Chapter Eighteen

Raimie

Wind ruffled my hair as I dashed through the forest. The storm had broken, leaving a relentless flood of once-abandoned memories to scour my mind, and facts that for a lifetime, I’d wholeheartedly believed gradually shattered under the force of the truth’s revelation.

All of my memories from before my ninth birthday—the ones about the forest, the homestead, and Fissid—glimmered and puffed into smoke. Climbing trees in the forest was replaced by racing across Daira’s rooftops. Happy dinners with mama on the homestead, laughing while my father cleaned dishes, were displaced by tense meals in our manor house, worrying about whether the head of our household would survive his current mission for the queen. Learning to trade for grain in Fissid was smothered by watching Eledis negotiate with yet another rebellion’s leader.

Once my past’s underlying base had shifted back into its proper place, detailed recollections rose in a barrage, and I couldn’t stop them from flowing forth.

My earliest memory is of Nylion. Mama is teaching us our letters, writing out a sentence before having us copy it, but she only ever talks to me with her instruction, ignoring Nylion. With each snub, my other half gets more upset, and I decide to speak up before his anger bleeds over onto me.

Tugging on mama’s sleeve, I say, “Nyl makes pretty letters too.”

Perking up from where he’s been lying, Nylion beams at me, rubbing his cheek against my leg. My other half is always desperate for praise. He never gets the credit for anything good we do. Only I get that.

“Your imaginary friend?” mama says. “I’m sure he does, my beautiful boy. Why don’t you show me?”

“Would you like a turn?” I ask Nylion.

Rising to his elbows, my other half nods, and I give him permission to take over. I watch through our eyes as Nylion precisely copies mama’s example. Compared to my wiggly scrawl, my other half’s version looks like an exact replica by the time it’s done.

“See, mama?” Nylion chirps. “I write pretty letters too.”

We grin, wanting to hear her praise, but with her hand flying to clasp her mouth, she chokes on a gasp. We don’t know if the retching noises she’s making are compliments or not. Crawling toward her, we reach for her cheek.

“Mama-?”

“What are you?” she whispers with tears glistening in her eyes.

Why is she asking that? Shouldn’t she know?

“We are NylRaimie,” we say.

With a sob, she flinches away from us before smacking us so hard that we fall to the floor. When our head cracks against tile, we black out.

The time when bumps and bruises began.

I’m four, and my education has already begun. While mama watches me from her corner, I give the wrong answer to my history tutor’s question, and as it passes through our lips, Nylion winces. When I see the disappointed look on mama’s face, I flush, but my shame is forgotten when the tutor advances on me with a red face.

I’m gone for several hours, and when awareness returns, mama’s soothing the welts across my knuckles and back while Nylion cries in a corner.

The beginning of my martial training.

“I don’t want to! I don’t want to!” I shout as I race over the garden’s grass.

Behind me, I know a group of palace guards is following me, as I know what will happen if I’m caught. When I reach a tree, I jump up it in one go, huddling on a branch once I’m far above where anyone can reach me.

When they reach the tree, the palace guard stops, looking up at me with their hands on their hips and disgruntled expressions in place.

“Raimie, you have to come down now,” one of them says. “Your father wants you in a weapons yard. Now. A spymaster’s training always starts after their fifth birthday. You know that.”

But I don’t want to learn how to fight. I don’t LIKE fighting. Because look at Nylion, huddling in the crook of a branch and its trunk. He’s shaking with fear, and that feeling is making my world warp.

The soldiers below me turn into faceless people, monsters come to hurt me and him, and I can’t get away.

Still.

“No!” I shout. “You can’t get me up here, and I’m not coming down. So… so… YOU GO AWAY!”

For a while, I think I’ve won. Then, someone comes to the tree with a ladder.

A bubble of light and laughter, interspersing the darkness of my first nine years.

