Red Sister (Book of the Ancestor 1)

‘… light is a temporary kindness.’ Nona found that the Poisoner had taken up her theme and was waxing lyrical. She shook herself and tried to pay attention. ‘It is made new in the flame of a candle or the sun’s hot eye. Before it comes there is darkness. After it leaves there will be darkness. The night is patient, endlessly so. And shadow, shadow is the war, the wound, where the two contest, where the light bleeds.’

The Poisoner paused to tuck a stray coil of red hair back into her headdress. ‘Look around you: shadow is never still. Each shadow has two makers, the light and that which blocks the light. Both move. And if we leave this cave of dancing flames and restless novices, still we find no shadow without motion. The sun moves, Abeth moves, clouds come and go. To conceal yourself you must understand this motion. You must learn when to be still and when to move. In Shade I will teach you patience and stealth. We will study them until they become your religion and Sister Wheel marches down my stairs to call you heretics.

‘There may be times when your life depends on your ability to stay hidden, or when someone else’s life depends on the subtlety with which you insinuate yourself past a defence. If you take the red or the grey this will certainly be the case, but however you serve the Ancestor know that both patience and the talent for passing unnoticed will prove among the most valuable skills you’re taught as novices.’

The Poisoner stood dark before them framed by the golden and beaded light where it threaded the smallest of gaps around the curtains’ edges. ‘For today I want you to find a place to sit. Seek your patience as Mistress Path has taught you, and watch your older sisters as they hunt each other, or watch them as best you can. All hiding is nine parts seeing. So watch. See.’

‘Aren’t we going to learn shadow-weaving?’ Clera stood her ground as the others started to move off.

Nona stopped and turned back. ‘Sister Kettle says there was a Grey Sister who could set her own shadow loose and it would go off by itself and do … things …’ She trailed off, noting the Poisoner’s stillness. Up in the convent she was Sister Apple. In the cave she could be the Poisoner or Sister Apple depending on the moment, but in the dark it was difficult to think of her as anything but the Poisoner, and Nona knew that if she could see the nun’s face her eyes would have taken on that hard gleam that always reminded you just how dangerous she was.

‘I instruct patience and you answer with impatience?’ The Poisoner lifted her hands before her, gathering shadows like cobwebs as they rose. Darkness streamed between her open fingers. ‘We don’t weave shadow, we weave the light. How can a person cast no shadow? Only if they weave the light so that its path still leads to the spot it would have struck were they not there.’ All the while she spoke the darkness thickened in her hands. ‘To cut your shadow loose requires little skill, only the right knife. And those, fortunately, are far more rare than foolish novices are common. It is perhaps the most foolhardy and stupid of courses for a shadow-worker to take. A loosed shadow can be a vicious weapon but once free it’s apt to cease listening to its owner and is soon lost to the greater darkness.’

The Poisoner closed her hands into fists, squeezing the clotted night within them into an inky darkness that bled between her fingers. She squeezed harder, her lip curling in a snarl, then opened her fists once more. On each palm lay a small black pellet, as if a hole had been punched through her hands.

‘Take them.’ Mistress Shade glanced from Clera to Nona. ‘If you want to work shadows you must swallow the night. No?’

Clera came forward, uncertain, and took the small ball of darkness from the nun’s left hand, shadows misting up around her fingers. Nona took the other one, finding it cold and hard.

‘Swallow them.’

Nona put hers in her mouth. Immediately a vile bitterness spread across her tongue, crawling up the insides of her cheeks. The nausea already twisting in her gut became razored wire bound tight around her innards. The pain made her want to scream. She wanted nothing more than to spit the pill out, but she clamped her jaws shut and, retching, tried to gather enough saliva to swallow the thing. Her tongue felt as if it were shrivelling in her mouth. With a gurgle of disgust she managed to choke the darkness down. But Clera just spat a great black mess on the floor.

‘Ancestor!’ Clera spat and spat again. ‘That’s disgusting.’

‘So is spitting on my floor, Clera Ghomal.’ The Poisoner wrinkled her nose. ‘No matter. The truth is a bitter pill to swallow is it not, Nona?’

‘Yes, Mistress Shade,’ Nona answered through numb and wrinkled lips.

‘And Clera should have had a sufficient dose too.’ The Poisoner leaned in towards Clera. ‘Have you ever cheated in one of my exams, novice?’

‘No.’ Nona answered first though she had had no intention of doing so.

‘Yes,’ Clera said, her eyes widening. ‘I swapped crucible jars with Ara last month while she wasn’t—’ Clera clamped her hands over her mouth. ‘—looking. And in the antidotes test I—’ Clera kept talking behind her hands, her words muffled but audible.

‘You would do well to sew your lips together, novices. Truth is an axe. Without judgement it’s swung in great circles, wounding everybody,’ the Poisoner said. ‘Allow me to demonstrate. Nona, what question are you most worried that I’ll ask you?’

‘I’m afraid you’ll ask me what really happened to make my mother sell me.’ Nona struggled with her jaw as her tongue twitched in its eagerness to volunteer the whole story unasked.

A momentary frown crossed the Poisoner’s brow. She held her hand up. ‘I have a more interesting question: Who have you had a crush on, Nona?’

‘Arabella, and you, and Regol—’ Nona started running for the doorway, both hands over her mouth, cheeks burning, pursued by Sister Apple’s laughter, Clera just a fraction behind.

‘She poisoned us!’ Clera shouted after Nona as they climbed. ‘The bitch poisoned us.’

‘She did say she would make something new while we all trained for the forging.’ Nona couldn’t shut herself up, even as she ran. She glanced back, fearing pursuit, never more vulnerable.

Nona broke from the stairs out into the daylight, the sun’s red light fierce after shadow-filled cave. Clera barged past her, turned by the collision and hopping for balance. They ended up facing each other, ten yards apart in the courtyard, which was otherwise empty but for Sister Mop crossing from the laundry.

‘Why—’

‘Don’t! I’ll put this in your eye!’ Clera’s hand emerged from her habit clutching a throwing star – not the five-pointed design to be found in the Blade stores, but a smaller four-pointed make.

‘Where did you get that?’ Nona couldn’t help herself. Besides, Clera wouldn’t throw it at her.

Clera’s mouth spasmed, her lips writhed. ‘Partnis!’ She screamed the word.

‘Why—’

‘What—’

Both girls started questions, but knowing they would have to answer the other they broke off, spun around, and ran in opposite directions, Clera sprinting, Nona hobbled by the agony pulsing through her.

Nona vomited even before she reached the edge of the convent, but it was an hour before the bitterness left her mouth and she could once again tell a lie.