The Shadow Realm

by James Galloway

  "She had to have," he growled, looking at the amulet. "The chain isn't broken. And I don't think she was hanging upside down out of a tree."

  "Maybe something happened to make her take it off, and she forgot where she left it," Auli offered.

  "But you just said that she'd never take it off," Tarrin said. "What can you think of that would make you take off your amulet, Auli?"

  She pondered a moment. "Nothing," she replied. "I do take mine off when I bathe, because I don't want it getting tarnished, but I'm always alone when I do it, and it's the first thing I put back on." She blushed. "I'd appreciate it if you didn't repeat that, honored one," she said with slight chagrin. "Even that would be enough for the rumors to bury me in the eyes of the others."

  "I never heard it," he said absently, fretting. It didn't make any sense! Why was the amulet of a dead Sha'Kar laying out in the forest? Why--

  Tarrin blinked, then stood straight up so quickly his feet came off the ground. A cold fist seemed to have punched him in the stomach.

  "Oh, Goddess," he breathed. "No, it can't be that."

  "What, honored one?"

  "They couldn't have gone that far," he said in disbelief, handing the amulet to Auli and then summoning the power of High Sorcery to him. He allowed it to fill him to a reasonable degree, and then sent out a sweeping, loosely woven weave of Earth and Divine, a weave that sank into the ground and fanned out in every direction, a weave that had been woven to search for something very specific.

  To his horror, he received almost immediate responses. They were ahead of them, the closest about two hundred spans ahead, just past a particularly thick snarl of thorny plants.

  "Oh, no," he said under his breath, his flesh actually creeping. "Goddess, they did. They did it. I can't believe it."

  "What, honored one?" Auli demanded. What did they do?"

  But he didn't answer. He broke into a sprint quickly, moving towards the closest of those responses, coming up to the thorns. He swept them out of his path with a weave of Air, smashing them to the ground, and then stepped over them, into a strangely clear area with large, old trees, and plenty of space between the trunks. Those thorns grew in a wide circle around the area, and Tarrin realized that all the responses were coming from inside the circle. He took ten steps, just past a big, old oak, and felt that he was standing right in front of the closest of them.

  Auli managed to catch up to him, and saw him staring at the ground. "What is the matter, honored one?" she asked in breathless anticipation. She could tell that he was upset by whatever it was, but her nature wouldn't let her leave it alone. She was curious now, and she just had to know.

  Tarrin pointed both palms at the ground, and a weave of Earth caused the forest floor before him to literally explode outward. Dirt flew in every direction, washing over them as Auli screamed in surprise and flinched away from the cascade, then she laughed ruefully and shook dirt out of her platinum blond hair. "Warn a girl next time, honored one!" she told him with another laugh, starting to look down. "It's going to take me...all...day...."

  Auli trailed off as she looked into a six span deep pit before them, with roots hanging out of the edges of it. And at the bottom of the pit, crumpled in on itself and dishevelled, was a skeleton.

  And around them, inside the barrier of thorns, there were three hundred and forty other responses to his searching spell.

  Tarrin found the missing Sha'Kar.

  "I didn't know they had a old cemetery out here," Auli said in a nervous tone. "Those are Sha'Kar bones."

  "Look at them, Auli," he said in a tightly controlled voice. "They're not that old. I'd say about ten years."

  "Ten years? Nobody's died here for thirty," she scoffed. "Only--" she gave a great, horrified gasp. "No!" she said in protest. "It can't be one of the ones that died in the ceremony! They died at the Ward!"

  "Oh, yes," he said in a cold, emotionless tone. "This is the most recent grave. I'd say that this is Theran Ai'Shar. Over there is the next recent." He pointed about fifteen spans to the left. "That would be Aliani Ai'Shar. There are hundreds of other, Auli. I'll bet every single Sha'Kar that supposedly died in that ceremony is buried here."

  "But-But-But how did they get here?" Auli demanded uncertainly. "Did someone retrieve their bodies and bury them?" Tarrin dropped down into the grave and knelt over the bones, putting his paws on them. "What are you doing?" she said in shock. "Honored one, don't disturb the rest of the fallen! It's not right!"

