by Ivy Asher
“You can cloak,” he tells me, his tone shocked, and he runs a fingertip over a handful of lines on my back. “I’ve never seen anyone with these marks, but that’s definitely what they’re saying. Vinna has new ones too; the mixing must be creating new abilities,” he states contemplatively, still studying the lines like he’s triple-checking that he’s right.
“What does that mean?”
“That when you activate this sequence, you can blend into your surroundings to the point that no one can see you. I don’t know if that means invisibility all together or more of a chameleon effect?”
My eyes go wide, and I try to look down at the marks on my back, in shock. He touches my shoulder blades. “These are spears of some kind,” he tells me. “And these four bands are how you can slip through space.”
“Slip through space?” I question.
“Teleport...like you just did earlier when you disappeared for five hours. It looks like you can physically move from one place to another, like I can, but you’re also able to separate from your body and move around that way too. Sentinels call it projecting, and it’s very rare, although at this point with your Sept, that shouldn’t surprise me.”
He runs a finger down the thin bands of symbols on my forearm, and I turn to face him.
“These are shields. But interestingly, they shield you from outside attacks and also from yourself, you must have a weapon that takes a lot of skill to wield. Your runes will protect you from it.” His eyes drop to the rune garters high up on my thighs. “I’d guess it’s these. They look like symbols for long swords but different.” He shrugs as he crouches down so he can study them closer.
I’m feeling a little lab rat-y, with the way he’s looking at my runes. He vacillates between intrigued scientist and reverent worshipper, and I can sense he’s cataloging things while also wading through awe. I’m surprised by his astonished reaction altogether though. The guy can portal between worlds at will, but he thinks my runes are cool?
“These are your mate runes,” he identifies, pointing to my ring finger and the line of marks above my breast on the right side. “Treno has runes that allow him to control water. That’s what this line on your left side is. It’s not a natural elemental affinity, because it’s just for the one element, but it’s a strong mark.”
Wekun stands up and lifts my arm: between two of the thick bands of runes on my upper arm is another of Treno’s marks. It looks like something a kid’s Spirograph toy would make. I had one when I was little; I used to love putting my pen in the different pattern wheels and circling it around, making endless amounts of perfect spirals and intersecting shape patterns on paper. I could sit and do it for hours, and this mark is ovals and triangles that all cut through each other to make a cool symmetrical pattern.
“These are blades too, not swords though...something smaller.”
“And this?” I ask, tilting my head back and pointing at the circle under my chin.
Wekun smiles, satisfaction lighting his features. “That, Falon, is your Sept rune.”
“We can’t find her anywhere, are you sure that—” Treno’s question chokes off as he storms inside the tent and quickly takes me in. His eyes jump to Wekun’s close proximity to my very naked body, and his purple and blue gaze flashes with fury. “What in the rut do you think you’re doing?” he bellows, stomping over to place himself in front of me.
Wekun wisely slips himself to the opposite corner of the tent, his hands up and his face and body radiating innocence.
“I’ll rip your eyes from your head for looking at her and then choke you with your own severed hands,” Treno threatens.
I wince at the visual.
He takes a step in Wekun’s direction and then stops himself. Treno seems momentarily torn between wanting to rip him apart with his bare hands and protecting my naked body from Wekun’s unwelcome gaze. Treno has the same marks on him that Zeph does, that I do, and I realize that Wekun never answered my question about what went wrong when trying to sever the mate bonds.
“He wasn’t doing anything, Treno. He was just telling me what my runes mean. I asked him to,” I defend, reaching up to his massive shoulder and trying to pull him back.
He doesn’t budge.
“That’s not his place, not like that, and not with a mated female,” Treno argues, fury and self-righteousness wafting off him in waves.
I snort. “Then whose place is it? And we’re not mated. This is none of your business,” I counter.
He rounds on me, stepping forward until his tunic-covered chest is pressed against my naked one. “I could have told you what my marks mean, and the fact that you’re still wearing my runes, and I’m now adorned in yours, proves that we’re as mated as we ever were.”
I narrow my eyes and shake my head at him. “You had plenty of time to fill me in, Treno. You were too busy blaming me for your problems and your brother’s attempts to kill you.”
“Falon,” he implores, cutting me off and lifting his hands to gently cup my shoulders.
I shrug him off. “No. You have no right to come barging in here and accusing anyone of anything. Wekun is trying to help me, which is more than I can say of anyone else.”
“We’re mates, Falon, this will take time for all of us to adjust to, but you need to hear me on this,” he orders.
“I don’t need to do anything,” I snap, stepping back from him. “What we are is temporary, because I’m going to fix it. It will be better for all of us in the long run, you’ll see.”
“We are not temporary. It doesn’t work that way. You may not want to listen right now, and I’ll respect that, but you can’t shut me out forever.”
“Watch me,” I growl and reach for the dry shirt I hung on top of the screen. I pull it on over my head, needing the buffer between me and Treno to help fortify my indignation and my choices.
“You can leave now,” I tell him, giving him my back as I pick up a comb from the side table next to the bed.
