Shadow Heart

by J. L. Lyon

  No. He couldn’t. Even to think such a thing was a betrayal of his master. And betrayal was death. There was a story his master used to tell, of a man who built wings to fly high above the earth like the gods. And that man, who forgot he was just a man, flew too close to the sun and his wings melted. In his bid for glory, he shot too high and plummeted to his death. That was the consequence of such thoughts.

  I was created for a purpose. I should not want more.

  His thoughts turned back to the mission at hand, eyes set on the lights growing brighter in the distance at his approach. He would have had them back at the forest if not for the intervention of their mysterious hosts. They wore furs, appeared to be little more than cavemen, but they were not what they seemed. He could not fully grasp the importance of what he had seen just yet, but knew it to be a gem that both his master and his superiors would grasp for greedily. It would be up to him to decide which received it.

  There had been technology hidden in that cave, as advanced as anything he had seen in the World System. From that he deduced that they must have been tracking the movements of the Spectorium hunters. Knowing the position of the Spectorium himself, it was not difficult to guess by which trajectory his mark would eventually leave the forest, so all he had to do was sit at the north rim and wait. He had not expected the horse. Had it only been the single rider, it might have meant mission failure.

  But the horse proved not to be the fastest of beasts, and with two riders they had to stop more often than he did on foot. What ground they gained in the day he more than made up for in the night. He could go days on only two to three hours of sleep, thanks to his training. And he could run faster than most men he had met, and for longer, too.

  He had almost met with disaster on the previous night, nearly stumbling into the camp of a hundred Persian warriors who just happened to be on the same road as his mark, moving in the very same direction. The coincidence again brought his mind back to the charge given to him by his master: Silent Thunder has been searching for something this past year…the most dangerous of all Old World secrets. They must never find it. Some things were never meant to see the light of day.

  Could the Persians know of this secret as well? And if he found it first, could he use it to barter for his freedom?

  He shook his head, again pushing the notion aside. He could see the tower now, lines of black finally revealing its shadow against the gray sky. The lights were disconcerting. Was this outpost manned? But surely his target would have turned and followed a different path by now, and the tracks—admittedly scarce on the broken asphalt—still led him forward.

  The only explanation was that they had happened upon the abandoned outpost and turned the lights on themselves. His opinion of his mark immediately dropped. She might not know about him, but there were other enemies out here almost as dangerous. It had been a foolish move, one that betrayed their position quite handedly.

  His training took over as he drew within a few hundred yards. His breathing became shallow and his feet made no sound discernible to the human ear. If he could have trained his heart to stop beating, he would have. As his master so eloquently put it, he was a scalpel. The assassin you never knew was there until it was too late. Some of his marks never knew at all.

  Blonde hair flashed in the meager light streaming from the outpost’s doorway, and he jumped deftly behind the first tree at the edge of the road. The outpost had been constructed a little ways in, so he was still about fifty yards from the door. But that was no longer his goal. He peered around the tree and again saw the blonde hair, ragged and unkempt from days of travel, bobbing left and right against the woman’s back as she moved away from him, bending at intervals to retrieve sticks from the ground. He enjoyed the sight. It brought back warm memories…and harsh ones.

  Best not to try to sneak up on this one. She had proven he should not underestimate her long ago. He drew a tranquilizer gun from his supplies and loaded it with a single dart. Enough juice to put her down immediately, but not kill her. He stepped around the tree and took careful aim down the sight of the long cylinder.

  The shot was silent, with barely any recoil, and his aim was dead-on. The dart sliced right through her hair and into her neck, and she dropped like a sack of meat.

  He scanned the area quickly for the other one, but saw no trace. Only the horse tied to a nearby tree. She must still be inside.

  After waiting another moment, just to be certain, he broke from his position of cover and strode silently to where the blonde woman lay. Her hair had fallen over her face, so he bent down to push it lovingly—mockingly—aside. He stroked her cheek simply because he could, feeling that same softness that had so often gotten his blood pumping, until he had finally conquered her. She had managed her revenge, it was true, but now he would have the last word.

  In mere moments his mission would be complete, and who was to say he couldn’t gather a bit of information in the process—just in case there was something valuable enough to free him from his master? He grinned.

  Oh, this was going to be fun, indeed.

  - X -

  Grace ascended the staircase that connected the outpost’s base with the watchtower that overlooked the road. Most of the dead had been confined to the first floor. That had likely been the epicenter of the battle. Once the defenders had been overcome, all that was left was to mop up the survivors. Those were the ones Grace stepped over as she climbed, trying her best not to look down and see the initial stages of decomposition.

  The smell was awful, but nothing like the toxic stink she had encountered at their initial entrance. Aside from the discarded shells, there was no weaponry. Whoever had done this had also stripped the bodies clean of useful supplies. They shut down the outpost, too, she thought to herself. If they took the time to do that, it’s doubtful they left behind any damaging information.

  Unless it wasn’t the Great Army at all. She had thought a lot about Grantoro and his underground haven since their meeting. What if there were more such places hidden all across the Wilderness? There were stories of Great Army execution squads entering supposed ruins and never coming out again. She had taken them for hopeful delusions and legends, but what if they weren’t? What if there were others out there fighting the World System right in her backyard?

