Chapter Twelve
CHAPTER
TWELVE
Yuri’s time as a bonded was going to be far more difficult than he’d expected.
There was meant to be a feast after the ceremony—a grand affair in which he and Aurelie would get to know each other, any awkwardness buffered by the revelry.
Instead, he found himself walking in silence beside a girl whose fury hummed like a second heartbeat, sinking into the very fabric of his being and making him second-guess his every word. What was he meant to say to her?
Hello, I’m sorry your father turned into a demon.
Or maybe, Was cutting off that man’s hand truly necessary?
Neither would go over well, and a simple hello felt painfully inadequate.
In the mounting silence of their walk, Yuri found himself acutely aware of not only his own breaths, but hers—quick and too sharp.
He drew a step back, worried he was making her nervous, only to then worry that she’d think he was trying to get away from her.
He stepped forward again, a marionette tangled in his own strings.
Yuri’s wings, too, were bent at an odd angle, for he was uncertain what to do with them when there was a human watching.
Should he stretch them out to appear large and impressive?
Keep them tucked away so he wouldn’t accidentally graze her?
Surely she must be used to being around an angel, yet she kept staring at his wings as if she were seeing them for the first time.
He stretched them out just a little, testing her reaction. Aurelie glanced quickly away.
Light help me, he thought, I’m horrible at this.
“Rhovar seems nice,” he said, each word hanging brittle in the air. They were descending the long stretch of hill between the cathedral and the looming castle, their tense silence stitched together by the sound of boots on scorched stone.
The charred fields, the ruined buildings … Perhaps this kingdom had been beautiful once, but now it wore its history like a jagged scar. Even its people moved like ghosts, frail and stooped under the weight of survival, sweeping glass from the ground and mending what little they could.
Aurelie’s sorrow bled through the bond, so sharp that it made his throat tight. Yuri dragged a hand through his hair, wishing he’d never learned to speak the human tongue.
“Your father should be fine,” he added after a moment, helpless in long bouts of silence. “I’ll ensure that no one harms him.”
“My father is a demon,” she snapped. “He most certainly will not be fine.”
Yuri tipped his head toward the sky, hoping a well-placed bolt of lightning might do him a favor and strike his lips clean off his face.
He peered sideways after Aurelie’s fourth attempted sly glance at him and wondered if she felt the same awkward tension he wrestled with.
He tried to shake it off, but that only made it worse, like trying to ignore an itch as it crawled deeper under the skin.
Was this what damnation felt like? Who knew that comforting a woman could be so difficult.
“I don’t understand how it happened,” she whispered. It was clear she was holding on by a fraying thread, but what was Yuri meant to do about that? Hold her hand? Embrace her?
“I’ve heard much about Varen,” he offered carefully, “and by all accounts, he seemed an excellent man.”
“He is an excellent man.”
Yuri could only nod. It wasn’t as if he could disagree with her, but the truth was that there was no returning Varen to the human he’d once been. Sooner or later, Aurelie would have to realize that on her own.
She glanced once more at his wings, lips pressed together until she finally asked, “Do you have eyes all over yours, too?”
Yuri blinked, caught off guard.
So that’s what she’s looking for.
He let his wings unfold, uncertain why it made him so nervous.
Aurelie looked first at the front, where there was nothing but unblemished feathers.
Then he turned so she could see the eye that nestled in the center of each wing.
Both were so white that they blended in with the rest of the feathers, easy to miss.
“Azriel has four wings,” she noted, inspecting him. “You only have two.”
“And my commander has six,” Yuri said, offering a small smile.
“The number of wings an angel has depends on where they sit on the hierarchy. It’s possible I may grow more one day.
It’s said they come from accomplishing great feats.
” What he didn’t say was that any additional wings seemed a complete nuisance.
Angels took great pride in their wings, Yuri included.
They made him faster and more agile, the eyes within the feathers helping him see all of the battlefield at any given time.
But unlike most, he found himself consistently frustrated with their lack of ability to simply magic their wings away.
Powerful demons could do it, and yet angels were stuck with them always—brushing against low branches in the forest, dragging heavy through water, and far too wide for most human doorways.
He probably should have aspired to be as well-decorated as Xadriel, and yet for Yuri, any more than two wings felt purely ornamental and not worth the boost in speed that they gave.
