A Plague of Shadows (18 page)
Read A Plague of Shadows Online
Authors: Travis Simmons
She’d hesitated too long. She lowered her hand over his skin, feeling a strange kind of heat that came from the wound, even though the rest of his body looked cold. Silent tears crept out of her eyes, and she gave her fears up to the All Father.
Please, we are so far from home, and we’ve lost so much. Please don’t let me lose him too,
she thought. She closed her eyes and felt the wyrd flow through her. Oddly enough, it almost felt as though she was tapped into something higher than her, as if a consciousness she’d never known before was guiding her hand, forming her thoughts into something that could mold the wyrd she was wielding.
Once the power began to flow into the wound it felt like the wound started pulling at her power, drinking it in and feeding off her wyrd. She gasped at the sensation, like a metaphysical tug of war with whatever sleeping power Rorick possessed. She could imagine that everyone had a kind of energy field that could give and take, and right now, Rorick’s energy was taking what Abagail was offering in order to make him whole once more.
The power started to wane, leaking less and less into Rorick until finally it stopped and the silver glow that Abagail could see through her partially closed eyes dimmed and then faded altogether. She opened her eyes and saw Daphne ease closer to Rorick’s wound, her tiny head bending over the slash and gazing at the blood. Leona leaned closer too.
“Is anything happening?” Abagail asked.
No one answered, but they didn’t need to. Abagail could see that nothing was happening. She could tell that the wound wasn’t closing, and if she thought she could see the blood slowing, or bits of flesh knitting back together, that was probably just a trick of her hopeful mind.
“Wait!” Leona crowed, and Daphne fluttered up into the air in surprise, her purple light dancing over Rorick’s body with ever flap of her wings. “Something’s happening!”
“You’re just hoping something’s happening. I thought I’d seen it too,” Abagail told her. “It’s nothing.”
“No, the wound is smaller,” Leona said.
Abagail leaned forward to see if the wound really was getting smaller, but she couldn’t really tell. If it was knitting shut it was doing it at a slow enough pace that she couldn’t see it. But was that the beginning of a silver scar near the one end?
“Maybe,” she said, slipping her glove back on since the light had faded and she could no longer feel the power in her appendage.
“No, it’s not bleeding any longer,” Leona said.
That was something Abagail could agree with. The wound didn’t leak any blood now, instead it was starting to congeal, and now that she was aware of it, the wound seemed to knit shut faster.
Her breath caught in her throat and she looked at her gloved hand. She’d never even thought she could do something like that. Elation flooded her chest, and she felt like she could laugh and cry all at once. A smile broke over her face, and the wound was now closing even faster than it had before.
Now there was just a little opening left in his side and even that was closing.
“Abagail!” Leona said as Rorick started to moan and twitch. “You did it!”
A nervous laugh broke free of Abagail’s mouth as she watched the color return to Rorick’s face.
“What happened?” he asked, pushing himself up.
Abagail was too happy to listen, but she knew Leona was filling him in because of the exclamations and the wild gestures.
“I did see you finish off that darkling,” Rorick said, ruffling Leona’s hair. “That was great work, we hadn’t thought of using fire.”
“It was so obvious!” Leona said. “But I almost didn’t think of it either.”
“So what do we do now?” Rorick asked.
“You need rest,” Abagail told him.
“We could all use rest,” he said. “But I feel oddly energized.” He frowned and shook his head. “I meant what do we do now that there’s darkling loose on the trail?”
“Keep watch?” Abagail shrugged. “I’m not really sure.”
“Hafaress’ Hearth,” Leona said. “We should build one here, and take part of it with us.”
“But Hafaress’ Hearth is started by a priest of Hafaress, it has to be blessed,” Abagail told her sister.
“I think a torch would work just as well,” Rorick said. “Fire seems to do the trick, even if it’s not blessed.” He cast a glance to where the darklings were still smoldering in the snow, their flesh cracked and glowing like embers.
“I agree,” Leona said. “We need wood and fire.”
Abagail motioned to the ruined porch. “It shouldn’t take long for us to find the wood,” she said.
“And we already have fire going in the hut. But first, we really need some sleep,” Rorick said.
Daphne alighted on Leona’s shoulder, and sat down, her knees tucked up under her chin.
“Alright, sleep first, and then we plan,” Abagail said.
“Wait,” Leona said. “What about the shadows?”
“What shadows?” Abagail wondered.
“On your arm. You used the wyrd of the plague, did it corrupt you more?” her sister wondered.
At the thought Abagail’s heart plummeted. She had been so happy moments before, and now she was thinking of the plague which doomed her. She shook her head. “Leo, I used the plague to heal him, I’m sure it’s spread.”
Leona nodded, her head down.
“Alright,” Rorick said. “Let’s get you inside and to bed,” he told Leona. He dug the hammer out of the snow and led Leona away, trudging through the snow to the hut where the warmth of their fire glowed within.
Daphne landed before Abagail and made a motion like she was rolling up a sleeve. Abagail looked at Daphne oddly, and the pixie took wing, landing on Abagail’s arm and pulling at her sleeve. Abagail obeyed and pulled up the sleeve of her right arm.
