Between the Shade and the Shadow

by Coleman Alexander

  “If she weren’t here, I’d put you in your place. Everyone is so sure that you’re going to be the next Masai. But I know you, Ahraia. You’re not hardened by the night. Everything that’s come to you—everything you’ve ever done—has come on the shoulders of your shadow. You won’t pass your test.”

  Ahraia’s heart felt like it had risen into her throat. Each heartbeat surged hotter than the last. Losna’s distress twined with her own and the result was hard to restrain. Kren nodded to the wards.

  “Take her away from here. She shouldn’t be here. Bind her if you must.”

  A flood of emotions rose in Ahraia: despondence mixed with anger, loathing and sickness all at once.

  The wards stepped towards her but she bound them firmly where they stood, rooting them to the ground. She grabbed Kren by her wrist. Binding a sprite was condemnable, but Ahraia formed an enchantment before she could help it, wrestling control over her sister.

  Kren flinched visibly at her touch and writhed against the connection. “Let me go,” she commanded, unable to break free.

  Ahraia grappled to keep the wards in check. The injustice of Kren’s words made her latch onto the bindings, finding strength she only ever used in folding darkness.

  “What’s become of you?” she asked, shaking. Kren refused to meet her eye, but Ahraia forced her to lift her chin. Her face was twisted bitterly and her eyes were hollow, without the faintest familiarity.

  “This isn’t you . . .” Ahraia whispered, hurt. “You were my sister—do you forget yourself so completely? You, who raised us and brought us through the light. You, who tempered our fears and guided us as shades and spritelings. If this is what the test makes of us, then you’re right, I won’t become a sprite.” Kren was shaking too now, desperately trying to break Ahraia’s hold.

  Let me go.

  “Our brothers are dead,” Ahraia said. “Our nit is on the brink. You should be ashamed of yourself.”

  “It should be me going to Angolor.”

  Ahraia didn’t have to say anything, her disgust flowed through the enchantment unchecked. Kren was as pale as the moon. Her ears were quivering. The enchantment snapped, too upsetting to Ahraia. A voice suddenly rose from beyond the central cores.

  “A little sisterly love. How very spritish . . .”

  The Masai was watching with a bemused look, half hidden by the darkening cores. Kren was already bowing, her ears batting ruefully.

  Ahraia stared with a mix of embarrassment and fear. Do you think she heard me? she conveyed to Losna. Her shadow, however, had her hackles raised and wasn’t listening.

  The Masai moved easily through the tumble of the forest, wearing the whitest dress Ahraia had ever seen. It was the color of clouds on a moon-burned night. It glowed obscenely, inappropriate to be sure, reflecting on the dark scars of her face. Ahraia bowed belatedly, lowering her eyes to the ground.

  “Did you have those buffoons bound as well?” the Masai asked, gesturing toward the dae-wards, neither of whom had moved. Ahraia dropped their binding, and hesitated, unsure if it was acceptable to admit the truth or not. Their sudden flurry of prostration revealed the truth to the Masai. Ahraia nodded. A cold smile played at the corners of the Masai’s lips. “Controlling three at once, and a sprite among them . . . I’m impressed.”

  Kren blushed all the brighter, her pale markings flushing almost as bright as Ahraia’s.

  The Masai looked to her and the two wards. “Leave us.”

  The dae-wards hurried away, looking chastised. Kren turned, hiding her face as she went.

  I wasn’t enchanting them . . . Ahraia started, suddenly worried that the Masai meant to punish her.

  “It’s our nature to move that which we can—that’s what makes us sprites.” Her tone was easy, but she watched intently as Losna leapt down one root to another until she was right next to Ahraia.

  Losna leaned close, her agitation reflecting through their bond, though her fur and tail thankfully didn’t show it. Ahraia was nervous too. She had never imagined standing before the most powerful sprite in all of the Silh.

  The Masai’s voice was gentle as she spoke. “Your sister wanted to go to Angolor? I don’t blame her. It’s a wonder—and not just of my making. True dark spreads as far as you can walk in a night, a long winter night.” Her pale eyes gleamed with the most life Ahraia had seen yet. “Darkenings overgrown and bustling, veiled webs stretching over midda trees for miles and miles. And it spreads. Almost on its own. Eventually, dark willing, it will cover all the woods—like an ever-sprouting veil to protect us all, a true empire. Like we sprites once had.”

