Between the Shade and the Shadow Read online

  Between the Shade and the Shadow

  Coleman Alexander

  The Realmless, LLC

  Contents

  Prologue

  1. Shade

  2. The Darkening

  3. The Astra

  4. Bindings

  5. Singing

  6. The Stone Tree

  7. The Underdae

  8. Bright Fire

  9. Lightwalker

  10. Worries in the Night

  11. The Masai

  12. Traded for Darkness

  13. Fading Light

  14. Alp and Astra

  15. Chasms

  16. Fingers and Fog

  17. Running Shadows

  18. Beneath the Dae-Mon

  19. Separation

  20. Waning

  21. Lightening

  22. Broken Dark

  23. Kill

  24. Wraith

  25. Severed

  26. Lost

  27. Darkness

  28. Shadow Bound

  29. Discovery

  30. Hunted by Darkness

  31. Unbroken Bond

  32. Digging Graves

  33. Fire and Light

  34. Bound

  35. The Heart of the Woods

  Epilogue

  The End

  Author’s Note

  Dedication

  Prologue

  SHADOW

  Midnight had come and gone and Ahraia still hadn’t found a shadow. If she didn’t find one soon, she was dead.

  Her hair stuck to her face even in the bitter cold and though the sky was clear and overflowing with stars, a fine dusting of snow spun from the treetops with the gusting wind. The branches swayed and shifted. The light of the moons danced dangerously across the ground. But it was a lifeless dance—the woods were desolate. Deserted.

  Dead, Ahraia thought. Like I’m going to be.

  The lightrise was coming.

  Cold sweat froze upon her neck and mixed with her rising dread, sending shivers through her spine with every step. She shuddered to think what awaited her if she dared return home to the darkening without a shadow: condemnation to the shadow woods, where the Shad-Mon lurked.

  Even dying beneath the blistering light of the Dae-Mon would be better than that.

  She tried to push the thought aside, but her hope was fading. Even if she managed to find a shadow, she still had to bond it and bind it and that took time—time that had already slipped past her like the moons through the night sky.

  How could I have failed? she thought.

  Her mother had never told her what to do if she didn’t find a shadow—no one even mentioned it as a possibility. Even the weakest spritelings found something to bind. It was as if every shadow in the forest had sensed her and fled.

  Her thin boots crunched over the frozen ground. She brushed the frost-tinged strands of hair from her face and blew out a hard breath; the air fogged before her, a portent of her fate to come.

  Maybe if I just keep running . . . Maybe if I find a dark hollow and hide . . .

  She wondered if her mother would send the wards after her. Would they hunt her down? Would they drag her back to Daispar to condemn her? Or would they assume that the light had taken her?

  Maybe if I just leave the forest . . .

  No. That was impossible. No sprite left the safety of the deep roots and dark hollows. No one risked walking beneath the bright fire in the dead of day.

  Ahraia ran on, lost in worry until she noticed the forest ahead was growing brighter—not deadly, like the first hint of the Dae-Mon creeping over the horizon, nor sharp like the flicker of a lightwalker’s angry flame. But luminous. Incandescent. Broad and expansive and ominously so. She shivered, her ears standing on end in nervous anticipation.

  The Endless Plains.

  She squinted. The snow glowed painfully white. The last silhouettes of the forest stood judging her, their eaves crossed disapprovingly. She ducked beneath them, feeling both daring and afraid, flitting from one tree to the next, until at last, she stood under the very last tree, at the edge of the woods.

  Her breath caught in her throat.

  The Endless Plain stretched before her into nothingness, extending beyond thought or reason as the light of the Bright Moon burned overhead. The night sky was dim and the stars were withdrawn. They seemed shy and fitful in the brilliance of their mother. The Blood Moon rested behind her round face, watchful, as ever.

  Ahraia marveled at the vast expanse. How could a land be so barren and free? How could it be without cover? She had never stood so near to it—so dangerously close. She wondered what it would be like to run across such open lands.

