Bright Obscurity

by Ruby Brown

  On the day Mal was leaving for ‘camp’, she packed her bags and said goodbye to her parents, who were strangely emotional about the whole thing. At first, they insisted on driving Mal to school, but luckily Mal managed to convince them that she could walk and headed down the road to meet Dallas, who was waiting for her in a dark blue car. Mal slid into the passenger seat and winced as the rock music Dallas was blaring from the car radio.

  “Can you turn it down?” Mal asked. The intense screaming and heavy guitar riffs wasn’t doing anything to help calm her nerves. Dallas glared at her, and then reached out slowly and turned the volume down one digit. Mal looked straight ahead out of the front window as Dallas silently drove the car to the school’s parking lot. He stopped the car, and thankfully the music stopped too. With her ears ringing, Mal sat and flexed her fingers, taking deep breaths.

  “Okay?” Dallas asked, slightly impatiently.

  Mal prickled with annoyance at his tone. “Yep,” she said. Akraansir magic started bubbling up around her fingers, spilling over and filling the car with a poisonous smell. Within seconds, Mal looked exactly like her dad. She exhaled heavily and blinked a few times, shuffling around in her seat to try and get used to it. “How do I look?” she asked, jumping slightly at the sound of her dad’s voice coming from her mouth.

  Dallas nodded approvingly and settled back in his seat, staring out of the front window. Mal looked at him for a second longer and then opened her door and walked towards the school’s office. She hid her shaking hands in her pockets and approached the front desk, where a heavily wrinkled and bespectacled woman, her thin and greying brown hair tied back into a severe bun that emphasized her sharp, harsh lines of her jaw, nose and mouth. She glanced up when Mal walked into the room. Under her cold stare, Mal felt her anxiety increase tenfold, and struggled to arrange her features into a calm and serious expression.

  “Can I help you?” the woman asked when Mal arrived at her desk.

  “I...um,” Mal paused when she heard her dad’s voice, still not used to hearing it coming from her. She composed herself quickly. “I’m here to tell you that my daughter, Mallika Jay, won’t be attending school for the next two weeks. Her aunt died.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that,” the woman said, looking bored. She tapped a few keys on the computer in front of her and then said “anything else?”

  “Um...no,” Mal said uncertainly.

  “Have a lovely day,” the woman said, clearly bored.

  Mal couldn’t quite believe it had been that easy. Awkwardly, she nodded and walked out of the door.

  “Okay?” Dallas asked when she got back to the car.

  “Just drive,” Mal said as her disguise melted away and she was back to her normal self. She could have sworn she heard Dallas chuckle as he started the car and they joined the traffic piling up on the streets. After about half an hour Dallas parked the car so it was hidden by some trees and they walked through the forest before coming to the clearing where Tenebar loomed. Mal felt a whole cascade of emotions as she walked towards the crumbling building. Apprehension tinged with excitement at what the next two weeks would hold, guilt at lying to her parents, her school, her friends...but when she noticed Dallas looking at her from the corner of his eye she straightened her spine and stopped twisting her fingers together.

  Cass enveloped Mal in a hug when she walked through the front door. Mal could feel her fragile body trembling, although she wasn’t quite sure why. Cass told Mal to follow her to the room she’d be staying in and Mal looked back to thank Dallas, but he had already melted into the colourful crowd. Mal dragged her bags through Tenebar until Cass opened the door to a small, square room with a sloping ceiling and light brown wooden floors. The wardrobe and bookshelf that took up most of the available space, with a bunk bed with red blankets and crisp right pillows pressed up against the wall. Mal walked towards the only window and stood right up against the glass. Beneath her feet all she could see was the tops of the trees in the forest. She felt like she was floating on top of the world and for a moment she just stared into the clear blue sky and forgot everything.

  Then something small and hard collided with her back and wrapped around her, making Mal’s face press against the glass in a highly undignified way. “Mal!” Trixie squealed, hugging her even tighter. Struggling to breathe, Mal just stood and waited until Trixie let go and spun her around, beaming.

  “Trixie will be staying with you,” Cass said fondly.

