Page 24 of Sanctuary of the Shadow
Picking up her Seer cards, she shuffled the deck and pictured the otherworldly eyes of the man who was becoming a permanent fixture in her thoughts. Aloud, she whispered the name he’d chosen. And then she laid out a reading, though he wasn’t there to see it.
Ice. Wetland. Waterfall. River. Ocean. And…
The Deep.
As she turned over the last card, images of that strange dream from the other night flashed before her eyes. Diving straight down, feeling the darkness surrounding her, certain she had chosen wrong…
She couldn’t deny the connection. But what did it mean?
She stared at his cards, trying to make sense of them. Ice. She closed her eyes and felt cold. Empty, isolated. Helpless. Andpain. So much pain.
The next card… Wetland. That was a tricky one. Wetlands could be rich places of fertile soil, or they could be lifeless bogs. In this case, she sensed the latter. An image of a battlefield came to mind—after the fighting had concluded and bodies lay strewn about. Carnage and chaos.
Then, Waterfall. Waterfalls were the opposite of wetlands, full of energy and power, a sign of unpredictable and uncontrollable change.
Ocean was the most powerful card in the deck. Vast. Unfathomable. The source of all life. Often, but not always, benevolent.
And lastly…the Deep. The silent depths, where no light could penetrate, where stillness was absolute. Dark, silent.
And terrifying.
Why was it terrifying? The Deep had never scared her before, but it wasn’t a card she drew often. After that dream, however, she felt differently.
Unfortunately, she couldn’t do for Raith what she had done for the women who visited her today. There was no simple declaration of fate, no “do this and don’t do that.” For Raith, everything was hazy.
Was it because he wasn’t participating in the reading? Or was it because of Harrow’s involvement? Seers could never clearly read their own futures or those of the ones closest to them. That was the more likely scenario.
For better or worse, Raith’s fate was closely linked with her own.
More questions bubbled up until she thought her head might explode, and she couldn’t stand it anymore. Stacking the cards, she left her tent in a hurry. She didn’t stop rushing until she reached the big top, slipping through the backstage entrance.
Inside, the show was going full swing—quite literally, as Malaikah was currently swinging back and forth on a trapeze high above, preparing to make the precarious leap to the next one.
She sprang, her lithe body arcing with perfect poise as she sailed through the air to catch the next swing. But, oh! She feinted a fall, only to catch herself with one hand and swing with incredible strength around the trapeze, holding on with only one palm.
At the top, she steadied and balanced in a perfect one-armed handstand, spreading her legs into splits. Her panther’s tail whipped back and forth around her, aiding her balance. The crowd roared with applause.
Harrow shook her head in amazement. Malaikah never ceased to impress.
Salizar entered the ring below, wielding his pointed staff, demanding applause for the Amazing Malaikah, “exotic beauty of the Southern lands,” in a booming voice.
Harrow cringed. Both she and Malaikah hated that damn line, though Mal had begrudgingly learned to cope with it over the years, unable to deny its effectiveness in encouraging the humans to give up their money. It had always been a point of contention between her and Salizar, however.
While the extra volley of coin now raining down from the bleachers was unmistakable, to Harrow, calling Mal that was degrading to the brilliant woman who had reached a level of mastery few ever achieved, and that wasn’t worth any amount of gold.
Sure, Hybrids would always hold a level of fascination to humans, but it was born out of ignorance. Malaikah certainly looked different compared to everyone else in the audience, with her panther ears and tail and claws, but she deserved to be celebrated for her accomplishments and not for her appearance.
This was an old debate, but something made her think of it anew today. It didn’t take long to discover why—Raith. Salizar was planning to do the same thing to Raith, but worse. Keeping him in a cage like an animal, making him out to be a terrible monster when he wasn’t. It was sickening. Especially because it wasSalizarcommitting these atrocities, a man she had always believed to be inherently noble, despite his ruthless reputation.
How could she have been so wrong about him?
Suddenly, she couldn’t stand there another second. Couldn’t watch the crowd cheering for the “exotic beauty” who landed perfectly on her feet, executing a graceful bow before them. Couldn’t stare at the back of Salizar’s head, at the top hat he wore to disguise pointed ears that made him just asexoticas the rest of the creatures in his circus. Couldn’t stand there thinking about how she was just as bad as him for hiding her own ears beneath a scarf every day and pretending she was human.
Without another word, she left the big top and went straight to the only place she wanted to be. She assured herself that Salizar would be busy with the show for another half hour or so.
There was no way he’d catch her.
Chapter Six
