The Astra stepped closer. “That being said, I’m not willing to lose you to some childish stubbornness between yourself and your father. You’re not going anywhere. Beran, see her back to Daispar and make sure she stays there until I return. I’m not finished with her.”
Ahraia shook with rage. She wanted to hit the Astra in the mouth, to drag her beneath the moonlight and burn her perfect skin from her face. Ahraia turned and stalked away without another word, incensed by the pair of them, furious their designs had left two of her brothers dead and another condemned. The Astra glared after her.
“Wait, Ahraia,” Ahraia’s father commanded, an enchantment intertwined with words. Ahraia brushed it aside, too angry to let him hold her back.
Where are we going? Losna thought, trotting after her.
“We’re going to make sure the spritelings have a nit tree once we’re gone.”
Without the orb? How are you going to do that?
The folds of the darkening drooped low above Ahraia, like a spider web sagging between each point of support. She straddled the highest curve of her mother’s nit tree, her legs dangling dangerously on either side of the arching trunk, like resting on the spine of some enormous beast whose branches extended as ribs to form the dome of the nit.
“You’re supposed to protect us . . . to provide shelter,” Ahraia murmured to the nit tree. “I’m trying to help you.”
A deep sense of stubbornness quivered beneath her legs—unease belying an unwillingness to change.
That’s not going to get you anywhere, Ahraia reprimanded. Do you want to keep protecting us or not?
The tree didn’t move in the least. Ahraia sighed.
Losna stood warily below. It was day outside of Daispar and Ahraia’s anger had slowly smoldered, hardening into a firm will to make sure the spritelings would have a nit once she was gone.
Her shadow’s neck craned upward. It was strange to be in the tree, and stranger still to ask it to unfold itself—but with the orb gone, it had only one option for light.
Losna’s thoughts drifted up from below, sounding worried and motherly. Are you almost done up there?
Ahraia snorted. Binding a single spring branch was one thing, but binding whole trees required enchantment of another magnitude. She was still getting used to the vast spread required of her mind, the ability to not only move a part, but to understand the whole: from leaves to twigs to branches to trunks to roots and back again.
I’m just getting started, she conveyed, knowing if she called out aloud half the darkening would hear her. Go find yourself some food or something, I’m going to be a while.
Food?
Ahraia sensed a twinge of excitement from below. A moment later she heard Losna’s thoughts receding.
Food, food, food . . .
Ahraia smiled. She turned back to her task and lowered herself into the binding, hiding her deep bitterness and growing despair. You need moonlight—and I’m trying to give it to you. Now let me show you.
She leaned back, knowing that forcing it would do nothing but strengthen the tree’s resolve to resist her. For a time, she just sat. She breathed in and out, keeping her mind as blank as she could. Then she began thinking of moonlight. She felt the leaves whisper. She started to work again, wriggling the tendrils of enchantment down each branch and trunk, holding more and more of the tree’s power in her grasp.
Straighten up, she thought.
The tree shuddered, unhappy with the change. Ahraia’s stomach turned nervously, but she knew the tree wouldn’t let her fall, no matter how much it disliked her suggestion.
If you won’t do it, I’ll have to grow another.
The tree creaked. And then it started to unfold, imperceptibly at first. Ahraia smiled. And she waited.
You won’t regret it, she thought.
It was tedious, and tenuous—the undoing of untold winters frozen and summers growing. But Ahraia could sense it: the slow unravelling of time and the aching strain against the growing grain. The trunk unfurled, like an enormous crane raising its neck, its wings still spread wide, encompassing and protecting its brood beneath.
Ahraia moved lithely up the trunk once it had extended enough, climbing to what would become the highest branches. She situated herself and waited until it reached just beneath the draping ceiling of the darkening. From here, she could tell the shell wasn’t a single layer, but many layers laying one branch over another, like lily pads crowding each other over a dark-bellied pond.
