30 sword. Once he’d come to the low, sprawling town, he scaled a ladder onto some family’s flat roof. They had a small potted garden; he skirted the rosemary silently. One foot on the lip of their rooftop, he waited, letting the night’s chill seep through his cloak. The stars hung bright and lonely. He heard a scream, faintly. A pause, shattered by wailing. And he took off running, leaping over the little alleys. The wailing stopped. He carried on. Perhaps he woke the men, the women, the children sleeping under him as he ran across their roofs. Perhaps no one heard him at all. But the shadow did. He saw it waiting for him, only the blazing eyes, on a rooftop in a swirling mass of smoke. “Elendi,” he whispered. “Son.” Now that he was done running, his wounds burned, throbbing in his chest. The eyes blinked. “The fault is all mine,” he said, lowering his sword to the ground. The shadow took a step forward. The man opened his arms, and the shadow came to him. For one heartbeat, two, he stood with its head against his shoulder, cool and soft and silky. Then he wrested the two of them to the floor, locking his arm around the shadow’s neck. The shadow’s claws raked him. It burned. Like fire and poison. As they rolled over, his sweat-beaded face came pressed up against the shadow’s ear. He saw the look in its eyes. Frightened, pleading. White and blazingly cold, icy, dark. Senator. Senator, move. “You love her,” it whispered, slowly, “more than you love me.” The Senator finally understood, startling from her seat, but the shadow grabbed her. She screamed. It hissed back at them, claws against her throat. “I’ll kill her!” “You won’t!” the man said. “Stand down. You have no right to disobey me.” “Your mistake,” the shadow spat. “That’s no longer true.” He saw the claws flex. “No! Celeste!” The shadow stared at her blood, flowing over its claws, then flinched back and dropped the body. “I made you!” the man roared. “You have no right to do this! None!” But he raged at air. The shadow fled out the window and was gone. * * * He had never felt quite so strange as that night, sneaking out of his own estate in dark cloak and
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