Dreams took her when she finally made her way back to her guest room. Too exhausted by the days of travel and the events of the past few weeks, she was barely aware of how nice it felt to lie down on a mattress instead of the cold ground….
The night rain sheeted the street, blowing almost horizontally with the gusts of wind. The platform and stairs of the Metro were deserted, a few cars moving, stores closed and bars quiet. The head of the vampire clan of Paris flipped the collar of his rain coat up, jammed his hands into his pockets and kept walking. He hadn't felt cold for centuries, but some memory of what it had felt like still lingered and so he still dressed for the weather, kept up the charade.
Night creature, hug the wall, listen for the sound of a follower. Stop moving, watch and listen, always listen and then keep moving. His people would not approve if they knew how many times he collaborated with this Shadowhunter.
He felt the thrum of her defiant heart beat, the pulse of that Angel blood before he saw her…
She was a creature of the night although for her it was a choice, a calling. The shadows did not consume her. They merely cloaked her, but no shadow could quench her inner fire. It was a fire that the damned and the cursed sought for its brilliance. She was different. Pride, anger, disobedience. And something else, hard to define, a secret side, an addiction to rebellion.
"You made it," she said crisply. She stood in the shadows, in the rain, her wet Gear blending in with the darkness. The auburn hair looked black.
"I did," said the vampire. "And I have troubling news for you…Lucian has been seen consorting with supporters of Valentine. He has joined. He killed three of my people last night…with the help of a demon. I heard rumours," here he paused, "that he fought some of your kind last night to. His own brethren…"
Aiedale Darklighter didn't even flinch, did not confirm that juicy pieced of gossip, but her eyes narrowed. "I see," she said, "well I will have to have a chat with Lucian then."
He felt the way she tensed, felt the anger coil and solidify within her as her heart rate jumped a few beats. Now her blood was pounding in her veins. The vampire approved. Vengeance remained a sweet indulgence that centuries of this damned life had not taken from him.
"Strike hard," he advised her. "Non ducor, duco,"
The dream swirled, shifting and she found herself walking a familiar street.
The red neon, pulsing chaos of Boulevard de Clichy in the Pigalle..her red soled heels clicked on the Parisian sidewalk as she held her chin up, keeping the grey head of her quarry in sight — trailing a moving foot target was one of the more difficult and subtle skills she had had to learn. She covered her quarry loosely, alternately paralleling on the dividing island in the centre of the boulevard and drifting behind in the early evening crowds.
He did not know she was tailing him, but she had to be careful. Plenty of other mundanes and the occasional Downworlders had noticed her passing through the crowd.
An unshaven and drunk young man slid in beside her, put an arm around her shoulder. "Je band pour too," he said in crooked French, there was alcohol on his breath and a cocky gleam in his eyes. She had no time for this and for a moment she had to fight a smouldering urge to hurt him. Punch him hard. No. Become ice. She shook his arm off and pushed him away, walking as if he had not tried to stop her. "Va void ailleurs is j'y sues" she said over her shoulder.
Her target entered a bar. Aiedale waited a beat and then followed him, sliding through the crowds with ease. He would lead her to Lucian, she knew that. This was his contact with Valentine.
The bouncer nodded in professional approval at her dress, then glanced briefly into her tiny black satin clutch, barely large enough to hold lipstick and a thin smartphone. If he could see her weapons on her, thought the Shadowhunter with grim amusement, he would not look at her that way or wave her inside past the heavy curtains with a friendly nod.
Her dark auburn hair pulled back into a neat French twist, she followed her prey through the dancing couples, weaving in and out as she made her way to the back door that opened onto a corner of the Shadow market. The hunt for Lucian was on…
Still she dreamed, knowing she was dreaming, but unable to pull herself out of the spiralling memories which pulled her down.
The Shadowmarket was packed. She moved through this labyrinth, the path so narrow that if she had found herself in the wilds she would have called them a hunter's trail.
These markets were an escape for Downworlders. This was the heart of their community, a common area where they could barter and trade, find love and riches. Where they could simply exist without any attempt to hide themselves. It was a place of sparkling fairy lights and inky shadows. Aiedale had always thought it reflected the diversity and resilience of the community which had formed it.