Was it her imagination, or had the shadow plague abated a little? She looked back up at the pixie, fluttering in the air above her arm, shedding light on the plague tainting her skin. Nearby the darkling still crackled and smoked.
Daphne nodded, a diminutive smile spreading over her face. Abagail looked back at her arm. She could have sworn the shadow plague had worked its way up to her elbow, but she hadn’t seen it for sure. But she did feel better about it, almost as if she’d won a little bit of the battle against the shadow plague this night.
The door to the hut stood open, and Abagail could see Rorick loading more wood into the fire, creating a brighter swath of light that illuminated the deep snow off the ruined porch. He was talking to Leona, and her sister was laughing. It made Abagail smile. For a little while she never thought she’d hear her sister laugh again.
So much was behind them. Abagail stared up at the stars, wondering if any of the stars in this world were shared with her home world of O. It was a strange feeling believing so many of the things now that just a couple days before she’d thought were nothing more than myth. She hoped her father was alright and that the ill tiding had left with her, but she couldn’t be sure.
Around the clearing the darkling birds started crowing louder. Abagail refused to pay them any attention. Tomorrow was soon enough to worry about them. For tonight, she had her loved ones to keep her company.
She stood, her knees wet with melted snow, and followed Daphne into the warmth of the hut.
What Now?
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FLIP THE PAGE FOR A SNEAK PEAK OF THE DARKLING TIDE
“How could they have killed the warrior?” Gorjugan asked. His hands were braced on either side of the black mirror, which revealed the twisted, burned remains of the darkling many miles away from where Gorjugan scryed. The warrior had been one of the strongest darklings he knew. That’s why he’d summoned it and sent it after those harboring the god slayer.
The warrior had been killed.
He let the image fade to black glass once more.
He rubbed at the back of his neck where the muscles bunched.
I have to do something, he thought. He needed the god slayer.
Gorjugan studied his plagued reflection. The right half of his body scarred by shadows, his blue eyes shining like diamonds from the depths of his skin. His blond hair appeared ghostly white in the black depths of the scrying mirror he peered into.
It had been this mirror that the god slayer had used to come into Agaranth. Gorjugan wasn’t able to decipher where it had come from. If he knew where it had come from, then Hilda and he would finally know where Olik had been hiding it all of these years.
Hilda won’t be happy that I’ve failed, he thought. Thinking of his darkling sister chilled him to the bone. When she was angry...it was best not to think of her angry. They both had things to do, and if he failed in getting the god slayer, Anthros would forever be bound to the Tree at Eget Row, and not able to help them overcome the Gods that banned them from the Ever After.
“Without Anthros,” Gorjugan said. He rubbed at his throat and winced at an oncoming headache. They all had their parts to play in the coming darkness, but Anthros was to keep them safe from the watching eyes of the All Father. Gorjugan cast his eyes up to the horizon where the sun bathed the tops of the Fey Forest in honeyed light. The Waking Eye was already rising, and those within the forest who kept the god slayer with them would soon be safe from the lesser darklings he’d sent after them.
Gorjugan could feel that soon the god slayer would be with the harbingers of light, and he couldn’t let that happen. Once it was with them, it would be nearly impossible to get back. He had to do something.
If the warrior didn’t work...Gorjugan didn’t like thinking of the alternative. The half-men darklings. They were called elle folk and were worse than the warrior. The warrior had owed him a debt since Gorjugan had saved him from the fires of the Waking Eye when the warrior was nothing but a weaker darkling, still a shadow of the power he’d grow into. The elle folk were different.
But there was nothing for it. There was little he could do. The price the elle folk would exact would be hefty, but nothing compared to what Hilda would do if he should fail. He imagined his sister’s half rotten form staring down on him as she laid him to rest in the sick beds on her boat. Gorjugan had lain for decades in those beds plagued by any number of pestilence she felt a worthy punishment until Hilda deigned he had learned his lesson. The thought of the nightmares, and the demons that plagued him while he slept was enough to make him do his best in carrying out her wishes.
He drew the silver dagger from his waist and slashed open his right palm. Polluted blood sprung to the surface, more shadows than scarlet. The shadowy blood oozed out of the wound and gathered on the floor before the mirror. He could see the mists gathering in the black surface of the scrying mirror, and felt the darkling wyrd within him call out to the elle folk.
About Travis
Travis Simmons was kicked out of magic school for his refusal to study and his penchant for mundane activities like cooking. While selling his sword he stumbled upon dogs that he wrongly thought were magical and imagined he could commune with them. After a vicious zombie attack in which witches helped him push back the undead horde, Travis found himself apprenticed to a necromancer.
Afraid that winter was coming, Travis tucked into his magical studies, but always chased his dreams of writing tales science fiction tales and fantasy stories where he could explore his wild imagination about life on other planets. Adamant that Travis learn the esoteric ways of the occult his master made his life a horror of practice and studies. But no matter how he tried, he could never conquer Travis' questing mind.