Shadow (4 page)

‘Be well.'

‘I certainly shall. Life can be good. Strange chap! I'm going to chop your head off now. Nice sword this, no? Enjoy. Bye.' Kiown stood and oblivion descended with his arm.

A DRAKE'S VISIT

1

Through Aziel's window the sky's lightstone began its fade into night. Sometimes the fade was slow, sometimes it took only minutes. Tonight was a slow fade. Little shapes still flitted among the grey clouds, specks darting playfully in and out too quickly to be birds. Surely they were Invia. She watched them, imagined herself flying among them, naked and free.

She imagined roaming through that now darkening landscape, seeing up close the horizon's distant tooth-sized peaks. It was hard to believe that there were actually
places
out there – that by taking steps just as she did to walk from one end of her room to the other, she would eventually end up miles away from where she started.

Standing to her window's left side, looking down, she could behold the Great Dividing Road, shooting off in a wide straight line, perfectly splitting the land into halves. Clouds pushed south in line with it at greater than usual speed, casting weak, many-sided shadows along it. A fervent broth of them gathered from east and west, bunched above the castle like pipe smoke being drawn in, then blown south. It was ever thus, but it seemed the whole strange business was suddenly urgent. Now even birds seemed unable to fly against the sky's weird current.

Just ahead another Invia moved closer to Aziel's tower than they usually came. She did not see its shape clearly, just the after-image of spread wings as it dived down through a fat blanket of cloud. Why should
they
be free to fly, she wondered, while the mighty dragons were trapped in the sky? She felt a moment's affinity with the great unseen creatures, imagined that they would feel the same for her, if they'd learned of her.

And learn of her they surely had. She was the Friend and Lord's daughter, after all.

Three faces swam like faint reflections across the window's glass. She gave a small cry of surprise. It had been a long while since Ghost visited. Gladness bloomed inside her to have company, any company.

One of Ghost's faces (not the beastly one, which she had asked Ghost to hide from her when possible) called her name in a frightened voice. She affected annoyance at being intruded upon, which could not have been further from the truth. ‘And what do
you
want?' she said. ‘Coming to my window like this, after having ignored me so long?'

‘We didn't mean to ignore,' Ghost replied, its voice tremulous. The hollow-eyed face which was mostly skull spoke while the others jostled around it. ‘We're frightened, Aziel. We have had to watch his room, though he scares us so, these days. Someone broke in last month. Do you know of it? We must be vigilant. And patient.'

‘Broke in! Was it a smelly old man?'

‘Very unlikely. A great wizard, it must have been. Truly great! And now something else has happened.'

‘What?'

‘Your father has become … a little strange.'

‘I don't want to talk about
him.
Not after what he put me through today.' Those strangled cries, the terrible shrieks of pain. And when one screaming voice was snuffed out, there began another, until three of them had finally been silenced.

‘We're not sure who to turn to,' said one of Ghost's other faces, the one so faded it could hardly be seen. Hints of fingertips pressed upon the window glass. ‘You're the only other one we speak with. The others we sometimes … watch. That's all. Watch.'

She sat back on the edge of her bed. ‘You may use the mirror, if you like. That window isn't very clean.'

‘No! It's easier to flee the window in a hurry, if we need to.'

‘Why would you need to flee? So frightened all the time, you are! What's happened with my father?'

‘He's…' The faces turned to each other, conferring in whispers too quiet for her to hear.

‘You can tell me, don't be afraid,' she said, running a comb through her long black hair. ‘
I'm
not the one who reports on
you.
'

The hollow-eyed face bunched like it might cry, the others looked pained. ‘We're sorry, Aziel. But that was long ago. Have you not forgiven us?'

She kept Ghost in brief suspense. ‘Oh, fine; yes, I have. I know you can't lie to him. And I'm glad you've come. I wish you'd visit more often.'

‘Why didn't you wail today, Aziel?'