Aurelie scrutinized Yuri a moment longer before stepping back. Her voice was quiet when she spoke, sounding almost as uncomfortable as he felt. “I appreciate what you did for my father. He wouldn’t be alive without you.”
He wouldn’t have, but Yuri hadn’t taken that knight’s blow to protect Varen. He’d done it to save Azriel. And yet, with Aurelie looking up at him as she was—her eyes puffy, her nose red—Yuri knew better than to admit it. Let this girl believe she had at least one person on her side.
“I’d hoped to be meeting you under better circumstances,” he said.
She hugged her arms around herself. Was that guilt Yuri felt brewing within her?
“I don’t make a habit of nearly killing my comrades,” she admitted. “I’ve no idea what came over me.”
“Fear,” he said simply. “It can make a monster out of anyone.”
Her gaze lowered to the ground. “I apologize for nearly stabbing your wings. I wasn’t thinking clearly.”
He blinked. “You nearly … Wait, you were going to stab my wings?”
“Only because you were keeping me from my father. You didn’t feel it?”
He drew his wings back inch by inch, hoping it wasn’t too obvious. “I can read your emotions, not your mind. I had no idea.”
Aurelie nodded, the silence stretching between them like a bowstring pulled just shy of breaking until she muttered, “I was never actually going to do it. It was just a thought.”
Yuri didn’t find that any more reassuring.
“I need to see him, Yuriel.”
He fell into step beside her, the weight of her desperation pressing against him through the bond. The townsfolk watched them with stony eyes and gossiped behind open hands, their voices as sharp as knives. Aurelie kept her gaze ahead, back straight, chin high.
But her confidence was all for show.
Yuri extended his wings to shield her until they made it through the castle doors.
Perhaps it made him a fool—he had, after all, just watched his bonded hack off an innocent man’s hand minutes after meeting her—but he sympathized with Aurelie.
It hadn’t been even an hour since they’d formed their bond, and already he was surprised to find himself feeling strangely protective over her.
How curious.
“I’ll see whether the king is amiable to that. And please, call me Yuri.”
“Thank you, Yuri.” She spoke his name as if testing its weight. His cheeks warmed. He hadn’t expected it to sound so familiar.
“Our rooms are attached,” she said, leading him up steep spiral steps. “We each have our own private quarters, but we share a washroom that connects our suites. My father thought it was best for us to be close, considering the recent attack.”
She stilled at the top of the stairs, then set her hand on his arm to guide him.
Yuri tried to focus on his steps, knowing he should memorize the layout of the castle, but he was more distracted by her closeness than he cared to admit.
When was the last time a woman had touched him?
Light, he’d forgotten how soft their skin was.
Just as he was admiring it, Aurelie’s grip suddenly tensed as they passed two knights—one of them a tall man with dark skin and the other the woman who had nearly cut off his hand. Aurelie’s heartbeat doubled as the woman’s gaze found her and darkened like a storm.
“Solange, wait—” the man called, but the knight shot through the hall quick as lightning. The hairs on Yuri’s neck prickled, her murderous intent like static in the air.
“You bitch.”
The instant Solange’s blade cleared its sheath, Yuri found himself in front of the knight. He caught Solange’s wrist with one hand, stopping the strike midair. The force jolted her, the knife clattering from her fingers and skidding across the stone floor.
The hall stilled, the only sound that of Solange’s rapid, angry breaths.
“You forget yourself, human.” Yuri spoke low, each word a soft strike. “An assault to my bonded is an assault to me. I suggest you back away.”
Solange bared her teeth, the fury in her gaze finding Aurelie. “The angels are fools to choose you.”
Yuri could taste Aurelie’s guilt like iron in his mouth, sharp and bitter.
The bond between them clung like a tether, feeding him every fractured piece of her shame until he, too, felt the full weight.
It took effort to remember that none of it belonged to him.
But fresh as the bond was, and as tangled as their emotions were becoming, it was getting harder to tell the difference.
The sound of boots striking stone broke the tension. The other knight, clearly rattled, caught Solange’s elbow and tore her back. “That’s enough. The healers said Nicolas will be fine, and we’ve had enough bloodshed today.”
Relief surged through the bond, dagger sharp.
“She cut off his fucking hand, Marcel,” Solange argued. “Alive is not the same as fine.”