  She reached the top of the staircase and entered the control deck. There were three bodies here, two on the floor and one strewn over the top of a computer console. It looked like he had attempted to dive behind it and had not quite made it. Bullets riddled most of the computers, rendering them useless. She wandered between the few that had not been destroyed, turning on the power and saying a prayer under her breath. But in the end she was disappointed. Each screen bore the words System failure - files corrupted.

  It had been another Great Army detachment who killed these men. No other group would have taken care to destroy sensitive data. But why? Was it possible these men weren’t actually with the Great Army? Silent Thunder had proven how easily they could impersonate Great Army soldiers for their attack on the Weapons Facility in Alexandria. She just didn’t see the purpose of doing something like that here.

  She took another survey of the room, holding on to the hope that she might find something in the rubble. But after several minutes of combing through the mess, she came up with nothing. All electronics had been destroyed or fried, their files utterly corrupted. The mystery victors had been thorough. She hesitated between the desire to be out of there and the sense of responsibility to be thorough herself. The next step of her search was one she had hoped to avoid.

  But there was no way around it.

  Grace bent to examine the bodies on the ground, reducing her intake of breath as she drew closer to the decay-tainted air. If there was something the killers missed, it would probably be there. Their weapons and extra ammunition had been stripped, but there might be other things. She tried to ignore the nausea rising in her throat as she rifled through their pockets, all of which turned ou
t to be empty. She huffed in frustration. All this, and she had no more knowledge than when she had come in.

  But as she turned to leave, she noticed that the dead man on the console had something clutched in his right hand. She stepped over to him, crinkling her nose as she pried away his stiff, cold fingers to remove the piece of paper hidden in his palm.

  Unfolding the crumpled square, Grace held it up to the light in order to read the faded scrawl, Code 0 overridden by MWR appt. Bruce orders: resist at all cost.

  That was it. She reread it three times but could make no more sense of it beyond that the men in this outpost were ordered to resist some action by Napoleon Alexander. That made her feel more pity for them...slightly.

  Perhaps Liz would know more. She folded the paper back up and slid it into her pocket, eager to be back outside and away from the stench of death. Liz had been right. The place was filled with ghosts. She couldn't sleep there any more than she could sleep inside a tomb.

  She left the control room and headed for the stairs, lost in thoughts of a peaceful night beneath the stars.

  - X -

  Liz woke to a burning sensation in her nose and jerked involuntarily backward. Her head thumped hard against something behind her, and when she tried to reach up to rub away the pain, she quickly found that she couldn’t. Her hands were tied, wrapped securely around the tree at her back. Only then did she realize she was missing time. What had happened? How had she gotten here?

  Something moved in the shadows at the edge of her vision, and she turned slowly as the figure coalesced into the shape of a man. She had not been afraid upon the realization she was tied to a tree. She had been in worse situations before and she had always managed to escape. But when she saw this man’s face, she felt true fear. More than at any time since her encounter with the lions, perhaps even since her time at the Capital Orphanage.

  “Rowan.”

  “Liz,” he replied in a low rumble devoid of feeling.

  She tried to keep her voice level, but between the cold and the fear she did not quite manage, “What are you doing here?”

  “He sent me.”

  A chill ran up her spine, “To do what?”

  His teeth flashed in the meager light, the lust in his eyes more beast than human. “The real question, Liz, is what are you doing here, with a rebel—the commander of the rebels, no less. Last I heard you were leading Sullivan’s armies. To defeat, mostly, but still. How the mighty do fall.”

  He knew she was with Grace. That must mean he was actually here for her. Coming across Liz in the process must have just been icing on the cake. That didn’t make her feel any better about what was ahead. Quite the opposite.

  “What does he want with her?” she asked.

  “I’d tell you, but it will be much better to show you, once she joins us,” Rowan replied. “Until then you and I have a few...personal things to talk about.”

  Liz doubted talk had anything to do with his plans, but the longer she could keep him talking the more she delayed his sick fantasy. If Grace saw him before he saw her, they might just have a chance.

  Rowan stepped over to her and lifted her chin. His touch made her skin crawl, and she fought the urge to bite his finger. But it was the eyes that got her most: so devoid of emotion that they might as well have been empty sockets. Whatever he was about to do to her, there was no passion in it. Only cold, calculating action. Almost as if everything of his humanity had been stripped away.

  “What did he do to you, Rowan?” she asked.

  His lips pressed into a thin line, and at last something flashed in his eyes. Anger. Hurt. Fear. And then it was gone, as quickly as it had appeared. He put more force against her chin, “Stand up.”

  As her hands were tied behind the tree, she used only her legs to lift herself off the ground. The bark bit into the exposed skin of her wrists and hands as they slid upward, but it felt somewhat empowering to be on her feet again.

