Stain

by A. G. Howard

  Elbows on her knees, she cupped her temples and shut her eyes, willing the world to stop spinning so her disjointed thoughts might do the same.

  Scorch, where are you?

  She took her favorite memory of him and spun it like a web within the dark swirl of her consciousness, hoping it might capture Scorch’s own thoughts, remind him of their bond, and bring him out of hiding.

  In this memory, Stain and Scorch had snuck out during the cessation course, as the best adventures were had while most everyone slept . . . when the hazy, greenish-gray world belonged to them alone. A group of thieving minstrels had passed through the ravine, and a gala was in full swing at the Wayward Tavern. Stain had peered within the tree’s opened windows where the musicians played fiddles, lutes, and percussion instruments. Dancers in fancy dresses and suits—with threadbare hems and tarnished embellishments—filled the hollowed-out trunk. The scent of ale and a comingling of warm food and body odor wafted out with the music.

  The rhythm made Stain’s feet warm and twitchy. Much like walking, or signing with her hands, dancing was a skill she’d retained, though she couldn’t grasp its origins. She wriggled in her boots and swished the hems of her breeches, pretending she wore a wide-swinging skirt with a fringe of lace. Her nose wrinkled as she attempted the fancy steps.

  Scorch nudged her away from the window. They walked out of view of the tavern until the trees surrendered to a small clearing. The music reached across the hazy distance.

  What were you doing there, with your feet? Scorch asked. And why was your nose crinkled?

  Stain shrugged. I was concentrating . . . pretending to dance in a ballroom. To spin among candlelit sconces, under an ornamented ceiling, alongside a graceful partner. That would be a grand adventure.

  His tail snapped in derision. Rather more like a waste of time.

  Of course, you wouldn’t understand. She wriggled in her boots and swished her hems again. Horses can’t dance.

  His ears flattened. I can dance as well as any man. Whickering, he shook hundreds of embers free of his mane until they lifted in the air. His wings flapped, stirring half of them to drift upward, imprinting their glow on the velvety canopy overhead. The rest of the lights floated around them until their surroundings resembled an arbor made of fireflies.

  Scorch huffed. There’s your ballroom.

  Stain gasped, marveling at the beauty of it. She reached up to blot appreciative tears from her cheeks, but none were there—regardless that her eyes pricked.

  Scorch lowered his long neck and bent a lithe, graceful foreleg in a bow worthy of any gentleman. Then, he pranced within the circle of embers, keeping time with the music—his tail flared out elegantly like a flag of silk, his legs stepping high.

  So awestruck by his expertise, Stain simply gaped.

  I’m too graceful a dancer for you, then? He asked, paused in mid-prance. Pitiful. A human game, yet I beat you at it like any other.

  She shook her head, unwilling to be bested. After a proper curtsy, she spun to the music alongside his prancing hooves . . . spinning and spinning until her surroundings blurred and the embers streaked inside her eyes to ribbons of yellow-orange light. Giddy and breathless, she fell on her back into a plume of ash, laughing.

  Scorch trotted up and snuffed her fuzzed head. He then sat on his hindquarters to gawk at her. Humans are strange creatures. Moved to tears by emotions. Moved to laughter by physical exertion. And you, tiny trifling thing, are the strangest of them all.

  She took that to mean she was the most human of all, and thanked him profusely, only to laugh again when he assured her it was nothing to be proud of. But she had been proud, for even if she didn’t know where she belonged, she knew with whom she belonged.

  Stain’s chest tightened on the memory; reliving it alone only made her feel lonelier. She no longer knew with whom she belonged. She wasn’t the foundling boy she pretended to be. She wasn’t the companion to a harrower witch and sylph team who robbed the dead and gave their memories life. She couldn’t remember Eldoria or Nerezeth—only the in-between.

  She had no identity; nothing that could serve as compass or beacon in this dry, powdery, gray world where she had never fit. Even the crooked shop owners had histories: places they’d come from, purposes to serve.

