Shatter (The Children of Man)

by Elizabeth C. Mock

  He could tell from the slight flush on her high cheekbones and the rise of her chest that she had been far from the stables when the girl had found her. Vaughn closed the distance and folded her into his arms. She rested her cheek against his chest and said nothing for a moment, because they both knew that once he spoke the quiet peace of this reunion would have to end. Rivka was the first to pull back with a resigned sigh. Her silver hair had fallen into her face and dark circles bruised the skin under her clear blue eyes.

  Tucking her hair behind her ear, Vaughn made a disapproving noise low in his throat. “You haven't been getting enough sleep, m’love.”

  With an indulgent smile, she laced her fingers through his and pulled him out of the courtyard. “You know why.”

  “Even after all these years?” He chuckled as they entered the kitchens, which seemed to Vaughn to also never sleep.

  She squeezed his hand. “Especially after all these years.”

  As they walked through the culinary territory of the temple, the head cook, Avery, took the opportunity to have Rivka taste the ginger lemon sauce he had prepared for the braised pork tonight. Vaughn could feel her keeping strict control of the emotions and thoughts roiling in her mind by projecting the poise and calm that seemed to define her. Taking the time to praise Avery for another masterpiece, she rewarded the chef with a smile before moving on. She glided by Vaughn's side never hurrying their pace, though he knew she would have wanted to hear everything he had discovered the moment she knew he had arrived.

  When they left the kitchens, Rivka steered them to the archives, not their quarters. Vaughn knew better than to question her, so he followed discussing the trivial matters of his trip as they crossed the temple. Entering the expansive room of the archives, he tasted the salt from the cold breeze blowing through the open doors that led to the balcony overlooking the bay. Rivka shivered as the breeze hit her and Vaughn swung off his thick traveling cloak. Walking up behind her, he draped it over her shoulders. She smiled at him, the worry now plain on her face.

  "It's worse than I suspected, isn't it?" she asked without any prelude.

  Vaughn nodded and taking her lead, he cut straight to the point. "Tomas is planning to take the Tereskan temple at Kilrood and kidnap Ianos in order to implicate the Nabosian council."

  Rivka pulled her fingers in toward her palms slowly as she closed her eyes. "To what end?"

  "He's been visiting Lanvirdis regularly since the reconstruction began. The people there love him. They see him as being merciful after the war, helping those most in need. He's shipping weapons for an uprising under the guise of relief for the villages battered by the recent storms along the eastern coast of Mergoria."

  "People will accept anything with open arms when desperate," Rivka said as she sank onto a bench pushed against the stone wall. "But why Ianos? If his goal is Nabos, why drag the Tereskans into this?"

  "For one, the moment Tomas tried to extend Daniyelan authority Ianos would be at the Boundary to find you," Vaughn said sitting next to her.

  Rivka nodded her agreement. "That he would. So before he even begins, he would need to silence Ianos' dissenting voice."

  "And at the same time enrage the people against the Nabosian monarchy and council as conspiring to renew their imperial aims."

  "Ashalioris preserve us." Rivka breathed out slowly. "The people will demand that Tomas bring them to justice."

  "Creating a void in Nabos."

  "And as soon as one person suggests in a tavern that Tomas has always been good to them despite their rulers' decisions…"

  "It isn't a far stretch to someone suggesting that Tomas rule and then the people will demand that he do so."

  "Tomas will accept reluctantly and will insist that this is a temporary measure until a new council can be formed and a new monarchy established."

  Vaughn laughed humorlessly. "And we know how those kinds of temporary measures have a nasty habit of becoming permanent."

  Grabbing Vaughn's hand that rested on her leg, Rivka said, "This is so much worse than Caleb thought. We must leave at once before these plans can be enacted. I will contact Hewitt immediately."

  Vaughn leaned in and kissed her hair inhaling the low scent of jasmine. "I'm going to bathe. We can leave once we've eaten. The ships are not scheduled to leave today."

  Rivka squeezed his hand and strode out of the room moving in her graceful, unhurried pace.

