33
Defenseless, Love scrambles backward, snow pelting her face while she gapes in terror at her bloody hand. Being matchless—and cut without knowing which sort of magic the arrow has delivered—is a plague. Likely, she’s about to go mad with unrequited love. It must be happening now because she’s wheezing and crawling across the woods in haste, as if to escape the wound.
The snow hurts, producing the bumps in Love’s skin, her body trembling like a leaf. These are human responses to temperature. She’s… cold.
Her mouth opens, but she cannot make another sound. This time, someone else bellows. It’s a voice she cherishes, the octave howling through the trees, roaring her name. It gets louder, wrestling its way through the storm. Not only is she on the verge of losing her faculties, but Andrew’s searching for her, though he’s supposed to be ardently consumed by his intended.
Fuck. Must he insist on being unpredictable?
Love retreats from the voice. He cannot catch her, cannot see her like this. She attempts to climb a tree, but she loses her grip, her knees scraping against the bark. Torn skin. Beads of crimson. Nature and the elements should not assault her this easily.
The cold bares its teeth and sinks into Love’s flesh. She tucks herself behind the tree and presses a fist to her mouth because she’s frozen. Everywhere is frozen. How do mortals endure this?
“Love!”
Andrew shouldn’t be out here. He knows she can take care of herself.
“Love!”
The human should be lovestruck. His memory of her should be gone.
“Love…”
Her name thins and gets swallowed by the landscape. He could be hurt. He could be freezing to death. Condemnation, the man is an idiot!
She imagines a place where the sun shines down on them, where they’re nothing more than lovers in a safe haven, clasping and fucking the hours away. Then she moves, scurrying on all fours, hunting, shivering.
Andrew’s form materializes through sheets of frost. His body is sprawled on the ground, devoid of his coat as though he’d bolted from the store, having given no thought to the climate. However, he’d brought his archery, the longbow and arrows scattered around him like detritus.
Most distressing of all, his face has lost all trace of color—of life.
“No!” she yells, scrambling to him, shaking his arms, and smearing her blood on his neck. “Andrew!”
No response. Sense is abandoning her, and she’s quivering and bleeding, and she wants to bury her face in the crook of his neck and stay there, waiting for the answering touch that won’t come.
Love grunts with effort, straining to loop his arm over her shoulder and carry him. His muscled form is an anvil tugging her down each time, and there’s the icy wind, and her wound is leaking, and madness is looming.
They collapse. Dazed, she slumps atop his chest. The snow begins to feel good, blunting Love of sensation, alleviating the gash in her hand. The trees spin overhead, and the needle branches scratch against the wind like gnarled fingers.
The world is so white. Meanwhile, there’s blue in the distance, but not a shape or object. It’s just the shade itself, akin to the sky. Love perceives a blot of gold too, like the sun. She’s missed them both, but now they’re here with her. If she can reach them, she’ll be fine. Perhaps she can drag Andrew to the sun, and then they can slumber peacefully or fuck languidly without a care in the world.
Movement in the distance. A filmy silhouette approaches, kneels, and sharpens into focus.
Love raises her head. It cannot be. The comfortable snow is pushing her to the brink, compromising her vision. That must be the case, because Anger wouldn’t dare be here right now. He’s afraid of snowstorms.
The god cocks his head, despair cutting into his chiseled face and his earring hoops flashing like scythes. He thrusts out the words with a shudder. “Do not hate me for this.”
Hate him for what? He’s here now. He will drag Andrew and Love to safety, and her mortal will live, and everyone will live, because she has completed her task.
Anger tilts his gaze toward the sky. Above, a dot of light pierces through the storm. It’s a star, and the sight leaches the exhaustion from Love. He’s sent a message.
To whom?
To them. Five figures march forward in unison, their carved, polished features impervious to the elements. Two gods and three goddesses. Once, they’d been archers like her. Yet they have since renamed themselves, their elevated monikers inspired by timeless things that presently escape Love’s mind as she struggles to focus beyond their ancient eyes.
The Fate Court. The five divinities who rule over The Dark Fates, much as titans do in fiction.
One dark goddess draped in an iridescent gown, the astral-woven textile whipping around her ankles and shoulders, the material as luminous as a galaxy. Another goddess with amethyst hair, as well as voluptuous curves like Wonder. And a third goddess of hypnotic, epicene beauty, her pale skin swathed in pearly lace, like starlight itself.
