Page 29 of Light and Shadow
As my gaze clears, I keep my movements slow and slight, hoping they won’t notice me watching. Knowledge is my only power now. A few feet from me, on a dais, Venora is slouched on an ornate throne. The wood is dark green and gold with inset jewels that have been polished to a shine. It’s the only clean spot in the room.
Strange she would make one spot clean. Why not keep the entire castle alive for her use. I don’t know much about magic, but it seems a small thing to clean or make someone else do it. Unless what looks like charring is something darker. Maybe her evil has permeated the walls. So why not the throne? Too many questions without answers.
With her elbow on the padded arm, Venora leans on her hand. She’s even paler than she was in the woods. Perhaps trying to kill me has weakened her.
Aaran said that even Venora had to deal with the limitations of magic and its costs.
“I want her to feel the emptiness of shadow.” Her voice bites with rage.
A tall, slim man stands at her right hand. “I will help you find the magic that will destroy her and those like her. We will make the humans from the prophecy wish they’d never been born, and when we are done with Domhan, we will take the human world for our own.” With hair as white as snow, he has a face as young and fair as all the elves. His eyes are black as night, and his lips rosy, like a child’s. He is a hideous amalgamation of contrast. Once, he might have been handsome; now evil emanates from his every pore.
With eyes filled with adoration, she looks up at him. “Do you promise, Ciaran? I’m tired and need to rest. Will you go through the old scrolls and find the magic to destroy that?” She waves a hand in my general direction.
I close my eyes and hold my breath. Going unnoticed for a time is my best hope. I don’t think I can survive more torture.
Ciaran commands, “Take it away. Put it in the dungeon.”
Footsteps pad across the stone, and two sets of dirty bare feet approach me. I’m lifted gently and removed from the hall. A tall, sallow-faced elf with his head covered by a brown hood is my transport. He follows a smaller elf with a similar hood.
Rather than being handled like baggage as I expect, I’m reverently held like a child, carried down several passages and staircases, and placed on the floor of a cell.
“Who are you?” My voice is rough and scrapes painfully against my raw throat.
“Dorian.” He gestures to the female elf. “Cara.”
“I am Harper. Why are you here?” Why are these beautiful creatures filthy and living in this evil place?
Dorian cocks his head. “She took everyone from our village, bound our magic, and brought us here to serve her. She turns those who oppose her into shadow demons.” He points out the barred window high on the wall where dark wisps of evil troll the sky.
“I’m sorry.” I try to sit up, but every molecule in my body hurts, so I rest my cheek on the cold stone floor.
Removing his hooded cloak, Dorian says, “Our enslavement was not your doing.” He lays it on the ground, and then lifts me onto it. “You must be important and powerful to have resisted her magic and made her so angry.”
“I’m supposed to help two others defeat her.” Even shrugging hurts. I ball up the hood and rest my cheek on the rough fabric. “Thank you, Dorian.”
He nods gravely. “Cara will return with food, and if we can find some medicine, we will bring it. Her voice was removed with magic, and she cannot speak. The witch queen needed Cara’s healing magic, so she wasn’t completely bound like the rest of us. Many other forms of magic require spoken spells, but she can still heal and help you as healing magic is through touch.”
My chest tightens thinking of what these elves have suffered under the thumb of a tyrant.
They turn, walk out of my cell and close the door.
A moment later, the lock clicks into place, though I see no jailer.
Maybe this is where I’ll die. My heart knows Aaran will come for me. I don’t know how or when, but he will do whatever it takes to free me. All I have to do is stay alive long enough to be rescued.
The portal could have taken me a day or weeks away, so it’s impossible to know how long before Aaran, Bert, and Nainsi will come to help me. The idea of weeks of the torture I just endured makes me ache in my soul. My body hurts too much to sob the way I need to, but the tears come and dampen Dorian’s cloak.
Outside, demons screech as they circle the castle. The window has no glass, and the sound grates on the inside of my skull and grows louder until my cell rings with their horror. My skin prickles with their pain, as if I’ve touched someone deeply troubled and can’t get away.
This is its own kind of suffering. I cover my ears with my hands, but their pain bleeds through, and I’m riddled with the pain of the demons’ purgatory. I want to save them, but they are hers and beyond help from me or anyone else. I think about Dorian and Cara and wonder how many other elves are held here as slaves. At least they might be rescued. Trying to focus on what can be done eases the flow of shadow demon pain, but doesn’t remove it.
Unable to sleep, I shake and have no control to reel in the emotions or the effects.
It might be hours or minutes that passed before Cara returns. Silently, she places a tray on the stone floor and kneels beside me. Placing her hand on my cheek, she somehow dims the onslaught of the shadow demons’ torment. Her touch is feather-like, and her fingers cool. Without a word, she conveys that I must build a wall in my mind to keep them out.
I pray for the strength to build that wall, and the screeching leaves my head. Though they can still be heard outside.
“Thank you, Cara.” I struggle to sit.
