Shades of Darkness

by A. R. Kahler

  Without further ado, she hit play on the computer and I hit pause on my inner thought process. Or at least, I tried to. My thoughts were notoriously hard to silence. Tonight, I knew, not even sleep would still them.

  Dark dreams.

  Shadow

  Feather

  Root and Bone

  The gods created you for this.

  And I sit in the gnarled roots of the World Tree while the horned god Cernunnos speaks from his knotted pulpit:

  “The gods demand blood. They have always demanded blood. To speak with divinity, you must pay in pain.”

  He turns, but he is now Odin, the Allfather, the ravens Hugin and Munin perched on each shoulder. His suit is coal, his cowl crow feathers, his staff a root from the Tree itself.

  “When Yggdrasil burns, god and man shall dance.”

  And I turn in the classroom of glass students and see a girl. Her dark hair drips down pale skin, hides violet eyes.

  “I know you.”

  I say. She says.

  My reflection wavers. Glass cracks.

  Snow burns outside the window. Ravens scream.

  “Of course you know me,” she says. “For we are the same.”

  She steps forward, reaches out, touches

  my face. Only it isn’t her hand, it is my hand, and I stare back

  at my face through her eyes.

  “When the battle comes, you will be mine,” she says. “Together we will fight the Aesir. Together, we will earn the mortals’ worship.”

  I step back. “I don’t want to fight.”

  “But you will. You were born for this.” She smiles. Violet eyes glow.

  “You were born to be mine.”

  Her skin touches mine. Ravens scream as blood burns and the World Tree cries as the battlefield stretches before us, blood dripping, blood on fire, boughs brimming with blood and ravens. And in my hand—our hand—a dagger, and at my feet,

  a body. His golden body.

  I scream. Ravens fly.

  “Why are you hiding from me?”

  Her words crack. She cries blood.

  “Why are you hiding from me, Kaira?” Brad asks, his hands

  on my cheek, lips

  on my neck. His words dripping down my throat.

  “Why are you hiding from what you’ve done?”

  And I scream as raven feathers fill my lungs,

  as Brad bites my collar, presses hips to mine

  as Munin buries himself into my chest.

  I woke up feeling like I hadn’t slept in weeks. Fragments of my dreams filtered between my fingers as I pushed myself up to a sitting position. My alarm buzzed on the shelf above my bed, playing Carmina Burana because I liked pretending my mornings were epic, rather than just me dragging myself from a stupor into a caffeine-induced high. Elisa, as usual, was already up and showering in the bathroom. Despite this, the room was quiet and dark in the heavy winter dawn. Definitely not inviting. Why had I forgotten to turn off the alarm before passing out? I silenced the music and tried to curl up tighter into the covers. Sleep drifted back, slowly.

  At least until Elisa came back in and threw Toastie at my head.

  “No oversleeping,” she said in her most cheery yet demanding voice. “You know how grouchy you get when you miss breakfast.”

  I sighed and opened my eyes, sticking out my tongue at her while her back was turned. I must have passed out longer than I thought—her hair was already dry and she was just slipping into a fluffy Icelandic sweater I envied (and had stolen on many occasions, which accounted for the small ink stain on the sleeve).

  “Fine,” I muttered. “But I blame this all on you. You never told me Prehistoric Zombies was two hours long.”

  “You never asked,” she replied. “Besides, you started snoring halfway through. If anyone gets to be sleepy today, it’s me.”

  “I don’t snore,” I lied.

  “Breakfast’s over in thirty,” she said. She slid into her parka and grabbed her book bag. She was one of those girls who set out everything she’d need for the following day the night before. How she and I managed to live together in harmony was anyone’s guess. “Last minute” was often the name of my game. “I’ll save you a cinnamon roll.”

  I moaned. Saturday mornings were always cinnamon roll mornings. It made going to school on a technical weekend bearable, which is probably why they did it. I also guessed they put drugs in the frosting. To keep us pliable.

