Pursuit of Shadows (The Keeper Chronicles Book 2)

by JA Andrews

  Yervant told how the troops had slunk through the woods, approaching a small town right on the northern edge of the Scales. How the giant had gone out first, destroying building after building, then the Roven warriors had swept in. Until Queensland’s soldiers had appeared.

  “And behind ‘em, black like a shadow, a Keeper snuck through the mornin’.” Yervant’s voice was low and angry. “He had no amulets, no stones, no books. All his magic he sucked from the world around him.” The crowd rumbled. “And he didn’t help Queensland’s soldiers. Not a single soldier had an amulet or a charmed sword. The enemy fell before our blades like grass, and the Keeper didn’t even look at the bodies.”

  Will clenched his jaw in an effort to keep his face impassive. The only Keeper who’d been along the northern Scales was Mikal. And he had done everything he could to protect those men. He’d knocked aside arrows, softened the enemy’s steel, thrown illusions onto the field to confuse the Roven.

  “Just when we thought we had ‘em beat,” Yervant said, bitterness creeping into his voice, “the black Keeper stepped up to a burning house and took the fire in his hands.” A ripple of revulsion swept across the crowd.

  Mikal had never spoken of how the battle ended, and Will had never pressed him. He’d been tempted to look into the Wellstone where Mikal had recorded his memories of it, but it had felt invasive. And so he’d only known there’d been a fire. Mikal had always been good at moving flames. He used to light his candles by walking near the hearth. He’d just pull out a bit of flame, dancing on nothing but air, and bring it to his wick.

  “The Keeper took the fire in his hands,” Yervant continued, “and threw it at us, sending streams o’ fire across our men. Burnin’ Roven where they stood, poor Andro and Adaom among ‘em.”

  A swell of anger grumbled through the crowd.

  Mikal had wept for those men as well. Even all these years later, the Keeper carried those deaths with him like a shadow.

  “The black demon burned our men alive!” Yervant shouted. “He drove off the giant with his dark arts. But at the last moment, I drew my bow, and with Andro and Adaom’s bodies at my feet, I shot arrow after arrow at the monster.”

  “And you killed him!” Someone cried out from the crowd.

  Yervant nodded. “My last arrow struck home, sinking into his black heart. I saw him fall t’ the ground. Dead.”

  A wildly inappropriate smile threaten to spread across Will’s face. Mikal hadn’t been shot in the chest. He’d been shot in the shoulder. The arrow had knocked him down, and when he’d gotten to his feet, the Roven were fleeing. Will had changed the bandages on that wound, and it had healed cleanly. The arrow had been nothing. It was the rest of the battle that had left scars.

  Yervant finished his tale and bowed to cheers, sloshing his ale across the front of the stage before climbing down and disappearing into the audience.

  Estinn stepped back up on the stage. “Thank you, Yervant. Even though you only have one tale to tell”—she paused for some jeers from the crowd—“it’s one we don’t mind hearing. Year after year after year.”

  She raised her hand for silence. “Our next storyman is sure to tell something we haven’t heard before. A foreigner has offered to entertain us with tales from distant lands.” She turned and held a hand out toward Will. “Good people of the Morrow Clan, I present storyman Will of Gulfind!”

  A spattering of applause came from the crowd, mixed with murmurs. Will stepped onto the torchlit stage and found himself alone. The sun had set while Yervant talked. The light from the stage torches made the faces of the crowd indistinct, and he imagined they were an audience from back home. Maybe a gathering from a large village. It felt better than a crowd of Roven, but neither really mattered. Tonight the only audience that mattered was Borto.

  Will brought a stool from near the back of the stage forward, and settled on to it. He glanced around to make sure the wayfarer was watching, and catching a quick glimpse of the man standing off to the side, he began.

  “Good evening. Tonight I bring you the tale of the Black Horn. A tale of old magic worn thin and new magic just born. Of love and sacrifice. Of a vast army and a single soul.”

