A Shadow's Tale (10 page)

‘What was that?' Natalie asked quietly, locking gazes with me, trying to find an answer in my eyes.

‘Yo, Shad, dude! What happened to you?!' exclaimed Holly, barging in on Natalie's quiet concern in true Holly fashion. I shook my head at her. Natalie, thankfully more subtle than the other third of our trio, shushed the girl with a silencing charm. Taking a deep breath, I focused on putting one foot in front of the other in order to get back to my room. Natalie let me go on ahead for a few moments before following. I silently thanked her. I was going to get grilled for this later, but in the immediate aftermath, Natalie was willing to let it go. It would hurt so much to have to lose her when I eventually moved on from here.

When I opened the door to my room, I found Jamie waiting for me. I sighed heavily at the sight of his confused expression. Yeah, I know, I looked human for the moment, but he didn't have to stare. I headed for the tiny en-suite attached to my room, intending to melt into a puddle at the bottom of the shower for a while.

‘Go away, Jamie, I'm really not in the mood,' I grunted irritably, knowing how scratchy my voice probably sounded. It certainly felt raw. Jamie let out a long humph of frustration.

‘Well, I've got a letter here for you. Come and find me tomorrow to talk about it.'

‘You read my post?' I said, narrowing my eyes. ‘Isn't that some sort of big human no-no?'

‘We're not human, Shad. Good night,' Jamie said, winking as he left the room.

I sat with my back against the wall, scalding hot water cascading down on my head, trying to wash away the residual ache. With a deep sigh, I stood up, turning my face to the spray and washing the last remnants of shampoo from my hair before shutting off the water. Dressed in the baggy trousers and tank top that constituted my pyjamas, I wandered towards my bed, sleepily plaiting my hair. Grabbing the envelope Jamie had left, I curled up on my bed under my favourite purple blanket. I cursed the absent moon for my current inability to catch a scent off the envelope to determine who it might be from. I pulled out two pieces of paper, one a page that looked to have been ripped out of a fairly old book, the other, a scrap torn from the bottom of a notepad. The scrap read:

I sat back, trying to think about who ‘A' could be, and why they would want to warn me about being in danger. I didn't recognise
the spiky script from any of my classmates, nor Jamie, Holly or Natalie. I picked up the other piece of paper to see some sort of poem written there:

One line of the poem had been heavily scribbled out. I didn't have to wrack my brains too hard to discover the culprit. I sighed heavily, rolling over on my side. I was tired, exhausted, but the poem had stirred something in my mind, reminded me of something from so long ago. I just couldn't remember what. Little did I know that this was the beginning of the end. I slumped back against the pillow, too tired to think any more. I closed my eyes, praying that my vulnerable period would pass faster than it sounded.

Jamie was waiting for me at breakfast the next morning. I silently
glared at him, grabbing some food and sitting far away from him. Unfortunately, he followed me. I bit into my apple, a fruit I could only really enjoy during my non demonic time since my fangs usually got in the way.

‘Is there some part of being a jerk that means you ignore perfectly clear body language?' I asked icily, still annoyed that he had opened, read and scribbled on my post before I had even read it.

‘Hey, hate the game, not the player,' Jamie retorted. ‘I'm just trying to protect you, Shad.'

‘Funny way of doing it,' I muttered. Holly ran over to us in her usual hurricane mode, sitting next to me and immediately tearing into a bowl of cereal that was so full of sugar it made my teeth ache in sympathy. Natalie followed in a somewhat more sedate style with a plate of toast. Jamie cast me a look that clearly stated that we would talk later. I glared back.

Three days and three nights later, I sat up a tree on the edge of the forest, waiting impatiently for night to fall again. I hated being trapped as a human, and this one had definitely outlasted its novelty period. At least I had evaded Natalie's questions. Holly had teased me for the first two days, but I think she was as confused as Natalie. I leant my head back against the tree trunk, watching the sky. Something crashed further in the trees. I squinted, trying to see through the dark shadows of the trees, muttering a curse under my breath about human eyes and how useless they were for seeing in the gloom. Something was moving in there. Something not human that made my hair stand on end and my head hurt.