  She left a moment later, leaving me to drag myself out of bed. Today was definitely not a makeup day—the world could just rejoice in me putting on clothes. I slid into a pair of jeans crusted with ceramics and paint, and a T-shirt in roughly the same condition. Painting Studio later today basically meant “dressing up” was an exercise in futility.

  Last night’s dream scratched at the corners of my memory, but I couldn’t quite place it. When I was dressed and had the day’s stuff together, I took a cursory glance out the window, just to see if it had snowed any more during the night. Sure enough, a fine dusting coated everything, turning the pine branches into lace and the ground to cotton.

  And there, on the snowy windowsill, was a set of bird prints.

  My stomach gave a little twist as I remembered pieces of my dream, of a raven piercing my chest. Not just any raven—Munin. Why the hell is he back?

  The worst part about learning how to read omens wasn’t knowing that bad things would happen; that was just a part of life. It was the fact that you never knew what the omen entailed, exactly, or when the event would strike. Or how disastrous it would actually be.

  But if Munin was involved, it couldn’t be good.

  Today was going to be a great day.

  • • •

  The morning dragged by in that expectant blur I’d grown far too accustomed to—waiting for Painting Studio was almost like waiting for Christmas, but today was different. Because today, I’d be spending half of that four-hour chunk in critique, which I was pretty certain was a special level of Hell. Depending on the moment, I was both excited and terrified to be back in that room in a semicircle of easels, staring at a still life and trying not to look too hard at Chris.

  Ethan joined me at lunch. I spied Oliver in line, waiting to get his macaroni and cheese and fake chicken nuggets. Oh yes, Saturdays were always good days, food-wise at least. Lunchtime was also an excellent people-watching opportunity.

  Even though there weren’t any real cliques in the bitchy sense, the kids of Islington definitely filtered into their own groups. It made sense; I mean, you spend a good chunk of your day talking ceramics with a group of people and you’ll naturally be drawn to spending your social time with them as well. It was ridiculously easy to pick out who focused in what: the dancers were all shapes and sizes, but they had a definite poise when they walked that singled them out from the rest of us clunky movers; the drama kids were—just like at public high—the loudest and most outgoing and prone to fits of overbearing laughter; the musicians were reserved and generally had that air of I spend a lot of time staring at sheet music and that’s what I’m thinking about now; the writers just looked depressed most of the time; and the visual artists? Well, we were the ones who looked like we didn’t shower very often and had gotten all of our clothes from a more bohemian Cirque du Soleil. Myself included.

  “Ready for the gauntlet?” Ethan asked, bringing my attention back to the present.

  “Never,” I muttered.

  “It won’t be that bad,” Ethan said. “I mean, the scene couldn’t be that open to interpretation. Right?”

  “Um, really? Have you already forgotten the last one?”

  Ethan buried his head in his hands, running his fingers through his hair in defeat. “I’m trying,” he mumbled. “I never knew doing a painting of flowers could release so much emotional trauma.”

  “Yeah, well, symbolism and shit.”

  “I’ll never look at a lily the same way again. If I hadn’t known I was gay before, I would have after that p
iece of . . . art.”

  “I’ll just be happy if Tamora didn’t do this one naked. Her poor roommate. I don’t think I can stand to critique another piece of work done via ladybits.”

  Ethan shivered.

  “Can we please talk about something else?” he implored. “Something not about genitalia?”

  “I catch you guys at the strangest moments,” Oliver said, sitting beside Ethan. Ethan reached over and stole a chicken nugget from Oliver’s tray before the boy’s butt even hit the seat. “What’s this about genitalia?”

  “Art talk,” I muttered. “You wouldn’t get it. Rather, you wouldn’t want to get it.”

  “I think you may be right about that one.” Oliver managed to intercept another grab from Ethan. “You have your own!”

  “But stolen food always tastes better,” Ethan said with a grin.

  Oliver shook his head. “I don’t understand why I love him.”