The screams from the room next door echoed loud in her ears again. She hurled the comb. Its metal handle made short work of the window. On the largest shard, two of Ghost's faces jostled for position, until the hollow-eyed face won. ‘We're sorry. You're crying! We're sorry, Aziel. We just—'

‘Why do
you
care about whether or not I sing for him? Why must you remind me of it? You said you felt sorry for me, having to do that every day.'

‘We do! We do!'

She dabbed at her nose and eyes. ‘Today was worse than when I was sick and lost my voice, or the day that old man—' She quickly bit her tongue, not daring speak of the peculiar visitor she had since wished would return. ‘It's horrible. The noises: so horrible. What do they
do
in there? And Nanny at the door, saying those awful things she says…'

‘We wish he didn't make you wail for him, we do,' said Ghost. ‘But he has to find a part in you that's troublesome and make you put it aside for good. That's why he does it. Don't you see? The part that makes you want to
stop
them doing those terrible things, to save their lives.
That's
the troublesome part. That's what you must get rid of.'

‘You've told me before and I still don't understand. I don't think I want to.'

‘Aziel. We came to tell you—'

She threw herself on the bed, voice muffled in the mattress and so distorted by sobs that Ghost could not decipher a word: ‘Today and yesterday. A little voice inside me just said
not today! Don't do it, no matter what happens. It's him, not you.
So I didn't. I held it inside and had to bite down on my sleeve and pretend it was just animals being killed for the kitchens. Just like yesterday. Oh, I don't know what I'll do if they start it again tomorrow, I don't know.'

‘We came to tell you today was the last day. Vous told them so, told your nanny and the guards. We heard their talk. Oh how he frightened them! Aziel, he thinks you've done it.'

‘Done what?' she said into the mattress.

‘Got rid of it. The trouble part of you. Aziel! He thinks you've learned.'

‘Learned
what?
'

‘How to be more like him, and less like … like subjects. Your silence was what he wanted all along, don't you see? No matter what you heard being done next door, he wanted you to let it happen. On purpose. He knew that on the day he
didn't
hear your voice cry out from your window, you'd have done it!'

One of the other faces fought its way into the largest glass shard, displacing the other. ‘And that's why we're here,' it said in a deeper voice. ‘Something about you – about you
learning
has changed him. Shocked him, it seems. We don't know why.'

She sat up, her heart beating faster. ‘It's not – it's not
the
change? What Arch talks about?'

‘We don't know. We watch the Arch – but we don't understand what he – wait, he comes!'

2

‘Stay! Come back, won't you, Ghost? Please, come back later?'

But the window's shards, and the oblong mirror in the corner, showed only their normal reflections.

Tap-thock,
tap.
Tap-thock,
tap.
Arch's staff and withered leg, sounds as familiar as the walls of her room or the sky out the window. As familiar was the pause, then keys rattling in Arch's hand, sliding into the lock and twisting around. The hideous face peered in, hideous even to Aziel who treasured his deep scholarly voice and even the sometimes foul smell of him, as he smelled now. Which meant he'd cast recently. He'd promised her he wouldn't, unless he really had to. She didn't like how it hurt him.

A black feather was caught in his collar. She reached to pluck it off, earning a smile from the good side of his face. The burned mangled side didn't so much as twitch.

He'd been in his shape-shifter form, the big black bird he posed as when travelling in secret. She felt the heat still easing from him, though no smoke came from the three large horns weighing down his head. ‘May I sit?' he asked, knowing such courtesy – however unnecessary – pleased her.

‘You may,' she said, curtseying. She watched the pained way he moved and knew he had travelled far. He was not a natural shape-shifter; holding an animal form would, for him, be like squatting in a very uncomfortable position for a long time.

For a while he just sat and breathed his laboured breaths, his face turned so the deformed side was away from her.

‘Ghost says, Father's changing. Ghost says—'

‘I'm aware. Very much aware.' He sighed wearily. ‘It's far from complete. But the last stage of it all approaches. You can't see it with your eyes, Aziel, but power gathers
itself
toward him, independent of anything I do. It is loose power for now. It surrounds him like a great whirlpool, but will condense and be part of him. Not simply used and burned up, like a mage would use it. And I doubt now that there's even time to—' He glanced at the window shards on the floor. ‘Ghost, you say. Is it here now?'

