Shadowfall g-1 Read online

  “ Blood… to open the way, seed or menses to bless, sweat to imbue, tears to swell, saliva to ebb, phlegm to manifest, yellow bile to gift, and black to take it all away.”

  As she finished, water flowed from the spigot into the bucket. She allowed it to overflow. She’d need an entire bucket to wash the floor.

  With her pail full, she straightened. Hot and moist from her effort, she crossed to a ladder and pushed it toward one of the high windows.

  Just a little breeze and a bit of freshened air… then I’ll get back to the chore.

  She climbed the ladder. Once at the opening, she shoved her head through. Only now did she notice how much her eyes and nose burned from the reek of the rookery. She took deep, gulping breaths.

  All of Chrismferry lay sprawled below her. The city spread in walls, canals, and roofs all the way to the horizon. It was split in halves by the mighty Tigre River, shining silver in the sunlight. It was said that the city was so wide that it took a man on foot ten days to cross from one end to the other. There was a common response when one spoke about its vastness: The world is the city, and the city is the world.

  Gazing from the window, Dart saw it was true.

  Set like a jewel in the heart of the first of the Nine Lands, Chrismferry was the hub around which the world turned. The entire surrounding countryside, from shore to shore, fed the city, barging up from the coasts, carting down from the fields, flown in on the potbellied flippercrafts. The city was insatiable.

  And at the center of it all stood the great castillion of the eldermost god, Chrism. Dart, resting her chin on her fingers, stared at the walled and towered fortress. A vast thousand-acre garden spread out from its southern side, shadowed by the castillion itself. Wooded, it looked more like a forest than a garden, fitting for a god of the loam.

  And like Lord Chrism himself, his castillion was both noble and humble. Its walls were thick white granite, quarried locally, and unadorned. The main keep had been built on the site of the original ferry bridge that once forded the Tigre River. The structure rose up from both shores and spanned the waterway in between. The center halls were held above the river by giant, ancient pillars, all that was left of the original bridge. Even its nine towers, the Stone Graces, shared the river. Four rose from the north bank, four on the south, while the last and tallest rose above the river itself. These towers were the same white stone, simple, yet reassuring in their solidity. The only bits of decoration anywhere were the carved silver gates to the castillion, depicting the great Sundering, the moment when the kingdom of the gods had been shattered and they appeared among the lands of Myrillia.

  Dart sighed, dreaming of stepping through those brilliant gates someday. Until then, there were floors to clean.

  As she turned, the sharp creak of hinges startled her, loud in the stone space. Ravens stirred and squawked in complaint.

  Dart hopped down from the ladder, fearful of being caught idle. She found the gloom of the rookery suddenly oppressive. The door lay cracked open, wider by a handbreadth. But no one was in sight.

  “Good morrow!” she called. “Is anyone there?”

  There was no answer. Slowly her straining eyes began to pierce the darkness. Shadows retreated. She saw no one. Must have been a crosswind… tugging at the door.

  She turned to gather her pail and brush. As she bent away, the tower door crashed shut.

  Ravens screeched. A few took wing, crossing from one perch to another. Plops of guano rained around the room.

  The loss of the filtering torchlight from the hall drew the shadows toward her again, eating away the room.

  “Is anyone there?” Her voice was meeker this time, her throat tight with fear. “Please…”

  Footsteps answered, crossing toward her.

  She fell back against the stone wall.

  “There’s no need to fret, little kitten.” The voice was soft and deep. A figure appeared out of the gloom, large and broad shouldered.

  Dart recognized the voice as Master Willet, a scholar of the Conclave. As he stepped into the patch of sunlight flowing from the window, she saw he wore the usual sashed black robe of the Conclave, his hood thrown back. As was customary for the mistresses and masters, his head was shaved to the scalp.

  Dart stepped from the wall and curtsied with a half bend of a knee. “Master Willet.”

  He waved her out of the gloom under the window and into his patch of sunlight. “Come, child. What are you doing up here all alone?”

