Shadow Scale by Rachel Hartman
“We need to know if Abdo is well enough to travel,” I said.
Of course I am, Abdo grumped in my head, but Nedouard, not privy to our conversation, pulled up a chair for Abdo and then seated himself on a facing stool. Abdo grudgingly sat and held out his arm.
Nedouard unwrapped the bandages and said, “Lovely.”
“Lovely?” I said, bracing myself to look. The midwife at Donques had done her best; Dr. Belestros had removed the stitches, leaving a raised and knotted scar.
“Is it still causing you pain?” said Nedouard. There was a long pause while Abdo spoke in his head. “You’re past the danger of infection, but it’s going to be stiff.” A very long pause. “Your tendons will have formed adhesions in all the wrong places. They’ll be the devil to untangle. I’m not sure what Belestros thought he could do, the arrogant dragon.” Pause. “Maybe in the Tanamoot. In their own country, the dragons have superior equipment.”
Nedouard rose, opened a cabinet, and pulled out ointment and soap. “Above all, keep it clean,” he said. “We underestimate the importance of hygiene in the Southlands, and we pay for it dearly.” He handed the supplies to Abdo. “Pack these, and then get some sleep. Seraphina, may I speak with you alone?”
“Of course,” I said. Abdo looked irritated but did as Nedouard asked. The doctor motioned me to take Abdo’s empty seat.
“Blanche didn’t need help with her machine—as if I could have helped. She’s scared,” said Nedouard in a low voice. “I am, too, and horrified for Dame Okra. Is there nothing we can do for her?”
The question bespoke his kindness. “I don’t see how,” I said, despairing. “Dame Okra could surely push back against Jannoula, but she seems disinclined to try.”
“Is it possible to evict Jannoula from your mind once she’s in?” asked the old doctor.
“I did it,” I said, “but it was difficult. I had to trick her and build a place to contain her. I’m not sure it would work again; she’d be on guard against it.”
“It’s reassuring to know it’s possible,” he said, fidgeting with a button of his doublet. “When I hear Abdo’s voice in my mind, there’s no way not to hear him. I despair of being able to keep her out when she gets around to me.”
“Abdo’s voice must be like her knocking,” I said, thinking fast. I had not reasoned this out until now. “Abdo can’t manipulate your body or hear any thoughts except the ones you direct toward him in answer.”
“He doesn’t hear thoughts I direct toward him in answer,” said Nedouard, sitting up straighter. “I always have to reply aloud.”
That had been true of Lars and Dame Okra as well, I suddenly realized. I hadn’t thought about it; I’d assumed they’d been answering aloud for my benefit.
Abdo could hear me reply in my head, but then, he was arguably in my mind already. “That’s encouraging,” I said. “Truly. Maybe Jannoula won’t be able to enter any further than that unless you let her in.”
Dame Okra hadn’t even liked to hear Abdo’s voice; she’d found it invasive. I remembered suddenly how Abdo had speculated about altering Dame Okra’s memory—did that mean he could enter minds more completely if he chose to, whether he’d been invited in or not? I wasn’t sure.
“If you hear Jannoula’s voice, don’t answer,” I said, hoping that would be enough.
“That sounds easy,” said Nedouard grimly. “But how was Dame Okra caught out?”
“Her mind reaches out involuntarily,” I said. “It gives her prognostications; apparently it also makes her vulnerable. Jannoula was able to seize her.”
“Dame Okra never reached out to anyone—in the friendly sense, I mean. She disliked even that much vulnerability,” said Nedouard, shaking his bald head. “I confess, I find this intriguing. What makes us the way we are?”
“Dame Okra’s prickliness, you mean?” I asked as he stood and crossed the attic room toward his bed. “Or Jannoula’s desire to possess other people’s minds?”
“Both,” said Nedouard. He knelt by his bed and began feeling around under the mattress. “As well as that peculiar fellow who steals things that don’t belong to him.” He found what he was searching for: a sealed, folded parchment and a small, shiny object. He gazed at them tenderly. “Are we irretrievably broken, Seraphina, or can we be made whole again?”
