When Shadows Fall

by Bruce Blake

Heart hammering in his chest, the prince sprinted the last few paces to the archway, through it into the antechamber. To his relief, it remained empty. He hurried to the door and pulled hard on the brass ring, his jaw clamped tight in preparation for the groan of the hinges, the scrape of the wood on the stone floor.

  Still no sound from the sharpening room.

  He yanked the door open and bolted out into the hot evening leaving the portal ajar behind him.

  ***

  The patter of quick footsteps in the hall made Shourn raise a brow; he paused in rubbing the cloth dowsed with oil along the length of the prince’s blade.

  “What’s he up to?” the armorer murmured.

  He dropped the square of fabric on the stool and picked up another, wiped his fingers on its soft, dry surface first, then used it to wipe the excess oil from the sword. He lifted the hilt to his eye, gazed along the fine edge and nodded, satisfied with his work. The steel hadn’t been dull, so he didn’t know why the prince insisted he sharpen it, but it wasn’t his place to question the young man who’d be his king one day. If he’d learned anything in his life, it was to kiss the ass of any man with the ability to make his life miserable just because the mood struck him.

  The soft cloth whispered along the blade one more time, Shourn taking extra care not to shave the skin off his finger, but he halted at another sound.

  The outer door opening.

  Shourn’s forehead creased. Who else needed an old man so close to dinner time? He had a few choice words picked out if it turned out to be anyone but the king himself. Distracted and a little bit more careless than usual, he took the cloth from the blade and accidentally touched his thumb to the sword. The fresh edge cut him and he sucked a breath through his teeth, jammed his thumb into his mouth. The rusty tang of blood flooded his tongue.

  “Dammit,” he muttered around his sliced digit.

  He tossed the cloth aside, returned his injured thumb to his mouth, and stalked down the hall to the antechamber, Prince Teryk’s sword in hand.

  “Dis better be ‘ood,” he said, words distorted by a mouth full of thumb.

  The door stood open, the chamber empty.

  His eyes darted around the sparse room and found only the furnishings intended to be there. He leaned back and peered one way along the hall, then the other. Empty. No one had gone past the sharpening room; he’d have noticed if they did as he’d noticed the prince sneaking by earlier. Not sure why he’d needed to sneak, but the prince could do whatever he wanted, he supposed.

  Shourn shook his head and popped his thumb out of his mouth.

  “Prince Teryk?”

  His voice echoed along the hall, but received no response.

  “You highness?”

  Nothing. Shourn shrugged and shook his head, returned to the antechamber and put the prince’s sword on the low table.

  “What’s so important a prince needs to leave before his sword’s ready?”

  He went to the door and looked up at the sky, gauging the time by the sun’s position. Morth should be dragging his lazy ass around the corner any time, coming to relieve him so he could get dinner in his belly. About time.

  Shourn pushed the door closed, still shaking his head as he sat in the chair, admiring the prince’s freshly-edged blade. He returned his thumb to his mouth, sucking on the rusty flavor of blood mingled with the bitter taste of oil.

  “Fuckin’ printh,” he murmured. His stomach growled and he settled back in the chair, waiting for Morth.

  XVI Bloodless

  The edge of the bedframe pressed against the back of N’th Ailyssa Ra’s thighs, the thin mattress compressed almost to nothing beneath her weight, but she didn’t notice the discomfort as she stared at the wall.

  It occurred to her the stone wall and its markings had consumed much of her waking hours these past few turns of the moon. The number of chalk lines drawn upon its surface remained at ninety-eight despite the number of sunrises since she drew the last mark.

  Still she didn’t bleed, and no child grew in her belly.

  How could there be? She’d carry no babe if her blood was done. More importantly, no woman made a babe without coupling.

  Ninety-eight lines which should be one hundred and five. The wall had lost count but, after most of a lifetime spent keeping track, N’th Ailyssa Ra’s mind had not.

  She inhaled deeply, tasting the familiar hint of chalk dust in the air, then let her breath out with a sound of resignation. Whenever she named herself in her thoughts, she did so with all of her titles, knowing the time when she’d no longer be able to use them drew nigh.

