The Keeper's Shadow

by Dennis Foon

“I have news,” she says, then after a brief pause, adds, “about Alandra.”

  Roan’s stomach lurches. Alandra! He’d been so consumed with the events of the last few weeks that he’d not stopped to think about her. Mabatan’s been with Alandra?

  “She lives. She has eschewed the Dirt and rejected the Dirt Eaters.”

  “But that’s good news!” Roan says. Alandra was a close friend until things went wrong. This could mean starting over, renewing their bond. The possibility lightens his heart.

  “So she’s alright?” prods Lumpy. Roan, too, is aware Mabatan’s feelings don’t seem to match her news.

  “She is content,” she says hesitantly. “For the first time in many months.”

  “You didn’t quite answer the question,” chides Lumpy.

  “Her body is protected by the Apsara in Kira’s village. But the rest of her is with the Novakin. She has been chosen to be their curatrix, their healer.”

  “It’s what Alandra said she wanted,” Roan says hopefully. “To protect the children.”

  “And that’s bad—how?” asks Lumpy, not giving up on having his question answered.

  “She has been given a very powerful form,” says Mabatan. “A hydra.”

  “Bigger and stronger sounds good,” says Lumpy. “How many heads do those things have again?”

  Mabatan frowns. “Nine. A form of that magnitude can overwhelm the spirit. If…when…the Novakin are freed, Alandra may not have will enough to separate from it.”

  “You mean she’ll be trapped in a monster?” Roan asks, distressed. Mabatan averts her gaze. Had she known? Was this part of some Wazya plan he had no knowledge of? “It should have been me. I’m supposed to be the protector of the Novakin. You should have done this to me. At the very least, I should have been asked.”

  “Roan, this was not planned. Alandra was there when we found Stowe. We got as far as Kira’s village together but Willum had to get Stowe to the Caldera. Alandra had the sickness and couldn’t travel so I was asked to stay behind with her. To assist her withdrawal from the Dirt. That in itself could have killed her. But then, we were preparing for a meditation when—”

  A sharp bird’s cry from Ende commands their attention. Barreling across the plain are two small motorized vehicles, each manned by a pair of Clerics, with a half-dozen Fandor riding alongside. Not much of a force against a dozen Brothers and Apsara.

  Riding to Ende, Roan points to the vehicles. “They could have Apogees!”

  “Then they must be destroyed. Flank formation!” orders Ende.

  Breaking their cover, Brothers and Apsara split as they race toward the outmatched Fandor. The Clerics scoot between and around their cohorts, as if the Fandor were some kind of diversion. Then Roan gets his first good look at the long, silver objects, one mounted on each vehicle.

  Rotating it on its stand, the Cleric aims his device at Ende. Taking out the commander, thinks Roan. There’s a barely audible whistle. One of the Apsara rides in front of Ende just as a shimmer disturbs the air. The Apsara is frozen for an instant, then convulses as if she were somehow being pulled inside out. A moment later, when she collapses over the neck of her horse, Roan hears the whisper of an anguished moan, desperate and pleading. The look of terror on the dead warrior’s face leaves little doubt in his mind that she has just come face to face with the monstrous emptiness Mabatan spoke of.

  “This ends now!” Ende cries out as she gallops toward the vehicle.

  The Cleric trains his weapon on three Apsara ahead of her and they all fall instantly. But they’ve gotten Ende close enough and she leaps, landing beside the Clerics. With two quick slashes she finishes them both. Seeing the weapon in the second transport swivel in her direction, she jumps out, pulling the driver of the vehicle with her. The truck careens into a tree and the weapon explodes.

  While Ende rolls to safety, Roan rides to intercept the remaining truck. As the Clerics fire at the Brothers covering him, Roan leans alongside the vehicle and with one swoop of his hook-sword, he slices the front wheel. The vehicle flips over and the Clerics go flying. The weapon too sails up in the air, and then, smashing into the hard ground, it explodes, spraying debris everywhere.

  Roan sees Lumpy collapse, holding his stomach. Frightened, he rushes to his friend’s side. “Did you get hit?”

  Looking pale, Lumpy smiles faintly.

  “Let me see,” says Roan.

  Lumpy moves his hands. A shard of silver metal is embedded in his abdomen.

