Page 68 of Heart of Shadows

Her feet and legs scratched over stone flags and then small, bumpy cobbles. Aside from that, there were no clues as to her surroundings. The sound of the city rumbling around her was no comfort, either. The maelstrom of voices and sounds was overwhelming, and she could distinguish nothing to give her any point of reference, save for up and down.

She tried to still her juddering sobs, for they only made the breathlessness worse. Tears streamed down her face. Eventually, she felt cool darkness envelop her and heard a door slam shut behind her. Several more banged open and closed in quick succession before and behind. Her feet stumbled over thresholds as she crossed them blindly.

The bag was suddenly ripped from her head and the gag torn from her mouth. She retched with relief and sucked in a huge gulp of air. It was cold and filled with the fetid stench of excrement and rot, but she did not care. She blinked, but need not have. It was dark. Small lamps threw flickering shadows and paltry light over the rough, dark stone. There were no windows.

Harper tried to control the rising feeling of claustrophobia. She twisted her head, to see the way they had come, to determine if there was a scrap of daylight somewhere, but she gleaned no clues. A moment later, they hauled her forward again, opened a door, and tossed her into a pitch-black cell.

The door boomed shut behind her. When she heard a thump from the other side, she knew it had been barred. She scrabbled for it, pushing against the unyielding wood, to no avail. Trapped.

Time was immeasurable. Harper had no idea how long she sat on the frigid, hard floor. Not even her stomach or energy could mark the passage of time. She was already starving and exhausted. Her face pounded from the impact upon the ground earlier, and there was a crusted trail of dried blood from her nose. She gently picked it off, carefully touching her tender face. One hip throbbed, sore and angry, where she had been hit. She did not need to see it to know a gigantic bruise had already started blooming.

Harper’s only companion was the dark. The smallest amount of faint light slipped under the door. That one solid, thin line connected her to the outside world, but it was small comfort for it offered no illumination on her situation. In here, the smell was even worse. Even before she explored its cramped confines, it was not hard to determine she was in some kind of prison cell.

Moving agonisingly slowly, in no small part because of her complaining body, she crawled around the space. It was narrower than she was tall and not much longer. Straw, or perhaps rushes, covered the stone-flagged floor. The shafts were wafer thin and trampled. Some crumbled as she picked them up.

There was no mattress, bed, or blanket that she could find as she felt around, her fingers sinking into the corners of the floor. They trailed through dirt, grime, and slime until she was certain she would be a creature of dirt, grime, and slime herself. She raised a hand to her face to sniff it—immediately regretting the action—and fumbled for the hem of her cloak to wipe her fingers clean. There was a bucket in the corner, which had an even worse smell. Harper recoiled from it.

After a period of sitting in the dark, huddled against a wall and wrapped in her cloak, which offered no resistance against the cold around her, she stiffly rose and stumbled to the door, leaning against the hard wood. At least it was slightly warmer than the stone, for what that was worth. Yet no matter how she searched for any crack or weakness, pushed it, or slotted her fingers into the edges to try and pull it—there was no handle on the inside of the door, perhaps for good reason—she could not get even a whisper of give in the stout wood. Her palms caressed the worn boards as she rested her forehead against it with a sigh. Through it, she could hear faint sounds. It was low and deep, the drone of men talking.

Think. There has to be a weakness somewhere. An idea struck her. She scraped some of the paltry, slightly soggy straw into a pile and reached down into the middle of herself, feeling for that slight tingle, the deep well where she knew the magic was. Knowing what it felt like to have Aedon’s strong magic coursing through her, she knew exactly what to look for. Somewhere deep inside, there it was, the tiniest little nugget, slightly bigger than it had been before. She clung to it. Perhaps she did not have to sit in the cold or the dark after all.

The magic slipped away. She grasped it tighter, focusing on the tiny trickle. The faintest warmth heated the very tips of her fingers, but no more. Eventually, she shook with the mental strain and her hands fell to her sides. She slumped against the wall with a huff of resignation. Aedon had made it look so easy. It appeared it wouldn’t be that way for her, at least not yet.

Harper gritted her teeth in silent frustration. There was no way out that she could tell. Her weapon—Aedon’s beautiful knife—was gone. And she had no means, magical or otherwise, to facilitate her escape. She would have to wait for whatever was coming, and that was the most terrifying thought of all. It made her stomach flip and body shake with nerves. Slowly, she pulled her cloak about her, retreated to the far corner of the cell, and slumped onto the floor with her knees drawn to her chest.

