Shadowborne by Matthew Callahan

Author:Matthew Callahan [Callahan, Matthew]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781732922204
Publisher: Roguish Creations
Published: 2019-02-12T22:00:00+00:00

The next morning, after consulting with Madigan, Will prepared to set out for the map room. With both of them wracking their brains, they had been able to piece together the likeliest path that would lead him straight to it. Barring any unforeseen circumstances, he should be able to spend enough time inside that he could even bring paper with him and make his own notes while he was there.

Before long, Ynarra arrived with breakfast. She flushed bright red when she saw Madigan and Will forced himself to suppress a chuckle. I don’t think she gets too much attention, given the way she flits about when Mad smiles at her—I should go easy on them.

After she departed, Will ate a quick breakfast while Madigan began to pore over another tome from the library. Once Will judged that enough time had passed, he made his way to the entryway, grabbing his lock-picking kit along the way. No locked doors to keep me out this time.

As he opened the door to leave the room, something gave him pause. He halted, door ajar, and looked around. He couldn’t place it, a feeling of… what? He didn’t know. But he knew he wasn’t mistaken, there was definitely something awry.

He glanced around. There was something different about the halls outside. There was no one in sight, no one to see him, so he wrapped himself in his Shade. Immediately, the feeling intensified. His key was active, yes, but in a different way. The vibrations made him feel uncomfortable, sick, wrong. The walls were the same. The sourceless light still shone dully. There was no one else around and the dust beneath his feet showed only traces of Ynarra’s footprints coming and going.

That was it: The footprints, there was something strange about the footprints.

Will crouched. Why am I wasting my time staring at Ynarra’s tracks? Still, he couldn’t deny that there was something off about them. They were outlined in the dust, but the lines seemed almost impossibly precise. He ducked down for a closer inspection and saw that it was as if every single step Ynarra took had moved precisely the correct amount of dust. There was no dragging of feet, no shuffling, not even a gust of air to mar the print. It was the most perfectly proportioned footprint imaginable.

Scanning outward, he saw that the dust itself appeared somewhat different than the previous afternoon. There’s more of it, isn’t there? It looks…deeper. Sure enough, to the naked eye it appeared as if it had been months since his last outing. In fact, no trace remained on the ground of his own prints from yesterday or any of Ynarra’s prints from previous visits. All that remained were those left by Ynarra on her most recent visit.

Will paled. How many times had he heard that time worked differently here? Had something happened? How much time had passed? His heart suddenly seemed to be in his throat. Something’s wrong.

He felt a strange sense of vertigo, even within the Shade.

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