  Will opened himself up to the crowd finding skepticism mixed with curiosity. His breathed in the earthy smell of the torch oil spiced with sorren seeds, and looked down at the stage for a long moment, waiting until the crowd settled into silence, their emotions swinging toward curiosity.

  "The bag with the Black Horn bounced against Eliese's back like the prodding of a little sprite, cheering her on to adventure and victory…”

  As he told of Eliese’s early adventures, it began to happen. The two children directly in front of him were drawn in, and their amusement seeped out, mixing with that of their family, with the Roven warrior behind them.

  By the time he reached the heart of the story, the emotions of the crowd had risen, each individual’s anticipation merging with their neighbors until it filled the small theater. Instead of feeling it in his chest, it became something more—almost a visible cloud, almost a living thing.

  “…on the mantle,” Will continued, “the ram's horn sat like a curl of blackness, darker than the shadows. Eliese reached up, her hand hesitating only a moment before picking it up.”

  Will gauged the audience. Only at the very edges did the mist begin to tatter with distracted people out on the fringes. A dead spot farther along the side circled around someone keeping themselves isolated from the story. But around Borto, the crowd hung together, utterly focused.

  The Black Horn moved along simple and well-made, needing little help on his part. An obscure story he’d found tucked away in the queen’s library, he’d stitched it together with a similar account at the Stronghold. They’d been easy to merge and the story had become one of his favorites.

  Even exchanging the Keeper for a wise woman and leaving out any mentions of Queensland took minimal thought. He just needed to pick up the spool of the story and follow the thread. The words lined up, one after the other. They stretched ahead of him as easy to follow as a wide path through the grass.

  Keeping tabs on the emotions of the audience, he slowed down or sped up the tale. And like all audiences, they let themselves be pulled into it, delighting in the feel of the story.

  A bright spot of fascination off to his left in the mist of emotions caught his attention. He glanced over to see Rass perched on a wagon wheel in her little grey slave’s shift, beaming at him.

  At the darkest moment he paused, letting the tragedy seep through the air. The audience sat silent, somber while the darkness of the tragedy felt complete. Speaking just loud enough to carry over the quiet crowd, he drew them back toward the light, with the slightest hope of finding what was lost.

  When the final words had been spoken and allowed to fade away, the crowd erupted into cheers and Borto applauded enthusiastically. The emotions of the crowd splintered into individual people feeling individual things, and Will pressed his fist to his chest and bowed his head to the crowd.

  He moved to a seat just off the stage to watch the next storyteller. A Roven woman sang next, a long ballad that warbled on the high notes. She finished and the audience talked and laughed and argued with each other while waiting for the next performer. Will sat half-listening to the conversations around him, half-watching Borto. Two men were arguing about whether or not the ubiquitous rumors of frost goblins on the Sweep were true.

  The Sweep was obsessed with the idea of frost goblins this spring.

  A story about frost goblins would be fascinating to hear. Until recently, he’d always heard the little creatures mentioned as only a nuisance. But this year, the stories sounded more threatening.

  “Another report came today,” the first man said. “Eight rangers dead.”

  The second man shook his head. “Just more rumors.”

  “Magar says they’re not,” the first insisted.

  “Your cousin will say anything to scare you…”


  Will opened up toward them, feeling an acidic fear blossom in his chest, even from the protestor.

  Will stretched out farther through the crowd, catching more uncertainty than usual. Every town he’d passed through for the last several weeks had an undercurrent of uneasiness. Will had attributed it to the clans readying themselves for the long migration north to their summer valleys, but maybe it was more.

  Past everyone, Will felt that dead spot again. A place where emotions were being held tight. He shifted to see past the torches.

  Lady Dreadful leaned against a wagon, partially shadowed from the torchlight studying him. His own uneasiness filled his chest.

