Shades in Shadow by N. K. Jemisin Read Free Book Online Page B

which is inherently chaotic. But when Mother stops talking, her hands shaking a little, Glee takes those hands in her own. Her mother is blind; she needs to know things through touch and sound. And Glee wants her mother to know this:
    “I’ll come back.” Whether she finds her father or not; whether she chooses to bring him home or not. (She has not decided yet if that is a good idea, even if it’s possible.) “I will come back.”
    “I believe that,” Mother says. “You’ve said it, so of course I do. But when ?”
    That question Glee cannot answer, either. So unsatisfying, these little mortal uncertainties. Mother sighs a little, but then she walks Glee to the door.
    Glee goes east, following the sunrise. This is only partially symbolic. The town in which she was conceived and raised is situated at the northwestern edge of the continent; on foot, the only ways to go are east or south. He probably went in the direction of the sunrise, in the same way that a right-handed person is likely to have turned right. And she is aided by the fact that he is who he is, no matter how human he appears to be. He has a presence. Even nineteen years later, when she goes to the places a penniless traveler would visit and asks after a man with her skin and white hair and a face that, according to her mother, would rather break than smile, people laugh—but remember. He leaves a deep impression on the universe, even now, with his fragile-fleshed feet.
    She also discovers, as she travels through the sprawling north-Senm city of Esh Passe, that she can perceive magic. Her mother’s paintings have always felt of strangeness, but Glee can see those with her eyes. When she closes her eyes, however, she can see footprints on the Esh Passe streets etched in light and colors against the dark of her inner lids. She can see the air tinted in the wake of someone’s passing and feel those other presences around her like bright, glowing lamps shining against her skin. These are the marks of the godlings of Esh Passe, and it is strange to feel so much closer to her mother now, when she has never been farther.
    Beyond the magical lights of the godlings, Esh Passe is full of strings of colored lanterns and torches on posts and bonfires, as well as occasional spats of fireworks against the night sky. It’s hot during the day, so people here live for the night, and perhaps it is a dollop of Nahadoth’s nature that makes the city as wild as it is. Some of this fascinates Glee simply because it is different from the quiet life she’s led up to now, so she spends a few nights sitting in noisy clubs, nursing a drink and people-watching and politely refusing those who proposition her. Only once does she deign to dance, and instantly she realizes the danger and stops. Art is magic, she understands at last, and she is too much her parents’ child—artist mother, god father—to blend the two without disaster. Regretfully, she apologizes to her dance partner and leaves the club, never to return again.
    This is the moment when Glee first begins to understand what it means to be what she is. It has been a purely intellectual thing up to this point. Now it is an existential actuality: she can observe mortal lives and perhaps even share in them to some degree, for she is mortal herself. But she will, must, always stand apart no matter how hard she tries to fit in, because she is something else, too.
    It should not need to be said that this does not trouble her much. It is not loneliness that she feels. She has purpose, which keeps the loneliness at bay; that’s how gods cope, after all. She isn’t a god either, though, and she’s aware that at some point purpose may not be enough for her.
    It becomes another answer to the question of why she means to find Itempas. She’ll ask him about it, when she finds him.
    Glee grows three years older in the time that it takes to find her father. She has to stop sometimes and work to earn money. (Stealing, or