Auntie Kaedesa has thrown an extravagant party for the advent of my seventh year. Everyone’s here: mama, Eledis, Auntie, Lysinthir, Oswin, Silivren, even Uncle Marcuset. With protocols relaxed and my guard lowered, remembering to call my uncle by something other than Emir has been more difficult than I thought it would be, but I’ve managed it, to my quiet pride.

Even my father has shown his face, released from his duties as spymaster for his son’s birthday. It’s one of those rare days where mama is happy, where my tutors are banished, and where Nylion doesn’t take control. I go to bed that night without a single hidden bruise.

The realization that I’m not quite normal.

“You’re mastering the blade at a surprisingly quick rate, young Raimie,” Bryruned says.

After a lengthy sparring session, I’ve backed my weapons tutor into a corner, and with a grin, Bryruned concedes the fight. It’s a nice feeling, only supplemented by Nylion’s whooping cheers, and I smile.

“We thank you,” I say before lowering my blade.

After Bryruned sheathes his own weapon, we collapse with our muscles trembling. Today demanded an extensive training session, considering I’ll be participating in my first mission for the Hand tonight. After its successful completion, my weapons training will move away from the formal fighting styles that I’ve been learning over the last two years. Now that I can duel and spar with the best of nobles, the time has come for me to learn how to use crude weapons and uncivilized styles, things that will keep me alive while I serve in the Hand.

“WE thank you?” Bryruned asks, lifting an eyebrow as he joins me.

Humming, I rock from side to side, bumping my shoulder into Nylion’s, and at each of these, my other half’s smile widens.

“You gave us praise,” I say. “Why shouldn’t we thank you? We’ve trained with you for years, and in that time, you’ve never given us a complement. After what happened last month, we weren’t sure if you could forgive us.”

“Raimie, everyone knows you didn’t mean to hurt Heritren,” Bryruned says. “Let go of that guilt, boy. He wouldn’t want it for you.”

Ha. This remorse can’t be soothed with words alone. Reaching over Nylion for a water bladder, I hastily raise it to suppress a rush of shame, and while I drink from it, Bryruned watches me with a frown.

“You said we again there, Raimie,” he says.

Why is that man so focused on which words we use?

“We are supposed to refer to ourselves as ‘I’, remember?” Nylion says with an eye roll.

That’s right. The childhood lessons that mama has given us for as long as I can remember faded in the rush of battle.

I’ve never understood her insistence on using the singular pronoun. ‘I’ seems like such a useless word. When is anyone alone enough to need it? For that matter, what is ‘alone’? The idea of being solitary makes me sick to my stomach, one of the rare things I can’t hold at arm’s length. I pity any poor bastard who’s caught in such a life, spent apart from his other half.

Mama insists that I must pretend like I’m alone, though, that I can only use ‘I’, and frankly, I’m sick of that sham. Why must Nylion hide in the shadows? It’s not fair, and I CAN’T STAND it.

With fire rising up my throat, I say, “WE, Bryruned. WE would like to know if WE can go home. Nyl and I have a lot to prepare for tonight.”

The weapons master recoils from me.

“Fucking hell…” he says under his breath.

And the fire in me goes out, leaving mirth jumping between me and Nylion.

“Oo!” I say. “Is this another curse? I like it. Fucking hell, fucking…”

Repeating it to myself, I commit it to memory, never seeing the weapons master reaching his feet.

“GET OUT!” Bryruned roars.

With his hackles raised, he advances on me, and I’ve seen the look on Bryruned’s face before. It’s one that always comes with pain, and that knowledge makes my choice simple. I flee.

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The epitome of my youthful mistakes.

I’m six, and I’ve learned a lot in the year since my martial education began. Easily riposting Heritren’s swing, I use the light to dance around the sword master, giggling the whole way. Heritren rounds on me, pressing the attack until my back is to the wall. The older man smirks, but it’s one that I return.

I bind the light in my feet to first the wall’s light and then, the ceiling’s, leaving my opponent standing beneath me. Well out of his sword’s range, I beckon for the sword master’s next attack.