  “I call top bunk!” Trixie said excitedly and hurtled towards the beds, clambering up the ladder like a monkey and perched at the top, unpacking the purple backpack she was clutching. Mal stepped closer to Cass and spoke quietly so that Trixie couldn’t hear. “Why is Trixie with me? If anything happens, she could easily get hurt.”

  “Originally, Rose was going to stay with you, but when Blaise asked her she protested. Trixie was only too eager to volunteer. I think she sees you as her older sister in a lot of ways.”

  “Blaise asked her?” Mal said.

  Cass looked surprised at Mal’s tone of voice. “Yes. Is that a problem?”

  Mal looked straight ahead so that Cass wouldn’t see the whirlwind of emotions behind her eyes. “No, of course not,” she said, trying to sound offhand. The three of them had decided not to tell Cass about their suspicions that it was her brother organising the attacks on Mal. She was stressed enough as it is. Just now, looking at her, Mal could see her wings drooping and the bright light that shone from her sapphire eyes like matching stars had been reduced to a dull glow fainter than that of a guttering candle flame fighting for its life in a pool of wax. Still, Cass painted a smile on her face and backed out of the room so Mal could settle in. Mal unpacked hurriedly, barely paying attention to Trixie’s relentless chattering. Her mind was so full of her own thoughts that if she tried to stretch it to accommodate anyone else’s, it would surely explode.

  As soon as Mal’s bags were emptied, she traipsed through Tenebar and found Rose cleaning her guns in the weapons room. “What happened with Blaise?” Mal said, deciding not to bother with greetings as she knew Rose wouldn’t either.

  Rose looked puzzled. “What do you mean?”

  “He asked you to be my roommate and you said no. Why?”

  “He never asked me anything like that,” Rose said firmly, a dark shadow flickering behind her eyes, and Mal became aware that it sounded like she was accusing Rose of something. Her eyes drifted down to the gun Rose was clutching in her hand, and took a wary step back before continuing.

  “Cass told me that that’s what happened. I’m rooming with Trixie now.”

  Rose put her gun down. “Blaise must have told her that I’d said no, even when he’d never asked me. Why would he do that though?”

  “Easier target,” Dallas’ voice came from behind Mal, making her jump and spin around.

  “Stop sneaking up on me like that,” Mal said angrily. Dallas just shrugged. Mal assumed that would be as close to an apology she was going to get. “What do you mean by easier target?” Dallas looked at her like she was stupid.

  “Trixie probably has the least experience out of all of us, and she’s very easily overpowered. Having her in the room with you won’t be as much of a threat as me, so you’re easier to get to,” Rose explained. Her tone darkened with each word, and her eyes got narrower until she was glaring at the table in front of her as if its stainless-steel surfaces were the most disgusting thing she’d ever seen. Dallas nodded in agreement.

  “We have to get her out of there,” Mal said angrily. “The risk of her getting hurt is too big. We can’t let that happen.”

  “There’s nothing we can do,” Rose said, angrily polishing her gun, which was something Mal didn’t know you could do. “Blaise can’t know that we’re onto him. If we demand that Trixie swaps with me or Dallas...”

  “Not me,” Dallas said, quite alarmed.

  Rose rolled her eyes. “Then Blaise will get suspicious. We just have to keep our fingers cross
ed.” Rose’s tone was bitter and acidic. Mal knew how much she hated standing around and doing nothing. It must be killing her to admit that all they could do was wait and see what the outcome of this situation was.

  Partly because she was afraid Rose was going to start shooting things with her gun, Mal left the room and headed back to the space she now shared with Trixie, who was happily reading while listening to music. Mal flopped onto her bed and studied the slats of the bed above her for a bit, not really thinking about anything and too tired to do much else.

  “You hungry?” Mal asked Trixie when she glanced out the window and realised that the sky was darkening. Dinner should be almost ready.

  “Yeah,” Trixie said, looking up from her book.

  “Come on then.” Mal swung her legs off of her bed, stood up and stretched. She looked up to Trixie, who was sitting meekly on her bunk bed, her eyes darting nervously around the room. “What’s wrong?”

