David Dalglish - A Dance of Shadows

He took a step toward her, reaching out a hand.

“We can be together,” he said. “I know I erred revealing our love to the priests. I know I was a fool to feel guilt and shame. Please, this is all I know to do to make up for it.”

“Is that all you have to offer me?” Zusa asked. She thought of herself in her filth, him kissing her neck. Thought of how oblivious he’d been to her situation. She was just a memory to him, a perfect memory…

“You’re insane,” she told him. “You’re a sick man unable to let go of the past. We aren’t in love, Daverik. Perhaps once, but that love died a decade ago. It’s time you open your damn eyes and see that.”

She saw his anger building, an almost childish denial of the truth.

“You’ve only forgotten! It will take time, but time we will have. We were our firsts, Katherine. Surely no flame has burned brighter for you than me.”

“I won’t leave Alyssa and Nathan,” she said. “They’re my family now. You’re only a bad memory.”

Daverik let out a bitter laugh, and he tensed as if to strike her, but then suddenly his entire body went slack.

“I know,” he said, defeat in his voice. “I’d hoped otherwise, but I know. I’m sorry, Katherine. If you’d only said yes, I’d have never told you. I’d have spared you the heartache.”

Zusa felt her heart begin to race as her mind immediately went to the most dire of assumptions.

“What do you mean?” she asked.

More of that horrible bitter laughter.

“I am not the only one to meet with Laerek tonight,” said Daverik. “The Widow was to meet him as well, but only after.”

Her racing heart stopped. Her stomach clenched.

“After what?” she asked.

“After killing Alyssa Gemcroft.”

Zusa flung herself at him, grabbing his neck so she might slam him against the wall.

“Why?” she screamed. “What have we done to deserve this?”

“I am not the one you should be angry with,” Daverik said, clutching at her wrists. “I didn’t set this in motion. We gave Alyssa a chance to turn to Karak, but she refused, and do you know why? Because of you. Because of everything you told her about our god. Her death is on your hands, Katherine, not mine.”

“My name is Zusa!” she screamed, kicking him in the stomach. The man doubled over, coughing. Coughing, and laughing.

“There is no time,” he told her. “The Widow is just a puppet, a minor player in all this. Alyssa is already dead. But I’ll tell you where to find Laerek. You can go, take your vengeance, and then at last we can be together.”

Zusa’s grip tightened, and she almost strangled the life from her former lover.

“Don’t be a fool,” he said in a raspy voice, fighting to breathe through her grasp. “Kill the one responsible, then come with me. We’ll leave this all behind. You’ll never feel pain again, not like this. Don’t go back. You don’t want to see it.”

“No,” she said, letting him go. “You’re a child, Daverik, just a child. You’ve never understood me, and you never will.”

With every last bit of strength she ran toward the Connington mansion, daggers at the ready, long cloak billowing.

Daverik watched her go, and his heart ached worse than his sore neck. He loved her, so much he loved her, but time and trials had changed her, warped her into something he only vaguely recognized.

“Such a shame,” he whispered.

He heard Ezra land behind him, quiet as a cat landing on padded feet.

“She still will not accept you, will she?” she asked.

Daverik shook his head. “Zusa is too far gone, and whatever love she has for me is not enough to bring her back.”

He looked over his shoulder, saw Ezra drawing her daggers. Daverik once more thought of the softness of Zusa’s skin, the way his lips had brushed her neck, and then cast aside the sinful memories so he might give his faceless her order.

“She’ll interfere if she can,” he said. “Kill her, and if the Widow fails, then kill Alyssa as well.”

Ezra stepped closer, rubbing her wrapped face against his shoulder while peering up at him.

“You risked much for an old love,” she said. “Deborah barely lives, and there are others in the temple not so lucky.”

“The dead go to Karak, their souls claimed and protected,” Daverik snapped. “Zusa is greater than any of them, yet she will burn, only burn. I had to try.”

Ezra smirked as she stepped away to give chase. “Tell me,” she said. “Would you have risked for my soul as you have for hers?”

He could not answer, and he felt his neck flush with the shame.

“I thought not,” Ezra said. “Dangerous games, Daverik. You play such dangerous games…”

She ran, to murder the only woman Daverik had ever loved. The act was just, of course, a necessary fate for a woman who had blasphemed against Karak for so long. But he would find no comfort in it, no solace.

“Forgive me,” he told the night. “Perhaps, after an eternity, I might one day hold your body against mine. But I’ve given you enough chances. I wash my hands of this. Your fault, not mine, dear Katherine…”

Stephen Connington stepped into the tiny room, holding a candle to give himself light. As he’d hoped, she was already waiting for him there.

“Mother,” he said, seeing her sitting against the wall, surrounded by little toys carved out of wood.

“I’m here, child,” Melody said.

Stephen went to her, curling up in her arms as he closed his eyes. He was getting too big for it, he knew, but he did so anyway. With his eyes closed, he was once more lost in darkness, lost in a past he’d thought he’d escaped. Sadly, it seemed he never would.

“Do you think Father loved me?” he asked.

“You know he did.”

He thought of the years of darkness between months of light, of the beatings and the hunger, followed by Leon’s lips on his neck.

“Do I?” Stephen asked.

He’d been a bastard of Leon’s, birthed by a lowly servant girl who had aroused his father’s rare sexual lust. Melody was not his mother, not by blood, no matter how much he might wish it were true. There’d been times Leon had treated him well, had laughed and told him stories as they walked through the mansion. Other times, though… other times…

“He told you he loved you, didn’t he?” Melody asked, stirring him from his thoughts.

His father’s voice echoed in his head, distorted over time so he couldn’t be sure if the love he heard in it existed or not.

You know they would kill you, Stephen. They don’t think you’re good enough to be one of them, to take over everything I’ve built. They want someone pulled from a prissy noble lady’s cunt instead. But you’re my daughter, you hear me? You never forget it. My blood. So don’t you worry when I put you down there. It’s for your safety, Stephen. Your safety.

No matter the love he felt from his father, those long months spent in the cell had worn on him, bathing him in darkness as he grew up isolated and alone. But then, when he was almost six, an angel had been delivered to him. It was his mother, the true mother who owned his heart. Melody had been placed in the cell adjacent to his. The first he’d ever known of her was the songs she sang to pass the time. In that deep darkness, that voice had carried him, given him comfort so he could sleep without crying.

“Alyssa’s supposed to be next,” Stephen said. “Laerek insists on it, but only after you tell me it’s too late for her.”

“I know,” Melody said, gently stroking his hair. Not his real hair, but the long wig he’d put on prior to entering. He still remembered the night he’d taken it, hidden in shadows while watching the whores pass. Oh, some didn’t ask for money, might have even claimed they were proper women, noble ladies or faithful wives. But that’s not what they were. His father had made that clear.