‘No, Arch.'

‘What did it want?'

‘It fled when you came. It seemed afraid. Of Father, and of you. It always is of course, but this time it wasn't the usual
kind
of afraid.'

‘Ah.' He drummed the fingers of his good hand on the long silver staff, forked at both ends, which lay across his lap. The other hand lay still and looked like a twisted blackened stick pulled from a fire. ‘I think we should move you to a lower floor,' he said. ‘Tomorrow. Further away from him. Eventually out of the castle altogether, if need be.'

‘Won't he—'

‘Be angry? Perhaps. I can handle his anger. I think. It is likely to lack focus, to spray about the place.' The Arch Mage glanced at her sidelong and winked. ‘Or perhaps he'll be angry with your nanny. It depends who he thinks moved you.' She laughed, not knowing if he was joking or serious. ‘You're his caged bird, Aziel, whose voice he loves. That is all. You are less important to him than he and you both think.'

To her surprise, though he'd surely not meant it to, the remark stung. ‘Then who
is
important to him?'

‘As it has always been:
he
is important to him. And someone called Shadow, I suppose. Aziel. Did you hear anything of the Wall at World's End? Or anything else unusual?'

She thought of the clouds, but didn't want him to think she thought something so silly as that could be important. ‘I saw big airships. Strange fat things. They floated along slowly. One came right over this tower!'

‘Ah good, they returned. They are mine. I had them built in Esk. Not well enough, apparently. One crashed: I don't even know where.'

‘What are they for?'

‘They gathered some … some rare airs for me. From far away. You have heard nothing about the Wall?'

‘What about it?'

He sighed. ‘It is destroyed.'

She did not understand.

‘We don't know how, or who did this,' he said, staring into the distance. ‘Nor why. It may help the change occur. Or it may harm your father a great deal.' Arch lapsed into one of his silences.

She had read many books about World's End, about the Wall, and other things she did not much understand. ‘You look concerned, Aziel,' he said. ‘Don't be. A new world is open to us, or shall be soon. And the war will very soon be won. The occasion is joyous. Whatever it does to Vous.'

‘But what is on the other side? Are there people there, more rebel cities?'

‘No, Aziel. I have seen things in the Hall of Windows. Things I won't tell you of. Once we have mastered the new airs, all will be well.'

‘Was it…? Arch. You do know who did it! Don't you?'

His face showed surprise. ‘How can you tell?'

‘I don't know, but I can. You know who did it. You can say who. I won't tell anyone. Not Ghost or Nanny or anyone.'

‘Very well. Aziel, do you know what Ghost really is? I shall tell you. Your father killed five of his friends, long before you were born. I shall not lie to you – I helped him plan it. They were a threat to us, to the smooth running of things. But your father had not before murdered with his own hands. That is, not outside the heat of battle. He'd only ever had
others
do such things for him. The deeds lingered in his mind, after. And in the airs, which are stronger here than elsewhere.'

‘He felt guilty?'

‘Yes. And with our rituals, as the change began, more power drew itself through him, around him, and interacted with his mind. Do you know what magic is, Aziel, at its most fundamental?'

She thought of the little tricks Arch used to do to amuse her, recalled a bird made of light which clumsily fluttered around the room, until it ran into the wall and puffed into a burst of sparks. Even now an echo of childish delight reached through nearly ten years to touch her like a warm breeze. ‘You told me what magic is, but I forget the words you used.'

‘Magic is loose reality. This chair I sit upon is fixed reality. You and I are fixed reality, though far more flexible and complex than the chair. Think of us standing in a river, as unformed clay floats past us. Mages can not only see the wet clay, we can grab it and shape it. Great mages, such as I, have big, fast hands. Faster than a blink. We make deliberate shapes, very carefully worked out beforehand, for mistakes are dangerous.