After a moment, he went on. “I don’t want the crown. And the game is rigged so that I’ll certainly never wear it. But yes – if he dies, I am the last of the blood of House Swan.”
“You didn’t manifest a swan,” I said. We’d reached the alley on the other side and I paused there, letting us catch our breath and casting worried glances in every direction. The alley appeared empty – but a lot of things appeared other than they really were.
“I didn’t,” he said, seeming amused at my comment.
I reached for his sleeve and found the tiny pocket, slipping a toothpick out of it and bringing it to his lips. They were surprisingly soft as he accepted the toothpick from my fingers and for just a moment, I wondered what it would be like to kiss him. I leaned in close, imagining it, emboldened by his blindfold. But what would he think of me if I kissed him when I’d just been married to his brother? Something in my heart lurched at the thought and I drew back again. Besides, it wasn’t right to take advantage of him when he was my captive.
“Do it,” he whispered, his breath so close I could feel it.
“Do what?” I asked, my heart beating so fast I couldn’t seem to catch my breath.
He only smirked in response and it was all I could do not to snatch that toothpick and kiss him. That would show him and his smirks!
“Let’s move,” I whispered, drawing him down the alley. He followed me with easy grace, despite his captivity.
I steered him carefully around the obstacles in the alley – items people had dropped while fleeing violence, objects that might have been carried as weapons, spatters of blood and other fluids that I didn’t want to identify. My arm wrapped around him as we fled. He needed more guidance than I would have expected with his hands bound and his eyes covered and that required more touch. But there was something about wrapping my arm around his warm body that made me feel vulnerable – even more vulnerable than the screams and cries in the street did. It was fully dark now, and the fires in the distance blazed, casting the city into a haze of flickering orange light.
Maybe they were trying to burn out the evil here, just like we tried to burn it out of the Forbidding. I suspected it was not the evil who were suffering tonight. The thought made my heart hurt. This was all wrong – all of it. And someone should have led these people to a better way before they exploded like this.
Osprey stumbled. I’d failed to notice a broken sign in his path.
“I’m sorry,” I gasped. “I’m so sorry for all of this.”
“I’m not sorry that you’re trying to save me.”
The outer city wall was before us now, and I sighed in relief. I just had to follow it to a gate. Once we were outside the city, I could ease up on our pace.
I followed the stone wall, nervous as the sounds and cries grew louder with every step we took. We were approaching a bright flare ahead.
“Are we almost at the gate?” Osprey whispered. He was chewing his toothpick nervously.
“I think it’s close,” I replied, peering down the quiet street to the source of the noise and light. There wouldn’t be a way to avoid people if I wanted to get out.
“The gates will be closed. It’s standard protocol for an uprising,” Osprey said calmly. “I’d offer Os to fly over the wall, but we both know that if I get up on him, my orders will force me to take you back to Le Majest. I won’t have a choice. So, you’ll have to do this without my help. The Claws have a codeword. It will get you out, but if you use it, it will be reported to Le Majest and if he ever finds you, he will certainly punish you.”
“As if marrying him is not punishment enough.”
He snorted a laugh. “If you use it, it tells them that you’re considered an exception to their orders. It can get you through the gate. It’s a phrase. You tell the Claws, ‘this trap has a beating heart.’ Can you remember that?”
“Easily. Juste certainly likes creepy comments. But there’s a flaw in your thinking. They’re going to notice that you’re my prisoner.”
“Yes,” he agreed, a grimace on his face as he hunched over his chest. The bee must be at work. Its power was in healing magic. And while it would help, it likely hurt, too.
“Then it’s not much of a plan.”
“Unless you go without me,” he gasped. “And you should. I’m only going to slow you down. If you leave me tied up in the cellar of one of these buildings, it will be days before they find me. It will give you a head start.”
I huffed. “No. I’m not leaving you behind, Osprey. You’re as much a prisoner of the crown prince as I am. You’re as pursued and trapped and tied as me, and I won’t leave you to your fate.”