  The hairs on Ahraia’s neck stood on end; she wasn’t sure if it was from the thought of such expansive dark or from simply being alone with the Masai.

  The Masai’s ears flickered, inviting Ahraia to speak openly. “Sounds good, doesn’t it?”

  Ahraia nodded. Custom dictated she keep her head bowed, but she couldn’t take her eyes from the Masai. Her dress was a spin of web that Ahraia had never seen. It glowed so brightly that her skin seemed dark as the last shadows of dusk, making her scars show like the stripes on a swamp-cat. Her white hair twisted in a silver cascade over the dress, and her pallid yellow eyes accentuated the brightness. They were tinged with soft golden rays around the edges, almost like the way the Dae-Mon sent flares of light into the sky right before it rose deadly over the horizon.

  “I’ll talk to your Astra about your sister. My offer still stands and she can afford to uproot another daughter . . . and it would be nice for you to have a familiar face once you settle in Angolor.” She smiled reassuringly.

  That would be nice, Ahraia conveyed, angry with Kren but glad for the Masai’s consideration.

  The Masai nodded, looking towards Losna.

  “Your shadow is beautiful. I asked for her name, but she wouldn’t say.” A smile played once more at her lips, her ears flickering again for Ahraia to speak aloud.

  “She wouldn’t?” Ahraia asked, looking at Losna.

  Losna looked like a Jontun had cornered her. I don’t have to tell her my name.

  Losna! She’s the Masai! Ahraia conveyed, startled by her hostility.

  “Losna,” the Masai said easily, obviously having heard an echo of Ahraia’s thoughts. “A fitting name.” She bent to scratch Losna behind her ears, eliciting a low growl.

  Ahraia flushed in embarrassment. What are you doing? You can’t do that!

  “It’s all right,” the Masai said with a mild look of distress. She stepped away from Losna who stopped growling but continued to show her teeth.

  Stop that, Ahraia chided.

  The flares in the Masai’s eyes seemed to diminish. “She reminds me of my shadow. His name was Ansbach.”

  I don’t like her, Losna thought. Ahraia flushed, worried that the Masai might somehow be able to discern her shadow’s thoughts.

  “Ansbach? Was he of the plains?” Ahraia asked, so flustered that she spoke aloud, searching for anything that might distract the Masai from Losna’s behavior. Losna! she thought in terror. You can’t disrespect her like that, we’ll be shown the light.

  “From the plains?” the Masai asked. “No. He was from the forests of Cairn. She has beautiful color, doesn’t she? Such a beautiful coat.”

  Thank you, Ahraia conveyed, regaining her composure. Greet her, she urged to Losna as muted as she could.

  Losna came reluctantly forward, sniffing at the out-held hand of the Masai. The Masai held perfectly still, but her fingers trembled ever so slightly.

  “What happened to Ansbach?” Ahraia asked, distracted and flustered.

  The Masai’s face gave no hint of emotion. “He returned to the forest. As all shadows do.” And he is still with me.

  Ahraia waited for the Masai to speak again, unsure if she had been meant to know her last thought. But the Masai turned and left them standing at the entrance of the chasms in rigid silence.

  16

  Fingers and Fog

  Ahraia shive
red beneath the cloudless night. The stars shone with untarnished brilliance, and the Great Swell cut the night and the river, slashing through the sky above and reflecting in ever-turning glints off the water below.

  Hayvon and the shades stood on the far bank of the Winnowlin, in the Shadow Woods. The bridging tree groaned, its branches strangled beneath the churning river.

  “Let it go!” the Astra called.

  The sprites on the bank braced themselves for the spray of water, but the bridge lingered a moment longer than it should have. The binders had relinquished their hold, but the tree remained. They looked at each other, confused. A scowl formed at the Astra’s lips, but then the tree shook and whipped back, spattering the woods with dark water.

  Ahraia took a shuddering breath, overwhelmed by her attempt to keep the bridging tree down. She clutched at Losna, swallowing down a dry lump in her throat, staring across the fog-covered waters.

  Hayvon and the others had collapsed at the water’s edge, in exhaustion or despair.