Aiedale normally enjoyed coming here and, over time, the Downworlders had come not only to tolerate her but to accept her presence. But she moved through the market silently, too focused to take any enjoyment in the buzz around her. She brushed through curtains of enchanted fey flowers, blinked away the lights of twinkling protection charms set by warlocks from the many stalls that lined the streets. Each lantern lit with warlock magic. Like burning jewels, amethyst and ruby, sapphire and opal, their light created a private world that was both new and old.
A faerie selling flowers with glamour heavy on them brushed past her and, as Aiedale turned her body so as to edge past, she saw the fair haired head of Lucian vanishing down a side street.
You did not always know what a person was capable of. Many times, thought the Shadowhunter, you had to wait, give it time, time was the gambling partner.
And Lucian had at last shown his cards.
She thought of Machiavelli: The promise given was a necessity of the past: the word broken is a necessity of the present.
The faint flicker of movement in her periphery vision was the final warning that she was being followed.
She had been drilled since she was a young child: once is an accident. Twice, a coincidence. Three times, and you are being hunted. They were the precepts all operatives understood and held themselves to. They were dead simple and full of common sense: never look over your shoulder or steal free looks. Make it seem like it was their fault they had lost you.
Wasn't she supposed to be the hunter tonight? No matter, she was no helpless prey.
Lucian was one of the best.
But she was better. She was adept, bold, cunning, the sort of Shadowhunter who excelled when the stakes were high…and she was better because she had to be tonight.
Who was Lucian? What was he to her?
He was a Shadowhunter. She had trained with him, argued with him, gotten drunk with him and watched his every move with wariness and a trace of envy. But he was a person, she thought, twisted by greed and pain into doing things that once even he would have said were wrong.
And so he was nothing to her now. He was threat that needed to be eliminated.
Their game of cat and mouse finally came to an end. It ended as a bad fight had to: in a dilapidated flat which reeked of master stench in a seedy neighbourhood where the mundane and Shadow world overlapped in disconcerting ways.
"Aiedale," he said, "what a surprise."
Every trace of vulnerability locked down. She felt her entire body go cold, warning bells going off in her head.
"This has to end."
"You know…the question I've spent so long thinking about," said Lucian, "is: are you a Shadowhunter? Or are you a slave to the wishes of Downworlders?"
It was a brutal fight. It was always going to be messy between them. Lucian was not above insulting her in every way he knew would hurt her and she was not above it either.
Parry, give ground, parry, give ground…
No.
That was not how she fought. It was not how she had been taught, what she had been raised to know until it was more instinct than knowledge. What she knew was to be pro-active and to create her own chances, to lead the fight. To nullify an opponent's strengths, to play to their weakness. Endless training…hour on hour, day on day, month on month. Training until the movements and the reasons for fighting no longer had any meaning, but became instinct.
She had learned the lessons.
She knew the opponent. But she knew the opponent too well…knew that if she went all the way then she was throwing away all that she had ever known, to walk away from the oaths sworn before the Angel. She'd fought him before, contemplated the complications of killing him and now….now could she act?
But she also knew she couldn't maintain this defensive stance and hold her own in a duel. Perception, footwork, timing, awareness, blows, counters, feints they were all a given at this level. The duel — the true battle — was in the mind. Lose concentration, lose focus for a single instant, and you were dead. No matter the reason or the justification, a second's lapse was catastrophic.
"You are a failure," he taunted, breathing heavily. "You were such a disappointment. It would have been so easy for you to be so much more."
All frustrations that had built up were given vent, all that anger and resentment finally given voice, "Because I dared to ask why? Because I refused to follow the petty rules and regulations Clave blindly, every time? Because I was never a mindless, soulless killer? Because I dared to say there were some things we should. not. do?"
"Traitor," he snarled. "Traitor to your own kind! You side with Downworlder scum and mundanes —"
"That is your reason? That is why you charge me with treachery?" she demanded. "It is not for you that I fight. You have no right to charge me so. Nothing you have done has earned you the right to judge me." And she felt the crystal calm settle around her, "I still know what I want to be. I know what is right and this is not it. You are wrong. I am no traitor."
Everything was at stake, everything to lose.
But everything to gain if she played this right. If she could take that step, ruthless and calculating as it was.
She straightened a fraction; visibly bracing, her voice levelling out to an odd calm as she met the Shadowhunter's eyes. "This is not what a Darklighter would do. This is not what a Shadowhunter sworn to Raziel would do. This must end."
It had changed then. Once her decision was made.
The two separated, knives flashing in dim light like bright stars.
"Yeild!" spat the blonde haired opponent.