‘Hey, Shadster! Whatcha doin' all the way up there?' Holly's voice echoed up through the branches.

‘Shad, we really need to talk, you've been avoiding me for three days!' Natalie's plaintive call wasn't far behind. I gritted my teeth, trying to listen, but all I could hear was Holly and Natalie
below me.

‘Shush,' I hissed, glaring down at the pair.

‘Hello you lot, what're you all up to now?' Jamie said, sauntering casually across the grounds towards us. I rolled my eyes. Just what I needed. Another nosy part demon. I didn't know if he had made the name connections, but I sure didn't want him to meet ‘dearest Daddy'. Then again, he said that his father was the anthropomorphic personification of War. Maybe he knew what it was like to have the evil paternal figure.

‘Trying to get a couple of answers off Shad. You know how hard that is when she doesn't want to talk.'

‘Maybe I can help you, then,' Jamie smirked.

‘Don't you dare!' I threatened.

‘Really? Okay, why has she been all weird for the last few days?'

‘Vulnerable period, her breed of part demon has them. Turns their physical over to their primary half.'

‘Earth speak, please, Jameson?' Holly interrupted.

I could almost see the evil grin growing on Jamie's face. ‘She hasn't told you? She's a half demon.'

There was silence for a moment before Holly broke it. ‘Whadda ya mean, she's a half demon? OHMYGOD! That means she's just like you! When's the wedding?! When are the children gonna come?!'

‘Shut it, Holly,' I growled, dropping down from the tree. A bolt of magic slammed into my back, sending me to the ground. I glanced behind me. What I saw made my blood run cold. The black hair, the ragged cut-off trousers, the red eyes. Karthragan! How did he track me here? He wasn't supposed to be able to track me here! Frozen by panic, I couldn't move. All I could do was pray that I smelled different in human form. There was no way I'd be able to take him on in this state. I yelled at the others to run, scrambling to my feet, trying to get to the school. I had to get to a teacher, to warn everyone. Another blast of magic caught
me off balance. I hit the ground once again with a painful thud. Karthragan grabbed me by the hair, wrenching me backwards. I thought my spine would crack under the pressure. Somewhere to the side came the sound of a battle cry. The pressure on my spine vanished. Flipping over, I spotted a violet-haired girl with a huge sword dodging bolts of magic.

‘Get the humans inside, Shadow!' she yelled. I remembered that voice. She had sent me back from Synairn!

‘But who—' I started to ask before she repeated her orders. Deciding that this was one woman I shouldn't mess with, I grabbed Holly, sprinting towards the main building of the Academy. Natalie came running out of the front door, wand at the ready. The sun finally set. The shivers ran through my body as the warmth of magic coursed through my blood once more. Thrusting Holly to Natalie, I ran back out to where the fight between Karthragan and the strange girl had reached magical levels. The girl moved unevenly, as if her leg hurt. Karthragan must have managed to land a blow on her! Yelling a few choice words of my own, I joined the fray.

‘Get out of here, Shadow!'

‘I can help!' The momentary distraction allowed Karthragan to land a punch on me. I gasped, frozen to the spot. His hand had gone through me, lodged in my stomach without leaving a mark. I could feel it. A brief flash of surprise flitted across his face before a smirk twisted his cruel features. He pulled his hand away, letting me crumple to the ground. He raised his sword, preparing to deal the final blow. The blade sliced through the air. It clanged as it hit something solid. Natalie stood not far off, wand raised, holding a shield in place above me. Gratitude flowed through my mind as I scrambled out of the way, summoning my magic, ready to fight. Holly and Natalie joined us, preparing themselves to kick some serious butt. Karthragan laughed. I didn't like the sound of that. He had something up his sleeve. I just didn't know what it was. Something slammed into
my back, pinning me to the ground. I rolled, trying to throw whatever it was off. I froze. Jamie.

‘What the hell are you doing?' I snarled, trying to shove him off. He smirked.

‘What do you think I'm doing?'