  At least a dozen Roven sat between him and her, but he closed himself off to all but the frost goblin men, then stretched out past people one by one. A young woman with loose, fiery hair spoke to the man beside her, her emotions swirling bright, just under the surface, edged with jealousy. A man whose beard had streaks of grey chatted with the woman beside him, comfort and contentedness running deep. An older man sat alone, humming with a worn, hollow fear. When he reached Lady Dreadful, he found nothing but emptiness.

  Night had truly fallen and a boy scurried across the stage adding more torches. Excitement and pride broke Will’s concentration on the woman and her blank, hollowness faded from his chest. The extra torches drenched the stage with light, obscuring anything past it. Will shifted on the blanket, trying to shrink back into the shadows, wishing he could see Lady Dreadful. But he might as well be on stage, perfectly lit up and unable to see anything.

  He turned his attention to the next wayfarer woman who’d taken the stage, trying to push Lady Dreadful out of his mind. Tomorrow morning he’d leave with Borto, or following right behind him. The cold woman could stay here in Porreen and rot.

  Borto Mildiani took the stage and Will turned all his attention to the man. It wasn’t difficult. From his first words, the man had the audience enthralled.

  Even more than his face or his name, this set him apart from Vahe.

  Will had forgotten little about the wayfarer’s visit to his childhood home. Vahe had told three tales that morning, tales of danger and suspense. As a child, Will hadn’t been able to pinpoint what he hadn’t liked about them, but he’d told enough stories by now to know. The way Vahe lingered on frightening ideas, the turns of phrase—he enjoyed his audience’s fear.

  Borto, on the other hand, made the festival laugh. The crowd threw themselves into his hands and he rewarded them with excitement and intrigue. He told the tale of a young Roven girl lost on the Sweep who’d called out to the Serpent Queen for help and Will listened closely, absorbing the story to write down tonight. Most stories were easy to remember, this one was so well crafted and told, it would be effortless. The thread of the story ran perfectly true from the lost girl calling for help, to the sinuous, black shape of the Serpent Queen descending from the night sky, and instead of leading the girl back home, changing her into a shadow and bringing her up to live among the stars.

  Will found the Roven myth of the Serpent Queen fascinating. In Queensland, the black cloud-like darkness that wound through the sky was a shadow trail left by the ogre whose constellation sat at one end. Just a lack of stars, a nothing.

  But the Roven viewed the darkness as a serpent, slowly devouring every other star. She was the part of the night sky they claimed as their own, different from the rest and bent on destroying it.

  Borto finished to thunderous applause and Will rose with the rest of the crowd.

  Estinn took the stage long enough to declare Borto the winner of the contest. Will stepped forward to talk to him, but everyone else in the crowd had the same idea and the stage swarmed with people.

  Several wayfarers and even a handful of Roven congratulated Will on his excellent story, but the crowd inexorably pushed him back and shut him out. Borto thundered something enthusiastically to the crowd around him. It would be hours before they left the man alone, but Will didn’t need to talk to him tonight. He’d be back at dawn, just happening to be leaving at the same time as Borto. Only one route led off the Sweep this far south, and they’d have days on the lonely Sea Road to talk before they’d have a chance to go separate ways.

  The obscurity of Will’s room called to him. He looked around for Lady Dreadful, but saw no sign of her. Instead of relief, a wave of vulnerability swept over him, like he’d been tossed into murky water where anything might be slithering past.

  He slipped into the throng moving toward the city gate and with the darkness and the mood of the crowd, reached the unsavory alley leading to the inn with a minimal number of distrustful glances and no sign of a thick copper braid. The moon wouldn’t rise for hours, and the alley sat in heavy shadows. Will paused at the beginning of it. That woman had him rattled.

  Still he hesitated. He let out a huff of annoyance at his own fear, even as he cast out down the dark alley, checking for the vitalle of anyone hiding in the shadows. He found nothing.

  Walking quickly to his room, he slid the insubstantial latch into place, and leaned against the door. Across the dark room on the windowsill he could just make out a lump. It only took a couple steps closer to make it out. A dead mouse. With a small laugh, Will leaned out the window, half expecting an undersized hawk to wing through the sky, but it was empty of everything but distant, cold stars. With a flick, he shot the mouse out the window to land in the alley.

