Absence_Whispers and Shadow Page 23

  ‘Why?’

  ‘I took something from it.’

  His rapt eyes shone. ‘What did you take?’

  ‘I’m not sure exactly. A part of the whispers I think. I tore some of them off when I escaped and they soaked into me. It’s awful Kye - like I’m possessed by the shadow of the man who sent them. It rises up inside me sometimes and looks through my eyes or puts thoughts in my head.’

  ‘Your eyes - when I met you in the woods.’

  ‘Yes, it was there then. It’s what got me running from the house.’

  ‘Who do you think he is? ... This man whose shadow you stole.’

  ‘I don’t know, but I had a vision through his eyes when arrived in the city. He was standing beneath The Reader during a ceremony and the people were chanting his name. But no matter how hard I try, I can’t remember it. Not because I’ve forgotten it though. It’s there in my head, but the shadow keeps smudging it out.’

  ‘Why don’t you tell Ormis? He might be able to help you.’

  ‘I can’t. He might find out about this,’ she said sweeping a hand across her transparency. ‘Absence isn’t known to the Caliste and if he finds out, he’ll keep me here forever.’

  ‘But what if he scours you again?’

  ‘Then I’ll just have to hope he finds the shadow and overlooks me. Whatever happens though, promise me you’ll keep my secret. I’ve got to deal with this in my own way.’

  ‘I won’t tell him anything, I promise.’ He spoke the words with conviction and there was a burning sincerity in his eyes.

  ‘And you have to be careful too. Ormis suspects you as well.’

  He scowled. ‘Of what?’

  ‘Don’t you know? You’re caught on the Membrane. You can see and hear spirits when others can’t. And you can even see me! There aren’t many that can. Last night at the campsite, I felt that spirit coming and it woke me up. It woke you up too. Don’t you know what that means?’ A jangle of keys on the other side of the door froze them both before he could answer. ‘It might be Ormis. I’ve got to go. Just don’t tell him anything.’

  She started away, but he called after her when she was half way through the wall. ‘Wait!’ he said, his face brightening with an idea. ‘Think of that name now.’

  She did and she spoke it as though it was sitting on her tongue. ‘Izle. His name is Izle.’ And with that she swept through the wall and into her body just as a gaoler pushed a bowl through her door.

  When she heard him trudging back down the corridor, she opened her eyes and smiled. Kye had asked her to think of the name while she was in fear of being caught. The shadow feared the exorcist just as much as she did and would have been deep in its hiding place when he asked her to remember and unable to smudge it out. It was a quick witted inquiry and for that she was grateful to him.

  She laid there until the smell from the bowl drew her. It was nearly two days since she her last good meal and all at once she was ravenous. She took the bowl to the table and worked sloppily with a wooden spoon to transfer its soupy contents to her stomach. But half way down the room started to turn. She dropped the spoon and gripped the table; sure she was going to fall. Her hands began to tremble and her left foot to twitch. She looked across at the bed - its filthy rectangle now a sanctuary in her revolving world. She stood up, but when she took a step towards it her knee buckled and she fell in a sprawl, cracking her head on the stone floor. The room blurred, turning faster and faster around a new axis in her head and in a matter of seconds, it spun into complete darkness.

  A Watery Grey Silhouette

  Ormis strode through the Caliste and into the cloistered courtyard that nestled behind the battlements. The sun had yet to pour into the mountain fortress and at this hour the courtyard was a bowl of shadow. He came straight from the dormitory in the rear of the cavern - a crescent shaped building with three stories, each with twelve arched windows, lit day and night with mistlamps. The dormitory had once quartered two hundred exorcists, but in recent years its residents had dwindled to almost none and last night he was the only one in residence. His bed was in the far west corner of the top floor and in his twenty-five years as an exorcist he had never brightened or cluttered it with a single personal effect. Once he made and vacated it in the morning, his bed space could not be told apart from the forty-nine others on the dormitory floor and only by opening his wardrobe and discovering his ceremonial robes could anyone guess it was even used.

