Chapter 7
LIANA
One Week Later
The air hums when I wake. It’s the kind of sound that doesn’t just reach my ears but sinks deep into my marrow, slipping through bone and blood, and it leaves the faintest metallic taste on the tongue.
The crystals lining my windowsill flicker in uneven rhythm, pulsing faint light over the carved ceiling.
“Liana,” the voice that once accompanied my dream whispers. This is different than last time—it’s not an echo in the shadows, it’s tangible. A part of me that has lain dormant for half a century comes to life.
I close my eyes, savoring the slip of his voice over my skin. It’s a guilty pleasure, one I really shouldn’t indulge in and usually am very good at avoiding.
Biting my tongue between my teeth, I wait. Rewarding him with a response feels like giving in. He hasn’t earned that.
When moments pass and he says no more, I let out a long breath. Maybe I didn’t hear him. Maybe…
My palms sweat and my back tenses.
Fine. You win, I grumble inwardly.
“Again, Shadow?” I say aloud. “I have not heard from you since my people fell all those years ago. Why return to haunt me now?”
My voice is quiet, barely filling my bedroom. But there is no response.
Breathing out through my nostrils, I stay in bed a second longer, letting the warmth of it comfort me as I feel foolish for answering. I should’ve known it was just an echo of a memory.
My shadow is gone. I don’t know if he’s crossed the barrier between life and death or merely has become so consumed with power and maintaining his court that he has forgotten me and all we shared.
Either way, I really shouldn’t care.
Today, Mrath of the Sisterhood de Bhaldraithe will return to our halls. After my meeting with the sovereigns and the council, the one where we were able to debate, investigate, and later confirm that Arlet has indeed been taken to the Elven Kingdom in Shvathemar, Mrath arranged to visit.
In that same meeting, we also accepted that Vann’s whereabouts are unknown.
I rise and cross my home to look out the window near the front door. Outside, I can see the rest of Council Road. Each member of the court was given a home in this area. More than half of the structures had to be rebuilt, but they all resemble each other in some way or another.
The clock tower that alerts the inhabitants to the hour begins to sing, and I listen to the tune absentmindedly. It’s morning. I watch the children emerge from Ra’Sa and Melisa’s home, and see other council members walking out as well, already prepared to diligently tend to their tasks.
The center of the city, beyond the residential section, is visible, and I see the Ardorflame Temple in the middle.
It is essentially a massive chunk of Fuegorra, pulsing like waves of lava, surrounded by walls and pillars that have been broken since we arrived in Enduvida to escape the destruction of our civilization.
Everything grows brighter in the morning. Yet, it is still calm.
Channels of minerals carry light from the temple’s veins to the twinkling crystals that line the ground, the stalactites, and the ceiling. They all shimmer, glitter, fade. Then, in a brilliant, rhythmic display, they come back to life.
When Arion first sent a missive declaring that he wanted Arlet as his bride, and that his union with her would grant us immunity from future attacks, most of the council had seen the words as hollow.
Arlet was not so easily convinced. But it has been weeks—no, months—since that letter was first sent, and we still exist peacefully.
The work churns on.
Arlet and Vann’s absence has not gone unnoticed—how could it with the positions they held? But communities are resilient. No one person is ever the key to everything. It is a sad and hopeful truth.
My heart aches for them both, but I worry more for Arlet’s gentle, kind soul. The elves pride themselves on appearing the most civilized and educated of the species on our continent. But I spent time in their capital once. Long ago.
Monsters can still be clean, eloquent, and well-dressed.
Some would say they hate women. They would disagree, saying that to keep a woman safely in her home, without asking her choice on the matter, is to protect her. The word “hatred” feels too hot and passionate for all that, but hatred, as I have experienced, can be cold. Calculating.
There is a part of me that hates the elves, and always will.
Turning from the window, I go to my wardrobe, thumbing my way through rows and rows of clothes.
Clothes that have been gifted to me throughout my life.
Items that used to appear at the oddest of times.
It wasn’t as if I had the money to buy them—no, I was very poor growing up. It’s why I entered the priestesshood.
My mind continues to wander, remembering the fashions of the elves, but all I can truly see are the moments of discarding, the moments where, at a beautiful party, I saw someone cast to the side.
