by Cheree Alsop
SHADOWS
Book 1 in the World of Shadows
By Cheree L. Alsop
Copyright © 2011 by Cheree L. Alsop
All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the author except for the use of brief quotations in a book review. This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are a product of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
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Cover Design by Stephanie Godwin
www.ChereeAlsop.com
To my husband, Michael Alsop,
for priceless input and helping me
to never settle when a scene could be better.
To my family for their endless support of my dreams.
I love you!
Chapter 1
I crept along the cavern, careful to keep my chain coiled so it wouldn't hit against the rocks. I neared the hole and crouched. Light flickered off the red rock walls from the torches below, casting shadows like dancing demons along my tiny crawlspace. The slender Luminos gathered in the cavern beneath me had to crouch in order to avoid bumping their heads. The fire that burned on the floor a few feet away sent up a thin stream of black smoke that trailed along the ceiling to find escape in my tunnel. I lowered slowly to my stomach and listened.
“We need to leave, Sir Axon,” a voice said in an anxious tone.
“It's pertinent that we have time for negotiations,” another agreed levelly.
Someone threw a log on the fire and sparks flew up to my hiding place.
“It isn't safe here,” a man pointed out.
“Safer than out there,” Sir Axon’s calm, commanding voice replied. “This is an excellent opportunity to learn the effect the Sathen have had on our people.”
“But you put your life in danger every day that you prolong our stay,” the second voice said.
“And our presence here is resented,” the first continued. “Who knows how long they will tolerate us?”
“They're not going to kill us in our sleep,” Sir Axon said, a slight smile in his voice.
“You never know,” the first voice muttered.
Sir Axon sighed. “Regardless, we’ll leave first thing in the morning. We have outstayed our welcome and I have things to discuss with Father. I can only pray negotiations will go smoothly and we'll be on our way back to Lumini before the week is out.”
“We hope so, Sir,” the level voice replied.
The logs on the fire settled, sending up another cloud of sparks to my hole. One spark landed on my brown cloak. A squeak escaped my lips as I smothered it.
“What was that?” a voice demanded.
I froze.
“I'll check it out,” Sir Axon said. He stood and poked his head in the hole before the others could stop him.
Axon look down the way opposite from me, then turned and met my eyes. Firelight from below showed pale blue eyes the exact color of the ice from the bottom cavern. He stared at me and a smile tugged at the corner of his lips. He winked and ducked out of the hole. “No one's up there; must have been a tunnel rat.”
“I hate those nasty tunnel rats,” the anxious man grumbled. “They stole one of my good shoes.”
The men started to laugh.
“Well, they did!” he replied haughtily. “Stole it right off my foot when I was sleeping. Big, hairy rodents.”
“Why were you sleeping with your shoes on, anyway?” one of the men pressed.
“To keep the rats away from my toes,” he replied.
The men laughed harder.
I crept back out of the tunnel cloaked by their noise. I wondered why Sir Axon hadn't ratted me out. Our eyes met and he had even winked. No one winked at a Duskie.
If Axon told the leaders of the Caves he had seen me, I would be evicted, or worse, killed; although punishment by eviction was the same as death because the Sathen would find me and tear me apart anyway. A shudder ran through my skin and I felt the bite of serrated teeth, a shadow of memory that sent chills along my spine. I ducked through another tunnel and walked faster, anxious to reach my room.
I didn’t trust him; my stomach clenched in a knot as I gathered my chain and carried the heavy links back to the stone chamber that made up my quarters. A fine layer of red dust, a result of the never-ending mining, covered the stone pad that served as my bed. The sound of metal on stone echoed through the shafts, and when I put my hand on the cool wall, it vibrated slightly under my touch.
I swept the pad off the best I could and settled down to catch the last few minutes of sleep before my shift; but a moment after my eyes closed, the gears that opened my stone door began to grind. I sat up. The door slid open to reveal Chaxa, the Luminos head guard. He smiled and my heart slowed. I stood up reluctantly.
“Been out of your quarters between shifts, number six?”
I shook my head, but knew better than to argue.
He motioned with a sigh and I turned around to face the wall. “You know the rules, yet you insist on breaking them.”
“Easier to break them if I know what they are,” I mumbled.
“What was that?” Chaxa snapped.
I heard the soft hiss of leather on stone and didn’t answer. Instead, my fingers found the impressions in the wall made by hundreds of such occurrences. The grooves gave me strength when the first lash bit into my back.
“Twelve lashes for leaving your chamber between shifts, and five more for talking back to a superior,” Chaxa said in a satisfied tone.
I bit my lip at the sting of another lash and regretted that I had worn my newest shirt. By the time Chaxa was finished, it wouldn’t be more than rags, though it really wasn’t more than rags to begin with. The whip hissed through the air and caught me low in the back. I gritted my teeth to keep from crying out. I never gave Chaxa the satisfaction of hearing my pain, and took comfort in the fact that I knew the Caves far better than he could imagine.
