Shadow Heir Chapter 22
Life moves on, even if all your friends hate you...
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Kalissa didn’t say a word as she drove us home. Charlie wasn’t the chatty sort. Hatred swirled in the air, suffocating. When we got back to Mr. Whiting’s house, I shut myself in my room with the mushroom and snowflake sprites who tried to cheer me up.
Bouncing acrobatics couldn’t pierce that cloak of loathing.
Hunger drove me to the lunch table, but Kalissa wouldn’t even look at me. I took my food and retreated to my room.
A day later, Charlie pounded on my door. “Lazy freak, enough moping. Get out here!”
I just sat, curled in a ball and wrapped in blankets stripped off my bed.
Eventually, he went away.
Lazy freak.
Sure.
Fine.
Call me that. Call me a murderer, a selfish coward—all of it was true. I’d thought I was some sort of champion. Shelter the defenseless sprites, heal the wilting Unseelie plants, show mercy to the tortured messenger. What a joke.
Kalissa’s eyes showed me the truth.
These hands had grasped evil and used it. Blood spilled—not my fault, but through my action.
Murderer.
In the moment when I could have removed myself from the equation, I’d stayed silent.
My father’s wishes? My father’s sacrifice?
A spider silk dream severed by reality’s sword. He’d saved a child who would destroy life as we knew it by merely existing.
Maybe the Order was right.
And yet, the sprites gathered around me, hugging an evil thing too big for them to even wrap their minuscule arms around, said something different—lent truth to that fantasy of defending the helpless.
With Tel’garoph’s magic.
Saving things woven from evil with that same evil. Synthetic sylvans. I’d thought they came from nowhere? Nowhere but my own head, just like Raelyx had come from Tel’garoph’s.
I raised my head to look at them. “Did I make you?”
Solemn heads tilted to look at me. Nodded—all except the single snowflake sprite I’d brought home from AllMart.
My head dropped back into the dubious shelter of my knees. I hugged myself harder.
I’d thought I was providing shelter for these creatures. What a joke. I’d been spawning them out of some subconscious need for comfort.
Almost, I reached out to unravel them.
But that would be murder.
I’d already spilled enough blood.
Maybe the Order was right. Maybe all Unseelie were evil. And even if they weren’t, I could destroy the world. One wrong step, one moment of inattention and Tel’garoph would take me. I would cease to exist and that death would be so much worse than the one the Order had planned.
But try as I might, I couldn’t bring myself to go downstairs and ask Kalissa to open a portal to Castle Archdragon.
She would do it. Maybe she would do it anyway. Maybe I didn’t have a decision to make and the Mercy would just show up at my door and take the choice out of my hands.
Maybe all I had to do was wait.
But if the Mercy didn’t knock on my door, maybe it would be Tel’garoph, and I refused to let him take me.
Hopeless as it might be, I would do my best to kill him the next time we met, and sitting curled in a ball on my bed wouldn’t help me beat him.
Two ends; death by Mercy or battle with Tel’garoph. And if he came before I gathered my courage, I couldn’t lose.
That night, after Kalissa went to sleep and Charlie went home, I snuck into the workroom with my sword and worked.
Muscles burned, salt stung my eyes, and still I worked. Worked until dawn light came and I opened my eyes to find Charlie’s booted feet standing in front of where I’d passed out on the floor.
He looked down at me, folded his arms.
I stiffened, ready to give back any vitriol that came my way. Coward, murderer, liar, traitor.
“You and Kalissa need to talk.”
I blinked at him. Anger edged his voice, kept barely under wraps.
He didn’t move.
I forced my voice to work. “Kalissa doesn’t want to talk to me.” I don’t want to look in that mirror again.
“Kalissa’s a bitch.”
My throat stuck together and I coughed, trying to breathe. The nearest water tap was in the bathroom next to Kalissa’s room, so I just hadn’t drunk anything all night.
Charlie looked up, away from me. His cheeks flushed—with anger, embarrassment? “You’re a bitch, too. Fix your stupid girl problems. This place is almost as bad as home.” He turned away and started to stomp off.
“Stupid girl problems?” I shoved my way to my feet and went after him. “I’m half Unseelie—she’s never going to forgive me for that.” I betrayed her. Forced her to trust his daughter.
Charlie stopped, turned, and I danced back, away from his fist. “You think we didn’t all know you were a freak? Does it really matter what kind? You’re all freaks. Get over yourself.”
I cringed back. How dare he! A freak? Like anyone who was different was caught between two different forces trying to kill them!
I kicked out. He grabbed my leg, stepped in fast, and then I was on the ground seeing stars with his knee crushing the air out of my lungs.
His eyes blazed. “You think trying to kill yourself training is going to help her? You think she’s not in just as much pain as you are? Get over yourself, damn freak. You’re not the only one hurting.”
I squirmed, twisted to the side, but he stood up and stomped off before my battered body could react. The workroom door slammed behind him.
The ghost of his voice lingered in the air. You’re not the only one hurting.
The vision came from an eternity away—a life where everything wasn’t cracked and bleeding—but it still came. Charlie with his bar of iron fending off that Nightmare feeding on his mom.