  Ahraia, her father conveyed, interrupting her thoughts. The summoning . . .

  She looked away from Hayvon to find that all the sprites were kneeling next to the river, drinking in unison. Even the Masai was down on all fours, leaning forward to the water, her tarry vine keeping her hair from falling in.

  The Astra and her father glowered at Ahraia. Drink, they conveyed.

  Numbly, Ahraia walked to the water’s edge and knelt, she lowered her lips just above the water. She waited, pretending to drink but refusing to take part in the ritual, feeling the cold stream just beneath her lips.

  A roar shook from the Shadow Woods. Ahraia trembled, then stood and wiped her still dry lips. She found the Masai watching her too, now. She hastily turned her eyes back to the opposite bank.

  Hayvon was up, and Shim was as well. The younger shade lurched towards the water.

  Don’t touch the water, she thought, yet knowing it was already too late. It was too far to convey anyway, and Shim stumbled into the shallows. He lowered himself and drank deeply, coughing and sputtering on his hands and knees. Tev was still lying on the banks, sprawled out as though she was already dead.

  Go, Hayvon, Ahraia thought. You have to go.

  Hayvon limped to where Tev lay, shaking her and trying to rouse her. A roar shattered the air, echoing much closer. The sprites on the near bank eagerly watched on, ears sharp and eyes glowing. They jeered at Shim as he scrambled out of the water. Hayvon dragged Tev to her feet, but she refused to move, crying, in great wracking sobs that shook her whole body.

  Losna growled next to Ahraia. They’re wasting his time.

  You have to leave her, Hayvon. You have to go, Ahraia thought.

  He looked back across the water, as though he had heard her. He met her eye and raised his hand in farewell. Ahraia knew it was disgraceful, but she didn’t care; she raised her hand as well, ignoring the sharp censures of her father and the bristling contempt of the other sprites. Hayvon lingered half a moment longer, still staring across the water, and she heard a distant thought.

  Farewell, Ahraia.

  Farewell, Hayvon. Be safe, she answered, with a clenched jaw and hot tears slipping down her face, hoping beyond thought and reason that he might somehow escape the Shadow Woods. But she knew the truth of the matter—a death too horrible to imagine was coming for him from the heart of the forest.

  Get a hold of yourself, her father conveyed. It’s unbecoming.

  Ahraia ignored him.

  With a last word to Tev, Hayvon turned and guided Shim into the woods, leaving the smaller shade where she stood next to the roaring call of the river. The heavy currents of fog boiled over her. She sobbed until her body heaved and stillness settled over her.

  The sprites’ eyes gleamed, and Ahraia could feel their eagerness as the steady hum of conveyance and twitching ears. She tasted bile in the back of her throat. She wanted to scream at Tev to run.

  Losna whimpered, stamping and shifting nervously next to Ahraia. She needs to go. Now.

  The Astra stood near the Masai, frowning.

  Ahraia had the distinct impression that her every movement was being watched by others beyond her father. If not for that, she would have called out to Tev to do anything—to swim, to run, to hide, to jump in the river and drown rather than be caught in stillness. Anything but wait.

  It’s coming! One of the sprites conveyed. The Masai actually smiled. A cruel and terrifying smile.

  Losna’s eyes were intent on the woods. She let out a low, angry woof. It’s here.

  Ahraia searched, wondering what her shadow saw. Tev stood before the ever-shifting silhouettes of the trees, a tiny figure in front of the gaping maw of the forest. Every hair on Ahraia’s body stood on end. She could feel the menace. Her ears turned, listening. A limb moved, against the grain of the rest of the woods.

  And then she saw it.

  A flush of fear coursed through her. She wanted to scream for Tev to run. But she couldn’t, her voice was gone. Even her thoughts were subdued. She stood, totally petrified. Whatever they had seen in the Stone Tree, be it alp or sprite, wraith or shadow, it certainly had not been the Shad-Mon.

  A long, slender hand, with fingers as long as Ahraia was tall, gripped a tree impossibly high above the ground. Impossibly quiet. Sinuously, it reached forward to the next tree, seeming to move when the fog moved, drawing forward like a spider on its web.