Even though she couldn’t see it, she could feel the warmth of the Dae-Mon just outside. It terrified her to know that if she chose, she could send light cascading down into the center of the darkening. The hollows and paths spread out below, but no sprites were about. It was the middle of the day. She wondered idly what would happen if she broke a hole open above the Astra’s nit. The darkening’s cover tightened.
Don’t worry, I won’t, she conveyed to the tree, binding the nearby branches. At once, she could feel that they were old, and resiliently proud, resistant to her touch. You look like you could use a little rest . . . and a little company up here.
Delicately, she teased the nit tree underneath its branches. The nit tree felt the warmth and the light and settled itself into the weave, its branches fixing themselves within the shell, beneath the outer layers where the light was dim but not direct.
Just like moonlight, Ahraia thought. She waited, feeling the trunk stiffen contentedly. Once she was convinced it would stick, she retreated back down and went to work on the break left by the unfurled trunk. She wove the branches back together, sewing them across the void. Then she climbed down to the base and was surprised to find Losna curled on the ground, waiting.
“How long have you been here?” Ahraia asked, realizing how preoccupied she must have been to not notice her shadow.
Losna looked up, put off. Her stomach growled. The wall wouldn’t let me out.
“It wouldn’t open?” Ahraia said, surprised. The darkening recognized Losna just as easily as any shade or sprite, and had no trouble forming a closure for her.
I’m hungry.
Ahraia had a sinking suspicion and guessed why the shell had resisted her above.
Come on, she thought, leading Losna back out of the nit by the quickest path to the darkening wall.
Open, she commanded once she stood before the thick cover. The wall, however, tightened, sending a quiver outward that passed like ripples on a pond. “What’s the meaning of this?” she said to the wall, her suspicions confirmed.
I told you, Losna thought.
Ahraia tried again. She sat down, growing more irritated with every passing moment. Binding the wall was simple, instinctive like folding closures in a shade tree, but the wall was being obstinate, and intentionally so. Ahraia’s attempts became progressively more aggressive and less couth.
Open. Move. Open! She grabbed the branches and shook them violently without consequence, pushing them with all her strength.
Losna let out a low, warning growl. Ahraia turned to find the Astra walking towards her.
“Trying to leave during the day? I knew I couldn’t trust you, but this is a new low.”
Ahraia realized how suspect she looked.
“I wasn’t trying to leave. Losna was just trying to hunt . . . the wall wouldn’t let her out.”
The Astra’s ears flickered at Ahraia’s voice. “Do you think, after the stunt your brother pulled, I’m going to let your shadow just walk out of the darkening? She can eat at the cook fires with the rest of the shadows. Neither of you are going anywhere.”
Until when? Ahraia conveyed, her ears batting in irritation.
“Until whenever I say. Trying to leave by day?” The Astra shook her head. “I underestimated how dastardly you are.”
Ahraia glared at her. A muscle twitched in her cheek.
“I’m not willing to lose you for nothing. You think you can just leave this darkening? You think you can run?”
You think you
can stop me? Ahraia challenged with ears burning. She knew at once it was foolish and irrational, but she hated the Astra. She couldn’t think straight, and it wasn’t as though the Astra could condemn her for her insolence. You think you can kill my brothers and expect me to imp along. I won’t. I’d rather die by the light.
The Astra stepped forward aggressively. The darkening wall suddenly wrapped itself around Losna, who let out a terrified yelp.
“Don’t test me, Ahraia.”
Ahraia fought down every urge to leap at the Astra, with Losna’s panic flooding her mind. Her breaths came ragged. “She’s no good to you dead.” She had meant it as a threat, but it came out as a whimper.
“No . . . she’s not.” The wall released Losna, who scurried towards Ahraia with her tail tucked low. The Astra was glaring at the pair of them. “But that doesn’t mean others aren’t.”
A bond formed, threats forcing themselves into Ahraia’s mind: she saw the faces of Kyah, Thelon and Alua, cold and lifeless, lying dead with fog dripping all about them.
