Chapter 17 – The Black Death Woods and Created Shadows

  Before anyone could respond, they were all, once again, in the house on Misyl Continent. Yana had used [Shadow Step].

  Yana put the emerald chrysalis in her room and called Amber to check on Devon. The Shadow Cat came into the room looking like she hadn’t slept in eons. Yana raised an eyebrow. “Is everything okay?”

  “Yes. I have just been worried about Devon.”

  Yana looked at her pitiful state and nodded. “But he is better?”

  “He is, Mistress.” She looked to Yana as seriously as she could. “Can he stay here a while, Mistress?”

  Yana nodded. “No problem. He can stay with us as long as he needs. He is not a Shadow-were like you.”

  “No, Mistress. His ability sent him down the line of a Shadow Vape.” Yana raised an eyebrow—Shadow Vapes were extremely rare, highly adaptable Familiars.

  “Okay. I am going to An, and then I will enter my Dune Domain.”

  Amber nodded and went back to her brother.

  An Continent is large. DD and Yana stood at the edge of the Black Death Woods—an odd, cold rolling chill clung to the ground, ensuring no life ever entered the tree line. Yana felt a shard in the center of this dark forest.

  The trees were black—bark and leaves—and no light could penetrate the canopy. Yana looked into the depth of the darkness, her eyes seeing within as if it were all illuminated by the brightest sun.

  ‘Should we go in, Mistress?’ DD’s voice was still like volcanic eruptions and dust storms co-mingling in a narrow vacuum as he spoke into Yana’s soul. She cringed at the feeling of his voice in her soul as she watched the telltale signs of sleeping shadow within the forest ahead.

  “I think the shadows here are created and rogue. There will be a bit of a fight.” She smiled; a fight meant new shadows.

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  DD nodded.

  “Starlight. I need your light. Add it to my shadow light.”

  Yana and DD entered the forest as one. Yana initiated [Shadow Light], and a dark illumination rose from the ground to light their path. Starlight seemed to bloom from Yana’s abdomen. The Starguide rose above them, and her brilliant illumination intertwined with the dark shadow light. The resulting combination was a sparkling, dark light that revealed all shadows but blinded none. The entire forest trembled under this unnatural clarity.

  “The memory shard is in the center. Do you sense it, Starlight?”

  “I do, Mistress. This way.”

  The right of the vast circle of sparkling dark light elongated and pointed to the northeast.

  They only took three steps when the created shadows around them attacked. Anyone could control and own them—if they were strong enough to do so. Yana smiled.

  The spell she was weaving flew forward just as she used [Shadow Control]. The weave took over shadow control and webbed out over the forest. The created shadows all seemed to freeze in the air as they were caught by the webbing.

  Jasmine flowed forth from Yana’s soul and—with DD—began stopping the few that escaped the webbing. The wind howled into the forest as the shadows charged and fell almost at the same time.

  DD’s [Void Rip] cut through shadow, and Jasmine’s [Shadow Embrace] forced shadows into the control web.

  The group moved quickly through the forest, the created shadows funneling into the webs, and Yana smiling as DD continually destroyed along the way.

  They all stopped as Starlight’s brilliance reflected brightly off of a large white tree. The darkness of [Shadow Light] was banished from the mystic tree’s presence as it stood in the center of a small clearing.

  Yana felt the memory shard calling to her, and she guided it up through root and trunk.

  The memory shard passed through the bark like a pebble though the surface of a stream.

  The black swirling portal of the Dune Domain opened and swallowed the memory shard and captured shadows.

  The second shard was hers. [Memory Shade #9 Acquired.]

  Another torrent of shadows came for them.

  “Starlight!”

  “Yes, Mistress.” Starlight blinked out as if a light switch had been flipped. [Shadow Light] darkened, enhancing the depth of the shadow around them. Yana’s black eyes glowed purple, and DD’s were like hot red orbs. He cast [Shadow Kill] and [Void Rip] in unison.

  Jasmine moved behind her Mistress and embraced her. Yana smiled sinisterly. Her shadow weapon formed into a great bow, and she knocked two bows onto it. The bows flew, and—with Jasmine’s [Shadow Embrace]—shadows seemed to be sucked to them on mass.

  Her bow quickly turned into her scythe, and she sliced through the shadows being drawn to her.

  Then—[Shadow Step]—Yana moved them all instantly to the dark, chilling underside of the continent for the second memory shard.