With trembling hands, he placed the letter and a silver ring set with a tiny pearl in my lap. My heart leaped at the angular handwriting; it was Orma’s. I took Nedouard’s hands in my own—to still them, to thank him. He pulled away, saying only, “Those arrived while you were traveling. Forgive me.”
I enfolded the ring in my hand, and his eyes unlocked from it.
“Safe travels,” he said.
I kissed his liver-spotted forehead and left. Stars shone through the little window at the bottom of the stairs.
Abdo, asleep, had usurped my bed entirely. It was remarkable how such a small person could require all the blankets.
I lit a lantern with an ember from the hearth and opened the letter. I had barely enough light to read by, but I didn’t care. I worked for each word, and the work was a joy.
Eskar reports that you were well when she left, and that you took my suggestion to seek out the ityasaari. I do not know your exact route, but I assume if I send this care of Dame Okra, it will reach you eventually.
I have little news. Eskar has begun courting the exiles here, recruiting them to Comonot’s cause. She believes he will change his mind, and she wants to be ready when he does. I don’t point out her irrationality, though it gives me a certain satisfaction.
My research continues apace. I am impatient for you to be here. Some things can only be told in person. Eskar thinks I shouldn’t write at all, that it is far too risky and impulsive.
I smiled, trying to imagine Uncle Orma being impulsive by any but dragon standards. Orma went on:
I am writing you anyway, because I must chance it. I send along an object. Keep it. It is of the utmost importance. The thing itself plus nothing equals everything.
That was all. I turned the page over; he hadn’t even signed his name.
I examined the ring in the lamplight. Was it a quigutl device? If so, I’d have to agree with Eskar about being needlessly risky. He was hiding from the Censors; thniks could be traced. The ring had a single tiny pearl embedded in the silver, but no switch that I could see. The inside was inscribed with nothing but the silversmith’s mark. The pearl itself might be the switch. I dared not pinch or press it. I slid the ring onto my index finger, where it jammed at the second knuckle. It fit the pinkie of my right hand. The pearl winked at me.
I would keep it, of course. The reason would surely become clear in time, and the thing itself—plus or minus anything—was lovely.
Abdo gave a fluttering snore. I flopped down beside him gently, or so I thought, but it was enough to disturb him. Stop, he muttered, rolling over.
“I need to start reviewing my Porphyrian,” I whispered to him. “My tutor taught me a little, but—”
Southlanders can’t speak it, said Abdo sleepily. Too hard for your flimsy foreign minds. There are six genders and seven cases.
That sounded familiar. I stretched out on the blanketless half of the bed and tried to remember: naive masculine, naive feminine, emergent masculine, emergent feminine, cosmic neuter, point neuter. Nominative, accusative, genitive, dative … locative? Evocative? Saints’ dogs, I was never any good at this.
Still. Orma was in Porphyry. That was worth all the grammar in the world.
We just had to get through Samsam first.
Abdo and I, in traveling clothes, waited atop the townhouse steps, shivering in the predawn mist. I’d gathered our baggage as silently as possible; I hadn’t seen Dame Okra and hoped to keep it that way.
Between Nedouard and sleepiness, I hadn’t told Abdo about Jannoula last night. I was trying to explain now. “You remember how Gianni Patto’s mind was a strange color? It was mixed up with a second ityasaari’s—Jannou
I know that name, said Abdo, twisting his mouth as he considered.
“The lady I banished from my garden,” I reminded him.
His eyes widened. That was Jannoula? Back home, in Porphyry, she gets into other ityasaari’s minds, and the old priest, Paulos Pende, pulls her back out.
I gaped at him, stunned. “H-how long has this been going on?”
Abdo made a rude sound through his lips, like a snorting horse. I don’t know. She’s a nuisance, really. Pende grabs her, like plucking off a tick. He showed me how.
Before I could question him further, a cacophony of thudding hooves interrupted us. Around the corner rode our Samsamese escort: an old hunter in stained leathers with an evil-looking knife strapped to his leg and a grizzled braid down his back; behind him, leading four more horses, came a dark-haired bravo in crisp Samsamese black, a rapier at his side and a smirk on his lips.
The Regent of Samsam, famously stingy, had sent us only two men. I hoped they would be enough to protect us from the famously intolerant Samsamese.