  After a moments’ hesitation, Trixie said “I can’t get down.”

  Mal chuckled and sighed, her muscles relaxing. She stood by the ladder and coaxed Trixie down, and when her feet hit the floor the two of them headed towards the dining hall with Trixie, her eyes still wide, clutching Mal’s hand.

  Chapter 16

  Mal collapsed to the floor, panting and sweating, her eyes screwed up tightly to stop the tears trickling down her face. Rose stood above her, hands on her hips. Her mouth was moving, but Mal couldn’t hear what she was saying. She felt like she had been put through a blender. Every part of her was shaking, and she couldn’t think straight. She forced herself to stand upright, even as the room around her spun and she felt nauseous. Leaning against a wall, she took deep breaths in an attempt to steady herself. She had been in this room with Rose for hours, practising her magic. Rose had pushed her further then she’d ever been before, appalled at her loose grip on her powers and insisting that she improve as soon as possible.

  Mal turned her face towards the open window, letting the cold night breeze wash across her face as she stared at the stars. After dinner, she’d gone back to the room with Trixie and read her stories until the small girl fell asleep on Mal’s shoulder, drooling all down her shirt. Once Mal felt it was safe, she gently eased Trixie off of her and crept down to meet Rose, who greeted her with a brisk “you’re three minutes late”.

  Rose rolled her eyes at Mal’s pathetic figure, hunched over and breathing heavily, and said “go back to bed. We’ll continue this tomorrow.” Mal could tell from Rose’s tone that she was disappointed in her, but she couldn’t care less. She stumbled drunkenly back to the room where Trixie was peacefully sleeping. Mal felt a wave of relief wash over her when she saw that Trixie was alive and okay.

  Suddenly, she felt completely disgusted with herself. She was putting everyone around her at risk, simply by existing. She didn’t know how far Blaise would go to get to her and her magic, but if anyone she cared about got hurt along the way, she would never forgive herself. Feeling sick to her stomach, Mal buried herself in her blankets and shut her eyes, praying for sleep to come soon so she could stop feeling like she was being ripped apart piece by piece. She didn’t remember drifting into unconsciousness, but she must have at some point because she woke the next day when a beam of sunlight hit her face directly, making her wince and hide in the dark confines of her blanket.

  And that was pretty much how the next few days went. Mal did her usual training, and then at night she would attend a gruelling practise session with Rose. After dragging her exhausted body back to bed, she’d wake up the next day in the same uncomfortable fashion, not made any better by her aching muscles and the dark rings starting to appear under her eyes. But Mal was quite proud to find that she was improving, much too slowly for Rose’s taste, but gradually Mal was gaining confidence in herself and her abilities. But there was a lurking darkness to her thoughts, something that she felt like she couldn’t control, and after every session the monster inside her grew.

  There was a voice in her head, which Mal assumed was a product of her Akraansir magic, and the more she used her magic the stronger it grew. It hissed in her ear, coiled itself around her lungs and squeezed until she couldn’t breathe, poisoning her thoughts with toxic fumes that came from every breath it released. It spoke of terrible things, of bloodshed and heartbreak, abandoned children starving not just for food but for affection, and the terrible sobs that tore through a mother’s body as she stood by the coffin of her child. But instead of highlighting the tragedy of these things, the voice seemed to find a perverse attraction to them. It screamed at Mal to use her dark magic, to destroy the world so it could be reborn again with her as its queen. She tried to resist, but several times she came very close, close enough that she could actually feel her magic welling out of her palms. She tightened her grip, digging her nails into her palms to the point that she drew blood.

  She tried to avoid using her Akraansir magic when she was training with Rose, but Rose seemed convinced that this would be her most powerful weapon against Blaise and insisted that she practise as much as possible. Mal was too afraid to tell her the real reason why she didn’t want to use her Akraansir magic. She was scared that as the words left her lips Rose would be running away from her, leaving her abandoned in this place that she still knew so little of. As time went on, Mal became more and more afraid of herself and the power she had, and after almost every practise she could be found curled up in her bed, resisting the terrible bloodlust that ate at her soul, using the pillows and blankets to muffle her sobs so that Trixie, sleeping peacefully above her, wouldn’t be alerted to her distress. Mal kept telling herself that she was doing this for those she cared about, to protect them from threats she didn’t fully understand, but she couldn’t help but question if she was turning into a danger bigger than the one she was trying to save them from.