Almost as bad as home.
There were no more tears left. All my self-pity had seeped into the floor of the workroom. I got to my feet.
Killing myself training wouldn’t solve anything.
Maybe, just maybe, talking with Kalissa would help. It certainly couldn’t make anything worse.
I went downstairs, expecting to see Kalissa in the kitchen making breakfast. Instead, Mr. Whiting sat at the table, reading the newspaper.
Relief from worry so buried I hadn’t even realized it weighed on me descended. He was alive. He was okay!
I hurried over. “Where have you been? What happened? Why did you send us home without you?”
That word again. Home.
He didn’t look up from the paper. “And here Charlie was saying I wouldn’t see you except for a glimpse here or there when you came for food.”
Guilt twisted my stomach. I remembered him frozen in ice, limbs contorted into a chair. And I remembered melting that ice, watching him crumple into a heap. It was the first time I’d seen him since the forest.
Delight buried under self loathing dared to bubble up. “You survived.” Because of me.
Kalissa hated me, but she was alive.
Dizziness left me gripping the edge of the table and dropping down into a chair next to him. Stupid to train without water. Stupid to do it all night. If Father were here, he would have read me the riot act.
But he wasn’t.
Just like that, those bubbles of delight popped. I looked down at the swirling wood grain beneath my fingers, expecting to see red.
“You disobeyed orders.”
The iron displeasure in Mr. Whiting’s voice whipped my head up. I stared at him.
He held the newspaper between us, feigning disinterest. But around him wisped currents of rage built on fear.
“I—” I don’t answer to you. I saved you. You and Kalissa.
“You nearly destroyed everything.”
Those words hit me like a bolt in the heart.
True.
I nearly destroyed everything.
“You nearly set off an eternal winter almost directly on top of the portal between our realm and the Seelie realm.”
Another bolt. I gasped from the pain.
He still didn’t look away from his newspaper. “And you dragged Charlie in with you. He could have died and everyone relying on him would have died, too.”
His mother.
I curled into myself. Leaving my room was a mistake.
“I’ve just spent the last two days cleaning up your mess, smoothing things over with the queen of the Seelie court, and stopping the cataclysm you spawned.” Mr. Whiting shook the newspaper and folded it with a snap. His eyes burned with anger. “What were you thinking?”
Nothing. I wasn’t thinking. Stupid idiot, using magic to claw some amount of good out of Tel’garoph’s mess. An eternal winter? That was only my due. Every time I let that power out, something awful happened.
Stupid, stupid!
Cold welled up at my fingertips. Frost crawled across the tabletop and Mr. Whiting stood, looking at it with disgust. “Control yourself!”
I stood, turned to go—what had I been thinking, coming out here?—and then stopped. The solution was so close. Kalissa didn’t have to open the portal to Castle Archdragon, Mr. Whiting could do it with barely a thought. And if I went there, I wouldn’t set off an ice age, I wouldn’t let my body get stolen and used to destroy the world, I wouldn’t hurt anyone or scare anyone ever again. Tears froze in my eyes and fell to the carpeted floor, where they sat like crystallize demon tears, mocking me.
I opened my mouth. To apologize. To give up. To ask—
“Eira, you can’t use this power. It’s too much for any mortal. Shut it away—you know how. I watched you grow up, watched you control it. You have to do that again, don’t you see? Control it and we can protect you.”
Charlie’s voice from memory. You think we didn’t all know you were a freak?
Seal my power away? Like evil? And why not? As long as it existed, it was one more handle Tel’garoph could use to find me.
It was one more handle I could use to survive. One more handle I could use to protect those around me. One more handle I could use to destroy the world.
Does it really matter what kind? Charlie, at least, didn’t care.
Funny, a world where Charlie was my biggest supporter.
“Where’s Kalissa?” Not the words I meant to say.
“Out.”
I turned back around, met his fiery eyes. “I didn’t mean to set off an eternal winter. I just wanted to distract him long enough to rescue you and Kalissa.” Wasn’t rescuing you good, even if you hate me for it?
“I told you to stay put.”
“You told me to let you die.” More crystal tears fell silently to the floor.
Mr. Whiting snorted and looked away, muttering, “Isn’t it just like Caylen to raise such a contrary kid?” He looked back to me. His voice firmed. “I’ve asked Kalissa not to say anything. I don’t know if she’ll do what I asked. But I can only hide you if you stop putting us all in danger. Focus on your swordsmanship, seal that evil back up where it won’t hurt anyone. We’ve got time to train you up properly now. Next time, if there is a next time, you won’t need to resort to magic.”
The ultimatum crackled in the air between us. Use magic and lose his protection.
He picked up the newspaper again and leaned back in his chair. “Get hydrated and get some sleep, kid. You were thumping around up there all night.”
#
I focused on swordsmanship like Mr. Whiting asked—shoved that whirlwind of emotion to the back of my mind, sealed it up in a tiny prison where all its raging couldn’t touch me. I needed him to teach me no matter what happened. Each night, I dropped into my bed like a stone. Tel’garoph haunted my dreams. The sprites stayed out of my way.