  I should be looking for a shadow, she thought.

  She shivered, imagining what the unhindered light might feel like on her skin: bright and boundless, painfully sweet and soft. The grasses rose above the thin snow and ruffled in the gusting wind, uncaring of the coming morning. She yearned to feel like that, to run amongst them, to run without a care and laugh with the rolling downs.

  The wind danced before her.

  Come with me, it seemed to say, tugging at her mind. Her cloak whipped outward, the veins of the eaves-web glimmering indecently, chasing the wind onto the plains.

  “That’s forbidden,” she murmured back. I have to keep looking.

  She meant to turn away. But her feet didn’t move.

  Her mind wouldn’t let them.

  Instead, she stood perfectly still, captivated, as her eyes adjusted to the brilliant landscape. Running beneath the moonlight would mark her. And if she were caught afield when the Dae-Mon rose, discovered by day's light, it would mean death of another sort. Trapped. Burned. Blistered by the Dae-Mon.

  What’s worse—dying condemned or dying afire?

  Her answer came easily; the wind was calling her. It turned about her and pulled her white hair across her face, tickling at her cheek.

  Come with me, it seemed to say. Run with me.

  She took a step and then felt her worry wrench her to a stop. There aren’t any shadows out there.

  Come with me, she heard again.

  For the first time in her life, Ahraia stepped out of the forest.

  The moonlight prickled perilously on her pale skin. She looked down. Her skin wasn’t pale—it was gray, ashen. It was gray like the Bright Moon was white, as ashen as the fallen aspen leaf. Her markings emerged on her wrists, revealed as the faintest speckling. Her hair was a mixture of the Bright Moon and her skin: a translucent sheet of silver that shimmered against the stars and played amongst their light. It was bright. She grinned.

  And her mother said bright was a bad thing.

  She giggled and took another step. She unsquinted her eyes. More light. She laughed. The wind stirred beneath her, pulling at her heart. She took another step, and then another.

  And then she began to run, her fear falling about her feet as she let herself race with the wind, unhindered by the dark and tumble of the forest. She laughed and delighted beneath the forbidden light. Nothing else in life compared. She ran like she had never run before, time slipping by until her lungs burned like a brilliant and terrible fire. The moons stared down on her, and still Ahraia ran.

  When she finally stopped, the forest extended as a distant black line behind. Her hair settled around her in a halo of cold light and she breathed in great, puffing breaths beside a dark pool. The waters formed a rippling reflection of the night above. Ahraia stopped to drink and looked down at her reflection as the wind calmed. The markings on her face and neck showed too now, veins of silver-red seeping across her skin—the markings of the moonlight. She had never seen them so sharply. For a moment, her
simmering fear returned.

  Unnatural. Unwanted. Unwelcome.

  Those were the thoughts her mother would use. No decent sprite would let herself be scarred so plainly. None but the dae-wards who roamed on the fringes of daylight were marked like this.

  And none of the other spritelings would run across the Endless Plains, a rebellious part of her thought. She laughed at the audacity of it. She would be dead with the lightrise. Why shouldn’t she laugh at her markings? Her mother would never even know.

  And then laughter echoed from across the pool, quiet but unmistakable.

  A shadow?

  Ahraia looked up and there stood a dark shape silhouetted against the white snow of the plains. It stared back at her, smiling.

  A flush of excitement ran through her.

  A shadow.

  How had she not noticed it? Had it been running with her the whole time? Ahraia smiled, aware of how unlikely it was—a shadow, here, where there were no shadows to be found.

  Of course you find shadow where there’s light, she thought.

  She reached out with her mind and discovered she already recognized the shadow. She had felt its presence the very first time she had seen the Endless Plains. This was one of their keepers—and it had been waiting for her. Ahraia smiled.

  The shadow smiled back.