“Just promise that you’ll leave me if I become a liability.” He sounded desperate.
“No!” The thought of it made something ache inside.
“Aella.”
My heart froze in my chest. He never said my actual name. On his tongue, it sounded like a caress. I held my breath until he spoke again.
“Can you do one more thing for me? One last request.”
“Anything,” I gasped, leaning in close.
“I can hear that we’re getting close to the action. When we get there, we might not survive what comes next. There’s little I can do to thank you for what you’ve done for me.”
“I’ve done nothing but complicate your life.”
“And I don’t have the right to ask – and yet, I think I will.” He turned his head and spat his toothpick out. His next words were rough, almost harsh. “Come closer.”
My heart sped as I moved from beside him to stand in front of him.
“Closer, still.”
I stepped closer again, so that I could have embraced him.
“Just once.” It sounded like a plea. “Just once before I die, grant me this one gift.” He paused, and I watched his dark throat bob as he swallowed down whatever was making him nervous. “Let me taste your lips. Burn yourself across my memory one last time.”
I froze. Had he really said that? I could feel the heat rushing up to my cheeks.
“I ... not me.” I stumbled over my words, my tongue felt too thick to speak. The idea of him still offering this rattled me. Didn’t he see me as tainted by my marriage to his brother? Even if it was against my will, I felt that way. “You deserve better. You should choose better.”
“I choose you.”
“I’m hurting you. I’m wrecking you. With every choice that I make. Even the ones made for me,” I said, feeling oddly vulnerable in this moment.
“I still want you,” he said, his certainty fading as he tagged on another thought. “Unless you don’t want me.”
He leaned forward, slowly, his tied hands finding one of mine, his forehead slowly coming to rest against mine.
“It’s okay that you don’t, House Apidae,” he said huskily. “It’s your choice to make, too.”
My heart was so loud that I couldn’t even hear the fighting in the distance. I tried to take a breath, but it was a faint, unstable thing.
Before he could say more, I caught his face between my hands and pulled his mouth down. And then his lips had found mine and he kissed me so gently, it was like a hummingbird kissing a flower. I gasped and one of his sweet lips slipped between mine and I couldn’t think. It felt ... like blasphemy ... for me to kiss him. I wasn’t worthy of it. I didn’t have the right. And yet I didn’t want it to ever stop.
My hands reached up to tangle through his short hair and my breath came back gusting in startled bursts. He made a pleased sound into my lips and then kissed me again, deeper, more roughly as if he could show me with just his kiss everything he’d do if his hands weren’t tied and his eyes not bound with that handkerchief. His tongue found mine and my thoughts swirled and tangled like they were part of the Forbidding. I couldn’t catch them, couldn’t keep them in place, could only add my own passion and desperate longing to his until one was so bound up in the other that they were one shared hope.
And it hurt, hurt, hurt because
I knew it couldn’t last, that we were stealing something we couldn’t own, asking for something the skies would never give. And I didn’t care that it hurt. I wanted to keep hurting like this forever.
I kissed him like I hoped it would and felt the urgent roughness of his kiss responding to it.
I hadn’t realized that I’d manifested my bees until I opened my eyes to their golden glow. The corners of Osprey’s lips curled up and his dimple flashed in his cheek.
“You’re the sweetness of honey and the sharpness of the sting all rolled into one, House Apidae.”
Oh, sweet skies they’d really stung him! I could see the mark on his lip where it was swelling up.
“I’m so sorry,” I gasped, putting my hand over my own swollen lips.
“I’m not.”
He kissed me again, stung lip and all, taking his time as if he could make one kiss last a thousand year. Then he rested his forehead against mine.
“Just like honey.” He sighed. “If I had to bet on anyone getting what they wanted, I’d bet on you, House Apidae, but even if your plan fails and I perish, I’ll never be sorry that we stole these kisses.”
