Daughter of the Dark: Shadow Through Time 2

by Louise Cusack

  If Kert was startled by the question he hid it well. ‘Because of the child,’ he said simply. ‘We have a son.’

  Pagan nodded at this, wondering how the child had been conceived. Out of love, gratitude, fear? He could feel his teeth grating hard against each other. Still, this was Lae’s child. ‘I was told by your guardsman that he has an eye ailment. I could heal —’

  ‘You will not touch my son,’ Kert said, and there was no compromise in his voice.

  ‘Does his mother concur?’ Pagan asked, taking his courage in his hands. ‘Would she not want me to —?’

  ‘Why don’t you ask her?’ Kert offered and before Pagan could react he stepped to the door and ordered a guard to send for Lae.

  Pagan nodded, as though satisfied, yet inside he was far from calm. Anxiety swirled around him like the winds of the Maelstrom. How would Lae look upon him? Would she think him too old? In truth, he was twice her age now. The idea of seeing her again both terrified and elated him in equal portions.

  Kert said nothing, merely observed him from his position against the window frame while he waited. Minutes dragged like seasons.

  At last there was a sharp rap on the door. ‘The Lady Lae,’ a guard announced.

  ‘Enter,’ Kert said and the door began to open.

  Pagan held his breath and wished he’d bathed before he’d come or at least cleaned his clothes. But more, he wished desperately, desperately that he could turn back the hands of time.

  And then she was through the door, a quick flash of gold from the mesh cap on her head and a rustle of heavy brocade. Pagan’s mind quietened as they stared at each other and he noticed that she was older too. Not aged as he was, but leaner and more mature, with a depth to her eyes that he hadn’t remembered. Compassion? She could not have learned that from her husband. The swirling tattoo of Be’uccdha down the right side of her face added mystery and allure where there was already dark beauty.

  ‘My dear,’ Kert said, ‘the Guardian Pagan, whom I’m sure you remember. Pagan, my wife, the Lady Sh’hale.’

  Lae nodded, her eyes locked on his. ‘Pagan,’ she said softly, and could not look away, just as he could not.

  ‘My Lady Sh’hale,’ he replied, no malice in his voice, simply a statement of fact. The woman he loved was married to another. He could say these things inside his mind — admit to himself that the rush of warmth in his face, the pounding of blood at his temples and the way his eyes were unable to leave her face were testimony to the fact that his love had survived. No matter the time spent on Magoria, Lae still kept the keys of his heart and he wanted the lock to rust over if she would not open it. He could never love another.

  ‘He has lost the child of The Light,’ Kert told her. ‘We must hope the boy does not require further assistance to join the Four Worlds.’

  ‘Indeed,’ Lae said gently, still staring at Pagan as though she had not heard her husband’s words. ‘You have changed,’ she remarked, ‘but the years have been kind.’ Her eyes softened then and Pagan scarcely remembered to breathe. ‘Your father was a handsome man,’ she said, and Pagan felt his heart soar. It was as much of a compliment as she could give him in front of her husband, and it was more than enough to reassure Pagan that he had not repulsed her.

  ‘He wishes to see our son,’ Kert said, and Lae blinked, the trance broken.

  ‘Is this true?’ she asked, glancing first at her husband, then warily back to Pagan. ‘For what purpose?’

  ‘To heal him,’ Pagan assured her, taking a step forward and then stalling when he saw Kert stiffen at the window. ‘I was told he had an eye ailment that necessitated darkness. If I could see the boy —’

  ‘No!’ Lae said overloud and backed away from him, shaking her head, the beautiful hair he remembered, so soft to the touch, brushing against her shoulders. A shorter style. And now Pagan noticed that her foot dragged as she walked.

  ‘You’re limping.’ He pointed at the hem of her gown. ‘Have you hurt an ankle?’

  ‘Would you heal my wife and see into her mind as well?’ Kert asked.

  Lae’s eyes widened in alarm and she took the necessary few steps further away to clutch Kert’s arm. The glow of happiness her presence had brought Pagan abruptly faded. She feared him and he had no idea why.

  ‘Where is the child of The Light?’ she asked Pagan. ‘Why isn’t he with you?’ Her unfocused gaze followed the outline of his body, searching for an aura, just as her father had done so many times before. It was an unpleasant reminder of The Dark, just as her question was an unpleasant reminder of how his championing duty had been so carelessly dismissed.