"No," she said quietly, the composure in her quiet voice at odds with the myriad of tine cuts and abrasions which covered her face, sweat and blood and grime smeared together. But the conviction that laced through it, the cool assurance in those eyes made the request a solemn threat.
The duel had moved past its duelists, passed whatever oaths and loyalties and lies had restricted Aiedale. The final resolve had tipped, rolling forward with gathering strength. There were no nods to convention, not any more. No pretty plays to please the eye at this level of combat, no more big roundhouse blows, no opportunities to elicit them allowed. The entire thing had tightened, become quicksilver fast and wildly fluid. This was two warriors at the peak of their ability and resolve. This was proficiency thousands of hours in the making, and it gave no quarter to civility or custom.
This was two Shadowhunters fighting to the death. This was utter focus that had passed beyond any emotion, raw and tattered wounds that remained forever. Pain and resolve tightened and pressed into quick, precise movements.
Thrust, cut, underhand, overhead. Always moving, forcing her opponent into small corrective steps on the spot, forcing him too limit his moves, sacrificing maneuverability and opportunity. Motions that were completely ruthless combined with quicksilver grace and controlled fluidity.
Things escalated quickly — like she knew they would. The smaller moves cascading into a fatal flaw. The two were too well matched otherwise. Speed versus power, technique versus strength…until he tried to bait her ego into a trap that she resisted, leaving his left side momentarily unprotected, and she pounced.
There was no name for the emotions that howled through her as Lucian's long knife tumbled away, hopelessly out of reach and Aiedale's own blade cut deeply into his exposed left side. No way to curb or contain them, they rolled through and over her, leaving her dizzy, breathless, triumphant. But also beaten, lost and alone.
Lay the killing blow…
Never stay the blow; never defer. Never pity.
She'd thought about taking him prisoner and dragging him in chains to the Clave - it would have been so satisfying - but not now, not after everything…not after what he had said. The Clave wouldn't mind making examples of them might even let him live in exchange for his damning testimony of her.
When she spoke it was quietly and calmly, "The Clave made it so easy for us to kill, no matter what we may feel or whether or not it was…right." She continued in the same, even tones as Lucian stumbled to his knees, "The Clave loves to tell us that because of what we are…because we…because I was a Shadowhunter, all that mattered was the Clave, our mandate no matter the cost, it is only the hunt that counts never the aftermath."
She rolled the hilt of her knife to a tighter grip. "You should have thought about what the cost of your decisions would be, Lucian. Should have remembered that power like Valentine's only destroys."
"Traitor," snarled Lucian.
Aiedale stepped forward, adept enough that as she brought her arm down decisively, the blow was one-handed, delivered with the power and assurance of a seasoned killer.
It was over.
It was done.
As she limped through the narrow path made between a tangle of tables and chairs, ignoring the occasional bloodstain, Aiedale saw a terrified Fey who'd inched slowly clear of the inner room where Aiedale had been fighting with Lucian. Backing up to the wall, the Fey remained still, electric blue eyes flicking between her and the door. Still possessed of the buzzing calm that had taken her early in the duel, Aiedale knew that she was looking at a liability which every bit of her training was saying to take care of — permanently. Deviating her path just slightly, she grabbed a handful of the Fey's clothing and dragged them towards the exit.
She dragged the unresisting Fey down the twisted metal stairs and into the dark street on by the scruff their clothes, walking around the side of the building and down two rickety stairs before they came to a halt at the side wall of the building. The Fey pressed back, eyes on the blade in Aiedale's hand and the Shadowhunter stared into the wide, pupil-less eyes set into a pale, lovely, androgynous face, eyebrows creased by undisguised fear.
It was strange, what came to her mind in that moment; the insignificance of this one life, the clear and undeniable logic which dictated that to let the one being who had seen the fight between her and a Shadowhunter who had betrayed their kind and accused her of treachery to—
It was a gaping mistake to leave a witness alive.
The memory of how she had always envied those who could live their lives free of all this —
The lessons ground in to never hesitate never hesitate because then you would have already lost. Hesitate and you are useless — worse than that even. You became a hindrance, an embarrassment to your family, to the Nephilim —
The memory of killing Lucian, the sickened pall which had pressed in around her, collapsing some inner part of her just as every kill had done before. Something lost in that moment, something fragile and important —
The Fey stared at her, chest frozen, eyes wide.
