Shade of Deception (Two)

Ten - SoD

Ten:

Sky walked over, and she seemed almost worried for me.

“Is this witch bothering you?”

Sky asked bluntly, directly to Grendel’s face, and the older immortal beauty did not even bat a lash at the young dragoness’ question, but she did return a mild volley of her own.

“How is your dear mum? Still licking the wounds from her piteous defeat at her tween daughter’s hands?”

Sky’s lip twitched in annoyance and she said, “We were far more civil. Expressions were measured, mine was larger, we have come to a mutually beneficial arrangement about our roles shifting for the sake of the Nix.”

Sky said, and Grendel tipped her imaginary cap to Sky.

“Kudos on besting dear mammy, she has always been a tough old bird.”

The dragon punch did not elude sky, but she merely shrugged it off.

“Didn’t they have that old guy from the Highlander play Beowulf this time? I think I saw it on the Syfy channel recently.”

Sky mentioned in a cheery tone, and Grendel looked annoyed. Clearly the entire thing surrounding her un-attractive monstrous portrait in a famous and classic story was a sore topic. One she probably only mentioned in passing to me because it was so causally linked to her given name.

“To live all the eons I have, and to see all that has risen from the ooze, so to speak, and still to be intrinsically linked to that mortal’s work of spite.”

Grendel sighed deeply, and she seemed to dispel her excess anger, and she met Sky’s gaze with an obstinate one of her own.

“I see your point, however, forgive a girl her concern at seeing you flirting with my sister-like bestie.”

Sky said in a casual tone, and something in that statement held a charge to it, power, almost like a form of natural expression discharged through the air. Grendel eyed me, and then looked over to Sky.

“Heavens dove, you’ve either cursed your entire species, or you have forever gained the most powerful guardian the Nix have ever seen.”

She said in a casual tone, but it held the weight of mystery, and the air of confusion.

“Well, I shall leave you lasses to it. It was a pleasure to see you both. I do hope we can all become friends, or at least not wage war.”

Grendel said in parting, and Sky muttered, “Sometimes that is all one can achieve.”

I frowned at her and she shook her head softly and mouthed out, “Not here.”

I scanned the surrounding, and I noticed the casual observers who did not actively remember shade sight was nearly three-sixty all the time. I noticed how the guards and other more casually eloquent dressed magus were studying me yet pretending to mill about in the gardens. Even some of the farmers and the workers were tracking my progress in the lush platform which seemed to be closest to the Magus controlled spire.

Overhead, I saw Skylar’s eyes swing to several harmless-looking drones zooming past. They were like basketball-sized quicksilver fowls only they moved around without any obvious propulsion system.

They are expression, enchanted items of technology. I believe the common human role-playing-game community often like to label this “magi-tech. That is obviously not what we call it, but it is the words you are most likely to know off-the-cuff.”

Being that we lived in the space-age world of tech and information, one did not require her nerd card to get the gest of Sky’s reference. Besides, games really do transcend all the classic stereotypical teen tropes. Modern jocks are also allowed to be techno-wizards, and vice-versa. Hell, there are plenty of high achieving schools where the mathletes are the true heroes of their hallowed halls. With that said, I may or may not have played my fair share of a certain MMORPG throughout middle school and part of high school. It wasn’t until I became aware of my origins, of being a shade, and being required to hunt and defend my hamlet from haunts—spectral beings composed of the echoes and remaining slivers of persona from the deceased.

Apparently, the haunts can be seen by more than just myself, but it takes a powerful being like a shade, a magus, or a homunculus, to seal the rifts that tare the fabric of reality between worlds, connecting earth to the spectral realm. My sight seems to be an all access pass into the other side. I can even see the desiccated terrain of the spectral realm that is almost like a shattered, broken, and rotted version of our living realm. It sort-of reminded me of a BBC show a year back that only had one season, called The Fades. It was like that depiction of an adjacent dimensions, only without the constant ash falling and covering the ground. I saw the show after I had learned what I am, after I had access to the spectral realm. It fascinated me that a mortal had the vision to produce such an accurate representation. I even wondered if maybe they had a near-death experience and saw into the spectral realm for a moment, otherwise it was insane happenstance.

My mind spun back like a returning boomerang to the present. Sky gave me a knowing look, one that said she knew I had just been deep in my spacy reveries. I was not a ditz, but I did lend myself to such profoundly complex brooding sessions that I often lost track of the world around me, if only for a moment or two.

I gave her a mildly apologetic look.

“You’re here trying to be helpful and I am spacing out on you.”