  ‘I believe the child is safe and well,’ Pagan said. ‘I am no longer required —’

  ‘Why should we believe you?’ Kert said, including Lae in his statement, for indeed her expression of disbelief mirrored his own so perfectly that Pagan could see that they were now united against him. The rapport he had imagined with Lae was gone. ‘You arrive here with a convenient lack of memory,’ Kert went on. ‘For all we know you are hiding your misdeeds on Magoria. Perhaps you have abandoned the child there —’

  ‘I remember nothing,’ Pagan said. ‘It is always the way —’

  ‘The Light remembered,’ Lae said. ‘She spoke of Magoria.’

  ‘She was The Light,’ Pagan replied gently, for though Lae clearly disbelieved him, he could not be angry with her. Kert had obviously poisoned her mind. ‘No other in the history of our people has remembered their time there. It was part of her destiny to remember —’

  ‘Theories,’ Kert cut over him. ‘You have no proof.’

  Pagan said nothing for a moment, then ventured to defend himself by saying, ‘Though I cannot know what occurred in Magoria, I feel certain that my duty to the throne —’

  ‘You do know,’ Lae cut over him, her unfocused gaze just offset from his shoulder. ‘You’re lying.’ She met his gaze, shock and disbelief large in her eyes. ‘Lying.’ She said it again as though unable to believe it could be true.

  ‘What happened on Magoria?’ Kert probed and Pagan swallowed back the sickness that rose in his throat. ‘Did you harm the child of The Light? Did you abandon the child?’

  ‘There!’ Lae pointed to his right side. ‘A flare of deception. You did abandon the child.’

  ‘No. Not …’ Pagan did not want to speak the words that would push him from Lae’s heart forever.

  ‘Tell it,’ Kert demanded, and beside him Lae simply pressed her hands against her waist, as though to prepare herself for bad news.

  ‘There was a note with me when I arrived from Magoria,’ Pagan said, his voice as flat as his heart now was. ‘It said that I fathered a child there. A son. When I left to return to Ennae with Glimmer I obviously abandoned that child.’

  ‘This is his truth,’ Lae said in a hushed whisper. She turned away from him, her beautiful dark eyes glazed with shock.

  ‘I remember nothing of that time,’ he said, but she was already distanced from him. He could see it in her stance, in the way her lips pressed tightly together.

  ‘How old is your son?’ Kert asked, relentless.

  ‘Vandal is twelve,’ Pagan replied.

  ‘And the woman who is his mother?’ Kert persisted. ‘What is her name.’

  ‘Sarah,’ he said.

  Lae shook her head, yet still she would not look at him. ‘Twelve years,’ she whispered.

  ‘At least thirteen,’ Kert pointed out. ‘Were you her lover from the moment you arrived in Magoria?’ he asked Pagan. ‘Or did you wait a week out of deference to your betrothal to my wife.’

  Beside him Lae closed her eyes. She shook her head again, then said, ‘Husband,’ faintly and fled the room.

  Pagan watched her limp out and could say nothing. His heart ached within his chest, but there was a void between them now that he doubted would ever be bridged. When the door was closed he looked back at Kert. ‘She does not love you,’ he said, knowing he had seen this truth in Lae’s eyes.

 
‘And you have successfully destroyed any love she may have held for you,’ Kert replied, pulling out the chair and seating himself at the map table before he looked back up at Pagan. ‘It is lucky that she loves our son more than life itself. Thus her loyalty will always lie with me.’

  Pagan stared at his rival and felt suddenly old and useless. His charge did not want him, he was not allowed to heal the woman he loved, or her son, and there was no royal at the Volcastle to serve. He remembered then that the royal on the Plains had told him he may seek after Mooraz, but must not kill The Dark. There had been no such order to Kert, he was sure.

  ‘Why does The Dark still live?’ he asked.

  Kert shrugged and pushed maps around the table, as though sorting them out. ‘I chose to remain here and keep our forces intact.’

  ‘So you did not try to seek him out, to avenge the death of your king?’

  Kert put down the map in his hand and looked up. ‘The Dark cannot hurt me here, and while I keep the Volcastle safe it can be handed to royalty. I keep Lae safe here. Would you have me endanger her life and that of our son?’

