Chapter Twenty-Four
Twenty-Four
Tribulations
The test was designed to fail. Single-handedly stealing half a million worth of jewels would be difficult for a team of Halcin let alone one.
Not to mention who Shadach was forced to steal from.
The test was not open to personal interpretation.
He could not steal jewels from anyone. It had to be from Patin, a lord of Everglade City who had a bad habit of double-crossing the Halcin.
One of the reasons he had so many jewels.
Not that the Halcin hadn’t double-crossed Lord Patin just as many times, but that fact never got mentioned in Halcin circles.
Oh, and from the moment Shadach arrived in Everglade City, he had three days to do it.
Because, apparently, the task wasn’t hard enough as it was.
Shadach sat on a bench in Mother’s garden, the wind harsh against his skin as he waited for Aoife to finish washing up in the house. She had been allowed in because Mother was out.
Three days. How was Shadach going to steal half a million in jewels from one of the Kingdom’s most vicious lords in three days?
Shadach either needed to become the swindliest, most conniving Halcin in the Kingdom …
or he needed a miracle. He dreaded the former and he wasn’t terribly optimistic about the latter.
“Excited about your big test?”
Shadach looked to his left at the voice. It was at once familiar and wholly foreign. His younger sister, Petra, came and sat beside him. Her long dark hair fell to her waist, her Halcin eyes sharp and quick where they had once been full of wonder.
“Ecstatic,” Shadach said with no inflection.
Petra laughed. “You know, your written Halcin is way better than your spoken. Based on your letters I thought you spoke it every day.”
“Based on your letters I thought you were still too short to reach the kitchen shelves. We’ve both been lied to.” Shadach glanced at his sister.
She rolled her eyes, but was smiling. It had taken a year or two after him leaving, but Petra had figured out how to get letters back and forth without Mother finding and burning them.
The letters had dwindled in frequency over the years until it was only a catch-up letter once a year, but still.
He felt like he at least knew Petra. He couldn’t say the same for his other siblings.
A pang of regret for the years he’d missed gnawed at his throat. He swallowed it down.
Shadach leaned back, resting his head against the fence. “You know, when I left I thought I was going to set an example. To change things. But being back here, now, it looks like it did little good.”
“That’s your own dumb fault for trying to be a hero.” The snark in Petra’s voice was reminiscent of Mother. But her voice softened when she said, “You’re also wrong.”
Petra sighed as if Shadach had been literally twisting her arm for information.
“Don’t tell Mom I told you, but you remember Jethrin? From down the street?”
The boy about Shadach’s age with the overly-large front teeth. Shadach nodded.
“He’s attending the university in the City of Tides. Studying some crazy science thing.”
Shadach stared at Petra. Dumbfounded. “But … how …” Halcin were normally rejected from universities on sight. Though it wasn’t like many applied in the first place.
Petra shrugged. “He’s a genius. One of the professors noticed and vouched for him.
Now we’re all supposed to hate him, but he doesn’t care.
He’s having too much fun nerding out about science shit.
And my friend, Cara,” Petra nodded to the side as if Cara had magically appeared there, “she does this crazy cool art with beads and bottles when nobody is looking. And also,” Petra shrugged her shirt off her right shoulder.
“Is that,” Shadach leaned in for a closer look, “a tattoo?”
“Got it a year ago. Cool, right?”
The tattoo was small, almost non-existent, but on closer inspection it was a sun and stars with an arrow piercing one of the stars.
“I love it,” he said.
Petra’s smile was priceless. Checking herself, she pulled her shirt back over her shoulder. “Point is, not everything is what it seems. When you left, it was an earthquake. Sometimes the aftershocks take a while to hit, but that doesn’t mean they’re not hitting.”
Shadach nodded, a cautious sense of hope taking root. “Thank you.”
“And on that happy note,” Petra said, “I, for one, cannot wait to see how you pull off this heist.”
Shadach’s laugh was dry and humourless. “You and me both.”
“No ideas then?”
“Not a single one.”
“You really are a shit Halcin these days.” Her lips formed a harsh line, but her eyes glinted with mischief.
