The Reclamation (Shadowed Wings Book 3) Page 3

  I try to stand up and then curse my useless, uncooperative body. I crawl over to the pile of grot fruit and shove handfuls into my mouth in hopes that it will help me get up and try to stop this. Pained bellows and enraged growls bounce off the cave walls, and panic surges through me so potently that it steals my breath. I swallow down as much grot as I can between dry heaves and terror-laced tears. I hate Ryn and Zeph right now, but I don’t want either dead.

  I’m on the verge of doing the last thing I want to do right now, which is letting Pigeon out and hoping she can somehow stop them, when Ryn and Zeph both explode into their gryphons. Instantaneously the massive cave seems small as the two gargantuan beasts circle and snap at each other. The setting sun fills the cave with oranges and purples, and it makes Ryn’s huge white and gray gryphon look like it’s splattered with watercolor. Zeph’s all black sky shadow soaks up all the different hues like they were never there in the first place, and if I didn’t know better, I’d think I was watching the night and the sunset themselves fighting.

  I search for the steel vault I trapped Pigeon in at my center, but before I can do anything else, both gryphons leap up and take off one by one through the hole in the cave roof, like cyclones of rage and torment. I stare at the open ceiling and surrounding cave, an imprint of fury and pain now seemingly stamped over every surface. I feel like I’m choking on the hate both of them just expelled, and I hold my chest and try to get up.

  I scream when a hand clutches my wrist, stopping me from moving. My head snaps over to find Treno staring at me with concern. Fuck. I forgot he was here for a moment. Fear and relief slam into me as his blue and purple gaze settles on mine.

  “Let them go. You’d just get hurt trying to stop them. They’ll sort it out.”

  I can practically hear the unspoken one way or another in his statement.

  “They can’t kill each other without hurting you,” he adds, answering my unvoiced worry about how far the fight can go. The flash of hurt in his eyes as he relays this information bitch-slaps me back into the cold reality of betrayal and lies, and I hate that in this case, I’m the perpetrator of Treno’s pain.

  My eyes flick back and forth between his mismatched stare. I’m suddenly so fucking sorry and so fucking happy to see him that it’s like the two overwhelming emotions crash together inside of me and explode out in a sob that opens the dam, and I have no choice but to come flooding out. I wrap my arms around his neck, and shakily he sits up and pulls me into his lap. My guilt and sorrow pour out of me, and I hate that after what I’ve done to him, he’s still willing to hold me while I leak weakness all over him.

  I know that he’s hurting. I can feel it in our connection, and yet here he is, holding me, reassuring me silently with just his mere presence that I’ll be okay. I hate my frailty more in this moment than I have in any other. I’ve floated through this world, delusional and purposefully naive. I’ve refused to open my eyes, to trust my instincts, to see what was right in front of me, and now everyone all around me is hurting and fighting.

  I allow myself this last moment to break, and vow that I will put myself back together in a way that will never let this happen again. No more blinders. No more poor helpless me. No more ignoring my instincts and second-guessing everything. It’s time to become the woman I need to be to survive in this world. It’s time to own my shit and find my way. It’s time to accept that this is my life now, and I better get fucking used to it.

  3

  The cave is silent. The smell of campfire and rage stings my nostrils, and I try to subtly chase the smells away by inhaling deeply while my cheek is pressed against Treno’s chest. I suspect he hasn’t showered for a bit, because he’s a tad ripe, and I squirm a little with the fact that I probably smell like ass too.

  He looks tired, his long white hair tangled and dirty, and I feel a slight tremor in his hold. I don’t see any injuries, but he was out as long as I was, so something must have happened to him. I want to ask, but I bite the questions back. I need to talk to him first. Explain what happened before I do anything else.

  I need to start putting the pieces together and fixing things after all the shit that’s happened to lead to all of us hiding out in some random cave, but I have no idea how to go about trying to repair anything. Treno releases steady breaths, and I take that as a sign that he’s ready to talk, either that or he’s ready for me to get the fuck out of his lap.

  I steel myself and scoot back away from him. He lets me go, and I try and fail to read the look in his eyes as we separate. We both just stare at each other for a moment, taking each other in, breathing through the uncertainty and hurt.

  “I’m sorry,” I finally say at the same time he says, “You lied.”

  I can hear my heart hammer in my ears for three beats before he speaks again. “Are you?” he asks.

  I shoo away the defensiveness that automatically springs up inside of me and truly think about his question for a moment. “Yes, and also no. I’m not sorry that I lied. I didn’t want to die or to be tortured in a dungeon. Stating half-truths was the only way to keep either of those things from happening. But I am sorry for hurting you.”

