Shattered by Shadows: The Innocence Cycle, Book 1 Read online

  “Zhad!” Celdorn cursed. The remaining three Farak were attempting to mount ponies he hadn’t noticed. He and Elbrion charged after them on foot.

  One Farak hopped alongside a saddled gelding, unable to get his foot into the bouncing stirrup. Elbrion’s shimmering sword tore through his torso like a scythe through wheat, and the Farak toppled. His pony shrieked and fled.

  Celdorn took care of the second, who cowered in a bush behind the ponies.

  The third managed to mount. His pony took off like her tail was on fire.

  “Malak, stop her!” Celdorn called.

  But Malak and Drendil were already chasing the fleeing pony. They galloped ahead and blocked her way. The terrified mare reared, throwing her rider to the ground with a nasty crunch. When Celdorn caught up to them, the man lay on the ground, stunned and moaning. He didn’t suffer long.

  The camp now silent, Celdorn inspected the bodies, kicking each one as the rage at these animals rumbled in his belly. “How dare you do this in my realm,” he stormed. “How could you defile Alsimion with this…this evil?”

  Celdorn pulled out of his ranting when he found one of the Farak still alive and moving beneath the weight of his dead partner. The man sobbed and pleaded for mercy. Celdorn hastened his death, but there was no mercy in it.

  When he'd assured himself these men would cause no further trouble, he heaved a calming breath, wiped his sword clean, sheathed it, and turned his attention to the woman.

  She was gone.

  Chapter 3

  “The blood ends here,” Celdorn called to Elbrion.

  The injured woman had climbed the steep, shale-ridden slope leading into the foothills above the camp, a difficult feat with her hands bound behind her. Celdorn found splashes of blood where she'd slipped and fallen in her efforts.

  “Do you have any sense of her?”

  Elbrion stared up the hill, his gaze unfocused. “No. It is as if she has vanished from the face of Qabara.”

  “Well, we know she didn’t do that. We have a blood trail.” Celdorn shook his head. This made no sense. “You go that way.” He pointed to the left where the path wove between the boulders. “I’ll try over here.”

  Celdorn called out to the woman in Borok, the Trade Tongue used throughout the realm of the Shalamhar. “Don’t be afraid. We’re here to help.”

  When he came to a turn in the path, he saw the woman darting past a rock just above him on the trail. She wove between the granite boulders, glancing back at him from frantic eyes. She didn’t look Farak; she was too tall. And she was too dark to be Wallanard. She looked Rogaran, but that was unlikely, as they had no villages in this region. He wondered how she'd ended up here as she disappeared around a curve.

  The woman shrieked, and Celdorn picked up his pace. When he caught up with her, Elbrion was holding her arms as she gaped at his light-infused face. Her swollen eyes widened with fear as they swept over his towering body. His brilliant pulsations shone clearly even through his white tunic and trousers. Her gaze came to rest on his pale blue eyes, the only color in a sea of luminous white. He was an intimidating sight in the best of circumstances, and this poor woman was already overwhelmed.

  Elbrion sang in steady, soothing tones, enthralling her with his melodic cadence. Her obsidian eyes locked with his, and peace crept over her bloodied features.

  When Celdorn moved closer, she broke out of her daze and immediately twisted and pulled away, ducking under Elbrion’s arms. She kicked at his knees with amazing force for one so wounded, collapsing his legs. Celdorn stepped in front of her, but she twisted again and knocked him back with an unexpected kick to the groin. Pain exploded, and he folded with a gasp. He rose slowly and with great discomfort for she'd hit her mark with precision.

  When Celdorn looked up, the woman was climbing higher on the path. Dividing again, he and Elbrion continued their pursuit. In spite of being battered and still bleeding, this woman had a great deal of strength and agility. Her body was as sleek and sinewy as a trained Guardian’s, though she had the definite curves of a female. Her face and much of her body were hidden beneath her thigh-length, ebony hair.

  Celdorn called to her again. “Your captors are dead. We want to help you to safety.” There was no response.

