As I let her roll onto the ground, her leg thrashed and her eyes opened with an anxious look. I draped a clawed finger over her arm, wishing for my real hands more than I ever had before. “Callista. You are safe.”
“Aedan?” She wrapped her arm around my finger and murmured, “Don’t leave me.”
“Of course not.” I tried to whisper, but the cursed drekkan’s voice didn’t have a soft level. “Can I heal your burns?”
“Please,” she whispered as she slipped back into sleep.
I threaded my magic into her arm and used it to encourage her body to grow new skin and knit it into the old. I cleared the ashes out of her lungs and throat, and I breathed easier as fresh air flowed unimpeded through her body. I wasn’t sure if I could give her strength through the mistek bond, but I tried.
She looked so calm and relaxed that I could not bring myself to pull my finger out from under her arm. Instead, I sat next to her, crouched so she could wrap her arm around my finger.
An hour passed. Then two. I did not want to wake her, but I needed to return to the castle soon. A callida flew up to us and started chirping a warbly song.
“Your kind usually avoids me,” I rumbled at it.
The bright yellow thing stopped singing long enough to make a chortly laugh, andCallista stirred.
She woke up slowly, stretching and blinking until her eyes focused on my face. Her brows lifted. “Did you know you’re big enough to eat me?”
I rolled my eyes, glad that she was well enough to make such a light-hearted comment. “A wild drekkan would not think twice about making you dinner, but I’ve retained my elven sensitivities despite this form.”
She hugged my finger and sat up. I retrieved my hand, but I missed her touch. It had been a light thing, but a very real sign of her trust and comfort with me, even while I was a monster. Would she touch me again? Or was it only the result of her terrified state earlier?
She bent her knees and attempted to dust ashes and char off her dress. Her toes poked out of the damaged layers of fabric, and then they wiggled into the loose dirt. She lifted them up enough so the late-afternoon sunshine landed on them. A wide grin spread across her face as she hugged her knees. “Are we here for acultural experience?”
I dug a man-sized hole into the ground with my toes and then lifted the soil-covered appendages into the sunshine. They just felt dirty. “Perhaps I would appreciate it more if I had elf toes.”
Callista pressed her chin into her knees. “What exactly did my mother curse you with?”
I shifted my weight into a more comfortable position. “That is an unexpected question.”
“I’ve just realized I never asked you. All this time you’ve wanted to learn about fae and curses, but maybe she gave you the answer.” She shrugged. “I never actually saw my mother curse anyone, so I’m doubly curious.”
I blew out an uncomfortable breath. “I confess that the events of the day have distorted my memories. Robin, my cousin, waswith me, though, and he said that she turned the power of the lies we told her around on us to make us suffer our own magic. I was to feel the effects of my own monsters and the protective barrier that I’d wanted to reinforce would become impenetrable.”
Callista tipped her head. “That’s less of a curse and more of a reversal of magic… at least the part about suffering your own monsters.”
She shifted so her elbows rested on her knees and her head landed in her hands. “She didn’t say anything about how long it would last? With wording like that, I’d expect it to go away as you became less monstrous.”
I snorted. “Less monstrous? Whatever is that supposed to mean?”
She stood up and set a hand on my folded wing. “You might not realize this, but you were far more horrible when we first met than you are now. I’ve… I’ve never felt safer with anyone.”
Her hands shifted to her hips. “Did shetellyou when it would end? You said you deceived her. Was there a condition or two that you must meet? Maybe related to lying?”
I looked away from her as her mother’s words played in my mind.You will suffer the effects of your own monsters until you beg for the kindness you refused me and feel the pain of love you do not deserve.I could not say the words out loud. I had already begged Callista for the kindness of a punishment I deserved, and she had refused me. I felt the pains of loving her when she could never want me—someone she had already labeledmonstrous.
And I refused to make her feel any responsibility for finding a way to release me from the conditions her mother had made. “She listed conditions, but they are impossible. That is why I’ve scoured the library for more information.Other options.” I turned back to look at her. “But reading my family’s book is more important to me than breaking the curse, and I am grateful for every moment you spend with me doing that.”
She patted my wing again. “See that, right there? Those words would never have come from the drekkan’s mouth I first met.”
I shook my head. “The sun is close to the horizon. We need to get back to the castle before I shift out here and we get stuck in the forest for the night.”
She looked over her shoulder, as if she could see the castle, but it was the wrong direction. I lifted a wing and pointed. “It’s that way.”
Her lower lip slipped under her teeth before tilting into tiny smile. I’d never seen her bite her lip before. “Would you believe that I’d rather get stuck out here in the forest with you than go back to the castle and face… whoever tried to kill me?”
My brows lowered into a scowl, and I couldn’t stop them if I wanted to. “Who did it?”