  Her closed eyes prickled—refusing her the satisfaction a few tears might offer. Tasting the salty flavor of heartache upon one’s lips was what made the pain one’s own. Without that experience, even her losses felt as if they belonged to someone else.

  Stain opened her eyes to find her dizziness gone. Standing, she stomped both her feet so the torn skin along her soles and ankles would throb. The pain grounded her, assured her the one true friend who helped her feel anchored and strong was still out there.

  Scorch . . . I want to help you. And I could use your help, too. Where are you?

  She caught a breath upon hearing what sounded like a muffled whinny from below. What if he had wandered within accidentally? He might be dazed if he’d lost enough blood, or even feverish. She didn’t know how a Pegasus’s body or mind reacted to trauma if he couldn’t fly to heal. The shrouds were known for playing tricks on the mind, yet she couldn’t dismiss the possibility her friend was trapped down there and needed her. Her desire to find him, and to find herself, trumped all caution.

  Crouching, she used exposed roots and low-hanging branches for anchorage during her descent. A stray quag-puddle—souring the air with its putrid stench—lapped at her heel, but she rolled her hips to the other side of a tree, sending the burbling murk off in another direction.

  She arrived at the bottom sooner than expected, and only then did her caution return in the form of countless white, piercing eyes. She didn’t see Scorch anywhere. Clenching the bag at her shoulder, she reminded herself of her other reason to brave this cursed lowland, and stepped forward as vapory, black silhouettes glided out from behind the trees to surround her.

  Her shapeless captors stirred the thin layer of ash covering the ground, causing a misty effect. One skimmed closer, faded to a washed-out white, as gauzy as the clean muslin bandages in Stain’s bag. This shroud grew lithe-limbed and slender, morphing to a woman’s torso and face. Black, bony obtrusions appeared, giving the impression of a beak and horns.

  The creature leaned across Stain and breathed the scent of must and decay. “Our lost boy has returned.”

  Bitter regret knotted in Stain’s throat; if they thought her a boy, they hadn’t absorbed her memories. Crony must have them hidden away, meaning Stain had endangered herself for nothing.

  “I am Mistress Umbra, mother of the Shroud Collective. We are your ancestors. Those who lost their minds to the promise of darkness and rest centuries ago. You have two choices: become one of us and strengthen our cerebral framework, or offer your flesh for us to consume. Should you not choose, we choose for you.”

  Stain pointed at her throat, indicating she couldn’t speak.

  “Ah, have you lost your tongue? Fret not; I can look into one’s heart, read their deepest desires. But there must be nothing between us but flesh.” Mistress Umbra’s phantasmal hands became a half-dozen jagged twigs that reached for Stain’s clothes.

  Stain stepped back, causing the mother shroud’s fingers to miss their mark. A gust of wind bristled the shaved hairs along Stain’s neck. The ring of vaporous creatures tightened around her, pushing her forward.

  Mistress Umbra siphoned in and out of her children, one part ethereal, and the other substance. “Foolish boy. Do you not realize there’s no escape this time? You haven’t your pets to protect you. No rime scorpionsss,” Mistress Umbra’s beakish mouth hissed. “No shadowsss.”

  Stain hadn’t expected that information. Scorpions and shadows . . . protecting her. Her mind reverted to Crony’s cryptic allusion in the garden, about shadows offering freedom. Had she, in her half-dead state, somehow brought such creatures into the ravine with her? Where were they now? Had they been captured by Dregs and mounted as disp
lays in his shop?

  Remorse tightened in her chest as she thought upon her abandoned jars of earlier. She had to return to the ravager’s camp and steal them back.

  The wispy shrouds expanded to a wall of solid soot around her, leaving no opening. Meeting Mistress Umbra’s beady gaze, Stain pointed to the path above, indicating she wished to leave.

  “We have captured you,” the mother shroud said, “thus we own you. We need but choose whether to absorb your mind and memories, or gorge upon your flesh.”

  Stain’s throat grew dry. She signed out of instinct and desperation, having no expectation of being understood, for who could possibly read the strange language shared by her, Luce, and Crony?

