Page 36 of Her Shadow so Dark and Lovely
“Little mouse, here,” Sila says, keeping her voice down. Her hand rests on my thigh, cool even through the wool of my dress.She’s kneeling on the step below with a wry smile. “I don’t imagine they’re very satisfying, but you should eat something.” I take the little parcel she’s offering me.
Wrapped in the cloth is a dry, dense flat bread. It’s the kind of thing made to be edible for a long time, at the expense of being actually edible. It’s sweet and a little salty. It’ll have to do. Sila passes me water and I try to wash it down.
Where are we?
“Where we are supposed to be,” Sila says, as opaque as the surrounding darkness. “The labyrinthine Heart of the Library is constantly shifting and changing. The only way through is to know where you want to be going, and to go there, regardless of what the Heart throws at you.”
How helpful.
A smile plays at the corner of her mouth. “So long as I know what we are looking for, we will find it. Trust me, little mouse, I won’t lead you astray.”
Won’t you?
The cramping in my fingers is easing, the aching in my feet fading, but my limbs feel heavy still. The thought of moving on is an unpleasant one.
“Not in here,” she says, smiling. “Now come, before you fall asleep and turn to stone.”
The hallways and rooms and staircases are certainly more interesting than the endless corridors, but when I follow Sila through the hallway that I swore we entered through for the third time, it’s easy to believe we are hopelessly lost. I have to remember that the Heart is an insidious thing. I’ve already witnessed it tricking my mind into believing the corridors hadn’t been moving. It could very well be playing the same tricks again.I had trusted Sila when I took her hand in the scriptorium. I had to keep trusting her now.
“You think so loudly, little mouse,” Sila teases.
It all looks the same.
“It is,” says Sila. “Mostly.” I frown at her, holding my lantern aloft to see if she’s still teasing me. Her face is as deathly serious as I have ever seen it.
What is it we are looking for, exactly?
“There will be a door,” she says. “And that will be the next test, because the labyrinth would dearly love to keep you.”
Keep me? You said it liked me.
“It does. Wearerather alike, the Heart and I. Ah, here it is.” For the first time, the darkness shifts and a wall appears out of the gloom with a tall door shut fast. It doesn’t budge when Sila tries to pull it open. She glances at the dark above her. “Oh come now, don’t you want to let Lorel see what you’ve prepared for her?”
There is something like an embarrassed silence hanging in the air. Almost bashful. Then, with a soft sigh, the door opens just a touch. Somehow it only serves to settle a scowl on Sila’s face.
“So eager to please,” she huffs. She turns as I go to follow her, forcing me to stop short and look up sharply at her. “Whatever happens, just keep walking. Do not stop for me. I can take care of myself.”
What?
I give her an alarmed look as she grows taller, eyes going dark, blood welling in them and the shadows bleeding out of her. “Just keep walking,” she says. It echoes in soft whispers as she turns and wrenches the door fully open. We hardly have to step through it before we’re plunged into darkness.
Chapter 20
Lorel
My lantern’sdull light tries to hold back the darkness, but it’s a thick, light absorbing thing and I am a poor mage. The light in the lantern trembles as I shiver.
“Keep walking, little mouse. I will follow,” whispers Sila from somewhere behind me.
Fuck. I take a deep, trembling breath. In the labyrinth, I had Sila to guide me through its twists and turns. I am not as sure of myself here. I put one foot in front of the other and hope the ground intends to hold. That it won’t just swallow me down, never to be seen again. Sila would never allow it.
My footsteps echo into the dark, bouncing back to me and away again. Echoes mean there are walls, at least. This darkness isn’t endless.
I can hear my heart thumping in my ears, feel the desire for flight as well as any prey animal would. I hope it doesn’t give out before this ends.
I’ve been in the caves of the Glade before, where the silken glow worms live. Little pin pricks of light that wax and wane in the darkness in some kind of arcane rhythm as they dangleand dance on long thin threads. I’m reminded of them now, as a dozen tiny glowing orbs twinkle to life around me. They shift along with me as I walk, like eyes watching me in the dark. A chill runs down my spine and then I feel the brush of shadow and darkness that I know is Sila. There is a snarl. Something damp touches my cheek. Not Sila. I fight down the urge to retch.
My lantern light shivers with me, blurring as my eyes water and a vile feeling crawls over my skin. The air moves again and I flinch, only to brush the back of my hand against something softly scaled and damp in the dark behind me. It’s too much. It’s too much and I have to keep going. Another snarl cut off with a screech. And another.