  Coming around the next turn, Celdorn stumbled over a child scrambling for the shadows under a rock shelf. The woman was gone. He studied the area, bewildered. The path ended just above them, and except for a set of mountain lion tracks, there were no footprints, nothing to indicate how she’d disappeared—unless she’d been snatched up by the animal. But surely he would have heard something, and there would be blood.

  Still shaking his head, he turned back toward the girl. “Where did you come from, little one?” He crouched low and reached toward her, hand open, palm up. “Don’t be afraid. I’m here to help.”

  The girl, who looked to be no more than ten, pulled back as if his hand were a striking snake. Panicked turquoise eyes darted back and forth behind long strands of tangled and matted strawberry-blond hair, searching for some means of escape. She too was naked and as badly injured as the woman. Celdorn pulled back and held his hands up in half-surrender, not knowing how else to convince her that he meant no harm.

  Suddenly, the mountain groaned and the massive rocks shifted, sending a tumble of pebbles down the path and creating an opening next to the girl. With the silence and speed of a terrified rabbit, she lunged toward the narrow gap. She had to bend low to avoid hitting her head, but with her hands bound behind her, she lost her balance and fell forward. She pushed with her legs, face and shoulders scraping the ground.

  Celdorn stared at the opening—too small for him to follow—certain it hadn’t been there moments before. The large rocks had moved. Impossible. Not trusting his eyes, he examined the boulders, running his hand over the fissure.

  Celdorn heard the girl gasp, followed by a soft thud.

  “Elbrion, there’s a child coming through to your side,” he called as he searched for a way around.

  ~

  Elbrion watched the air waver around the slim cleft. The light warped and colors fluctuated as the girl’s pale blond head pushed through. Her body jolted at the sight of Elbrion’s boots. When she lifted her battered face, struggling to rise to her knees, her gaze swept upward and took in the full six and a half feet of his light-infused form. With a gasp, her eyes went wide, and she crumpled onto her side, her face locked in a crazed stare.

  Puzzled, Elbrion squatted down. The girl was barely breathing, her body as limp as a rag doll. He laid his hand on the side of her face, mindful of the gashes, and chanted softly.

  As soon as Elbrion stepped into the girl’s inner world, an invisible force slammed into him, pushing him back. The ground beneath his feet lurched and nausea swept through him. He grabbed at a nearby stone wall for balance only to have it move, sending him stumbling to his right. Another wall immediately rose, and he caught himself just before his face struck. He righted himself and glanced around. His head throbbed with the Zhekhum that engulfed him, his own light dimmed by the pressure.

  He sang louder and the pulsations coursing through his body brightened, illuminating a small sphere. He seemed to be in the darkened corridors of an ancient castle. In front of him, the earth suddenly bulged and yawned as a high-pitched wail ascended from somewhere beneath his feet and erupted through the gaping maw. Elbrion took a few hurried steps back, stopping abruptly when something jabbed his back. Turning, he found large, pointed spikes protruding from a wall. Shards of torn flesh and bloodied clothing hung from them. He spun and stepped to his left, moving around the growing fissure in the floor. The ground swelled again, and he ran forward just before the mound burst open with another piercing scream.

  A terror Elbrion knew was not his own gripped his mind, fracturing his thoughts. His chest constricted as a dimly lit hallway appeared, filled with injured children scurrying like terrified mice into various doorways and fastening latches behind them. Panicked,
pain-filled shrieks exploded from up and down the corridor.

  As Elbrion’s mind blackened with debilitating fear, the structure shifted again. A stairway emerged. Walls rose behind him, leaving him no choice but to descend. He sang louder in an effort to hold onto his sanity, which was warping along with his perceptions.

  At the bottom of the stairs, he found walls lined with shackles and bloodied, multi-thonged whips lying on the ground. The empty room stank of old sweat and human excrement. When he attempted to move forward, his way was blocked by a new wall. Each time he turned and took a few steps, the path changed.

  Elbrion tried to sense the girl’s life-force in all the chaos. She was nowhere and everywhere at the same time. His head throbbed with confusion.