I employed a technique I had only ever seen used once, and that was by Holly on a boyfriend she had caught with another girl. I kicked up backwards as hard as I could. Jamie yelped in a surprisingly satisfying high-pitched voice I shot out from underneath him, running to Holly and Natalie, starting to herd them towards the school.

‘You've got to go!' I urged them.

‘Nat, have you ever realised that whenever Shadow says that and we obey, she always ends up beaten to a pulp?' Holly asked airily.

‘Please, don't argue,' I begged them, ‘you have no idea what he's capable of!'

‘No, Shadow, we're staying. You might have lied to us all these years, but we're still your friends.' Natalie replied firmly. She opened her mouth to say something else, but Karthragan launched his next strike. A wave of magic, not unlike one I unleashed during a power surge, knocked us all off our feet. For a moment, I couldn't breathe, the wind knocked out of my lungs. I coughed as I pushed myself up, wrapping an arm around my ribs.

‘Shadow?' came a quiet voice. A hand touched my shoulder. The strange girl was there. I finally got a good look at her. Her violet hair was cut in a severe bob although it was messy from fighting. Her eyes were equally purple. She looked so familiar. ‘Come on, Shadow,' she said, helping me get up. ‘I've taken care of Dad. Let's get you seen to.'

‘Holly…Natalie…' I murmured, looking around for them. My eyes fell on two limp forms still lying in the grass. I froze. They weren't breathing.

I vaguely remember the girl dragging me off to the dorms, back to my room as I stared blankly ahead in silent shock. I sat in the shower again, the way I had done three days ago. Silent tears streamed down my cheeks, mixed with the scalding water. Oh goddess, they were dead. Holly and Natalie were dead! I had lost yet more people to Karthragan. When would it end? When would I be able to make friends with people without fear of Karthragan coming and taking it all away from me once more? Would he always be two steps behind me, just waiting? An hour later, the girl had to pull me out of the shower. She sat me on the bed, wrapped in a blanket, staring blankly at the wall.

‘Look, Shadow, you can't afford to do this to yourself. It's too dangerous. You know that.'

‘Who are you?' I murmured dully, not even looking at her, continuing to glare flatly ahead of me. My eyes were dry of tears, but I still felt the need to cry.

‘I thought you would have recognised me, Shadow. I'm Amarath, Amarath Roth. Your twin.' I tore my gaze away from the wall to look at her. Her hair, her eyes, her whole face. Everywhere in the scriptures, it had said that demons come in pairs. I had never actually realised the implications of that. Every demon had a twin. Amarath was mine. I let out a harsh, bark-like laugh. I had lost both my best friends, another friend betrayed me and I had found a long-lost sister. Ignoring her as best I could, I stood up and got dressed. I put on the clothes that would be almost a uniform for me for the next few years. All black, a long-sleeved top, jeans with a belt that could hold potion vials, ankle boots, and my cloak. I glanced around the room. Everything in it reminded me of Holly and Natalie. The books Natalie wanted me to read, the whoopee cushion I had taken off Holly for overuse. Photos of the three of us laughing. Every memory I had gathered at the Academy, Holly and Natalie were a part of. How could I put it all behind me, knowing that I was the cause of their demise? How could I move on, knowing that their death was my
fault? Amarath touched my shoulder gently.

‘Shadow, we need to go. I'm really sorry about your friends, but we need to get out of here before Karthragan turns up with reinforcements. Stop acting like you're dead or you
will
end up as a corpse! Pack up your stuff, we're leaving. I've got someone I want you to meet.'

We left the Academy. I packed everything, got Merlas and we left. Amarath teleported us to a clearing somewhere, a power she assured me I was capable of wielding, just not trained to do. I wasn't really listening to her. My mind was too focused on Holly and Natalie, the things we'd done together, the teachers we'd pranked, the trouble we had gotten ourselves into. Amarath snapped her fingers in front of my face. I jumped, glaring at her.

‘What did you do that for?'

