Shadows of Blood

by L. E. Dereksen

  “And what else?”

  “I don’t know. I think I covered it pretty well.”

  “And those stupid lies about the dead Guardian?”

  “Right. Those.” I frowned. “You know that was his idea?”

  “Don’t care. You took the coward’s way out. Apologize.”

  I shut my eyes, on the verge of retreat. Until I thought about Tala: holding her, seeing her one more time, listening to the sound of her voice. “You’re right,” I snapped. “I was a coward.”

  “Good. Now don’t look at me,” she said. “He’s over there. Say it again. To him.” She pointed behind her, and I found myself staring at Kulnethar. His face had become serious, brows drawn.

  Something shifted. I almost fled, feeling exposed, feeling shame claw its way back to the surface. But I had to see Tala. I shoved my pride down and met his eye. “I’m sorry, Kylan,” I said. “I was wrong.”

  The room fell silent. Kulnethar blinked and looked away. He nodded. He nodded again. “Okay,” he said quietly. “Go wait in the gardens. If she chooses to come, she’ll meet you there.”

  I paced. I tried to imagine the conversation that was happening now. Was Kulnethar speaking fairly on my behalf, or was he trying to dissuade her? Would she come?

  She had to. It was Tala. She loved me. She would never turn me away.

  But that presence in the Unseen. That terrifying power, hammering me back. What if it were more than the Chorah’dyn? What if Tala were already turned against me?

  No.

  But the Chorah’dyn had seen me. She had looked at me, knowing everything.

  Knowing my shame.

  Did that mean Tala could see as well?

  The thought sent a bolt of fear through me. What if she knew about Breta? What if she knew about the kiss? What if she knew . . .

  No. Don’t even think about it. It never happened. It was an accident.

  I almost fled back through the Unseen, back into the safety of my dark room. But as I turned, I saw her.

  My breath caught. She was standing amidst the trees, a white garment draped over her, drifting in the wind, while her hair hung loose like a cloud of shadow. It curled around her face and fell past her shoulders, thick and black. Dark eyes gazed at me. And hanging from her neck was a single shining drop of stone. If I expected someone half-shrunk into Sumadi, I was wrong. She was glowing. She was radiant.

  “Tala . . .”

  She didn’t move.

  I wanted to run to her, but fear held me back. Was it too late?

  “Tala, speak to me,” I breathed. “Is it you? Is it really you?”

  “Of course it’s me, you stubborn idiot.” She smiled.

  Relief washed over me. I crossed to her, gathering her in my arms. She let me hold her. She sighed as I breathed her in, the richness of her, the delight of clean and oiled hair. I kissed her. She pulled me towards her. Her fingers pressed into my back, clutching me. The wind tugged around us, wakening our desire. And as my fingers brushed her arm, a strange energy ran through me, dancing across our skin, our lips, filling me and burning inside like rich cider.

  She murmured and drew me close. A vibrancy twined through us, growing stronger, reaching into me. Reaching across the Unseen. Finding me where I was.

  No. I recognized it too late. I tried to gasp and pull away, but it burst through me, that same presence, powerful and unstoppable, searing every corner of my mind. I staggered back with a cry, nearly yanked to the Guardian’s Hall. But I forced myself into the garden, panting and shaken. Pain etched across my head.

  “Vanya?”

  I couldn’t open my eyes. She drew close to me, and the pain twisted a little deeper. I stumbled back, arms out, gasping.

  “I’m sorry. I’m sorry, Tala. It’s that thing inside you. I . . . I can’t. It won’t let me close to you.”

  I forced my watering eyes open. For a moment, she was blindingly bright, then the sweet darkness of the garden wrapped around us, and the pain faded to an aching throb. Still, I could feel it, like a veiled sun burning behind a wall.

  “Oh, Vanya.” She shook her head, face brimming with sadness. “Can’t you see? Look, look!” She held out both her arms, hands opening. “She healed you!”

  “And took you instead.”

  “She took nothing. I am here. Alive, Vanya—more than ever before!”

  “No.” I edged back. “I . . . I felt that thing. I felt what it would do. It was going to destroy me.”