  You didn’t capture me. I know you to be tricksters, but I chose to brave entering. To seek answers. I’ve no memory for you to consume. Your lair is as much my birthplace as it is yours . . . the place where my identity both ended and originated.

  To Stain’s surprise, the circle of shrouds drew back, their eyes dimming as they turned to their mother.

  “How do you know the old language?” Mistress Umbra asked, her beakish nose tipping sideways, as if weighed with curiosity.

  Stain gasped in disbelief. Her fingers grew more eager with the next question. Old language?

  “Ancient.”

  Where did it come from? Who first used it? Stain asked these both as questions and wondrous epiphanies. There were a people somewhere with whom she could communicate.

  “Its origins are vague. We know only that it abides within our consciousness.” The mother shroud waved a twiggy arm to encompass her children. “Our eldest souls brought it with them after the moon dropped from the sky. They remembered it from a great war involving deadly beasts. It harkens back to a time when there was no ravine . . . no split in the earth. No collection of disembodied corpses craving everything they’ve lost.”

  That was Stain’s cue. She opened her bag and dragged out a chime, holding it up. The glassy cylinders glistened faintly in the stagnant, shrouded miasma surrounding her.

  I propose a trade . . . fresh human memories for my freedom.

  She forwent asking for any further information. Given that the multitude of white eyes pierced her through—as though surmising how she might taste—securing her present seemed much more crucial than any past ever could.

  Mistress Umbra took one look at a mother and daughter singing nursery rhymes in the jingling glass and laughed—a thick, frothy sound, like the gurgle of a stray quag-puddle. “No, child. There will be no bargain. These memories sing of sleep and cessation. The search for rest is what trapped us here. We have slept long enough. What we wish for is to live, to experience. To wake . . . eternal.”

  The mother shroud’s refusal spurred her children to rise, bobbing in front of Stain with cavernous mouths open, their cold breath rife with the stench of blood and death. Stain suppressed a soundless scream and dropped the chimes while holding tight to her bag.

  Mistress Umbra sidled close enough her beak touched the tip of Stain’s nose. Her ghoulish beauty sent a chill through Stain’s spine. “Many long years ago, a sylph man fluttered in and took a prize from us. A princess of Eldoria that we marked as our own.”

  Stain sucked in a shocked breath. A sylph. Were they speaking of Luce when he still had his wings?

  “In the bargain, he left us a part of her, to experience the robust flavor of her sins. But it escaped our watch. Then, you came to fulfill that emptiness. We felt the same draw to you, as you were also from that castle.”

  Stain tensed. From Eldoria’s castle? How do you know?

  “We recognized the page boy’s royal vestments; only two other witnesses realized you were wearing Eldoria’s traditional habiliments. A shame those two have been keeping that secret from you.”

  Stain stood her ground, though the reminder of Luce and Crony’s betrayal made her want to sink.

  “You came today in hopes to understand who you are. I will tell you.” Mistress Umbra stretched tall as a tree. Stain craned her neck to look up at her and lost her balance, landing on her rump. “You are payment for a debt long overdue. We’ve thought of you often, wishing to see inside your mind and understand how a boy of Eldoria’s courts merited the fealty of Nerezeth’s creatures. Day and night, together, here in our wasteland. When you first came, we had hoped to absorb your memories, your identity, your power; for our need to conquer and assimilate roils as deep and dark as our hunger for flesh.”

  The shrouds whipped around Stain’s head, slapping her with fallen leaves and bits of ash. Their gusty passage swiped at her eyelashes, stirring them so they tickled unsettlingly.

