The Shadow Watch Read online

  THE SHADOW WATCH

  S.A. Klopfenstein

  The Shadow Watch © 2018 by S.A. Klopfenstein

  Published by Guardian Grey Publishing

  Cover Illustration by Gwenn Danae

  Cover Typography by Stefanie Saw

  Edited by Tamara Blain

  Map Design by Sebastian Breit

  All Rights Reserved

  First Edition

  ISBN-13: 978-1984017024

  ISBN-10:1984017020

  Please visit S.A. Klopfenstein’s website at:

  www.authorsaklopfenstein.com

  Guardian Grey logo made by Freepik

  from www.flaticon.com

  For Kaitlin, my partner in crime

  Contents

  Prologue

  I. The Gallows

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  II. Winter’s End

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  III. A Shadow Among Legions

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  IV. Into The Teeth

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  V. The Assassin’s Den

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  VI. The Shadow & The Morph

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  VII. The Watchtower

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  VIII. The Slave’s Blade

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  IX. Creatures Of The North

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  X. The Casting Of The Lots

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  XI. Night Of Gods & Monsters

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  XII. Night Of Blood & Teeth

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  XIII. The Fate Of The Gallows Girl

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Author’s Note

  Magic of the Watchers

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  Prologue

  The Year 312 N.W.

  Sixteenth Year of the Reign of Aleksander Maro

  The mother could feel the creatures in her mind, searching, probing, scouring, desperate to unveil what remained hidden to them in the city of tents. She gripped her daughter’s hand tight, so tight she could feel the throbbing of her daughter’s heartbeat in her palm. Little Astoria did not know why her mother had snuck her out of their tent in the middle of the night. She did not know what creatures might lurk behind the skin of any one of their tribesmen, waiting to crawl out and devour her.

  Together, mother and daughter crept through the city, weaving from shadow to shadow. The mother prayed the creatures would not find her until her daughter was safe, but the sun goddess of the Yan Avii had turned her face from the world.

  Astoria yawned, then covered her mouth with her tiny hand.

  She’s seen only seven summers, thought the mother. It pained her to think of what she had to do, but she could not keep her daughter a secret any longer. It was not safe.

  Astoria did not know what hunted her because she did not yet understand the New World. She did not know of the ancient vows that had been sworn by ancient rulers, nor of the vile creatures that had been molded by them, molded for only one purpose—to eradicate Astoria’s kind from the world.

  Fear wrapped its fingers around the mother’s throat, and she held still. She could sense the creatures again. They were searching all across the makeshift City Upon the Steppe. They had sensed magic, and they would not leave until their hunger was sated.

  It did not matter that the Yan Avii were no longer part of the empire. The creatures did not abide by treaties or boundary lines. They knew only the purpose for which they had been bred. Astoria had used magic, and they had come for her.

  A tenuous cloud slithered across the sky, shrouding the twin moons of the New World. A blessing from the gods. The mother imagined the Sisters were whispering to her as they cast the world in shadow. She could almost hear their voices on the wind. Be brave, good mother, be swift.

  The mother seized the moment and hurried down the dark lanes through the labyrinth of tents, tugging her daughter along behind her.

  Astoria shivered. Her tiny hand trembled in her mother’s palm. Astoria wore only a cotton shift, which barely reached her knees and left too much of her bony shoulders bare. The mother wished she had thought to grab her daughter’s cloak, but there had been no time.

  Such a lovely thing, her daughter’s magic, an innocent thing. Astoria had used her gift for good. She had saved the boy. But the creatures came for her, all the same.

  The cloud passed, and the Sisters rejoined their thousand daughters in their nightlong dance across the sky, bathing the tent city in iridescent light. But the momentary darkness had been enough.

  At the edge of the Yan Avii tent city, the mother reached the tent she sought. The flap fell behind them, shielding them from watching eyes, though the creatures relied upon another sense. The mother felt their minds again, but she would not have to ward them off much longer. Her daughter was nearly safe.

  The merchant was so burly he seemed to fill the tent. His smile was crooked like his heart, the mother had no doubt. Her own heart shuddered at what she had to do.

  Sweat beaded from the merchant’s bald, fat head. Piercings lined the left side of his face from jaw to earlobe, threaded by a golden chain. His robes were blue like the glaciers of the mother’s homeland, woven of fine silk, and she knew he had not attained that wealth from dealing in spices.

  “Who’s he?” Astoria muttered sleepily.

  The merchant grinned, but he let the mother explain.

  “He’s… an old friend, my dear. He is going to look after you. You must go with him.”