  A candle sat on a tiny table beneath the window. Will set his finger against the wick. “Incende,” he breathed. His fingertip tingled as energy passed through it and a small flame burst into life.

  He sank down onto the bed, dropping his head into his hands and staring at the floor, letting the silence and emptiness wrap around him like a breath of fresh air.

  “Who are you?”

  The woman’s voice cut through the room and Will’s head snapped up.

  Leaning against the wall, tucked back in the narrowest corner of his room, the candlelight showing barely more than her face, stood Lady Dreadful.

  Chapter Five

  Will shoved himself up off the bed. “Who are you?” he shot back

  She ignored the question. “You shouldn’t be here.” Her Roven accent bit the words off harshly.

  Will stared at her for a moment. “This is my room.”

  Trying to gauge her emotions, he opened up toward her. The same emptiness blossomed in his chest. He focused more, searching until he felt an undercurrent of anger, deep and…old. Foundational. The sort of emotion that had been there her entire life. Anger surrounded by coldness and emptiness.

  He could see her face, but her dark ranger leathers blurred into the shadows. Making her somehow part of the darkness except a glint of silver from a knife hilt at her belt.

  She stepped forward and he forced himself to hold his ground.

  “I’m usually better at reading people.” The shock of her presence quickly wore off and was replaced with anger at her audacity. “I had the impression you didn’t like me. Not that you were headed to my room for a midnight visit.”

  He still felt nothing. This woman exuded less emotion than anyone he’d ever met. His own body, on the other hand, thrummed with wariness and alarm. The door stood between them and Will had the urge to run, but outside this room he would still be just as trapped. A foreigner running down the streets chased by a Roven? That story did not end well.

  “Who are you?” she repeated.

  Will gestured to his bright red shirt. “I thought the shirt made it obvious. And the story I told tonight.”

  She said nothing.

  “I’m a storyteller.” …from Gulfind, he almost added. But the lie felt too blatant.

  Her eyes glittered out of the dimness, giving Will the wild impression that she could see through shadows and somehow into him.

  “You sound like you’re from Queensland.”

  Will’s chest tightened but he kept his voice light. “The people from Queensland and Gulfind sound remarkably alike.�
� Which was one of the main reasons he’d picked Gulfind as his pretend home. “The countries are on such good terms that the family trees along the border are muddled with folk from both countries.”

  He waited for her to do or say anything. “There’s a whole history behind that, but since I make my living as a storyteller, you’ll have to pay me if you want to hear it.”

  “Leave the Sweep.”

  Her imperious tone was irritating. He sat on the bed and kicked his feet out with a hundred times more nonchalance than he felt.

  “I was just considering staying.” That lie was blatant, but it was worth it to see the scowl deepen on her face. Will shifted farther onto the bed so he could lean against the wall.

  She took a step forward and Will tensed.

  He cast out through the room again, looking for a source of energy. The candle flame held too little vitalle to do anything. If she attacked, he’d have to pull energy out of her. Which was distasteful. And then he’d—do what? The only spells he worked well were subtle and slow.

  His mind offered up outlandish suggestions from old stories: he could split open the ground like Keeper Chesavia had done. Except even when he told that tale he had no idea how she’d done that. He could call fire from the candle and build it into a wall, pressing her back like Keeper Terrane had done against the trolls.

  Of course when Will had tried to manipulate flames, even with a bonfire to draw from, all he’d managed was a little tumbleweed of fire that had scuttled erratically across the ground before fizzling out.

  He smiled at her, not bothering to make it look sincere. “Now, I think it’s time you tell me who you are, and why you’re lurking in my room. It’s obviously not to hear me tell a story.”

  She shrugged. “Maybe I am. There’s no better way to learn about people than to hear them tell stories, isn’t that right?”

  Will’s stomach clenched at the echo of his words to Borto. “Have you been following me all day?”