  “Let me help you,” he called into the air.

  As if in response, crushing pain blasted his mind. He doubled over, squeezing his head to keep it from shattering. He knew he had to step out of this place immediately or risk never being able to free himself.

  Elbrion opened his eyes and let go of the girl’s face, leaving her inner world behind. He gasped for air and leaned on the granite boulders to steady himself. Bewildered by what he had encountered, he stared at the shell of a girl lying on the ground.

  Fumbling for the knife at his hip, he cut the bonds from her wrists, singing softly in his native tongue as he straightened her frame. A deep sorrow consumed his heart, but he was uncertain if it was her grief or his own. He stared at her empty emerald eyes, wondering who she was and how she had come to have such an elaborate, well-defined inner landscape.

  ~

  Celdorn found Elbrion cradling the girl. “Is she all right?”

  “She seems to have left her body. I believe the sight of me frightened and overwhelmed her.” Elbrion’s usually placid face was shadowed with pain. “Her mind is a strange labyrinth of tenebrious corridors and chambers of torment, the like of which I have never encountered. I dared not linger long.”

  “That’s a rare comment for you to make, my friend.”

  Celdorn moved toward the limp girl. His anger smoldered as he brushed back her blood-encrusted hair, revealing a battered face, now further darkened by the dirt and debris embedded from groveling in the loose stones. Her nose, covered with dried blood, looked broken; a steady stream of fluids flowed from the nostrils onto a cracked and distended upper lip. Her eyes had multiple layers of coloring. The left side of her head was swollen and still bleeding, her ear split at the top. As he continued down her body, he found crimson imprints wrapped around her tiny neck. Several darkened areas around her rib cage and upper thighs looked as if they were left by large boots. She had dozens of jagged, discolored scars scattered over her entire body, which was slight, little more than five feet tall and the weight of less than half a man.

  “Dear Qho’el, what happened to this girl? It looks like she’s been tortured for years.” Celdorn shed his leather jerkin and pulled his wool tunic over his head. He tucked it around the girl, unable to bear the sight any longer.

  As his attention returned to her face, he shook his head. “My mind’s playing tricks on me, Elbrion. When I saw this girl on the other side, she looked no more than ten. Now she appears to be twice that, and her hair changed colors.” He glanced around at the hills above them, seeing no ascending path on this side either. “Where did the darker one go?”

  “I believe there is only the one you see here.”

  “But the other woman had black hair and was much more”—he fumbled for an appropriate word as he studied the girl— “mature.”

  “There is some strange power in this place creating illusion, but I perceive no other presence. It seems the forces of Alsimion are working to assist this girl.”

  “But why try to confuse us? We’re helping her.”

  “I cannot answer that.”

  “I saw a shadow cross your face. What were you sensing from her?”

  “Torment. Terror. Hopelessness,” Elbrion replied. “The emotions were chaotic, but now I get no sense of her at all. It is as if her body is as vacant as her eyes.”

  Celdorn stared down at the girl’s face, wondering how she ended up here. His heart twisted as he began to remove the gravel embedded in her bloodied cheeks, unexpected tears blurring his vision. He noticed his hands shaking as anger warred with the sorrow churning in his gut.

  Some of the rock shards had burrowed so deeply into her flesh and the bleeding so profuse, he couldn’t see clearly and feared he might do more damage. “We need to take her to the water and see if we can wash off some of this.”

  With Elbrion carrying the girl, they moved down the hill and headed toward the winding stream that half-encircled the far end of the clearing. They washed the girl’s wounds in the icy flow, but she still didn’t rouse. Celdorn closed her eyes unable to endure the deathlike stare any longer.

  “What are we going to do with her?” Elbrion asked as they climbed the bank and wrapped the girl in Celdorn’s cloak.

  “We’ll take her to the keep for now, and Dalgo can tend her wounds. I don’t want to risk any of the villages until we know how she came to be here. She is obviously not Farak. She looks Wallanard. Or at least now she does.”

