A Plague of Shadows (16 page)

“Is she still out there?” Abagail asked. Startled that she’d slept so long she sat up quickly and looked around for Leona.

“Yea, she’s on the porch, I tried talking to her, but she wouldn’t come in. She claims she isn’t cold.” Rorick shrugged and went to the table. He brought back a couple packets of nuts and handed one to Abagail.

She took it gratefully and laid it on the cot beside her. “I should go talk to her,” she said. She just wished Leona would come inside. It was warm in here, and out there the wind was blowing and the snow was drifting, and she could barely make out the shadowy lump of her sister on the porch.

It made Abagail cold just thinking about stepping out into the squall.

With a huff she pushed to her feet, tugged her glove tighter over her hand and headed for the door.

“Are you going to take your sword?” Rorick asked.

“We’re on Singer’s Trail, darkling can’t reach us here,” she told him.

“Yea, but that doesn’t mean wild animals can’t get us,” he told her, the ghost of a smile dusting his face.

“Point taken.” It only took her a moment longer to slide her scabbard on to her belt and then she was slipping the door open and stepping out into the cold. Leona glanced back at her, sighed, and pulled her cloak tighter around her shoulders.

The moment the door was closed, Abagail could feel the intense cold of the forest cutting through her garments and biting into her skin. She ran a hand through her short hair and yawned.

“Cold night out,” Abagail said.

“It gets that way when it’s winter,” Leona said, absently playing with the doll beside her. “Do you really think she’s with me?” Leona asked. She didn’t sound particularly happy to talk to Abagail, but at least she was talking to her.

“Skuld?” Abagail asked. She dusted fluffy snow off the railing and then leaned beside her sister, looking out into the clearing.

“Yea,” Leona said.

“I’ve seen something around you, somehow.”

“What does she look like?” Leona asked. She sounded less hostile now than she had before.

“Honestly I didn’t really see her well. She doesn’t appear like a person, just this haze of mist hanging around you.” Abagail looked around her sister, but she couldn’t see the figure just then.

“So I probably don’t need the doll any longer?” Leona asked.

“I would say it’s a safe bet you don’t, what does Skuld say?” Abagail asked.

“It’s not about what Skuld says,” Leona told her, and a bit of her old hostility was in her voice. The wind pulled at her blonde hair and Abagail fought the urge to smooth it back. She was sure Leona would recoil from her touch.

Abagail frowned.

“Well, what is it about?” Abagail asked.

Leona was silent for a while, staring down at the wooden doll her father had bought her so many years ago.

“So much is changing,” Leona told her. “Everything seems different now, and I just don’t know how anything
fits
any longer. Does that make sense?” Leona looked up at her and Abagail could see she’d been crying.

“Leo, what’s wrong?” Abagail asked, throwing caution to the wind and touching her sister’s shoulder with her gloved hand. Leona didn’t pull away.

“Everything?” it wasn’t a question, but it sounded like one. Leona wasn’t even sure what she meant. “I . . . I just don’t know. I never thought
this
would happen, that we would be separated from dad, that we’d be on some foreign world fleeing the darklings coming for our family.”

“You and me both,” Abagail said. “But we are here, and we have to work together, you know that right? As far as we know, we are all we have left.”

Leona looked sharply at Abagail, but she nodded. “I know,” she said, her voice thick with emotions. She shivered under Abagail’s hand, and Abagail wasn’t entirely sure it was from the cold.

“So we have to talk to one another,” Abagail told her. Leona stiffened a little under her hand.

“It’s stupid,” Leona said.

“What’s stupid?” Abagail asked her, easing closer.

“Why I’ve been acting the way that I have,” she whispered.

“And why is that?”

“I kinda like Rorick,” Leona said, and then blushed.

Abagail’s stomach did a little flip and she looked away from her sister. “Oh.”

“Yea, and I know it’s stupid, he obviously likes you, and I’ve known for ages that you like him. I just don’t know,” Leona said.

“It’s because he’s always there,” Abagail told her. “He’s always around us, and he cares for us like he cares for family. I completely understand why you like him, it’s probably why I like him too.”

“I think he likes you more than a sister,” Leona told Abagail.

