The Sharded Blade | Part 1 (A Dark Fantasy Novella)

Part 21

Heart heavy in my stomach, I returned home to the inn.  The sun was rising now, and I found the unoccupied blanket once wrapping my daughter's spirit as she slept.  It looked as though the pilfered covering had simply fallen to the floor as she dissipated for, what I expected was, the last time.  Tonight would tell.  If she failed to reappear, I know that I'd done something right.

I hoped she was at peace, and I also held on to the belief that what I had done assisted her attaining such a status.  

Taking up the blanket in my arms, I held it as though doing so was comparable to holding her.  Ultimately, I concluded I'd have to seek out her mother and tell her what tragedy had befallen our child.  I wondered if she'd believe me.  Or would she think me mad?  She was always so grounded.  Not the sort of person who believed in wizards, curses, cults, and ghosts. And the tale I would have to tell contained all those and more.

Pondering these matters, the now furthest thing from my mind was the number of shards remaining to my once complete dagger.  Carli's absence had pushed those now trivial thoughts aside, replacing them with memories I was glad to have, but also at the same time sad that I did.

Slumping to the floor, wishing I could just drift into oblivion like a ghost myself, Gertrude stood next to me on her hind legs regarding my contemplative pose.  "Thank you," I said.

A chitter.

"Yeah, I know.  Back to business as usual now, right?"

A growl from the rat followed.

"No, I don't need time," I shook my head.  "Let's jump right back in with both feet, shall we?  If you've got one for me, don't hold back."

I think Gertrude wanted to say something, but a thudding clamor, like elephants charging from below us, broke up our exchange and the making of future plans.  Back to my feet, I wasn't so daft as to not recognize the sounds meant we had intruders.  I hadn't sealed back up the tunnel, so I was now certain someone had followed us, probably after finding several dead bodies in the temple, all of which had met some unnatural and brutal ends.

Gertrude flew onto my shoulder like a loyal companion as we headed for the entrance to our own personal underworld.  There was no doubt in my mind that we would find members of the Cult of Si looking for some revenge.  Even so, I wasn't really worried and barreled down the stairs to greet them.  It's not like I could die or anything, right?

While I was not surprised to be greeted by a myriad of green-robed, torch-wielding hoodlums standing there, more astonished to see me than I was them, there was however one minor detail that took me aback.  It was who was also with them that I was not ready for.  Standing there, among the cultists that I would have liked nothing more than to cut wide open, was an all too familiar and haunting face from my past.

She stood there, our gazes meeting, her long black hair looking exactly like the last time I'd laid eyes on her sixteen years ago.  And not a day older from the looks of things.  "Kaldon? Well, if this is a pleasant surprise, I don't know what is," she said.

In robes quite similar to those of the cultists, except for being royal blue, stood none other than my ex-wife.  On her shoulder slinked a ferret, its tail pulsing and wrapping around her neck.

"Hyra?"  I said her name, but it was hard to form the syllables.

She smiled. "Hello, love.  So, you're the one causing all this trouble?  Here I thought you were dead.  You should be dead."

Gertrude gave an agitated hiss.

I drew my weapon out of habit. "What are you doing with the Cult of Si? And does this mean I am to assume you are the one ultimately responsible for our daughter's death?"

Hyra cocked her head sideways at the mention of Carli's fate.  "Now that's interesting how you would know about that.  How is that, I wonder?  Although now that actually causes everything to make a little more sense."  She tapped her finger on her chin.  "The six dead members of our conclave were those involved, and you killed them out of some sense of parental duty?  But that doesn't answer the question of how you knew."

"Hyra, I swear I'll kill all of you for this."  My threats contained all the appropriate venom.  "Our daughter is dead!  Because you decided to join a cult?"

"Join? Oh, Kaldon, naïve as always.  I'm not a member.  I'm their leader."

"What?" I croaked.

One of the men with her stepped forward, "Want us to kill him, High Sister?"

She waved a hand to stop her crony's advance, which is when I decided to act instead, growling and charging them.  It was the shortest offensive in the history of offensives.  With another wave of Hyra's hand, I was frozen in place; like slamming into a wall of transparent tar.  This was something that caught me completely off guard, since it was obviously magic, and the Hyra I knew didn't know any magic.

Gertrude, in mid-leap from my shoulder, apparently deciding to join in my attack, looked pathetic compared to the odds she was about to face.  The spell seemed to have no effect on her.  Eyes blazing red, she charged in, and I hoped whatever she had been able to do to that Sister of Si in the temple, she could do again.  I suspected they wouldn't stand a chance if she could.

At that point was when Hyra's pet ferret sprung into action, eyes glowing the same red, hurtling off her shoulder, through the air, and, after a short battle between the furry creatures, subdued my associate under its own paws.  My heart sank further as it bit into Gertrude's neck, drawing an ear piercing wail that I felt inside my own gut.

"Hyra," I grunted out her name and the words to follow, "so help me, I'll kill you."

"I don't think so, Kaldon."  Then, as if I were inconsequential to her, she turned to one of the cultists with her. "Brother Daln, I'm sensing my daughter's spirit lingering in this place.  Take the Soul Trap, search it, and see if you can corral her."

"Yes, High Sister," said one of the hooded men.  He carried what appeared as not much more than a plain wooden cube in his hands, which I assumed was the special object to which she referred.

He was off, heading upstairs, leaving me with Hyra and the rest of my new friends.  "Hyra, I am not just going to kill you, I'm going to make you suffer." I swore my oath again, just for emphasis as to how pissed off I was.

While her ferret continued subduing Gertrude, my ex-wife approached me, helpless as I was.  Leaning in, she chose to whisper her next words into my ear as I couldn't move a muscle.  "You don't know anything about me, Kaldon.  What I'm capable of?  The only thing you're going to do right now is die."

And with that proclamation, she shoved a wavy-bladed dagger into my gut.  It was the second time I'd been stabbed like that, but this time the sensation was entirely different from the first.  It burned like before, but I also felt the blood oozing out of me and my life escaping as everything went quickly to black.