  "I'm not going to move anything," he told her, closing his eyes and Bridging into the Weave. "Now be quiet, Auli. Let me concentrate."

  "What are you doing, honored one?"

  "Finding the memory of what happened here, but I need quiet to do it," he growled at her.

  It had to be in the Weave somewhere. Theran Ai'Shar, this is your chance to tell your story, Tarrin thought to himself as he Bridged, raised his mind into the Weave without leaving his body. If there's anything of you left in the Weave, come to me now. I need your memory. I need your echo. Come to me! He emptied his mind, tilted his head back and let the magic flow with him, through him, opening himself to the faint echoes of the Weave, searching for that one specific fragment of history to touch him.

  And it was there. A brief flash, an image, of a blond Sha'Kar standing blankly before a pit he himself had just excavated with Sorcery, standing there for quite a while. He simply stood there, and then there was another behind him. A flash, a glint of light, and then it was over. Theran Ai'Shar toppled lifelessly into the grave he had dug for himself, and then the grave began to fill.

  She said that when they came out, Iselde's mother looked pale and out of sorts, Tarrin remembered Dar telling him the day before, when he was relating the story of what happened to Iselde's parents. She didn't talk to anyone or do anything. She said that the woman just stood there a moment with blank eyes, then walked out the door. They never saw her again.

  A blank look, walking out the door and into the city. And Tarrin would bet that they walked right out here, got past the thorns, dug themselves a grave, and then patiently waited for their executioner to arrive and do them in. Then the executioner fills the grave, and the Sha'Kar is forgotten. Yet another failure in the ceremony of Ascension. Thank you, Theran Ai'Shar, Tarrin thought to himself in grim satisfaction. You showed me exactly what I needed to see. Rest now, and let me handle avenging you and your wife.

  "I don't understand, honored one!" Auli said as Tarrin lifted himself out of the grave and then carefully refilled it.

  "It's very simple, Auli," Tarrin told her in a distant, emotionless tone. "The Council didn't send Iselde's parents to the Ward to try to breach it. They had them come out here, under control of a Mind weave, and then someone came along and murdered them."

  "M-M-M-Murdered?" she said in stunned disbelief. The very thought that a Sha'Kar might do violence was inconceivable to her. But to take a life? It was impossible! "Goddess, honored one, why would they do that? It makes no sense!"

  "That, my dear Auli, is the question," he said in a focused tone.

  Tarrin had expected to find something damning, but in his wildest dreams, he never dreamed he'd find something like this. No wonder the Council reacted so strongly when Tarrin mentioned it. Because they'd killed the missing Sha'Kar.

  He now knew what happened to the missing Sha'Kar. Now he needed to know why. This wasn't about digging dirt on the Council anymore. They were murdering their own people, and they had to be stopped. But before he could put a paw in, he needed to understand what motivated the Council to start killing their own subjects. The other Sha'Kar would be safe enough now that Tarrin knew what was going on. If they showed up at someone's house and enchanted them to take this final walk out to this graveyard, he would intervene. He wouldn't let this happen again. But between now and killing the Council, he wanted to find out why this had happened. What could have driven Sha'Kar to do violence, something that was absolutely against the very fiber of their being.

 
And not just violence. To commit the ultimate sin. Murder.

  "Auli," he said in a very calm, very rational voice. "Don't leave my sight from now on, do you understand?" he asked. "What you know now, girl, it could get you killed."

  "You can't be serious!" she gasped.

  "I've never been more serious in my life," he told her earnestly. "You and I, Auli, we're going to sit down and talk. You're going to tell me everything you know about the Council, the Sha'Kar, this ceremony, and anything else that may help me. You're a free spirit, a wanderer, a mischief maker. I was once one myself, and I know how you can accumulate secrets when you go where you're not supposed to go, and do things you're not supposed to do."

  She flushed slightly, then took on a nervously pleased look. "I've overheard a few things, honored one," she told him.

  "When we get back, you're going to tell me everything, Auli. And I mean everything." He looked at her. "And I don't think I need to tell you that we keep what we found here a secret."

