Chapter 7: Beyond Shadows

Crumbs watched the meteor crash into the earth from the corner of his vision. With the leftover remnants of his speed, he caught the sight of something else as well.

On the side of Eva’s basket, from within its shadow that the falling star had reduced to nearly nothing, darkness whirled like a vortex. A beast with a set of yellow, vertically-slit eyes rose from within. The radiation from the star made the skin on the top of its head sizzle, yet strands of shade continuously replaced the dead tissue. A finger poked out of the basket’s shadow, thin and curved.

Waves of explosive heat roared, threatening to melt everything in their path. But between a threat and an action was an instant. That instant stretched and darkness gathered within it. All of it. It usurped the shadows from the deepest corners of the plaza, leaving behind uncoloured nothingness and streaming into a tiny ball above the beast’s digit.

Its maw opened, darkness imitating saliva dripping down its teeth, followed by tendrils of the dark element webbing around the girl’s container like a rib cage, sealing her.

“Domination Sorcery: Thousand Year Void Parade.”

What carried the sound was less than a voice but more than a thought. The words rippled through Crumbs, their meaning latching onto his eardrums. What followed was an anchoring silence. Not a single combustion produced a flicker of sound. Neither wind nor pebbles rustled.

Time lay frozen.

…

‘The threats to our city do not sleep, little one.’

I relived the moment Father had said those words to me. His broad shoulders cast a shadow on the ground that sent a chill down my spine.

This must’ve been when I was around eight years old and decided I wanted to be like him when I grew up. A hero. It was also before mother died. Before his advice and training took the same sinister turn as his mind. Back then, it was like Father came straight out of a comic book. He wasn’t home often. How could a hero be? But when he was home, he made it count, and I would always walk away with a one-liner or two.

Of course, I couldn’t keep my newfound dreams to myself and told my entire circle—which consisted of only May and my Mother—about it. Repeatedly. May got so sick of me, she dodged me for an entire week. Mother had no such luxury. She wasn’t eager about it. Took every opportunity to tell me as such. ‘Focus on school instead.’ But, finally, after asking for the thousandth time, she booked me an appointment at the hospital for an attribute test.

The exam was quick. I only needed to place my palm against a crystal ball, which an assistant would then read. Instead of an assistant, I got Doctor Evans. He was a close friend of my mother who she’d asked for a favour. ‘Extra luck,’ she said.

It didn’t work.

I sat in a basic chair in his office, ready to receive the results.

Doctor Evans’s glasses were downcast. He wouldn’t meet my eyes.

“You cannot control mana.”

The statement cut through my throat, taking my ability to speak. I couldn’t remember what went on in my mind at the time. I think it may have been nothing at all. All I remembered was my heartbeat stopping.

“It’s a rare but known occurrence,” he said.

“Do you know the cause?” Mother asked. Her tone was steady. Too steady if you asked me.

“There are certain Shura bloodlines that fight each other when mixed, resulting in an inability to access the heritage of both. Mana control included. Though we do not know your background, Serrin,”—here the Doctor glanced at my mother—“,we think this is such a case. It would also explain why she has no visible marks.”

I looked up, partly to stop my forming tears. Mother didn’t have fluffy ears, fish scales, or talons for hands. But her eyes—they were wholly black. I’d never seen another person with a similar mark, which was better for all. They were unnerving. Sometimes when I stared for too long, I seemed to disappear into a blackness like being buried alive. When Mother noticed she would quickly break eye contact, and I would jerk back awake. It wasn’t only me either. Maya always studied the floor when Mother was there, and when we went outside, Mother wrapped a black cloth over her eyes.

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“So there’s nothing that can be done?” Mother said. Again in a tone which I didn’t like.

Doctor Evans shook his head.

“I’m afraid not.”

Then he turned towards me.

“This doesn’t mean you need to give up on your dream, Asha.”

The drumming in my chest revived. “What do you mean?”

“A hero is something you are in your heart—”

The rest of his bogus spiel didn’t register in my mind—perhaps that was why Mother had asked for his help. To console me. Whatever the case, a great weight plummeted into my stomach. My fate had been settled. Since birth. I would never get to be like my father. Tears threatened to jump over the edge of my lower eyelids. And maybe it was my memory, but I thought I saw the edge of my mother’s mouth curved upwards.

What Doctor Evans and Mother spoke of during the last part of the meeting was a mystery to me. I’d tuned it out. When I regained awareness, I was in front of an ice cream stand in the city, holding hands with my mother.

The bustling of people around me was far away, like I was hearing everything from behind the door of a bunker. Children strolled the plaza with a smile on their face and one even showed off a levitation spell he’d learned at school to his parents.

Vayu, God of Wind, I thought, and my teeth crunched on each other.

Motioning towards me, Mother addressed the owner of the shop.