Fitful sleep was the best she managed. Harper’s eyelids drooped, exhausted, then jerked open again with every small noise from outside. Every sound put her on high alert. Were they coming to fetch her? Where would they take her? What would they do? Would she—could she—escape?

Then the sounds faded again and she huddled deeper into her cloak, wishing for the comforting presence and warmth of Aedon and his companions. The growing torrent of anxiety also taunted her about him. Every nerve was frayed, and her thoughts were a runaway horse of worry. He had pleaded with her, but she had not believed his nature ran true. Perhaps, just perhaps, she had been wrong about him… about them all.

She looked about her, from one dark corner to another, glad she could not see anything. If only they could see her now. They were right. Erika most of all. Harper was glad she would never have to admit it to Erika’s face. Then again, her thoughts trailing in loops and circles, she returned to worrying about her own hide. Concern over what her own fate would be stifled her breath in her chest. Not for the first time, she berated herself for making the wrong choice. She’d probably never get the chance to admit anything to Erika’s face. She should never have come.

There was nothing to do but wait on her fate now. Perhaps someone would come to rescue her. Harper laughed mirthlessly at the thought. Who would come for her? Who even could? Certainly not Aedon and his companions. They had made their feelings abundantly clear. She could not blame them. She had walked into exactly the folly they had predicted, and now she was in a strange world, about to be charged with a crime that seemed punishable by death or “worse”, whatever that meant. None of her own kin or friends would come. They did not exist. She fleetingly pondered how long she had been gone since the hours and days had blurred together. She stopped that thought before it went any further, wondering what everyone would think had happened when she seemingly vanished without a trace.

She did not know whether she hated herself or the situation she found herself in more. She had been foolish to believe she would be taken for her word. This wasn’t Caledan, but there wasn’t justice in either realm. That was blatantly clear. No “innocent until proven guilty”. This place was unjust, unfair, and she didn’t belong. It was as far from her vision of being a noble knight or intrepid adventurer, or being sent home by a gracious and understanding king, as she had hoped.

“You’re so stupid, Harper,” she growled at herself. “Should have stayed with Aedon. At least they accepted me, as useless as I was.” They would have used her Dragonheart, but that was better than it returning to the king’s vaults to gather dust. She scowled and punched the floor, as if she could punch her regret, frustration, and fear. It did nothing other than earn her a new pain.

No one came for her in what seemed like an age. Harper did not bother moving from her corner, huddled up in her cloak, shivering from head to toe. The light and warmth of the turn of summer to autumn seemed like a distant memory already. What had once seemed like a thick cloak, stifling in the heat, now felt like nothing more than her old, thin, tattered cloak, and offered her no shelter, comfort, or protection.

When the door clunked open, Harper startled. The dim light outside was blinding after so long in the dark. After a moment of surprise, she scrambled forward. A dark form dropped a wooden bowl in the room and set a wooden beaker down, spilling most of the contents of both in the process. Before she could reach the door, it slammed shut again.

Harper cried out. The muffled thump of the bar slipping into place rattled the door. Then receding footsteps. Then silence.

She felt around the floor for the bowl and cup. Water. It smelled suspiciously unclean, but she downed it in one gulp all the same. The gruel in the bowl was weak and tasted barely edible. The hunk of bread was so stale that she could have mistaken it for a stone. She ate it all anyway, grateful for something to fill her stomach.

Once finished, she retreated back to her corner. Her stomach still rumbled unhappily. A few mouthfuls of paltry food and tainted water did nothing to still its mutiny. She hung her head. Her forehead pounded mercilessly, as though she had spent the night before downing too much ale. Unfortunately, Harper knew she would not be able to shake it off so easily. She could not help but wish that this was nothing more than a bad dream. The assault on her senses told her it was very real indeed.

The next time they came, she had no idea how long it had been, but she was ready. There was only one name that might curry her some kind of favour, or chance, as much as she hated to use it. It had repeatedly taunted her, but would it help or damn her? She had no idea. She hoped it would not land her in a worse predicament.

When the door slipped open to allow a meal in, she shouted past the burn in her throat. “Dimitrius Vaeri Mortris! I demand to speak with Dimitrius Vaeri Mortris of House Ellarian!”

The dish paused in midair, before the hand holding it dropped it. The door shut a second later, but with a quieter slam than before. Harper’s heart pounded. What had she done? This could make things even worse—but she had nothing else to gamble.

51

DIMITRI

Dimitri longed to run, but he forced himself to take measured, unhurried steps, schooling his features into boredom with a hint of indignance at being disturbed for such paltry matters. Under the surface, he was a torrent of crashing storms. Was it her? How had she come to be in Tournai? Who knew?

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