The grooves in the wall were the only thing that kept me standing when he finally wound up his whip, gave a slight chuckle, then left through the rock door. “Your shift’s started. Don’t make me whip you again for being late,” he said before the door slid shut.
I fell to my knees and pressed my forehead against the cool rock floor. The red dust that covered it felt soft to my fingers that had been rubbed raw from the rough wall. I breathed in and took strength in the earthy, familiar cinnamon and mineral scent of the stone. I put a hand on the wall and rose unsteadily to my feet, then stumbled to the rocky ledge that served as both dresser and shelf and picked up the second to last shirt I owned. I sighed at the thought of explaining to the steward why I was going to need another one soon.
I gingerly pulled off my shredded shirt and spread it on the shelf. Seventeen tears lined the back, some of which were already damp with blood. Chaxa was as good as his word. I could have taken off my shirt, but I would never debase myself in front of Chaxa, and the cloth helped to soften some of the blows. I shook my head and crumpled the shirt into a ball.
I took a careful sip of the water in my rations cup, then carried the cup to the corner and mixed the rest of the contents
with the red rock sand I kept there. When the dirt had turned to a thick paste, I spread it as gently as I could over the lash wounds. It would keep the infection out and stop the bleeding enough so they could clot, but the fresh wounds stung and I bit my lower lip between my teeth while I waited for the mud to dry enough so I could put on my somewhat clean extra shirt.
I hesitated, glanced at the door, then knelt and lifted a small stone in the corner by my bed. The groves were nearly seamless, and I felt a faint swelling of pride at the hole beneath, the result of careful, quiet carving during precious hours when I should have been sleeping. I took out the object hidden inside and held it reverently in my hand.
I knew every line and shade of the brittle leaf that still held the green of summer from distant lands beyond the desert; it gave me hope that I would somehow get out of the Caves and away from Chaxa for good. I closed my eyes and took a gentle breath; the strange, foreign scent it once held that told of sunshine and green plants far different from the twisted, spiny shrubs of the desert had long since vanished, replaced by the ever-present cinnamon scent of the Caves, but I held the smell in memory. I wanted to see the plants and feel the sunshine so strongly my chest ached.
I had found the leaf long ago before the traders stopped braving the Sathen to cross the desert, and before the Sathen became fearless and attacked armed caravans, leaving us abandoned as we mined the Caves in a vain attempt to find the Reathe that had long ago been exhausted. The leaf fell from a trader’s pack, a forgotten remnant clinging to the canvas without the knowledge of the hope it gave to a lowly Duskie, alone and wishing for change above all else.
A low gong rang out, signaling that I was late. I sighed and set the leaf gently back in the hole, then slid the rock on top and dusted sand over the seam so Chaxa wouldn’t find it. I eased my shirt gingerly over my head, then gathered up my chains and pulled the lever by the door. The gears ground moodily and the door slid open to reveal the dimly lit rock hallway beyond. It was easily to tell when it was day because the Luminos needed light to maneuver the tunnels. The Nathos could see in the dark, a trait we inherited, making the low burning torches unnecessary at night.
I took the shortest path to the entrance, lowering my eyes obediently whenever a Luminos walked by. The brief glimpses I did catch of their faces showed them to be worn and exhausted. Their dark gray skin had an unhealthy pallor and their light hair was slick with sweat. It must have been a hard day of gathering.
Not that I cared. I gritted my teeth and let the chain uncoil behind me, keeping to the side of the cave so I didn’t trip any of the mighty Luminos. Heaven forbid I create any sort of encumbrance along their path. I dropped the last of the chains by the northeast entrance to the cave and took up the spear and shield left by Norse at dawn. Kamis, another of the twelve Duskies who inhabited Firen Caves, nodded at me, then turned back to her post on the far side of the entrance. We settled down for the eight hour shift.
Luminos, self-proclaimed Lords of the Daylight, absorbed their powers from the sun and lost them when the sun set. Nathos, Guardians of Night, were the opposite, gaining their powers from the moon and losing them at daybreak. Unfortunately, this left a gap of about two hours between dusk and dawn when neither party was at full strength. This wasn’t a problem in the years before I was born, but since the outbreak of the Sathen, the two groups had been forced to band together in order to survive.
The mines used to be the main source of Reathe, the rust-red dust that gave Luminos and Nathos the ability to stay up during the hours when they were normally weak, but the Caves' resources had depleted, and now the inhabitants struggled just to survive in the arid desert. The Nathos hunted the desert creatures at night while the Luminos gathered the unforgiving plants and roots during the day. It was a stale existence, and the peace between the two races was shaky at best.
Insert us, the Duskies. Cast off children from forbidden relations between Luminos and Nathos, we weren’t as strong as either race at their full power, but we also didn’t lose our strength at the odd hours between morning and evening. This made us convenient guards but untrustworthy living companions, hence the chains and whips. The numbers of Duskies who had once been necessary to mine the Reathe had been cut down when the Reathe disappeared, and only the twelve of us were now kept for defense from the Sathen. We never questioned what had been done with the multitude of Duskies who used to slave within the lower tunnels, but the Sathen provided a swift resolution to such problems, so it was better to keep to one's self and not ask too many questions.