“Like you have any good ideas.” Shadach’s voice was flat but not particularly insulted.
“I have a few.”
Shadach sat up straighter. “You can’t be serious.”
“I’m not called the smart one in the family for nothing.” Petra smiled then, looking out over the garden. “Could you exploit any of Lord Patin’s lovers?”
“Doubtful. He’s as suspicious of women as he is of the Halcin. He wouldn’t trust a woman with his secrets.”
“He must think Halcin women are the most conniving creatures on the planet … he’s probably not wrong.” There was a devilish pride in her voice. “What about his Selat enemies?” she continued. “If you find out who they are, maybe they’ll help you out of spite.”
“Except I doubt they know anything useful for stealing the jewels.” Shadach dug the heel of his boot into the dirt. “The Selats would be more interested in destroying his power than taking his jewel collection.”
Petra’s lips twisted in thought. “If I remember right, Reska and his men tried to steal Patin’s jewels a few years back, yeah?”
Shadach nodded. They’d made it all the way to the vault, but had been killed by fatal booby traps before they’d managed to get the door open.
“What if you retrace their steps, but not get killed by the booby traps at the end?”
“Is that all I have to do?” Shadach’s shoulders slumped. No one from Reska’s crew had lived to tell how they’d gotten so far.
“Don’t look so defeated,” Petra said. “Rumour has it Reska told his cousin, Weis, their original plan. And he’s still in Everglade. If you get the details from him, you might be able to take advantage of everything they did right and avoid what they did wrong.”
“Except Lord Patin would have entirely changed his security. New traps, new systems, new everything. What Weis knows won’t matter anymore.”
“Patin couldn’t have changed his entire house, his whole vault.” Petra looked at Shadach, the humour in her gone. “Some of it still must be true. And some is more than you’ve got now.”
Shadach nodded, struggling to share Petra’s optimism. “I’ll try to track down Weis. And I’m glad at least somebody wants me to succeed.”
“We all secretly want you to succeed, Shadach, even if no one is going to admit it. After all,” Petra bumped Shadach’s shoulder with hers, the humour coming back to her eyes, “we hate Lord Patin even more than we hate you.”
~*~
By the time Aoife came outside, Shadach’s mind was a twisted labyrinth of “what-if” and “how-to.” How was he to do the impossible?
Not only that, but to do it with integrity?
He couldn’t very well be Emperor or show his people there were other ways to live when the instant life got hard he reverted back to his unsavoury roots.
But what else was he to do?
Shadach looked up at the sound of Aoife’s footsteps.
He would recognise them anywhere: soft and unassuming, but with a quiet certainty.
Her hair was smoothed and almost tame, fresh from a wash, and her piercing gaze was all the brighter for having had the dirt and grime cleaned from her face.
He smiled, the panic loosening in his chest. He still didn’t know how she did it.
How only seeing her could make him calm, make his body know everything was going to be okay.
Some magic was not meant to be questioned.
“I think that’s the first real bath I’ve had since the Temple of Lust.” Aoife sat beside him. “It didn’t even matter the water was cold.”
He kissed her lightly. “You’re beautiful no matter how many baths you’ve had.”
“Beautiful, maybe. But the smell …” Aoife shook her head with a disdain that was only half-fake.
He laughed and kissed her again. “Are you ready to go?”
“Do we have to walk there, too?”
“Actually, everyone is so convinced we’ll fail, they’ve decided to be helpful and lend us horses.”
Aoife moved her lips into an “oh” shape. “Nice. Travelling in style.”
“Do you know how to ride?” Did they have horses in Aoife’s world?
They had talked about Aoife’s world, this place of “Earth” and “Ireland,” but Shadach would never know it all.
Besides, whenever they did talk about her world, he found it quickly turned into him wanting to know more about Aoife herself.
Her world suddenly became less important.
“I took some lessons in Australia, before it interfered too much with martial arts. I think I’ll remember enough.”
“If not,” Shadach leaned in closer, “you can ride with me.”