  Despite the quiet solitude of the third floor he hadn’t slept well. The strange quality of the girl’s scour had kept him tossing and turning most of the night. She was a frustrating anomaly that had put stones in his pillow and with the help of the High Exorcist he was determined to shake them out. He cut through the cloister and into the library. Sunlight was streaming in through the high windows of the rotunda, gilding a wide arc of books that could only be reached with ladders. Solwin the librarian sat directly below, poring over the mountain of parchments that covered his battered old desk. He looked up as Ormis entered and his grey eyebrows knitting together.

  ‘Ah Ormis. I saw you were back. There’s a matter of some urgency over in Arrowich. He raised a parchment. ‘This is the fourth request from the warden.’

  ‘I’m not finished with the last business.’

  Solwin consulted his ledger. ‘Galleran Forest wasn’t it? Your log entry says you settled it.’

  ‘I did, but we got involved in something else. Lord Riole is aware. I’ll be working in the city today.’

  ‘Something else eh,’ said the librarian, brightening with interest. ‘Something I need to know about?’

  ‘He didn’t say.’

  Solwin leant back in his chair. ‘Look at all these,’ he said, sweeping a hand over his pile of parchments. ‘All of them from this last week. At least half of them repeat requests. You can feel the desperation in the writing and I wouldn’t be surprised if the next batch were penned in blood. Irongate’s good at the moment, but you want to read this lot. It’s a different story out there. We’ve three exorcists assigned to the city but only thirty for the rest of the Westland. Thirty to cover every ward from the mountains to the sea. There have been eight witch killings in the last month - seven were burnt and one of them flayed and salted. Left out for the birds to peck at! There’s going to be trouble, mark my words. We need more men. Getting those five back from King Treigus would be a start.’

  ‘Lord Riole thinks we benefit from the arrangement. The torucks are doing a good job in the Eastland.’

  ‘No doubt. But we can always train more men to fight. People aren’t interested in our work, let alone any good at it. Priorities Ormis. We need new blood or this place will turn into a museum.’ He tapped his papers with one finger. ‘And if that happens who’s gonna deal with this lot?’

  Ormis shrugged. Solwin was already a few pages into his favourite script and he had no intention of hearing it out. He stepped forward and placed a book on the table.

  ‘Ah,’ Solwin said, running his fingers over the gilded letters on the cover. ‘The Noble Emotions. I bet you had to dust this one off. It’ll be a while till it goes out again I reckon…Strange choice for you.’

  Ormis frowned. ‘How so?’

  Solwin shifted in his chair the way people do when they realise they’ve crossed a line. ‘It’s just that you’re not one to give much away… You know. You keep what’s inside hidden.’ Ormis was looking through him now. ‘Never mind. I don’t know what I was trying to say. The important thing is: did you find what you were looking for?’

  ‘It served its purpose.’

  ‘Good. Anything you want me to dig out today?’

  ‘No. But thank you. I’ll be right up as soon as this business is done,’ he said, turning away before he could get started on something else. But it wasn’t to be.

  ‘Tell me Ormis, do you have any passions outside of work?’ said Solwin, throwing the question after him like a lasso. He froze as the question tightened around him. Inquiries into his
personal life were a rare occurrence.

  He turned around. ‘Our work’s important.’

  The old librarian laughed. ‘Indeed it is. I’d be the first to fly that flag. But it hasn’t slipped my notice that your wages are barely touched. You’ve accrued quite a sum even with the half you wanted sending to the orphanage. I take it you want to continue with that arrangement.’

  ‘For as long as I serve.’

  Solwin smiled. ‘I’m sorry Ormis. Don’t misunderstand me because I think your charity and prudence are laudable. It’s just so rare to see. It’s like you do this job for nothing. I’m just saying you need to live a little if you’re going to stay sane in this place. You spend more time up here than the breeze… Tell me, when did you last take a drink or keep the company of a good woman?’