  Dart slumped forward. “Punishment, Master Willet.” She curtsied again, in case he hadn’t seen her first one.

  “So I’ve been told.”

  Dart felt a rush of heat to her cheek. Her humiliation knew no end.

  “It seems you’ve been a slovenly pupil. Needing additional tutoring. I was sent up here for a private lesson.”

  “Ser?”

  He stepped closer. A hand rose swiftly to her cheek. The back of his knuckles slid along her skin.

  Startled by his sudden touch, she fell back a step-but fingers snatched on to the collar of her shirt. She was yanked toward him. His other arm encircled her waist and pulled her tight against him, lifting her onto her toes.

  “Master Willet!” Tears rose to her eyes, confused, terrified.

  “Not a word, little kitten.” He leaned down to her ear, his voice suddenly savage. “Not now, not later, not ever.”

  She struggled. Lips found her throat, pressing and hungry. She smelled garlic and spiced meats on his breath.

  “No!” she cried out.

  A hand struck her across the face, stinging, shocking. She tasted blood in her mouth.

  “Not a sound, little kitten.” His words were both angry and strangely thick. He shoved her to the wall, pinned her between the stone and his heavy body.

  She knew what he intended. Here at the school they were trained in all the humoral fluids, including the handling of a god’s seed or menses. As such, they were instructed in the private ways of men and women. It was no great mystery.

  But it was a mystery forbidden to them. To serve a god, a handmaiden must be pure, untouched. Once bedded, all hope of such honor was gone. Just last year, a secret tryst between a young man and woman, both fifthfloorers, had been discovered. They had been whipped, then banished from the Conclave.

  “Not a word,” he growled again, fingers at her throat. His other hand reached down between her legs, under the tied edges of her skirt. Fingers tore at her undergarments, ripping and pulling.

  Tears ran down Dart’s face, burning with shame and horror. She couldn’t breathe. She stared over the master’s head as he panted and pawed. A hundred pairs of eyes stared down at her from the rafters. Silent witnesses.

  And there was one other.

  Pupp ran in circles at her feet, passing through her flesh, biting at her attacker, but his razored teeth found no purchase. The bit of energy he had used to scratch Laurelle must have wasted his reserves.

  Dart felt just as helpless.

  Below, fingers found what they had been searching for, cupping against her skin. She had been touched like this in the past only by healers testing her virginity. But now it was rougher, horrific. A scream built behind her ribs.

  Then the hand moved away.

  “Now for your lesson,” he groaned at her. “To show you how to please a god.”

  She was forced to the floor, on her back. He straddled atop her, pulling up his robe. He wore nothing underneath.

  He kneed her legs apart and shoved her skirts above her hips.

  She fought against him, but this only seemed to make him grunt harder and his eyes glint more feral. She sobbed and choked and even tried to bite at him. She would lose more than her virginity here on this floor. She would lose all her hopes for herself, for her future, for the only home she knew.

  But there was no stopping him. He was huge, outweighed her by ten stone. All she could do was cry and sob. Terror had taken all her strength away.

  She turned her face. P
upp lay near her head. His eyes glowed with fury. Though forever silent, Dart imagined him whining, sharing her pain and terror.

  Then she felt Willet shove inside her, ripping her, breaking her. Blood flowed. The scream burst from her lips, but he was ready even for this. A fistful of her own skirt was shoved into her mouth, gagging her.

  “I am your god!” he moaned.

  Pupp was again on his feet, diving through her body, his touch cold. He shoved down between her legs, his frigid wake ebbing some of the pain. When he reached her belly, ice flared. The momentary agony vanished, washed away. She felt nothing below her waist.

  Still, Willet continued to rut into her, pounding and pushing, grunting and panting.

  Dart squeezed her eyes closed, wishing herself away. But there was no escape. She could smell him, hear him, feel his lips on her neck.

  Then the monster arched back from her, gasping out through clenched teeth. Dart cringed, but Master Willet’s cry of pleasure suddenly transfigured into a scream of pain. He fell back from the cradle of her thighs.