  As the last words exit my mouth, I see a flash of devastation in Treno’s mismatched gaze, and it feels like a punch to the gut. I hate that I put that there, and I hate that if I had all of this to do over again, I would do exactly what I had done before.

  “So were you spying?” Treno demands, more bite to his tone and hardness in his eyes than was there before.

  “No,” I defend. I want to snap that he should know better than that, but what do either of us really know about the other at all... Nothing. “I was telling the truth about how I ended up here and not knowing what I was. I just left out that the Hidden found me first.”

  “Oh, you simply left it out,” he repeats, his eyes now mocking.

  Again irritation bubbles up in my chest, and I have to remind myself that he has every right to be mad. The problem is, so do I. I shake that thought away and try to commit to being empathetic and understanding. We’re not going to get anywhere by fighting, and judging by the shitty cave we’re shacking up in, we need to get somewhere.

  “I spent a little time with the Hidden, and then I was kicked out. I was trying to get home when you and your soldiers shot me out of the sky. I didn’t ask to be taken against my will to Kestrel City. I was forced to try and make the best of a bad situation. Everything else was the truth: I was stuck there and just trying to get back to the gate so I could go home. I found some information about my family in the archives, but I wasn’t spying or hiding anything from you for any reason other than I had to protect myself,” I explain, my tone pleading for him to see things from my perspective.

  “Spent a little time with the Hidden?” Treno snarls. “You’re mated to their traitor leader and apparently his Altern. It sounds like you did a lot more than spend a little time,” he accuses, and all thoughts of being the voice of reason and understanding go flying right out the window.

  “I was just as shocked by that as I was to find out I was mated to you,” I snap at him, jumping to my feet.

  I feel light-headed and weak, but at least I’m up, so I shove that aside and embrace my frustration. I get that he’s hurt, but I didn’t do any of this out of malice. I deserve to feel bad about how it turned out, but I don’t deserve to be beaten over the head with it all. What the fuck else could I have done?

  “I was dropped into the middle of a war, through no fault of my own, and forced to figure out how to survive. I didn’t know that being physical with anyone would result in a lifelong mating. It wasn’t in the welcome brochure that no one handed to me when I showed up in this fucking hell hole. In my world, sex doesn’t work that way. I had no idea that I could end up in a situation like this.”

  Treno growls at me and gets to his own feet. He doesn’t look as shaky as I do, and that just pisses me off even more. Gone is the sweet and playful male, whose presence felt like cool water on
a scorching day. In his place is a cold, hard warlord who apparently isn’t going to offer me the empathy I was trying to offer him.

  “Well, if you didn’t know how things worked here, then you had no business rutting with anyone. Now you’ve tied me to my enemies, turned my brother against me, and ruined me in ways I don’t even know how to come back from!”

  “I’ve ruined you?” I ask, taken aback. Shock and anger swirl in me, and I’m stunned by the selfishness radiating out of him. Does he even care what’s been done to me? “Fuck you, Altern of the Avowed,” I spit back at him, fed up and stepping into his space like I’ve forgotten that he’s a foot and a half taller than me and probably bench-presses my weight for a warm up. His eyes blaze even brighter with fury, but I continue.

  “I didn’t pursue any of you. Each and every one of you knew I wasn’t from here and would have no idea how things worked. I didn’t see anyone explaining matings to me before they were coming inside of me. You aren’t the only injured party in this situation, Treno. I’ve been fucked literally and figuratively by each of you and what you kept from me.”

  “You had no right,” he yells.

  “Neither did you!” I snap back, matching his indignation glare for glare. “I’m tired of all you alpha meathead bitches always trying to keep me on my back foot. I’m sorry that I couldn’t tell you the truth about who found me first. Trust me, right now no one is sorrier than I am that we’re all mated and stuck with each other. But what the hell was I supposed to do? The Avowed would have killed me, just like the Hidden wanted to. I was stuck and just trying to get home. If all you selfish pricks had just let me be, none of us would be here right now. So blame each other, because I’m not here for it anymore.”

  “My brother—”

  “Attacked me, knowing we were bonded. He knew what would happen to you, and if you think otherwise, you’re delusional. Loa slit my throat with his blessing. So before you go off about him, you should check back into reality, because from where I was bleeding to death on the ground, Lazza seemed perfectly fine with you dying.”

