Chapter Sixteen
Sixteen
Gone
The Shadows crawled after Shadach as he walked through the temple, their hissing laughter mocking him. Aoife had lied. And the priestess had lied to indulge Aoife’s lie.
What was there to hide? What were these Gates? A codename? For what? Something to do with Aristen?
Devastating answers lashed through Shadach’s head, making him feel as if needles were driving into his eyes.
He had been suspicious of the priestesses from the beginning.
The Head Priestess had reassured him he was safe, but how foolish could she be?
Of course there were traitors among them.
When there was power involved, there was always a traitor.
But Aoife. Why was she in on the lie?
She had thrown herself at him, worshipped with him in pure passion and then two seconds later lied to his face. To what end? Had the passion been a trick? A diversion?
If so, even Shadach had been fooled.
Going into his room, he closed the door and locked out the world. Pity he could not lock out his thoughts. Nor the Shadows. They swarmed around him, dancing and rolling through the air in praise of his distress. He wanted to punch them.
He could do better than that.
As if sensing his thoughts, the Shadows went silent, creeping away from him in silent apology. Shadach would not be appeased. Not now.
Aoife may have had her secrets, but she was not the only one. Shadach had his, too. Seeing Shadows being born was not the only talent he had. He had one that was far more dangerous. Far more likely to make him a target. A talent that, as far as he knew, no other Halcin had.
He could read the Shadows.
The power had come to him slowly. Unintentionally.
He had worked and trained as a teenager to fully awaken his ability to see Shadows at their moment of creation.
But in the process, he had awoken something else.
Now, he could call to the Shadows, bring them to him, reach inside their darkness and learn what secrets they held.
Shadach sat quietly on the bed trying focus his mind.
A difficult task when he was so on edge.
But he breathed and breathed and, finally, with something close to a tranquil mind, he reached into the Shadows with his thoughts.
With his kinetic energy, he connected to their darkness, their viciousness.
He could sense them slinking about the temple, mocking and jeering the humans around them.
Shadach wondered if some of their hatred came from the fact that they were not human themselves.
That they lived a half-life, existing as a piece of a person.
They would never be whole.
The Shadows fled Shadach’s call as fast as they could, desperate to reach the limits of his power.
Shadach had once tried, and terrifically failed, to call every Shadow in the Kingdom to his side.
But it turned out there was a proximity limit to his power.
The Shadows had to be somewhat close for him to summon them.
And the more Shadows he summoned, the more exhausted he became.
Unfortunately for the Shadows in the temple, they did not run fast enough.
Shadach pulled them to him with violent force.
He sifted through them in his mind. Searching.
Extracting their secrets. Specifically, he searched for Shadows relating to Tara, Aoife, and those Gates.
Most of the Shadows Shadach called he quickly released.
They had nothing of interest to him. But there was one Shadow.
One Shadow that came to Shadach’s side kicking and screaming.
It writhed and wriggled at having been summoned, shrieking at what it knew was to come.
It’s body was thick and heavy with whips of grey pulsing through it.
Shadach reached out his hand, his fingers digging into its slimy body.
The Shadow shivered, and then it revealed its secrets, its body giving them up to Shadach’s mind’s eye.
Most people in the Kingdom thought the Shadows themselves were lies. This wasn’t true. The Shadows were created through lies, but they themselves were the truth. Hidden inside their darkness was the brutal honesty someone did not want known.
Shadach saw the truth this particular Shadow had been created to hide, images and voices flashing through his mind. He saw Tara and two other priestesses. They stood in a dark room, whispering their treachery.
“But Tafana,” one of them said.
“She’s lost her way,” Tara hissed. “The God of Lust would never choose a Halcin as the Emperor. He is our God. A Xana God. And a Xana will reign.”
“How will we get rid of him?” one of the priestesses said. “I’m not a murderer.” Her voice shook.
“Relax,” Tara’s tone was mocking, “we just have to get to the girl.”
“Tara?” Came the Head Priestess’ voice. “What are you doing in there?”
The image ended. Tara must have lied to Tafana about their conversation, thus creating the Shadow. Shadach mentally came back to the room in time to see the Shadow he’d been reading shaking, convulsing. Its body thinned, the darkness becoming lighter and lighter until it disappeared into nothing.
The air itself felt softer. Happier.
