Chapter 2
Five Years Later
As a child, I thought Norhavellis felt like home.
The moment our daily chores were finished, Eden and I would run, flush faced and laughing, through the shadows of the Visstill Forest and into the friendly and predictably safe arms of our village.
We’d lay a blanket in the grass under some tree or another, fresh bread with a dollop of honey in hand, and simply watch for travelers on their way to Noctis’s seaside capital of Istralla.
We didn’t often have visitors, but those we encountered were always interesting.
Merchants with their goods—we liked to imagine they carried treasure fit for the Light Bringer himself—tucked away in heavy trunks; legionnaires with their profiles—we liked to imagine they were handsome—covered by their golden masks; or even the rare traveling troupe on its way to perform at Istralla’s theater.
It was a feast for our imaginations. We’d lie back on our elbows and daydream, wondering what it would be like to travel the kingdom ourselves.
Sometimes this mental exercise proved difficult; what opportunities, if any, truly awaited us? But we fantasized, anyway.
In my memories, Norhavellis is sweet smelling and gentle, not harsh and cloying like a dead thing left to molder in the rain. But that memory faded, and I was left with only the weight of the present.
I pulled my cloak tighter, the dark red velvet heavy on my shoulders despite its tattered edges.
The hood hung low, casting shadows on my face and shielding me from the chill in the air, but it couldn’t protect me from the foul stench that enveloped Norhavellis.
It was more than just a scent; it was decay of the mind, body, and spirit.
My village was filled with filthy buildings, broken people, and the threat of Corruption that loomed like a storm, ready to burst and drown us all.
A grim transformation, indeed.
I knocked on the chipped door of a small cottage, careful to make as little sound as possible.
“I don’t think she’s home,” Elliot whispered, shifting on his feet and narrowly avoiding the thin string of bells staked low to the ground. It was early evening, so his boyish face was more shadowed than usual. “Maybe we should just come back tomorrow morning. It’s getting dark.”
I thumbed the vials of elixir in my pocket, reassuring myself that they were still there.
Elliot and I wore full-length cloaks that partially hid our hair and faces.
If we were recognized while distributing the final dregs of elixir on behalf of our Absolver parents, we’d be swarmed by demon-fearing Norhavellians.
Typically, the villagers would accept the elixir that we held, bartering their animals, their crop, and their services for extra vials.
But lately, they demanded more. Questioned more.
Because Corruption was spreading in droves, regardless of how much elixir was consumed.
“Let’s give her a minute,” I whispered back. “Maybe she’s just—”
Behind the door came the sound of sliding chains and a rattling lock.
The door creaked back on its hinges, revealing a blond woman, eyes sunken and thin hair brittle, and her two young children.
She was Margaret, the blacksmith’s wife, but it took a moment for the recognition to set in.
Never before had she looked so miserable or disheveled.
“You came,” Margaret squeaked, aimlessly caressing both her skirt and her children’s misshapen hair. The twins were young—perhaps only three or four. “I didn’t know if you’d come. The village can be a dangerous place at night.”
I swallowed uncomfortably. Of course it was. Locks on doors, warning bells threaded, dogs on guard, and hollow-faced men and women sitting on their dark porches with crossbows in hand. Anything to keep their last elixir vials from being stolen.
“What do you think—aren’t the twins getting so big?
” Margaret asked, peering down at her children.
“Say hello, Matthew. Say hello, Isabelle.” Matthew’s face was a blank slate as he looked up at his mother; his lips mouthed hello, but the sound didn’t come.
Isabelle simply buried her face within her mother’s skirts, whimpering softly.
Elliot mouthed hello, too, and gave a little wave, but the children didn’t react.
Margaret straightened, smiling nervously.
“We were just on our way to the holding cells.”
“In that case, we won’t keep you. Here,” I said, offering her one of the slim vials in my pocket. “It will be enough for one week, even when shared. Just a small mouthful is fine.”
One week. Just enough to last them until the Light Legion came with their seasonal redistribution, which would be any day now.
I smiled politely before turning around, intending to step off her porch as quickly as possible and return home for dinner.
Elliot and I had been rushing around Norhavellis all afternoon, and our stomachs were pathetically empty.