‘You weren't listening. I told you, this is Shaeman.' I hadn't noticed a tall man standing next to us. Another part demon. I could sense it. His face appeared open and friendly, despite the scars I could see, although they were mainly hidden beneath his clothes. His shaggy, silver hair had once been cut short, but now left to grow out, reaching down to his shoulders. One lock of hair, messily plaited, reached down to his waist. His clothes were a deep red, covering as much skin as possible, with some sort of half cloak covering his right side. Despite his hair colour, he appeared to be only a couple of years older than I was, in his early twenties. His silver eyes stirred something in my memory, but I couldn't place it.

‘Shadow,' he said, nodding at me. ‘We have met before, although not introduced.' I racked my brains for any memory of a silver haired man when it struck me. This has to be one of the twins who took me to Karthragan when Arias banished me to Aspheri!

‘You, you were one of the boys who led me to Karthragan, weren't you!' I snarled. I clenched my fists, riling myself up for a fight, eyes narrowed and temper flaring. If Amarath thought we could trust this moronic, backstabbing…

Shaeman put up his hands in a surrendering gesture. ‘To be
fair, I was eight at the time. At that point, if I didn't obey Dad, then the consequences were severe. We didn't tend to question his authority.'

‘Long story short, Shad, Shaeman's our half brother, him and his twin Vrael. Kar's been breeding like a rabbit on Speed. Vrael managed to get himself chucked into another dimension. We've got to pull together as a family if we're going to get through the prophecy.'

‘Prophecy?'

‘Oh, in the name of Arias! What did they teach you in the Senate Towers?'

‘Obviously not what you think…'

Amarath and Shaeman sighed, exchanging long suffering glances before beginning to explain. In the rules of demons and part demons, they were born in pairs. That much I had finally understood. It also seemed, in the case of powerful demons and all part demons, one of the twin's lives was subject to prophecy. In the most part, they weren't an important factor. However, the more powerful the demon parent, the more the prophecy took control of their life. This time, it fell on me. Karthragan happened to be the Prince of Darkness, the big cheese of the demon world. The poem that Amarath had sent me was the prophecy. In short, I was going to die at his hands and him at mine to determine who would rule over the demons.

‘But before we start working on that, we have to find Vrael. Between the four of us, we should be able to deal with Karthragan should he decide to try to start the prophecy early. Which doesn't work, by the way, so don't get any ideas.'

‘So, where is this brother?'

‘DOTD.'

DOTD, or the Dimension of the Dead, was aptly named. No one who has ventured there for any length of time has returned whole, or indeed, returned at all. I'd only ever heard of one person, an explorer from Synairn, who once made the journey
there. He came back as a changed man. He locked himself in his home for months, refusing to speak to anyone, refusing to leave. One day, he stepped out of his front door, and disintegrated into dust. He never spoke to anyone of his journey. When the City Guard searched his house after his death, they found nothing about his travel to the dimension. Not a single word or drawing. And now we were heading to the exact same place. Amarath, Shaeman and I. I did vaguely wonder about our sanity. Why were we going to a place that had such a cursed reputation? Even if we did find Shaeman's twin, there was no guarantee that they would even recognise each other. However, I did have to respect the fact that I had no idea what I was doing, and they did. Maybe demons weren't affected by the curse or something. Following their lead, I pulled the hood of my cloak low over my face. Shaeman's hand gripped my shoulder tightly in order to teleport me, neither of my siblings willing to let me try on my own. Squeezing my eyes shut, I prepared myself for the unpleasant freezing sensation that I had come to associate with interdimensional teleportation.