I said, and Sky rolled her eyes.

“Please, a girl deserves a good breather every couple of hours at least. And you looked like you flew miles away without leaving the ground—so to speak.”

She gestured to an enormous platform holding the entire upper spires level up and I sniffed at that. Sky acted and spoke like a woman many times her actual age. She had the snappy wit and word manipulation skills of a top-shelf novelist. If we were not constantly preparing to have things try to kill us or well, dealing with things really trying to kill us, we I could see her becoming a Pulitzer Prize winner or an International bestselling author. If not those, she could always become a police detective, because she had mad skills at sweating perps in the box! (And high school boys in the classrooms as well!)

“I just want to kick into gear and figure out where that big meathead is, so we can get back home. I don’t like the vibe here. There is something off.”

Sky glanced at me with an ardent swish of her eyes to the drones.

“Things appear rather tense. I believe we could do with a thorough investigation of the state of things in Hidden. It has been ages since mother checked in with the city.”

Sky said in a tone that told me she was bothered by her mother’s decision to steer clear of the Hidden capital. All the time I have been amongst them, the Nix spoke well of Hidden, yet we arrive here, and I see a vastly different reality presenting itself before me. The Nix appear mostly to be treated little better than the humans, and their relations with the city appear to be fracturing. Most of them live in the lowest tier, with the humans. There were ample indignities and injustices here for Roger to have begun a crusade against. However, what I saw was merely the surface layers. Heaven only knew what might lay beneath the hollow dignity and false friendships. We had only just arrived, and yet I could smell the metaphorical stink in the air.

“Well, we need to hurry up, shake hands, sip the cocktails and get the f**k to the lower district where Roger was last seen. My shade sight might be able to help us catch his trail if we’re lucky. If not, we can always play it by ear along the way and hope for a clue.”

I said, and Sky tipped her head in agreement.

“It’s high tea, not cocktails, but close enough, I guess. I have the feeling I am going to wish we could have cocktails after this meeting.”

Sky joked, and I smirked at her and our knowing gazes connected. She did not enjoy alcohol any more than I did, but I understood her meaning. We were in for the worst of it, a meeting with the city leaders. Most of whom already appeared to be obstinate and unbearable in large doses. Let’s not forget the ever-present fact that they also believed I was going to destroy the world—World Ender they called me. I have heard some unsavory terms in my short life, but I have never imagined any could make me feel so cheap, and so utterly devoid of value. Well not devoid, if you valued destruction and utter chaos. While I already recognized the need for some level of consistent chaos to keep order in balance, I still could not begin to wrap my mind around what might have triggered the other shades. Why I appeared the only sane one of to live. Then there was that little voice in the back of my mind, wondering if they shades were being set up. I am merely taking everyone’s word for it that shades have been these terrible monsters. However, as in human history, the writers of history are the victors. They get to frame the losers in whatever unflattering lights they deem.

Senna was the only reason I bought the anti-shade facts as truth. I have witnessed how decent, kind, and generous she is to everyone who is not me. I have seen the lengths she will extend for even strangers and mortals, so I have an extremely hard time believing everything she has done, and the terrible rift growing between her and Sky is over a lie. Senna is an apex; she is above this level of pettiness. Still, I want to meet someone like me, to know for sure. So that any traces of doubt can be wiped form my mind.

“We’ll make an excuse and bid take our leave once the tea is over. Do watch your cup like a hawk. I would not put it past a zealous youth to try to poison the monstrous shade while she sips tea in a mildly vulnerable position amongst perceived enemies.”

Skylar warned me, and her hard eyes told me that she was not joking. She combed her fingers through her ginger-blonde locks, and she studied the lower city with great interest. I knew she could see what I saw, and I could feel it eating away at her. She was their apex, and she was not leaving here without answers, and hopefully reformations. Whatever was happening here, Skylar had never known before now. I gather that she might have paid a surprise visit much sooner if she had. It did occur to me; this was the very reason Senna was so secretive with Sky. She knew her daughter well, and she knew Sky would never stand for injustices against her people, not with their collective tails so close to the fires of extinction.

“Dear ones, please come along now. We have much to discus, and even more information to share.”

The pink goth-lily magus leader said, and I gave her a mild smirk with a sassy look. Her responsive and piercing gaze almost stripped me via intention alone! I fought against the blush covering my cheeks again. These older immortal women muck up everything inside me! I feel like a complete fool before them, and they just seem to get away with twisting my emotions to their every whim! I sulked darkly, as we began to follow our hot and devious hostess.