  Realization dawned on Astoria’s face. Her eyes widened. Her lips trembled. “Go with him where?”

  “Somewhere safe.”

  “Y-you’re coming too?”

  The mother shook her head. The merchant’s chest heaved with silent laughter. How many times has he witnessed such treachery, to find the betrayal of a mother so amusing?

  “W-where are you going?” said Astoria.

  The mother choked back a sob. She knelt and pulled her daughter close, and Astoria’s tears soaked through her tunic. “Far away, my love,” said the mother.

  “I w-want to go with you.”

  “You can’t. My friend will keep you safe. You must be strong, my love. You must trust me.”

  “I trust you,” Astoria told her mother, straightening up bravely.

  She’s strong, thought the mother. Too strong. This is the only way.

  Astoria did not realize that her mother did not even know the merchant’s name. She did not understand when the man gave her mother a handful of coins in the exchange. The merchant took hold of Astoria’s hand, and the mother let go, biting her lip until it bled to keep from crying.

  “We move out at first light,” the merchant said.

  The mother handed him back the coins. “Leave tonight. Leave now.”

  The merchant raised a dark brow, but he did not question her. His golden tooth shone when he smiled. His fingers closed around the coins. “As you say. Come, little girl. We’ll wake my friends, and then, we will go.”

  “Her name is Tori,” said th
e mother. It was what the village children called her when they played. It sounded unassuming and common. Her true name betrayed its Old World origins. The mother feared anything, even a name, might draw attention to her daughter.

  “Come then, Tori.”

  Astoria held on to the merchant’s thick hand, and they left to wake his friends. The chain on the side of his face jingled lightly. His friends would be wearing chains too, the mother knew, though not on their faces. Soon, her daughter would wear chains as well. Astoria looked back one last time, her tawny face streaked with tears.

  The mother managed a feeble smile. “Be brave, my love.”

  The tent flap fell, separating them forever. Mother and daughter, blood of the same magical blood, no more.

  “I’m sorry,” the mother murmured to the vacant tent. Her heart collapsed inside the hollow cave of her chest.

  Her daughter was gone. But there was no time to mourn. Her daughter was not safe yet.

  The creatures had sensed magic. They hungered for blood, and the mother would give them what they had come for. Her magic was of the realm of minds, and it was important Astoria forget the things she could do. As she hurried from the merchant’s tent, the mother reached out with her sense, found her daughter’s mind, and reached inside. One by one, she removed the memories that made Astoria who she was, what she was. Each one brought tears. She was robbing her own daughter, but it was the only way.

  She hurried to finish, hoping it was enough. Already, the mother felt the creatures coming. They had sensed her magic, as they had sensed her daughter’s before.

  But this time, the mother opened herself to their sense, and their minds washed over her, pulsing with hunger and anticipation. They had crossed the world for this. The creatures changed their skins and flew to find her, soaring on black wings. The mother rose from the ground and flew to meet them, soaring with no wings at all. Only magic. Tears ran down her cheeks in cold, meteoric streaks as she flew across the city, as she flew to die.

  Her blood rained down upon the city of tents. Her body fell like a star. The creatures fell like crows, and they sated their hunger.

  But the mother greeted the gods with grateful tears.

  Her daughter was safe. That was all she had asked of them.

  Astoria was safe.

  Part I

  The Gallows

  In those days, the chancellors were the only gods. The old gods abandoned us long ago, and their Watchers along with them. Our gods were cruel, and they demanded blood. But all that changed the day of the Gallows.

  —from New Histories of the Old World

  1

  The Year 322 N.W.

  Fifth Year of the Reign of Cyrus Maro

  The gallows loomed over them like a slaver’s rod as the servants prepared the city square for the chancellor’s drafting ceremony. The mighty towers of Maro’El cast long shadows over the square in the fading light, and Tori Burodai’s breath hung heavy in the winter air, mixing with flurries of snow that lashed at her face with each gust of the wind. Her fingers felt like they might shatter as she hoisted the wooden beams upon her shoulder. The tips of her gloves were cut off so she could hold the beams in place while Darien Redvar pounded in the spikes. Her fingers were red and swollen, but the pain would end soon enough. The gallows was nearly finished.

  Tori rubbed her hands together vigorously, then reached for another beam, muttering curses beneath her breath.

  “You froze yet, Tori?” Darien said. He pounded the spikes home with a mallet, which sent jarring aches through Tori’s wrists as she held the beam still.

  She bit down on her tongue. “I’ll survive.”