  Shafts of moonlight speared through the canopy of the forest as Faela slowed to a walk. Looking back through the tree line, she could see the fire flickering against the black curtain of the horizon. Unlike the last forest they had encountered in the blighted town of Moshurst, these woods had all the indications of healthy nocturnal life. Moving further and deeper into the forest, Faela heard rustling in the nearby thicket as a small squirrel scampered within its branches trying to evade the hunting owls. The aerial predators called to one another in their low echoing hoots as they stalked their prey. Under the trees, the wind, that had sliced across the moor, here broke against the foliage leaving them trembling in its wake. Other than this underlying noise, the forest remained still and silent.

  Wandering down a game trail, she found a small clearing with a felled tree trunk uprooted years ago. Lichen and moss covered it, reclaiming it for the forest. Walking on the balls of her feet to mask the sounds of her passage, she picked her way over to the trunk’s dirt covered roots that hung toward the ground in defeat. It looked to her like they were trying to find their way back to the earth when they had given up.

  Running her fingers across the springy moss covering the trunk, Faela observed, "Even in death, you're still part of the forest. You can never escape, can you?"

  She drew her shoulders up to her ears and sighed. Fishing her vial out from under her shirt, she clasped it in her fingers and closed her eyes. Racing over the leagues between her and Kilrood to the southeast crossing the Higini Mountains, her mind approached Mergoria’s capital city on the coast of the Kurinean Sea.

  Within a few breaths, she felt Sammi's sleepy excitement. She had woken him. Walling away her guilt, tears formed in the corners of her eyes as he smiled and laughed happily. As always, he showed her a series of images and babbled along as if telling her about his day.

  Ianos had taken him down to the shores of the Sea. He showed her how the waves had covered his legs, which had surprised him. But his indignation at the shock soon transformed into pure delight. He was very upset when Ianos had taken him home, but he was also hungry, so he was still happy. Faela sent all the appropriate emotional responses to each image and portion of the story. Sammi yawned still sleepy.

  The guilt at waking her son hit her again, so she sang his lullaby to return him to the rest from which she had stolen him. Shine, shine like the sun. Light will come and night be done.

  At the final lines, she caressed his mind and broke the contact. I’ll be home soon. Mama misses you, lamb.

  Like I miss my heart, she thought as she opened her eyes.

  When the forest reappeared around her, two men dressed in black stood blocking her view. Before she could even scream, the shorter man backhanded her across the face. The force knocked her backward off the tree trunk and into a juniper bush.

  "Oh, you have given us quite the chase, missy," said the man who had struck her. "Lucky for us, Master Nikolais was none too specific about what condition you needed to be in when we returned you to him."

  "Now why would you run out on your husband like that, girl?" asked the taller, blonde man who shook his head. "And take his only child. That's just cruel, that is. No way to treat a man."

  The branches of the voluminous shrub jabbed into her back and neck sharply. Pulling herself out of the juniper, her cheek ached from the force of the blow and her head swam.

  With rage clear in her eyes, Faela wiped the blood from her split lip with a knuckle. "Then I guess it's a good thing that Nikolais isn't a man."

  "Oh, ho," said the shorter one with a laug
h. "He said you was a feisty one."

  "How much did Nikolais promise you?" Faela asked her voice cold and hard trying to keep them talking.

  "We might not look respectable to you," the blonde said, "but we don't break contracts, girl. Besides, Nikolais warned us that you'd try to buy us, so he promised us a bonus if you did. Said he would match whatever price you offered on top of our original fee."

  Searching for another defense, Faela rose to her feet with her hands away from her body to indicate that she had no weapons. "Do you know who I am?"

  "Master Nikolais' wife," said the shorter one uncertainly.

  She nodded with a wicked smile. "Did he tell you who I was before we married?"

  "What does that matter?" The shorter one snapped his patience wearing thin.

  "Oh," Faela said slowly, "it matters if you want to live to spend your fee."

  The blonde smirked. "It don't matter who you were or who you are. All that matters is getting you back to Finalaran."