A god with a hawkish nose and two braids hanging down to his waist like ropes. And a cloaked god with slanted brows that trap him in an eternal frown.
These are the first faces she’d beheld from her crib. Growing up, Love had spent hours emulating their walk and the richness of their voices. Long ago, they used to be her saviors.
Today, Love must be her own savior, for they are not here to humor her. The rulers spread out and form a crescent around her and Andrew. Amid a tempest, their posture is flawless, their presence enhanced by the flurries. It does not matter that the blizzard had started before the deities arrived. The Court has sparked a craze in winter, and the storm is thrashing now, welcoming her rulers but killing her mortal.
Or rather, that is untrue. Nature has no superiors. Love’s disoriented mind is embellishing.
Ice. Spasms. Agony.
Love gathers Andrew against her chest in a feeble attempt to keep his body warm. She hunches, her cascading hair shielding his visage while she turns to Anger in desperation.
The archer gives her a terrible, mournful look. He rises and stalks backward—back toward her crew. Envy, Sorrow, and Wonder. They’re standing behind The Fate Court, watching with slack jaws.
Yet they shouldn’t be here. Love has done what she was supposed to.
She bundles her wounded hand into a fist to staunch the blood. “W-what d-do you want-t-t?”
In a synchronized move, The Court answers. They raise five bows nocked with arrows.
“Move away from the human,” the god with slanted brows commands.
No. This isn’t fair. The danger is over.
Love’s gaze swings between the deities. It finally lands on Wonder, who’s silent and locked in a stupor. The rest of their crew remains quiet instead of speaking up or doing something, anything to stop this.
The pinpricks of treachery assault Love’s flesh. They have never claimed to be her friends, but they were raised and trained together. And yes, she’d wrongly assumed Wonder had become kindred among so many adversaries.
So be it. This must be Love’s fight. It’s her battle, with her frostbitten hands and sliced palm, with her chattering teeth and small frame racked by cold.
The god repeats in a silky, impatient tone, “Back away, Love. You’ve grown too ill to influence the mortal. Your arrows have failed, and he remains a threat. We’ll take over from here.”
Love crushes Andrew against her. “No.”
“Release him. Now!”
Swallow. Tremble. Defy.
“F-f-fuck y-you,” she seethes, drawing out the insult.
Five pairs of eyes spark with a mixture of disappointment, intolerance, and cruelty.
“Anger,” the cloaked god barks, his garment slapping the air.
Anger hesitates. “Almighty rulers. Perhaps we should wait and see—”
“Restrain your peer! Protect her!”
Anger grimaces, then advances. With a hiss, Love releases Andrew. She flings herself across the snow and snatches an arrow with her uninjured hand, her fingers gripping the shaft. Lurching off the ground, she barrels into Anger and haphazardly sweeps the tip at the god’s face.
He knocks it from Love’s grasp with more force than intended, the blow striking her to the earth, where she crumbles against Andrew. A cry rips from her lungs, and her wrist throbs a nasty rhythm against her skin.
“Fuck!” Distraught, Anger launches to her side. “Love, I didn’t mean—”
“Anger!” the goddess with amethyst hair shouts. “Forget the bitch’s fucking wounds and grab her!”
It’s been too long. It’s too cold.
Has Andrew’s heart faded? Has it stopped beating?
A resilient voice breaks through the storm. “Love.”
She jolts, her attention dropping to Andrew’s ashen face. She knows those features like she knows The Stars. His eyes devour her, then narrow at the deities and the five deadly arrows poised in his direction. His irises blaze, misinterpret, and conclude. Love opens her mouth to assure him they won’t fire, not with her in the way. She won’t let them.
But Andrew is faster. With a growl, he surges to his knees, seizes Love by the waist, and hauls her out of the way.
Love staggers and tumbles into Anger’s arms. The second he catches her, she shrieks and vaults forward, her arms and legs flailing against the god’s grip.
“Stop!” she bellows. “Please, stop!”
Desperate, she buries her incisors into Anger’s hand, but the motherfucker only grunts. Then he stumbles under the impact of Wonder’s elbow ramming into his skull, The Court too focused on Andrew to notice.