  Celdorn kicked one of the dead bodies as they passed through the camp. “What were these vermin doing?”

  The pulsations of Elbrion’s light dimmed as he gazed around. “I do not dare imagine. The emotions lingering in this place are overwhelming.”

  Elbrion pressed his palms against a tree and leaned his forehead into the trunk. After a few moments, he stepped back, his expression grave. “There is anger rumbling in Alsimion. The wood has been tainted by this evil, and a cleansing is coming.”

  Elbrion shivered. “Let us leave this place.”

  Chapter 4

  “That was quite the scenic route, Celdorn,” chided Dalgo, opening an eye and peeking up at him from where he lazed. “We’ve been waiting half the day.”

  “A slight exaggeration since we parted only a few hours ago.” In spite of his grim mood, Celdorn couldn’t help but smile at the scene before him, such a stark contrast to what they’d just left in the Farak camp. His four men lounged among the gnarled white roots of the chiming trees of Alsimion, having found places where they could bask in the warmth of the noon sun. They were an intimidating lot compared to the Farak. He hoped they wouldn’t frighten the girl when she woke. Dressed in their dark wool and leathers, weapons at their sides, they could easily be mistaken for mercenary rabble, but he found himself strangely comforted by the sight.

  Tobil sat up, his gaze fixed on the bundle in front of Celdorn. “What’ve you got there?”

  “A young woman. Well, more a girl.”

  Eyebrows raised all around as the men turned to look at him.

  “A girl, out here?” Tobil rose and moved toward Celdorn with a half-smile, as if he thought it a joke, but his face sobered when he saw the limp bundle in Celdorn’s arms and the tiny, pale feet hanging out.

  “We stumbled across a camp where ten Farak were holding her against her will, assaulting and ravishing her. From her scars, I’d say she’s been held captive for years.”

  “What did you do with the Farak?”

  “They’ll trouble her no more.”

  No one asked for further explanation.

  Celdorn looked down at the girl. He knew he’d done the right thing, but he was disturbed by the violence that had erupted from him. The Farak he’d killed had been unarmed, untrained peasants. They were executions, plain and simple. Celdorn had the right as Lord Protector to dispense judgment as he saw fit, but the murder that still burned in his heart disturbed him. It had been years since he’d used his sword for anything other than training. The realm had been peaceful, even border skirmishes were rare, the need for executions, rarer still. He was shaken.

  “Does this have something to do with the explosions of light?” Haldor asked.

  Celdorn deferred to Elbrion.

  “I believe they were i
ntended to direct us toward the girl.”

  Haldor’s brow furrowed. “Qho’el?”

  Elbrion shook his head. “I think it was Alsimion.”

  “Truly?” Haldor’s brows arched in surprise, and his gaze focused on the girl. He approached and gingerly touched her head, cocking his own with an enigmatic, distant expression, as if listening. “She was unconscious when you found her?”

  “No,” Celdorn replied. “She was fighting.” Haldor’s brows arched higher as he took in her small frame. “It’s a long story. I’ll tell you about it later. We need to get her back to Kelach. She’s so cold, I’m concerned for her. Do any of you have an extra cloak?”

  “Use mine.” Tobil tossed his cloak over the girl, and Celdorn tucked it around her, making sure her icy feet were well wrapped.

  The others called for their stallions, mounted, and followed Celdorn as he headed south. After a few miles, the trail narrowed and grew rockier as it climbed, skirting the granite foothills on the right and being pressed in by a developing cliff on the left. The Guardians were quiet as they rode, allowing the light and music of Alsimion to soothe them.

  When they’d been traveling for over an hour, the girl began to stir. Just as Celdorn was about to assure her that she was safe, a pale arm thrust through the outer cloak. Her head popped up, swollen eyes wild with fear, and a high-pitched, unearthly wail erupted from her lips, splitting the delicate music of the forest. She grabbed Celdorn’s shoulder and pulled herself upright, kicking at the cloak tangled around her legs. Before Celdorn could react, the girl flipped herself backward.