  Hands on her knees, she pushed herself up from the bed, unsure what to do next. She’d said her morning prayers to the Goddess, thanking her for the sun and the moon, the grass and birds and sky, but skipping the thanks for her womb. At the end of the supplications performed by every member of the order, she added her own words, as she had each dawn, afternoon, and sunset for one hundred and five risings of the sun. She beseeched the Goddess to return her blood, to give her another chance to honor her with a fertile Daughter.

  But the Goddess had forsaken her. Her blood had not renewed its flow and the man they brought her for coupling—her last opportunity to produce a child that might save, or at least prolong, her position in the order—had been the one man with whom she’d never bring herself to procreate.

  Her son.

  She pursed her lips and hung her head, a righteous anger she’d never experienced brewing in her belly in place of the child she was unable to conceive. It tingled along her arms, clenched her fists, tightened her throat. She raised her head, glared at the rows of chalk lines on the wall, the wounds in the stone above them indicative of her life gone by. Every one of them—etched and chalk-drawn, both—angered her further. Each one wounded her as though carved into her soul by the Goddess herself.

  Ailyssa stomped across the room and snatched the rag off the shelf. She shook it out, sending a puff of dust whirling through the air, but stopped before putting it to its use. It had been so long since she’d touched the rough material, an age since she cleansed the wall of its accusing marks.

  The cloth dangled from her fingers as she held it out, hesitating a hand’s breadth from the stone wall, arm quivering. She inhaled a hard breath through her nose, forced it back out, her teeth clamped tight behind her lips. Never had she erased the sacred lines marking the moon’s passing before her blood came and told her to do so. But neither had she stopped inscribing the lines before the time to stop had come, until now. Her trembling hand moved toward the wall.

  The knock on the door startled her, and the restoring cloth fell from her hand.

  With a surprised gasp, Ailyssa plucked the square off the floor and fumbled it back into its spot on the shelf, folded just so beside the nub of chalk she’d worn down to almost nothing since her last bleed. When it was back in place, she wiped her fingers on the front of her smock and waved her hand in the air to disperse the chalk dust floating around her head.

  He told.

  The thought stabbed her heart. She’d begged him not to tell anyone they hadn’t coupled, though it truly didn’t matter if he did or not. What difference would it make if he didn’t? A few days? The lack of time she had remaining didn’t cause her nearly as much pain as the possibility of her son’s betrayal.

  Ailyssa’s fingers touched the handle, but she didn’t pull it open immediately. She took an instant to compose herself, smoothing her smock and rubbing her hand along the gray stubble on her head. A swallow of bitter saliva was the most she could do to convert the anger and hurt in her belly to something else.

  N’th Adesi Re probably meant her smile to calm and comfort her friend before she spoke any words. She held her hands tucked into the sleeves of her red trimmed-with-white Matron’s smock and, when Ailyssa said nothing in greeting nor invited her in, Adesi tilted her head to one side.

  “Are you all right, N’th Ailyssa Ra?”

  Hearing the Matron s
peak the falsely earned title stung Ailyssa as surely as if a fire wasp flew into the room and planted its business end into her heart. The inexplicable rage filling her dissolved, leaving behind an emptiness that threatened to suck itself full of despair.

  “Forgive me, N’th Adesi Re. Please, come in.” The Matron entered the room as Ailyssa stepped aside.

  “Leave the door open, Mother.”

  “Of course.”

  The Matron had never given her such an instruction before; the women of the order considered privacy of high value. They gathered for prayer, meals, exercise, and ritual, but the rest of the time they spent in private studies and communing with the Goddess, living their lives behind closed doors. A door left ajar was highly unusual, and Ailyssa suppressed a shiver at the implication of having done so.

  Adesi strode to the center of the room and stopped, Ailyssa a pace behind her. She didn’t need to see the Matron’s eyes to know her gaze lay upon the marking wall. The woman silently counted the chalk marks every time she entered the room, calculating how many there were and how many there should be. Perspiration sprang to Ailyssa’s hands so she rubbed her fingertips together, loathing the wetness on her skin.

  “Hmm,” the Matron breathed. “You have stopped counting.”