With a snarl, Anger stumbles and loses his grasp on Love. She crashes to the ground and lands beside her longbow.
“Draw!” the god with braids shouts.
The Court pulls their bowstrings taut. Andrew roars, snatches his own bow off the ground, and nocks it while launching in front of Love, blocking her with his body.
One arrow surges forth. At the same time, Andrew looses his weapon, the projectile cracking against the other, splitting the immortal arrow in half and slicing a path across the goddess’s pale throat.
Sparks of light flare through the squall. Blood spritzes the air. On a shriek, the deity buckles, crashing to her knees and clasping the gash in the side of her neck.
Andrew hadn’t impaled her, but only because the shot had been swift. He hadn’t had enough time to aim. Based on the protective noise erupting from his lungs, this mercy hadn’t been intentional. For Love’s sake, he’d shown no benevolence.
Momentary shock dominates the sovereign’s features, as well as Love’s crew. To see one of their own toppled by a human is no small phenomenon. Rarer still is the concept of an inferior weapon besting one belonging to a deity.
The Court recuperates. Fury and umbrage contort their faces, and they draw once more.
No. Not him!
Something mercenary rises from the pit of Love’s womb. The volcanic sensation crackles like flames, searing a wrathful path across her flesh, from her curled fingers to her shoulder blades. Under layers of skin and bone, a set of plumes tighten like springs.
Arrows eject toward Andrew, too many for human archery to deflect at once. Yet with swift motions, he nocks his weapon and glares down the shaft. His fingers flex, about to release.
A thunderous sound rips from Love’s mouth. Her flesh tears open like stitches, muscles stretching in a way that has been compacted for eons.
Two shapes cut into Andrew’s line of sight. They flap in front of him like shields, fringed shingles of black intercepting the spray of celestial weapons. Each arrow strikes the dark surface and fragments into stardust.
Everyone pauses. All but Love, who crouches on all fours before Andrew, her wings braced upright, screening him from harm. The panels splay wide and high, grazing the treetops, tiers of plumage bristling.
A second later, Love recognizes what she’s done. At some point, she’d leaped to the ground and flung her wings upward to obstruct the arrows. With her palms flattening the snow, she digs her fingernails into the frost like talons. While aiming a predatory glare at The Court, she feels the dark red of her eyes brightening like fresh blood.
A low, feral snarl rolls from her lungs. “Touch him and die.”
Awe renders every deity immobile. Anger, Wonder, Sorrow, and Envy stare with slack jaws. They have not seen the wings since she was first assigned to the mortal world. Perhaps they’ve forgotten or have been humoring Love, pretending the wings don’t exist.
Love cannot blame them. For she has been doing the same thing.
Muscles, sinew, and joints unfold from their crimped positions. The wingspan branches out, plumes fanning on either side of her, impervious to the furious wind.
Slowly, she gains her feet. The wings flap once, thrusting a gale toward her enemies, nearly blowing them off their feet.
A sharp intake reaches her ears. She twists her head over one shoulder, to where Andrew’s riveted gaze traces every inch of the wings. With the archery stalled in his grip, his eyes dash across the panels with reverence and pride, then cut to Love.
The silent question consumes his features. Why the fuck did you ever keep them hidden?
She gives him a raw, unfiltered look. Because they made me different from everyone.
From humans. From deities.
Winged fauna have siblings, flocks, mates with the same trait. But not Love. No one in either realm looks like her. For too long, she has renounced this part of herself.
Yet not anymore. In his eyes, in her heart, she understands. The wings are a part of Love, mighty to behold, and weapons in their own right.
Andrew’s mouth tips into a mutinous grin. Fly and conquer, Little Myth, he mouths.
Indeed. Love swerves toward the rulers, just as Andrew aligns himself with her.
He draws back his arrow, prompting the rulers to hiss and arm themselves. As he looses his weapon, Love catapults into the sky. Her wings slice through the storm, rocketing through the firing squad of arrows. Her plumes thwart the projectiles, while Andrew’s archery fends off the rest.
It takes a precious moment to recall the mechanics of flight. Then the memory returns to Love, as if it never abandoned her.
