Chapter 7 Feathers in the Dark #2
“If you need anything, just call out,” he says.
I nod, my throat too tight for words.
I drift, half-dreaming, the crackle of the fire and the low murmur of their voices lulling me into something close to peace.
But I wake sometime later, the moon a white crescent overhead, to the sound of whispered voices and the unmistakable thud of boots on the forest floor.
I peek out from under the blanket.
Sable and Grim are on watch, crouched low behind a screen of brambles, their eyes shining like animals in the dark. Bran sits by the fire, polishing his glasses, but his attention is fixed on the woods. Shade stands at the edge of the camp, his silhouette carved from shadow.
I look around, shivering.
That’s when I see them.
Scattered near the men, half-buried in the moss, are a handful of black feathers. Some are glossy and new, others battered and broken, but all are the same deep, impossible black as the one I keep with me.
I stare, my suspicious growing so loud they’re a scream instead of a whisper.
For a moment, I can’t breathe.
All those years in the garden, the birds that watched and waited, the way they seemed to understand me. The way they always appeared when I needed them most.
I look at the men again, really look, at the tilt of Shade’s head, the glint in Sable’s eyes, and the way Onyx moves with a silent certainty that’s not quite human.
Is it truly possibly that the rumors of men who aren’t quite men, of fierce, deadly monsters were more truth than fiction?
I clench the feather in my fist, letting it prick my palm.
I get up and walk to the fire, determined to ask my questions.
Bran looks up, his eyes soft behind the glass. “Couldn’t sleep?” he asks.
For a second, I wonder if he’s caught me in the act of watching them. My cheeks go hot, but I force myself to meet his gaze.
“I could ask you the same,” I say.
He gestures for me to come closer, patting the moss beside him. “The night feels more like home to me than anything has. Sit?”
I do, folding myself cross-legged next to him.
The fire throws strange shapes across the planes of his face—gentle, almost boyish, until the shadow catches his jaw and makes him a beautiful, dangerous predator again.
He’s changed out of the fine shirt he wore yesterday, now in a simple black tunic and rough-hewn pants.
Somehow, it makes him even less human. Or maybe that’s just what I want to see.
For a long minute, we watch the flames dance.
Eventually, I steal another glance at Bran. He’s rubbing the bridge of his nose, deep in thought. The firelight glances off his glasses, hiding his eyes.
“How are you?” he asks finally, his voice so soft it almost disappears.
I want to say fine, but my throat closes around the word.
He notices, and his hand finds my knee, solid and reassuring. “You’re safe here,” he says, and I almost believe him.
“Are you…?” I can’t bring myself to ask if they’re really the ravens I love so much.
His mouth twitches. “Am I okay?” He says it lightly, but I hear an old ache underneath. “Sometimes. When we have to be.”
I shiver, but not from the cold. “What about the rest of the time?”
He leans back, bracing on his hands, his face turned up to the stars. “The rest of the time, we survive, the same way we always have. When you live on the run, eventually, you get used to the cold comfort of never knowing what comes next.”
The fire spits, and I flinch. Bran doesn’t.
“Do you remember your life before…all of this?” I ask.
His smile is sad and private. “Every minute.”
We sit in silence, the air thick with the things neither of us wants to say.
When Sable and Grim return to the fire, Sable is grinning, his eyes bright with mischief.
“What are we talking about?” he asks, flopping down on my other side and draping an arm over my shoulders like he’s known me all his life.
“Nothing,” Bran says, but Sable ignores him, crowding me closer until my thigh is pressed to Bran’s and my shoulder to Sable’s. Sable’s body is hot, and he smells like sap and crushed mint.
Grim stands behind the log, his arms crossed, watching me with an intensity that makes the fine hairs on my arms stand up. “You should ask your questions,” he says.
My tongue refuses to work for a minute. “Were you really just…boys when you were forced you out?”
“We were terrors.” Sable snorts as if it’s a joke, but there’s a darkness in his eyes that doesn’t match his tone. “We still are.”
Bran shoots him a look, but Sable just grins, all sharp teeth and shadow. “It’s the truth, isn’t it?”
They lapse into silence again, and I find myself leaning against Sable, soaking up the heat from his body and the easy way he smiles.
“Can I ask…” I hesitate, not sure which question I want to start with here. “The king, my father…it seems as if he knows you. He fears you.”
“We knew him once,” Grim says. “In another life.”
“He says you’re dangerous,” I whisper.
“And do you believe him?”