  "I'm sure he told you my name," Faela said the smile never leaving her face.

  "So, you're a rich Merchant brat." The blonde shrugged dismissing its relevance.

  "Not untrue," she said nodding, "but that's not what I meant. Because I'm sure that you know my brother, because he knows you two. He knew Nikolais contracted you. He warned me."

  She waited for the recognition to dawn on their faces and when it did, she was not disappointed. They fidgeted as they shared an anxious look.

  "It don't change nothing," said the shorter man a little too quickly. "We still collect the bounty, yeah? What Murphy does after that ain't got nothing to do with us."

  "Do you really think that's how he'll see it?" she said with mock concern.

  The blonde yanked Faela by the arm dragging her close to him. "I'm sick of hearing you talk. Let's find another use for that mouth."

  The man crushed his mouth onto hers, his breath hot on her tongue. She could taste the sourness of stale ale and onions. She struggled to push herself away from him, but he held her tight as he slammed her hard into a nearby tree. Her heart hammering against her ribs, she felt his hands move from holding her arms to her side. Unable to scream with him covering her mouth, she opened the link between her and Kade.

  Kade watched Faela disappear into the tree line as he sat back down.

  "She'll be fine," Mireya reassured him. "She can take care of herself."

  Kade grunted noncommittally. "I don't like anyone going off by themselves." He didn't feel the need to tell her about his promise to Caleb or his own personal discomfort at the idea of her going alone.

  "Of course, she can take care of herself," Dathien said to Mireya, "but she shouldn't needlessly risk herself either. Besides, you're the one who had a bad feeling about that forest."

  Mireya's head snapped up at Dathien's words. "Ooh, that’s right. I change my mind. Kade, can you go find her?"

  Sensing Faela's distant feelings of guilt, Kade decided to give her some time to sort herself out before going after her. “Let's let her alone for a bit. She traveled by herself for a long time. I'm sure she misses the quiet solitude.” Speaking under his breath, Kade said, “Light knows I do.”

  Mireya looked skeptical of Kade's proposed explanation. “I'd think after being alone for so long she'd want people around.” Mireya played with the hem of Dathien's cloak.

  “Yes, but you, unlike most people, seem to disappear to another place even when in a crowd,” Kade said. “Even when in the middle of a conversation at times.”

  Mireya blushed. “I don't mean to,” she said in a quiet voice looking down at the stiff cloth between her fingers.

  They sat in silence. The only sound was the popping of the fire and the hissing of the wood as water evaporated in the heat. Staring into the fire, Kade sought Faela again without intending to and found the same affectionate love and masked guilt he had felt the night Eve and Sheridan had arrived. Before he could analyze her emotions further, Mireya spoke banishing the silence and his wandering thoughts.

  “I know that I come across as vapid sometimes,” she said focusing on the stray threads of the cloak's hem. She wrapped the string around her pinky. “I don't mean to. It's just so hard to stay here, when there's so much distracting me with all the colors and the music. It's just everywhere, never ceasing, always flowing.”

  As Mireya got that far away glaze to her eyes, Kade rocked forward into his knees watching her closely.

  Mireya shook her head. “I'm sorry, I did it again, didn't I?” she asked, her small hands balled into fists in her lap. “Rivka never lets it distract her.”

  “Rivka also has centuries of practice, love.” Dathien reassured her with a squeeze. “You're only nineteen. Give it time.”

  “Mireya,” Kade inquired with an avid fascination, “are you telling me that you can actually see the flows of color magic?”

  Mireya nodded her mouth pouting in frustration.

  “All the time? You can't shut it out?” he asked his dark amber eyes sparkling.

  She shook her head. “It's always there.”

  “Would you mind if I try something?” he asked as gently as he could.

  “What do you want to try?” she asked drawing her eyebrows together in suspicion.

  “You don't need to do anything,” Kade assured her as his eyes disappeared under a violet haze. As Kade watched the purple pulses that indicated the intersections of the different folds of space and time, he turned his gaze to Mireya who shimmered with a bluish indigo light that radiated from within her skin. Blinking, the purple receded from his tawny eyes.

