A Tempest of Shadows

by Washington, Jane

  “The Sky Keep is not a tower,” Ingrid said, her voice lowering as she moved beside him. “It’s a castle.”

  “You’ve been around these Sinn folks less than an hour and you’re already obsessed with semantics.” Avrid glanced to her, his mouth twitching up.

  I watched them bickering quietly, leaving myself with only a moment to quickly prepare to see the Scholar before the cage groaned to a stop and the door was being pulled open by a steward woman who quickly disappeared. Avrid and Ingrid both stepped back to the wall of the cage, waiting for me to pass them.

  Right, they were only here to … why were they here again?

  With an uneasy tightness to my mouth, I edged past them and onto the carpeted balcony. It was wide enough for the thick shelves curving around the wall, a person, and a book cart. The railing was a twisted, patterned stormstone. The lamps extending from every second post were smaller than they had seemed from below, considering the collective glow that they all produced. Up close, they were warm and subtle, their glow welcoming. I walked along the shelves, my fingers brushing the ladders I passed. They were on rails attached to the shelves. One shifted at my touch, and my feet stopped. My hand was moving past the ladder, to the shelf beyond it, as though I had slipped. My fingers were against the spine of a book, the faded lettering dipping into the worn leather.

  The Battle for Ledenaether.

  My fingertip traced the last word, catching the grooves, spelling it out letter by letter.

  The afterworld.

  It was one word in Forian that everyone knew, steward or sectorian.

  Shuddering, I jerked away from it, and spun to find that Avrid and Ingrid had slipped away. They were standing several feet back, both of them staring over my shoulder. Calder was also looking that way, though his golden eye was as clear and bright as ever, no tension in the scars that lined his face. I swallowed, preparing myself for the Scholar as I quickly spun on my feet, pulling my hands firmly behind my back and taking a step away from the shelf.

  The Scholar seemed to gather darkness around himself. The golden-red glow of the lamp beside him was straining, hopeful rays of light pulling at his shoulders, trying to stroke the strong angle of his jaw. Every effort fell short, the brightness dying against his skin. He wore dark robes again, open along the front. His clothes beneath were black. A heavy belt was weighed down by scroll cases and smooth leather pouches. His eyes were a soft and angry colour, somewhere between blue and red. An unnatural, deep violet. With him so suddenly close, I could see the strange markings against the bare sides of his head, bordering the golden-moonlight hair at the top of his head that threaded through a thin black chain, a long braid disappearing into his robes. The markings were barely visible, the colour of his skin.

  Scars.

  Carvings.

  I made a soundless choking sound, my eyes flicking back to his in horror. He glared at me, and then at the book I had touched.

  “Can you read Forian, Tempest?” He spat out my Fated name like it was a curse. Which, of course … it was.

  I shook my head, even though it was only mostly true. It seemed like the safest thing to say.

  Keep your secrets, my mother had said once, her eyes seeing but unseeing, her face turned toward the window as steam from her teapot curled into the air. I could smell the jasmine from my memory, the ache of it tunnelling into my throat. That is how we win. She had looked at me without scorn. Without fear or disgust. Her eyes full of secrets. I mean women, Lavenia. That is how women beat men. They never know what we know until it’s too late.

  I wasn’t sure why that seemed so important now, but I didn’t have a wealth of advice to draw on when it came to powerful people controlling my existence. As a steward, it was a way of life that I had been bred to accept. Becoming a criminal seemed only one short step away from that.

  “Can you read at all?” the Scholar asked, drawing to his full height.

  I hesitated before shaking my head again. Calder knew that I was lying this time. I had written to him in Fyrian—albeit badly. I glanced at him, but he had also stepped back, closer to the other two Sentinels. He was watching and listening but pretending he wasn’t.

  “Useless,” the Scholar ground out.

  He began to stride away, and I quickly stepped back to the shelf, grabbing the book that I had touched and shoving it into my pack. When the Scholar realised I wasn’t following, he turned and captured my upper arm, hauling me back toward the cage. He shoved me against the back of the cage and then turned around, filling the entrance with his sheer size. He reached out and slammed the door in the faces of the three Sentinels and then barked out “One,” to the hidden steward.

