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Chapter twenty-three

Caverns and Chaos

T he rocks were slick. I slipped down the narrow tunnel, stumbling at times, ducking at others to protect my face from the wayward webs. My courage wavered, but a gentle clink from the precious package of potions bid me onward. The thread of shadow still held my hand while the lightbox showed the way brilliantly. But beyond the reach of the light, the cavern was darker than black. The sounds of the cave expanded until we all stood in a large atrium. The sounds of dripping echoed down several endless passages. My back ached as I stood upright, and I shook the remaining spiderwebs off.

The wolves stood at attention facing away from us humans in the center. They sniffed, their ears turning and twitching, then they all rested back on their haunches. From a distant corner, a pale, ugly cat slunk into view and joined the team. Bertha had returned for the adventure.

“Good to go then,” the Shade said as he pulled out his map, then indicated with his hand. “To the left, if you please.” The Shade offered his elbow, and I took it, grateful for the grounding touch. The cavern was just small enough that the edges of light caught on shining mineral veins, which threaded through the gray stones, while the distant walls remained dark and hazy. My eyes constantly tricked me into believing that there was movement along the walls at the edge of the light.

We walked quietly, the crunching sound of sand on stone the only noise as our group traveled underground. Nothing stirred. Soon, between the fatigue and the boredom, the walls became only walls, and the sounds mere murmurs of a sleeping mountain. No creatures attacked, and my tension loosened.

Uncle Koll tapped my shoulder. His voice, though low, echoed in the dark. “Did I ever tell you the time that Sh—”

The Shade cleared his throat.

“—that the Shade used his powers to cheat in a game?”

I pursed my lips, intrigued. “You have not.”

“Well, the first time he discovered them, he was four. He was helping to make some soup, and we thought it was just a storm cloud when he started to cry. But we discovered that shadows were his magic type when he was around five. That’s still very early—as you know—for magic to show itself.” It was common for magic to develop between ten and sixteen years of age, maybe seven if they are stronger. Five was nearly unheard of. My horrifyingly old age of twenty was impossible. “We were playing King’s Castle, and his washer had just knocked out my galer. But then I noticed that tiny shadows had shifted my pieces off the board. I told him he couldn’t do that, and he was so upset he kicked the board and screamed. The whole room blackened, and I thought I’d gone blind! Poor soul scared himself too, and he tripped and fell over the chair he knocked over. Thankfully, I caught him. We sat there as he settled down, and the shadows reabsorbed into this tiny, sobbing little boy on my lap.”

Uncle Koll chuckled, the sound mixed with amusement and sadness. “Scared us half to death. And it certainly scared the maid who dropped the tea tray. ”

“I can imagine. I wasn’t taught much about shadow magic. Except that there was only one.” And that he was evil. I squeezed the Shade’s arm, happy to have corrected that assumption.

“Oh certainly, shadow magic, light magic, even the elemental magics can have their nuances,” Uncle Koll continued. “But the shadows scared his father, to be honest—terrified him, more like it. Thought people would judge him.”

The Shade’s voice rumbled in the cavern. “The beginning of the end.”

Uncle Koll hummed his agreement. “The Shade was his own sort of trouble. Take a mischievous five-year-old, give him tangible cords of shadow, and you get many a disgruntled chef as a cookie starts floating off the table and out the door.” He laughed, casting a very sharp side-eye at the Shade. “Or moving chairs out behind their favorite uncles as they are about to sit.”

The Shade smiled with an edge of orneriness.

“Is the thought magic…yours then too?” I glanced up to see him nod. “Did that show up at the same time?”

His eyes were evergreen in the light of the lamp as they met mine, and his lips pressed flat in thought. “I’m not sure when that arrived…”

Uncle Koll shook his head. “He always seemed to have a second sense about what was going on—even as a child. I’m not sure if that came with knowing people’s thoughts or before. Shadow magic can certainly be a tangible thing, but just like a human shadow is a representation, shadow magic extends to thoughts—the representation of the inner person. Though I suspect it’s why you often played alone or with one or two others. You were easily upset in large groups of people.”

