Draka

I waited in the infirmary until all the Wolves who were going out on patrol soon had left, and there was a window before another patrol was expected to return. I amused myself by messing with my magic. Manipulating shadows had become so second nature to me over the last several weeks that I barely thought about it anymore, but that also meant that I hadn’t actively worked on figuring out my limits. I knew that I could almost cover a weak light source if I started from darkness. But the infirmary was bright. The two windows weren’t glass, instead being covered with some kind of organic membrane that I couldn’t see through, but they let in plenty of light.

There were still shadows, though. Even if I had been in a bare room with a dozen 100W lights surrounding me, all I would need to do would be to get close enough to the floor and I’d have something to work with, if I could just handle the pain and exhaustion of pushing as hard as necessary. Here, every bed had darkness under it. The bookcase that sat along one wall with various scrolls and bottles on it had a solid frame, and it cast a short shadow on every shelf. And then there were the unlit lanterns in the ceiling, the chest against the wall opposite the windows, the corners by the windows themselves… I had plenty to work with.

On a whim I looked down and focused on my own shadow. It wasn’t very sharp or dark, but I could fix that. Looking down at myself, I could see a glow gathering in my chest. It was an odd thing to see. Depth perception told me that I was seeing something inside of myself, through skin and bone and muscle, yet I saw it as clearly as if I was made of glass. Then it released, flowing out of me in a tide of darkness, not in a specific direction or through a particular limb but from every part of me, as though I had gold-limned shadow coming out of every pore. If I had pores. I wasn’t sure that I did. I didn’t have any hair, obviously, and I hadn’t noticed myself sweating, so maybe not.

I wonder where all the heat went when I ran or flew.

Even with my thoughts running away from me, I still maintained enough focus to deepen my shadow and make it stretch and merge with the darkness under the nearest bed. I grunted with satisfaction. Two months ago, allowing my focus to slip at all would have messed everything up. Now I could both watch how the magic flowed and swirled as it made the shadow do my bidding, and wonder if lizards or other reptiles could sweat.

Shadows satisfactorily connected, I focused on myself and tried to shift. There was still too much resistance. The room was too bright, my shadow not dark enough. I dug deeper, drawing in more power and letting it flow out of myself in the form of an ever deeper darkness, forcing the light away until I, in the middle of the room, was covered in shadow. My head began to pound and I felt myself beginning to grow faint, but I kept pushing until the resistance finally gave, and I shifted. My world immediately shrunk into the short stretch of darkness between me and the bed, and I quickly slipped in under it, which I hadn’t fully expected to work. The beds only had a couple of inches of clearance from the floor, and were about two yards long and less than a yard wide. It didn’t seem like there would be enough space under one to fit all of me, but as far as I could tell none of me was sticking out.

Then I shifted back, causing my front to smash into the floor and my back to smash into the bed, lifting it and nearly flipping it over as all of my very real, very solid volume had to go somewhere. There was a clatter as I scrabbled out and the bed fell back to the floor, but no harm had been done to either me or the furniture, as far as I could tell.

Alright, I thought. Good to know. I can fit in spaces that are too small, then shift back. I should just make sure that it’s in a place with some give, because when there’s no space for me my body will damn well make space. Or try to. I was sure that I wouldn’t like the effect if I tried to shift back in a space with less give than my body.

I also noticed that there was a fine scattering of dirt and scale-flakes on the floor where I’d come from. I’d never really shifted on a clean surface and hung around to see the effects before, but it made sense. If the dirt and the dead bits weren’t part of my body, they didn’t come along when I shifted. Everything inside me did, though, or there’d be a way more unpleasant mess on the floor.

My train of thought was interrupted when Garal came through the door, probably wondering what the hell all the noise was about. “Is everything alright?” he asked, looking around and finally resting his eyes on the one bed that stood askew.

“I just bumped into the bed,” I lied.

“Okay,” he said. “Everybody has finished eating, and the patrol has left. Do you want to see the prisoner?”

“Yeah, that’s probably what I should be doing, isn’t it?” I said, and he went to clear out the rest of the Wolves remaining on the bottom floor.