“I don’t want to lose you,” I gasped, startled by the confession.
“I don’t think you can,” he whispered, his breath rough and lips still parted.
I would have kissed him again, but the sound of marching and a harsh order caught my attention. I froze, listening. They were on the other end of the street from the glowing gate, marching this way.
“We need to go, now!” I said, urgently wrapping my arm around him and pushing him forward. My bees vanished immediately except for one that spun round and round my head. I cursed and it finally left me.
The moment that it did, I realized that something was wrong. Osprey stumbled, his head lolling to one side.
“Osprey?” I hissed, still trying to pull him along.
Pain flared through my chest so suddenly that I stumbled from the agony of it. With the pain came a pull, drawing me back toward the center of the city.
Chapter Twenty-Four
“Keep trying you Forbidding-taken dust-kisser!” I snarled. I’d had no idea the feather could do that, but I knew I didn’t dare follow its pull. My new husband only wanted one thing for me – torture. And what he wanted for the precious boy who’d just kissed me was death. He could go kiss dust.
There was a shout from down the street toward the gate and a dark mass of silhouettes stepped into the street between me and the gate.
“Down there! I hear them marching!” I heard a rough voice cry.
“Back, you Imperial fools! Back, or we’ll spray you with fire and soak you in death. This land is ours and we’ll live free or die to make it so!”
There was a roar of agreement around the voice and I agreed with the sentiment, too, but now I was stuck between a crowd of rebels and the marching feet of Claws. On the Claw side, I heard the answering order sound.
“Prepare arms! Ready the line!”
The sound of boots shuffling told me it was being obeyed.
I cursed, looking for a way out. The alley we’d used to come to this street was past the line of Claws and I didn’t see any other alleys. There were doors lining the street on both sides – doors of darkened homes. Should I try one of them?
“Osprey?” I whispered. All his weight was leaning on me.
He moaned unintelligibly. I shot a glance at him and saw the golden feather flaring in his breast. My breath quickened. The bee was doing its job – and the timing couldn’t be worse. He would need me to protect him while he went through this. He couldn’t fend for himself like this, not even if I hadn’t trussed him up like a goat.
I turned back to the task at hand, my belly flipping nervously. I wasn’t sure if I could make it as far as the closest door. And what if it didn’t open when I made it there?
But we were stuck between two opposing forces. What other option was there?
I struggled toward the door with Osprey moaning in my arms. He was conscious enough to move his feet – which I was grateful for. I wouldn’t be able to carry him – but he was harder to move with his hands tied. Frustrated, I tugged at the belt, untying it and slinging it around him, cinching it around both of us so that I’d have at least that advantage in trying to keep him close. After a moment, I tugged off the blindfold, too. He didn’t need it right now and it looked suspicious. His eyes were shut, mouth hanging open.
I cursed. But at least it was less obvious this way that he was my prisoner.
It took all my strength to half-drag him to the nearest door. I tugged on the handle, cursing wildly when it was locked, just as I’d feared.
My palms were sweating, body aching from exertion, chest screaming to me to follow the pull. I gritted my teeth and tried to think.
The Claws were so close that I could see the embroidery on their coats, bright in the dancing light that swathed the city. Smoke and ash swirled in the air around them and around the dark shadows coming from the other direction. I was stuck. Trapped. I could cry out to tell them to stop ... but then what? None of them would listen. I needed a plan and I was coming up with nothing.
Panicked, I wrapped my arms around Osprey as his head fell to my shoulder. I had to think. I had to get him out of here.
Something glowing and bright – a bottle, I thought – soared through the air, striking the ground where we’d been standing just moments ago. A crash sounded and then fire flared, rushing across the pool of fluid where the bottle had crashed. It shot up in a blazing wall between the Claws and the revolutionaries, lighting the entire street in a single flash.
Everyone was closer than I’d realized, their faces bright in the light of the flash – hundreds of Claws on one side and dozens of rebels on the other. Their eyes all swiveled to me and I had to clamp my jaw tight to keep from squeaking in sudden fear.
