Chapter 24 #2
One by one, he teased apart strings from thorns, breaking whatever mechanism held them entwined. Each time he broke that connection, a thorn slid from her skin and fell to the floor, until the last one pulled free and a mounded pile of them lay on the soft moss-covered floor.
With the thorns in her face gone, she felt her connection to the remaining two as she never had before, twin pulsing spots of brightness tying her to Griff and Kaliaris. She tensed as Tristen went to leave her for Griff, some part of her rebelling at the thought of losing Griff.
As if Tristen could sense her feelings—and he probably could, considering he was radiating so much magic he might as well have been glowing—he ran his hand over her Guardian tattoo and said, “You won’t lose them.”
He pulled the thorn from Griff first, untangling it from him, then again from Nyx.
She felt the shift—the loss—but she still had the connection to him through her original Guardian bond tattoo.
But she had never been bonded to the Station via that tattoo.
The Avatars had been designed as a buffer between the Guardians and the Stations, to keep the Guardians from ever learning the truth of what the Stations were.
To keep them from being influenced by those Stations.
But as Tristen moved from Griff to Kaliaris, unwinding Kaliaris’s entanglement with the chaos thorn, she felt him reweaving it into her.
A connection similar to the one she had forged, but without the thorn as an intermediary.
Instead, where the thorn had been was a weak spot.
A break point. She could feel how, if anything happened to either her or Kaliaris, the bond would simply pull apart, rather than what happened to one of them rippling through to affect the other.
He repeated the same process with her bond to Griff, creating the same fault point.
When he was finished, he scooped up the fallen chaos thorns, carried them to the pedestal at the center of the Station’s Heart, and poured them onto it.
His magic washed over them and they began to melt, sinking into the pedestal.
As they melded back into Kaliaris, she felt the Station shudder around her, then relax.
As if something vital had been returned to them.
At long last, Tristen walked back to Griff.
He placed a hand on Griff’s shoulder, but Nyx could tell Tristen was only sending his magic to gather information—he wasn’t changing anything.
Not yet. Whatever he was looking for, he searched for several minutes before dropping his hand from Griff’s shoulder.
Nyx’s breath stalled, and she saw her own fears reflected in Jevryn’s face. Could Tristen not do this after all? Had Griff been tied to the Station for too long?
“I can separate you from the Station,” Tristen told Griff finally. “Like I did for Nyx. Connected but not inseparable.”
“But?” Griff asked gently.
“But I know this isn’t your original form.
Nyx told me. It’s a facet of the Station that allows you to change shape to suit the Guardian, but it isn’t something I can control.
Transforming one being into another is beyond the limits of a Shaman’s magic.
And whatever form you’re in when I make this change is the one you will be tethered to permanently.
I can feel the aspect of the bond that made your form change when Nyx took over the Station, but it won’t activate again unless the Guardian changes.
And I can’t make it reactivate—it’s controlled by a spell that’s not part of the Shamanic work that created the bonds. ”
“That is not a problem,” Jevryn said.
“Isn’t it his decision whether it’s a problem or not?” Tristen asked hotly. “What body a person is in should be their choice.”
“It is not a problem,” Jevryn said, stepping in front of Griff and blocking him from Tristen’s view. “Because I remember precisely who he is.”
Jevryn took Griff’s face in his hands. Magic saturated him, potent and unmistakable.
Nyx recognized it, because she had carried it with her for a time.
It was the creative power of Lethe, flowing through Jevryn and into Griff.
Griff shuddered. His feathers rippled, melted, flowed into golden brown skin.
Bone crunched, shifted, rearranged, his body rippling and contorting as hind paws became human feet, as talons became hands, as torso and face reshaped, his glasses slipping from his face.
Jevryn sank to the floor as the massive griffin became an ordinary—albeit winged—man crouched on all fours.
Those golden wings curved out to each side, them and Jevryn’s place in front of Griff providing a modicum of modesty for his otherwise naked form.
Gently, Jevryn tilted Griff’s face up. “Arradin? Are you alright?”
After a moment, Griff nodded. Clothes rose up from the floor next to him, and Nyx and Tristen turned away while Griff dressed.
She imagined that process was somewhat awkward, as she’d gathered from the one time she’d seen Griff in his human form that only Jevryn’s touch kept him anchored in his current body.
As if Lethe’s creation magic had to constantly fight Kaliaris’s to hold Griff in his human form.
After much rustling of fabric, Griff said, “It is alright now.” His voice was the same as it always was, rich and familiar.
She turned. He stood with his left hand clasped in Jevryn’s right.
He wore loose pants that looked like linen or something similar, dyed a dark brown.
His shirt was of the same material but a slightly lighter color, a sleeveless tunic that clasped in the back with cutouts designed for his wings.
He was taller than Jevryn, with a more muscular build and blond hair that looked like it had once been a short haircut that had been allowed to grow out for a few months.
He looked different, but everything about him still said Griff, from the look in his eyes to the glasses once more perched on his nose.
She must have been staring too long, because a hesitant smile tugged up the corners of his lips. “Do I get a hug, or am I frightening now?”
Nyx launched herself across the few feet of space separating them and threw her arms around his waist. His right arm came around her, squeezing her tightly in return. Then his wings flared out and curved around her and Jevryn, blocking them off from Tristen’s view and sweeping Jevryn closer.
Griff’s left arm slid around Jevryn’s waist, pulling him in.
After a brief hesitation, Jevryn’s arms came around them both in return.
For that moment, with both of her fathers with her and Griff finally about to be free, Nyx was truly happy for the first time since she’d lost Seth.
Because in that moment, she knew exactly how much she was loved—by the one father who would always tell her, and by the one who proved it time and again, even if he didn’t quite know how to say it.
When they broke apart, Jevryn was the only dry-eyed one of the three of them. But his irises were a pale green, and maybe she didn’t know exactly what the color meant, but she could guess.
Behind her, a throat cleared. Nyx and Jevryn stepped to either side of Griff, letting Tristen walk forward.
She couldn’t feel his magic at work this time, because it wasn’t working on the bond between her and Griff—only the one between him and the Station.
All she could do was watch, and wait, until the force of Tristen’s magic finally dimmed and he stepped back.
The air hummed with energy. “Is it done?” Jevryn asked.