  The cage lurched and then began a slow descent, leaving me to stare at the Scholar’s back.

  “You’ve used your magic again,” he said.

  It hadn’t occurred to me until that very moment that while I had indeed used my magic again … I had used it in a way that the Vold magic most certainly was not supposed to be used. In fact, what I had done should have been impossible for a Vold.

  I nodded, but he couldn’t see me, which meant he wasn’t asking a question.

  “You also haven’t eaten. And magic burnout doesn’t count as sleep. You’ve bathed at least, but my servants are expected to follow rigorous schedules. I have no time for fainting or sickness.”

  He turned, and I pointed at myself and then at him and then at the Obelisk behind him. He stared at me, not understanding my wordless commands as Calder did. Gnawing on my lip, I tried again, pinching at my coat and then pointing to one of the Obelisk servants as we slowly rolled past another balcony. This time, I was sure the Scholar understood what I was asking, but he still remained silent, staring at me. He looked like he was gritting his teeth. Eventually, he let out a short, sharp breath.

  “You will not become a servant of the Obelisk. Even if you were a Sinn, that would be a position of great honour.” He let the explanation hang in the air between us, a certain disdain settling it over me. Shame and anger flooded into me. I felt stupid, but I was angry at him for making me feel like that. I plucked at my coat again and shrugged this time, throwing my hands up.

  What do you want from me?

  “You will serve me. Once every five days.” His eyes turned cutting, his rage flaring again. “After your service with me, you will return to the Citadel and serve Fjor. The third day you will be in Hearthenge with Helki, then Lake Enke with Vale, and then you will go to Edelsten to serve Vidrol in the Sky Keep.”

  My head was spinning, and for more than one reason. I was trying to fit the names he used with the other four masters. Vale, I already knew, was the Weaver; Fjor was the Inquisitor; and Vidrol was the King. That left Helki as the Warmaster and the Scholar still unnamed.

  And then there was the second point of confusion.

  I stepped forward, tapping the face of the timepiece clipped to the Scholar’s belt. He grabbed my wrist, ripping my hand away, the look on his face disbelieving. The cage slowed to a stop on the first level, and a steward appeared at the door. The Scholar turned, fixing him with a look. He quickly disappeared, and then those angry violet eyes were slamming back into me, his grip tightening to a painful pinch.

  “Touch me again … and I’ll remove each of your fingers, one by one.” His voice lowered to a whisper, his tone shivering with danger. He closed his eyes and then released me, opening them again.

  I ignored the threat, because I hadn’t touched him. I reached for the timepiece again but didn’t touch it, merely pointed at it. He hadn’t answered my question.

  “You will have enough time to travel between us,” he returned harshly. “Fjor has created something to ensure it.”

  The Inquisitor had created a magical object for me, but he hadn’t broken the spell holding my voice captive. The realisation made me uneasy. It would have taken far less effort to return my voice, than to create a whole new magical artefact.

  The Scholar turned and yanked the door ope
n, barking out a command for me to follow him. Only a few moments later, Calder, Avrid, and Ingrid stepped from another of the cages. They strode toward us, but I only tucked my head down and followed the Scholar. He passed from the core of the tower into an outer passageway. It seemed that the outer layer of the Obelisk was just like any other tower, riddled with staircases and bare, debris-littered rooms fashioned like the insides of small turrets, complete with sunlight shooting through small murder holes in the dark stone walls. Other rooms were furnished richly with thick carpets and wide windows, with furnishings set about in careful patterns. I only glimpsed those rooms through partly-open doors as the Scholar swept past them. Occasionally, I would see servants of the Obelisk scattering from his path and disappearing into those rooms, the doors closing softly behind them. We wound through the first level and stopped before another set of cages. The Scholar muttered, “Top,” before pushing me into one. The others didn’t step up to our cage this time, but the Scholar still slammed the cage door. They moved quietly to the next cage, Calder passing me a look. I could see his blue eye fixing to my arm where the Scholar had grabbed me.