“I doubt it, but don’t worry, if it makes you feel better I will keep my distance,” Abagail said.

“No, it’s just silly anyway. Skuld tells me there’s other things in my future anyway,” Leona said. “Whatever that is.”

“Are we good now?” Abagail wondered.

Before Leona had the chance to answer, however, the sound of footsteps crunching through snow reached their ears. A chill ran down Abagail’s back that had nothing to do with the cold night. She backed up against the wall and pulled Leona along with her. Leona didn’t fight it, she followed her sister back to the door.

“What is it?” Leona whispered.

“I don’t know,” Abagail breathed.

The footfalls were coming from the left, the path they’d previously come from. They were heavy, and didn’t sound like any animal Abagail ever knew. The problem was, it was dark out, and Abagail couldn’t see very far at all. She squinted into the darkness, but while the light was coming from behind her, it didn’t create a pool of light very far into the clearing. Through the flashes of lightning overhead, she thought she could see a shape several feet away from them, but she couldn’t be sure.

Abagail placed a hand on her sword. Leona flashed a glance down to her sister’s weapon and looked back up at Abagail, worry in her eyes. Abagail hoped they didn’t need it, but she feared they would. What was worse, Celeste said there were ghosts in this town, and that worried her. What if this was a ghost?

The figure moved closer, and she could just make out the shape of a man.

“What is it?” Leona asked.

“I’m not sure, but you need to get inside,” Abagail said.

“I’m not leaving you,” Leona said. Abagail sometimes wished Leona wouldn’t be so stubborn. But maybe she was right, maybe inside was the best place for both of them.

She eased to her right, moving as slow as she could to not draw attention. But that was stupid, she was standing right in the light, and the figure was obviously facing them, even though all she could see what his booted feet, she
knew
he was watching them, and that made her skin crawl. As of yet he hadn’t spoken.

A glint of red drew her attention up, and it was the first time she’d seen his eyes. She stopped, forgetting what she was doing and just stared at this creature before her. Was it even a man? Its eyes held her in their grip, freezing her legs in place and not letting her move, no matter how she tried to escape the snare of his stare.

“Abbie, look away from his eyes,” Leona begged.

Abagail couldn’t look away. The eyes were like fire, winking in the darkness of the snowy night. Even the soft flakes falling all around weren’t enough to break her eyes from his grasp.

“Abagail,” Leona said louder, shaking her sister. “Come on, we need to get inside.”

The eyes flashed, and Abagail felt herself grow weak in the knees. She crumpled to the rough wooden porch, the cold and the splinters biting into her legs. Still the eyes held her.

Leona stepped in front of her, breaking her line of sight.

“Be gone,” Leona yelled at the creature.

On shaky legs Abagail stood, leaning heavily on the wall. “Don’t look into his eyes,” she told her sister.

She eased the door open, and pulled Leona back into the hut.

“What’s going on?” Rorick asked, coming toward them. “I thought you guys were fighting or something.” He took Abagail under one arm and led her to the cot.

“There’s something out there,” she told him as he eased her down.

“Something like what?” he asked, kneeling before her.

“A ghost,” Leona said. “The same thing Celeste was telling us about.”

“I don’t think it’s a ghost,” Abagail said. “It felt weird.”

“Have you ever
felt
a ghost before?” Leona asked.

“No, have you?” Abagail countered.

Leona fell silent.

“So what do we do?” Rorick wondered. Standing he crossed to the window.

“Don’t look into his eyes,” Abagail said.

“They are red,” he whispered.

“I said don’t look into his eyes!” Abagail crossed to him and pulled him away from the window. Leona filled the space Rorick had previously occupied, looking out at this new terror.

“I wasn’t looking into his eyes, I could see them out of the corner of mine,” he said.

“It’s a warrior,” Leona said.

“I think it’s a darkling,” Abagail said.

“How can you be certain?” Leona asked her.

“It can’t be, Celeste said that no darklings can make it onto Singer’s Trail,” Rorick argued, drawing his hammer.

Abagail looked out the window, trying hard not to look into the glowing red eyes. The figure had stepped into the light now and stood directly opposite Abagail. He wasn’t on the porch yet, but the way he just stood there was almost as menacing as if he’d made it up on the porch without their noticing.