  Then, one night, as Mal was preparing to enter the next phase of the most exhausting training session she’d had yet, the door to the room they were practising in slammed open and Blaise marched into the room, dragging a sobbing Trixie by the hand. Trixie cried Mal’s name when she saw her and tore herself from Blaise’s grip, rushing to bury herself in Mal’s arms. Mal fell to her knees so she could better comfort the hysterical girl, stroking her hair and murmuring comforting things in her ear as Trixie gripped her clothes tightly in her fists and drenched them with her tears.

  “What did you do to her?” Rose said accusingly to Blaise, before her eyes widened. No matter how brave she was, she knew that indicting someone as powerful as Blaise, especially with how bad his temper had been recently, was a bad idea. Immediately, she dropped her eyes as a sign of apology, and a smug smirk crossed Blaise’s face. Mal’s heart fell as she saw Rose give in. Looking at the thunder in Blaise’s eyes, she was shaken, and didn’t know if she could deal with the oncoming storm herself. She hugged Trixie harder, providing her with comfort as well as taking some for herself.

  “What are you doing here?” Blaise demanded.

  “Late-night training session,” Mal said quickly, which was true.

  “Trixie came to my office crying because she’d woken up and you weren’t in the room with her. What makes you think it’s okay to leave a little girl like that alone by herself?” Blaise fumed.

  As if you care, Mal thought to herself, her arms tightening around Trixie once more as a defensive gesture more than anything else. But honestly, she felt terrible. She hadn’t thought about what would happen if Trixie had woken up and she wasn’t there. She could only imagine how scared Trixie must have been. “I’m sorry. I couldn’t sleep and so I went for a walk around Tenebar, and I ran into Rose, who suggested I practise for a bit with her. I thought it was a good idea, considering all the attacks that have been happening.”

  Blaise’s eyes flashed and his mouth curled into a vicious snarl before he managed to compose his expression. Mal felt a flare of triumph. She’d made him break his façade, even if it was just for a split second. His reaction gave it a
ll away. “Go back to bed,” Blaise said, a new edge to his voice.

  Keeping her eyes downcast to hide her expression, Rose walked briskly out of the room. Mal scooped Trixie up in her arms and carried her all the way back to their room. She still felt awful about leaving her, so Mal let her curl up next to her in the bottom bunk. Trixie slept with one hand on Mal’s arm at all times in a protectively affectionate gesture, every exhale and inhale tickling the bare skin of Mal’s neck.

  Things changed drastically over the course of the next few days. Blaise demoted Rose and Dallas from highly ranking soldiers to little more than glorified secretaries, turning years of hard work and training into dust and putting them in a practically powerless position amongst the masses. He’d also moved Mal and Trixie to a new room, which seemed like something nice for him to do as this room was bigger and better furnished, but he had strategically placed Trixie’s bed so that it was impossible for Mal to sneak past without waking her up.

  Suddenly, he became very interested in Mal’s tuition and knowledge of magical lore, assigning her an 8-billion-and-something year old tutor who mumbled every word he spoke and never seemed to hear anything Mal said, although they may have had something to do with the impressive amounts of hair that sprouted from his ears. Mal’s tutor kept her in the library for hours every single day, meaning she never had any time to actually train. Mal panicked when she realised what Blaise was trying to do, and so despite her nerves went up to Cass and Blaise’s office to complain.

  “Her education is more important than her training,” Blaise insisted after Mal had explained why she was there to a very concerned Cass, who was now listening to Blaise with a furrowed brow. “How can we expect her to fight against an enemy she doesn’t know anything about?” Cass nodded slowly, and to her horror Mal realised she was actually agreeing with him.