"Go," she whispered, "go. Go somewhere. Just go." The Fey stared at her as she stepped away, releasing her hold on them and lifted a finger to her lips in both a request and a warning. Understanding, the Fey nodded vigorously then sidestepped, pressed against the wall, and fled down the remaining stairs.
She destroyed the building.
Let that be your funeral pyre, she thought as she left, a quick shadow against the wet pavement, fire truck sirens wailing behind her as the flames leapt up the sides of the building. Let you burn in hell for betraying all of us and joining Valentine…
Her dreams swirled to the offices of the Paris Institute and a dinging text on her mobile from her Aunt. Before her was a wide oak desk littered in mundane reports and the nightly Shadowhunter reports, passively monitoring through-going information and, while the explosive fire in the suburb had been logged, it was being left to the mundane police. It was not considered to have the suspicious circumstances that would warrant Shadowhunter involvement. Which meant her aunt wanted to see her about something else.
The list was still quite long regardless of whether that fight with Lucian was on it…
She entered the debriefing room, standing very straight and tall in the wide room. A massive table ran down the centre of the room, a dozen straight-backed wooden chairs decorated with colourful inlays, each with dark blue cushioned armrests, were arrayed along either side of the table. Extra chairs were lined up against the cream coloured walls. It was sophisticated. It was elegant. It was austere.
The wolves were drawing close. But she felt no fear, simply a rising determination within her. Let them try and come for her. Let them see that she had teeth and claws of her own.
You didn't have to like what you did. You just had to do it. And you had survive long enough to see it through.
All her aunt said was: We go to Alicante.
Nothing else mattered. The world was on fire. And she was probably going to burn with it.
Aideale woke, gasping, hand clenched around the hilt of the seraph blade she had been given by Celeborn.
Dawn was still a ways off, but she rose from the bed, nerves jangling and mind spinning. Calm yourself, she said sternly. Dress, ready your weapons, that fight is in the past. There is another at hand.
There were just some things even Shadowhunters couldn't hide with runes, thought Aragorn as he watched Aiedale walk toward their little group, weaving in and out of the warriors and common folk rushing to prepare for departure to Helms Deep. And it had nothing to do with her looks or manner of dress. Aiedale was cautious without being afraid, careful without being shy. She moved with all the grace of oil across water, a natural slinkiness to her movement which could move from casually relaxed to explosive in a blink of an eye.
People moved out of her way, eyes averted as if she was a predator, a wolf among sheep.
What a lonely life she lives, thought the man to himself, lonelier then even the Ranger's solitary lot. By blood and by training, Aiedale was cut off from the kind of simple exchanges between individuals that could give meaning and colour to a person's life. If what he had gleaned from her upbringing was true, there had been precious few the young woman could rely on even among her own kind. As a result, Aiedale was at once both sophisticated, charming and highly educated, but floundered with bewildered confusion when confronted with basic conversation and human interaction.
"Stop staring at me," said the Shadowhunter cooly as she reached them.
"Everyone is staring at you," said the dwarf. "You are more interesting than the elf."
Aiedale rolled her eyes. "I should have put a glamour on."
"That would just make things more complicated," pointed out the man. "How would you explain glamours to them?"
"I wouldn't," said the Shadowhunter, "because with a glamour they would never have known I was here."
"That would have only made it worse when you finally revealed yourself."
"Who says a Shadowhunter ever reveals themselves to the mundanes they are charged to watch over?"
The man shook his head, "You are purposefully missing the point."
"I purposefully miss all sort of points," said the Shadowhunter. "Like sword points…"
"Aiedale," said the man, "don't be vexing."
A ghost of a smile crossed her face, a nostalgic glint to her eyes.
Aiedale moved off then. "Have fun with your bronc," she called back over her shoulder.
The Lady of Rohan, blonde hair gleaming and eyes fixed curiously on the Shadowhunter, walked over then, dressed in plain dark green traveling clothes. "What can you tell me of her?" asked the woman, her eyes darting to the three companions briefly.
"She is very hard to describe," said the Ranger with a wry grin. "Try to keep on her good side."
Eowyn looked very confused. "She seems quiet and reasonable…"
"She is," reassured the Ranger, "most of the time."
The dwarf snorted. "Yes," he said, "unless you get in her way…"
"And then she is not so reasonable," completed the elf. "But so far she has saved her knives for orcs and cave trolls."