The dimension of the dead was cold. Very cold. I drew my cloak tighter around me to try to stave off the bitter, icy wind, tucking my fingers into folds in the material. The landscape itself was hostile, with jagged mountains clawing at a grey sky, sharp stones littering the plains. Even the trees were dead, bark blackened by some long-dead fire, their twisted branches broken and crumbling. It looked as if someone had taken all the colour from this world, leaving it with nothing more than shades of grey. The only spot of colour I could see was the dying sun, a patch of red struggling to maintain its place in the sky as gravity tried to drag it down behind the mountains. Before us lay fields of tangled briars and brambles, with sharp thorns inviting us to spill our blood on them. Shaeman sniffed the air then tilted his head to one side slightly, listening out for something. Amarath drew her sword, her eyes scanning the landscape for anything
resembling danger. They glanced at each other. Shaeman gestured towards a tiny column of smoke. Amarath nodded. I felt as if I had missed out on something. Amarath and Shaeman seemed perfectly capable of dealing with the retrieval of Shaeman's twin without my help. Why had they brought me along? It's not even as if I knew very much about demons, nor about what we could do. Amarath began to hack a path through the thick net of thorns with a ferocity I sincerely hoped she would never turn against me. Pulling my hood a little further down over my face, I followed her, with Shaeman close behind.

The column of smoke came from a village, the only thing in the barren landscape that actually seemed to have some degree of life. We crept closer, trying to be as discreet as possible. Amarath and Shaeman had mastered a sort of predatory lope that was silent and unnoticeable, even if Amarath's was slightly more awkward as she favoured one leg. I, on the other hand, was about as discreet as a bull with diarrhoea. We paused at a thicket of dry, brittle bushes to observe the little village. Pale, flickering light illuminated the windows of the blackened timber structures. A larger source of light came from what I guessed was the heart of the village. Amarath gestured for us to advance. I shivered as we passed through the empty streets, wondering what sort of creatures could live here. It was as if nothing could live here. Everything was so dead. The sound of clashing metal and cheering voices filled my ears. Amarath peeked round one of the dilapidated houses before pulling back and gesturing to Shaeman to look. I looked around as well. In what appeared to be the central square of the tiny village, people were gathered in a circle around a grey, flickering fire and two fighting men. My gaze was locked on the two clashing swords. The light danced on their bare torsos, flashing across the planes of their toned muscles. The firelight played in the silver hair of one of the combatants, tied back in a loose ponytail. His movements were fluid and graceful as his slender, lithe body, turning the battle
into a dance, the ultimate predator. I hadn't realised how closely I must have been watching him, not to mention the fact that my mouth was hanging open in awe at their display of combat skills. Amarath elbowed me in the ribs, a smile playing on her lips.

‘I wouldn't get too many ideas, Shad, since that's your brother.' I rolled my eyes at her, shaking my head. Yeah, he was good-looking, but after the fiasco with Jamie, I was definitely not looking for a man in my life. I swear, even though I'd only just met her, Amarath was going to be the death of me. I turned my gaze back to the fight as the fighter I now knew to be Vrael thrust his sword through the chest of his opponent. I felt my eyes widen. It had been a duel to the death?! My astonishment at that, however, was nothing compared to the shock as I watched the defeated man look down at the blade protruding grotesquely from his ribs and
laugh
. He laughed and pulled the weapon out, handing it back to Vrael, saying something to his in a strange, harsh language that I couldn't understand, a language so feral and growling as to be intimidating. The language of the dead. It made my fangs ache just to hear it. Shaeman, his eyes fixed on his twin, whistled low under his breath. In the middle of the crowd complimenting him on his fight, Vrael stiffened, alert. His eyes scanned the streets, looking for the source of the noise.

Someone grabbed me from behind, yelling out in that language. I scrabbled at the arm around my neck as my hood was yanked down. My claws cut deep gashes in my captor's flesh, but they didn't seem to even notice. A hand grabbed my hair, pulling my head to one side to expose my neck. I heard yells of surprise and indignation as Amarath and Shaeman were given the same treatment. Vrael spoke, his voice commanding and authoritarian as he strode towards us, displaying the same graceful, dangerous lope as his brother had, sheathing the sword in a scabbard on his hip, a shirt hanging over his shoulder. He was pale, paler than his twin, but shared the same silver hair and eyes, although his hair, instead of being cropped short like Shaeman, had been left to
grow long to his shoulder blades and swept into an elegant queue. The villagers were restless, that much was obvious. The man holding Amarath snarled at Vrael before raking his teeth down Amarath's neck. Black blood immediately welled in the two grooves left by his fangs. Shaeman roared in fury, tearing himself out of his captor's grasp, lunging towards me. Amarath dealt her own captor a nasty head-butt, probably breaking his nose, before she leapt for Vrael. Shaeman's fingers dug into my arm a split second before he teleported.