Saw the deception and disappointment that lurked in every corner.
I did not think so much had changed in the last hundred years.
In fact, I am almost sure that Arlet being in Shvathemar will be a cruel, caging experience. She will be humiliated. Toyed with till she feels her mind tearing apart. She has already survived so much at the hands of the giants.
But anyone can be broken—even those already hardened by life. I pray she will not be.
The lingering memory of the voice tugs at the corners of my consciousness. I have a meeting soon. I shouldn’t waste time. And yet…
I pull on a cloak and slippers, quickly pile my hair atop my head, and then leave my home, making my way to the small, newly renovated space behind the Ardorflame Temple. Two ocean-risen Enduares greet me, serving as attendants to help clean and repair damages.
“Mother Liana,” one—Sur’Khale—starts. “We weren’t expecting—”
“Peace, my child.”
The polished stone is cold against my slippers. The two attendants follow me down a hallway.
Sur’Khale is quiet as I continue to inspect the place. So many scrolls, so many artifacts brought from the settlements under the sea or found scattered through the city. The objects and stories, filled with memories, make me quieter here. Softer.
“I was told that you have started moving in some of the sacred records I’ve been keeping. I would like to view one,” I say gently.
He bows. “Of course. Which were you hoping to see?”
“The last one I brought. It’s titled ‘Shadow.’”
He heads to the stacks of still-being-organized scrolls and begins to search. I know there are several volumes—dozens, actually—but I don’t pry. I sit at the newly made marble table and wait. There’s a briskness to the air at this hour that I quite enjoy.
Seconds later, he joins me and spreads the parchment in front of me. Lines of notation—measurements of magical resonance—waver and skip in the ink.
The younger attendant, clearly nervous, looks at the scroll. He’s got an eye for the magic that is only written for Fuegorra readers to read, but he doesn’t know me well enough to recognize that it’s written in my own hand.
“No need to do all this,” I say, rolling the stone parchment closed and securing it with a clasp.
“But this is an account of a war criminal.” He sucks his teeth. “A man made of smoke. The Living Shadow.”
The sound of that name nearly stops my heart. I school my expression before either of them notices.
“They say he wiped out entire villages, towns, and cities,” I respond evenly. “He was one of the elves’ biggest assets in the skirmishes between our people long ago.”
The other attendant, Re’Slane, having seen the turmoil on his companion’s face, comes over.
“Why do you need this?”
Why, indeed?
Because his voice has been coming to me more and more frequently.
Because I see him in dreams. Lurking in his shadows.
Because he could be useful in finding Arlet and Vann.
Because…both his magic and mine are entwined in this scroll. Old promises from young lovers. And I need to see if he is still alive.
“That is for me to know,” I say evenly. Then I stand, collecting the scroll, and head back to my home after they exchange goodbyes.
My throat is tight as I cross the distance.
I purposefully separated this record from one of the artifacts in my dwelling in the hopes that I would not obsess over that which I cannot change.
When I enter my home, the air feels electric. In one of the spare rooms on the first floor, I retrieve the chest of pale stone bound in old sigils and seals of wax buried under woven silks and blankets. I’d sealed it shortly after arriving here, promising to let him come for it if he wanted.
It is just another reminder he never came back.
Using one of the jeweled ends of the scroll case, I lock it into the mechanism, and I press my hand to the sigil. The magical wax softens. The lid loosens with a sigh.
Inside lies a single blade, wrapped in faded blue silk. When I draw it free, the air grows colder. The dagger’s edge, black as obsidian, glints faintly in the candlelight.
“Hello, old ghost,” I whisper. Something lodges itself in my throat as I wait, feeling oddly fragile.
It hums. Barely audible, but there.
I used to tell myself the weapon was only metal and stone, not a heartbeat. But it was his, once. And if it is still making sound, it means that the Shadow lives on.
Castien.
Fifty years since I’ve last seen him, and still the name is a wound I can reopen with one thought.
He was the kind of man the gods made by mistake—a creature meant to love the light but born into darkness.
Assassin, spy, heretic. He could pass through walls, slip past sentries, and cut throats without sound.
He killed masses with his burning shadows.
And once, he held my heart in his hands like something fragile and precious.