  The cage began to move, but this time, the Scholar stayed silent, facing away from me as though he had forgotten my presence entirely. The top of the Obelisk was soaked in sunlight and would have been stifling if it hadn’t been for the open, glassless windows. The entire top floor seemed to be one long residence, curving around the outside of the library. The inside walls had geometric lines and shapes cut into the stormstone, some kind of reflective surface painted into the grooves so that the sun streaming inside bounced softly around, highlighting those shapes. The outside walls had huge, open windows set above stone window seats every few feet, the openings covered in light golden sails to protect the interior from the strong winds. The furniture was placed with a methodical stiffness, most of it made of maplewood or stone or a combination of both. There were no creature comforts tossed about. There were piles of books arranged by colour and size and a leather case rolled open on a desk to reveal an assortment of quill pens and lead pencils. The Scholar strode to a book cart that had been drawn up beside one of the desks, a few bundles piled atop it.

  “You technically aren’t incarcerated, so you may choose your clothing.” He tapped the side of the cart. “These didn’t come from me.”

  He seemed to be waiting, so I approached and picked apart the ribbon from one of the bundles. It was a soft, off-white cloak with a deep hood, the fastenings shaped like little swords. Inside the cloak I found a bundle of soft-boiled leather and a strange assortment of armoured pieces. Unsure how to wear any of it, I quickly wrapped it back into the cloak and moved to the next bundle. It was a long length of grey-blue fabric with the texture of thin silk. It was accompanied by a rope belt and a thick, yellow-gold shawl. I picked up the bundle, waiting for further orders.

  The Scholar continued to stare at me, the look of disdainful anger on his face deepening. “Are you waiting for permission? Get changed.”

  I clutched the fabric to my chest, quickly brushing past him to try and find somewhere safe from his eyes.

  “These are my private quarters,” he shot out, bringing my steps to a halt. “You’re not to be unattended in here at any time. Leave my sight, and I’ll have you punished for trespassing.”

  I stared at him, partly in disbelief, but also with a blossoming hatred. Calder was also staring at him but without disbelief or hatred. Avrid and Ingrid turned to face away, though Ingrid, it seemed, was still trying to monitor the situation out of the corner of her eye. Calder walked over to me, his mouth set in a hard line. As he passed the Scholar, I noticed that the size difference between them wasn’t so great as I’d first thought it to be. The five masters just seemed enormous. Perhaps it was an effect of their great power. Calder’s hand landed on my shoulder, steering me further into the residence until I was out of sight of the Scholar. Not a word was said by either of them, but the action seemed to scream volumes.

  They had tasked him with protecting me and he would … even if it was against them.

  Calder kept his back turned as I changed, leaving me to marvel over the garments in peace. If the Scholar hadn’t already told me that the clothes hadn’t come from him, I would have known it the second I pulled out the undergarments. Soft as silk but reinforced beneath with the boned linen of a corset, the bodysuit comprised of underwear joined to the bodice, which was laced in the middle of the back and over the chest to create the perfect figure. They were the undergarments of a sectorian. A very wealthy sectorian. There was no way that the great Sinn genius would have deemed it appropriate or productive to drape me in luxurious clothing.

  The blue-grey dress fit over the bodysuit perfectly, contrasting with the cream colour and shivering slightly the way silk does over silk. It was a very typical style of robe for the sectorian women, loose about the shoulders and clinched at the upper arm by a single button. It exposed the laced chest of the undergarment before darkening to a deeper colour and clinching at the waist where the skirt separated into two long, flowing sections of silk tied together over the thighs with silken thread. If I had been a sectorian girl, I would have been gifted such a dress on my sixteenth birthday to mark the beginning of my journey into womanhood. The yellow-gold shawl was the softest, warmest wool, and I wrapped it eagerly around myself, twirling gently.