“Careful, Raimie,” Nylion says. “He is smart, remember?”

As if to emphasize my other half’s point, Heritren reaches for his belt, tossing a brace of throwing knives at me. I have no hope of dodging them all, and the floor is at least ten feet below me, which wouldn’t be a fun drop to make. Either way, pain’s coming for me.

In a panic, I release a wave of dusk to halt the knives, but once it’s accomplished its purpose, leaving steel clattering to stone, I forget to dismiss it.

A dark wave speeds toward Heritren, and although he’s fast enough to sidestep out of mortal danger, the shadows tear through his arm, removing it at the shoulder.

Together, Nylion and I scream alongside Heritren’s grunt, and at the sight of so much blood gushing from my tutor, I lose my grip on the light that’s holding me to the ceiling. When I wake up, hours later, I have a concussion, a dislocated shoulder, and the burden of what I did to handle.

This memory integrated with such a wrench that I tripped. Failing to recover from this, I tumbled for quite a while before coming to a stop on my back. Tears were threatening to spill from my eyes, although that wasn’t entirely caused by the fall.

“Is it over?” I groaned.

“One more, heart of my heart,” Nylion whispered. “At least, for now.”

Daira’s streets race beneath my feet as I flee from my pursuer. Beyond, Nylion urges me to move faster, to sprint on and on and on.

The sea wall prevents my escape. Frantically, I search for somewhere to hide, an obstacle to slip through, or something to climb.

When my pursuer’s furious cries reach my ears, I grimace. I tricked mama into thinking that I took my medicine this morning because that stuff is awful. I don’t like it, and Nylion HATES it, disappearing for hours afterward. When my other half returns from these vanishings, he’s… changed. Skipping the medicine for one day was a secret relief, but mama found out, and she wasn’t happy. Why is my tiny deceit getting this violent of a reaction?

The sound of her pounding feet gets louder, and I bolt to the left.

“Up here, Raimie!” Nylion calls.

Perched atop an isolated pile of crates along the sea wall’s edge, he furiously waves his arms above his head with such desperate panic in him.

“She is a terrible climber.”

That’s truth if I’ve ever heard it. Many have been the hours that we’ve listened to her frustrated shouting while on rooftops. Maybe we can once more wait, out of reach, until her temper cools down.

Leaping for the lowest box, I pull myself halfway onto it, but a hand grabs my dangling leg, and the added weight knocks me off-balance. When my fingers lose tension, the hold on my ankle lasts long enough for my chin to hit the sea wall, making my teeth gnash through my lip, before I’m released. Stars accompany me on my tumble into the sea.

Before I can think to breathe, water closes over my head. My arm uselessly drifts, and when I try to swim, pain nearly makes me faint. Honestly, though, I’m lucky that only my arm was hurt. I could just as easily have been splattered on the rocks at the base of the wall.

Blinking stars away, I see a murky, underwater world with a spike of terror, and flailing my legs, I manage to surface.

The towering sea wall—safety—is much further away than it should be, and atop it, a face is staring at me from the dozens of people nearby.

“Mama! I can’t-” I cry.

Water claims me for a third time, and when I fight free of it, I cough and splutter, sobbing.

“Mama, help!”

I lose her among the ships crowding the harbor’s piers. The ocean’s current is dragging me toward this, and animal panic has me thrashing my legs in a vain attempt to keep water from dashing me on those pilings.

“Raimie!” mama shouts. “Use the light, and grab my hand!”

Kneeling on the pier, she’s stretched dangerously far over the ocean, reaching for me. Gods, I thought she’d left me to drown.

Grasping at the light, I shoot it into the ocean, desperate to reach her, but I’ve never used it while swimming before. I don’t account for water’s drag against my body once I’ve burst free of its surface. What I’ve expelled doesn’t gain me nearly enough height, but even still, I reach for rescue.