"And those glares for those who disagree with her," said the dwarf, remembering Aiedale's furious words with Boromir so long ago at the Council of Elrond. "Or fail to express appreciation for her presence," he added as an afterthought.
"Or those that annoy her," said the elf.
"Or those that call her a girl," said the dwarf.
"No one," said the elf, "has made that mistake for a long time."
"Yet," said Gimli, "but the Horsemaster came damn close."
"Eomer?" said Eowyn. "Diplomacy is not his strong suit. I hope my brother was not-"
"No, no," said Aragorn quickly, trying to reassure the golden haired lady. "Your brother was most considerate given the unfortunate and suspicious circumstances under which he found us."
"She was one insult away from—"
"That's enough Gimli," said Aragorn firmly. "Aiedale is a highly trained warrior and perfectly capable of controlling her temper."
For the most part, he added to himself. Although he had not seen her lose it with any of their companions he knew that she walked an edge of control when she fought as if battle brought out some inner fury that burned within her. He wondered, briefly glancing at the Shadowhunter who was checking her mount's girth with practiced fingers, how far she could be pushed before she would snap. And what would snapping look like? He wasn't sure he wanted to find out. Without Gandalf's towering presence and the protection he offered, the Ranger was uncomfortably aware of the suspicious looks being cast toward the young woman. Which was why he steeled himself and moved towards her, angling himself to prevent curious onlookers from seeing their exchange as easily and hoping the sounds of horses and creaking wagons would muffle his words.
"What now?" asked the Shadowhunter as her fingers moved from girth to the straps that held a green blanket and other supplies to the horse's saddle. They had already been attached by a groom of the Royal Stables, but Aideale was checking them again, the action betraying her anxiety.
"I only want to express some concern," he hedged quietly, "about how you have behaved with our hosts."
The look she sent him was dark, "I have barely interacted with them beyond polite words with the Lady Eowyn when she came to great me last night." Her eyes narrowed dangerously. "Are you implying that I have a reputation?" she demanded in mock horror. "Or that I don't have one?"
"This is no laughing matter," said Aragorn tightly, "rumours are already beginning to circulate and, while most are harmless and outlandish, others are not so pleasant."
She snorted. "Where is the closest brothel? I seek scandal and low companionship."
"Aiedale!"
"I don't care what they thing," said the Shadowhunter. "I have never cared what mundanes think about me."
"You are making your life needlessly hard."
"All it takes," said Aiedale sharply, "is one glamour and they can't even see me. One glamour and I disappear. One glamour and I am the noiseless shadow they almost see but can't."
"You can't hide forever," he argued back. "You cannot always turn to your runes and glamours. You need to be a part of the world around you, Aiedale. The human world." He risked stepping closer, his voice dropping, "You are human, Aiedale. Like me. Like them. Maybe if you stood a little closer, showed a little compassion you would see that."
The look she sent him was as wide eyed as the look his newly tamed war horse had fixed him with when he opened the stall door. Something panicked as if he had crossed some forbidden line. She drew away from him, body tensing as if preparing to fight.
"I am not completely human, Ranger. I walk in your world, but I can only walk the edges of it." Her eyes were hard, the warning delivered with sharp, cold fierceness, "Never, ever forget that."
The day past agonizingly slowly for a Shadowhunter used to the highly trained efficiency of Nephilim warriors and the modern luxuries of motorized transport or handy portals. Still fuming over the audacity of her male companion's words, she settled into a gloomy cloud on the back of her horse. Trailing behind Legolas and Gimli, she found herself reflecting rather fondly on the journey the still intact Fellowship. Before Moria and all that mess on the snowy mountain, Aiedale had had the freedom to leave her companions and return. A comfortable rhythm of scouting established between her, the elf, and the Ranger. She had also been far too hard on the hobbits. They moved quickly compared to this.
Out on the open plains of Rohan with relatively few landmarks once the city of Edoras was out of sight, she was painfully aware of how exposed and vulnerable they were.
The brief pause at mid-day was making her skin itch, her head swivelling from side to side, uncaring if it betrayed her jangling nerves. But her mind was distracted from thoughts of ambushes and orcs and other nasty surprises, by the sight of the Lady Eowyn speaking with the Ranger some yards ahead.
Aiedale glanced away, uncomfortable.