A pang of loneliness struck me. His loneliness? It would be hard to hear the thoughts around you as a child—good, bad, ugly, and otherwise. The more people, the more thoughts. “Must have been overwhelming.”

“It was,” the Shade agreed. “Now I’m pleased to only hear you,” he murmured into my mind.

I rolled my eyes. “And Uncle Koll.”

“I’ve heard his thoughts my whole life. I’m glad to hear someone new.”

“My only appeal—novelty.” I said quietly, forgetting to think it.

He stopped and let Uncle Koll walk ahead of us. The man was now carrying on about some other dinnertime disaster the Shade had caused. The Shade placed his other hand on mine. “You have many appeals.” His eyes took their time looking me over, each glance a caress. “For example, you have very nice leather boots.”

I snorted and pushed us forward. “You gave them to me.”

“Maybe, but you are wearing them. I wouldn’t look nearly as delicious.”

“Is it snack time?”

“Are you on the menu?”

My cheeks heated, and my thoughts—as well as my heart—stopped beating. What is the game I had fallen into, and why was I enjoying this? Grinning, I tucked the light away and reached into my pouch. I pulled out a piece of dried meat, holding it in front of his mouth.

“To satisfy your hunger.” My gaze seized upon his lips. His eyebrow quirked as he smiled back. Without realizing it, we had stopped walking again. He grabbed the food with his hand before kissing my fingertips, one at a time. The Shade splayed open my hand and placed gentle tingling kiss upon my palm. A shadow pulled back the edge of my sleeve.

A wolf growled, and I startled. I turned to see him standing on defense, his hackles raised and teeth bared toward the tunnel. Screeching reached our ears right before a chant of “Food, food, food” ricocheted in my mind. Many things were coming this way. Spyrings.

Not again.

“Time to run, Dayspring.”

We sprinted down the path, clattering legs close behind us. The Shade pushed Uncle Koll forward, throwing up a barricade of shadow behind us. Several too-long pinchers slammed into the wall and started to reach through. Sweat beaded on the Shade’s brow. The manor animals kept pace with us as we turned left and right. Bertha frolicked in delight, looking back as if she wanted to return to the spyrings.

“How are you running and blocking?” I shouted.

“He’s always had a keen mind,” Uncle Koll began, “once when he was fourteen—”

“Later, if you please!” The Shade took a sharp right. “The bats are ahead. Listen in your mind for them.”

My boots pounded, and I was thankful that skirts weren’t slowing my escape this time. I imagined the shadowy room and inserted a window, which opened to let more thoughts in. Several small voices began chirping. “Here, sir. Here!” and “Turn, now! Turn!”

The voices were extremely helpful. The sounds of the spyrings grew distant, and I slowed, heavy with fatigue. The bats fluttered ahead, offering new instruction for the Shade. Everyone walked now, cooling down after our sprint. The Shade still panted, as if he’d exerted even more energy than when he had fought the prince. I wondered if he needed a snack. Perhaps I could grab him some. Perhaps he could kiss my fingertips again, or…

“Shut the mental window, Aelia!” Uncle Koll cried out.

My face flushed, and I mentally slammed it shut.

The Shade’s chuckle echoed around us, growing even as the echoes reverberated his mirth back to us. “Perhaps add a gossamer curtain as a filter? Allow others’ thoughts to come inside without letting your thoughts leak out?”

I held my burning cheeks in my hands. “Certainly. So sorry.”

Uncle Koll approached, wheezing, and patted me on the back once before bending forward, hands on his knees, as he dragged in air with noisy breaths. “Not at all. I just don’t care to be distracted while running from certain eight-legged death.”

The Shade stood at attention, the rapid rise and fall of his chest pulling at his leather vest as he scoured the cavern. I added curtains to the windows in my inner room, hoping it would work.

“ Silence.”

“Nothing here.”

“They retreat, sir.”

The bats spoke over the other. The Shade dropped his shoulders and looked toward the ceiling. He looked exhausted.

Uncle Koll’s brow furrowed. “Rest, son. You know—”

“I do.”

