Shadow's Son (33 page)

Raising his voice to the night, he began to chant. Shadows screamed
as they were consumed in the sorcery. The wound ceased to bother him.
In its place arose a wave of ecstasy far beyond any earthly pleasure. It raced
through his body like lightning as his paean to the forces Beyond soared
into the sky.

Above the altar, a window of nothingness opened.

He braced himself as a frigid wind erupted from the rift and stood
firm, resolute in the powers at his command, even as a figure appeared in
the aperture. Harsh words resounded from the void. They grated on his
ears like gnashing mountains, like the grinding of the world's bones.

"Levictus. Long has it been since your last communication. Is this the
manner in which you pay homage to the Lords of Unrelenting Dark?"

Levictus knelt on the broken ground. "I have summoned you to-"

His voice broke into a hoarse scream as a jet of black flames lashed out
from the portal. Levictus dropped to the ground, wrapped in their searing
embrace. When the flames departed, he was curled into a tight ball.

The figure leaned closer to the rift. A dark gown clung to voluptuous
curves. Cascades of midnight hair framed eyes that glowed like the pits of
hell.

"Such as you do not summon us," she intoned. "You are a servant, a
slave of the Shadow, to be used in whatever manner we require."

Levictus pulled himself back onto his knees. The pain was subsiding.
He held his hands up to the moonlight, expecting to see a mass of charred
flesh. Instead, there was only smooth, healthy skin.

He genuflected before the altar. "Forgive me, mistress."

"Tell us why you have reached across the Void this night."

"I require ... I
ask
for another infusion."

"You dare? You, to whom the Lords of Shadow have granted more
power than any mortal in a thousand years, to whom the secrets of the
Dark were laid bare? You dare to demand more?"

Levictus dared to lift his gaze. The words, so long withheld, poured
out of him in a rush. "I do not demand. I merely beg for the strength to
serve your will. Othir, the jewel of the empire, lies under the sun like a
great, bloated whore, spreading her cancer to every land. I would tear
down her scabrous walls and scatter her people to the four winds. I would
bring the Shadow to this place and extinguish the light of Nimea forever."

The emissary's head tilted so that her hair fell across her face, hiding
her dusky features. "What you desire is possible, but there is a danger."

Levictus lowered his forehead to the cool earth. "I accept the risks."

"And there is another price to be paid as well."

Levictus had feared as much when he hatched this plan. Sixteen years
ago, he had been given a task to cement his original pact with the Other Side. He didn't mind at the time; it gave him a chance to experiment with
his newfound powers. Now, after freeing himself from Vassili's yoke, the
idea of continued service enraged him, but he would have his final revenge
on Othir and the man who had wounded him. Though his heart resisted,
he bowed his head in assent.

He listened to the emissary's message, whispered across the Void, and
all the while his chest grew heavy with dread as the Shadow's plans were
divulged to him. And yet, what choice did he have? He had bound his fate
to this path long ago. It was too late to break free.

When she finished, Levictus exhaled a long sigh, and then nodded
once more. "I will do as you bid. When do I receive my boon?"

The figure faded from view as the window shriveled up like a dead
leaf. "It comes."

The grove darkened, and black clouds gathered above to block out the
moonlight. Branches scratched together as a breeze from the Other Side
crept through the trees. The ground quivered under his feet. Levictus
clenched his fists as the tides of magic coalesced around him, but he could
not have prepared himself for the tsunami that crashed down upon his
head. He gasped and shivered, helpless in the throes of power. It scoured
the marrow from his bones. It pounded through his veins and swelled in
his chest until he thought his heart would explode. Overhead, storm
clouds crackled and spat.

Then, like the calm in the eye of a hurricane, the surge evaporated.

Levictus picked himself up from the patch of dry ground where the
convulsions had thrown him. He was himself again, and yet he was
changed. Things looked different. The darkness churned around him like
a living, breathing thing. Glowing eyes watched him from the shadows.

The shadows.

They had changed, too. Looking upon them, he understood what had
been given to him, and he accepted.

With a smile, Levictus wrapped his cloak around him. As the deep,
cool blackness fell around him, his body lightened and he flew on the
night winds, back to Othir to sow the seeds of destruction.

cold wind flogged Caim as he crouched behind the neck of his
stolen steed. He pushed the animal all the way from the city,
cutting cross-country between villages to save precious minutes. The
moon, full and red, tracked his progress over the plains. A blood moon,
the sailors called it. Night of ill omens.

The wound he'd received from the sorcerer's knife, scrawled like a
streak of bloody charcoal down his forearm, burned like the blazes, but
the pain was nothing next to the rage boiling in his chest. He knew where
he had seen a wound like the earl's and like Mat's.

He stood in the center of the corpse-strewn courtyard. A large man slumped at
his feet. Strings of red-black blood ran from the wound in his chest. A tremor ran
through Caim as the corpse opened its eyes, black spheres without irises or whites.
A whisper issued from blue-tinged lips.

He had been presented with an opportunity he never thought to have
in a hundred lifetimes, to avenge his father's death, and he had let it slip
through his fingers like wet sand. Damn Ral. It was clear the man had
made some kind of deal with that creature, Levictus. But what drew them
together? What plan had they hatched, and how did it involve Josey?
Caim knew Ral. The man's dreams were grandiose, but teamed up with
one who could conjure the shadows, how far could he go? The questions
haunted Caim all during the harrowing ride.

When his first horse foundered, he sidetracked to a wayside roadhouse
and stole another. The second horse proved hardier, if not so fast as the
first, but after an hour of cantering the beast labored for breath. Caim felt
sorry for the animal, but he didn't let up as evening approached in deepening strands of purple and blue. Nothing mattered except reaching
Josey.

