82. Angélique
82
Angélique
I hate him. I truly hate him.
He asked me if I trusted him, and right after, he let me fall to my death.
Not completely, but it feels like it, anyway.
He flies next to me the whole way I fall, ready to pluck me from the air if my wings don’t extend.
And they do. I feel my back burn and scream in pain, but the damn wings open.
Obviously they do because that asshole made me free fall from higher than Notre Dame, and it’s like my body remembers.
So, the wings open and I don’t ‘splash’ on the ground.
The speed of my fall is way more than when I fell—I can’t really call that fly—from Notre Dame to le parvis, so it hurts like hell to slow down my speed, but I manage it.
I’m so proud of myself…until Elhyor plucks me from the ground between his claws and brings me back where it all started.
At least, this time the wings are already out, and I don’t have to go again through the pain of them ripping my back open.
But it’s still painful, and I realize why.
I might be a warrior who’s been trained her whole life, so my body is used to going through labor, but my wings stayed tucked inside of me until now and never worked out.
And somehow I expected them to be as ready as my body, but that would be impossible.
It might be easier with a smaller body—aka by shifting completely—but if there’s a magic spell to do that, I still haven’t found it yet.
I’m getting exhausted though and the only thing I managed so far was to glide to the ground doing circles because I don’t think my wings can lift my body yet.
Talk about a scary fallen angel…
Yeah, well, all I know is how to fall without dying.
It would be nice if I could actually fly.
By the time Elhyor stops throwing me to the ground, the night has fallen and I’m exhausted. I need a shower again, and I think I could sleep twenty-four hours straight and wouldn’t mind.
I’m also so freaking hungry that I don’t care that the little bun from earlier is cold now because I swallow it in only four bites, and I’m not feeling full after that.
On our way back inside Notre Dame, Elhyor doesn’t even bother with putting back his shirt on and ushers me inside our room as he goes to the kitchen to grab us some sweets and water bottles.
I’m too tired to wait for him though, so I strip, not even bothering with throwing my clothes in the laundry bin and shower as fast as I can.
I should be taking my time and soothing the pain in my muscles, but after three tries I managed to retract my wings and the muscles that are in pain aren’t even there anymore.
It’s like I have phantom pain.
I heard that it’s something that happens when someone gets amputated. They still get pain in something that doesn’t exist anymore.
It’s the same here.
I have this feeling like something is burning at my back and yet there are no wings to burn at all or to be sore.
I probably need to get used to it because there is no way I’m going to survive the war that is brewing if I don’t learn to shift and fly fast.
Not sure the big bad dragon is the best teacher, though, because if his idea of a lesson is letting me fall higher and higher until I finally manage to fly like it’s some innate knowledge, he can’t be more wrong.
He can force my wings out if he wants, but the rest of the lesson will be done by more sensible people.
Maybe now that we have a lead, I can get Cassiopé and Léandre out of the archive room so they can help.
That’s the last thing I think about before I finally fall asleep, not even waiting on Elhyor or the food he promised.