I kicked a rock and it bounced down the side of the mountain. Kamis shot me a look, but I ignored her. I glanced at the jagged scars around my right ankle and shuddered at the thought of the night a year ago when I had been desperate enough to run away even with the Sathen out there. A flashback of pain, my pounding heart, and scars deep inside that no one could heal sent a surge of pent-up hatred through my body. I picked up another rock and threw it as hard as I could.
“You want to bring the Sathen on us?” Kamis growled, showing her sharp canines.
“Maybe I do,” I replied harshly, but a cold shiver crawled across my skin at the thought. I saw their eyes again in my mind, black and pupil-less, and felt the bite of a hundred serrated teeth around my ankle. I shuddered and looked away from the sun setting slowly beyond the desert mountains casting blood red rays across the sand.
Chapter 2
I had just fallen asleep on my stone bed after my second shift when the sound of the grinding gears broke through my ragged dreams. I sat up, but my muscles, sore and cold from sleeping on the rock, wouldn’t respond any faster than my fatigued brain. Four Luminos rushed in, their gray skin and pale hair contrasting sharply to my confused eyes.
They threw a canvas bag over my head before I could move. Adrenaline surged through my veins and woke my weary limbs; I kicked and punched like I had been trained to do since I could walk. After several expletives that would have made a tunnel rat blush, the Luminos had my arms and legs bound with cords. They threw me back on the bed.
Cold stone rubbed my raw back, bringing an onslaught of memories I had locked tightly away. Fear raced through my mind and I screamed.
“Silence!” one of the Luminos shouted.
A hand clamped over my bagged mouth. I bit down hard and my canines tore through the cloth and into his hand. He swore and something struck the side of my face. Blinding pain followed and I stopped struggling.
The chain attached to the manacle on my wrist was unlocked and replaced with another chain. I couldn’t think past the pain in my head, and couldn’t figure out what they were doing or why. They picked me up and carried me from my stone chamber, the one place that had been my own, my home. Maybe I had gone too far with my spying. Maybe Axon had ratted me out. Maybe I was on my way to the killing chamber.
I kicked out with my bound legs. My bare feet caught one of the Luminos in the chest and shoved him into a wall. I rolled over, breaking the grasps of the other Luminos that carried me. They dropped me to the ground and I tried to scramble away, a hard feat with my arms and legs bound and the bag over my head.
Someone kicked me in the stomach before I got very far. I rolled to my back and held my arms over my face. The heavy chain tangled on top of me, impeding my movement. I grabbed it in my hands and swung. The chain connected with someone, bringing more swearing. They kicked me again, higher this time. A jolt of pain ran through my ribs. I rolled, found a foot with my hands, and bit down again hard. A blow to the back of my head knocked me unconscious.
I awoke to the sensation of being carried. My head pounded and light showed angry and red through my closed eyelids. I opened them, but only saw the inside of the cloth bag. Fear jolted through my veins when I remembered what had happened. I kicked out, but my legs were in the air and whoever had me slung over his shoulders held me tightly behind the knees with one hand and had my still-bound arms clutched in the other. I bent down to bite where I thought his neck would be and su
ddenly found myself flying through the air to land with a bone jarring thud on the hard ground.
But I didn’t land on the stone of the Firen Caves. I landed on dirt, dirt that smelled of sunshine and the dusty, arid air of the desert. I was outside.
Terror filled my mind and I tried to back blindly away on my hands and knees.
“Where are you going, little minx?” a gruff voice said with a hint of amusement.
Someone grabbed the chain on my wrist and hauled me to my feet. I wobbled, dizzy from the blows to the head. “Walk,” the same voice growled in my ear.
Panic filled me at the threat in his tone that alluded to what would happen if I didn’t obey. I forced one foot in front of the other, stumbling blindly beside my captor. Footsteps walked around us, signifying that we were not alone. I took whatever comfort I could in the hope that maybe being in a group would stop any undue acts of cruelty. Of course, that had never stopped the sentries of Firen Caves.
The party stopped and waited for me to get back to my feet after tripping over yet another unseen rock. My bare feet ached from the unaccustomed sharpness of stones that seemed to poke out of nowhere from the hot desert sand.
“She would probably keep up better if she could see,” a voice in front of us said with a slight hint of sarcasm.
“We can’t trust her,” the man beside me argued, but he pulled the bag off my head anyway.
The glaring sunshine blinded my eyes used to the darkness of a cave, not the full light of day. I ducked my head, still kneeling on the sun-baked sand. The most I had seen of the outside world was from the entrance of the Caves and my one failed attempt to leave. I squinted, trying to peer through the blanketing rays. Tears filled my eyes. I wiped them on the sleeve of my dirty shirt and got dust in them instead. I blinked and glared at the man next to me.
