, and looked solidly made. It was doubtless locked, but Asha slid herself over to it anyway, levering herself to her feet and barely managing to get her hands on the doorknob.

  She scowled as it refused to turn. Just as she’d expected.

  She assessed the rest of the room, forcing herself to stay calm. There was no point in calling out; if she couldn’t hear anyone outside then there was likely no one around to help. And she didn’t want to draw the attention of whoever had brought her here. This might be her best, or only, opportunity to find a way out.

  She made her way back over to where she’d started, feeling at her bindings as she went. The knots were tight, but she thought she might be able to undo them, in time. Whoever had tied them must have been in a hurry. Or, she hoped, simply careless.

  She frowned as she recalled the man who had attacked her. He had definitely been a Shadow… which more than suggested that the Shadraehin had become tired of her lack of answers. But Scyner hadn’t struck her as an impatient man, nor did he have any reason to think she wasn’t doing her best to fulfill her side of the bargain. It might be taking longer than he had anticipated—but kidnapping her? It didn’t feel right, didn’t feel like something he would gain any advantage from.

  She heard the scraping of boots outside the door and quickly lay back down, resting her head back in the tacky pool of reddish-brown blood. The lock clicked and the door creaked as it swung open.

  “Still out,” growled a deep voice as heavy footsteps clomped into the room. “You shouldn’t have hit her so hard, Teran. Shadraehin won’t be happy if he finds out we hurt her.”

  “The Shadraehin won’t be happy if he finds out we touched her,” came the dry response. “And as for hitting her so hard, I apologize. Next time I’ll try and hit the person I’m trying to knock out with just the right amount of force.” This man sounded sharper, more eloquent. There was a pause, and then he continued, “Besides, she’s awake. Get up, girl. I can see the bloodstain from where you moved.”

  Asha hesitated, then rolled into a sitting position, staring at the two men as calmly as she could.

  The man closest to her was Teran, the one who had hit her. A portly Shadow with a round, cheerful face, he was the least likely looking kidnapper Asha could have imagined.

  The other she recognized from around the palace, though she had never interacted with him. He was muscular, thickly built, probably someone who served in a heavy labor capacity.

  “Why am I here?” she asked quietly. Her head still swam a little from the pain, but she did her best not to show it.

  The big m
an scowled, but Teran just gave her a slight smile. “Direct. I like that.” He grabbed the chair from beside the table and swung it around so that it faced Asha, then sat on it. “I think you know why you’re here, Ashalia. We very much would like the information you promised the Shadraehin. The information you owe him.”

  Asha scowled. “As I already explained to the many messengers you sent—I don’t have it yet. The duke doesn’t trust me enough to tell me everything.” She shook her head, doing her best to look irritated rather than scared. “Why would I lie about this?”

  “I don’t know,” admitted Teran. “But we’ve been keeping an eye on you, and fates take me if you’re not in the Northwarden’s inner circle. Fates, he made you a Representative! You’re holding out on us, Ashalia.” He leaned forward. “I’m sure of it.”

  Asha stared at him steadily. “Perhaps it would be better if you got the Shadraehin to come down here himself, clear all of this up.” If Davian had been right and the Shadraehin was actually a woman, these two appeared to be unaware.

  The big man shifted, looking uncomfortable, but Teran simply smiled at her. He rose, stepped forward, and casually backhanded her across the face; the force of the blow sent her reeling, her vision blurring as new pain joined the already pounding ache of her skull.

  “So you overheard us talking. Congratulations,” Teran continued, as if nothing had happened. “The thing is, Ashalia, the Shadraehin wants us to keep an eye on you until you hold up your end of the bargain. Which wasn’t a problem until the other day, when he informed us that we were to stay up here and keep watching you even if this army, these ‘Blind,’ reach the city—that no matter how dangerous it gets, we are not to go back to the Sanctuary until he has his information.”

  His expression twisted. “And when I can see that you’re keeping me here in harm’s way, that upsets me. So you’re going to keep your end of the Shadraehin’s bargain, or I’ll start making things… unpleasant for you.” He leaned forward, touching Asha’s cheek gently.