  Ailyssa gazed at her feet as N’th Adesi Re turned her scrutiny from the stone wall to her friend. Silence hung between them, palpable and weighty. It filled the gap as though water had been poured into the room and, though Ailyssa searched for the ability to speak words, they eluded her, the silence choking her.

  “Ailyssa?”

  She raised her head to the Matron, whose calming smile had waned. Her lips lay flat and concerned upon her face.

  “I have, N’th Adesi Re.”

  “Why have you stopped? Have you given up?”

  Ailyssa inhaled through her nose, a sob teetering on its edge. “My blood has not come.”

  She wanted to divert her gaze from the Matron’s more than she’d ever wanted to do anything in her life. More than she wanted to carry a child, more than she wanted to bleed anew. If she could just look away, she wouldn’t care if she ever flowed again. The Matron put a hand on her forearm, her expression brightening.

  “Perhaps you are seeded, Mother. Have you felt any signs?”

  Ailyssa shook her head and a tear drew a wet path down her cheek.

  “There is still time,” Adesi said, nodding but not sounding convinced herself. “I have heard of—”

  He didn’t tell her. I’ve given myself away.

  “No, Matron. I cannot be with child.”

  Ailyssa closed her eyes, quashing her urge to cry. When she opened them, N’th Adesi Re had tilted her head to the side again, questioning without speaking words. She wondered if she remained quiet long enough, would Adesi ask the question or simply let the silence go on until the Goddess summoned them to their next lives?

  But she couldn’t stand the hush. The Goddess considered the keeping of truth to oneself no better than a lie. Ailyssa had been lying long enough.

  “We...we didn’t couple.”

  “What?” Adesi’s eyes went wide. “But why not, Ailyssa? The man was fertile. He was your last chance.”

  “He was...” Ailyssa hesitated, her eyes flickering away from the Matron’s gaze to the wall behind her, the scratches of her life, the chalk marks condemning her. The words about to pass her lips would make those lines of condemnation seem pale. “He was my son.”

  N’th Adesi Re’s hand dropped from Ailyssa’s arm, her face became stony. The eyes Ailyssa had come to know as the caring eyes of a friend filled with aversion, as if she’d forced the Matron to eat a distasteful bit of food.

  “Heretic,” she spat. “No Mother has a son.”

  Ailyssa’s chest tightened around her heart and lungs, forcing rapid blood through her veins, constricting her breath. She shook her head and a mewling sound akin to the cry of a distressed kitten slipped from her throat. Her hand reached out, fingers clawing for the front of the Matron’s smock, but N’th Adesi Re stepped away, avoiding her touch like it carried disease.

  “Your flow has ceased. You carry no child and neither you nor your Daughter have honored the Goddess, and now you utter the word ‘son.’”

  She shook her head, more tears spilling down her cheeks.

  “You have birthed boys, too, Adesi,” she said, her words choked. “You must wonder where they are, who they’ve become. Surely you have missed them, grieved them.”

  “Never.”

  The word fell to the floor like a stone spit from her mouth. She glared, her lips pursed, but didn’t move. Ailyssa imagined what the Matron must be thinking: she’d come to offer her friend encouragement and goodwill and received sacrilege in return, words spoken against the sacred Goddess.

  But how can a woman bring a child into the world and then forget him?

  She parted her lips to say so, but the Matron raised her hand and slapped her hard across the cheek. Ailyssa’s head jerked with the impact and she raised her own hand, touching the stinging flesh, and stared aghast at her friend.

  “Adesi—”

  “My name is N’th Adesi Re, Ailyssa,” the Matron said. “And you will be stripped of your titles and expelled from the order.”

  She swept past Ailyssa toward the door, her red trimmed-with-white smock whirling around her. In desperation, Ailyssa caught her by the sleeve, stopping her and spinning her back.

  “You can’t,” she shouted, tears flowing hard. “I’ve lived my whole life for the Goddess. You can’t.”

  Adesi brushed her aside and approached the counting wall, arm raised and finger extended. The pad of her fingertip touched the circle drawn around a rut carved thirty-two before the last.