  Mabatan nudges Roan aside. “I will look after him. Ende waits for you.”

  Roan, shaking, stares at Lumpy.

  “I’m alright,” Lumpy smiles. “Get out of here.”

  As Mabatan helps Lumpy off his mount, Roan reluctantly joins Ende, who’s standing by the two Clerics that Roan sent flying. One is still breathing. The other is not. “Look,” Ende says, pointing at the green crater in the dead Cleric’s neck. “As soon as he died, it whined and then…this. Exactly as Willum and Kira described.”

  “Same for the others?”

  “Same.”

  Roan stares at the unconscious Cleric. “Will he survive?”

  “No more than a day.”

  “We need to examine it.”

  “And who will accomplish that task?” Ende asks.

  “The physicians I told you about. At the Academy. We need to get this Cleric to them.”

  Ende considers the situation. “Go on ahead. Put him on the horse with you. The ride won’t do him any good, but with some luck, you’ll make it before he dies. Take two riders. You want to move fast. From what Stinger described, I doubt there’s much left here that will be of use, but we’ll search the area anyway.”

  Roan hurries back to Lumpy. Mabatan has removed the fragment and is cleaning the wound.

  “He will recover,” she says. Her voice is warm to comfort him, but her eyes never leave Lumpy. “He cannot move quickly. Go do what you must and leave his well-being to me.”

  “You heard her,” Lumpy says, then gasps in pain.

  “I warned you not to talk right now,” Mabatan chides, wagging her finger.

  “See you at the Academy,” Lumpy mouths, before letting his head collapse back in exhaustion.

  The Cleric secured against the pommel of his saddle, Roan climbs onto his horse. Lumpy’s wounded. Alandra may be lost. Four Apsara and two Brothers were killed today. Nodding goodbye to Ende, Roan murmurs, “I’m sorry for your losses,” though he knows full well the inadequacy of his words.

  Ende’s eyes betray her sadness. “You heard the whispers as they perished?”

  “Yes, I heard.”

  “Death is the fate all warriors accept, yet to have one’s spirit claimed in such a way…”

  “Next time we encounter the Apogee, we’ll be better prepared,” says Roan, but the assurance sounds strangely hollow; he might as well be promising to destroy the City single-handed.

  But his doubts do not escape Ende’s notice. “If you bend your attention to the goal, Roan of Longlight, you will accomplish it.”

  These were the same words she’d spoken to him that stormy night at the encampment. He knows she shouldn’t have had to repeat them. So he bears the reprimand without comment and with Mejan and a Brother beside him, gallops off, keeping his goal firmly in mind.

  By the time night sets upon them, they’ve reached the five hills. When they come to the Academy’s hidden entrance, they lead their horses inside the threshold, out of view. Laying the still-breathing Cleric on a blanket, Mejan and the Brother take one end, Roan the other. The narrow corridor makes the going awkward and slow, but moving steadily they soon arrive at the secret door of the library. Roan expertly opens the door and shouts, “Othard! Imin! Help!”

  They are barely down the steps when the two doctors appear. “Put him down,” Imin says with astonishing calm.

  Setting the Cleric on the floor, they all step back to watch the two physicians as they palpate and prod the injured man.

  “
Ruptured kidney,” says Othard.

  “And spleen,” adds Imin.

  “Punctured lung.”

  “Liver’s lacerated.”

  “Will he make it?” asks Roan.

  They both shake their heads.

  “Even if we had a proper operating room…”

  “…and the correct instruments…”

  “…we wouldn’t be able to help him.”

  “These Clerics we fought had new enablers. When they died, the enablers…imploded.” Uneasy, Roan pauses. Othard and Imin look at him expectantly. With a sigh, Roan asks, “Do you think there might be a way to remove his enabler before that happens?”

  Imin examines the throbbing device, appallingly visible beneath the Cleric’s skin, obviously reluctant. “Hmm...”

  “Hmm…” Othard echoes.

  As the physicians puzzle over the challenge of extricating the enabler, Algie pushes past Roan to hover over them. “My, my, my!” he exclaims, nudging Othard aside. “The technology really has zipped along!”

  “Are you familiar with these?” asks Imin.