  She shook her head. “Your mind is broken, Vanya. There’s a wound left by the shadows. Left for so long it feels like you, though it isn’t. The real you has been twisted around it, like . . . like flesh warped around an unset bone. It hurts, Vanya. Yes. And if you let her inside, it would, because she’d go to that place. She’d heal what was broken so long ago, and you’d have to grow new skin around it. But you would not be destroyed, I promise you. Look!” She spread her arms. “I am here. I am here, my love.”

  I was almost swayed by her words. Something resonated there, in the strength of her voice, in the light of her eyes. It was her. And yet more. Something else. What was it? Could I trust it? Could I really?

  I shrank away. “And what about your fate? What will she do to you, if you go?”

  Tala sighed. “Vanya, don’t be afraid for me. This is my path now. I’m choosing this as much as she is.”

  “But you don’t understand,” I groaned. “I never told you. Tala. Oh, Tala, I never told you. I never thought it would come to this. That you . . .”

  “Don’t be afraid,” she said again.

  “I saw . . .” I swallowed. I shook my head. “When you were in the Temple, recovering, I saw Polityr. I saw Pol.”

  “The one who was Chosen?” Her voice was kind.

  “Yes!” I choked. “Tala, he was Sumadi. He was one of them. I saw him. And Breta killed him in . . . in . . . in the camel yard. And Mani saw. And she said we shouldn’t tell anyone. But Tala, it’s true. Chosen become Sumadi. Sumadi.”

  Her brows drew together. Her eyes grew troubled. “You really believe this?”

  “Yes, Tala. I’m so sorry. I should have told you sooner. But don’t you see now? I . . . I can’t stand by and do nothing and wait for you to become some haunted thing, taken and destroyed, twisted into one of those creatures. You’ll come back for me, yes—as one of them. Oh, Tala! I can’t! Please listen to me. Don’t go. Don’t!”

  “I have to.”

  “But what if you don’t?” I stepped forward. “Tala, what if you could take this power and . . . and bend it to some other purpose? I could go with you. We could go together. We could follow the Sumadi back to their source and learn the truth for ourselves. Maybe there’s something else we have to do. Don’t you remember saying that to me? Let the other Chosen go to their fate, but not you, Tala. Not you.”

  She shook her head. “Vanya, you wouldn’t say these things if you knew. I have a purpose here, something more than I could ever hope for as a Guardian. And I trust the Chorah’dyn. I see her now.”

  “I see her too,” I snapped. “She’s turning your thoughts. She’s using you.”

  “No, it’s not like that.”

  “But it is! My Tala would never throw herself blindly away for some distant entity.”

  She smiled. “Your Tala? Vanya, I was never yours. Don’t you remember?” She drew closer. I could feel the Unseen, the veiled sun, burning stronger, pressing against my thinning wall.

  “Why are saying that?” I winced, refusing to back away. “I was going to save you!”

  “Were you?”

  “Yes!”

  She stopped, so close to me. So close. “Oh, Vanya.” She touched my face, and her skin was like fire. “Be free of these lies.”

  I stood my ground. Her touch burned into me, but I would not fall back again.

  “I’m afraid for you, my love. And there’s more. More you won’t tell me.”

  I laughed, though it came out sounding harsh, on the edge of tears. �
�I don’t . . .” My voice faltered, choked off by the pain of her touch, her words. “Tala, if you go, I have nothing.”

  “That’s not true either.”

  “Isn’t it?” My heart laboured, crushed beneath the weight of my chest. “You’re right, Tala. You’re right. I’m not what I should be, and I . . . I’m afraid that without you . . .” The panic grew. I struggled to catch my breath. “I . . . I did something. Oh, Tala.”

  I shut my eyes but gripped her, trembling, afraid to let go, though I could feel the Unseen building, the presence growing again, throbbing against me.

  “Tell me,” she said. The voice was a whisper, yet it hammered through me.

  I sobbed. I could feel myself buckling, folding in shame. I tried to resist, but even as I clutched my secrets, they dissolved, burned away.