Shooting around the boughs, she loops downward. Snatching one of the whizzing arrows in her fist, Love slashes its point across the spine of the goddess with amethyst hair. The female screams, crimson spurting from her wound.
“Love!” Wonder hollers, kicking one of Love’s discarded arrows across the snow.
Amid the flurries, the iron shaft cleaves a path to her, and Love nosedives for the weapon. Meanwhile, Wonder catches Envy and Sorrow’s eyes, issuing an unspoken plea, to which the pair trades glances.
With a shrug, Sorrow says, “I will if you will.”
Envy smirks and replies, “Why the fuck not?”
The next moments swirl into a dream, taking forever and an instant. From behind, the archers brace their bows and let loose on The Court, intercepting another squadron of arrows headed for Andrew. More flashes of light slice through the tempest, these ones harsher and brighter upon collision.
Treachery contorts the ruler’s expressions. They swing their weapons toward Envy and Sorrow. All but the god with slanted brows, who charges at Andrew.
Combatants explode into motion. Wonder screeches and targets the monarchs, her quartz arrow glinting, lancing three arrows and splintering them into fragments. Lastly, the weapon’s head lodges into the god with braids, and the male howls, a stream of crimson bursting from his side.
Envy and Sorrow eject their weapons against the remaining goddesses. Arrows fly, blood splatters the snow, and voices tear through the landscape.
Envy pivots while letting loose a sequence of arrows. Sorrow reels her spine backward, bending her upper body horizontally to dodge a projectile, then twisting and releasing her arrow. Wonder spins from an onslaught of weapons and nocks her bow.
Anger growls and clenches his longbow, his arrows cleaving the air. Like Andrew, he guards Love from the opposite side, both of them shooting anyone who targets her in the sky.
The battle rages on. The cloaked god with the slanted brows ignores the commotion and homes in on Andrew.
Human momentum does not compare with immortal speed. Yet the god has forgotten that letting emotions get the better of a deity doesn’t serve them during war. Nor does hubris.
None of these monarchs anticipate a worthy challenge from a human. In their arrogance, they underestimate him once again.
The god fights with a temper. Therefore, he fights clumsily.
Andrew seizes that advantage. Faintly, Love wonders if he’s written scenes like this one, for he moves like a storyteller. Someone in control, who knows what’s coming.
While shielding Love’s airborne silhouette, he foresees the attack, his arrow impaling the god’s right pectoral. Bellowing in pain, the deity catapults forward, his mighty fist meeting air as Andrew loops out of the way, then slices the tip of another arrow across the warrior’s cheek. Clasping his wound, the affronted deity gnashes his teeth and leaps at the mortal. The males sidestep and shoot at one another, Andrew refusing to move out of Love’s path.
Her flesh is growing numb, the iron is unwieldy, and the gales obscure visibility. And while she remembers how to fly, Love’s wings are out of practice, and she’d depleted herself when the wings broke free. Therefore, the plumage falter upon descent.
Refusing to let that dissuade her, Love summons the last vestiges of willpower. Her strength may be weakening, but she hasn’t lost her aim. Thus, another kind of blizzard surges through her veins, granting her one final streak of energy.
She locates her bow amid the tempest, plunges, and steals her beloved archery off the ground. Soaring back upward and windmilling the lone arrow between her stiff fingers, she nocks it to the bow. The pale goddess catches the movement, recovering long enough from her throat injury to target Love.
Hissing, Andrew fires at the female. Fuming, Anger does the same.
Except this distracts them. As the males fight to safeguard Love, the god with slanted brows tilts his arrow toward the mortal who threatens their existence.
But if Andrew means to die protecting Love, he has another thing coming. If they must revolt, they will do it as one. Side by side. Together. Like mates, if only for this moment.
The god shoots. With a cry of fury, Love blasts through. Speeding her way toward Andrew, she swoops into the line of fire and spins midair to face the rulers. Wings flapping wildly around her, she lets her weapon fly.
Two arrows launch forth and meet in a detonation of bloodred light. Andrew’s body cannons backward. The blast uproots Love next, hurling her into the sky, her wings twisting and tangling.
Andrew bellows her name. A peeling sensation pries a scream from her lungs, as if someone is sawing a blade through her vertebrae, gravity pulling her down. Feathers explode, scatter, and rain to the ground.