I brush through my frizzed locks, the ends of my hair still wet from sitting in the bathing pool with Zeph. Concern and curiosity over where he is and if he’s okay trickles through me, but I turn the worry tap off and tell myself he’s not my problem. Well, hopefully not for much longer anyway.
Treno is still behind me, radiating irritation. I can sense that he wants to say something, but he holds back. Good. Because I don’t want to hear shit he has to say.
“This isn’t over,” he finally grumbles, and then he spins on his heel and storms out.
“Yeah...fuck you,” I mumble under my breath as I comb through more snarls.
I miss conditioner.
“Sorry about that,” I offer Wekun on a tired sigh.
I pull several furs off the bed and drag them over to the pillow nest that’s calling my name.
“You look shot as fuck right now, so I won’t push you tonight, but when you feel up to it, can we try to break the mate bonds for good?” I ask, my voice breaking slightly and forcing my vulnerability to leak out against my will.
“Falon...”
I stop what I’m doing and turn to Wekun. The way he just said my name is screaming that there’s going to be a bunch of words that pour out after it, and I’m not going to want to hear any of them.
“I tried,” he tells me somberly. “It appeared to work for two of your connections. I felt them break, just like I was expecting. But then with the third... When it came to Zeph...maybe it was your awakening that messed with the strength of the connection. Or in your case, it might be that severing things just isn’t possible. I couldn’t cut the cords between you, and not only that, when I tried, it almost drained me completely, and the next thing I knew, the two connections I had already severed were back and fortified as fuck. I’ve never seen anything like it. I understand why you’re making the choice that you are, but there’s nothing more that I can do at this point to help you break away from them.”
His words burrow into me, cutting me deeply as they go. De
solation pours into the wounds, and I collapse onto the cushions and stare at nothing as I try to think through a future where I’m stuck with mates like these. Choosing to sever our ties hurt, but I knew it was the right thing to do. Pigeon even knew it was what was best for us. And now, to know that I’m stuck? I look up at Wekun, devastated.
Sympathy fills his features, and he runs a hand over his shorn white hair like he’s trying to think of a way to make all of this better.
“There’s another Bond Weaver in Tierit— that’s where the Sentinels live in the other world. She’s ancient, so if anyone would know of any other ways, it would be her. I can check with her. Well, if her watchdog, Issak, will let me get near her that is. He doesn’t like me, which is an effect I can have on mates. He’s not mated to Getta, just indebted to her, I think, but still.” He shrugs his shoulders. “I honestly have no clue what his story is. He came over with her when she crossed…it’s an odd friendship.”
My mind prickles with recognition for some reason, and I examine his words, looking for the trigger.
“Anyway, let’s get you set up here and start working with your runes and what they can do. I’ll sneak off the first chance I get and see if I can get in to speak with her, find out if she knows any other ways.”
I nod in agreement at his plan, and exhaustion washes over me. I quickly get myself comfortable and pull the furs up around me. Wekun stumbles toward the bed and falls face first against the lumpy mattress. I swear he’s out before his body is done bouncing from the impact.
I release a weary breath and study the runes on my finger.
“What the fuck are we going to do, Pigeon?”
She pulls her head out from under her wing, swaying like she’s too tired to balance properly. She flashes me an image of scissors cutting string, an X, and me fucking each of our mates in turn.
I scoff. “Did you really just tell me, ‘If you can’t sever ’em, fuck ’em’?” I ask incredulously. “That is not the same thing as if you can’t beat ’em, join ’em,” I scold.
She just makes that chuffing noise she does when she’s amused, and her face disappears back under her wing.
I watch her for a moment as her breaths grow heavy and steady with sleep. One minute she hates them, the next she’s ready to forgive and move on. I can’t even keep track anymore of what she wants or doesn’t want.
They say women are hard to figure out, well, they sure as fuck never met a female gryphon. Talk about taking confusing to a whole other level.
I try to list what still needs to be done, while my body winds down and prepares for rest. I realize that, as difficult as everything has been already, I’m pretty sure that the hard part of all of this has just begun.
I sigh and drift off to Pigeon’s gryphon-porn-filled dreams flooding my mind.
Fickle fucking buffalo wing.
13
“The last thing any of us should be doing is sticking our noses into Gryphon business. Yes, we are obligated to help fix what our people did to them, but even if we have the best of intentions, they’re not going to see it that way,” a female Ouphe from the crowd comments, and everyone gathered in the center of the camp starts talking all at once again.
Several of them raise their hands to be called on so they too can voice their opinions. The middle-aged salt-and-pepper-haired lady who seems to be running the show here calls on a man.
“Even if we wanted to help, how are we supposed to identify which gryphons are good and which are bad?” he asks, and sounds of agreement from people around him rise up into the air.
I open my mouth to say that Lazza really is the only threat that needs to be dealt with, but if I can’t figure out how to break the Vow, one side will be fighting the other side, and this guy has a point.