  Its fur was light like her skin, light but not pale—gray, ashen. It was gray like the night was sometimes black, as ashen as the charcoal of the fire pits, shimmering under the light of the stars. Around its large ears, its coloring was darker, a mixture of its fur and the night.

  Ahraia walked silently around the pool, her eyes fixed on the shadow. It stood and watched her, its long tail swishing restlessly in the night. Ahraia paused, her ears quivering. She tried to remember everything she had been told about bonding and binding a shadow, but all she could focus on was how beautiful it was. It stood almost as tall as she, even though it prowled on four legs. Its eyes shone yellow, like her own.

  As she neared it, she giggled again, nervously.

  She reached out to cast the bond but found the connection was already formed. How long had it been there? She didn’t know, but it was perfect.

  She stood before it for a long moment and then reached out with a gray, light-scarred hand to touch its black nose. It was wet and warm and she laughed. The shadow licked at her hands, a warm and rough embrace, the type a shadow makes. Ahraia kissed it on its forehead.

  “So you are my shadow?” she asked in a whisper as she ran her fingers through a big clump of fur behind its ears.

  The young wolf nuzzled her in silent agreement.

  “And I am your shade,” Ahraia said.

  Ahraia walked with her hand grasped firmly in the fur of her newly-found shadow, hoping it wouldn’t slip away. It walked next to her with steady, rolling strides, but doubt was creeping into her wolf’s mind as they returned to the safety of the woods.

  What will I call you? Ahraia thought, hoping to distract it from its worries, wondering if she had bound it as she should have—a proper binding as her mother called it. They had spent the last hour of the night running after the moons and chasing after the wind. They had dashed light-footed over half-frozen streams, leaping over ice that was far too thin to hold them, while laughing at the thrill of it. They had startled a herd of keress, the great elk of the plains and Ahraia’s shadow had howled with glee, causing the beasts to bray and stomp and shake their antlers all the more.

  But now the morning approached, and they both were growing wary. The Bright Moon had joined the Dark Moon beneath the horizon, and only the Blood Moon remained just above the hilltops. It was an ominous time to be out.

  “Do wolves have names?” Ahraia murmured aloud.

  The wolf’s thoughts burned like dim flames, ill-conceived beyond instinct. Her shadow’s ears tucked back nervously. She was thinking of the plains and the moons and her pack.

  We tell stories about the moons, Ahraia conveyed, making her thoughts known to the wolf. They were wolves once, like you, sisters who roamed the plains. My people tell the story of the Blood Wolf and the Dark Wolf, but my favorite is the story of the Bright Wolf. Ahraia ran her finger’s through her wolf’s fur, knowing how unspritish that was to admit. The Blood Moon and Dark Moon were smaller and slower—they didn’t burn like the Bright Moon. Her shadow didn’t care. Her ears stood straighter; she was listening.

  The Bright Wolf was the strongest wolf to ever walk the lands, Ahraia thought to her wolf. Losna was her name, and it was known from Everdark to Everlight. But one day, Losna’s mother was killed by the Dae-Mon. So bitter and angry was she that she leapt into the sky to chase after the Dae-Mon. Losna became the Bright Moon, the Masah, the great hunter of the night. Now she spends her night ruling over the world and her days chasing the Dae-Mon. That is why the wolves call for her. Because they love her. And they miss her.

  Ahraia let her mind fall into silence. They walked for a time, dodging between slivers of moonlight that fell to the forest floor.

  Losna, her shadow thought.

  “I will call you Losna.” The name rolled off Ahraia’s tongue and rumbled in her heart. She nodded, as though it was decided. “It’s a good name,” she said, running her fingers through her shadow’s fur. You called me, didn’t you? It wasn’t the wind. It was your thoughts carried on the wind.

  She felt her shadow warm next to her.

  But how could you call me if you don’t speak?

  Ahraia lowered herself deeper into the enchantment, trying to sense what the wolf was feeling.

  Wary.