Eowyn didn't know about Arwen. She didn't know that when two people are meant to be together — like Aragorn and Arwen were - they will be together. It was fate. It was as if cosmic forces had aligned, placing the elf princess and the Ranger who-was-to-be-king on a collision course that no Rohirrim beauty — no matter how fierce — could alter. Aiedale only knew that because she had seen the way the elf princess looked at the Ranger and the Ranger looked at the elf princess. A love that had been built over decades and only grown deeper for the hardship it had faced.
Some things just were.
Which left Aiedale feeling painfully out of her depth. She had no idea what to say or how best to break the news to Eowyn.
Ask her about the finer points of knife throwing or how to do your black eyeliner cat eyes in the back of a moving Parisian taxi cab and Aiedale would have a ready response. Ask her how to fudge a few details on a patrol report with a bit of cleverly worded Latin verb conjugations or how to place a powerful explosive on a narrow tipped arrow and she would have gladly provided her insights. Ask her how spend all night hunting demons through the streets of Paris in a pair of designer stilettos or how to rune your favourite charm bracelet so that the next vampire that got a bit close to your jugular never tried it again —
But telling Eowyn better luck next time, girl? Plenty of fish in the sea and all that?
She had no idea, thought the Shadowhunter. She gazed intently at the Rohan princess who was too lost in her own private world to realize that Aiedale was staring at her with an intensity that would have made most feel like something very small being looked at by a very hungry hawk.
Aiedale's and her contemporaries treated romance with a mix of devil-may-care, catch-me-if-you-can mixed and a practical edge of 'I have a job to do.' The Clave had made it quite clear early on that any attachments one had, any romantic notions about destiny or true love, were never to come between the Shadowhunter and their mandate. She could use the interest shown her as a tool or a momentary distraction between jobs, but it went no further than that until an appropriate Shadowhunter boy came along and the Clave stamped its ascent.
But, even if she had good advice, any she offered the woman was certain to be ignored. Eowyn would not listen to her words of caution even if Aiedale begged her to listen. She would not heed the warnings about the lines that existed between what was personal and what was business not when she had been raised on tales of romance.
And a Shadowhunter never begged, thought Aiedale cooly. They never begged because they never allowed a situation to come to that point. If Eowyn was a lost cause then Aiedale's options were a little more narrowed…which meant she was going to have to make the seemingly blind Aragorn aware of the pining looks being sent his way. Besides, it served him right for his words to her earlier that day.
Or was he blind? Surely, thought Aiedale, he was not that blind. Men, she inwardly snarled. Of all the useless, hopeless, idiotic creations this world is cursed with —
"You know," said Aiedale deciding to give up on subtly and go for blunt, "you just life an eyebrow at the princess and she'd follow you to the nearest tent."
"Aideale," snapped a suddenly horrified looking Ranger.
"Aragorn," snapped Aiedale right back. "You are no naive schoolboy. Either reciprocate or inform her that your heart is forever held in the immortal hands of Arwen. But don't be an ass and not tell her."
She sped up, unable to keep looking at the man or risk having to bat back his feeble excuses, the guilt in his eyes was evident enough. He did not want to break the princess's heart.
How many hearts had she broken? She wasn't sure. She had toyed with a string of boy friends, always knowing none of them could make the grade or stand the tests. Aiedale had tried to convince herself that leaving someone isn't the worst thing you can do to them. Painful it may be, but it doesn't have to be a tragedy. They had known, they must have, that she did not truly love them.
And if one is fortunate enough to be loved one should treasure it.
You lucky duck, Aragorn, she thought darkly. Stop holding it over the rest of us poor lonely sods.
She faced him. He was kind, even now. It grated her, his kindness. That he could see a future for their relationship grated even more, all she could see were games and lies.
"Don't ask me questions you already know the answers to. I've laid myself bare to you and all its gotten me was judgement and useless advice. Don't torture me. It is a cruel thing to do, even to someone like me."
"I love you."
"You don't know me." She lifted her chin, "You met me when the world was on fire. You do not know my secrets, my wishes, my darkest fears."
"Let me know them," he said. "Let me stand with you."
But she resisted it. She could not untangle him from the Clave and its expectations for her.
After her words with the Ranger, Aiedale would have been quite happy to avoid him for the remainder of the ride, preferably until she could traipse back to her own world. But the Ranger clearly did not feel the same.
He found her, sitting some distance from the fire that Gimli and Legolas had built up, and sat down, close enough to have a conversation but not so close as to invade her personal space. She refused to look at him, hoping he would leave her be.
"They are afraid," said the man quietly.