The tips of our fingers touch, and at that contact, I clench mine, but my momentum has pulled me further than I expected. The counterweight above me tilts before I smash into wood.

When I break free of darkness, I’m muddled for a split-second before agony rips through me, and I scream.

“Do not let her go!” Nylion shouts above me. “I did not save her worthless life for you to end it.”

I struggle to get clear of the haze in my mind, but when it fades, I find Nylion floating across from me with both of us clinging to something buoyant. I’m not sure what it is, but that doesn’t much matter.

My mouth and throat are dry, so when I try to speak, only a croak emerges, which has Nylion’s face pinching. Reaching around me, he cups the back of my neck, leaning forward to form a cave between us. Our place of safety, always pulled forth when the world becomes too much.

“It is ok,” Nylion says. “Take it slowly.”

So, I do, clearing my throat until my voice is freed.

“What happened?” I ask.

Turning away, Nylion rests the side of his head on my forehead.

“Mother offered up the first act of love that she has ever given m… us, and as is typical for her, it backfired. She fell, hit her head, and flopped on top of us right as I took over. Almost dragged us into the depths with her, that-”

With my other half’s voice strangled, he’s left swallowing several times before he can speak again.

“I had the good sense to snatch a batch of passing driftwood before the tide swept us out to sea, and here we are.”

Leaning back, Nylion waves a hand over the horizon. As I follow the sweep of his hand, nothing but ocean greets me, but our peril falls out of my awareness when I see what’s hanging from my arm.

Mama.

As if to remind me that it exists, pain blasts through me, turning my vision white, and desperately, I shift my burden onto our tiny raft. She only sinks, though, helpless to stay aloft while unconscious.

“What do we-?” I gasp.

“It will be dark soon,” Nylion says. “Use the light. Perhaps luck will shine on us, sending a ship our way.”

My other half always has the best suggestions. Gulping down more light than I ever have before, I hold it in my body and pray to Alouin that it will be enough.

I keep mama above water with my broken arm, clinging to driftwood. To Nylion. The clumsy curses I mutter help drive pain away, letting me stay conscious. I should thank Bryruned for teaching them to me, if I see the weapons master again. If he lets me and Nylion near him again.

“Help!” I shout, taking a break from cursing. “Mama, please wake up.”

Over the quiet slosh of water, my whisper loudly carries.

As time passes, the sky turns orange and purple. Once the stars have emerged, though, cursing can’t hold pain at bay anymore, and I lazily float in the water, holding to consciousness for the sole purpose of maintaining my grip.

“Mama, why were you chasing us?” I ask. “Is it really that important for me to take your medicine? Even when it makes Nyl go away?”

“She hates me, heart of my heart,” Nylion says with his voice floating through the haze. “I am the source of her shame.”

Mama says nothing, and I swallow the lump in my throat. As something obstructs my view of the stars above, voices shout in the dark, but I can’t summon the energy to call for help. I’m forced to rely on the light that’s blazing from my body, willfully ignoring how little it’s helped me so far. Instead, I hum a lullaby, indulging in the illusion that I’m putting mama to bed for once.

Her weight is lifted off of my arm, and it screams at that release of pressure. Mumbling my own protests, I slap at the water, searching for her.

From behind, something gets wrapped around my stomach. I twist, flailing at what’s holding me, but even still, it lifts me out of the ocean and into the air until I’m pulled over a ship’s railing, and when I’m released, I flop to its deck.

“Raimie!”

A rough hand caresses my face, and I grab it.

“Mama?” I ask.

When my eyes clear, my father’s worried face crystalizes for me.

“She’s fine. Waking up now,” he says. “What happened?”

“My fault,” I mumble. “Misjudged propulsion. Clung too hard, and mama fell.”

“It wasn’t his fault,” mama snaps with a cough. “It was the OTHER.”

“Oh, NOW she wakes up,” Nylion says while my father frantically says.

“Samantha! You should be resting.”

“No, Aramar. We need to address this.”

