A Traitor in the Shadows by Joseph Lallo

Author:Joseph Lallo [Lallo, Joseph]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2019-07-29T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter 5

“This is a terrible mistake,” Blot said. “You shouldn’t be sticking your head up. That’s a good way to get it cut off, and I need you with your head on. Being the shadow of a corpse won’t do me much good.”

“When in doubt, do the right thing,” he said.

It had taken the better part of the day for Alan to work out who the intern was and where he lived. The pair was in Alan’s car now, and his phone called out the next turn.

“I can’t believe you found his address,” Blot moped. “I thought for sure he would be harder to find than that.”

“It turns out becoming an intern of a big campaign is something you brag about on social media.”

“… The internet… I wish I’d had it to prepare. I’d have headed straight for this president of yours. I didn’t even know you had a president. I was taught to look for lords and kings and things.”

He took another turn. The setting sun allowed Blot to, with some difficulty, remain roughly cast upon the passenger’s seat. Alan glanced at her briefly.

“We’ll discuss that whole ‘previous invasion’ thing and your disappointment about not knowing our power structure later. Right now, I’ve got to figure out what I’m going to say to…” He glanced at the printout on the seat in front of her. “Lenny Castro.”

“This isn’t going to go well,” Blot said. “Dun isn’t going to be happy with me when he learns I told you as much as I did.”

“Is Lenny going to know anything? Or am I about to inform him he’s got a shadow like mine?”

“Dun will have persuaded him to help the cause. That’s what he instructed me in.”

“Manipulation?”

“He called it ‘sculpting ambition.’ I wasn’t his best student…”

“Good for me, I guess.”

“But Dun will definitely be teamed up with his host.” She slouched a bit. “He has more to offer than I do…”

“What do you mean?”

“He’ll have more power. He’ll be able to do more things than I can. If he’s got the sort of host who’s hungry for power…”

“Right, right. I got it. But what sort of things?”

“I don’t know, exactly. It depends on how compatible he is. He could be all the way to shape shifting, or just able to move and manipulate bigger objects from farther away than I can.”

“… Shape shifting?”

“Yes. I can move a cup of coffee around by manipulating its shadow. To a degree, an object must do what its shadow does. Since we are your shadows, and we can change our own shapes, shades with the right training and enough power can change your shapes.”

He blinked his eyes. “That’s really unsettling.”

“What are you planning to do?”

Alan shook off what she’d just said. “I’m going to try to talk sense into him. Into them, I guess.”

“Talk sense into them? What does that even mean?”

“I’m going to find out their intentions and try to persuade them not to do anything rash.”

“We trained to do this for years. You’re not going to change his mind.

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