Page 23 of Daughter of the Dark Sun
Today was one of those days.
Why give up now? What about her?
Something deep inside Therat’s fractured mind came to life at the thought of the maiden in the shadows. A deep hurt squeezed at his heart. He stumbled, falling to his knees. The shadows swimming in his mind darkened until he could only see the endless black of nothingness.
As if emerging from the shadows like the night he saw her bloodied and beaten, Mireithren appeared in Therat’s mind. He clawed at his face, fingers catching on a beard grown long and unkempt, but the Maiden of Shadows did not leave. She held a strange look on her face, a cross between pity and anger, and something else Therat could not place. Did notwantto place.
“Get out, get out, GET OUT!” he cried, his plea echoing over the barren rock and far-away dunes.
Mireithren’s face twisted at his words. Her eyes turned black, pulling Therat in until he was awash with agony. His blood turned to liquid fire, each frantic beat of his heart searing him from inside until he thought he would turn to ash. Straining muscles grown weak from starvation, Therat stumbled to his feet. The radiant heat of Myrniar’s gift chased away the void as he turned to face the sun.
“What do you want with me? You will ruin me, use me to work the Dark Goddess’s vile machinations. It must be, it must,” he whispered, trying to ignore the pain in his heart.
A whistling wind rushed past his ears like a scream. Mireithren’s face turned to smoke, and the pain fled with her cruel eyes. He breathed a sigh of relief. One day soon, he would lose his memories of that raven-haired woman with a scarred face and the universe in her eyes.
Restless, Therat resumed walking. After some time, he dimly became aware of a small bluish line in the distance surrounded by a copse of trees. Thirst clawed at his throat. For days, he had only tasted the iron tang of his bleeding lips. A strange feeling like he had been here before passed over Therat, but the desire for water numbed the sensation.
A hazy outline of trees gathered around a small crescent moon-shaped lake came into view. The water remained cool even under the desert sun. Therat choked it down, icy liquid washing down weeks of dust. Instinct took over, sustaining life where his mind would not.
After drinking his fill, Therat collapsed. The dark returned to take his vision. He passed into a daze under the shade, too weak to move but too restless to sleep. Hours passed before the warmth faded from his skin. Night approached, and with it, the one small joy Therat had in life: losing himself.
The ghosts of millions long dead came when night descended. More of the man would slip away, until one day he would wake and not remember a thing. Therat longed for such an end. It would be a relief. He was too broken to have a future. Too afraid of what the woman wanted.
Yet, on this night, the Shadow-weave did not claim more of the man. Instead, it melted away from his vision, leaving his eyes clear for the first time in months.
The world looked different than he remembered. Twisted, gnarled. The acacia trees here bent low to the ground, leaf tips tinged red as if they had been dipped in blood. A haunting, eerie music wafted through the air—a dirge, it seemed. An echo of some past tragedy. Unrelenting sorrow cut through the Shadow-weave, pulling Therat from his black cocoon that suffocated instead of transformed.
Wind blew away the clouds covering the moon. Silver light glittered over the land below. It reflected off the still surface of the crescent-shaped lake, illuminating the small oasis like a mirror.
The music grew louder in Therat’s ears. He knew this place. It came to him in his dreams, a thousand times and a thousand more.
“Mama… Da…” he whispered. Therat fell to his knees, a dagger of grief plunged into his heart.
He found himself in the place where his life ended seventeen years ago. Where he should have died, along with his brother. But instead, the boy took wild shadows into his heart, naive enough to think they would always answer to him.
A bitter laugh rang out in the growing night, running over the soft rise of hills and off to the far horizon. A fitting place to find his end, back where it all began those many years ago.
Therat stood, taking in the waxing shape of the moon rising on the southeastern horizon. He could not tell how long he hadwandered the desert, but something told him this wasthatday. The one tinged with red he could never erase from memory. He cursed whatever part still remembered, the part pulling him here. But Therat would not give in, could not relive the memories he locked away.
A gust of wind blew past, cold teeth biting at his exposed flesh. Something moved in his peripherals. A jewel caught in the branches of a leafless tree glittered in the moonlight. A shadow took form on the western horizon against the dim glow of the retreating sun. The shade grew larger, devouring the light. Was this the end? Death Herself, come at last?
The umbral shroud melted away from the figure before him, revealing a woman with waves of deep auburn red hair. Dark gray eyes peered out from a heart-shaped face. A face Therat once swore he would never forget. The tangle of grief rose, the tears he refused to shed desperately seeking release.
“No… Mama!” The words tore at his throat. Therat reached a hand out to the vision: his shepherdess to the Undying Realms Beyond.
A thin chain looped over several of her fingers. It glowed a faint blue in the moonlight, pale and ethereal against his mother’s dark skin. The pendant hung low, a crescent moon around a silver tree with white gemstone leaves. Therat knew it well: an heirloom of his mother’s House passed down since the end of the First Era. As a boy, he delighted in the stories she told him of women it graced over thousands of years. She wore it… on the night… when her head… when her head…
Therat scrambled back from the vision. His heart raced, eyes squeezing shut trying to fight back the pain.
I’m here, Little Cub. I won’t let them hurt you.
His mother’s voice. A soft sighing song as delicate as she. It quelled the panic in an instant, the words embracing Therat as his mother used to. He opened his eyes. The vision left, butthe necklace remained, tangled in the thorns of an acacia tree. Sucking in his breath, Therat stared long at the lost heirloom. A piece of his mother returned. Proof she existed outside of his blurred memories.
The longer he stared at the pendant, the more memories returned to a mind devoid of happiness. The glow of his mother’s smile, one side of her mouth curled up higher than the other over a dimple. The way her eyes sparkled in the moonlight, turning silvery-gray. The stories passed down from her family of shadewalkers, of a time when delicate flowers of silver and trees of white grew in the shadows. She did not fear them. Therat wished he could live like her. His mother always seemed so peaceful, finding bliss during the day with his father but freest at night under the cloak of shadows.
The tears welling behind Therat’s eyes burst through, burning as seventeen years of repressed emotions cascaded down his bare chest. All the rage, the sorrow, the sleepless nights trying to find a reason for his never-ending tragedies. The beauty of his mother’s face brought the harsh reality of life back into focus.
The ghosts of the past left. In the silence, the thoughts he tried desperately to ignore came thundering back. He abandoned his family. Though leaving soon, Adon would come back to Av Madhira in time. And what of his grandfather? His promise to find his parents’ killers, to bring them to justice? He could not let the madness claim him, not yet. He wanted to die but needed to live for his mother and father.