  “Neither do I,” I responded. Then stole one of Oliver’s chicken nuggets.

  “I’m cute?” Ethan ventured. “And crafty. Definitely crafty.”

  “Speaking of cute,” Oliver said, and gestured with his chin to my left. And there, lo and behold, was Chris, bee-lining toward us with a tray heaped with food.

  “You’ve got to be kidding me,” I muttered. Ethan raised an eyebrow, but before I could answer or tell him to keep his stupid mouth shut, Chris was standing beside us. Beside me. It took a great deal of self-control not to scoot over, even though the other half of the round table was free.

  “Hey guys,” he said. There was a tentativeness to his voice that was cute. I mean, cute if I could actually care about that. “Mind if I sit with you?”

  And I won’t lie, I almost told him we were just about to leave, but that was stupid seeing as Oliver’s tray was still full and mine was only half picked over. Ugh, what was I becoming? He was just a guy and I wasn’t interested in dating and there wasn’t any more to it.

  “Not at all,” I said, sliding out the chair. Playing nonchalant was my best way out of this becoming awkward. In theory.

  The next ten seconds of silence were potentially the most cringe-worthy of my life. Especially because Ethan was leaning forward with his hands clasped before him, a slight grin on his face, like he was about to do a job interview. Thankfully, Oliver came to the rescue.

  “You ready for the Russian Lit quiz Tuesday?” he asked, popping a nugget in his mouth.

  Chris’s face lit up at the bone Oliver threw him.

  “Not really,” he said. “I still have to finish the last fifty pages of Tolstoy.”

  “Ugh, have fun,” Oliver replied. “At least it’s not Nabokov anymore. Guy made me want to shoot myself.”

  “Isn’t that the whole point of Russian literature?” Chris asked innocently.

  I chuckled. “Well played, sir. Well played.”

  “Speaking of shooting ourselves, we were just talking about Painting Studio,” Ethan said. “And how excited we are for Tamora’s piece.”

  Chris laughed—it was one of those laughs that was too loud for the situation, which just made it even funnier.

  “I nearly lost it last time,” he said. “I just hope she wasn’t using oil paints. Those can damage you.”

  I tried to filter out the boys’ banter and focus on food. Faux nuggets and macaroni was easily my favorite meal in the known universe, and if I let myself pay attention to the boy sitting a foot to my right, I’d lose my appetite entirely. That would be a grave disservice to the gods of food.

  It worked. Right up to the point where Ethan threw a nugget at my head.

  “Earth to Kaira,” he said when I jumped back in my seat. “You still there?”

  “What? Sorry, zoning out.”

  “We noticed,” Ethan replied. “Chris just asked what we were doing tonight.”

  “We?”

  “You were coming to my concert, right?” Oliver asked.

  I nodded, then caught the drift.

  “What our eloquent friend is trying to say,” Ethan intervened, “is that you’re more than welcome to join us. Kaira and I were going to meet in the Writers’ House at six thirty to grab some hot cocoa before braving our way to the auditorium. Sound good?”

  “Perfect,” Chris replied. A pause. “You don’t really think Tamora painted with her nether regions again, do you?”

  It took a moment for my brain to start working and connect the dots, as it had begun to spin on he’s going to a concert with you, he’s going to a concert with you. It made my pulse race, and not in a good way.

  “I hope not,” Ethan said. “But as they say, ‘God hates the gays.’ This would just be another fitting form of punishment.”

  Oliver chuckled and kissed Ethan on the cheek. I glanced to Chris, who was grinning and picking at his food. When his brown eyes darted to mine, I was immediately grateful for that previous stuffing of my face. My heart leaped into my throat, and any chance of food getting past the obstruction was lost.

  I know it was stupid, but something in that smile reminded me of Brad.

  • • •

  “You were totally smooth,” Ethan said as we left the cafeteria. “I mean, like, Oscar-worthy performance in there. I nearly cried.”