  It was a small, private moment. A tender secret that I hadn’t even revealed to myself. There I was, standing at the top of the world in a sharp stone tower with the sun streaming through to thread fingers of fire into my hair. I had stepped away from the many lives of my past—cursed, outcast, desperate, criminal, killer of the weak—and now I was just a girl who had always wondered what it felt like to wear silk. Of course, someone had forced me to wear it … but I wouldn’t have put it on otherwise.

  I didn’t glance at Calder as I moved past him, but I caught the raised and lowered brows of Avrid and Ingrid respectively. The Scholar reached for another bundle on his trolley and tossed it to my feet, his eyes sweeping over me.

  “Pack all this shit up.” He jerked a finger at the remaining bundles. “Burn your old clothes. Especially those boots. We must make you desirable enough to tolerate, at the very least.”

  Frowning, I placed my old clothes on the floor and picked up the new bundle, unravelling the canvas wrapping from an exquisite pair of boots and woollen socks. I pulled them on, my fingers shaking against the dark brown leather. They laced all the way up to my knees and immediately encased me in comfortable warmth.

  The Scholar strode away, back towards the cages. I heard him yelling something as I finally turned to look at Calder. He was staring at me, his expression troubled. Those words vibrated between us, as though we had simultaneously become stuck on them.

  Desirable enough to tolerate.

  I busied myself with gathering my items from the floor, my brow crinkled. It was a simple enough statement, and possibly even understandable if one considered that the five masters—or at least the Scholar and one other—weren’t the kindest of gentlemen, and yet, like so many other things that had been said both at my trial and since … I was plagued by the sensation of a deeper meaning.

  The Scholar strode back into view, a steward girl scuttling behind him. She hurried up to me and snatched the bundle of old clothing from my arms, running from our presence as quickly as she could go. As soon as the extra bundles were stuffed into my bursting pack, the Scholar was pointing to one of the bench seats. I walked over and sat where he indicated, waiting for further instructions.

  And then I waited some more.

  He had gone back to his work, sitting at his desk and making notes in a giant ledger, his quill pen scrawling across the page faster than I had ever seen anyone write. Whenever I shifted my position or rolled my shoulders back, his forehead pinched, his eyes narrowing. I soon became still, my eyes drifting to the window. After several hours of this, Calder sent Ingrid and Avrid away, muttering something beneath his brea
th as they headed back to the cages.

  As the sun began to set, the Scholar glanced up from his work, his violet eyes taking a moment to adjust to his surroundings, as though he had been unaware of them until that moment. He stood, striding over to me, a sheet of paper in hand, a list printed down it in perfect, sharp handwriting. He glared down at me and then consulted his list.

  “You’ll cook my meals, clean my home”—he waved the sheet around, indicating the residence—“you’ll be permitted to eat my meals with me, and you’ll sleep in my bed—”

  “You’ve claimed her service for this?” Calder interjected, his teeth pressed together, his eyes flashing in disgust. “She’s a liten.”

  “You take your role too seriously,” the Scholar goaded him. “Older litens are married often enough, and she will be a kongelig in under a month. But it doesn’t matter. These are purely the elements needed for the equation to work.”

  “What equation?” Calder asked, my mouth forming the same words, though no sound joined his angry voice.

  “The girl must be in love with me by the time of her kongelig ceremony. She will be married that very day—no sooner and no later—and I’ll be the one she…” He faltered, his throat working, his beautiful, furious face twisting with disgust once again as the last word was forced from his lips. “Chooses.”

  7

  Fantasy

  She will be married that very day—no sooner and no later.

  The words of the Scholar haunted me as I went about the tasks on his list. Each item was absurdly detailed. I was forced to use a different cleaning cloth for each section and room within his residence. His quill pens were to be sharpened at an exact angle, which was to be measured by an instrument at his desk. His sheets were to be folded in a specific pattern and changed every day. His pillows were to be sprayed with a mist I was required to mix from ingredients found in the apothecary. That was the final chore on my list, right below the requirement that I sleep beside him every night.