Tabitha Chirrick - Overshadowed

“W-which scenario is more likely?” Jace asked.

“I honestly can’t fathom. Both. Either. No one knows for sure.”

“But if the mothership was gone?”

“Ha, well, easier said than done. But yes, if it were gone, we’d have an answer as to the fate of the shuttle.”

“So I’m guessing your plan is to destroy it,” Tayel said. “The mothership, I mean.”

“Yes. It is our last plan. You saw the sizable siege outside when you came in.”

“And the burned villages,” Jace said quietly.

“Kalanie Outpost is our final refuge,” Locke said. “We have until the walls crumble to turn the tides of this war, or we’re all lost. That mothership is their headquarters. It has to fall if we are to survive.”

Tayel rubbed her temples. Every step forward created two giant leaps back. Even if Jace’s parents made it here, they could already be long gone, but she didn’t know for sure, and she wouldn’t — couldn’t — stop trying until she did. She’d done everything for this chance to bring him home.

“So what’s the plan, then?” she asked. “We’ll help.”

Shy’s head whipped up, her grin pulling wryly to the side of her face that wasn’t gouged.

Locke laughed. “I like your enthusiasm, but you won’t likely find a place in the Varg war packs. They’ve allowed me to stay here and help, but only because I have long since gained their trust and am acting in a role their people cannot replace.”

“What do you mean a ‘role they can’t replace’?” Shy asked. “You’re going?”

He nodded. “I’ll be assisting them in the final charge against the mothership.”

Her eyes widened. She shoved his injured side and spoke over his groan. “With this? You can’t, Locke.”

“You’re limping all over the place,” Fehn said. “You’d be committing suicide.”

Locke grimaced. “Rokkir technology is far more advanced than the Varg are used to. When we board the mothership, we need to extract as much data from their systems as possible. With that, we may have more than an end to their siege on Modnik. We may be able to establish their entire war plan, all their leaders — everything.”

“How much do you know about their tech?” Fehn asked him.

“Enough. I’ve got a trick or two up my sleeve, and the Varg will protect me while I gather information.”

“No,” Shy said. “We’ll go.”

“Shy—”

“You can be the boss, the smart guy who came up with the plan — whatever you’d like, but you can tell us how to get what you need, and we will go in your stead. This is why I came here. This is why I travelled all the way from home: to help you. Our throne is seated by a madman, and our people are scared, leaderless, and being sold off to these sick, shapeshifting bastards. I am bringing you back to Sinos alive so you can set things right.”

“Sister—”

“It’s perfect,” Tayel said. “Let us go instead of you. Shy’s the best fighter I’ve ever seen, Fehn’s got the dark aether, and I…” She picked up her mag baton. “I could stand to hit a few things myself.”

Shy smiled.

Jace puffed his chest. “And I—”

“You’re all a bunch of kids,” Locke said, exasperated. “I’m sorry, but it doesn’t feel right putting you in harm’s way.”

“Oh please.” Shy rolled her eyes. “We’re not children — especially me. Where do you get off? We’ve already overcome the impossible and we’ve faced the enemy head on. Don’t refuse the help out of pride, Locke.”

“It’s not out of pride. The war pack isn’t going to simply trust a group of outsiders to aid them in the most dire war in their history.”

“You can convince them. I know you can. You once convinced Edger to eat the tail of a rhinestone scorpion.”

He snorted. “Edger was drunk.”

“So were you.”

He pinched the bridge of his nose. “Fine. I’ll speak with the pack leader, but I can’t promise he’ll let you in on their plans — much less replace me in the execution of them. I don’t know when they intend to launch the attack, but their planning session convenes in the morning. You’ll have time to rest, at least.”

“Thank you,” Tayel said.

“We’ll see how grateful you are if he lets you go.” He shook his head. “In any case, it looks like everyone’s finished. I can take you all to the home pack. They might be able to make you all new clothes. You’ll need them if you intend to be outside.”

“Sounds good,” Shy said.

Tayel helped clean up the mess from the meal, and followed Locke through the compound afterward.

The night went by in a blur, with her growing more and more tired as she was led from one task to the next. The home pack re-wrapped her burn, took her measurements for clothes, and assigned her, Fehn, and Jace cots in a vacant barrack. It was hard not to consider why it was empty in the first place.

When the checklist of things to do finally ended, she fell onto her cot and squeezed her eyes shut. But with the rattling walls and prospect of launching an attack on the Rokkir mothership, she doubted sleep would ever come.

Tayel dreamed of long hallways in Castle Aishan, where dark portals flickered in the walls. Ruxbane reached out for her from within them. Each shadow she passed, his reach came closer. Every step, those hallways grew more and more narrow until a ship — Shy’s ship — flew overhead, a trail of fire and smoke eating at its wing. Tayel ground to a silent halt. The ship. The crash. Modnik . The vessel tore itself apart in the sky, and she started awake.

Heat radiated from a single torch perched on the wall above her cot. It cast the small room in blue. She placed her sweating palms against the fabric and pushed herself up, causing the metal poles to grate over the silence. She winced. Jace turned over under his furs in the cot beside her, and Tayel froze — waited. Her breathing was a rapid whisper of air in the quiet until a soft whistle left Jace, his snoring resumed.

She slid her legs over the side and settled her bare feet to the floor. Castle Aishan, exploding ships, dark portals; what a dream. It wasn’t bad enough she had to deal with everything while awake. She wiped her forehead with her hand. It came away slick.

On the opposite side of the room as Jace, Fehn’s cot lay empty, a bundle of furs left hanging over the edge. A twinge of worry pinched inside her. Maybe he’d gone to the bathroom, or maybe he was getting breakfast, if it was time for food at all. She had no concept of the hour, if it was night or day. There were no windows, no clocks.

She rubbed her temples, grinding the images of portals and Ruxbane out of her skull. After everything she’d been through, sleep should have come much easier.

A soft rap on the outer stone wall echoed in the room, and without waiting for answer, the furs hanging over the entrance split open. A feminine silhouette stood out against the orange backlight in the hall.

Tayel leaned forward. “Shy?”

“Hey,” Shy whispered back. She slipped through the opening and tiptoed to Tayel’s cot, carrying a strong scent of spice with her. “Can I sit?”

Tayel nodded and shifted to the side.

“How’d you sleep?” Shy asked.

Tayel closed her eyes and saw Ruxbane again. She remembered his angular face in the clouds of dust back in Castle Aishan, the quirk of a smile as he stepped toward her. She remembered the councilwoman, crazed and seething in the forest clearing, saying Ruxbane wanted Tayel alive. With everything that happened since, it seemed so trivial — so nonsensical — but alone, in the dark, with everyone asleep, and the quakes of combat rumbling through her cot, the idea of him haunted her.