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Not far from us, a man dangled a giggling girl upside down by her ankle. He tossed her little body over the edge of the cliff, only for her to shift into her unkindness and fly straight back to him.
She reshaped to hang from his arm, her cheeks fire-red from cold and exhaustion alike. “Again, Papa! Again!”
“Enough now!” a woman, presumably her mother, scolded her mate while she tried to herd a flock of four fledglings with her arms where they hopped about the basket of foods they’d brought. “If she gets her plumes too sweaty, she’ll catch a fever in this cold.”
When the man planted his daughter firmly on the ground, she shifted once more, only for two of her birds to dash at the basket. Whatever food they stole before they flew off had her mother muttering curses.
I grinned at her rebellion. “How early can you shift?”
“My first shift happened when I was… five, I believe,” Malyr answered diligently, as he had done with all my other questions today—and there had been dozens of them. “I’d climbed the shelves in the larder to get to something. A jar of honey? I cannot recall. The boards came loose and I fell, but never hit the ground. What a mess that was.” He let out a little chuckle. “Unfortunately, I didn’t manage to shift again when our cook came after me with the wooden rolling pin, chasing me out of the kitchens.”
I laughed at that, picturing a little boy scrambling for footing on the flour-covered ground. “You were a troublemaker.”
He shook his head. “Between the three of us, I was the easy one. Up to a certain age and power.”
“Then who was?”
“My sister, Naya.” There was an ardent reverence in his voice I’d never heard on him before, followed by a smile so sincere and heart-melting, it eclipsed the one from earlier in the saddle. “At two days old, she shifted in her cradle. By the time her flight feathers came in around three or so, servants were instructed to keep the windows, doors, and flight holes shut at all times. Yet she still managed to get out somehow. I found her toddling through the weapons room, dragging anaerymelsword behind her shortly before the siege. No doubt she would have swung it one day.” His smile wavered, trembled, then died. “If only she’d gotten the chance to grow taller than its sheath.”
His words squeezed around my heart, the insight into his past, his grief, utterly unexpected. A glimpse into Malyr’s darkness, as if he was opening his shadows, allowing me to look deeper. To search for that glimmer I’d seen during our dance. Would it be wise to dare?
It was tempting.
And treacherous.
“You loved her very much.” I’d heard it in his reverent tone and saw it in the way his gaze had softened, sending a ripple of old guilt across my core. Whatever pain and grief he harbored in his chest, I’d contributed to a great deal. The least I could do was own up to it. “I should have said this much sooner, but… I regret the hand I played in Harlen’s death, Malyr. Deeply.”
A muscle twitched in his jaws the way it often did when he was reining in his temper—one of the few emotional indicators he ever offered—but he smoothed it away with a heavy swallow and set his eyes on me. “It was not you who killed him. It was me, with my fear of the uncontrolled chaos my shadows bring, the disobedient destruction.”
My ears pricked at the solemn austerity in his tone. “Disobedient?”
He pinched his lips together as if he regretted mentioning it. “We could have escaped the dungeons… if only I had unleashed them.”
How had he escaped?
The question stirred in my belly, but I didn’t dare ask, else it might destroy this precious moment of tranquil peace between us, fickle and strange as it may be. He’d been so different on our way here, charming and playful, distressingly kind in the way he’d urged me to break free of invisible bonds that had tied me down all my life. Why? Why was he being like this?
When it came to Malyr, I couldn’t help myself but expect his ulterior motive of breaking me behind every touch, every whisper, every hint of charm. But then again, Sebian’s charm had apparently harbored an ulterior motive just as wicked. But he’d hid it, whereas Malyr had only ever been open about his intent. Did that not make him safe in his honesty? His kindness trustworthy?
What if he was truly torn between his loyalty and whatever warm feelings he harbored for me, the daughter of his enemy, the killer of his brother? Such a thing couldn’t be painless to reconcile, nor easy. What if I’d judged him too harshly at thekjaer, fearing he was out to hurt me when, in reality, he himself was hurting—pulled into two directions until it threatened to rip him apart right down the middle?
Oh gods, my head ached with how my thoughts raced, colliding against one another as I struggled to suffocate the hope that could certainly only bring heartbreak. To keep my wits about me. Most of them seemed to have scattered in the wind when I’d cantered across that meadow…
“Come here.” Malyr rolled onto his side, propping one hand under his head in support while he patted the quilt with the other. “I want my wife closer.”
I lowered myself down to face him, resting my head on my arm only a few inches away from him, taking in his scent of lemongrass, letting his body heat seep under my skin. “I am not your wife yet.”
“You accepted my gift, the food I fed you, our dance beneath the stars, did you not?” He lifted his hand to cup my cheek, letting the warmth of his palm caress my wind-whipped skin. “Among Ravens, you are my mate now. The wedding is merely a symbolic act to pacify humans and their customs.”
His words lingered between us, easing away some of the doubt I’d harbored, the worry that he might break the betrothal, but not all. “I am not a Raven; therefore, I’m not truly your mate, and not yet your wife. That makes me nothing.”
Up and down went his thumb along my cheekbone in rhythmic motions. “This morning, after I spoke to Lady Cecilia, I ordered cartloads of grains to be moved from our southern stores to Tidestone, along with dried meats, pulses, and several hundred pounds of seed for use in the spring. Her father, Lord Taradur, and his forces will oversee their transport, ensuring their arrival at Tidestone after you free Marla with how wet the ground is, but certainly before our wedding. If you ask her, I am sure she will confirm.”
My lips parted on a little gasp as I stared at him wide-eyed. “You are sending… But… Why?”
“Reassurance.” His mouth shifted around as if he was chewing over whichever words would follow next. “Your fear I will break our betrothal once Marla has gone free is valid. Quite reasonable, even. Tidestone soldiers must have been at half-rations for how long now? Two months?”
More like five, but that would make me seem like a poor bargain struck all over again. “Three.”