“No,” I whisper, but even as I say it, I know it’s not quite true.
They are dangerous, frightfully so. But I don’t fear them.
Perhaps that’s foolishness on my part, or perhaps it’s something else, something beyond my understanding.
But I know they don’t mean me harm, as much as my father is convinced they do.
They look at me like I’m salvation, not like I’m something to destroy.
“You should,” Shade says abruptly, startling me. I didn’t even realize he’d returned. I peer over my shoulder to find him standing in the shadows, his eyes bleak. “We are dangerous, Princess.”
I shiver, wrapping my arms around myself. “He said you’re killers.”
“We are, so often and so long we lost count long ago.”
I turn this revelation over in my mind and realize that it changes nothing. How can it when the king has more blood on his hands than anyone has a right to? If they’re killers, what does that make my father?
The others return, each drawn by the pull of the fire and the low hum of conversation.
Talon sits across from me, legs splayed wide, his size making the log groan beneath him. He grins, all wolf and hunger.
Shade and Grim take seats flanking him, their faces unreadable.
Rune slips in next to Sable, so close I feel the tattoos under his skin burning hot.
Onyx hangs back at first, looming at the fire’s periphery like a storm cloud, but eventually he sits beside Bran, his bulk squeezing me tighter into the group.
I’m caged, but for once, I don’t mind it.
Shade’s gaze pins me as he leans in, the firelight making his eyes seem endless. “Does the truth frighten you?”
I meet his gaze, refusing to look away. “No,” I say.
His mouth curves in approval. “Good. Fear makes people do stupid things.”
“Sometimes it’s the only thing that keeps you alive,” Grim mutters, staring into the flames.
The men pass around a battered bottle, pouring amber liquid into tin cups. Sable hands me one, his fingers lingering over mine, and I sip it before I think better of it. It tastes like burnt honey and clove, hot enough to numb my tongue.
The talk grows looser after that.
They tell stories—some so wild I know they can’t be true, others so close to my own dreams I feel them like a second heartbeat.
Talon regales us with the time he killed a bear with nothing but a belt and a boot. “It wasn’t a big bear,” he admits, “but it had an attitude.” He laughs, and the sound is so rich and real that I can’t help but smile.
Rune tells a story about losing his clothes to a band of outlaws before escaping naked into the woods while Sable and Bran watched from the branches of a tree, dying of laughter.
Sable interrupts constantly, correcting details or making them worse, and I get the feeling the truth isn’t the point.
Onyx’s stories are quieter, but every word carries the weight of a thousand lived lives. Grim rarely speaks, but when he does, his words slice through the laughter, making everyone pause. Shade just listens, his gaze flicking between the men, always watching for weakness or a lie.
Somewhere between the stories and the fire and the way Sable keeps refilling my cup, my body grows soft and pliant, my mind thick with comfort and heat.
Their touches grow bolder. Talon slides one massive hand up the inside of my knee, his fingers splayed possessively over my thigh as he demonstrates a hunting technique, using my leg as the prey.
I laugh, but the sound is breathless.
Shade sits closest now, barely a hand’s width from me, and every time he passes me the bottle, he brushes my skin with the back of his knuckles. The first few times, I flinch. The last time, I hold his gaze and let the contact linger.
Onyx’s arm drapes over my shoulder, heavy and warm. His other hand holds my ankle in his lap, his thumb stroking in lazy circles over the bone. When the blanket slips, he tucks it back around me, his knuckles grazing my breast in a way that’s too casual to be accidental.
Rune traces patterns on my skin as he talks, drawing invisible symbols up and down my forearm, along the inside of my wrist, on the back of my neck. Each mark seems to burn cold at first, then seeps warmth into my veins.
I shudder, and he just grins.
Grim stays back until, suddenly, he’s not. He moves in, fast and silent, kneeling at my back. With one hand, he gathers my hair to the side, exposing my neck. The other hand—cold as winter—cups my chin and tips my head back.
“You need to remember how this feels,” he whispers in my ear, the feel of his breath sending a bolt of pure electricity down my spine.
Before I can answer, he presses his lips to the spot just below my jaw, where the pulse beats a frantic rhythm. His tongue is hot, the scrape of his teeth even hotter.
I gasp, my body arching toward him, and Grim releases me, settling back with a look of hot satisfaction.
Sable is the first to speak, his voice bright and mocking. “Careful, Grim. You’ll make her faint before she gets to the fun part.”
Grim just shrugs, but his eyes never leave me.