He was a warrior, just as Leona had said. But he was an older warrior, his blond hair tumbling loose from underneath a horned helmet. His armor was made of leather and furs in a way that would keep him warm as well as protected. He didn’t move, he just stared at them.

“I don’t know how I know,” Abagail said. “I just do. And as far as the trail, who’s to say what can and can’t make it onto it? I’m sure the weaker darklings like those birds can’t make it on here without some kind of assistance, but what if stronger darklings can make their own rift, like I did?”

Rorick frowned, but he didn’t comment.

“So what do we do?” Leona asked. “We can’t wait for him to attack us.”

But just then the warrior made the decision for them. His mouth opened, his jaw unhinging in a symphony of cracks and pops, and out from the depths of his gaping maw poured shadows like oil.

They plopped onto the snowy ground, puffs of snow billowing up into the air as the heavier shadows were buried in the depths of snow. But Abagail knew that wasn’t the last they’d seen of the shadows.

Three had fallen out before his mouth started to take on its regular shape, snapping and popping and listing sideways as he closed it once more. She was adamant not to look into his eyes.

Daphne streaked across the room and started battering at the window, her wings hammering against the glass ineffectually as her little body bounced against it. And then, somehow, she was no longer a butterfly, but a little person with wings: a pixie. She was so fast that Abagail couldn’t really tell what she looked like, only that her entire body was a tapestry of plum colored designs on lavender skin.

But then the shadows took shape, standing up like people, wavering almost as if they weren’t completely there. Three shadow people: three darklings.

Abagail’s hand itched for release, and she felt the crippling pain come to her fingers once more. She cleared her throat and clutched the hilt of her short sword.
Not again,
she thought.
You won’t control me this time.
She was adamant. She couldn’t afford another rift in the wall of the shield.

“What are we going to do?” Leona asked.

“You’re going to stay here,” Rorick told her. “I’m going out there.”

“The Waking Eye you are,” Abagail said. “We’re both going out there.”

She stalked past him. Already Daphne was pounding against the door, vying for release. The moment Abagail slid the door open, Daphne was out into the darkness, glowing like a tiny sun and showering the shadows with puffs of purple incandescence blasted from her hands.

It worked like a charm, pushing the shadow men further and further back away from the hut. Before they knew it, the darklings and Daphne were fading into the darkness beyond the ring of light created by their hut.

The red-eyed warrior turned to them, and Abagail cast her eyes down. She drew her sword, clasping her throbbing hand tighter around the hilt. She refused to let the power free, and clenched her teeth through the pain.

The warrior’s swords sang out of their scabbard as he drew his two blades and turned to them. That was the only sound he made. His eyes flashed red, and Abagail cast a glance to her right to make sure Rorick hadn’t been watching when the first attack came.

Rorick’s eyes were looking at the warrior’s feet and his fingers tightened and relaxed on the hilt of his hammer. The warrior advanced, both of his swords slicing down at Rorick. Rorick dodged out of the way as the swords buried into the snow, clinking hard against the frozen ground.

Abagail jumped into action. Dancing forward on her feet she stabbed at the warriors open side, and spun away as he brought his swords up. Steel sung through the air over her head as she ducked under the weapons and darted back in to jab him in the stomach. She leapt away before he could redirect his swords.

She retreated back toward the hut, the warrior now interested in her since she’d landed so many successful blows. He stalked closer to her, his feet kicking up snow as he trudged. He didn’t bleed from his wounds, which would have been strange to Abagail, if she didn’t know he was a darkling. He didn’t even seem out of breath.

Do they even need to breathe?
She couldn’t be sure of that either.

She crouched down, waiting for the darkling to get closer. He attacked at her twice, his right sword came up in a stabbing motion while his left arm brought his other sword down at her. Abagail twisted her sword in her grip, dashed under his left arm, and sliced at his midsection as she went.

His swords smashed into the porch, wood and debris splintered into the darkness. His left sword was stuck. He tried to get it loose, and while he was working Rorick swung his hammer down with all of his might, smashing it into the warrior’s bent leg.