Murderer. Liar. Traitor. Coward.
The only thing that drove those words out of my head was sword work, so I worked myself harder.
A week later, Kalissa arrived during breakfast time. She was covered with dots of silver ichor. Anger and frustration swirled around her like a telepathic storm.
Mr. Whiting looked up as she stomped over to the breakfast table and jerked her chair out.
Charlie, who’d showed up the day before and stayed the night, pushed the cereal and milk in her direction.
“Hard hunt?” Mr. Whiting’s voice held a note of careful neutrality.
Kalissa dumped the rest of the Charm Palz into her bowl and slopped milk on top. Didn’t answer.
My belly tightened. She didn’t look at me—hadn’t looked at me once.
Out hunting by herself—as an apprentice? Could apprentices even go hunting sylvans by themselves? Or was she with someone else?
How many moments before whoever she’d told about me showed up? How many moments did I have left to live?
I’d thought it would be a relief, but this knife-edge uncertainty cut deep.
Kalissa’s eyes flicked to me—hatred, shame, guilt—emotions slammed into my mind, twisting my belly. The cereal that had gone down so recently wanted to come back up. Stomach acid and milk.
“Shouldn’t have been.” She shoved another spoonful of cereal in her mouth.
A snap in my mind. Her emotions vanished from my awareness.
Shame for turning me in? For keeping my secret?
Almost, I shoved away from the table and went upstairs to await my fate. If the Mercy came, would he kill me in the living room in front of everyone else? It seemed like the kind of thing he would do. Better to be elsewhere so they didn’t have to see.
“Oh?” The caution in Mr. Whiting’s voice grew.
Kalissa didn’t elaborate. Silence pinned me to my chair. Which was it? Had she reported me?
Charlie’s laugh, too loud, rebounded against the tension. “Ah, you wimp. It was probably a handful of Kobolds.”
A joke? Teasing? Or did he really think so little of her?
Kalissa turned her glare on him. The air between them heated but it didn’t seem to faze him. “Not. Kobolds.”
He laughed again, an edge of customary meanness in the sound. “Lighten up, wimp.”
“Shut up!” She dropped her spoon and stood. Milk splashed everywhere. Her eyes grew distant but held no less fury. “Sadistic bastard.”
She turned, and I saw the tears in the shoulder of her gray coat. Tears like claws, flesh exposed beneath. I knew that shape.
Drakon claws?
She’d been hunting Drakon? Her? After what she’d just been through?
She stomped off and I stared after her.
“Who?” Charlie asked quietly.
You, I almost said. Mr. Whiting spoke before I got the chance.
“Our dearest Mercy wanted her assistance. Some hands-on mentorship, I think he said. He didn’t mention what kind of creature he was hunting.”
Drakon. The Mercy had taken her to hunt Drakon. Another ploy to get the Mind Crown? Sheer cruelty?
Charlie slammed his chair back. Stood. The force of it sloshed milk over the rim of my bowl. “And you let her go?” He turned to go after her. Shame, guilt, pity slammed against my mind. Not the sinister kind I’d gotten from Kalissa, something gentler.
And I teased her.
Mr. Whiting held up a hand—not that Charlie could see it. “She won’t want your—”
“—Nobody asked you!” He left. The front door slammed with force that shook the whole house.
I sat in the sudden silence staring down at the splatters of milk on the table like drops of emotional blood spilled one too many times.
Mr. Whiting didn’t look at me. It didn’t help.
If she told the Mercy—
His thought? Mine? Did it matter?
Being more careful of the furniture, I stood and gathered up my bowl. Rinsed it, put it in the dishwasher alongside my wooden spoon. My fingers ached where the rubber coating on the metal appliance was too thin. But Kalissa wasn’t going to do it.
I donned my gloves and cleared the rest of the table while Mr. Whiting just sat there, staring at the wood grain of the table as if it would give him answers.
Kalissa kept the microfiber cloth hanging on the handle of one of the kitchen drawers. I picked it up, wet it down, and wiped the table. Sopping up emotional stains—if only it were that easy.
The cloth went back on the handle so it could be used for the rest of the day before being washed. The same way it worked at my home, with Father.
Father who I killed.
I turned to go back to my room and await my fate.
A whisper scalded the edge of my mind as I passed the entryway and put one foot on the stairs.
Help!
Pain in my side—no, not my side. Tentacles, midnight black, red eyes drawing me in. No, not me.
I was in the house, climbing the stairs. But these surroundings weren’t Mr. Whiting’s house. No, I was caught in the dark. Wind kissed my cheek. A woman stood before me, veins threaded with black, tentacles reaching—
I’d seen that creature before.
Iron in the hand that wasn’t mine, trying to drive the creature back.
Not today. You won’t beat me, damn it! Someone—
And then my foot was back on the stair and my head ached. Golden spore dust littered the carpet and a mob of mushroom sprites surged down the stairs toward me, carrying something so translucent it was visible only as a distortion as it moved.
My sword.
Charlie.