  "I wouldn't dare tell anyone. They wouldn't believe me if I did," she said with a rueful, half-hearted chuckle.

  "Someone would," he told her pointedly. "Whoever did this. And then he'd be looking to have you join the rest of them."

  "That's not a very pleasant thought."

  "It rarely is," he told her, finding a grim kind of satisfaction in it. He was horrified at what he found, but in finding it, he would be taking the first step to putting a stop to it. He still couldn't believe it. Maybe he should have, though. Missing people, a tight-lipped governing body? It would stink of murder if it had been humans or Wikuni. But not Sha'Kar, who almost worshipped pacifism as a religion. Tarrin had suspected that the Sha'Kar had somehow escaped, or went after the Firestaff and failed, not be murdered by their own Council and then have it all explained away as failing a dangerous ceremony.

  He just needed a little more information. Knowing that the Council killed the missing Sha'Kar didn't explain why it had happened, what could have driven them to that. There was more here, alot more, and they needed the whole picture before they moved in any way.

  It was a very short yet very tense walk back to the Ai'Shar estate. Auli seemed temporarily traumatized by the ghastly secret she had learned, so much so that she completely forgot to put on the amulet that Tarrin gave to her. She carried it in her hand as they broke the treeline right behind the estate. Tarrin didn't bother going around, he put a paw around Auli's waist and jumped the fence, landing in neatly tended rows of vegetables. People may talk about Auli, and right now Tarrin didn't want anyone so much as noticing a hair out of place on her pretty head. A quick question from a servant had the man leading them to a servant's entrance in the back of the main house, opening into a storeroom that was just off the kitchen.

  Once inside, Tarrin breathed a sigh of relief. He quickly scanned for another lurking watcher in the Weave, something he'd been doing every few moments after they carefully restored the cemetery and Tarrin repaired the thorn wall he'd flattened, covering the evidence of their visit. He even scoured away their scents and wiped away their footprints, leaving nothing behind. Tarrin's mind worked furiously on their trip back, as he tried to fathom what could have driven the Council to start murdering the others. What kind of insanity, what madness possessed them? He still had no answers by the time he and Auli tread cautiously into the kitchen. Tarrin didn't want to run into Arlan right now. He was one of the Council's pupils, and he had the feeling that anything Tarrin said around him would get back to them before it finished coming out of his mouth.

  "We made it back," she said in a trembling voice.

  "We're safe now, cub," he said, assuming a protective role with the girl. Right now, she was important as any of his children for what she knew. "Once we get back to my room, everything will be just fine."

  A very fast, harried walk along the grand passages brought him back to his room, and he threw the door open and ushered her inside with a quick look for servants, then came in behind her. Auli almost cried in relief when she ran into the room, and Tarrin couldn't help but feel the tension flow out of him. The Warded room was isolated from prying eyes and ears, and they'd be safe there. It also wasn't empty. Keritanima waited for him on one of the divans, as Kimmie and Binter sat on the floor just beside it with a chessboard set between them. His sister jumped up as soon as Tarrin moved into the room behind Auli. "It's about time!" she said hotly, putting her fists on her hips and glaring at him. "You said you'd be right back!"

  "We found something," he said, nodding towards Auli. "Something bad."

  "It was horrible!" Auli said in a shuddering tone. "It's a nightmare! I can't believe this is happening!"

  "Kimmie, could you take Auli over to the bed and help calm her down?" Tarrin asked. "She just had a very nasty shock."

  "Certainly, love," she said with a gentle smile. She got up and came over, then put an arm around the Sha'Kar girl and led her towards the raised bed, talking to her in low, reassuring tones. Kimmie's gentle nature should get the girl to regain her composure, but it may take a little while.

  "Well, it looks like both of us have some news," Keritanima said. "Who wants to go first?"

  "You'd better. After I say what I have to say, you'll forget about what you have to say."

  "I'm almost aflutter with anticipation," she said in a humorless voice. "I went to visit Allia again around noon. She was asleep with Allyn in her bed, and I couldn't pass up the opportunity to try checking her again, when she really has her defenses all the way down."