  “I . . . I killed her.”

  I fell to my knees. Tala knelt with me. She clutched the back of my neck.

  “Breta?”

  I nodded.

  Her grip tightened. I felt her shaking. “Oh, my love.”

  “It was an accident . . .”

  “Was it?”

  “Yes.” I sobbed again. “No. I don’t know. I . . . I . . .”

  “You pushed her.”

  I nodded, forcing myself to breathe.

  “Why?”

  “I don’t know. It was Shatayeth. He told her things. Dangerous things. Then she threatened—”

  I broke off.

  “What?”

  “She threatened to tell you. That I . . . I . . . it wasn’t anything. I swear it wasn’t.” I took a shuddering breath. “I kissed her. It was only a moment. But you believed in me, you trusted me. And I didn’t want to break that. Not with everything that was happening. I was so afraid.”

  “So you killed her.”

  I nodded.

  “You killed her, Ishvandu.”

  I wept, folding into myself. The light rolled over me, pounding like a storm. She held me a moment longer, though her grip had tightened into something painful.

  Then the presence lifted. I felt empty, exhausted. When I glanced up, I saw Tala had straightened. She was standing over me. Her head was bowed, her shoulders slumped.

  “Tala?”

  She shook her head. “I had hoped . . .”

  “Oh, Tala. Don’t say it like that. Please. I’m sorry. I . . . I . . .”

  “Tell them.”

  I blinked, breathless and hurting. “What?”

  “The truth, Vanya.”

  “But I would die!”

  She wiped her face. “This isn’t you. You had a purpose, Vanya. An oath. And I can’t carry that for you anymore. I can’t . . .” She took a trembling breath. “I have to go.”

  “Tala . . .”

  She turned away. I felt something tear inside of me.

  “At least let me go with you!” I cried. “Let me stand with you at the end, or die with you. Let me—Tala, please! I’m sorry. I . . . Don’t go! Please, don’t go!”

  But only silence answered. The dark of the garden closed around me, and I was alone.

  Chapter Fifty

  Ishvandu ab’Admundi

  I sat in the shadows of my room all night, huddled like a sack. I felt weak, empty. I had poured out everything to her. And she had turned away.

  And rightly so.

  I heard my words, over and over again. Pathetic. Broken. Guilty. I nursed them like a wound, no matter how much they hurt. I felt each one. Tasting the bitter gall. Swallowing it down. Letting the words burn inside.

  By the time the sky lightened, I had made up my mind.

  I rose as if nothing had happened. I washed myself and joined the Dawning prayer. I ate the morning meal. I listened calmly to ab’Tanadu’s lecture.

  “If you don’t bring yourself under control, Ishvandu, I will take leadership of this kiyah myself, though it’s the last thing I want. Do you hear me? You have to be better than this. I know it’s hard to lose Tala, but you’re not being rational about this. You have to be rational. You think you get to be a Guardian only when everything’s right with you? Let me tell you, boy, it never is. And that’s when your mettle is tested. When everything seems to come against you, that’s when you get to be a Guardian. Remember what you were like in the desert? That’s the Ishvandu we need right now. So get over yourself, acting like—”

  “You’re right,” I said.

  He frowned. “Are you hearing me? Because sands take you if I have to repeat myself. I might just hit you instead.”

  “I hear you, ab’Tanadu. I’ve been irrational and weak. I haven’t been the leader I should be. Now can we get to work, or do you have more to say?”

  Ab’Tanadu stared at me. Jil stared at me. Only Mani chuckled and returned to her meal.

  By the afternoon, I had met with Umaala and arranged for three new members of our kiyah. Two were Benji and Arkaya, whose blades I gladly welcomed. The third was a transfer—someone to help lift our shockingly low collective experience: Antaru from the fourth. He was bulky and strong, and Jin’sal had found him too withdrawn for the outward-focused fourth kiyah. I might have said too stupid, if Tala hadn’t always insisted otherwise. So he too was added to our numbers.

  By the end of the day, I was the head of a respectable kiyah of eight.