Uncle Koll just nodded.

The Shade dragged the back of his hand against his forehead as he rolled his ankle to loosen it. “Lucas”—he saw my confusion—“the bat behind us, says the spyrings are retreating.”

Uncle Koll smiled and pulled at the whisps of his whiskers. “Thank heavens. I don’t know how much longer I could have—”

A raccoon screeched and tumbled backward followed by his friends. The wolves jumped to their feet, turning, spinning, facing…everywhere. Only Bertha sat back and began to calmly lick her thin paws with her pitch-black tongue.

The clattering began once again, this time loud and from every corner of the cavern. The spider-like creatures poured out of holes that were tucked away from the light, crawling and dripping down the walls.

“Above, sir. Above!” a bat cried.

I snapped my gaze upward. Hundreds of spyrings drifted down like volcanic ash. Lower, lower, on top of our heads.

The Shade grabbed my hand and took off toward one of the tunnels to the east. “Uncle, can you—”

“With pleasure!” Uncle Koll lifted his left hand, tossing up a stone slab like a door across the nearest tunnels and blocking the way. A set of shadows whipped before us, lifting, tossing, and slicing through the spyrings that charged us from the front. Bertha jumped up to bat spyrings out of the air, tumbling with them until she had ripped off a claw here and a leg there. The wolves tore through the spyrings on our flanks while the other creatures tucked between us and Uncle Koll. The raccoons displayed uncommon violence when a spyring fell before them. The Shade’s tug pulled me with him into the next tunnel.

“Collapse it!” the Shade shouted.

With a grunt, Uncle Koll turned and planted his feet in a low squatting stance. The final mammals, including Lucas, tumbled into the tunnel or flitted in on thin wings, then Uncle Koll swirled his arms and threw them toward the floor. The tunnel behind us collapsed in a tumble of boulders. When silence reigned, my shoulders fell slack with relief.

“Well done,” the Shade said as he petted the ugly cave cat.

“Thank you, my boy. Feels good to stretch my magic again.”

The Shade smiled. “Shall we be off then?” He offered his elbow, then turned back. “Uncle?”

Uncle Koll was still squatting. “Well, ha! It seems I have gotten down…and now…I cannot get up. ”

I rushed back to help lift him—unnecessarily, it turned out, since the shadows wrapped him and lifted him aloft, while I…guided…kind of.

I laughed, feeling awkward and presumptuous. “Looks like you don’t need me.”

The Shade’s expression turned hard, his green eyes glinting in the light. “I don’t need you to help lift.” My soul ached. I knew it. “But that does not imply or even suggest that I don’t need you.” A wayward shadow slipped past my cheek in a sweet caress. “I need you very much.”

Uncle Koll walked through the shadow waving his hands. “Yes, yes. True love. Star crossed. Et cetera, et cetera. Please save the wooing of your lady for outside. I have no desire to remain here while you two figure this out.”

The shadow drifted to my palm and tugged, and I grasped it until it led me to the warmth of his own rough hand. “You need me?” I said stupidly but hopefully, knowing I was begging for attention.

“Like water. Like sunlight.”

I pressed my lips together. “Are you a plant?”

“Come on .” Uncle Koll demanded as he stormed ahead. Our eyes met as we traversed forward. I watched as the sharp edges of his face flickered in the lamplight. His dark brows pulled down in determination, his jaw scruffy and begging to be touched. My fingers burned with anticipation. But I held back. This man had been kind when he could have been cruel. He had been helpful when he could have abandoned me. And certainly, he cared for my wounds when I showed up mostly dead on his doorstep. He helped me make potions, and perhaps even a near-cure for the queen. He made me a lightbox because I felt afraid. Certainly, this man meant much more to me than I had expected .

I sighed, long and deep. Indeed, I liked him. I was a fool, but I liked my evil shadow overlord very much. And not even because he had saved my life or housed me. I had come willingly—pursued, certainly—but even before my life was on the line, at the ball, he had felt like a safe haven. The Shade had already claimed me as his, perhaps I should make him mine too.

The mark prickled on my neck.

Perhaps I would.