  “However, mostly dead and broken as you were, the old witch thought you valuable. So she promised us recompense should we turn you over.” The mother shroud snarled. “She gave us an important memory from a dying knight then vowed to send that marked princess to us again, so we could share the memory with her. For it will break her. Thus, we released you, as the promise of vengeance is sweeter by far than any other flavor. But five years have passed, and all we have to show for our patience is the bouquet of roses that rested upon your chest in your coffin.” Two of the shrouds sank into the ground then returned with a bouquet of withered black roses held between their nebulous forms. They tossed them toward Stain. She picked them up. The perfume was powerful and stung her nose, triggering a ripple of familiarity. Not from a memory, but from a dream she’d had just before waking the first time in Crony’s keep. A dream of lavender petals and golden ink on black pages. “As you have no memories to share, your mind has little to satisfy our consciousness. Thus, we’ll settle for your tender flesh to appease our appetite.”

  Stain’s pulse lurched. The shrouds hissed and gathered so thickly, they blotted out the canopy overhead until there was nothing but blinking white eyes and gaping, hollow mouths. Stain drew up her hands to protect her face, pleading in silence. Her eyes squeezed so tightly, she didn’t realize her fingers had lit up until she felt the burn. She peeked, seeing the golden glow and that the roses had revived in her hands, the petals soft and velvety again—as if freshly plucked.

  The shrouds pulled back to make room for Mistress Umbra. Her twiggy fingers took the bouquet away. “You’ve sunlight in your hands, boy . . . another fascinating anomaly. But not enough to save you. Not enough.”

  The shrouds advanced and siphoned into her skin, their blackness spreading alongside her veins in jagged trails. She felt herself becoming vaporous, her heart slowing its beat.

  If you’re done entertaining your playmates, I could show them some real light.

  Stain’s body stiffened at Scorch’s voice in her mind. He sounded out of breath, yet strong.

  Help me, she pleaded.

  As you say, tiny trifling thing, but you will owe me a token of service. Things are going to get hot. Protect yourself.

  She forced her body into a ball—a monumental effort, as her limbs and torso felt as insubstantial as air. The moment she’d covered her head with the canvas bag, rescue came in a rush of hoofbeats, heat, and harrowing shrieks. An uncomfortable pulsation stretched beneath her skin and out her fingertips as the shrouds abandoned her. They dispersed behind their trees, leaving Mistress Umbra to fend off Scorch’s fiery attack alone.

  Stain coughed in the smoky aftermath, her body aching again. She welcomed the pain; it meant she was solid, alive. Scrambling to her feet, bag in hand, she positioned herself behind Scorch.

  The Pegasus’s powerful muscles twitched, though he listed toward his left wing where it dragged the ground. The other wing, healthy and strong, thudded, stirring gusts that fed the sparks in his mane and tail until they flickered bright as torches. Damaged as he was, there was no question he would be the victor. Shrouds were nothing more than darkness incarnate. Scorch—with his flame and wind—was their enemy inasmuch as shade fled from sunlight.

  With a low, grunting nicker, he ignited the tangled roots leading to the circle of trees, setting trunks and li
mbs ablaze. The shrouds wailed and sank beneath the ground where the moss and ash protected them.

  “You want to know who you are, girl?” The mother shroud was submerged up to the waist within the gray powder as she slowly descended the way of her children. “We tasted your fate, beneath your flesh. You are riches and poverty. Life and death. You are more and less than you ever dreamed. But you have challenges yet to face. In the end, you will have to prove hard enough to wrap yourself in spikes, yet tender enough to walk amongst stars without crushing their fragile legs. You will need to have hair of steel and tears of stone. Only then will you find your true self again.” Her head disappeared into the ground, the ash funneling in her wake.

  Panting, Stain could do nothing but stare at the blank spot where the creature vanished. Possessing Stain’s body must have given the mother insight, for she had recognized Stain as a girl. Did that mean all her riddles were true? Steel hair. Stone tears. Wearing spikes and wading through stars? How could such things be in anyone’s future?

  Scorch whickered, the equivalent of clearing his throat.

  Stain looked up. Thank you . . . and I’m sorry.

  The Pegasus puffed a cloud of smoke in answer.

  They stood there, surrounded by firelight and cracking wood.

  She wanted to hug him for his timeliness—for saving her—but he was too proud for such emotional frippery.

  What foolishness led you here? he asked, flicking his tail in an annoyed gesture.