Mama coughs again.

“Contact the witch in Allanovian. This other in him needs to be erased.”

I give up on consciousness, but before I drift away, I catch a sudden spillover of terror from Nylion as he angrily grumbles to himself.

My mother and I fall ill. Four days later, we travel to Allanovian, and both she and Nylion are stolen from me in in that awful place.

Someone had replaced my heart with a hollow, throbbing wound. I’d forgotten how to breathe, how to speak, how to think.

“Raimie?” two figures that I should know asked.

“…why?” I managed to rasp.

“Why, what?” the dark one of the two asked.

Recoiling, I said, “How… could…?”

Striding between those familiar figures, Nylion crouched in front of me. As he took my hands, his horribly beaten and bruised face was creased with concern.

“I am sorry,” was all he said.

“You… knew…”

“Everything except who cursed us,” Nylion said. “I knew our scheming bitch of a mother was involved, but as for the others… I did not know how deep the betrayal went. Eledis, Gistrick, your father… and that was your Uncle’s flagship at the end. We should assume that Marcuset was at least privy to the decision as well.”

Pulling my hands free, I clutched at my head, struggling to force two versions of my past into some sense of order. How was I supposed to reconcile the two lives I’d led? One of happiness. One of truth. Which was real? Or were they both…? No.

My life in Daira explained so many inconsistencies that I’d never thought to question. If tutors had been working with me from the time that I was a toddler, it was no wonder I’d breezed through my lessons with Ferin and Rhylix. I’d already studied what Ferin had meant to teach me and learned the skills that Rhylix had imparted.

As for how quickly I’d mastered my friend’s lessons, my ability to replicate a skill after observing it only once would certainly help with gaining knowledge, but it couldn’t replace muscle memory, something that only repetitive practice could develop. I’d had an abundance of that when training with weapons masters, though.

The tutors also explained my oscillation between total ignorance of foreign relations to a somewhat skilled diplomat. Mediation had been drilled into me since birth.

But my happy childhood in the forest… it had all been a lie?

“Yes. Every part of it until we turned nine,” Nylion said. “At least you get to keep that half.”

Small consolation.

“Are you quite well, Raimie?” someone asked. “Your fall didn’t look that bad.”

As I let my hands slip off of my head, my ability to speak logically lurched into working order.

Without looking up, I asked, “How long have you two been with me? I know that I accessed Ele and Daevetch before finding Shadowsteal.”

Only silence answered me for a time, but I was content to stay in this quiet. It was a direct contrast to my current turmoil, and besides that, I didn’t think I could move right now. Curious whether this was true, I asked for my legs to straighten, and they twitched instead.

Great. When would this wear off?

In answer to my question, Bright said, “Since you were born.”

“Can you imagine?” Dim said with a nervous laugh. “You caused so much trouble as a toddler primeancer, running circles around your parents.”

And the blow of this knowledge knocked me back into partial reticence.

“Why didn’t you tell me… when you came back?” I dragged forth. “You hinted at it… constantly but said nothing after… Shadowsteal.”

“Would you have believed us?” Bright asked.

“And Eselan magic like what you suffered is unpredictable,” Dim added. “If we’d told you, our revelation might have broken the spell, or it might have stomped down harder on you instead.”

I nodded, satisfied, if not pleased, with their answer. On attempting to move my legs again, they did more than twitch, so I tried to stand, a little unnerved when Nylion, a very visible Nylion, steadied me. Even if it did nothing to actually stop my wobble, the gesture was… appreciated.

Seeing him while awake would take some getting used to. And at one point, it had been our natural state.

When I pulled Ele through my source, it quelled the burgeoning of something dark and violent with its peace, and I released a breath that I could swear I’d held since the barrage of memories had stopped.

“What will you do?” asked one of the three unseen but very real beings behind me.

I didn’t stop to check which of them it had been.

“My family has much to answer for,” I said. “I’m going to have a chat with them.”