“Two scoops of mango, please.”

There was a box of ice cream with two flavours of chocolate on display. I would’ve rather gotten that instead. But when I tried to summon the energy to correct my order, it fell flat in my throat. I sighed.

My lungs hadn’t fully emptied yet, and another kid bumped into me.

“Sorry!” They said.

I didn’t even turn their way. They glanced up at my mother who waved them off and mouthed her understanding.

Mother glanced at me, squeezed my hand.

“Do not be rude, Asha.”

I gave no response.

Mother opened her mouth to scold me, but the owner handed her our desert.

“Thank you,” Mother said.

She handed me my snack, and I licked the soft source of sugar. Chocolate would’ve been better. The thought entered my head uninvited. Out of nowhere, tears raced down my chin freely like a hawk soaring through the cloudless sky.

The shop owner blushed. “Is my ice cream that good?”

“The best in the business,” Mother said. “Excuse us.”

Mother led me towards a bench near the fountain in the centre of the shopping centre. She remained quiet. I cried in peace, munching on the inferior flavour of ice cream. My lips moved, and with no idea I was going to say it until I did, I said: “I wanted to be like dad.”

“I know, honey.”

The edges of my eyes burned. The fire seeped through into my gaze, and I stared straight up at her.

“You never wanted me to become a hero.”

Thinking back, knowing she was gone, I wish I hadn’t responded to my mother with such venom in my voice. She loved me, and I loved her. But it had hurt me. She had hurt me. Even rarer than Father being home was him trying to train me. Yet when he did, Mother would always find an excuse to stop him.

‘Her classes start early tomorrow.’ And then she’d drag me off to bed.

‘You reek of blood! Go take a shower first.’ And then she’d drag him off to bed.

But my favourite, the one which grated me the most: ‘She’s too young, Adrian. You’ll stunt her growth with all that training.’

Mother sighed.

“I am relieved if I am being honest, my dear.”

She cupped my chin.

I jerked away, dodging. But she pulled me into a hug. I wasn’t in the position to escape that.

“Why?” I asked, pulling on her blouse, fists balled up. My voice was soft. The question was hard.

Mother’s hands raked through my hair.

“I’m doing it for your own good.”

“What good?!” I cried. A few of the passerbys turned our way before deciding it wasn’t their business and increasing their walking pace. “It’s just training! You’re keeping me weak on purpose.”

“Your father travels a road of darkness. But there are paths in the shadows better left unlit, so no one disturbs the wickedness at their end.”

Her tone carried a finality. As if she was speaking a truth written into the base laws of the universe.

“I don’t expect you to understand, Asha. You’re still young. So hate me if you must. But one day when you’re older, you will thank me.”

She was right in expecting me not to understand her. I still didn’t. In the origin story of the bible, Prime, the One God, created the rest of the deities by splitting his powers into Good and Evil. Primals and gods received the Good. Ashuras and Shuras received the Bad.

“But the shadows are my friend,” I grumbled, more to myself than her. They always had been. So, why did I need to avoid them? They would never hurt me.

Mother’s smile was a fragile thing, one that would’ve broken underneath the slightest scrutiny.

“There are things beyond shadows, Asha. Ones you must leave alone.”

She died six years ago. I never thanked her to this this day.

Grief clouded Father’s mind following her death. He took more time off to ‘train’ me, not caring that I couldn’t use mana. You need basic fighting skills, he said. But his methods were far from basic, and he had no patience for lack of skill. A year into our training, the government called him back for duty. It was better that way. Dad was a hero. He needed battle to stay sharp, and staying inside the city was making him lose his sanity, day by day. Not that it mattered in the end.

He introduced me to Samantha right before he departed. She took me in, took the mess Father left behind, honed it, and turned it into something presentable. Often times, in the chilly depths of the night, I would think to myself: where would I be if Mother had allowed Father to train me? Would I be a better fighter? A stronger person? But as Samantha always told me: ‘Keep dreaming of the past, and your punches won’t land in the present.’

I regained consciousness in slow degrees.

Awareness of my surroundings seeped into my mind like sand through a sieve, pushing the nearly decade old memories back in my head. There was nothing to see: what surround me was beyond dark. An absolute gloom. Inside regular darkness you could find silhouettes, objects whose outlines created a layered depth in the shadows. This was not such a darkness. It was a void—a pure absence of not only the element which allowed us to see but everything else as well. This was so absolute, that if Mother were alive to see it, she would’ve tapped me on the shoulder and said, ‘See? This is what I meant.’

Her words repeated in my head like the lyrics of a song you couldn’t name. There are things beyond shadows, Asha. Ones you must leave alone. My heart hammered. There was a…vibration lingering in the dark. A lullaby that loomed like your own backdrop, inescapable and always behind you.

“Where am I?” My voice didn’t project, the whisper swallowed by the void.