Ahraia broke the binding, pushing the Astra from her mind. Her heart was hammering in her chest.
The Astra leaned in, meeting her eye with her ears rigid and sharp.
“I didn’t kill your brothers, Ahraia,” she said forcefully. “But I won’t hesitate to kill the rest of your nit. If you don’t pass your test, I swear to you, I will cut their shadows’ throats, just like I did those of my shades. I will wash my hands with their blood, then I’ll give those wretched spritelings to the Shad-Mon. Do you understand me? I never wanted it to come to this, but you leave me no choice. Don’t even think about running, or it’s their lives too.”
15
Chasms
The Bright Moon will be turned tonight, Losna thought, letting out a long, trailing sigh from her muzzle.
Ahraia lay flat on her back, staring up at the moon flower hanging above her. Hayvon had given it to her, the day after their mother had been condemned. It was a rare and precious thing, something she had never found in the forest, though she had wasted enough nights looking for one. How he had even come by the seed, he had never said. It had taken her months to coax it out, but now, it seemed like nothing more than a hanging reminder that he—her closest family besides Losna—was about to be given to the Shad-Mon. Another sibling dead.
We should have run when we could have, Losna thought.
“And what? Just leave Kyah and the spritelings to die?”
Losna let out a whine but didn’t argue. Ahraia stared upwards, in a haze of anxiety and fear.
“Why did he do it?” she said aloud, her thoughts slipping past her lips. “Why did he admit to it?”
Losna picked idly at her paw with her teeth, her eyes glowing faintly in the true dark. At least Vesta didn’t have to suffer like the others. Ahraia sensed her thoughts tarrying on Tev’s squirrel and Shim’s ermine.
“It’s not like she didn’t suffer. She’s still alone out there.”
Losna fell silent, still digging at her paw.
Ahraia stared upward, helpless. Since their run-in with the Astra, they hadn’t left the nit. Ahraia had gone to the top of her mother’s tree again, and the trunk seemed to be holding steady, the light suffice to keep it living—but now, even if it managed to stay alive, it might not matter. The Astra’s threats hung over her, like Hayvon’s death. And Ahraia couldn’t fathom passing her shadow test. She couldn’t imagine sending Losna away. The pain of such a thing would be excruciating. She would be driven mad if she even tried. And yet, somehow Hayvon had done it.
She sat up, a thought suddenly coming to her.
“I can’t lie here any longer.”
Losna turned quickly onto all fours, eager to be moving. But we can’t leave the darkening, she thought.
“I don’t mean to. I’m going to see Hayvon.”
Losna’s tail stopped swishing. You’re going to the chasms? You won’t be allowed, will you? They’ll be guarded.
Ahraia paused, wondering if the wards would stop her. “I’m not going to give them a choice.” She made a closure and stepped out of the shade tree. Losna hesitated.
Should I come with you?
Ahraia shook her head. “There’s no sense. You’ll just have to wait for me anyway. I’d feel better if I knew you were here.”
Losna stood poised at the edge of the deep dark, but didn’t make to follow. Ahraia didn’t like leaving her, but in a way, she was glad that Losna couldn’t come. The questions she meant to ask Hayvon wouldn’t be comfortable—least of all for Losna.
Once out of the nit, Ahraia flitted through the faint dark of the outer halls. It was mid-afternoon outside, and no sprites were about. Nonetheless, she tread the lesser-seen paths, through archways of leech ferns and beneath tunnels lined with hanging mushrooms. She wound past webs of wicker, winter, and velum weaves, all in varying states of growth, and around a dozen nit trees, including Gavea’s, before she circled back towards the central hollow. The nitesse’s body still hadn’t been found and the dae-ward hadn’t been seen either. All sorts of rumors had been passing through the darkening, rumors that the nitesse had run afoul with alps or humans or even the dae-ward. Ahraia guessed the ward had fled rather than face condemnation for being seen. She hoped Gavea was never found.