He reached the first stand of trees. The path was an inky band that
snaked through the woods. He slowed the horse to a walk as they passed
under the roof of branches. Ral had sent people after Josey. Even now they
could be at the cabin. For the hundredth time he cursed himself for not
killing Ral when he had the chance. The man was a fiend, not fit to live
among humanity.

The same could be said for me.

True enough, but he would gladly go to the gallows as long as Ral
went before him. If anything happened to Josey, he'd never forgive himself. He should have gotten her farther away, hidden her in another city
where she'd be safe. The recriminations battered at him as he peered
through the forest's gloom. The cabin was not far off the path. If Kas had
left a fire burning, he should see its light soon.

Caim almost passed by the cabin before he picked out its white lines
of wattle in the darkness. He yanked his mount to a halt and was running
as soon as his feet hit the ground, knives drawn. The front door hung open
on loose hinges. Beyond it, darkness swathed the interior. Not a sound
disturbed the stillness of the forest.

Caim leaned across the entrance. His gaze darted to the corners of the
front room. The place had an empty feel, devoid of life. The hearth had
been allowed to go out; the dying embers were sunken beneath a bed of
ashes. The few pieces of furniture were scattered about in shambles. Pieces
of clay dishes littered the floor amid half-dried pools of dark scarlet. A
sharp odor hung in the air. As he stepped over the threshold, Caim
spotted the still mound of a body.

Kas.

Three strides took Caim across the room. A pike with a shortened
shaft lay beside the old man's limp hand. Caim looked down at the man
who had raised him and didn't know how to react. Titanic weights pulled
at his insides; conflicting emotions congested in his vital organs. The
walls of the cabin closed around him, cutting him away from the night.
The wind's whisper vanished like ghosts of years past as the stink of blood
and burnt leather filled his head. For a moment Caim allowed himself to
feel remorse for the way he had left things between them. He had loved
this man, and yet hated him for not being his true father. With an effort
that showed in the whites of his knuckles, he shut those feelings away and turned his mind to more immediate matters. Blood stained the weapon's
point. So the old man hadn't gone down without a fight.
Good for you.

Caim knelt beside the body. The blood was sticky, not yet fully dried.
The rest of the room was empty. No sign of Josey. It looked like the bulk
of Ral's men had entered through the front door, and one by a broken
window. What he thought was blood spattered across the sill turned out
to be wine.

The door to the back room was half closed. He nudged it open. Scant
moonbeams fumbled across the crude floorboards. A garment was laid
over the disarrayed covers of a crude cot. An icy fist closed around Calm's
heart at the sight of Josey's borrowed gown. It had been slashed to bloody
strips. He flinched as identical wounds made by imaginary swords and
daggers pierced his flesh.

He searched the entire cabin for the body, but found nothing. He went
back outside to make a sweep of the yard. There were marks in the dirt
where one or more bodies had been dragged amid a crowd of hoofprints.
Caim was no tracker, but he could see they had come from the direction of
Othir and returned the same way. He must have just missed them. Of
course, they would stay to the main roads, secure in their numbers.

Calm's breath burned in his throat. Rage filled his thoughts, at Ral,
at himself, at the gods if they existed. The Brotherhood had Josey. A
thought flashed through his head. If they were riding with wounded, he
might still be able to catch them.

He started toward his steed, but stopped after a few paces. The horse
shuddered like it had an ague. Strings of milk white foam drooled from
its mouth. The damned thing was blown. Useless. It wouldn't run again
tonight, if ever.

Caim gave the animal what mercy remained in him. He stripped off
its bridle and saddle, and dropped them on the ground. A wasted effort.
It would probably drop over dead before morning. He had failed them.
Josey, Kas, Mathias, his parents-they were all gone now. He was alone.
Grief sliced up his insides like a river of broken glass. He wanted to
scream to the heavens, but the cry lodged in his throat. He had nothing
left. Then, a whisper-light touch settled on his shoulder.

"I'm so sorry,
Caim."

The words tickled his ear as Kit alighted beside him. Her inner radi ance surrounded him like the light of a thousand fireflies. He wanted her
comfort, wanted it more keenly than he had ever wanted anything in his
life since the day his father died, but he couldn't accept it. The rage had
rendered all his tender feelings down to a lump of useless, hardened tissue.

"Where have you been?" He made no effort to temper his tone. "Out
in some meadow, picking flowers and dancing with starlings?"

She floated around to face him. Tears trickled down her face like
falling stars. "I was here, Caim."

"Yet you did nothing."

"I couldn't!" she cried. "I saw them kill Kas and drag the girl away,
but there wasn't anything I could do."

"You could have come to find me. I could have stopped it."

"Would you have listened?"

"Of course I would-"

"No." She retreated a few steps from him. "You stopped listening to
me a long time ago, and it only got worse when you met that girl."

"Her name was Josey."

"If you want to know where they took her-"

"Say her name!" he screamed.

Kit wiped at her face with the back of her hands. "Josey, okay? Her
name is Josey, but she's not dead."

"I saw the dress, Kit."

"Listen, you idiot!" A deep crimson blush stained her cheeks as she
propped her tiny fists on her hips. "She's still alive. They took her and
rode off like a pack of demons. They left the dress so you would get all
hellfire mad and go riding after them without a thought in that wooden
head of yours."

He strode through her as if she weren't there, walked up to the door
of the cabin, and stood on the threshold. The emptiness within yawned
before him like a great mouth.