Free A Plague of Shadows by Travis Simmons Page B

Pixies can change shape, fairies don’t normally do that. And fairies are typically smaller,” Leona told them.
    “I didn’t know you were so versed in the lore of other races,” Rorick said with a smile.
    Leona frowned at him, but then laughed.
    “Well then it’s settled, we call her Luna,” Abagail said.
    “And if she reveals herself to be a he ?” Rorick asked.
    “Then we will name it Sol!” Leona said.
    “What if I can’t change the name in my head, and I just keep calling Sol Luna?” Rorick wondered. “Do you think his pixie-ness will get mad at me?”
    “You better watch it, he might shrink you!” Abagail warned him.
    “That’s not very funny,” Leona said. “And yes, he could do something horrible to you, you better be careful!”
    “Duly noted,” Rorick said, nodding seriously, though he smiled at Abagail once Leona turned away. Leona started wandering away and toward Luna.
    “So what’s really on your mind?” Rorick asked.
    “Do I have to pick just one thing?” Abagail asked.
    “Let’s start with one, that’s less confusing.”
    “Right now I’m wondering where we are going. Father said Agaranth, and I thought we would just step into the mirror on our side, and out of the mirror in my Aunt’s house.”
    “It is a little disconcerting. I’m assuming this road leads to the other mirror? Can he direct the road you think?”
    “Who knows?” Abagail shrugged.
    “I’m sure we will make it to where we need to go,” Rorick said. He fell silent as his eyes drifted upwards again, and Abagail didn’t press conversation, there was also too many things on her mind at the moment to desire conversation any longer.
    Mainly what would happen if they never reached where they were going? What happened if the wyrd of the rainbow bridge brought the shadow out of her faster? What if they finally arrived at an exit, but it didn’t lead to her Aunt Mattelyn?
    Underlying all of that was the noise from beneath them. Abagail wasn’t sure if the noise was getting louder, or if she was listening for it, and therefore hearing it louder than what she had before. Once she’d heard the moans of the dead, calling up to her that putrid word she couldn’t not hear it. She shivered as the word crept into the recesses of her mind. It seemed as though she knew the word, though she’d never heard it before a couple days ago.
    And what about the sounds of the boat? Abagail asked herself. She remembered the light beneath the bridge and the way it instantly reminded her of the fiery boat that sailed around the edges of the image in the painting she’d seen in her father’s study.
    Eget Row was supposed to connect all of the Nine Worlds together, and that even included the realm of the damned, the boat they traveled around in for all eternity. If this was Eget Row, and it was increasingly harder for her to think it was anything but Eget Row, then it was very possible that had been the boat she’d seen.
    The sound of water drew her mind away from her ponderings, and Leona let out a startled yelp. Luna fluttered higher, away from her sister, and Abagail raced forward to see what her sister was seeing.
    There, in the distance, just this side of her vision she could see the spray of water cascading off of something and down into the nothingness. Their feet drew them onward faster than before, and before long they were at the edge of a waterfall that was coming from a lake before them. The waterfall spilled down into the blankness of space, though Abagail could hear it hitting a huge lake below, echoing up around them.
    Further still, she thought she could see a mass of land.
    “This is incredible,” Rorick said. “If this is Eget Row, then that lake must be Elivigar. The waters created at the beginning of time.”
    “What’s that?” Abagail asked, pointing off to their right where the light from above glittered off something green that had crested out of the water, and dove back in with a splash.
    “We