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Kindle Notes & Highlights
A single white raven sat quietly on the stone, unmoving, its wings closely pressed against its body, its pain-filled eyes only half open and closing more with every slow blink. Its dull, ratty, damaged feathers explained the smell of dirt, dust, and dander, but not why that bird was the size of a juvenile, at best. What was wrong with it? “It’s Galantia’s anoa, the bird in our unkindness that carries the gift.” I squatted, slowly reaching for the bird with both hands, the sick-looking thing entirely unbothered. “There isn’t a trace of magic from what I can sense, almost as if—”
“Where are your shadows?” Malyr laughed, the blood gurgling that accompanied the sound lending it a generous tone of impeding hysteria. He wiped the back of his hand over his mouth before he spat a blob of pink-tainted saliva through the wires of the cage. It landed in the straw, speckling the white feathers of Galantia’s bird. And there, right beside her, sat Malyr’s anoa… … preening her damaged feathers.
“It was meant for me?” “Yes.” His thumb brushed over my palm within the confines of our intertwined fingers. “One of the silken ribbons I used, I found many years ago. More than ten, to be precise, right here at the beach. It had slipped off the hair of the most beautiful girl I had ever seen.”
won’t let you hurt her,” I bit out, tears blurring my vision, my breaths nothing but hiccupping trembles as her tossing limbs lost their vigor. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry…” A guttural cry scratched my throat bloody as I collapsed to my knees, her legs listlessly sprawling out, her arms hanging motionlessly by her side. “I’m sorry for not getting you out…”
“There’s nothing left of me worth saving,” Lorn’s words resonated in my head. “Just promise me you will burn me so my ashes will drift forever on the wind.” “I gave you this promise,” I said and pressed the torch into the wood, the straw catching fire with a hiss. “You are truly free now. Fly, Lorn. Drift on the wind one final time.”
“All useful skills,” I said and turned toward Asker. “Find them a home near the Winged Keep. Supply them with provisions. I want a guard to remain close to them while we find a way to avoid animosity or violence against the humans currently living on Vhaeryan soil.”
Tjema dropped her gaze, shyly shoving the tip of her boot over the dark red carpet. “Hello.” A motion twitched in my periphery. David had tilted his head in much the same way Malyr had done it the day in the forest, his eyes wide, but not with shock at her appearance. “Hello.”
“Did I do it?” Sebian’s mouth opened and closed as if gasping for air. “Did I… did I save her?”
See, I’ve chosen to die a long time ago, back when I shared supper with Asker and Marla. That night, I wandered along the Tarred Road…
That alone made it the most precious thing ever received, but she gifted me something else in that moment that took my breath away: she shoved her naked little toes beneath my calf, and not even the leather of my breeches could keep their damn chill away. And I didn’t want it to.
“More mashed apples for me.” She shrugged, her voice lingering between a mix of white and black feathers, then she flew off with Sebian’s anoa in tow. I stared behind her unkindness, the black raven struggling to keep up with five white ones, and grinned at the sky. “I hope you saw that just now. I’m sure she pushed her toes beneath my calf a hundred times already while I was asleep. I’m glad that I was awake for it once, but brother, how did you handle it? Her toes are bitterly cold.”
Even if we were both broken, then put together, her cracks matched up perfectly with mine.
For a girl, Valora. A boy, Quaelin. Sounds familiar, doesn’t it? It’s what you would have called your first child, or so Asker told us, had it lived.