The younger man waved and called loudly enough to make me cringe: “Goodt day, grausleine! Our Regent sends us to bring you—and your little boy—to Samsam.”
You’re a little boy, said Abdo, folding his skinny arms.
The men pulled up in front of the house. “I am Rodya,” said the young swordsman jovially, impervious to Abdo’s glare. “My comrade, Hanse, is the quiet one—ha!—but be assuredt, we are men of ability and reliability.” He seemed unduly pleased with this wording. “The Regent toldt us to get you to the Erlmyt by St. Abaster’s Day, and so we will, swift and safe.” He tapped a fist against his heart. “Thet is our promise.”
St. Abaster’s Day was only a fortnight off. I hoped he was right.
Hanse, the old hunter, had silently dismounted and was strapping our small luggage to the packhorse; he nodded his promise. I nodded back.
Rodya tried to help Abdo onto a horse. Abdo ducked under the horse, mounted from the other side, and grinned down at Rodya’s befuddlement. Rodya wasn’t the only one confused; the horse seemed spooked by the maneuver, snorting and circling, but Abdo stroked its mane and laid his cheek upon its neck to calm it.
“Eh, you know horses already! Goodt!” said Rodya, laughing it off. He turned to help me onto my horse, and I let him, out of pity.
“So you had no intention of saying goodbye?” shrilled a voice behind us. Dame Okra loomed at the top of the steps, glaring vitriol, arms akimbo. “Abdo can’t go with you. He’s hurt.”
Oh yes, it’s much clearer on her than it was on the wild man, said Abdo sagely, pursing his lips. His soul-light was hazy, but she’s got two colors, twisted around each other. It should just be a matter of—
“Abdo, don’t!” I cried, but it was too late. He’d been talking and reaching out to her at the same time, and now he clutched at his head with both hands, as if in pain. I wished I had his mind-sight, or any glimpse of what passed, unspoken, between him and Dame Okra. Her expression, always volatile, ran from horror to pain to triumph to horror again in seconds. She staggered back, her spaniel eyes bulging, her mouth a terrible crooked line.
“All right, then,” she gasped, staring at nothing, her face a pale green. “Travel. Good. It is well.” She limped back into the house.
I looked at Abdo. His face was ashen. One of his hair knots had come undone, as if he’d had a physical altercation; the incongruous corkscrew flopped across his forehead.
Abdo, speak to me! I cried, my heart pounding. Did Jannoula seize you?
He turned his head sideways and shook it, like a swimmer with water in his ear, or like he was trying to hear Jannoula rattling around in there. He said, No. I fought her off.
I exhaled shakily. What little training the temple had given Abdo had put him far ahead of any Southlander ityasaari, as far as I could tell. No one else could see mind-fire or speak in people’s heads; he’d worked out how to create St. Abaster’s Trap essentially on his own. If anyone could fend off Jannoula, surely it was he.
Still, I couldn’t help feeling he’d been extremely lucky just now.
His gaze had turned sheepish. I couldn’t unhook her from Dame Okra, though. I don’t see why not. The principle is sound.
Maybe you can ask this priest when we get to Porphyry, I said.
No thanks, said Abdo sourly. He’d only tell me I need more training.
“All right,” I said aloud, trying to gather myself. “It’s time we departed.”
Hanse, the old hunter, had been watching without expression, scratching his stubbly chin, waiting for us to finish messing around. Young Rodya translated my words, and the older man nodded, turned his horse west, and led us out the city gates, across country toward Samsam.
Barring another surprise like Gianni Patto, I believed there was only one ityasaari in Samsam: a middle-aged man, bald, stout, and square-spectacled. With his clothes on, he looked hunchbacked; I’d had the dubious privilege of looking in on him while he was bathing, and knew he had a pair of vestigial wings, membranous like a bat’s, carefully folded against his back. In my garden, I called him the Librarian because I’d never seen him without a book in his hand—not even in the bath. He lived in a crumbling mansion in a dismal valley where it always seemed to be raining.
“Thet is the Samsamese highlands,” Lars had said when I’d described it to him, two days before our journey began.