The light from the flames danced along sword blades on either side. And I didn’t know which of them to turn to. On the one hand, the rebels shared my ideals, but the way they were sacking the city wasn’t what I wanted and they weren’t going to win. On the other hand, the Claws would likely let me live if I told them who I was, only to drag me to Juste as his reluctant bride.
We all stood frozen for one heartbeat.
“That’s Wing Osprey,” the Claw officer said in shock, pointing at Osprey in my arms. He was a hulking man whose Claw coat barely stretched over thick muscles. “What have you done to him, girl?”
At the same time, one of the rebels spoke. She was a woman in her mid-forties and the cleaver in her hand was already streaked with gore.
“Choose wisely, girl. You’re either with them or with us. If you’re with us, slit the throat of that Wing and step over to this side.”
“And if I’m not with you?” I shot back.
“Then we’ll hack you down.” Her voice was ice cold. “With no mercy.”
“Then you’re no better than the Empire of War and Wings.”
“Justice is worth the price of a few soft girls who can’t choose a side,” she snarled.
“Touch the Wing and it will be the last thing you do,” the Claw officer said, as if he was just waiting for his chance to speak.
I gripped Osprey with both hands, my heart aching with frustration. These rebels should be more than this. The rebellion should be more than just ousting one enemy to make way for a worse regime. It should be about protecting the weak, about restoring justice and freedom.
Frustration filled me and with it, my bees began to rise within me. I had something to say before I blew my plan to pieces with all this pent-up rage.
“I’d hoped to side with you,” I told the rebels, “But here you are threatening people you don’t even know.”
“What do you know, you Imperial dog?”
“I know that there has to be a better way and I know that I’ll find it, even if I have to wade through the bile of fools to seize wisdom.”
“Is that a no?” she said, tilting
her head to the side. “Are you saying that you aren’t on our side?”
She took a step forward, the flames still dancing between her and the Claws, but leaving a clear path to me. The Claw closest to me nodded sharply at a gesture from his officer, and took a step closer, too.
“Are you saying that you aren’t with us?” he challenged me.
The buzzing was so powerful that I barely heard him. It filled every part of me, making the skin in my fingers and face tingle with the bees need to be released.
“I’m not with any of you,” I said boldly, “but very soon, you’ll have to decide if you’re on my side. A war is coming – a bigger one than this small skirmish – and anyone who loves freedom will have to stand up and defend it.”
“Who are you to make such bold claims?” The woman facing me took another step, matched by the Claw on the other side of the flames. She was eyeing him the same way he was eyeing her – both assessing whether it was better to grab me or their clear opponent. She tossed her cleaver to her other hand – a clear threat. One more step and her reach would be enough to slash my throat with that thing – or worse, Osprey’s. I didn’t dare give her the opportunity.
I relaxed and let go of the hold I had on my bees. They rushed from my hands in a glowing cloud, racing to spread through the crowd on either side of the flames while others spiraled around me like a living shield of insects. Their buzz was so loud I could hardly hear my own voice as I shouted.
“I am Aella of House Apidae, and I’m here for one reason – to manifest a new freedom in the Far Stones. Ignore me at your own peril.”
Combatants on both sides fought my swarm of bees, but bees are hard to hit, hard to hurt.
And I was out of brave words. Both sides might be distracted by my bees for now, but it wouldn’t be for long. I needed to get out of there, and I needed to bring Osprey with me.
My mind was so frantic that I couldn’t formulate a plan. I just needed out!
There had to be a way out.
More bees poured from my mouth, my nose, and even my eyes, swirling round and round me until they blocked my sight entirely. The strangest sensation filled me, as if my feet were lifting from the ground. I clung to Osprey, one arm around his back one arm cradling his head as it lolled on my shoulder. He wasn’t moaning anymore, and the silence had me worried.
Wing Magic Page 16