Once he’d done so I went out, meeting Herald and Mak in the mess area. Lalia had left with the soldiers. Garal and Lalia had apparently gotten permission from Rallon to stay in as long as I was there, and Garal told me that he’d be coming down himself as soon as he could. Despite having permission to stay, Lalia went out on patrol, both to keep up something of a facade of normalcy and to keep her away from me. The Wolves were obviously going to know that something was going on, considering Garal’s odd orders, but hopefully they would just think that there was a normal, human visitor who couldn’t be seen with the Wolves.

I told Mak to come with me, and asked Herald, who agreed after a thoughtful look that went from me to Mak a couple of times. She was going to need a proper explanation, but until she asked for it I wasn’t going to volunteer anything. It was a conversation I wanted to put off as long as I could.

“The warehouse had a strongroom when we took it over,” Garal told me as he led the way to the back of the building, somewhere under where I’d entered. “We converted it into a lockup for soldiers who show up to duty drunk, get into fights, or other disciplinary problems like that.”

It wasn’t like a vault or anything, but the door to the lockup was thick and banded with metal. Pot and Med, two of Rallon’s scouts, sat inside the door and greeted us as we entered, Herald and Mak with friendliness, Garal with the respect due someone who outranked them, and me with the respect due someone you definitely don’t want on your bad side. Although, to be fair, Pot at least looked fairly excited to see me again.

“We’ve had two of the command squad scouts on guard since you brought the prisoner in,” Garal explained. “The interrogator who accidentally ‘killed’ the previous one vanished soon after Mak and Herald came in together with one of the new guys, the damn traitors, but we don’t know if there’s anyone else who’s been bought or planted. As much as I hate that idea.”

“But us, we’re special,” Pot added happily. “The Commander trusts us implicitly, don’t he, Med?”

“Wouldn’t be on the command squad if he didn’t,” Med agreed, still looking at me warily.

“Did you talk to the guy?” I asked the room in general.

“Nah,” Pot said. “Got him breakfast, but that’s it. Hasn’t volunteered anything, either.”

“I asked them to wait until you got here,” Mak said. Very good, I thought. Very proactive of her.

“Thanks,” I told her, then looked at the Wolves in the room. “Shall we?”

At the other end of the room were two cells facing each other with a narrow aisle separating them. By the bars of the left hand one sat our prisoner, who’d been watching us silently since we’d come in. He didn’t look defiant or angry or anything like that, just thoughtful and apprehensive. But he couldn’t hide his fear. The room stank of it.

His knee looked better, but that’s magic potions for you.

The lockup was not large, with the walk between the two cells being barely two feet wide, and with five humans and a dragon in there it got crowded. I took the lead, walking over to the prisoner. He moved back from the bars, his eyes wary.

“Hello,” I told him. “I have some questions for you.”

“I can hardly believe that you’re real,” he said, then shook his head. “I can’t. I never should have helped you at all in the first place. I don’t know what came over me.”

His refusal was almost amusing, but this was no time for humour or softness. He smelled like prey, and he would obey or face the consequences. “What’s your name?” I asked him through the bars.

He hesitated, then said, “Ardek.”

“Ardek, you know that it’s far too late to change your mind, right?” I asked him.

“You don’t understand,” he said, “If I tell you anything and she finds out she –”

“Garal,” I said loudly. “Open the cell.”

Garal hesitated, and I looked at him with annoyance. “If I wanted to kill him, I could do that from here,” I told him. He nodded, then looked to Med, who tossed him a set of keys. With one of them Garal opened the lock of the wrapped chains that kept the cell door closed.

I pulled the door open and stepped inside. I had a very clear plan of how to deal with this.

“Ardek,” I said, stopping two feet in front of him. “Have you decided to stop being useful to me?”

The temperature in the room seemed to drop in response to the tone of my voice, and the humans behind me fell still and silent.

“I’m… I’m sorry,” Ardek stuttered. “I can’t. I can’t!”

“Mak,” I said flatly. “Come in here.”

She did so, slowly, and stood next to me. “Mak, tear his throat out,” I said in Tekereteki.

I heard the Herald take a sharp breath outside the cell. “I have no knife,” Mak protested haltingly in the same language.

“You have teeth,” I told her, and sat down to wait. “Go on.”

“Draka, what are you saying?” the Herald said urgently. “This is not funny.”

Mak looked at me, swallowed hard, then looked at Ardek and took one heavy, hesitant step towards him.