  It wasn’t so much a word as it was an emotion, imperceptible except as a vague feeling. It was the wolf’s state of being. Losna’s state of being, Ahraia thought, the name tugging their link tighter.

  The Dae-Mon lurked just below the horizon and gray light tinged the snowy land. Ahraia’s skin burned but she didn’t dare hurry—her only concern was keeping Losna tight to her body and mind. She found the tread of a familiar path and they followed it deeper into the woods, the world around them growing steadily brighter, until at last, she saw the tightly laced wall of trees ahead. The Darkening. She breathed out a sigh of relief.

  Daispar.

  Danger? Losna bristled.

  Ahraia flinched. The thought pierced their bond, sudden and raw—nothing like the conveyance she was accustomed to. When sprites like her mother or father made their thoughts known, their conveyance was articulate and clear. This was instinct—less a thought than a bare emotion; it was only Ahraia’s own mind that teased it into coherence. Yet the feeling was lucid and pure as the darkest night, fierce and sharp as the winter wind.

  Losna sniffed at the air and hesitated, staring at the wall before them.

  Home, Ahraia conveyed, reaching inside herself as she tried to conjure the emotion of the dark safety awaiting inside. The darkening was the village–the sprawling tree that formed a massive shelter inside the forest, keeping out the day’s light.

  Our darkening . . . Our den. She breathed out, stilling her fears so that her shadow could feel the reassurance of her emotions.

  Losna lowered her head and sniffed before continuing closer, never letting her eyes drift from the trees ahead, where the snow clung in white, half-drawn layers across the deep forest.

  Ahraia bound the branches of the darkening’s wall in enchantment; they were stiff with cold, frozen and sleepy.

  Open, she thought, rousing them, helping them know how they needed to move. The branches shifted, causing snow to tumble to the ground in soft thumps as a narrow closure formed in the side of the darkening.

  A pulse of fear emitted from Losna as the wall moved. But it wasn’t fear of the dark or the cold: it came from knowing that dark things—creatures of the night—lurked inside. She growled at the pitch-black maw, ready to run. Ahraia dug her fingers into Losna's fur.

  It’s okay, she thought, tense as though the Dae-Mon had fully risen. It’s safe. Come. I will protect you.

>   Relaxing her grip, Ahraia let her mind envelop the feeling of safety. This is home. She stepped inside, waiting to see if Losna followed her into the darkness.

  She sensed the darkening waiting for her, full of sprites and spritelings, shades and shadows. They surrounded her, their wraith-like eyes showing with night-gleam. The shift of feet and a flutter of wings broke the silence. Her ears turned at a whispered voice and the wicked laughter that followed. After a moment, a thought came out of the perfect dark.

  Are you a shade now? Where is your shadow? What happened to your skin? It was her mother’s conveyance, the Astra of the darkening.

  A hush spread nervously through the others.

  Ahraia had forgotten about her markings. She held her breath and waited. The darkening tree above kept all light from penetrating, keeping it night even as the day swelled lethally outside.

  Did you fail to bind a shadow? Her mother conveyed, her anger bristled beneath her words. Gavea and Tallin, two shades with imps for shadows, leered at Ahraia.

  Losna? I need you, Ahraia conveyed, trembling. She could feel Losna as though they stood beside one another, even with the darkening wall separating them. Her shadow was thinking of fleeing, back to her pack and the plains. Unease grew within the darkening. Her mother’s judgment twined with the sickening excitement of what her failure would mean to the others.

  The moment stretched on for an eternity.

  Please. I’ll run with you. I’ll keep you safe.

  Ahraia could feel Losna’s decision solidify around her promise. A shape stalked through the closure: a hulking, wolfish silhouette formed and then Ahraia felt coarse fur and the press of a warm, wet nose. She smiled, her ears batting in relief. Low muttering both spoken and conveyed billowed through the darkening. The branches of the closure intertwined again, closing out all the dawn’s creeping light. Her eyes prickled in momentary blindness.