Where Shadow Steps
Prologue
Alica.
In this act I curse you to life without parents, but I gift you with a chance to avoid our people’s fate. You may never understand why, and for this I am sorry, but I hope you never do.
May your life be filled with many shadows yet empty of darkness.
May your path be moonlit where ours is opaque.
May chance favour you.
Escape.
Chapter 1
The throbbing in my skull grew in tempo as I leapt from one roof to the next. I prayed silently that I’d make it as I didn’t have breath to spare on such luxuries. Not like anything benign was listening down here anyway. Cardeth’s slimy, malevolent streets slunk passed as I ran, their façade transparent to my experienced eyes. Living on these streets has long since removed the carefully placed veil of a ‘holy city’. Cardeth is a monument to no god; a deity, yes, but no god.
Baggy, coal black trousers restricted my well honed ability to avoid the daily crisis, surviving the night scarred and scathed yet innocent. Un-christened in the horrors I barely escaped too often. My calloused feet flashed with dull pain each time they slapped against the tiled rooftops. Too close behind me male laughter reached forward, nearly drowned out by the screaming roar of life in hell. Despite the early hours, Cardeth didn’t sleep. Cardeth never slept.
I could see Maeth now, the poorest part of the city. My haven. The tiles there are too thin to hold any of the big guys, and the smaller ones stopped coming for us after Barry’s body turned up eyeless. I didn’t do it, but they didn’t know that. If I played my cards right, rigged the deck and practised my cold blooded killer face, they never would.
“We’re gonna get you this time baby. You’ll enjoy it. Promise.” I could hear the smirk in his tone.
He was right; I wasn’t going to make it. Four years of running and I wasn’t going to make it. I leapt from rooftop to rooftop as several sets of lungs laboured behind me, drawing ever closer. My back and shoulders itched and tingled. No man whom I didn’t trust completely had been within two metres of me for four years since the orphanage had burned down; it was like an allergic reaction.Fear swelled between my breasts, betraying my rational mind. Adrenaline pulsed through my veins as panic set in and I split from the normal route to Maeth instead heading towards Sumian, the historical district.
I never entered the crucible of Sumian, sticking to the more open quarters where few houses were above single storey making for easy travelling and lots of open ground to see a threat well before its shadowy fingers could scar and stain your soul.
If you were paying attention anyway.
Cardeth’s historical district stretched up into the immeasurable night, the buildings little more than old ghosts against the perfect darkness. I reached the cusp of Sumian faster than expected. Tiles turned to stone, chimneys to chipped feet where all manner of ornamental fixtures stood in ages past. I continued beyond the outskirts into the deserted heart of Cardeth’s history. Dust mingled with sweat, plastering my short blonde waves against my neck. I rushed on, vaulting into building after antiquated building, using old mason’s elaborate handiwork to drag myself up the weathered stone. Panting, I heaved myself onto an immense roof. This was the highest I’d ever been; exhilaration sparked but failed to catch, dampened by the sickening fear. The echoes of pursuit faded, looks like I wasn't worth this much effort.
The throbbing slowed as panic faded and despite the agony in my muscles, the scrapes, bruises and bleeding fingers, glanced behind me. Four silhouettes retreated against the glare from Cardeth’s kaleidoscopic patchwork of lamps. They reached the edge of Sumian just as strong smothering wind surged over the roof, thrusting me forwards. I wavered on the precipice of life, or at-least an end to it, for not a moment but a stretch of eternity and terror before I threw myself backwards and staggered into dark, still silence. A cumulative, permeating silence deeper than the depth of fear.
