Shadow Dancer Boxed Set

by Courtney Rene

I found them in the big room. They were in deep conversation with Gabriel. Their heads were all bent together over a table looking at something. I leaned over Jack's shoulder to see what had their attention. It was just a map. A map of Acadia, but just a map all the same.

  "What are we looking at?" I asked from my position behind Jack.

  A growl issued from Gabriel before he said, "You decided to make an appearance today after all?"

  I sighed at him. He responded by arching one regal brow at me.

  "Gabriel, don't start," I said.

  He didn't respond. He continued to stare at me with that eyebrow.

  "I'm doing the best that I can here."

  "Hmph," he snorted. That one little sound could mean so many things.

  "I'm here now, okay?" I said. "So, tell me what's going on?"

  Jack turned to Simon and Simon turned to Gabriel and Gabriel looked at me.

  "Maybe we should just show her?" Jack asked.

  "Um…show me what?"

  Gabriel pursed his lips for a moment, and then nodded his head once at me as if a decision had been made. "Follow me."

  "Oh…kay," I said. We exited the big room and continued right out of the house. We headed to the place where I had seen the fires the week before. As we got closer, I realized there were a lot more than seven fires pits now. There was at least twice that many.

  I couldn't believe my eyes. There were so many people. I turned to Gabriel and asked, "How many are there?"

  "The numbers increase every day. They wander in and ride in and sneak in. We estimate their numbers at around seventy-five people."

  "Where are they coming from?" I asked.

  "Everywhere," someone said from behind me.

  I turned to see who it was and shrieked, "Taylor!" I jumped forward and hugged him tight for a moment.

  "I figured if you weren't going to come see me, I would hunt you down myself," he said. He said it with a smile though. He looked wonderful. It had only been about six weeks since I had last seen him, but he had filled out a bit. Whereas, before he was a bit on the tall and gangly side, he was finally starting to show the muscles someone gets with physical work.

  "You look great," I said, meaning it.

  "It's amazing what good food and work will do for you," he replied.

  "Are you ladies finished?" Gabriel said. I turned to find him almost on top of me, hands on hips, glaring.

  "Yeesh, Gabriel. Yes, we're finished," I replied. I shrugged at Taylor. He rolled his eyes in understanding.

  "As we were saying, the people are coming from all over," Gabriel said. "Some you will recognize as former members of your rebels. Some are refugees from the kingdom city. They are coming from everywhere. There is even one noble family here."

  "Noble?" I asked.

  "Used to be noble," Taylor said under his breath.

  Gabriel shot Taylor a glare that said without words, to "shut it" then out loud he said, "There are several families of property. My family is one of them. The nobles are the older families."

  Jack leaned in and said, "The rich people."

  "It was well known that if you didn't stand behind the king after he took over, you lost everything," Simon interjected.

  I looked around us and said, "But you didn't?"

  A smile finally flashed across Gabriel's face. "No," he said. "I didn't"

  I was missing something. "Why not?

  The snickers from everyone around ticked me off. "What?"

  Gabriel shrugged as if he could care less and said, "Fear."

  When I didn't respond, he continued, "I knew who he was. He and your mother had been friends, remember. They had hung out for a while. He'd been to our house. He knew he wouldn't be able to bully me. He didn't even try, as I said, I knew him…he knew me."

  Jack interrupted and said, "It was easier to label Gabriel a traitor so that others wouldn't support him."

  "What did labeling him do?" I asked. "From what I can tell, nothing."

  "It allowed me to be left alone," he said. "It left me out of the mess the kingdom is in. I could ignore it and…"

  "And?"

  "Mourn in peace," he finished firmly. The glare was back on his face and directed at me as if to dare me to contradict him or his feelings. "I didn't just lose my king and my friend when Malcolm died. In a heartbeat, I lost the only family I had left; my sister and her unborn child too. I was happy to be left alone."