Aoife flushed. Undoubtedly she, too, was imagining how it would feel to be so close. Closer than close. Their bodies pressed together, not an inch of light between—
Someone cleared their throat.
Shadach straightened. Aoife stared at a nearby bush with sudden, fervid interest.
“Mother,” he said. “You’re back.”
She stood a few paces away, her shawl loose around her shoulders, her greying hair falling from her bun.
“Are you ready?” she said in Halcin. Her face was cold, harsh. But something odd lingered in her voice. Shadach had been away too long to recognise what it was.
“For the impossible test? Of course, we’re ready.” He stood and Aoife followed, glancing between them.
Mother crooked an eyebrow, pulling her shawl tighter around her. “You’re taking her with you?”
Shadach glanced at Aoife who was glancing between him and Mother, trying to pretend she wasn’t concerned about what was being said.
“Of course she’s coming with me,” Shadach said, grasping Aoife’s hand in reassurance.
Mother pursed her lips, looking Aoife up and down as if she were spoilt meat.
“How long have you really known her? A job like this requires a partner you can trust.” A terrible glint flashed in Mother’s eyes.
“You know, I could be persuaded to loosen the rules if you should want to take Kesra instead. She’ll be a hundred times the help that Selat will and equally more trustworthy. ”
Rage flared in Shadach’s blood, pushing at his lips to say something just as spiteful. Kesra, of all people. Mother wasn’t just playing dirty, she was building a monument to herself made entirely of mud.
“I can trust Aoife with my life. Of course I can trust her with this.” Shadach tried to bite back the poison in his voice, but a great deal of venom still slipped through. “And you have no idea what she’s capable of. She’s two hundred times the woman Kesra is.”
Aoife and Shadach had saved each other time and again in so many ways. She and Kesra couldn’t even compare.
Mother waited a moment, seeming to contemplate Aoife and then Shadach. Shrugging, she turned and muttered, “I certainly hope you’re right.”
~*~
Shadach felt himself growing smaller as Everglade City loomed ahead.
Even sitting atop a horse, he felt the size of an insect in comparison.
The hood of his cloak covered his head, the thickness of the Shadows serving to veil his eyes.
This place. This was where he had lived as a child. This was where his father had died.
The city blurred in Shadach’s vision as he stared, studying this place that had made him who he was.
For better or worse. He and his father had lived in Everglade’s enclave from the time Shadach had been seven.
They had visited home to see Mother and his siblings often, but Father had wanted to teach his eldest son how to be a Halcin away from the safe confines of the Western Lands.
A real man learned on the job, as Father used to say.
Shadach smiled at the memory of Father sitting him down and explaining he was going to take him to Everglade.
He was going to teach Shadach everything he needed to know about the Halcin, about life.
A year later, Father had been murdered, forcing Shadach to learn a great deal about both.
The fires of Everglade blazed through the darkness of the Shadows like a promise of damnation.
The Underworld of the Damned. Was that what the God had planned for him?
Because becoming the most cruel, manipulative, conniving version of himself was the only way out he could see.
He might as well trade-in all the good will, all the change he’d tried to make with the Knitting Widow. There was no other option, was there?
Was this what the God wanted?
“Hey.”
Her voice jolted him out of his internal, downward spiral. Aoife. Her thick red hair peered out from her cloak, a slim, tender smile on her lips as she grasped the reins of her horse.
“We’re gonna figure this out,” she said. “We have every time before.” She crossed the distance between them by reaching out her hand and clasping his.
The warmth of her hand in his was a knife to his fears. Of course.
Of course, of course, of course. He was forgetting one very important thing. He was not alone. He had Aoife. This was not like before when he’d left home, when he’d gone out on his own with no friends, no money, no support. Now was different, no matter how dire it looked.
He squeezed Aoife’s hand. “Thank you.”
The response in her eyes told him she would have kissed him if they could have done it without falling off the horses.
Shadach repeated it to himself: he had Aoife. Aoife, whom he loved, whom he trusted. She would see him through. He told himself this at the same moment a cold, searing voice in his head said, “I certainly hope you’re right.”