  “Well, it was a long time ago,” the old man says, tapping his nose. “And this one is definitely a different kettle of fish.” He pulls out a magnifying glass and gently probes the area around the subcutaneous device. “Look at this…it’s a masterpiece. A horrid one, of course, but nevertheless...”

  Roan eyes the old Gunther with renewed hope. “Do you know how to get it out?”

  “Well, I…it’s possible, of course, but…”

  Algie bends forward to look at the Cleric’s wounds and then at the two doctors huddled beside him. Imin and Othard solemnly shake their heads. “Ah. Since there is no hope for the fellow. Yes. Yes. I think there might be a way.”

  DAUGHTER OF THE CITY

  FOURTEEN WILL KEEP WATCH AND BLESS THE LAND WHERE THEY LAY WITH THEIR INNOCENCE. FOURTEEN TO BE BORNE BY A DRAGON UNTIL SHE WHO WAS LOST IS FOUND AND WHAT HAS BEEN BROKEN IS MADE WHOLE AGAIN.

  —STEPPE,

  VISION #78, YEAR 5 A.C.

  DREAMFIELD JOURNALS OF THE

  FIRST INNER CIRCLE

  WILLUM TELLS STOWE STORIES. All the happy stories he remembers about his childhood escapades with Torin, Resa, and of course, Kira. And Stowe is laughing. He glimpses in her wide grin and crinkled, sparkling eyes the girl she would have been in other circumstances. He wishes he could keep her laughing and joyful forever, but with a sinking heart he sees that they’ve arrived at the ancient road that leads into the City.

  “What’s wrong, Willum?” Stowe asks, her smile gone, her brow furrowed.

  “It will not be long now,” he replies, reining in his mount.

  Stopping alongside him, Stowe looks at him wistfully. They have grown familiar, the warmth between them a comfort. They will have to abandon that now.

  “I’m afraid, Willum.”

  “You must make your fear serve you, Stowe.”

  “I know, it’s just…” She trails off, staring down the road ahead, her mind closed to him.

  “You have doubts.”

  “Questions. Questions I’m not sure you can answer, or will want to answer.”

  Willum waits, his silence the only encouragement he can offer.

  Stowe sighs, frustrated. “I hate it when you do that.”

  Willum smiles.

  “And that,” she says pointedly. “Why did our great-grandfather take on this responsibility? Why did he feel it was his fault? I know he discovered the Dirt and what it could do, but Darius was the one who abused it. He was the one who built the Constructions that are destroying the Dreamfield. Him and the Dirt Eaters.”

  “He accepted responsibility because the other Masters would not.”

  “That’s it?” Stowe exclaims in disbelief.

  “Roan of the Parting discovered the Dirt and how to use it. He found an opening into the world that is the source of all life, then invited in a group of plunderers. He allowed himself to overuse the Dirt and realized too late that his obsession had impaired his judgment.”

  “So we have to pay, possibly with our lives, for our great-grandfather’s addiction?”

  Willum sighs. “Stowe, you know it is not that simple.”

  “Oh? You certainly make it sound that way.”

  Willum breathes deeply.

  “You’re doing it again,” Stowe snips. Willum waits for her mounting frustration to turn in on itself. Like a powerful undertow, it scrapes his surface but ultimately it withdraws.

  “And what about our great-grandmother—what was her name again?”

  “Aithuna.”

  “Why did she help? The Wazya weren’t responsible. Why take that on? You and Kira, I understand. Your people were decimated by Darius. Your parents killed by Clerics. You have reasons.”

  “The Wazya view themselves as guardians, Stowe. If they see a hurt child, they do not wait for the person responsible to be brought to justice. They help the child. If they see a forest destroyed, they do not wait to petition those who destroyed it. They go out themselves and work to purify the soil. They collect and plant the seeds.”

  “What do hurt children and planting seeds have to do with us?”

  “Stowe. The Novakin represent all the hurt children. And we are the seeds…the seeds of Darius’s destruction.”

