I felt a flare of indignation at the fact that he was asking my captor's permission to speak with me alone instead of mine. Wylfrael's answer was so instantaneous that I didn't even have a chance to feel afraid of being alone with this new, unknown alien.

“No.”

Finally, Maerwynne’s probing gaze left my face, flashing above my head to Wylfrael.

“No?” he repeated. There was no mistaking the threatening growl that had entered his voice. But Wylfrael did not back down.

“No. You asked to see her and now you have seen her. I sense no change in you, so clearly you do not starburn for her. You should be satisfied.”

“You and I both know it can take time to starburn, to feel the bond settle into place,” Maerwynne replied. “Perhaps I will stay here a few days, just to be sure.”

“If you believe that is a wise use of your time with your star map going dark. I cannot help but notice my prisoner has not brought it back,” Wylfrael said cryptically.

Even though I could understand their words now, I was rapidly losing the thread of the conversation. I’d considered myself intelligent back home, and I’d worked hard to earn my Ph.D. in astrophysics. But now, here, I felt the true depth of my human ignorance. There was so much I simply didn’t understand about the situation, about these beings. Unknown history and biology and culture swirling around me, as opaque and impenetrable as the blizzard outside.

Wylfrael’s comment seemed to have struck an uneasy chord in our visitor. His wings shifted tensely and his jaw tightened. He and Wylfrael remained silent for a long moment, tension growing in their locked gazes above my head. Maerwynne looked away first, his eyes finding my face once more.

“What is your name, human?” the visitor asked.

I hesitated.

From how close he stood behind me, I felt a new tension enter Wylfrael’s body. I wasn’t sure what it meant, but I assumed it was some sort of anticipatory anger that I wouldn’t answer Maerwynne’s question. That I wasn’t showing enough respect or performing as he wanted.

I decided that it wasn’t worth staying silent. All that would earn me was more of Wylfrael’s ire.

“My name is Torrance.”

Wylfrael went very, very still at my back before suddenly bursting into movement. I yelped in surprise as his huge hand closed over my shoulder, moving me briskly behind him. His wings snapped open, a dizzying, star-speckled span of bone and black blocking my view of Maerwynne.

“Is there anything else you require before you leave, Maerwynne?” Wylfrael asked. The words seemed cordial enough, but the frosty message beneath them was obvious. Something akin to, you’ve overstayed your welcome, now get the fuck out of my house.

“No,” Maerwynne said, clearly taking the hint. I thought he’d walk out the door after that, but he added one more thing from the other side of the wall of Wylfrael’s wings.

“I will warn you now, Wylfrael, that I may come back again and ask to see her one more time, just to be sure. I expect that if and when I do, she will still be healthy and alive.”

Thanks, I thought sarcastically. I didn’t much appreciate being kept alive solely in case this guy decided he wanted to come back and marry me after all. But then again, at least it was something. Somebody else out there who knew I was here, who would notice if I died. It was a threat hanging over Wylfrael’s head that hadn’t been there before, a potential consequence if I was badly injured or killed or starved. Though, considering how intent Wylfrael was on making sure I ate, that last one didn’t seem very likely...

“And I will warn you, Maerwynne, that unless you starburn for her and lay claim to her as your mate, you have no power over her.”

Wylfrael’s voice got louder, harsher, booming in the space like thunder crashing through snow.

“Her life is not your concern. It is mine.”

OceanofPDF.com

OceanofPDF.com

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE Wylfrael

I was acting unreasonably. I knew it, and so did Maerwynne. The tilt of his head as he regarded me told me he was trying to work out why. Why I was limiting his contact with a mere prisoner. No doubt he wondered if, like Skallagrim, I’d started going mate-mad.

Perhaps I was going mate-mad. I certainly did not feel as steady as I once had. But there was nothing for it now, even if that was the case. I’d never be able to seek out my mate and stave off the madness now that I knew what would happen to her.

I had no control over my future.

But I could control this situation. At least, I could try. And right now, retaining control meant keeping Torrance within my grasp, no matter how unhinged it made me look to Maerwynne.

The half-Vizhiri god seemed to come to some conclusion. Whether that conclusion was in favour of my sanity or not, I could not say for sure.

“Alright, Wylfrael. I will leave you now. I plan to visit the Sionnachan villages in case my mate is somewhere else in your world.” His red brows drew together. “I presume you will not hinder me in this, the way you have hindered me with Torrance.”

“Correct,” I grunted. It bothered me how little it bothered me – the idea of Maerwynne speaking to Sionnachan females – when the thought of him alone with Torrance made me want to smash something. It wasn’t as if I thought Torrance needed to be kept safe from him, either. Maerwynne, like the Vizhiri males of his mother’s culture, adhered strictly to stringent codes of honour. He’d trained his body and his mind endlessly, as males in his mother’s world had to, to hold back the Vizhiri urge to drain a female of her blood. He was a master of control and paragon of near-puritanical nobleness. Unlike most stone sky gods who took lovers before they found their fated mates, he, as part of his Vizhiri training, was celibate. I knew he wouldn’t harm Torrance in any way.

I realized with a lurch of loathing that I’d likely already hurt Torrance far more than Maerwynne ever could. I was not sure, though, whether that loathing was for myself, or her, for making me care. I remembered her panting in pain after I’d put the webbing in her ear. The arching agony of her body, writhing beneath mine, while something very close to terror seized upon me. Terror at her frailty, the tortured twisting of her form, the way she’d hurt when I had not meant for her to hurt. I had not anticipated, had not intended –

“I bid you farewell then, Wylfrael. After I visit the villages, I will depart Sionnach.” Maerwynne’s voice cut into the whirl of my thoughts. “As you so rightly pointed out,” he added archly, “my disappearing star map limits my time here. I will see you at the gathering.”

He pulled open the door and launched into the air, disappearing into the storm.

I stepped forward and closed the door once more, snow scattering across the floor and my boots, before turning around to face Torrance.

Her left ear was mostly hidden by her long hair, but the soft curl of flesh at the bottom was slightly visible. The skin there was bright red, a human sign of inflammation, perhaps. A corporeal reminder of the torment, brief but terrible, I’d inflicted.

Am I the weak one?

Disoriented by her reaction to the webbing, and trying to beat back my shame, I’d cut any sense of mercy for my prisoner to the quick. I’d sneered at her when she’d called me a monster, and I’d mocked the very frailty that had made me so afraid. I’d tried to turn her agonized response into a symptom of her own human weakness, rather than a consequence of what I’d done.

Part of me wanted merely to say that she deserved it and be finished. To use her own guilt to absolve myself. But it seemed that what she did or did not deserve mattered less and less every passing moment. I’d seen her suffer, made her suffer. Been the cause of it, and condemned by it, all at once.