  ‘You are a changed man,’ Pagan observed, ‘if you would value love over revenge.’ Yet much as he hated Kert, he had to agree that the nobleman had done the right thing. Would he have, in similar circumstances? Perhaps Lae was better off with Kert. No, his pride would not allow that. He loved Lae. She deserved that and more.

  ‘You have nothing to keep you here,’ Kert pointed out. ‘If you cannot find the child of The Light, why don’t you travel to Be’uccdha and kill The Dark yourself?’

  Kert was eager to be rid of him, as Lae would now be, but should Pagan go? Or should he stay and try to prove his love for Lae — at least try to convince her to let him heal her foot? ‘I am ordered to remain at the Volcastle,’ he told Kert.

  ‘By the royal on the Plains?’ Kert asked, disbelief clear in his tone.

  ‘I am a Guardian,’ he reminded Kert. ‘The only Guardian remaining on Ennae. My place is in the royal castle unless I am ordered elsewhere.’

  Just as Pagan had expected, Kert could not argue with that. Yet his face showed a range of emotions, flickering thoughts, before he said, ‘Then you will stay, to serve whatever royalty may reside here.’

  ‘Yet you do not trust me?’

  ‘If I could kill you without disadvantaging the throne, I would,’ Kert told him, his eyes as cold as the Northern winter. ‘Yet I cannot.’ Clearly, Mihale’s death was still large in his mind. If a Guardian had been in attendance, the boy-king could have been revived. ‘You are welcome to remain here while you keep away from my wife,’ he warned. ‘Seek her out, and you will spend your time languishing in the dungeon.’

  ‘I will not seek her out,’ Pagan said, but he would not promise to avoid her. There was unsettled business of the heart between them, and no matter the risk, Pagan would see that resolved.

  CHAPTER FIFTY-TWO

  ‘She’s obviously still upset.’ Father Karl said, and Vandal turned to look at his mother, realising it had only been a matter of time before others saw what he already he knew. But still the urge to follow his mother’s example, to hide their grief, shaped his words.

  ‘It’s been weeks since Dad left,’ he argued. ‘She’s over it now.’

  ‘It can take years to get over that sort of heartbreak,’ the priest said. ‘Some women never get over it.’

  Vandal shrugged, his attention on his mother and the way she’d aged. She was thinner, that was for sure. And she hadn’t bothered to die her grey roots since his dad had left, so now she had an unsightly grey track down her part. Not that it was so obvious with her blonde hair, but Vandal could see it and it upset him. She didn’t care anymore. Her suit was creased and she had no lipstick on. She always wore lipstick to funerals. It was part of her ‘uniform’.

  ‘Another biscuit, Vandal?’ His Aunt Melissa offered him the tray, her pudgy little fingers with their glitter-pink nail polish right at home among the Iced Vo-Vos.

  He absently took a handful and went on watching his mum.

  ‘It’s almost as if she’s bereaved herself,’ the priest said and Melissa murmured something inane before she moved on. ‘Very sad,’ he added.

  Vandal nodded. It was sad. And it had happened so gradually he’d barely noticed, like someone dimming a light until there was nothing left. Her eyes were dull and so was her voice.

  ‘You must miss them a lot,’ the priest added in his deep, melodious voice, and Vandal swung his gaze back to the man, noticing what everyone else did at the first glance, his strange dark eyes that seemed to glow with some inner zeal. ‘Your sister and your dad,’ the priest added.

  ‘She wasn’t my real sister,’ Vandal said, then lowered his voice, ‘and I never really liked her.’

  ‘Are you sure that’s not just bitterness about the way they left?’

  ‘No.’ Vandal glanced around to make sure his aunt was out of earshot. ‘I always knew Dad liked her better. He was obsessed about protecting her.’

  ‘Well, after her mother died, that’s understandable.’

  Vandal’s eyes narrowed. ‘So because Mum and I are alive he shouldn’t care about us?’

  ‘I know he cares about you.’ The priest moved and suddenly the light was blocked out and Vandal felt isolated from the rest of the room. The rhythmic sobbing from the widow in the corner seemed to quieten. ‘And I know you want to see them again,’ the priest said and Vandal looked up into his strange eyes and felt dizzied, mesmerised. ‘You want to bring your dad and your sister back.’