  His mouth, slack for a moment, tugged up at the corners in a grin of understanding. “By the Light, do you two realize what you are, Mireya?”

  Looking at little uncomfortable, she looked up at Dathien and then over to Kade. “An oracle?”

  “Well, yes,” Kade agreed quickly. “But you exist in more planes than, well, everyone else I've ever met."

  "What does that mean?" Mireya asked with concern.

  Kade organized his thoughts, considering how best to explain what he had deduced. "Not everyone can feel the magic."

  Mireya nodded. “Only magic users can.”

  "Well, where those of us who wield magic can feel it when most people can't, you can not only feel it, but see it and hear it too. It's like you're the only person who can see and hear in a world full of blind and deaf people. To us, life is only tactile, fairly simple and manageable. But for you, you're having to deal with all those sights and sounds all the time."

  "Oh," was all Mireya said as she stared at the fire.

  "I’m able to understand only a little bit," Kade continued, "because those trained by the Amserian Order can see the flows of purple magic, the flows of time and space. But we have to actively search for the flows and only then can we see them after years of training. It seems though, that you exist in the plane that we only ever enter in order to pop through space or step through time."

  Kade looked at the petite, dark girl with a newfound respect. "Darkness, Mireya," Kade said looking at her as though for the first time, "it must be exhausting. Spending only moments there, when transitioning through, feels like an entire day of chopping and hauling firewood. I'm surprised you’re capable of carrying on a coherent conversation at all."

  Mireya gave Kade a slow, shy smile of appreciation. "Thank you, Kade."

  Dathien's deep blue eyes shone with gratitude. "Outside of Vamorines, it's hard for people to understand and harder still to explain. Back home, everyone just understands."

  "It gets very lonely out here," Mireya said resting her head against Dathien.

  At her words, Kade felt the pull that he had begun to associate with Faela singing. It was her lullaby.

  Standing, Kade stretched. "I think it's time I go check up on Faela." He waved behind him as he jogged toward the trees.

  His long strides eating the distance, it didn't take long before he had to weave around tree branches. He tried to
slow down his pace. He had meant what he said. He believed that Faela needed this time to herself. It had been days since she had found any real solitude. Though she tried to appear relaxed, being surrounded by so many people all the time kept her constantly vigilant. Kade knew exactly how exhausting that could be.

  Taking his time, he paused to listen to the reassuring sounds of the forest. But instead of the sounds of animals scurrying through the brush, he only heard the wind whistling through the leaves. The quiet of the forest was too still. The kind of stillness that indicated a predator crossing a territory, everything staying hidden and quiet in the hope that they would remain unnoticed.

  Trusting his instincts, Kade removed the curved, long knife from his waist and let the blade find its balance as he kept his wrist loose. As he scanned between the trunks of the trees, he slowed his breathing searching for anything out of place. It was in this state of relaxed wariness that it enveloped him like an undertow.

  The vague sense of Faela's emotions he had felt, the brief whispers of thoughts he had convinced himself he had imagined, tore open inside of his mind like they had that afternoon in Oakdarrow. He felt the pounding of panic, terror, and disgust, as well as waves of shame and guilt.

  Only this time the emotions were clear, instead of a tumbling snare. He closed his eyes and saw a cheek with a jagged scar pressed close to his face. He smelled sour beer and felt the rough scrape of facial hair on his own cheek.

  He heard Faela's thoughts whisper in his mind, Kade, can you hear me? Darkness, please hear me. Then he felt the man's hands and Faela's internal cry that she tried to shield from him, but failed in her panicked state. Stop, please. Please, not again. Blessed Light, make it stop.

  When Kade opened his eyes, they were veiled with black fire. Without pausing to find any signs to track her, he kept his body low as he sprinted through the trees. He knew exactly where to find Faela. His rage fueled the fire within him and that same fire licked from his hand engulfing the blade of the knife. He was close; he could hear the sounds of struggle and the curses of a coarse male voice.