“We could provide aid and healing to those who are willing to take it from us, but we can’t forget that many of the gryphons on both sides of this fight will happily kill us on sight. I don’t know whether we’d be of much help or more of a distraction,” a younger, pretty female calls out.
I release a deep sigh. I was hoping the Ouphe would be willing to help us, fight with the gryphons, and shore up the numbers against Lazza’s army, but I’m realizing that my hope was really fucking short-sided. I can see the willingness in many of the Ouphe’s faces, to help in what ways they can, but they make really good points about the fact that many of the gryphons who will be there won’t take kindly to their presence. There’s still a lot of work to be done on the front of Ouphe and Gryphon relations and peace treaties.
Wekun and I are leaning off to the side against a cart and watching the Ouphe have their say about what’s going on in the world between the Avowed and the Hidden. There are some gryphons spotted around the perimeter, including Ryn, Zeph, and Treno, but they’re keeping to the outskirts and staying quiet.
“They’ve hunted us to the brink of extinction; they can’t come to us for help now,” a man growls, and low murmurs of assent surround him. “No one came to our aid when we were forced to escape to this putrid wasteland and eke out our survival. Where was Awlon the Dark and his progeny then?”
The man spits on the ground, and I feel far too many eyes turn to me. Hostility ripples out toward where I’m perched, and it crawls up my skin in warning.
“No one person or bloodline was to blame for what happened,” Wekun interjects. “The Ouphe as a collective voted on the Vow and the Accords, and they passed with favor. We are all accountable for what our ancestors did,” he volleys into the crowd. “We must all work to do better and be better for our future generations.”
“Our future generations?” the man argues, fixing his angry gaze on Wekun. “You only pop in when you’re here to pluck strings in a favor of a future only your kind can see. You ran for the gates and a new world, abandoning the rest of us to suffer and get picked off. Don’t talk as though we’re one people when you know that’s not true.”
Wekun shakes his head, like he’s disappointed. “Are we back to that again?” he asks, scanning the crowd like his question is for all of them. “Some Sentinels chose to leave, others chose to remain, what happened after was the consequence of that choice, on both sides. How is one side held accountable for the tragedies the other suffered? Tierit and its people have also known hardship and struggle; we’re hidden from the world there, just as you are here. Blaming others for our problems serves no purpose,” he points out, and the gathered crowd grows quiet.
“I think we’ve had our say,” the leader of the camp announces, her eyes fixed on me and Wekun. “I don’t think we are in the position to truly help. You should speak to Cree and the Gryphons, they would be in a better position to help,” she tells me, and I nod.
“Thank you for trying at least,” I offer, but she just looks at me weird. I remember that the Ouphe and Gryphons aren’t big on manners and just smile at her and wait for the crowd to disperse enough for Wekun and me to take off so we can go speak to the gryphons.
“Is Cree the female with the cool mohawk and scars?” I ask Wekun as we’re waiting.
“The very one, although you might not want to bring up the scars.”
“Oh, is she sensitive?”
“No, but it will start her down battle memory lane, and we could be there for weeks as she tells stories and forces us to drink.”
I chuckle and shake my head. “Yeah, I’m not going to lie, I could be down for that.”
“You’re just trying to get out of training,” Wekun accuses, and I shrug, not even trying to deny it.
“I still don’t understand why I can’t just work on things on my own,” I grumble. “I’m not saying that they can’t get rune lessons too, but it doesn’t have to be together,” I point out.
Wekun went and organized a little group training with me and the mates I apparently can’t escape. I was glad to hear that Zeph was doing better and working to embrace what happened and find a way to make it work for him, but I’d prefer they did it far away from me.
“Get over it, Falon, it’s time to Sentinel up and do what needs to be done,” he announces, slapping me on the ass like I’m some obstinate horse that needs to get a move on. Three growls simultaneously fill the air around us, and I roll my eyes and rub my ass cheek.
“I should let them take you out,” I threaten Wekun, who simply glares at me, unamused by the joke.
“Then you’d really be stuck with them,” he points out as he takes the lead through the remaining crowd in the direction of the gryphon camp.
“When are you going to go have your little chat with the other Bond Weaver in Tierit anyway?”
“When you are good enough with your runes that I can leave for a couple days,” he calls back over his shoulder.
Well, crap then. Guess it’s time to Sentinel up…whatever that means.
We make our way to the gryphon camp quietly. I’m not going to admit this to Wekun, but I’m actually excited to start working with my runes. I’m just not overeager to be working on them with an audience of inconsiderate mates, who all just so happen to know that I tried to undo our bonds. So far, I’m not sure what to make of how they feel about that. Treno seemed annoyed, Zeph seemed surprised, and I don’t know what Ryn’s feelings are on the matter, I haven’t seen him yet.
I sort of feel like I’ve been caught doing something I’m not supposed to, but that doesn’t quite capture the awkwardness I feel today facing them. If it had worked, it would be a different story. I could just keep it moving and ignore them. But it backfired and somehow connected us even more, and that’s just plain fucking awkward for me. I feel like fate is laughing its ass off right now, and I’m just supposed to go about my day like I can’t hear it cackling and calling me out.
