Cast In Shadow

“These are my halls,” he said coldly. “And not even a Dragon may enter them with impunity.”

“But he’s been here before.”

The fieflord raised a brow. “How do you know that, little one?”

“I’m not called ‘little,’” she replied. She wanted to snap the words; they came out sounding, to her ears, pathetic.

“And what are you called now?”

“Kaylin. Kaylin Neya.”

His other brow rose. And fell. “Interesting. Yes, you are correct. Tiamaris has indeed visited the Long Halls. If any could find their way in, uninvited, it would be he. But I think, for the moment, he is content to wait. It will keep your Severn alive.”

“He’s not mine,” she said. And I don’t want him alive. But she couldn’t bring herself to say the words to the fieflord. Didn’t want to know why.

He held out a hand.

She tried to ignore it. But she found herself lifting hand in response. As if this were a dream. He took the hand; his skin was cool. Hers was damp.

“These are the Halls of Nightshade,” he said quietly. “Come. There are things here I wish you to see.” Without another word, he led her from the room.

She expected the doors to open into a hall.

So much for expectation. They opened instead into what must have been a forest. Not that she’d seen forests—not up close—but she’d seen them at a distance, when Clint had taken her flying to the Aeries of his kin. Here, the trees grew up, and up again, until they reached the rounded height of a ceiling that she could only barely glimpse through the greenery.

She walked slowly, her hand still captive to the fieflord’s, but he seemed to be in no hurry. And why would he? If he didn’t manage to get himself killed, he had forever. Time meant nothing to him.

At his side, in waking dream, it could almost mean nothing to her. She touched the rough surface of brown bark, and then moved on to the smooth surface of silver-white; she touched leaves that had fallen across the ground like a tapestry, a gentle riot of color. All of her words deserted her, which was just as well; she didn’t have any fine enough to describe what she saw.

And had she, she wouldn’t have exposed it. Beauty meant something to her, and she kept it to herself, as she kept most things that meant anything.

“There is no sunlight,” he told her, as if that made sense. “But outcaste or no, I am still Barrani Lord—they grow at my whim.”

“And if you don’t want them?”

He gestured. The tree just beyond the tip of her fingers withered, twisting toward the ground almost as if it were begging. She stopped herself from crying out. It was just a plant.

She didn’t ask again, however. And she kept her wonder contained; she looked; she touched nothing else. He had offered her a warning, in subtle Barrani fashion. She took it.

“Where are we going?”

“To the heart of this forest,” he replied. “Be honored. Not even my own have seen it.”

“Your children?”

His brows drew in. “Are you truly so ignorant, Kaylin?”

“Apparently.”

His hand tightened. It was not comfortable. Another warning. But he chose to do no more than that, and after a pause, he surprised her. He answered. “I have no children. I am outcaste.”

Outcaste was a word that had meaning for Kaylin, but in truth, not much. Although one human lord served as Caste-lord for her kind, the complicated laws of the caste did not apply to the rank and file. It certainly didn’t apply to the paupers and the beggars who made a living—or didn’t—in the fiefs. The Leontines, the Aerians and the humans—mortal races all—were not defined in the same way by caste; they were more numerous, and their lives reached from the lowest of gutters to the highest of towers. Not so, the Barrani.

“I spoke simply of my kin, those who chose to follow me. The forest speaks to them, but it speaks in a language that is … not pleasant to their ears. They will not hear it, and remain. And I am unwilling to release them.

“I release nothing that is mine.”

She said nothing for a while. For long enough that she found the silence uncomfortable. Not awkward; awkward was too petty a word. “Did you build this?”

“The forest?”

“The … Long Halls.”

“No.”

“The castle?”

“No. I have altered it over the years, but in truth, very little. It was here, for the taking.” His smile was thin. “I was not, however, the first to try. I was the first to succeed.”

“It had other occupants?”

“It had defenses,” he replied. “And I forget myself. You ask too many questions.”

“Questions are encouraged, in the Hawks. When they’re not stupid.”

“Indeed. Here, they are not. The answers can be fatal.” He stopped in front of a dense ring of trees; their branches seemed to interlock at all levels, as if they had deliberately grown together. She didn’t like the look of them. But then again, at the moment she didn’t like the look of herself, either. What she could see, that is; the dress, the funny shoes, the bold, black design on her arms. She drew her arms down.

His hand came with one. “You do not understand the marks you bear,” he said, his voice a little too close to her ear.

“And you do?”

“No, not completely. But I understand some of their significance. In truth, I’m surprised that you still survive.”

“Why?”

He smiled, but he didn’t answer. Instead, he lifted his hand and touched the trees that barred their way. They shuddered. There was something terrible about that shudder, something that looked so wrong she had to turn away. It was as if the trees were silently screaming.

But they parted. Like curtains, like great rolling doors, their limbs untwining, their trunks shifting. Roots moved beneath her feet—or something did. She really wanted to pay less attention.

“Come,” he said, when there was room enough for passage.

Her hand fell to her hips, and came up empty. Daggers, of course, were someplace else. But the desire for them, the reflex, was still a part of her. And it was growing stronger.

“Nothing will harm you here,” he told her, the smile gone. “You bear my mark. You are in my domain.”

I’ve lived in your fief for more than half my life, and it wasn’t ever safe. But she said nothing. And it was hard.

The trees were not as thick as they appeared; the darkness of their branches curved above like a roof or a canopy, but it lasted a scant ten feet, and then it was gone.