He straightened, his wings easing into a folded position behind his back.

“Then we will go now.”

I didn’t want to go anywhere with him. But I also didn’t want to get dragged. And I couldn’t pass up the chance to leave this chamber – who knew when I’d be allowed to do so again? Arms still crossed tightly over my chest, I went to him.

Together, we went out the door. Unlike last time when he’d led me through this place, he didn’t walk ahead but rather walked beside me.

I decided to take full advantage of the positions and started asking more questions, even if he wouldn’t answer them.

“So, who is this visitor, then? Another fox alien?”

“Fox?” Asha Wylfrael’s blue gaze remained ahead. “I do not know what a fox is. Our language has no equivalent.”

“Like Aiko and Shoshen.”

“They are Sionnachans.”

“Alright. So, is this visitor a Sionnachan? Are there more of them around here?”

“He is not Sionnachan.”

He... I didn’t consider it a great sign that this visitor was male.

“And why does he want to see me?” I asked, my steps faltering, dread pooling in my belly.

Asha Wylfrael’s reply turned that liquid dread to stone inside me.

“His name is Maerwynne. He’s come to see if you are meant to be his bride.”

I stopped walking, reeling like his words had punched me.

“His what?”

Instinctively, just as I’d done when Asha Wylfrael had stormed into my room, more tempest than man, I started backing away. We were in the tunnel now, and I whirled and stumbled back towards the stairs. Stairs that led to a prison that now felt like a safe haven.

A strong fist closed around the back of my T-shirt, like someone grabbing a kitten by the scruff of its neck, halting me.

“No!” I said, reaching back for his hand, my bare feet slipping on the crystal. “Please, no! I don’t want to marry an alien, please!”

“I thought you’d welcome such a thing,” Asha Wylfrael muttered sardonically. “If Maerwynne starburns for you, he’ll take you away from here. Away from me.”

I stilled, letting his words absorb. But they brought me no sense of relief. Asha Wylfrael was a murderer, my brutal captor, but at least he was the devil I knew.

“I’d just be trading one form of captivity for another,” I whispered. And this new form of captivity would have a whole new layer of threat to it – the threat of sexual violence. They have to breed somehow, right? Why else would an alien want a bride, especially one he doesn’t even know?

“Calm yourself, little human,” Asha Wylfrael said, releasing the fabric of my shirt. “You’re not going to marry him.”

“I’m... I’m not?” Slowly, I turned to face him, breathing heavily. Asha Wylfrael’s body loomed so close to mine that my nipples brushed his front on my next inhale. I crossed my arms once more, peering up into a face that was hard, entirely like stone, except for the winter fire of those eyes.

“It is not your fate to be his bride.”

“And how do you know what my fate is?” I whispered.

Asha Wylfrael’s gaze trekked over my face. He caught a strand of my hair near my ear between his finger and thumb, rubbing it slowly before suddenly letting go, as if remembering himself. But he didn’t move away. And he didn’t turn around.

“Because I am your destiny’s keeper, Torrance. Your fate is as I will it.”

“Fuck you,” I spat. My whole body heated with rage, my cheeks burning, my palms sweating, my feet feverish against the cool crystal floor.

Asha Wylfrael raised a silvery brow.

“I will not attempt to parse the meaning of that particular phrase now. Maerwynne is waiting.”

“If you’re so certain I’m not going with him, why even bring me to him at all?”

He sighed deeply, like he was bone-weary of this conversation, of me.

Well, right back at you.

“Because Maerwynne needs to see you for himself. He needs to confirm in his own mind that which I already know to be true. That you are not meant to be his.”

“Not meant to be his... because I’m meant to be yours?” The heat inside me went bitterly cold, the sweat on my body turning clammy. Had I been wrong about this new alien posing a different kind of threat than Asha Wylfrael? I’d originally wondered about Asha Wylfrael’s potentially sexual intentions when he’d first brought me here, but he hadn’t seemed interested in forcing me into anything like that. But then I remembered the way his gaze had snagged on my nipples. The way he’d caught my hair in his hand just now, for no other apparent reason than to stroke it.

“Don’t be absurd,” he said, looking at me like I was, well, an alien.

“Well, excuse me for not knowing what the hell is going on here!” I cried. “Alright. Fine. Let’s just go get this over with.”

We continued through the tunnel. It was the first time I’d been in here during daylight. There was no bright sun filtering through the crystal, though. Everything outside was a haze of white, wind howling against the suspended walkway as if trying to tear it out of the sky.

“There’s no chance this could collapse, is there?” I asked, trying to keep the waver out of my voice. I knew from the clear night I’d last been here just how high this tunnel was above the snow below.

“You won’t fall,” is all Asha Wylfrael said, his wings rustling.

“Great, thanks,” I muttered.

We went back the way we’d first come – through the tunnel then down the many stairs to the entrance hall. I’d hoped we’d go somewhere else, so I could learn a little more about the layout of this place, but when I saw Aiko standing with a tall stranger before she quickly flattened her ears and left, I knew we wouldn’t be going any further.

This must be Maerwynne.

Maerwynne and Asha Wylfrael were a study in contrasts. Where Asha Wylfrael’s colouring made me think of snow, sky, and wind-swept rock, Maerwynne was onyx and magma. He was a little leaner than Asha Wylfrael, lithe and long-limbed, with black hide and crimson hair and wings. He had the same glowing dots and lines strewn across his body and wings that Asha Wylfrael did, but his glowed like orange-red flame instead of blue. His tail, when I caught a glimpse of it, was smooth, black, and long, with something that looked like a barb at the end.

Maerwynne’s attention locked onto me as we descended the last steps and came to a stop before him. His eyes, too, were different from Asha Wylfrael’s. Instead of columns of roiling blue flame, he had a slim circle of scarlet in each eye, almost like each eye had two razor-thin red crescent moons touching each other at their tips, stamped on the background of a vast black sky.

The two of them were so different but undoubtedly similar in ways. They both had wings, and both had the same glowing markings strewn across their bodies. What kind of creatures are they?

“Greetings,” said the newcomer to me, “I am Maerwynne.”

“So Asha Wylfrael tells me.”

As soon as I heard it out loud – Asha Wylfrael – the words were freshly translated, and I realized with consternation that I’d been calling my captor Lord Wylfrael this entire time.

“Has he told you why I wished to see you?” Maerwynne asked.

“Yes,” I replied flatly.

Not sure what else to say, and not wanting to speak further anyway, I remained silent after that, feeling tiny and strange and like I was on some sort of display between these two strange alien giants. I crossed my arms once again, hunching slightly backwards, only to find that Asha Wylfrael – no, just Wylfrael – was immediately behind me. When my back bumped him, I straightened up again reflexively, as if burned by the contact.

Maerwynne watched me with unblinking eyes.

“I would have some time alone with her, just as I have had a chance to speak alone with Aiko.” He said it to Wylfrael, though he was still looking at me.