Chapter 8 #2
I freshened up, made myself a bachelor’s lunch of scrambled eggs, toast and bacon before taking my training manuals to the balcony. I needed to get some study in for the written test before I headed back to The Grey to check on Sapphire.
Yet as soon as I opened the books and began to read, all the words became a jumble of letters.
I couldn’t focus on anything. Lines of strategy, rank protocol, combat drills—they all blurred together, black ink swimming on white.
I tried to fix my eyes on the words, force them into my skull like I’d done a thousand times before. Nothing stuck.
My jaw clenched so hard it clicked. I pressed my thumb into the edge of the page until the paper bent. Didn’t help. Didn’t matter. The future I was supposed to be building was right here in these pages—promotions, ranks, more stripes on my shoulders. I should have cared.
But all I saw was blue hair in the dark.
Blue hair, and eyes that looked right at me. Like I was possibly her last hope.
I snapped the manual shut, the sound sharp in the hush. With a gentle sigh, I gathered my cloak, shoved on my boots again, headed down the stairs and clicked the door shut behind me.
I needed to see her.
~~~~~
My shoulder leaned against the cold brick wall.
I stood in the shadows looking up at the Silver Finch, the glamour still wrapping around me like an invisibility cloak.
There she was, perched on the sill of her room.
The place I’d seen her many times before.
Her hair was piled on top of her head, loose waves falling around her face, framing her sharp features.
In the low light, I could see the orange glow between her lips, it grew brighter with every drag of cinderleaf she sucked into her lungs.
It shouldn’t bother me—her habit—but it did.
I wanted to save her from it, but I knew I couldn't. I hated the way the smell of it clung to her hair. I’d rather smell the floral notes that seep from her skin.
She already breathed in enough poison every night.
Now she lights her own, one drag at a time.
Part of me got it though. I knew it was for the pain, to numb the senses. There was even a chance it was purely for comfort, a ritual—a way she kept her hands steady. I’d lived enough to know people clung to small poisons to survive bigger ones.
Without making a sound, I pushed off the ground, my wings stretching above me as I took to the skies. I hovered for a moment before landing gently on the tiled roof of the brothel. Sapphire was none the wiser to my presence. I’d keep it that way.
I tucked my wings in behind me as I perched next to her on the sill. She wore a lilac silk robe, and a black ribbon around her delicate neck that I’d seen before. Light brown splotches peaked from under the satin strip, and I gripped the wooden edge of the window.
The red vessel in my chest constricted. The familiar ache returning.
Her eyes were empty. Her body was a shell with no one inside.
Sapphire took another drag of her cigarette, blowing the smoke into the air. I watched as it curled and danced before disappearing into the night. “If anyone is out there . . . give me one good reason not to jump.”
My breath hitched, a crushing feeling wrapping its way around my ribs. I’d seen the way men looked at her—all hunger, no shame. The way they spoke to her like she was worth less than the dirt under their boots.
By the light, I’d wanted to rip her from this place.
But then there was the part that twisted in my gut: she didn’t run. Didn’t fight it. If it was so bad—if The Grey was hell for her—why stay? Why not slip away in the dark to another district and never look back?
I scrubbed a hand over my mouth, fingertips rasping over the stubble there as I watched her stare into the glittering night sky.
Maybe she couldn’t. Maybe someone had their claws sunk too deep in her skin to let her go.
A debt? A leash I couldn’t see? She wore it well, all those sharp edges and that careless smile. But I knew a cage when I saw one.
“One reason . . .” she whispered again, voice cracking.
That was all it took for my heart to shatter. Hearing her voice so broken, fractured something in me. There had to be something I could do for her—some sort of hope I could offer—before that slither of light I caught in her eyes from time to time snuffed out for good.
I reached back, fingers brushing through the warm sweep of feathers at my shoulder. One came free, easy. I let it slip from my hand, watched it drift on the draft until it landed in her lap. Her eyes widened, but she didn’t move, just stared at it like it might burn her gown.
Sapphire snuffed out the remnants of her cinderleaf, flicking the stub into the streets below. I hoped that it might be a reminder that there is a light in her that the darkness cannot touch.
A single tear traced a path down her pink-powdered cheek, and before I could stop myself, my hand moved on its own.
I brushed it away with my thumb, and the moment my skin met hers, something in my chest pulled taut—then swelled so suddenly I thought I might pass out from the sheer force of it.
Her skin was velvet beneath my touch. How did she do this to me?
In all my one hundred and six years, no woman had ever unravelled me like this.
Sapphire’s breath caught, her brow pinching together as she placed her palm on her cheek, looking around.
I wanted to reveal myself. I wanted to tell her that I could offer her a thousand reasons not to jump.
But I knew the moment I did, she’d raise her walls to the sky, and I’d spend a lifetime flying and still never reach her.
So I didn’t. I stayed concealed, watching as she slipped back into her room, heading for her nightstand. There, she pulled a box from the top drawer. My heart fluttered when I saw what she drew from it. Notes, and feathers.
A smile rippled across my lips. I was certain that she’d get rid of them the moment she found them, but I was wrong.
“Sapphire,” a male voice called from the other side of her door.
She quickly shoved the notes back into the box, and into their hiding place just before the door swung open.
My fist clenched.
The owner.
I saw it happen. The way her shoulders locked tight as he walked towards her, every soft line turning to stone as his hand closed around hers.
That mask slid back over her face so fast, you’d think it was carved there.
Not a flicker of the woman I’d seen behind the glass—just the painted smile they all paid for.
The bastard led her away, fingers hooked possessively around her wrist. She didn’t flinch, didn’t fight. Just one quick glance up at the window, straight through me like she knew I was there. And then she was gone.
I felt helpless as I watched her walk away, her shoulders straight but hesitant with every step. She was silently screaming for help, but what could I do? She was a Shadowkin, and I a Lightner.
Two souls from different realms bound by rules neither of us had written.