  I was in tricky waters all of a sudden. Too many emotions were swirling around us; anger, sadness, contempt. I moved us back to more pressing matters. "So, what about the other nobles? Did they all support Gideon's taking of the throne?"

  Simon pointed to a big dark green tent that sat a little away from the others. "That is the Steel family. They were once one of the nobles. His castle was up on the hill behind the Kingdom where all the nobles lived. His home was destroyed; his property confiscated. What you see is all they have left."

  "Why? What did he do?" I asked.

  "He questioned the right of Gideon to take the throne. Worried it was too soon after the king's death. Worried that we hadn't found the Queen. That was it," Jack said. "All the other nobles followed in line after that."

  "No one else stood up against him?" I asked.

  "The king has a powerful gift. It's a destructive one," Simon said.

  "Yes," I said, cutting him off. "I've seen it."

  "Then you can understand why people are afraid of him and didn't question or oppose him. He wields great power, maybe too much for one person. Maybe that is what corrupted him in the first place."

  I was suddenly very uncomfortable. I glanced at Taylor who slowly shook his head back and forth at me. Was he telling me to keep my power a secret? Or was he telling me my power wasn't the same as the king's?

  I knew though, that my power was the same as the king's, maybe a different color, but it was just as destructive, just as powerful, and just as corruptible. I felt the heavy gaze of Gabriel on me and met his eyes. He just watched me. Then he surprised the heck out of me and winked.

  I realized he did know what I was thinking. He was telling me it would be all right. I didn't know if he was right or not, but I did have one thing the king and the rebels didn't. I had Gabriel. That was something.

  "Okay, so," I said, "what do we do now?"

  Simon replied for everyone. "We have a meeting. All those squatters out there are about to be put to work."

  "Are you ready for this?" Gabriel asked.

  I was as ready as I was going to get. If I was to have a chance at taking over the kingdom, I needed an army, and one that knew what they were doing, one that knew what they we up against. I was beginning to think we wouldn't just be fighting the king and his army anymore. I had a feeling we would also have the rebels to contend with. "Yes. I'm ready."

  And so the Army of the Sun began.

  Chapter Five

  "This is ridiculous," I said and swiped a hand across my sweat-drenched face. "I don't know what I am doing or even how to use this stupid thing."

  "It's a sword and that's the whole point of practice," Jack said completely unperturbed by my grousing. At least he decided to give me a break. He stabbed the sword he had been using to spar with into the ground at his feet and leaned comfortably on the handle.

  "It's too heavy," I continued.

  "That's because you're weak," he said, a wide half toothless smile on his old face. "The more you practice the stronger your arms will get, and it won't be as heavy anymore."

  "Jack, I hate the sword. It's a boy's weapon," I whined. "I like my bow. I'm good at my bow. Why can't I just continue to train in that?"

  "Because you should be versed in several weapons," he said. "Besides, this was your idea to train all the soldiers, in as many weapons as possible."

  "Yes, but I didn't mean me!"

  He laughed out-right, which annoyed me all the more. "Too bad. You are just as in need of training as everyone else." He turned away from me and glanced at the other team
s working in the field. "Maybe more than some," he grumbled.

  "I heard that," I said.

  I sat down on the ground, crossed my legs under me, and dropped my head into my hands to try and block out the day for a moment. My hair was damp with sweat and stuck to my forehead and neck. My once yellow tank top had a stripe of wet running down the center of my back. I couldn't see it, but I could feel it, sticky against my skin. It was definitely full summer and hot. It wasn't just Jack and me on the training field that day. All the soldiers of my army were working as well. Men and women alike.

  More and more people continued to arrive and set up camp in Gabriel's forest. Although he hated that part of it, as he hated people in general, I was beginning to realize he did at least understand our need of them. We had almost one hundred soldiers for the army at that point, which didn't include their families. Yep, the forest was getting a bit crowded. The light from the fires at night lit up the sky.

  I liked to look out into the night and see the light from all the fires. Gabriel, however, stayed away from that side of the house once darkness fell. If he happened to glance in that direction and catch sight of the fires, he would growl and storm away, usually with a pithy comment about burning down the whole damn forest.