  “Shut up.” I rammed my elbow into him, maybe a little harder than necessary. I wasn’t pissed, really, but the fact that Chris made me think of my ex had me on edge. “If I remember correctly, you weren’t nearly as eloquent when you first met Oliver.”

  “Girl has a point,” Oliver said, grabbing my free arm. “She led that conversation. In fact, she nearly took our first kiss from you.”

  “I hate you both,” Ethan muttered.

  “Anyway, Chris is cute. And intelligent, at least from what I’ve seen in class.”

  If Oliver hadn’t been holding my arm, I might have smacked him, too.

  “And talented, which we know is a necessity for you,” Ethan said. “I think he might be just your type, Winters.”

  “I don’t have a type, Davis,” I replied. There were only two times we used each other’s last names: when we were jovial and when we were being deadly serious. I was hoping Ethan could tell it was the latter. “You know that.”

  “Uh huh. That’s why you jerked when Oliver mentioned him. Someone has a crush.”

  Just the word “crush” made me sick to my stomach. Love is for getting hurt. “He’s cute,” I admitted, because Ethan was incredibly good at spotting a lie. “But in that distant, untouchable sort of way.”

  “She’s already talking about touching him,” Oliver said with a chuckle.

  “Can it,” I warned him.

  “Let me guess,” Ethan mused. “This is another topic we add to our no-no list.”

  “Your what?” Oliver asked.

  “The list of things we don’t talk about. It’s a very short list, to be fair.”

  Eager to change the subject, I jumped on the topic.

  “Like ‘thesis,’ which you still haven’t seemed to grasp.” I made sure to direct that last bit at Oliver, who just shrugged and kicked a bit of snow to the curb.

  “And tiny insects that burrow under your skin,” Ethan added with a shiver. “I hate parasites.”

  “And . . . actually, that’s about it. Not much else is off topic.”

  “So Chris is definitely going on the list?”

  “Definitely,” I said. “Call me cat lady all you like. I will never crush on an Islington boy. Or girl,” I added, before either could beat me to the punch.

  “If you say so,” Ethan said. “Though we’ll see if you change your tune after the concert.” He chuckled to himself. “See what I did there? It was a pun. You know, a music pun. Because I said ‘tune’ and we’re going to a concert and—ow!”

  The last part was compliments of Oliver and the snowball he launched at his boyfriend’s face.

  “And now we know why you aren’t in the writing program,” Oliver said. Ethan just dusted off the snow from his peacoat and glowered.<
br />
  • • •

  I parted ways with the boys outside my dorm and headed inside to gather my things and my wits for the last run of the day. There was another half hour before class began, which was just enough time to check e-mail and all that other social media junk. And apply some makeup, because even though Chris just saw me without, I needed my warpaint to tackle an intensive four hours of playing eye avoidance with him. Yes yes, it was a complete one-eighty from my stance this morning, but I was allowed to be fickle on some things when I had to be rigorous about everything else.

  Out of habit, I checked my cubby for mail. A little blue slip sat inside, which was pretty much like discovering a hidden twenty in your pocket. It meant I got a package, and seeing as I hadn’t ordered anything, it meant a care package from home.

  Which meant cookies.

  Elisa would be pleased. Our weekend was just made.

  I took the slip over to the front desk and handed it to Jessica, another RA.

  “Score,” she said when she handed the large package over. “Are these more of your mother’s delicious baked confections?”

  Like Maria, Jessica was fresh out of college and sweeter than honey. Which was kind of funny, seeing as she usually wore black and had a tongue piercing from her “wild days.”

  “Looks like it,” I said, giving the box a cursory shake. It was very obvious this was from home and not from a shipping department: There were heart and star stickers all over it, and the return address said MOM with her address in tiny parentheses below. “Don’t worry, l’ll save you some.”

  “You’re a gem,” she said with a wink. “And you just got a week’s pass on room inspection.”

  That didn’t mean much, seeing as the RAs only glanced into seniors’ rooms to make sure we weren’t living under garbage. But it still made me grin.