  “Your fingers are icicles.” Darien stopped her, wrapped her hands with his own, and blew warm breath on them. The sudden heat stung.

  Tori pulled her hands away. “Look, the sooner we’re done, the sooner we’ll be beside the commander’s fires. Let’s just finish this bloody thing.”

  Tori hoisted another beam from the stockpile, and Darien retrieved more spikes. Darien was stronger—though Tori would never admit it to his face. He ought to have been the one holding the heavy beams upon his strong shoulders. Tori’s muscles were firm, and she had always held her own in a scrap, but her body was small and her limbs slender. However, the labor of hoisting the heavy beams warmed her up a little, and besides, she couldn’t hold the spikes in place if she couldn’t feel them, and the last thing she needed today was for her hand to slip and the mallet to shatter her fingers. Darien’s hands never faltered. He was a native of the high peaks of Klavash, accustomed to bitter cold, and he pounded the thick nails in with calculated precision.

  Tori and Darien had served Commander Scelero faithfully for three years, and for this servitude, they did not complain. Unlike many of the Oshan nobles, Commander Scelero was a decent master. But even he could do nothing when the chancellor required service. Every Lord House was required to send servants to prepare the city of Maro’El for the ceremony.

  Tori was glad she and Darien had been sent to the square together. Last year, she’d been forced to work with a whiny housemaid named Ela. The taskmasters had threatened to whip her. It always amazed Tori the way a few months working indoors made the maids think they were somehow above hard labor.

  Tori heaved another beam, but Darien paused, gazing up at the overhang that had taken shape.

  “You all right?” she asked.

  Darien shook his head, but returned to their task. “As if sending us to fight their civil war weren’t enough. To make us build the very thing that keeps us in line, it’s cruel.” Darien had never been summoned for square duty before. There were times Tori worried her friend was too soft for a servant’s life. His people were peaceful mountain folk who avoided conflict. Her own people, the Yan Avii, were warriors. They lived in the harsh climate of the Steppe, changing camps whenever the herds had eaten the grass down to dirt, or the weather turned too cold. The Burodai had fought with more than one neighboring tribe during her childhood.

  But Tori did not like to think of those days. “That’s the whole point. The nobles can make us freeze to stone out here, only to send us to die. And we’ll thank them all the same. We’ve had it worse than this. You know it, and so do they.” Tori’s years in the Fringes had shown her far crueler faces than those of the Oshan nobles. She had it easy serving in Maro’El, and Darien’s talk could land him back in the Fringes in an instant if overheard by a guard looking to gain favor with the nobles.

  Darien drove in another spike, harder this time. Tori’s shoulder ached with each pound. Only four more beams, she told herself.

  Tori had attended two drafting ceremonies since joining the commander’s household, but she had never seen the gallows used. It was a symbol. Servants did the nobles’ bidding, whether it was changing their linens or fighting their wars. Defectors would be executed. Darien paused again, as a servant from House Fedra fixed the noose of rope to the overhanging beam.

  Tori brushed his shoulder. “We won’t be drawn.” She said it confidently, willing it to be so, more for him than for herself, but if she was honest, she feared the draft as well. Being drafted into the chancellor’s Night Legions was as close to a death sentence as you could get. And even if they didn’t die physically, the soldiers’ minds were never the same. The indoctrination of the Legions was notoriously rigorous. Their expressions were always hard. Even their gait was rigid, as though they were automatons controlled by some dark spell. No one disobeyed orders, at least none that Tori had ever heard of.

  Darien sighed. “If we’re not drawn this war, then it’ll be the next. What difference does it make?”

  Tori glanced around nervously. He shouldn’t be talking like this, she thought. But Darien always got bitter around the draft. They set back to work on another beam.

  “I could never go on the chancellor’s raids and slaughter innocents, conditioned to think it’s right.”

  “You do what you got to survive,” said Tori. “That’s the
way the world is.” I learned that much from my mum.

  Darien turned to her, his weathered copper face twisting into a dark grimace from beneath his cloak. “You don’t believe that.”

  “I believe you alive is better than you dead.”

  “And what of the soldiers who killed my family? Were they better alive?”

  Darien’s family had been killed in a skirmish in Klavash four years before. Neither the chancellor’s Night Legions nor the Morgathian rebels paid the mountain tribes any mind. Just one more casualty caught in the middle of the fire.

  “The dead don’t speak,” Tori said. “We’re survivors. We do whatever it takes. Most likely, the only people we’d face are Morgathians who wanted to shoot our heads off, anyway.”

  Darien stared past her. “You really think you could do it? Kill?”