Page 56 of Devour the Dark

CHAPTER TWENTY

VANE

We’ve renteda carriage to take us to the manor. It’s a thing of luxury, with the twin bench seats upholstered in red velvet and the walls in black leather. Two small lanterns flicker from the outside casting soft light through the windows.

It may be a luxury, but when your standard mode of transportation is flying, everything pales in comparison.

I fidget in my seat.

Winnie takes my hand in hers, fingers threaded together.

The shadow sighs with contentment.

When we are apart, it riots.

When we are together, it calms.

When we are skin on skin, it settles into our hollows like a tide filling up a million tiny pools.

I almost sigh with it.

“Historically, shadows have never been split,” Asha says from the bench across from us. “How did you manage it?”

“Shadows do what shadows want,” is my answer, at the same time Winnie says, “It claimed me and when Vane was pushed off a cliff, I begged it to claim Vane too.”

“She’s downplaying it, of course,” I add. “She leapt off the cliff after me. The woman who is afraid of heights.”

“Recoveringfrom a fear of heights.” She smiles. “You gain the ability to fly, and gravity is no longer a burden.”

Asha’s gaze cuts between us. “You Maddred brothers like strong women.”

A statement. A fact. An observation.

If you had asked me this time last year, I would have denied it. The Darkland Dark Shadow liked to terrify. It wanted to chase and fuck and dominate. It needed to feel superior. There were days when even being around Pan was difficult because the shadow knew he was more powerful than it.

Some of that could have been attributed to the fact that the shadow and I were never a compatible match and it hated being off its island. The Neverland Shadow is different in every way. Agreeing to split itself being one of them. And I never get the feeling the Neverland Shadow is just one bad day away from tearing me apart from the inside out.

The carriage clatters to a halt at a busy intersection. We’re out of the Umbrage now and into the Merchant Quarter on the outskirts of Dark City. Darkland is made up of several mid-sized cities, with Dark City being its biggest. Everything else revolves around it, almost like a sundial. Even the Umbrage for all of its misfit, rebellious ways. Maddred Manor is on the northwest end of Dark City, halfway between the city and Port Night on the island’s northern coast.

When traffic is clear, we lurch forward straight through the intersection and through the Quarter.

Winnie is hunched forward trying to get the best view out the window. Darkland and Neverland couldn’t be more different from one another. Neverland is wilder, with a certain element of freedom. Darkland was always about restriction and control. I hated everything about it. And I didn’t realize just how much until our father was exiled, our titles stripped away. I struggled for so long with the Darkland Dark Shadow because it wantedto return and I did not. But giving it up… I was always acutely aware that giving it away meant giving its power to someone else and that was never an option. I think deep down, I always knew it had to be Roc. I wouldn’t trust the shadow with anyone else.

We pass a few shops that were once swarming with activity last I was here and are now boarded up, windows smashed, front facades scarred and stained.

It takes me by surprise, and it must show because Asha says, “There was a riot here years back. Fighting between the ruling class and the poor.”

“Roc didn’t tell me.”

“Probably because it never affected him. He could easily stand with the poor and turn around and party with the wealthy. They both loved him.”

“Was it settled then? The fighting? I’m surprised they haven’t rehabilitated the buildings.”

“The poor were driven back,” Asha explains. “Then double-taxed the year after. I think the ruin is meant to remind them of what happens when they get out of line.”

The wealthy and noble in Darkland always did embrace the lie that they were better than the lower class. Noble born meant superior blood. And while the merchant class could never fully penetrate the nobility, they were happy to be in close proximity to it, sure that when the time came, they would be protected from whatever ills plagued the lower class.

With the Merchant Quarter behind us, the large brownstones start to dominate the streets. Most of these houses belong to wealthy merchants, and most of them are designed by Hil Howe, a semi-famous architect from the mortal realm. He’s dead now, which has only added to the value of the houses.

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