I found myself face down in a pile of dirt. Why was it that the norm for being teleported by someone else seemed to invariably end up with me landing on my face? Shaking my head, I got to my feet, brushing myself off, trying to convince myself that the trip to the DOTD had not been all that traumatic and that all four of us were not going to need therapy for the rest of our lives. Shaeman appeared at my side, carefully turning me away from something. I tried to look back over my shoulder. Shaeman snorted quietly as he put his hand over my eyes, preventing me from seeing anything.

‘I wouldn't do that if I were you. You really don't want to see this.' He was right. From the glimpse I saw, I really didn't want to know about or see Vrael sucking at Amarath's neck. It was an image I was sure I would carry for the rest of my life, and not one I really wanted to. I squeezed my eyes shut, trying not to think about it. Shaeman chuckled under his breath.

‘Not particularly nice, is it? But then again, Vrael has to get the venom out of Amarath's system before it starts converting her into a vampire like him.'

‘Vrael's a vampire?'

‘They don't call it the dimension of the dead for nothing. They're all vampires there. Well, Vrael wasn't when he was sent there, but they fixed that for him.'

‘But he's out in sunlight…I thought vampires couldn't do
that.'

‘Full bloods can't. Vrael's only a half. His demonic blood wouldn't allow vampirism to take over any more than that. He can go out in sunlight, cast a reflection and eat garlic. I'm not sure I'll let him do that last one though. I don't think I could stand the smell of it hanging around.'

‘It is done. You may now look,' came Vrael's velvet tones. Amarath was getting to her feet, one hand on her neck, wobbling somewhat but intact. That's what counts.

Over the next month, we built our house. It should have taken longer than that, and would have if the construction workers had been human. But we weren't human. We had magic and strength on our side. We built it in that clearing, using wood from the trees, occasionally pulled through the forest by Merlas if we couldn't do it ourselves and stone drawn out by magic from the deep undergrowth. Shaeman even figured out how to make serviceable cement from the river, with water, sand and silt, (I suspect heavy amounts of magic). We even managed a full round of vulnerable periods. Unfortunately, that turned Vrael into a full vampire. We ended up burying him for the duration of the vulnerable period to prevent him from turning into a pile of ash. I learnt a lot about my siblings in that time spent working with them, building a sort of family dynamic between us. A strange one certainly, but it was ours. We were putting the finishing touches to the structure of the house when he started to look at me strangely. I have to admit, I was a little nervous. I didn't really fancy becoming a vampire's chew toy, even if he was my brother (okay, half brother). Shaeman noticed it and threw him a vial of blood from the collection we had all chipped in to create. Vrael shook his head, throwing it back at him, Shaeman catching it in a coordination born of throwing things at each other over the last month.

‘What's up, Vrae?' Amarath asked, walking over, wiping her
hands on her cloak.

Vrael gestured towards me with one hand. ‘She's pregnant.'

‘I'm
what?!'

‘Pregnant,' Vrael repeated, ‘I can smell the shift in your hormones.'

‘But…how?'

Amarath whacked her head off her palm. ‘Oh, I'm such an idiot. Karthragan punched you in the stomach. That would have been enough if you weren't blocking it.'

‘Whoa, slow down here, will someone explain, please?' I pleaded.

Vrael and Amarath glanced at each other before Amarath sighed heavily, rolling her eyes at the two boys. ‘All right, so it's a girl topic. Wusses! Shad, in a magical sense, a child is a bonding of the essences of the parents. In creatures such as ourselves, who can use magic to bend the rules of solidity, putting any part of your body
through
the other person's body constitutes a melding of the essences. The only way our bodies can cope with this is by focusing this on creating a child. You should have been taught to be able to counteract this, block it so that he couldn't put his fist right through you. Unfortunately, you haven't, and now you're carrying Karthragan's kid, which is wrong on so many levels.'