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She swallowed a small moan.
My heart felt like it would leap out of my chest. “I refuse to put you in danger just because I can’t imagine existing without you, Runa.”
She shivered, tears glimmering. “Then don’t.”
“I can’t control my awakening—”
“Oh, there you are!” Niya and Hyath, Runa’s friends who’d commandeered Natim, marched toward us.
Runa stiffened.
I dropped my hand.
We both backed away a little as if we’d been caught doing something wrong.
The light-skinned girl, Hyath, carried the fawn, and Niya, the ebony beauty, rested her hand on Syn’s shoulders as the lynx prowled beside them. Zetas gave a quiet growl. “We’ve been looking for you. Where did you go?”
Our argument...if it was an argument...hovered brittle and bright. With a sharp inhale, Runa visibly shook off the sorrow I’d caused, and forced a smile. “We went to bathe.”
Niya glanced at both of us, not quite believing the strained innocence in Runa’s tone. For a heartbeat, she looked as if she’d ask what we’d been discussing, but then she nodded and changed the subject. “You missed the last rites for Kivva, but his pyre will burn until the morning.” She turned to face the black-smoking fire.
I stiffened, peering at the blazing fuel in the centre of the flames. No wonder it blazed so brightly. It chewed a corpse.
“Lida was disciplined too,” Hyath murmured, cuddling Natim. “Tral told everyone that she was the first to strike you, Darro.”
My gaze snapped to hers.
She added, “Lida confessed that she used her stone hurler to hit you in the head. She apologised and said she let fear overcome her senses. The wolves made her nervous, and she acted without cause.”
Runa kept her stare on the fire burning Kivva’s remains. “What did Tral do to punish her?”
Niya stroked Syn’s head, the lynx preening under her attention while Zetas watched closely. “He gave her three lashings. She took them bravely, and then Way took her to the healer’s lupic to be tended.” Her gaze narrowed on Kivva’s pyre. “What happened out there, anyway? Tral only told us that the wolves killed Kivva, and he’s accepted their justice.”
I stayed silent, studying the women.
Both Niya and Hyath didn’t seem distraught that Kivva was dead.
Runa shook her head slightly. “Kivva let hate cloud his vision. Salak—the alpha who gave Darro a home—only did what any loved one would do.”
I would’ve liked to witness Salak delivering justice. A wave of homesickness came over me. I missed the alpha. Had he known what I was when he’d saved me? Did he sense what monstrous magic lived within me?
My stomach clenched.
I glanced around the camp beyond. Most of the Nhil paid homage to Kivva. Some sat cross-legged as close as they could to the raging flames, while others stood in small groups, toasting the dense smoke with cups full of purple drink.
The fire did its best to outshine the sun, its crackle and snap gruesome with greed.
The chief and Fire Reader stood at the head of the camp by the leader’s lupic. The chiefess held her youngling while a female cried beside her, and Aktor stood tense close by. His hand latched around the stick he used to bear weight on his bitten leg. His face twisted into grief, making him look mortal, contrite, and young.
With loss ringing his mouth and sadness pooling in his eyes, he looked exactly as he was—a chief’s son who watched his childhood friend burn.
As if he felt my eyes on him, he looked up.
Shadows seeped out of me, making Niya and Hyath suck in a worried breath.
“Darro...” Runa touched my forearm with a gentle caress.
The sting of her touch and the solemn sadness that’d settled between us made my shadows retreat, vanishing back into my flesh. A few other Nhil watched me warily, reminding me all over again that I was the outsider here. I was the unwelcome one, not Aktor, not Kivva.
Me.
And for the first time since the beasts and elements tried to keep Runa and me apart, I saw myself as they did. Not as a male who loved Runa with every inch of his shadow-blackened spirit but as a demon that’d brought death and despair into their clan.
The pain in my head increased, feeding down my nape and tangling around my spine.
Solin suddenly glanced up from talking with Tral, his dark eyes cutting through the pyre and milling members of his clan. He looked at me, then at Runa. He said something to Tral and broke away from the two leaders and their offspring.
I didn’t move as Solin made his way toward us, his bare feet kicking up dust as he came to a stop a few steps away, his bison fur wrapped low on his hips, his staff with its lynx-skull and feathers fluttering in his grasp. Ash handprints were stencilled onto his chest as if someone had shoved their hands into the fire, then stamped their coal-sooted fingers onto his skin.