  As to the army, we had set up four training stations for about twenty-five soldiers at one time, with one leader for each. The group leaders currently were Jack, Simon, Lucas, and Gabriel. They were each good at different things. They all took turns with training me, and they trained the others in rotating groups every day, including weekends, which I thought was a bit much. Although I was vetoed on my wish to have the entire weekend off, I was able to wrangle half-days on Sunday. It wasn't much, but it was something.

  Why was a bit of down time so important? I didn't want the soldiers to forget what they were fighting for. Forget why it was so necessary for them to train so hard. If all they saw, day in and day out was training, and training, and training, they wouldn't have time for their families or any joy, really. I wanted them to remember what we were working toward.

  I came to Acadia every day, but I still missed a great deal of the daily training. Even though the school year had ended without much fanfare, I was still spending my mornings working on summer classes. It had been a fight to get my mom and dad on board with graduating early, but in the end, I got my way. Thankfully.

  The group leaders more than made up for my morning away. When they did get me on the field to train, they trained me hard. Sometimes it felt like they got a little too much joy out of kicking my butt.

  The current training was hand-to-hand combat, the sword, and then the bow. I loved the bow. It was something I could do and do well. I was strong with the bow.

  The hand-to-hand stuff was also pretty easy for me. Especially since I had a bit of an advantage with my shadow sight. I could pop into the shadows and see their every move. They couldn't.

  The sword, I hated. I mean hated. It was heavy and bulky and I just didn't have the quick reflexes that you need to be good at it. I was trying, but the lack of years of training and muscle building sometimes made sword training overwhelming. I understood why I needed to learn and workout with the sword, I did. It was just a bit hard to take the constant corrections from my trainers: Sunny, don't do that; Sunny, do this; Sunny, use your arm; Sunny, step back faster; swing higher. By the end of the sword sessions, I was so sick of my name it wasn't even funny.

  The best part of the day though, was my time in horse training. Taylor and I would just saddle up our horses and go for a ride. Time spent with Taylor and Poppy was easy time. Plus, I was even getting to be quite the horse rider. No, really, I was.

  "You look done in," Lucas said from above me.

  I lifted my head and stared up at him. "Jack's being mean to me. Go and beat him up."

  That elicited the laugh I had been hoping for from both of them. "No need for that. She's done for the day," Jack said.

  "Great!" I said and bounced happily to my feet.

  Lucas scrutinized me for a moment out of half closed eyes. "Hey, I thought you were tired?"

  "I am, if it has to do with any more training today," I replied.

  "Wimp," he said, but softened the insult with a smile.

  I grabbed his hand in mine and leaned against him as we walked toward the keep. "I know it."

  "You going home for dinner?" he asked.

  "Of course. God forbid I miss dinner," I said. "Hey, are you trying to wrangle a dinner invitation out of me again?"

  He squeezed my hand and said, "Every chance I get. I have a thing for your mom's cooking."

  "I'm beginning to wonder if you're hanging out with me for me or my mom's lasagna," I said.

  "Well, it is a hard choice," he said.

  "Hey!"

  He stopped and suddenly lifted me up off the ground by my upper arms so that I was face level with him. "It's you. The food is nice, but it's you."

  I already knew that, but it was nice to hear anyway. He kissed me softly on my lips then set me down next to him, twinned our hands together again and hauled us off toward the keep as though nothing had happened.

  "Lucas?" I said.

  "Hmm."

  "What are we doing?" I asked.

  "What do you mean?"

  "I mean us, you and me. What are we doing exactly?" We weren't dating, as dating meant you actually went out on dates. We didn't. He came home with me once or twice a week to have dinner with my family and me, but other than that, we didn't actually go out. We spent loads of time together, every afternoon, but most of that was just in training or organizing with everyone else. He was the last person I saw each night before I phased back home, and he usually kissed me goodbye. A gentle kiss, followed by an "I'll see you tomorrow," but that was all. I was not getting into the same pattern with Lucas as I had with Leif.