  Could he know about the brown kingdom? Vandal felt a moment of fear, then he shook his head, his long dark fringe falling into his eyes. No one knew. Their secret was safe. ‘I’d bring back my dad if I could,’ he said. ‘But not her. We’d be happier without her.’

  ‘Do you think he would leave her behind?’ Father Karl asked, an odd gleam in his eyes.

  ‘She’s sixteen. She could fend for herself.’

  ‘But would he let her?’

  ‘No.’ Vandal had seen enough of his dad’s fanaticism about Glimmer to know that they’d never be rid of her. And now that his mother had told him why, he hated her even more. It was strange how easily he believed that the brown kingdom was real, but he figured that was because the story fitted. The way Glimmer acted, like a robot, the powers he now possessed, how his mum had been frantic the couple of times when his dad and Glimmer had been late home from somewhere.

  She’d obviously known it would only be a matter of time before they left. Vandal wished he’d known. But he knew now. And one day when he could travel between the worlds, he was going to Ennae. He was going to find his dad, and if he had gone back to his old girlfriend like his mum had said he would, Vandal was going to hurt them both. The way they’d hurt him and his mum.

  ‘Accidents happen,’ the priest said in a casual tone. ‘Perhaps the girl will die and then he’ll come home.’

  ‘Yeah. Right.’ But inside himself Vandal felt a stillness come into his mind. It was an idea he’d never considered. With Glimmer, and Lae, out of the way, they could be a family again. His mum would want that. And Vandal wanted that. Despite being angry about being abandoned, he wanted his dad back. He wanted his dad to love them both again and be with them. Every day. Forever. ‘Maybe she will die,’ he said softly.

  The priest nodded and took a sip of tea, the strange black stone on his ring glowing in the late afternoon light. ‘Maybe.’

  CHAPTER FIFTY-THREE

  Breehan’s eyes were firmly closed against the turmoil he could feel around him. A fierce wind howled, and though he could not feel it on his body, he was sure that if he opened his eyes they would soon be filled with Plains dust.

  ‘We are here,’ Glimmer said and the sound of the wind died away.

  Reluctantly Breehan opened his eyes, then raised a hand to lay it over the memory stone at his throat, an unconscious gesture that he performed whenever he was surprised. ‘The Fortress Sh’hale,’ he said
, then he noticed the material beneath his hand and looked down to find himself dressed in a robe of the finest white cloth, luminescent with silver threads. On his feet were matching slippers and as he dipped his head to look he felt something there, a turban of matching fabric by the feel.

  ‘We must present ourselves properly,’ Glimmer said. ‘It will smooth our way to be well received.’

  He turned at the sound of her voice and was taken aback by her alarming beauty. She was dressed in a matching robe of black shot with gold; her long white hair was woven into an elaborate cap on her head then fell sparkling around her shoulders, almost to her waist. Her eyes were so vibrant in her pale face that they looked like the most precious of jewels. Far more dazzling than —

  ‘The talisman you carry will save the Four Worlds,’ she said, reading his thoughts again. ‘It has more value than my eyes.’ Eyes which now gazed at him intently. ‘I have never understood the human penchant for flattery,’ she said. ‘Physical perfection is an accident of birth, an admirable trait to pass on to future generations to ensure strong breeding lines, but unimportant in itself.’

  ‘We are attracted to beauty because of our imagination,’ Breehan said. ‘It feeds our soul.’

  ‘For what purpose?’ she asked.

  He tried to think of an example Glimmer might understand. ‘When I looked at Noola,’ he said, ‘I saw beauty in the curve of her lips. They were not symmetrical lips, not perfect,’ he admitted, but the curve …’ He smiled to himself then, remembering. ‘The beauty in that curve allowed me to imagine beauty in her every movement, her every gesture.’

  ‘This delusion is called love,’ Glimmer said. ‘Sarah, who was my mother on Magoria told me about it.’

  ‘But a happy delusion,’ Breehan insisted.

  ‘Until love is gone.’

  They looked at each other and Breehan shook his head. ‘The curve is still beautiful,’ he said.

  ‘Because your love is not dead.’

  He smiled then. ‘Nor will it die,’ he admitted, feeling the truth of those words, the reassurance they brought him. No matter what happened to him, or to Noola, his love would not die.