She traced a rune across the grass, linking it to another. The elvish cloak was warm against the growing night chill and all she could hear was the low murmur of voices, the snap of small fires burning, and the stomp of restless horses. It was surprisingly quiet for such a large camp of civilians. The King of Rohan had retired to a dark green pavilion, the few Captains he had at hand with him, their faces tense. She was clearly not the only one uncomfortable with how exposed they were to attack.
"They are not soldiers," she said at last.
"You are," said the Ranger. "Have you ever been afraid of battle?"
What a question, she internally fumed. Was the man's goals to pry her armour back and offer some Middle Earth version of trauma therapy? It was as if he saw her red lines, sensed her fraying patience, and just breezed past them as if confident in the knowledge that she wouldn't actually throttle him.
Aiedale shrugged, shoulders tight, "Some say a good soldier fears their superior officers more than the enemy."
"Did you?"
"Sometimes," said Aiedale, refusing to elaborate.
The Ranger glanced her. "Weren't they also your family?"
"Sometimes," said Aiedale, "but the lines between family and officer were kept very clear. " She ran a gloved hand over her knee.
"I was raised in Imladris," said Aragorn. "Lord Elrond was a father to me. What about you? After your own father passed away?"
She nearly snorted. While Aragorn's childhood had been spent growing under the wise, nurturing guidance of the elves, her own had formative years had been spent learning in a far less forgiving, bleak world. She and her fellow trainees had been viewed by the adults in their lives with the objectivity of stock broker considering the potential return of an investment in their portfolio.
"My uncle I suppose," said the Shadowhunter, brow furrowing as she sorted through the various figures that had had an influence in her upbringing. Her aunt, preoccupied with her duty as head of the Paris Clave, had been a towering figure of authority and discipline — an iron hand disguised by no glove at all. Aiedale had quickly come to know that her aunt had a lack of sympathy for weakness or incompetence.
Which left? Well, it left Roscoe. But her uncle was complicated.
Aiedale shrugged. "It's hard to explain."
Indeed it was hard to put words to probably the only somewhat vaguely father-like figure she had had these past years. Uncle Roscoe, who had originally been posted in Moscow before marrying her aunt in a marriage arranged by their families, had had little influence on even his own children's upbringing. He would have been better off in the wilds of Siberia or on some lonely outpost — a place without women or children or social graces or Clave politics, with plenty of work and unspoken codes of camaraderie that no one needed the Codex to explain. He was disgusted by the petty politics, the constant backstabbing, and the endless emphasis on following the chain of command to the letter. It certainly hadn't come naturally to him to take his newly orphaned niece and nephew in whatever the circumstances that had led to them being deposited on the Paris Institute doorstep, still in clothes stained with their parent's blood. All he had seen was another twist in an already wearisome Clave game. Another warning to behave, another liability, another intricate play he must decipher…not two young children who had just lost their parents and unaware of how they were being shoved around like two chess pieces by the Clave.
"My uncle Roscoe…but he wasn't very parental," she elaborated when the Ranger kept looking at her expectantly.
She hadn't resented Roscoe for the distance he kept between himself and her or James, especially as she got older. She'd valued his grim honesty, his gruff dislike for the whole mess and it hadn't much mattered to her that he had never really tried to parent her. She had lost her father, Roscoe trying to replace him would have been salt in the wound.
She felt a smile tug at the corner's of her lips a moment later, "He liked it when the winds blew. Liked it when it stormed. Paris was too clean, too nice, too French for him. He didn't bother himself to much except to tell us when we messed up or what complete and utter idiots we had been." She glanced at Aragorn and continued, encouraged by his lack of apparent judgement, "I suppose the most fatherly he ever got was when I was promoted to an acting field officer. He told me that whatever setbacks one faced in life, however daunting or dispiriting the unfolding of events, one always makes it through as long as when they wake up they are looking forward to their first cup of tea."
"What did he mean by that?" asked the Ranger.
Aiedale gestured at the pipe which had somehow appeared crooked between the Ranger's scarred, weatherworn hands. "One should always be prepared to fight for one's simple pleasures and to defend them. That bit of a smoke in the evening…a gingersnap cookie in the bath…little things, mundane things but important things to." She interlocked her fingers, stretching out her hands. She could not see them through her gear and clothes but she could feel the runes burning ever so slightly.
The Ranger smiled, a comfortable silence settling between them as he lifted his pipe in agreement.