The chasms were just downstream of the central springs, where the soft gurgle of water broke the haunting quiet. Ahraia wasn’t sure if the deserted sense of stillness came from a lack of sprites or her missing Losna.
At the heart of the darkening, the grove of darkening cores towered upwards as the source of the outer shell. The trunks were black-barked and dozens of feet across, without a single branch forming until they unfurled above, curling back in great draping sheets to the edges of the darkening, with vine trunks growing down throughout to support them like the joints of a spider web. A gaping series of rocky chasms extended below their monstrous roots.
As expected, two dae-wards were guarding the entrance. Their light-veils hung loosely around their faces as they idled before the outer roots of the cores. They stood up as Ahraia approached.
“Where do you think you’re going?” the first said, his scars deeper than the other’s, marking him as older.
Ahraia braced herself for an enchantment, knowing she would have to be firm with the wards.
“I’m here to see my brother,” she said, walking with shoulders back and ears pointed towards the sky. She began to form a binding and was encouraged by the doubt radiating back at her. She hoped her eyes looked golden-bright, unbecoming for a shade.
The scarred ward stepped forward. “You’re not allowed here. Not while the lower recesses are occupied.”
Ahraia remembered the tone and strength of the Masai, and mimicked her as she spoke. “Who are you to tell me what I can and can’t do?”
Already being linked, Ahraia heard the conveyance passing between the wards. She’s going to be the Masai someday, the second ward conveyed. His ears tucked back nervously.
The older ward furrowed his brow. You don’t know that. She’s not even a sprite, he conveyed. I heard she can’t even make bindings.
Ahraia didn’t have to feign being angry. “Of course I’m going to be the Masai,” she said without thinking. Their eyes widened in surprise. They faltered, shoulders shrinking and ears batting back. Ahraia strengthened her hold, forcing stillness over the wards. And of course I can make bindings. She let her conveyance echo out threateningly, and she forced them to bow, bending their necks and tucking back their ears. They moved easier than most trees as their surprise gave way to fear. Ahraia continued her act, sensing they would fold with the right pressure. “Get out of my way.” Or you’ll never be nit-wards in my spritedom.
Just as she hoped, the wards shuffled aside, their resolve overrun. They bowed on their own accord.
And don’t bother me while I’m down here, she conveyed, moving right past them into the entrance of the first ravine.
She proceeded down a narrow passag
e with moss-fringed stone rising on either side. The bindings faded with each step, and at once, the silence swelled. She let out a breath, relieved it had worked.
The chasms were a series of caverns beneath the darkening cores. The roots of the darkening ripped at the earth like enormous hands, sinking their fingers deeper and deeper into the stones, forming great rents in the world.
Ahraia walked right to the edge of the first precipice, staring down into the blacked chasms. Roots snaked out of sight, and she reached out for a binding to lower herself into the depths but sensed resistance far stronger than that of the wards. The cores wouldn’t answer to her any more than the outer wall had.
“Fine,” she said aloud, her voice piffling amongst giants. She grabbed hold of a smaller root which trailed over the edge and began to rappel into the chasm without a binding.
At once, the air cooled. The cold mud on the knotted root was rough and slippery, but she climbed easily, having spent enough nights making springs and climbing trees. This was no different, and she found footholds and handholds on slick, pressed mud. The root she was holding grew too sinuous, so she switched to another. She brushed aside crawling seep trees and the interlaced night thistle, half-expecting to look up and see the wards’ heads appear above, but neither did. She scraped and clawed her way down, and, sooner than she expected, her feet found firm ground at the base of the first chasm.
She was engulfed in the bowels of the roots and the ground wasn’t truly ground; it was a twisting line of chest-thick runners covered in matted dirt and hardened mud. The musty earth filled her nose, and the damp pressed all about her. She stood in perfect stillness, letting her eyes adjust. A faint crescent was all that showed of the darkening above.
Between the Shade and the Shadow Page 20
