Faded Shadow Novels & Stories

When she lifted her head— The golden version was gone. Shattered. Its light dissolved into dust. The shadow stood tall. Victorious. Maeve’s heart stopped. “No—” The shadow looked down at the kneeling Cade. “Now we can be honest,” it whispered. The real Cade slowly stood. The black veins stopped crawling. The gold faded. Both eyes turned dark. Not empty. Not monstrous. Just dark. He turned toward Maeve. And for a second— She couldn’t read him.

"Just order takeout. I've got something I need to take care of, so don't wait up." Then, he turned and left before I could say a word. That scene had me digging my nails into my palms, leaving deep, red marks. When I rummaged through the shelves for some microwave pasta meals, I stumbled across a well-hidden photo album, tucked in a cardboard sleeve. The moment I flipped it open, I froze. A handwritten caption was attached below each photo. "Peanut, one month old. "Peanut's first steps. "Peanut's first picnic."

Arlo and Clara sat on the floor, their faces sombre. Our usual warmth and laughter were replaced with an uncomfortable silence. No one knew how to lift the gloom that had settled over us. We all felt lost and alone, each struggling to cope with our sorrows. As the evening wore on, the sadness seemed to deepen, filling every corner of the room. I was a shadow of myself, even my shadow was hopeless. For a fact, I was far more dead than the Arwan in question. My eyes, red and puffy from the emotional release, felt heavy and tired.

Navigating the dark woods in the pouring rain was far from easy but Wade had every emotion in the fabric of his being keeping him going. Another source of light appeared at the far end. It was an abandoned cabin in the middle of nowhere. Wade had a feeling that he had arrived. He stopped the car in the dark and abandoned it. Other than the light inside, there was nothing about the cabin that gave a hint that it wasn't completely abandoned. Wade stepped out of the car and blended into the darkness. His body shivered the moment the cold drops of rain touched his skin. He wasn't equipped to deal with it, nor did he care about it. All he could think of was Cody’s loyalty, Freddie’s motor mouth a

Sienna adjusted the collar of her blouse as she stood in front of the small group of women seated in folding chairs. A banner hung behind her, the freshly printed letters reading: Lucia Foundation – Hope Beyond the Shadows. Natalia stood off to the side, clipboard in hand, giving her an encouraging nod. “You’ve got this,” Natalia whispered. Sienna smiled, then took a breath and stepped forward. “Thank you all for coming today. I know how hard it can be to walk into a room like this. I’ve been where you are. Caught in a world that told me silence was survival.”

As everyone cautiously lowered their hands, their eyes instinctively fixated on the spot where the explosion had erupted. A faint residue of white light lingered, enveloping Sean and the Shadow Guardian like a glowing eggshell. Mesmerized by the spectacle, everyone seemed to have forgotten the enemies around them. Gradually, the light began to fade, dissipating under the collective gaze of the onlookers. As the brilliance diminished, grasps of disbelief echoed through the air. Under the fading light, the Shadow Guardian appeared, his once-invisible presence now drenched in blood. Half of his pale, deathly face was exposed through his torn black robe.

“You’re drooling, Little River.” He teases lightly, and I flush. “Sorry” I murmur, but before he can say anything, something moves beside him and moves towards me as if coming in for a hug. I scream and jump back, only to take a close look… What in the Dr. Facilier shit, is this? Is that his shadow casually coming my way? “I-uh-I…” “Back.” He says, and the shadow seems to deflate sadly and then retreat into his actual shadow.

Enough to start building something new. That night, as I lay in bed beside Draven, I felt the shadow stir one last time. "You are making a mistake," it whispered. "Bringing more Shadowborn here. Creating targets. Building something that can be destroyed." "Maybe," I agreed. "But I would rather fail trying to build something beautiful than succeed at hiding forever." "Hope is a weakness." "No. Hope is a choice. And I chose it. Every single day." The shadow faded. Not gone—I suspected it would never be truly gone.

The shadow form began to dissolve from its center outward, the edges going first and then the mass, seven centuries of compressed dark coming apart in waves of fading cold. *"You — the contract — this isn't—"* "Over," Ava said. The form shattered. Not an explosion. Not the dramatic violence of something destroyed. Something more final — the quiet dissolution of a thing that had held itself together for a very long time through will and compression and had finally run out of both. It came apart the way old ice comes apart in spring water, piece by piece and then all at once, and the grey light of the shadow realm went with it, fading from cold silver to something warmer, and then to nothing a