  Solwin couldn’t help himself sometimes. He was one of the few people who still inquired about his personal life and he was not a man to lubricate his words. He spoke as he thought, and had no leash on his opinion. Much could be learnt from him without voicing a single question, such was Solwin’s love of talking. It was as if only with an escort of syllables each breath was granted leave of his chest. He made no reply and simply stared through the librarian.

  ‘Thought so. You’re a strange sort, but I like you. You’re blunt and bloody miserable, but you show me respect. You do your work and cause me little trouble. But here’s the problem. I once tried to imagine what you would be like if it were possible to take the Caliste out of you… You know; wipe you clean of any influence we’ve had on you. And do you know what I saw? … Do you?’ Solwin leant forward, his tired eyes brightening with treasured insight.

  ‘Tell me,’ said Ormis feeling a rare urge to hear what he had to say.

  ‘A ghost! And one with less substance than those you seek. And that saddens me Ormis, it really does. Oh, I can tell you this because I’m an old man and common courtesy dictates you stand there and listen. All I’m saying is you need some valve. Some outside interest or vice. We all do. It’s not healthy rattling around this rock and working your way through these books. You’ll have plenty of time to grow a crust when you’re as old as me.’ He laced his fingers on his belly, enjoying his one-man audience. ‘I have a few days’ leave coming up. Do you know what that is?’

  Ormis nodded.

  ‘I’m going to take some ale and languish under a hot sun as far from this place as I can get. And I’ll tell you something else. If I had the strength to lift that sack of gold you’ve accumulated in the vaults, I’d take it and never come back. There’s enough of it to live out the rest of my year in some comfort.’

  ‘Drink clouds the mind.’

  Solwin shrugged. ‘So it does. But how could you know. What can you to say about the sun if you live your life in the shadows?’

  Ormis stared.

  Solwin held his gaze for a moment then gave a resigned sigh before looking down at his petitions. ‘This damn light. It’s why my eyes are so bad. Years of staring at the page you know. But at least I lived some while they were strong - seen some life other than ghosts and witch burnings.’ He raised his hand and waved Ormis away. ‘Go on, don’t let me keep you. But be back soon, this pile’s not getting any smaller.’

  Ormis whirled and strode out on noisy boot heels. He crossed the courtyard, climbed the battlements and looked out over a city that was just waking up. Most of the activity was around the market quarter where stalls were being set out, but there was an unusual number of guards milling around in the prison yard. At the centre of it all stood The Reader - yoked in a thick glaze of morning sun. Its shadow was long and it reached out of the city to the main road. He watched as three horse riders trotted into it and looked up at the colossus. From their angle The Reader’s face would be thick with shadow and burning in a halo of morning sunlight.

  As the breeze tossed his hair he thought over what the old librarian had said. He knew what the other exorcists thought of him - there were clues enough without Solwin’s testimonies. He felt the way he sucked cheer and humour from their gatherings. As soon as they saw him coming they would look at one another with knowing eyes; their light exchanges becoming guarded and clipped and their slouches quickening to rigidity.

  One night last week he was standing in the very same place when he heard another exorcist hail him. But when he turned around he realised the greeting wasn’t directed at him. Two exorcists were walking through the cloister and the one he thought had called to him was tipping his hat to a sculpture on one of the columns. The other exorcist laughed and they disappeared from sight in the direction of the dormitories. From the quality of their laughter he got the impression that they were sharing a joke with some mileage. He went to the column and studied the sculpture. It was the figure of an exorcist whose identity had long since been forgotten - a man in a cloak and cape, whose startling severity had been captured by the chisel and preserved in hard black stone. So this was how they saw him. It caused him no pain, for he coveted neither the affection nor high regard of his fellow exorcists. Quite the contrary. Popularity was the stead of vanity, and he despised both. In his opinion all a man needed was purpose, resolve and the power of reason. But he stood there a long time that night, brooding on the truth of himself as it spoke to him through the sculpture’s hard angles.