  I moved through the week with more resolve than I’d ever had before. It felt good. I gathered the kiyah and explained the plan: we were going back into the desert and setting up a permanent outpost at the well. We had been given the Al’kah’s blessing to make it happen, and the sixth would join us.

  There were a few raised eyebrows. “The sixth?” Antaru asked. “They’re giving us a whole kiyah?”

  “For the time being, yes.”

  He whistled and leaned back. “This should be interesting.”

  “Did I hear you say a permanent outpost?” Benji asked.

  I nodded at him. “That’s right.”

  “And they want us to stay out there?”

  “You are a full outrider of the third now, Benajin ab’Ibatu” I said. “Are you ready to face that danger without fear?”

  He glanced at me, as if realizing it for the first time. His back straightened even further—if that was possible—and he rested a hand on his newly sworn Guardian’s keshu. It was a long, slender blade, suited to one of his technical skill.

  “Of course, sal’ah!”

  Arkaya rolled her eyes, but said nothing. Her blade was short and thick, perfect for hacking at limbs and torsos. I was proud to have them both.

  “We’ll also be absorbing a crew of Labourers and Crafters. Arkaya?”

  The young woman met my eye, as cool as ever.

  “You will work with Adar ab’Dara to assemble a team of willing participants. If those from the last expedition want to join us again, that would be best, but it’s their choice.”

  She nodded. She seemed completely unbothered by the assignment, unashamed of her Labourer roots. I wondered what that felt like, to be held so low for so long and not care. Yes. She was exactly the Guardian I needed on this crew.

  “Mani,” I glanced at the older woman. “Supplies and logistics. You know what to do.”

  She nodded.

  “Ab’Tanadu?”

  The man raised a brow at me.

  “I’d like you to spend some time with Antaru. Walk him through our last mission and explain what’s at stake. Make sure he understands our defensive strategies against Sumadi.”

  “We should spend some time practicing as a kiyah, especially now that our newly sworn Guardians have blades.”

  “We will.”

  “Good.”

  We practised. We drilled every maneuver again and again, sweating in the yard where everyone could see us. We struggled at first, but I was impressed with how quickly our team fused. In fact, as the week drew to its end, I found myself enjoying their seriousness. Breta and Koryn had been divisive and distracting. Benji and Arkaya, and even Antaru, were focused. They cared about doing it
right. And most importantly, when I told them to move faster, they obeyed.

  It was Mani who came to me at the end of the week.

  She found me in the stable yard, settling Yma in for the night. Normally the Hands would see to the camels, but I felt like going through the motions—brushing and watering and digging the muck from her hooves.

  Without a word, Mani grabbed a brush and joined me. A rhythmic thump and swish filled the silence, and dust encircled us.

  “So will you go tomorrow?” she asked after a while.

  I knew instantly what she meant. Tala. She would depart from the north gate tomorrow with the other Chosen.

  I grunted and scrubbed deeper at a stubborn crust of mud. I kept seeing her face, the look she had given me—knowing, hurting. Never in all my life did I want to see that look again.

  “No,” I said.

  “Not even for your wife?”

  “She’s gone, Mani. She’s already gone.”

  Mani looked at me with her inscrutable eyes, but said nothing. We worked side by side. When the task was done, I dropped my brush into a crate of Yma’s things, then filled her water and gave her a last dusty thump.

  “Mani, you know what it is we’re doing here, right? You know what Anuai is all about?”

  “Tell me.”

  I hesitated. I wanted her with me. I needed her. And I knew behind that calm exterior was a perceptive, calculating eye. But where to begin? It was like rolling a massive boulder up the side of a hill, a boulder that could, at any moment, turn back to crush me.

  “Protect them,” I said at last. “I swore an oath to protect them, Mani, and that’s what I’m going to do. These are our people. They deserve the truth. Tala deserved the truth, and I kept that from her.”

  “We both did.”

  “You think the Circle would listen to me? Honestly, Mani—if I told them the truth of the Avanir, do you think they would believe me now that Tala has been Chosen?”

  Mani thought about it. “No,” she said.

  “No.” I looked at her. The moment hung between us. It was now or never. It was time.