  Rowan stepped back and looked her up and down approvingly, “It is amazing what time does for a woman. When I chased after you years ago, I thought you were the most beautiful thing I had ever seen. But you were a stick, then, just a little thing...half-developed and inexperienced.” He moved toward her once again, even closer than he had been before. She could almost feel the heat of his body fighting against the cold winter air.

  “But now here you are, a woman in all your glory,” he reached out to touch her cheek, “Your beauty has only grown with maturity. Eyes. Skin. Lips.” He ran his thumb across her mouth, and she cringed with revulsion. “Curves to turn the head of even the most devoted of husbands.” His hand traveled down her neck and across her chest, lingered for a moment, and then moved down to her stomach. “You know, some men are obsessed with the beauty of young women. Mere girls. They are fools. There is nothing so glorious as the beauty of a woman approaching her prime. You would only continue to get more beautiful, for the next ten to fifteen years. Pity. It would have been a sight to behold.”

  He punched her hard in the gut, so quickly she did not even have time to brace herself. The wind exploded from her lungs, and she gasped for more to replace it. Had she not been tied to the tree she certainly would be on her knees, but all she could do was lean forward. Rowan pushed her back against the tree and drew his knife. She tried to dodge his thrust at her neck but had nowhere to go. He could have killed her in that moment, but he stopped short, reaching up to the collar of her uniform and using the knife to cut the fabric. A moment later she felt the cold air bite at her chest. He had not disrobed her entirely, but now the uniform was extremely low cut. Hardly the fashion for a Silent Thunder operative.

  She laughed and received a backhanded slap.

  “Laugh while you can, for you will not enjoy this,” Rowan said. “There is a saying from one of the old religions. You may have heard it. ‘Those who live by the sword shall die by the sword.’ Well, it is no secret that your feminine charms have been your greatest weapon. In death you will be stripped of that weapon. Whoever finds you—if they find you—will see you humiliated and bare, all traces of beauty stripped away.”

  “And what care will I have for that once I’m dead?” she asked.

  He raised the knife and pressed the cool steel to her cheek, “Who said anything about killing you, my dear?”

  The cold seemed to spread from her chest to the rest of her body, freezing her veins as it went. She did not fear death, not really. She feared dying. And most of all, she feared the notion that she would survive something she should not, that she would take the slow road, lingering on in the world—suffering—even after death had marked her. This was what Rowan had planned. Pain. Torture. Maiming her beyond recognition. And then ensuring her survival, so that she must live with her suffering.

  Panic seized her, and though in her right mind she may have tried to remain stoic and calm, the imaginings of what was about to happen to her drove her mad with fear. She took a deep breath and let out a shriek, louder and more desperate than anything to have ever escaped her throat. And that shriek took the form of a name, the name of the only person who could help her now.

  Rowan stepped even closer now, so near she could feel his breath. And he smiled at her, eyes sparkling with the gleam of victory. He placed a piece of tape over her mouth and whispered mockingly in her ear.

  “Thank you.”

  29

  GRACE FROZE ON THE stairs when she heard the cry. She might have taken it for an animal if it hadn’t taken the form of her name. Liz was in trouble. And she had left her out there alone. She bounded down the stairs as fast as she could go, heedless of her previously injured leg for the first time.

  Not until she reached the bottom did she finally come to her senses. The lights were on. Liz had shouted her name. Whoever was out there, they knew Grace was inside. If she walked out the front door, she would fall right into their hands.

  The chances of her coming away clean from this were slim to none. With no clues as to who might be out the
re or what they might want, she would be going in blind. In fact, there was no way for her to even know if Liz was still alive. That cry could very well have been her last. The thought made her angry...to have come this far with someone and then lose them—it was more than she could stomach.

  She would leave here either with Liz, or revenge.

  Grace drew Novus Vita and made her way over to the far wall where she had turned on the lights just little more than an hour before. She took a deep breath and pulled down on the lever, plunging everything back into the deep darkness of night. If they had been watching the door for her, they would now be just as blind as she was, so she felt along the wall for the doorway and slid back outside. Not getting shot upon exit was a plus, so she made her way quickly and quietly around the base of the outpost, hoping that her black uniform would make her even more difficult to see.

  As her eyes adjusted and the trees came back into focus, she stepped away from the outpost and pressed her back against a trunk to check her bearings. She still had not been attacked, but there was no sign of Liz, either. She peered around the side of the tree and caught sight of Barley’s silhouette a few yards away, still tied up in the very same place he had been when she left.

  The entire area was quiet, but there was a tension in the air, a feeling of anticipation like the calm before an ambush. Something was out there, waiting, stalking her. She had been hunted before, but there was something different about this. Maybe it was being alone in darkness, or the tomb of dead bodies mere feet away, but she sensed death at her door, ready to take her at any moment. She might not even see it coming.

  Her grip tightened on Novus Vita, and she took a look around to the other side of the tree. A shadow moved, inconsistent with the motion of the branches overhead, and she strained her eyes in that direction. She caught a glint of Liz’s golden hair in the moonlight, blowing softly in the breeze. She was standing still, which was unlike her. The only time she could stay in one spot longer than two seconds was when she was asleep. She must be bound, or worse.