  Dart opened her eyes in time to see an arc of blood spout from the man’s groin, fountaining up like a stream of piss.

  But the man no longer had anything with which to piss.

  Nothing lay between the man’s legs.

  The same was not true of Dart. Still numb, unable to move her legs, she watched Pupp crawl out of her belly, rising up between her thighs, covered in her own blood. The small creature spat out a limp chunk of flesh: the man’s prick and sack. Pupp had bitten it all off from inside.

  “Pupp…” she moaned. Feeling returned to her, agony flaring, as her friend climbed free of her.

  Only then did she notice Willet’s eyes grow wide with horror. He was staring at Pupp, seeing her monstrous friend for the first time.

  It was the last thing he ever saw.

  Pupp leaped at the cowering man, becoming a blur of blade, spike, and razored teeth. He drove into the man’s belly, burrowing straight through. But Pupp was no longer a ghost. Flesh sizzled and burned with the touch of his molten skin. Curved spikes tore through flesh and bone.

  A horrible howl accompanied the slaughter.

  On hands and knees, Dart fled to the far side of the room. She had worked in the kitchens. She had seen meat ground into sausages, metal churning organ to pulp.

  This was the same.

  In moments, butchered to scrap, nothing remained of the man.

  Pupp crawled free of the pile, shaking blood and bits of gore from his spiked mane, coughing up gouts of scorched meat. With a final shudder, his body blazed into brightness, a burning ember blown to life.

  In that moment, Pupp shone with a terrible and fierce beauty. An intelligence beyond her friend stared into this world as a keening wail filled the chamber.

  Shadows thickened and billowed outward from his form, sweeping through the room. Ravens, silent sentinels until this moment, shattered from their perches in a panic of wings and feathers. As a flock, they dove out the windows and were gone.

  Alone now, Dart cowered, trapped between horror and panic.

  But no further harm came to her.

  The shadows fell under their weight, sinking to the floor and vanishing away. The piercing wail vanished with them.

  Pupp remained in the center of the room, his blaze doused to its usual ruddy hue. He was now clean, unsoiled-as was the rest of the rookery.

  Numb, Dart watched Pupp cross the spotless floor, trotting to her side as he had done all her life. He sat at her feet and groomed himself with a flaming tongue.

  Dart reached a trembling hand out to her friend. But her fingers passed through him. He had gone ghostly again. How?

  She took a step away, suddenly fearful. But as she moved, her legs shuddered, her knees jellied. An ache throbbed throughout her belly. She felt a fresh trickle of blood flow down her thighs. Sobbing, she fell to her hands. The room spun. She vomited boiled cabbage all over the floor.

  Pupp was there, nosing her, concerned.

  It was all too much. She fell on her side and curled herself on the floor, crying, sobbing, and shaking. She stared across the chamber. There was no sign of Master Willet, not even a stain of blood. All had vanished into the darkness.

  Had it happened? Had it all happened?

  A fist lay curled between her thighs, holding back the ache. She tugged her hand free. Her fingers were covered with blood.

  Pupp belly crawled to her bosom. She reached to him again. Her bloody hand found warm flesh to touch. Pupp pushed into her, rubbing into her stained palm. She could feel him! He was hard and warm, like an agate stone of a fire god, freshly blessed in blood.

  The answer was clear.

  “Blood,” she whispered.

  The effect was brief. As the heat dried the dampness from her palm, her fingers fell through Pupp’s form. He was gone again.

  Allowing the mystery to distract her, she sat on the floor and pulled her knees up to her chin. With her arms wrapped around her shins, she shivered and shuddered, rocking slightly. Occasional sobs broke through, but she focused on merely breathing. In and out. The Litany of Nine Graces echoed in her mind: blood to open the way, seed or menses to bless, sweat to imbue, tears to swell, saliva to ebb..

  But she kept coming back to the first.

  “Blood to open the way…” She stared at Pupp, now curled at her side, and wondered the meaning of it all.

