Crown of Shadows - C. S. Friedman [174]
“It’s your wife, Gerald.”
“As she died!” The red lines on her body came into focus for a moment, and Damien could see the whole of her clearly: bloodstained, ravaged, tortured by a madman’s blade ... and then the white cloth folded in again, softly, gently, and the only pain visible was in her eyes. “Almea Tarrant as she was in her last living moments, with none of what came before! None of the love, none of the memories, none of the things that might mitigate her terror as she—as she—”
The shadow had stopped moving. Was watching him.
Damien dared, “I don’t think she’s here to hurt you.”
“How can she be here for anything else? Remember what I did to her, Vryce!”
She was waiting, Damien thought. She expected something. What?
“You called for help,” he offered.
He whispered: “I tortured her.”
She was watching. Waiting. Not Tarrant’s wife, but an isolated fraction of the woman. One instant of her living existence, frozen in time by the power of this place.
He drew in a deep breath, trying to sound calmer than he felt. “She’s the first shadow here that hasn’t gone after us. Maybe that means something.”
Tarrant said nothing.
The figure turned. Not wholly away from them, but slowly moving in that direction. There was no hate in her eyes, Damien noted, nor anger, but a vast tide of pain. And maybe something else ... something more.
“She loved you very much,” he observed.
Tarrant shuddered. “This thing wouldn’t remember love.”
She had stopped. She was waiting. For them.
“Gerald,” He said it gently, testing the words. “I think she wants us to follow her.”
“For what? To help us? More likely to lead me deeper into this trap—”
He looked into the shadow’s eyes, at the reflection of life that shimmered in their depths.
“I don’t think so,” he said quietly.
Tarrant looked at him in astonishment. “Why?” he demanded hoarsely. “Why would she help me, after what I did to her?”
“Maybe she wants to see you punished for what you did. You did say you expected to die on Shaitan, didn’t you? Maybe she wants to lead you to your death.” He drew in a deep breath. How could he word the next idea so that the Hunter would accept it? “Or maybe in that last moment what she wanted was to save you. Maybe she saw the man she had married being swallowed up by an evil so powerful that all her words, all her love, couldn’t save him ... and now he has one chance to redeem himself. The first real chance he’s had in centuries.” He waited a moment, then said softly, “You knew her, Gerald. You tell me.”
The shadow was waiting.
“If she’s an illusion—” Tarrant began.
“She isn’t.”
“How can you be sure of that?”
“Because for all of Calesta’s subtlety, I don’t think he could have created this.” He gestured toward the shadow; did it smile sadly in response? “A reflection of pain, yes, and maybe hatred, and certainly a hunger for vengeance. Those are things he understands. But the rest?” Reading what was in her eyes, he shivered. God, what a woman she must have been. “Calesta knows nothing about human love; how could he mimic its form so perfectly?”
The Hunter turned to him. His pale eyes were so haunted, so tormented, that Damien had to fight not to look away. “Is that what you see in her?” he demanded.
“Among other things,” he said quietly. “Enough that I think she might want to lead us where we’re going. And we haven’t got a whole lot of other options, have we? Unless you have something up your sleeve you haven’t told me about.”
“No.”
“So?”
For a long time he just stood there. Damien waited. So did she.
“All right,” he said at last. A whisper, barely audible. “All right.”
They turned to where the ghostly figure stood, and saw that it had moved a few steps away. Damien waited until Tarrant had begun to walk toward her, then did so himself. His heart was pounding, with hope and fear both. Almea Tarrant’s shadow would be immune to Calesta’s illusory persuasions; the Iezu had no power over faeborn creatures. Which meant that she could probably lead them around the true obstacles,