It was the truth of the Shadows no one in the Kingdom would accept.
There was a way to destroy the Shadows. All one had to do was reveal their secrets.
As if anyone would stand for their darkest shames being dragged into the open.
Shadach was certain the masses would rather see him dead than let him know their darkness.
Shadach dug his hands into the mattress. The Head Priestess had been wrong. There were traitors around him.
And they had convinced Aoife to betray him, too.
~*~
He would confront Aoife. That was the only way, wasn’t it?
Shadach’s heart was heavy as he walked to Aoife’s room.
The sound of each footfall sounded like a gong clanging in his head.
The logical part of him, the hopeful part, told himself this couldn’t be right.
He had to have been wrong. Aoife had lied, yes, but she was also a woman of pure and passionate worship.
A woman who let the beauty of the moment take her whenever she was brave enough.
Surely, that kind of woman wouldn’t be bribed, wouldn’t be convinced to go against the will of the God?
Shadach swallowed the lump in his throat as he approached Aoife’s door, ignoring the claws digging into his stomach.
He lifted his hand and knocked. One rap.
Two rap. Three raps. He waited, holding his breath, trying to decide what he would say.
How he would tell her she’d been found out.
How he’d explain the betrayal he felt. How it killed him.
And yet, it shouldn’t have. He’d known better than to trust her.
No one answered the door. Shadach knocked again. No answer. Perhaps, she was still having her priestess lessons. Shadach lifted his hand to knock one more time.
“She’s not here.”
Shadach paused mid-knock at the voice behind him. It was an oddly gleeful voice. He turned to see Tara standing in the darkness, her long robes sweeping the ground, her hair tied back in a loose braid. She should have been beautiful.
She was heinous. It was the smile she wore. Sharp and cruel and out for blood.
“Where is she?” Shadach’s jaw tensed, his voice tight.
Tara shrugged. “Somewhere you’ll never find. Somewhere no one will ever find.” No Shadow. No lie.
Shadach’s stomach turned sick for a whole new reason. It occurred to him, far too late, that the truth had many interpretations. Tara had said they needed to “get to the girl.” Shadach had assumed that had meant bribery. Bringing her to their side. But what if it had meant—
“What have you done with her?” Shadach growled.
Tara’s laugh was scathing. “Nothing. Absolutely nothing. She walked through the Gates all by herself.” Her smile reminded Shadach of a panther about to kill its wounded prey. “I guess she won’t be able to testify that you’re the God’s chosen now. No Messenger. No blasphemous Halcin Emperor.”
Fool. Shadach had been an absolute fool.
“What Gates?” Shadach said, struggling to rein in his rage.
Tara shrugged again, stepping away from him. “Don’t know, don’t care.”
Shadach wrenched Tara’s arm and for half a breath, she looked afraid. Then, her eyes calmed, her body settling into easy mockery.
“What are you going to do? Kill me?” she laughed.
“Worse.” Shadach dragged her through the temple grounds, Tara half-laughing, half-scoffing the entire way.
Where was it? He didn’t quite remember. But he would know it when he—
There. That door.
“You’ve got to be kidding m—”
Shadach cut Tara off by banging on the door in front of him. No answer. He banged again.
From the other side came curses in Xana. Shadach didn’t understand them, but curses in any language didn’t need to be understood to be understood.
The door swung open, revealing Tafana, her hair wrapped up in cotton cloth, her eyes glassy from fresh sleep.
“Emperor,” Tafana tightened her night robe at the waist, “only the God himself is allowed to wake me at this hour.”
“Forgive me,” Shadach shoved Tara forward, “but someone needs to explain what she’s done.”
In a flash, Tafana’s tired, irritated eyes became fully alert, taking in every detail of her surroundings. And especially of Tara.
“Oh?” Tafana said. “Has someone been naughty?”
“I did nothing wrong.” Tara raised her chin, looking down at the Head Priestess. “Aoife wanted to know about the Gates. You yourself asked me to look into them.”
Shadach looked at Tafana who raised her hands in innocence.
“It was a simple request for information,” she said.
“Precisely.” Tara nodded, her chin slicing the air. “I told Aoife what she wanted to know, and she walked through the Gates.”
“She what?” Tafana nearly gave herself whiplash turning to Tara. “You let her walk into another dimension? When the Kingdom is in the state it’s in?”