But the woman grabbed my sleeve, holding me back.
“One more vial,” Margaret pleaded. “I know you have more. Just one more.”
“You have enough elixir to last until the restock,” I said slowly. “The rest of the vials belong to other Norhavellian children.” She knew this. Everyone knew this. “There will be more in just a few days’ time.”
“Maybe even earlier,” Elliot added brightly. “The Light Legion will be here any day now.”
“The extra vial isn’t for us,” Margaret snapped. “It’s for my husband.”
Isaac, her blacksmith husband, had been discovered to be Corrupt last month after bludgeoning his friend to death with an iron rod. The poor man’s face had been unrecognizable afterward.
“Wasn’t Isaac found to be…” I let the statement trail off, uneasy with where the conversation was headed.
“Corrupt, yes,” Margaret answered coolly, letting go of my sleeve and waving her hand as if the implication were a pesky insect at her throat. “I know what he’s done. What he looks like. But what if more elixir can reverse his condition? Maybe it can stop his dreams as it does ours.”
“We don’t give elixir to the Corrupt,” I said flatly. What she was asking was impossible. Corruption had no cure; it would be a waste of a vial.
“If you won’t grant me an extra vial, I will give Isaac ours,” she threatened. Her children shuffled their feet, peering up at us fearfully. “He needs it more than we do.”
Her demand was clearly a threat, but one we couldn’t appease without drawing attention to ourselves. Not to mention that her children would be at risk for Corruption if she gave away their vial.
“You may give him one-half of a standard vial,” I finally said, hoping that I sounded authoritative.
“No more. And you must keep the first vial for you and your children.” I wiped my hands on the sides of my skirt, irritated at their growing clamminess.
Margaret tapped her foot, eager for me to hand her the extra vial, but I made no move to give it to her.
“We’ll also accompany you to the holding cells to ensure you’re following protocol. ”
Margaret agreed to this, and she hastily bundled her children in soft woolen sweaters to ward against the late-summer air before we all headed out to see Isaac.
The holding cells were in a quiet part of the village, near the very woods that wrapped around our property.
The cells used to be in the center of town, but as Corruption worsened, it was quickly discovered that no one wanted to hear their demon-infested loved ones screaming for release.
The new structure was built on the outskirts, surrounded by thick, gnarled trees and stationed with an ever-rotating patrol of guards.
And then, every season, the Light Legion would come to purify the Corrupt and bury them in simple graves.
I put what I hoped was a reassuring hand on Elliot’s shoulder, knowing that the contents of the holding cells were never pleasant. A few years ago, there had been only one cell. Now there were at least two dozen.
And tonight they were full.
We followed the guards—a small handful of men—down a dimly lit hallway.
The Corrupt either slept in unnatural angles, stood stock-still with violence in their eyes, or appeared eerily calm both in character and countenance.
All had shadows under their lashes; all seemed distinctly other.
Isaac was in the last cell, and when we reached him, the guards left us alone.
Isaac was chained to the wall, but he had enough leeway to slowly slide to the bars.
Margaret greeted him warmly, brushing the ratty, sweat-slicked hair from his forehead.
As though he was still her husband and not a demon.
A cloudy substance dripped from Isaac’s eyes, mingling with a thick, fleshy fixative that covered the upper half of his face, making the skin appear fractured in several places.
“I try to conceal the shadows so that he doesn’t scare the children,” Margaret whispered, pulling a brush and a small tincture of flesh-colored putty from her skirt pockets.
Concealment, because elixir would be futile.
Corruption had no cure, just as the shadows on his face couldn’t be scrubbed off.
“Would you mind keeping the twins company until I’m done? ”
Elliot immediately sat with the children, entertaining them with a tale of Lelantos, the Air Weaver.
It was a delightful story, but it twisted an unseen knife in some soft, vulnerable part of me.
Before Eden’s death five years ago, I had enjoyed reading about the Weavers.
It had seemed possible that they would one day return from their centuries-long absence, making everything right and true.
That they’d save the world from Corruption and rid us of the Shadow Bringer and his demons.
It was difficult not to flinch as Elliot finished the story.