  “You betrayed the Goddess the day you drew this,” she said. “It is no wonder you have failed to mother a child for her honor since.”

  Ailyssa shook her head, but the Matron continued, forcing one last sliver of despair into her heart.

  “On this day, the Goddess struck you barren and cast you out. The order should have done the same.”

  She strode for the door again, jarring Ailyssa with her shoulder and knocking her to the bed as she passed.

  “No.”

  Ailyssa reached out stretching her fingers toward N’th Adesi Re, her one-time friend, but the Matron did not pause or hesitate. She went through the door, slamming it behind her, the impact making the shelf on the wall shudder. The cleansing cloth fell to the floor in a puff of chalk dust.

  The woman once known as N’th Ailyssa Ra, now known only as Ailyssa, a woman who’d spent her entire life in service of the Goddess, collapsed on the bed in a heap of tears and sobs. In all the time she’d inscribed scars on the wall to mark the passage of sunrises and seasons, she’d never set foot outside the order’s compound, and now she’d be cast out to live the rest of her days alone. No attendants or sisters, no fellow Mothers or Matrons.

  And no Goddess.

  Ailyssa buried her face in the pillow and prayed for the Goddess to grant her one last request: she wished for her life to come to an end.

  XVII Procession

  The procession of merchants rumbled along the interlocking bricks of the promenade. Horse’s hooves struck occasional sparks, wooden wheels clattered, boot heels clicked. At each cross street, another half dozen men leading pack animals or driving wagons, bearing stuffed-full packs or accompanied by man servants carrying their loads, joined the parade.

  A thrill coursed through Teryk’s veins. It had been near three full turns of the moon since he last set foot in the inner city, though he’d been here many times before. He recognized the Barzunian Fountain as they passed, its gold-leafed statue of Barzun the Bountiful bearing witness over Merchants’ Square. The cleaners had already set to work scrubbing the day’s bird droppings from poor Barzun’s brow and, by morning, he’d be clean and sparkling, ready for another round of pigeon shit to find its way onto his head.

  The column of men, w
agons, donkeys, and horses made their way along the Promenade, passing the Avenue of Kings with its colorful banners dangling slack in the windless evening, then Duchess Way lined with shops selling the baubles and face paints any self-respecting noblewoman considered embarrassing to be caught without.

  Teryk filled his lungs with the clean, fresh air. The scent of baked goods and roast meat hung in the air, wafting out of the food shops and taverns along Ellora Way, the bakeries finishing for the day and disposing of their leftovers, the public houses getting set to bustle through the night. Being in the inner city lifted his spirits—he hardly believed he’d made it this far.

  Sneaking out of Draekfarren castle had been harrowing, but not so difficult as the prince thought it might be. As he’d made his way out, disguised amongst a group of cleaners moving from their duties within the castle to other chores in the city, he’d sensed every eye upon him. With each step, he expected someone to stop him and ask questions, or perhaps feel Trenan’s—or worse, his father’s—hand on his shoulder, but he didn’t. He’d slipped through the gate with the troop of cleaners and disposed of the cleaning smock he’d used to blend in the instant he passed beyond sight of the gate.

  Now, wearing a crimson waistcoat embroidered with gold thread and edged with gold piping, a white cotton shirt with flared sleeves, and purple britches he thought made him resemble a dandy more than a peddler, he blended in with the merchants. A silver gazelle-head clasp held a deeper red cloak in place around his neck, the cape’s hood ready to be pulled up to conceal his identity when they approached Merchant Gate.

  Hidden beneath the folds of his cloak, the stolen crown sword bumped reassuringly against his leg, its touch lending him confidence. The mute euphoria of his initial success helped him ignore the guilt he held over deceiving his sister, though the thought of disobeying their father didn’t bother him in the least. He only lamented that Trenan might be blamed, but he’d decided he didn’t care what happened to the crotchety old armorer.

  Teryk shifted the sword on his hip and glanced at the man beside him, saw the merchant’s black cape hid any weapon he might be carrying. A niggling worry wormed into the back of his mind, so the prince wended his way through the column, inspecting each merchant and man servant for what weapons they carried and how ornamented they were.