Aiedale's sharp vision caught a flicker of moment by one of the hastily pitched tents some distance away in the gathering blood. A man was settling a baby into a basket, gently wrapping the blankets around it while the child's golden haired mother leaned over, a faint smile on her open, honest face. The man's helmet with its long horse hair plume had been discarded along with his sword. They looked happy despite their surroundings and the desperate circumstances that had led to them being there in the first place.
So saying, glorious Hector took his plumed helmet; and his beloved wife returned home turning often to look back…
Ah the Iliad, thought Aiedale. She'd read the text in the original Greek when she was ten like many Shadowhunter children did. The Greeks knew how to weave together the strands of tragedy and heroism, loss and triumph, the conflict between the individual and the state, between divine and human into a few lines, a quickly drawn scene of a father leaving his young son for war and death.
Aiedale's mind continued to wander, almost unwillingly wondering what kind of father her own would have been if he had lived. Would he have held her back from the front lines? Listened when she tried to sort through her increasingly tangled loyalties and reservations about what she was…what she did? Or would he have been like Uncle Roscoe? Unwilling to invest emotionally in a child knowing that she was like all the other young warriors being trained to be lit up like fireworks by the Clave?
She didn't know.
What she knew about his father was that he had loved his wife and children very much. She knew he had been loyal to the Clave, a scholar more than a warrior who had focused on contributing to the Clave's archives. She had some photos of him and carried a knife that had once been his. She had his signet ring in a box on her dresser along with her parent's wedding rings. James had ended up with one of his watches, an old stele that was kept in a place of honour on a bookshelf, and some of his books which her bother treasured like the most precious of the Shadowhunter Codexes.
"Do you miss your father?"
"Sometimes," said Aiedale.
"He must have loved you," said the Ranger quietly, gently. Prying her open one quiet word at a time, but treading with more care than he had before. Correctly assessing that if she was to truly snap shut and hate him for asking it was on the loss of her parents.
"For everything you love," said the Shadowhunter with absolute conviction, "you have to pay some price." She sighed, "He must have loved my brother and me very much to pay the price he did."
The pendant felt cool around her neck and heavy.
To think about profound loss…it was like listening to haunting echoes of memories. The immediate, painful moment when the loss occurred skipped over and, instead, the mind dwelled on the edges of it, wearing them smooth She had avoided thinking about it, shoving it to the side lest it make her falter at some critical moment.
She glanced at Aragorn and said, "We do not speak of the dead often. Do you know why?"
"No," said the man.
"Because Shadowhunters know they are never far."
"What do you mean?"
"You must have wondered," she said quietly, "where I had been that night on the plains. The night before we met Gandalf."
The man's eyebrows furrowed, his face sharpening. "I did wonder."
Aiedale had to fight the urge to look away, "I went to see my mother."
It was hard not to flinch, hard not to show any reaction as Aragorn's eyes opened a fraction wider and his mouth thinned.
"What do you mean?" His voice was sharp, hard and she hated it. It reminded her of all the times she had been dressed down for no good reason by a superior officer for saying something stupid. And just like then she was going to have to hold her temper in check and respond calmly, knowing that the only way to break through that skepticism was to deploy her words not emotion.
"Shadowhunters know," she said evenly, not looking at the man, "that our dead can come to us. They can linger as ghosts or as phantoms which only appear to us when they chose to, when we need their help." She took a deep breath, "I went to my mother. She called me that night."
"You jest—"
"No," said Aiedale, "I do not. The barrier between the living and the dead is thin…when they need to the dead come to us."
"And why," asked Aragorn, clearly humouring her, "did you need to speak to her?"
"There is another fight," said the Shadowhunter as she struggled to find words, "of which I am only just becoming aware of. She came to warn me, to tell me of a choice I will have to make."
He still didn't believe her but he did not say that. Instead he asked, "What choice?"
"That," she told the Ranger, "I cannot explain quite yet."
"Aiedale," he said warningly, "you are not making sense." He was looking at her, straight on. "Why tell me this now?"
She willed him to understand, reiterating the warning she had given him earlier in the day when his words had made warning bells ring in her head. They had gotten used to her, come to rely on her in some ways. But she was still Nephilim, still a warrior of the Clave, and her blood ran hot with Angel fire and the cold knowledge of all she was capable of. "Sometimes the fires a Shadowhunter lights burns…until all that is left is ashes."