“Mak!” the Herald called to her sister. “What are you doing? You cannot… Mak, stop!”

Ardek, confused and frightened, looked from me to Mak to the Herald. He didn’t even try to fight, he just scrabbled backwards into the corner of the cell, putting another two feet of distance between himself and Mak. “What’s going on?” he demanded. “What are they saying?”

Somewhere in the back of my mind a little voice was screaming that I couldn’t do this. It was sick. Mak had made a mistake, but she was still my friend, and the Herald’s sister. Ardek was just some kid who’d ended up with the wrong crowd. They were both people. They didn’t deserve this, either of them. I couldn’t do this to them.

The voice got so loud and insistent that it actually began to make me feel a little bad, so I silenced it and said, “Mak. I’m waiting.”

Mak took another slow step towards Ardek. “I’m sorry,” she whispered to him, low enough that only he and I could hear her.

“Mak, please!” the Herald said again, even more urgently, though she didn’t actually come inside the cell. “What is this? Stop!”

The other humans just stood, watching, not understanding any more than Ardek did though I’m sure they could read the situation. But he was my prisoner, and the Herald, Mak and I were victims of the group he belonged to. They clearly weren’t going to get involved.

Mak took another heavy step towards Ardek, and he caved. “Alright!” he nearly shrieked. “I’ll talk! I’ll tell you anything! Just get her away from me!”

“Stop!” I commanded, and Mak relaxed, taking two quick steps back from Ardek. I could see her trembling faintly.

God, she really would have done it. I told her to tear a man’s throat out with her teeth, and she really would have done it.

“Well done, Mak,” I told her. “You can go.”

Mak fled the cell and then, pushing past the others, from the room. The Herald shot me one agonised look, then followed her sister.

“Now, Ardek,” I said, leaning in close. “Tell me about the Night Blossom.”

Ardek, it turned out, didn’t know a whole lot. The Night Blossom recruited mostly from gangs of kids who’d survived to adulthood on the streets. Ardek himself was barely nineteen, and had only been brought in a month ago together with three of the guards I’d killed. The younger members were backed up by more experienced heavies, many of whom had two or three fighting-related minor advancements and a few, as I’d seen first hand, with combat Majors as well. Her people, mostly men but a few women as well, were fiercely loyal. He described her as pulling people in. Just being near her was enough to want to make her happy, and I’d felt some of that myself. Other than that he didn’t know much about her. Not her real name, nor her age or background.

He did know where she made her money. Ardek didn’t know anything about trading in slaves, and seemed quite honestly horrified when I told him what we’d found. The Night Blossom’s usual business was running brothels, gambling houses, and drinking holes, usually all in one building. Ardek had spent his time working for the Blossom doing security for a few such places and, through some utterly shit luck, had been assigned to the house along with his friends only a few days before I tore through them.

I wondered if those friends would be a problem. He’d known those three for years. They’d been like family to him. I considered killing him right then and there just to nip any potential annoying attempt at revenge in the bud, but something stopped me. Something about him. Maybe it was the way he smelled, or the way he held himself. It made me certain that he’d told me the truth, and that he’d never dare to do anything against me. That made him useful. It had been getting stronger over the hour or so that I spent with him, and was similar to how I felt about Mak, though in her case I had other reasons to spare her.

I left him sitting in his cell. Garal locked the door behind me, then went to clear the way for me. The Herald had come back in at some point, and had been standing silently in the aisle as I spoke to Ardek. Now, as we were leaving, she spoke up.

“Draka,” she said, “I deserve some answers.”

“You do,” I said with a sigh. We hadn’t spoken properly this whole time, and this was how we’d begin. Unfortunate didn’t begin to cover it.

“My sister cried herself to sleep in the middle of the morning, Draka,” she said accusingly. “I tried to ask her about what happened with that prisoner and she just kept saying that she deserved it! What happened? Why is Mak suddenly obeying you, like a… a slave or a servant? What happened to my sister? What did you do?”

Garal returned and led us out. We quickly decided that the cellar would be a better place for me than the infirmary, so he led us there. Once we were alone in the dark, with only a lantern for the Herald to see by, I swallowed my fear and answered her.

“Mak does deserve what I did, and worse,” I told her. “Yesterday I almost killed her.”

The Herald just stared at me in mute horror, and distantly I felt my heart break.