  They saw him as a man without feeling and emotion – a man made of stone. To a point he agreed with their analysis, but anger was an emotion was it not? And he had that in abundance. His temper was like a pile of dry leaves in his chest and it would often spiral out of control with the gentlest breath of provocation. Its latest flutter had resulted in a blacksmith with a broken nose and a blaze in Agelrish Holdings that might have been averted if he had handled it with more diplomacy. But when it came to the so called noble emotions as detailed in his latest library loan, he had to agree that he was severely lacking.

  But that was beginning to change.

  Over the last few months he had felt the stirrings of unfamiliar emotions; the most recent of which occurred while he was questioning the girl in Agelrish Holdings. When she asked after her uncle, he was suddenly touched by a new emotion through which he felt her loss and despair as if they were his own. The Noble Emotions called it empathy and he had been glad when it released him.

  At first he attributed these strange emotions to some form of mild illness. But over time his opinion had changed. He was now certain his hard exterior was fake and that these weak moments were caused by his real self, trying to break out. It was a ridiculous notion, but one he couldn’t shake. His noble emotions were locked up in a vault deep inside him, but now they were trying to escape. They were never able to consume him the way his temper could, but it was only a matter of time. On several occasions the emotions were strong enough to leave him faltering like a horse on a patch of ice. He had thought long and hard about when such a containment of his emotions could have occurred. But he couldn’t remember anything before his time in the orphanage and whenever he tried it was like there was an elastic barrier in his mind, pushing his focus away.

  Solwin had tried to imagine him without the influence of the Caliste and now he set himself the same challenge. He stretched a blank canvas over the city and tried to paint the man he would be if he wasn’t an exorcist. But he could find no colour for his strokes and all he could manage was a watery grey silhouette. He soon grew tired of his introspection and hurried off the battlements. His stony persona was back in charge now and he began to wonder what all the commotion in the prison yard was about.

  The Five Disciplines and their Subdivisions

  Detection – the finding of spirits and their subsequent exposure. The former is dependent

  on innate Membrane sensitivity, whereas the latter can be taught.

  Scour – the invasion of mind through which a soul can be assessed for purity.

  Draw – the generation of a self-directed Membrane tension

  Containment – the safe holding of a drawn spirit. This discipline has th
ree subdivisions:

  Suppression – the domination of a captured spirit.

  Partitioning – the segregation of a dominated spirit.

  Vigilance – the maintenance of partitioning.

  Purge – the ejection of a contained spirit and its expulsion from the Membrane. This discipline has two subdivisions:

  Compression – the mental constriction around a partitioned spirit which creates a rift in the Membrane.

  Expulsion – the ejection of the spirit through the rift.

  Note: If compression is incomplete the spirit will be ejected from the body and back onto the greater Membrane.

  Exorcism refers to the whole process of spirit eradication. It is a composite of one or more of the five disciplines, but always includes a Purge.

  Investment Submission for Ormis Brathra

  Five Disciplines:

  Detection /// Assessor - Hayhas Brahd

  Scour /// Assessor - Kass Riole

  Draw //// Assessor - Avol Irlan

  Containment /// Assessor - Avol Irlan

  Purge ///// Assessor - Vish Peshgar

  3 Cs

  Conduct – 2 Disciplinaries, 2 Confinements and fines of 8 silver moons.

  Common Law – Exceptional - Solwin Cahb

  Calista – Exceptional - Solwin Cahb

  Ormis is a rigid man with a solemn air – a man who I believe to be impervious to humour. He has done little to endear himself to the other novices and has turned down every offer to join them for social sorties into the city. He shows open contempt for the failings of his peers and is forthright in his criticism of them - a side of him which has brought him to blows and earnt him two confinements. This abrasive nature and short temper could make him a liability in some situations. He reached a final discipline within the first three months of training and came very close to being cast down. After this was made clear to him there were no further incidents. I have no doubt his temper is still there, but he has learnt to keep his tongue and avoid confrontation.