  "What did you find?"

  "I found an active Mind weave inside her," she said. "It was very, very hard to find, because it's buried so deeply in her subconscious that it was like digging up gold. I'd have never found it if she was awake."

  "That sounds like it's just confirmation of what we already knew."

  "Tarrin, Allyn was there. When I was done with her, on an impulse, I checked him."

  Tarrin's eyebrow rose. "You mean--"

  "He has one too, but it's alot stronger and alot more complicated," she answered. "Actually, it's more than one, and they're active weaves. They seem to be inserted into his subconscious and the more primitive sections of his brain. Emotions, impulses, desires, the things that connect us to animals. Basic urges."

  Tarrin stared at her emotionlessly for a long moment, and then it all just seemed to fall into place. The Sha'Kar seemed hedonistic, driven by nothing more than the desire to pleasure themselves. Decadence. Auli was a perfect example of that decadence, a woman that would sleep with anyone that would willingly--and perhaps unwillingly--climb into bed with her. That radical change from their racial culture wasn't the result of a thousand years of exile, it was the result of outside interference. And only a Sha'Kar could weave Mind weaves on other Sha'Kar.

  The Council.

  Their fingers reached far beyond murder, he realized. They were using Mind weaves on their own people, turning them into self-indulged pleasure seekers. But why? What made that necessary? What gains did they reap from it? They had to have some kind of reason for doing it.

  "Tarrin, someone's been tampering with the Sha'Kar," she told him. "And it has to be another Sha'Kar. This is way too complicated for it to be any other race."

  "I know," he said in a quiet tone, looking down at her. "It's the Council."

  "That's what I thought too, but it could be anyone with talent for Mind weaves." She fretted. "But that's not what has me so confused. The Mind weaves in Allyn were effects, not the actual weaves themselves. There wasn't enough inside Allyn for it to have been a full spell. Almost like the other half of a Mind weave that had somehow been split in two. They were just fingers stretching out from the main spell, to let the spell affect him. Since they're active, that means that the Mind weave has to be active as well. I swept the entire room for signs of the spell, but I couldn't find anything."

  "You tried tracing those fingers?"

  She nodded. "They just appear out of nowhere inside of both of them,
and I can't trace them back. It's like the spell is hiding from me."

  Tarrin looked to Auli. Poor girl. He wondered if she understood what was happening, if the Sha'Kar too were trapped inside themselves, screaming and raging against the control that was making them do what they were doing. Somehow...he doubted it. If this spell was provoking their basic impulses, they were simply being overwhelmed by the overpowering desire to seek pleasure. Tarrin didn't think anyone would find that to be too wrong. But how did it explain the Sha'Kar male torturing Zarina?

  "Well, that's mine. What's yours?"

  He looked down at her, his face grim. "I found the Sha'Kar."

  "The missing ones? You found out what happened to them?"

  "I found them," he said in a neutral tone. "They're all dead."

  "We suspected they were dead, brother. It's a small island."

  "They were buried in a part of the forest that's off limits. They were all murdered."

  Keritanima looked about to say something, then she stopped with her jaw hanging down. "Murdered?" she gasped.

  Tarrin related the tale to her of him finding the amulet under the log, running into Auli, and then the circumstances that had led him to the thorn-walled graveyard. "I found an echo in the Weave of what happened to Iselde's father," he told her. "He was controlled by Mind weaves to go there, and then he dug his own grave and waited patiently for whoever came along and killed him. They're all there. I counted them. Three hundred and forty-one."

  Keritanima looked a little flabbergasted. She took a step back and put a hand to her chest, then her eyes turned calculating. The political animal in Keritanima had taken over, and now it was processing this new information. "I guess it shouldn't have been that much of a surprise," she admitted. "If it were anyone but the Sha'Kar, anyway."

  "That's how I felt about it," he said.

  "Still, that seems pretty extreme. If they had to go so far as to kill their own, it makes me wonder what those Sha'Kar found out, what they discovered that would force the Council to kill them."