  A bell rang out sharply, rising from the courtyards below, announcing the ending of lessons.

  Only now did she notice the brightness of the western windows as the sun settled toward the horizon. She had been lost to the world for most of the day.

  One last sob shook through her. The reality of where she was and her situation could not be ignored. She carefully stretched her legs, rolling slowly to her feet with a groan. She stood for another long spell, dazed, at a loss in which direction to move.

  Who could she tell? What could she say? How could she explain?

  As these impossible questions and a thousand others rattled through her skull, her feet took over. She found herself at the bucket she had filled in another life. She bent and picked up the scrub brush. She stared down at it, knowing her body had already settled on an answer.

  She was no longer pure. No one would believe the truth here. All that would be understood was that she was now spoiled, fouled for any god, unfit to walk these halls. She would surely be cast out.

  But not this night.

  After what happened here, she could not survive banishment.

  Not this night.

  Dart knew what she must do.

  She shed her clothes and used the cold water and brush to clean her body. At first, she worked in a half panic, fearing being caught. Her hands trembled. But slowly her fingers gripped the brush more securely. She concentrated on the simple act of bathing, falling back on ritual. The cool water helped calm her.

  Once clean, she dried herself with rags. She still bled, so she padded herself with her ripped undergarments and climbed back into her outers. She carefully inspected her skirts and rubbed dust and dried guano over any bloody spots, hiding all evidence.

  She washed her hands in the pail and stared at her shattered reflection in the rocking waters. The girl who had climbed these steps was gone, vanished into the darkness as surely as Master Willet’s butchered form.

  She stared at the spot on the floor. She would never return here.

  Her eyes settled next on Pupp, sitting diligently, patiently. Like her, he had been transformed in this room, becoming a deeper mystery. She understood less about him, only that he had stood by her, protected her.

  For now, that was enough.

  Though an ache still lay buried deep inside her, where no scrub brush could ever reach, Dart put away her bucket and broom and broke open a bale of fresh hay. The smell of summer and pasture filled the room as she kicked a fresh layer around the chamber. She spread it thick to fully cover the floor.

  By the time she was
done, the windows to the east had gone dark and the sun was but a weak glow to the west. She could no longer hide up here.

  She crossed to the door and pulled it open. The torchlight was blinding. As she blinked away the glare, laughter echoed up from far below, bright and cheerful.

  It sounded brittle and brought an ache to her head.

  Supper was already being served. No one seemed to remember the little girl up in the tower. No one missed Dart.

  She headed down the stairs. Each step hurt, reminding her of something she hadn’t wanted to face.

  Someone had known she was up here. Someone had let Master Willet pass up the stairs, had let him know a girl was alone in the rookery.

  Something darker than anger filled her. Whoever it was, they would pay. The dartweed that grew in the courtyard, her namesake, developed woody thorns as it aged… thorns that were seldom seen until they pierced the flesh.

  “To me, Pupp,” she said quietly. “To me.”

  3

  DUNGEON

  “It aren’t that bad if you ignore the flies.”

  Tylar studied the moving feast that was his meal. Flies coated the stew of gristle and fat. The crust of bread atop it looked to be milled more from mold than flour. But he’d had worse. He soaked the hard bread into the broth, trying to soften the crust enough to chew. Tiny worms used the bread as a raft, climbing aboard.

  “What about these maggots?” he asked sourly, shaking the crust clean of the squiggling stowaways.

  “Nothing wrong with ’em. Them’s the only thing that gives this stew any taste.”

  Tylar bit into the bread and glanced to the ragged rat of a man who had joined him in his cell that morning, tossed in naked and striped with whippings across his back. A head shorter than Tylar, he was all bone and beard. He set upon the meal like a hinter-king upon a feast. From the gray hairs laced in his red beard, he was not a young man, but what little muscle on him was still hard. About a decade older than myself, Tylar judged.

  The prisoner noted his attention. “Name’s Rogger,” he mumbled over the edge of his bowl.