  Tev had seen it too, but too late. A scream erupted from the shade a bare moment before the clawed hand swept down and lifted her bodily back into the mist. Her voice, high-pitched and horrified, stopped with a sudden, terrible crunch. A harrowing silence swelled in its wake, but it didn’t last long. Ahraia could hear bones cracking. She could sense the Daemon looming just beyond sight—a hulking silhouette of some corporeal beast. The noise of its chewing ground across the river. Then the silhouette turned back to the forest, holding just a pair of dangling legs, and disappeared back into its fog.

  The Shad-Mon had come. And it was worse than any nightmare Ahraia had ever imagined.

  Losna sat with her ears perked up and her back to Ahraia, guarding inward on the darkening, listening and watching for any movement. It was still night but dawn was coming swiftly, and outside, the Bright Moon would just be dipping behind the horizon. It was getting ominously close to full.

  Two nights to go, Losna thought restlessly, standing and yawning.

  Keep your eyes out, Ahraia conveyed, pulling her hood closer. Almost half the turning had passed since Hayvon had been condemned, but still they were confined to the darkening, and their shadow test was looming.

  And the Shad-Mon was looming, for that matter, creeping through Ahraia’s thoughts, sweeping through her dreams like the clawed hand had swept through the mist.

  In the nights following the condemnation, Losna had dwelled on the shades’ fates. Do you think Hayvon could have escaped? Do you think he got away while that evil was hunting after Tev?

  “To what end?” Ahraia had answered, terrified by the memory of the silhouette. “To be hunted by darkness and hiding from light?” The thought of escape was almost worse than a swift death—alone and shadowless, trapped in the Shadow Woods with his days and nights spent cowering until the light overwhelmed him or the Shad-Mon found him. No sprite had ever returned from the heart of the woods, and Ahraia had little hope for Hayvon.

  It was a fate she refused to suffer. If she was going to fail the shadow test, they were going to run for it—and the spritelings and Kyah with them. They needed an escape route, one that would answer to her in a pinch. That was why she was leaned casually against the darkening wall in a tucked away corner of Daispar, where neither shades nor sprites would bother them.

  It’s almost day . . . no one’s going to be about, Losna thought, yawning wide again, and lowering herself to the ground. Besides, it’s not like you’re making a closure.

  She was right, of course, but it didn’t mean Ahraia wanted to be discovered softening the wall
.

  “Just keep your wits about you,” Ahraia said, reaching out to bind another tendril, slowly starting to stretch and bend the branch, gently turning it to her will. Her thoughts drifted as she worked, trailing from Hayvon and the Shad-Mon, to Vesta and the Stone Tree, and eventually to her shadow test. It was the Astra’s fault. Every little bit of it. And Ahraia wanted nothing more than to send her quivering across a bridging tree into the Shadow Woods. Then Ahraia would drink until she was sick, summoning the daemon down on the Astra and watching in delight while the Shad-Mon chewed her down to her shins.

  The tendril tensed, sensing Ahraia’s mood, tightening purposefully and spreading the thought to the other branches. Ahraia let go of the binding. She cleared her mind and stretched her neck. It had been a long night—a long turning, for that matter.

  Shouldn’t we tell Kyah the plan? So the spritelings are at least ready? Losna asked, noticing a break in Ahraia’s concentration.

  “There’s nothing to tell,” Ahraia answered. It’s too risky for them to know anything yet. She rebound the tendril and started to rework it. The plan wasn’t so much a plan as it was a last resort, an escape route if their shadow test fell apart.

  What if something happens to us?

  Ahraia shook her head and the branch she had bound shook with her. Then they’re dead anyway.

  The light outside was growing, and inside the darkening, it was getting too bright, even for Ahraia. She unbound the wall, leaving it ready for a quick exit and headed back for their nit. They wound through the darkening, but when she turned down the last path, Ahraia pulled up short, seeing Tallin waiting for her.

  She immediately thought of Gavea and wondered if Tallin suspected their role in her sister’s death. Gavea’s body had finally been found, light-torn and ravaged. Tallin had been stomping around the darkening in a foul mood ever since.

  “Where have you been? I’ve been looking everywhere for you,” Tallin said with her usual impish sneer.

  Ahraia picked a twig from the darkening wall from her sleeve and flicked it casually to the ground.