  "I don't know, Sunny. I want more from you, but I don't want to be just a replacement."

  Wow, shock coursed through me at that. "Lucas. Do I make you feel that way? Like a replacement?"

  "No. But sometimes I see you staring off into nothing, and I know you are thinking of him. I want to make sure you know who you are, when you're with me."

  I smiled and shook my head. "It's not like that, Lucas. Yes. I do think of him, but it's not that way anymore. It was for a while, but now it's that I'm worried about what he's doing or planning and when he's going to pop up again. It's been almost two months since I last saw or heard anything from him. The waiting and wondering is making me crazy."

  I stepped in front of him and wrapped my arms around his waist. "I'm not thinking about Leif anymore like that. I'm thinking about you, and it's not about training or planning either. I think of you like this, the way it feels when you put your arms around me, or when you're kissing me. I see the way the sun shines off your hair in the afternoon light, or the way your muscles change and ripple when you train with the sword. Trust me, I know who I want."

  He pulled me in tight against his body and gazed into my eyes. I could feel his heart thud inside his chest. It matched mine, as mine was hammering just as hard. "You sure?" he asked at last.

  "Yes. I'm sure," I replied and I had never been surer about anything.

  He lowered his lips to a hair's breath away from mine. I closed my eyes the moment I felt the first soft brush of his lips against me. I lifted up on tiptoes, tangled my fingers in the hair at the nape of his neck, and kissed him. I didn't want soft and gentle, I wanted no holding back, hard, and passionate. He didn't hesitate at all. He gave me just want I wanted.

  "Get a room!"

  With one hand I waved Taylor away, the other hand didn't release its hold on Lucas at all.

  "No seriously, guys. Ew," Taylor said.

  Lucas growled, I just sighed. I was finally making some headway in the romance department, only to be interrupted. "Yes, Taylor. What do you want?"

  He grinned at us. Oh, he knew exactly what he was doing. "Just wanted to say bye for the day."

&nbs
p; "Bye," I said.

  He laughed and headed off toward the stables, whistling as he went.

  "Well," I said.

  "Come on. Let's get you home. I'm starving."

  "Yeah, me too," I said, but I wasn't thinking about food.

  ~ * ~

  I had just sent Lucas back home to Acadia for the night and was on my way to bed myself. It was getting late, and I was pooped. I opened my door and shrieked, "Gah!"

  There, sitting on my bed like there was nothing amiss, was Leif. Long, lean, beautiful in that cold way he has, Leif. Not only was he in my room, but he was also pawing through some papers that I had laying about the room. At least they were only school information, notes, and stuff for my summer classes, but still.

  "Sunny," my mom yelled from downstairs, "you all right?"

  "Yeah," I yelled back as I stared Leif right in the face. "Sorry, just a bug."

  I stepped into the room, closed the door, and leaned up against it. "What are you doing here?"

  "I just popped in from Acadia."

  Well, that was a new one. All the time I had wasted going outside or to the forest when all I had needed to do was jump from the comfort of my room. Being a Shadow Walker came with a learning curve apparently. "That's not what I meant and you know it. What are you doing in my room?"

  He set down the papers that were still in his hand, shrugged at me and said, "We need to talk. Privately."

  "No, we don't. We have said all we need to say. Now you can leave."

  He slowly shook his head back and forth; his icy cold eyes never left my face. "I'm not going anywhere until we talk."

  Not knowing what else to do, I crossed my arms over my chest and said, "Fine. Talk."

  "What is the deal with you and that guy?"

  Two months? It took him two months to come and ask me that? Seriously? "None of your business. You lost that right, remember?"

  "You are my business."

  "No, I'm not, Leif," I said. "If that's all you wanted to talk about, then we're done here. You can leave."

  He stood and came over to where I leaned against the door. He crowded in, up against me, his face not even an inch from mine. He made a move in to kiss me.