“You’re going to die doing it that way. Your wing muscles haven’t been conditioned to fly in your human form. They’re used to carrying a heavy lion.” She looked up at me with big, pleading puppy eyes—or kitty eyes?—and I groaned.
She was going to kill me.
“I have an idea. Come with me.” When she didn’t immediately follow, I added, “I won’t make you touch any more rocks.”
“I’ll force feed you the rock next time,” she grumbled.
A slow grin spread across my face. “You could try.”
Her deep growl shook the room, like a pissed off kitty cat. My smile broadened.
Before my thoughts could sharpen on what I was about to do, there was a more pressing matter that needed attention.
“Do you have a pair of scissors?” I glanced over my shoulder and noted her quizzical expression.
“No, why? Stay away from my wings.”
I slammed to a halt, realizing how the words must have sounded. “Reagan.” I scrubbed a hand down my face. “I’m not going to cut your wings. You think I’d do something sick like that?”
“No.” She paused. “Reflex, sorry. I have knives?”
Reflex. I huffed out a sigh. This girl . . .
“Yeah, I’ll take a knife.” When she passed me one, I strode down the hall and into her bedroom. Then whirled to face her. “If I’m going to give you flying lessons, I have one rule: no nudity. So grab a shirt you don’t mind me tearing into.”
A crease formed between her brows, but she shrugged and tossed me a black t-shirt. I wasted no time digging the knife into the material, cutting the back straight down the middle. “I need a pair of shoe strings, too.” After a moment of rummaging in her closet, she threw them my way, then proceeded to pull on a pair of black cut-off shorts.
Making a couple holes in the shirt, I threaded the string through and tied the ends off. I crooked a finger at her and, when she came over, motioned for her to turn around. “Slip your arms through the sleeves.”
She clucked her tongue and grabbed the knife, cutting off the sleeves. “Better.”
Better for who?
When the shirt was draped across her front, I grasped the shoelaces, preparing to tie them together below her wings. She gathered her hair over a shoulder and that’s when I noticed a cutesy sea otter tattoo almost obscured by her right wing. The little creature was gripping a fish, looking ready to chow down.
I smirked and lifted a hand toward the spot, but stopped myself just in time. What I couldn’t stop was my mouth. “Is this your spirit animal or something?” And then my stupid finger touched the otter’s tail.
Reagan lifted her shoulder, the animal’s body stretching with the motion. “Not quite.”
My curiosity was piqued now. I pursued. “A pet then?”
“No,” she said softly. “She’s a memory. A reminder.”
I glanced at her thin scars again, and a rock tumbled into my gut. I hadn’t expected her to say that. If her memories were anything like mine, the tattoo similar to why I’d kept my scars . . . “I get that. You don’t need to tell me.”
“She was Fae,” she began anyway. “I was . . . I screwed up. And Mordecai . . .” Her words trailed off. Then she added, her voice barely a whisper, “She wasn’t even six . . .”
Unease churned in my stomach as I slowly threaded the shoelaces together. She didn’t continue and I struggled to keep my mouth shut. Questions pushed at my throat, but with difficulty, I swallowed them. After several beats of weighted silence, I simply said, “I’m sorry.” Another few seconds passed and I blurted, “The tattoo is cute, though.”
She huffed a laugh, shivering as I finished tying the strings. I inwardly sighed, relieved. Talking about my past demons wasn’t something I did. Maybe Reagan was the same way. “There,” I said smugly, stepping back to inspect my handiwork. “Problem solved.”
Her eyes narrowed as she looked down at my brilliant creation, then reached for the knife again. As she ripped away the material covering her stomach, I groaned. “You’re killing me here, Reagan.”
“You left too much. This is better. More mobile, too.”
Too much. Mobile. She might as well strip naked again. No. This would do.
“Okay, I have to do one last thing before this disastrous flight attempt can proceed. Just . . . don’t go anywhere. I’ll be out in a minute.” My heart was already an out-of-control drum in my chest. It had been so long. Was I really going to do this? What if . . . what if it didn’t work?
I didn’t wait for her reply, already making for the spare bedroom. The door snicked shut and I blew out a shaky breath. For a full minute, I stared at nothing, my mind completely blank. Behind me, my wings lightly scraped against the walls, as if to signal their purpose, their strength. Even now, when only their frame and a few lethal feathers remained.
You’re a master of your pain.
Determination pumped hot through my blood.
I was ready.
Sitting cross-legged in the middle of the bed, I let healing energy stir in my veins, let the magic recently enhanced by the Genesis Crystal thread itself toward my tattered wings. For the last three years, I convinced myself that I didn’t have the healing power to fix them. I wasn’t strong enough. But in truth, I’d never tried.
That night, when everything had gone wrong, I’d survived. I had lived. But that didn’t mean I could go on living and forget. I had to remember the cost of my mistakes. A price I hadn’t been willing to pay, but one I now atoned for every miserable day. So I’d kept my scars. Hadn’t tried to heal them. Including the wings that had