  Willum watches Stowe determine the implications of what he’s said, the key events of their histories flashing across the curtain of her memory: the plague unleashed on the Apsara, the killing of his parents, and then hers, the destruction of her home, her corruption by Darius, her brother’s weathered face, the warm glow that radiates from his heart despite all that has happened. Willum sees her eyes shift in the desperate struggle between the fragility of her love and the power of her hate. It is not long before she does as she must and the petulant, angry child is gone as surely as the joyful one. It is almost as if her skin has changed and she’s become hard, an infanta of steel. When her gaze shifts to meet his, its watery veil reflects only light and it too seems armored.

  “It’s all very clear to me now. Thank you, my Primary.” Spurring her horse forward, she rides with her back straight, the way she’s seen Ende ride. Regally. Like a queen. Like…Our Stowe.

  Stowe can finally see the towers of the City in the distance. Dust rises from the ruins littering the landscape. The City once stretched this far in the time before the meteor fell and the great wars destroyed the land. Now all that is left is the core, much of it rebuilt by her adopted father, the Keeper of the City.

  On this exposed road, it hadn’t taken long for her nose and hands to become so chilled that she had to disappear into her cloak. It was irrational, she knew, but she also felt more comfortable physically hidden from Willum. He’d respected her silence, of course; she was glad of that—and angry at the same time. But if he’d spoken, she might—just might—have started to cry. And that was a luxury she could not allow herself. Not now. Not ever. This seed had blossomed into a Nethervine flower and she wanted Darius to come and smell her. Oh, yes. Close. Very close. And then he’d feel her thorns.

  Pulling up alongside her, Willum can’t help but add one last piece of advice. “Whatever happens, Stowe, never doubt the power of the people’s faith in you. And in the prophecies. Remember: we must slide very carefully on the edge of that blade until it settles against our enemy’s throat.”

  She looks into her teacher’s guarded face and dispenses with all her regrets. Cousin, she says, reaching into his mind. Cousin, goodbye.

  Goodbye, cousin—the words melt over her like a father’s hug, and she buries them deep so that even she might never find them again.

  “Do you see?” Willum points. A cloud of dust is rapidly approaching. As it draws closer, Stowe identifies the vehicles and shiny weapons. Clerics—perimeter guards, a touchy lot.

  Remember our plan, Stowe.

  I will not forget, my Primary. The thoughts she sends him are confident. She knows it is possible Darius will see through the alibi she and Wi
llum have concocted—the Eldest has eyes behind his eyes. But she has knowledge, secrets, powerful ones that have put Darius in perspective. He’s still scary, all right, but more for the damage he can do than the person that he is—that person has weaknesses, many weaknesses, and she will exploit them all.

  As the Clerics screech to a halt, Willum places a hand on his horse’s neck to calm it. He looks on blithely as the perimeter guards point their weapons, anxious for any excuse to fire.

  Their captain scowls. “Who are you, and where do you think you’re going?”

  “I have been away, but now I have returned,” says Stowe, her voice warm and reaching none too subtly for the man’s heart.

  “Have you…papers?” the captain says haltingly.

  Lowering her hood, Stowe reveals her face.

  The Clerics can only stare, stunned. Then they gasp, falling to their knees. “Our Stowe!”

  Stowe allows herself a smile, a benevolent one, as she directs her horse to move past them.

  With Willum riding close on her left, they slip inconspicuously through the City gates. Instantly confronted by a gigantic billboard of herself shrouded in black cloth, Stowe whispers, “They’re making quite a show of my absence.”

  “Master Querin has always had a genius for the telling image.”

  “Master Querin makes my hair stand on end.” Stowe shivers dramatically, turning to smile at Willum. But he is looking ahead, unresponsive.

  Giddy to be back, for a moment she forgot to be careful. Not good. Everything she says, every gesture, every expression will be scrutinized by Darius. She must not let down her guard.

  As they approach the Pyramid, more and more people rush into the streets. Hundreds, thousands of citizens pour out of their offices and homes, desperate for a glimpse of Our Stowe. People rush up to touch her feet and press their tear-stained faces against her cloak, but they never push or pressure her in any way. Willum’s surrounded her with a shimmering golden light. Gold is the strongest of all colors, so strong most people cannot tolerate it, even though they cannot see it. She notices the faces of the crowd when they touch it. Awe. Coupled with fear. They reach, but not for long and not too close. She’s learnt a lot from Willum on the journey here, about the light, its different colors and their meanings. With practice, she too will be able to control it like he can.