“The highlands are enormous,” I’d said, looking at the map spread on Viridius’s worktable. “Can you narrow it down if I give you more details? There’s a village within walking distance, and a river, and—”
Lars laughed, slapping the table with a beefy hand. “All great houses are near a village and a river. We have a proverb: ‘In highlandts, every man is earl of his own valley.’ Thet means a lot of valleys. Also, means a rude joke in Samsamese.”
“I don’t think I need that one spelled out,” I said.
“Even the valleys have valleys, Phina. You couldt be looking for months.” He jabbed a finger at the southern edge of the uplands. “Thet is why you need to come here, to Fnark, where is St. Abaster’s tomb. On St. Abaster’s Day all the earls come down for their council, the Erlmyt.”
“Just the one day?” With the vagaries of travel, it might be hard to arrive so promptly.
“It can last a week, or a few weeks, but thet is not guaranteed. On St. Abaster’s Day it begins. Then you see all the earls together, and find the one you’re looking for.”
“How are you so sure he’s an earl?”
His gray eyes twinkled. “Who else in highlandts can afford so many books?”
“What if he doesn’t come to this meeting?” I said. “He seems a solitary sort.”
Lars shrugged his bulky shoulders. “Then perheps another earl will know him. It still saves you months of looking. It is your best chance.”
I hadn’t had the nerve to ask Lars the other question that immediately came to mind: What if your half brother, Josef, Earl of Apsig, is at the meeting? Josef and I had not parted on good terms after the events of midwinter; he despised half-dragons, and I was none too fond of would-be assassins.
If Earl Josef was at the Erlmyt, if he learned that the Librarian was my fellow half-dragon … I hardly dared contemplate the trouble that might cause.
It would be an exaggeration to say that the sky clouded over the moment we crossed the Samsamese border—but not by much.
Over the next fortnight, as we hastened toward Fnark past muddy pastures and rocky fields of rye, I tried not to think about Earl Josef at all, although my experience with him surely tempered my treatment of our Samsamese guides. I didn’t trust them. The Eight, from relatively tolerant Ninys, had had enough unease about traveling with two half-dragons. There was no question in my mind that Hanse and Rodya, hailing from St. Abaster’s homeland, should be kept in the dark about us. The Regent apparently had not told them we were seeking a half-dragon; t
I didn’t admit I spoke Samsamese, erring ruthlessly on the side of caution.
It rained each night and misted every morning; in the afternoons, it poured. We stayed at inns, when there were inns, but half the time we camped. Everything we owned grew steadily damper. The ends of our fingers were wrinkled as a matter of course; I could hardly bear to examine my toes. At least it wasn’t cold; St. Abaster’s Day falls at the point where spring has its first inklings of summer.
Rodya, in an oiled cloak and broad hat rimmed with dangling droplets, was a ceaseless font of drippy cheer. “In Samsam we hev two seasons: rain and snow. Is better along the coast. One week sunshine every summer!”
If he tells one more joke about rain, I’m going to drown myself in it, said Abdo, slumping in the saddle. I wasn’t enjoying the weather, but it seemed to affect him even more. All it would take, surely, is to look up with my mouth open—
How do you say “He talks too much” in Porphyrian? I asked hastily, trying to distract Abdo from his misery. I hazarded a guess, no doubt butchering the pronunciation.
Abdo gave me the expected fish-eye, but for an unexpected reason: Wrong gender. You use cosmic neuter for a stranger.
I glanced at Rodya; he leaned to one side and spat on the ground. He’s not a stranger anymore. If ever anyone embodied naive masculine, surely Rodya—
You use cosmic neuter for a stranger, Abdo insisted. And he’s a stranger until you’ve asked, “How may I pronoun you?”
But you told me cosmic neuter was the gender of gods and eggplant, I protested, unsure why I was arguing with a native speaker about his own language.
People may choose it, said Abdo. But it’s polite for strangers. You may be almost sure he’s not an eggplant, but he might still be some agent of the gods.
Abdo enjoyed correcting my grammar, but distraction only went so far, and I began to wonder whether the rain was really the problem. For hours each day he stared into the gray and rubbed the dark, knotty scar on his wrist. He didn’t eat properly—not that I blamed him. The Samsamese are overly fond of cabbage and lumpy gravy. I berated myself for letting him come; after the first week, I was convinced he was unwell. When I asked him, he just shrugged listlessly.