  I stomp away from him with every intention of storming the fuck out of here—the only problem is, I can’t find the fucking exit. I look around completely livid, and it seems the only way in or out of this cave is through the damn hole in the ceiling. Well, shit. I try to call my wings, but nothing happens. Maybe I’m too weak, or maybe something else is wrong with me. I don’t get any more time to think through that question though, because Treno closes the distance between us.

  I square my shoulders, not even caring if he’s going to ring my neck like it looks like he wants to, because I’m going to scratch his eyes out, and then I’m going to wait for Ryn and Zeph to get their agro asses back here, and I’m going to do the same thing to them. Either that or I’m going to fall over from exhaustion. It’s sixes either way at this point.

  Like a meteorite, Ryn drops to the ground right in front of me. It’s so unexpected that I scream and crouch down, covering my head with my hands like I’m expecting to be pummeled by more asshole gryphons falling from the sky.

  “Get away from her,” Ryn barks, and I run my eyes over him, checking for injuries.

  I stand up and look around, but there’s no sign of Zeph.

  “Look whose master let him off the leash,” Treno mocks, his tone laced with a current of violence.

  Ryn smiles, but there’s nothing kind or happy about it. “The Hidden don’t do that whole master thing. Only you and your brother still think you have the right to own other people.”

  “The Avowed are not slaves,” Treno roars, stepping into Ryn’s space. “You’ve been there from the beginning. You of all people should understand that we protect each other through the Vow, nothing more.”

  “Right. You only force your mark on people, whether they want it or not, and then control them when they do anything you disagree with. Definitely not slaves, my mistake,” Ryn snarks.

  “I trusted you. You were my friend my whole life!” Treno growls, and for a fraction of a second, I can see the hurt and betrayal that’s surging beneath his anger.

  “All of our people trusted you and your family, and look what’s become of us,” Ryn retorts, and they stand there staring at each other, every muscle tense and ready for action. “Do it,” Ryn taunts as retribution lights up in Treno’s eyes. “I welcome the challenge of weak males who are ready to die.”

  My uneasy stare flits black and forth between them. Just when I think they’re about to come to blows, Treno steps back, shaking his head, and then moves to a dark corner and sits down. His mismatched eyes are calculating, and his face is furious as he presses back into the shadows and shuts his features off from me.

  Ryn stomps over to the fire and rotates the sticks of meat still cooking above the flickering flames. He makes a face as he spins the skewers, and I see that one side of the llama-goat kebabs is pretty charred. My stomach growls, the noise rivaling the most menacing of noises I’ve ever heard come from any kind of shifter, and it’s clear that it doesn’t care what state the meat is in.

  I feel a little better than I did when I woke up. I’m standing, which is a massive improvement, and I suspect I have grot berries to thank for it. Just the thought of them makes me want to puke though, so I try to focus on something else. Unfortunately, there’s not much to focus on other than two very pissed off gryphon shifters. I can feel their fury lapping at me like ocean waves crashing angrily on the shore.

  “Where’s Zeph?” I ask, because the resentment-tainted silence is starting to drive me a little crazy, and a countdown to the next inevitable blowup might be a good distraction.

  “Here,” he grumps as he drops to the ground behind me, and I once again scream and grab my chest, hoping it will keep my heart right where it’s supposed to be instead of pounding through my sternum as it feels like it’s going to do.

  “Stop fucking doing that,” I snarl-croak as he walks past me and claims his own shadowy corner, which apparently is now going to serve as his sulking throne.

  The cave goes silent except for the crackling fire, but there’s enough hostile testosterone floating around that I could probably backstroke laps in it if I so desired. My lavender gaze floats to each of my mates in their respective corners. And I feel like I’m sitting in the middle of a powder keg.

  “So what now?” I ask, the question echoing around the dark stone walls caging all of us in.

  This group doesn’t exactly feel like they’re ready for the where is this going chat, but I don’t care. I can’t stay here and just drown in their bitterness. I’m sure Lazza is up to something that needs to be stopped, and I have some serious revenge to mete out on my apparent sister-in-law.

  “Well, isn’t that just the question of the hour,” Ryn jeers as he angrily pokes at the fire and then adds another log. “I’m sure Lazza is well aware of our plans and hideouts, thanks to my dear ol’ sister. Years of planning and putting things into place to help secure our victory are now completely useless. As a rebellion, we just had our wings clipped, and right now we’re stuck with Lazza’s brother, whose life conveniently now seems to be intertwined with ours, so there’s that too.”

  “You think I did this on purpose?” Treno demands, leaning forward.

  Ryn snaps a reply, but I don’t pay attention to what it is. I’m too busy staring at the shifter who, up until today, I thought was kind and patient, understanding and supportive. I didn’t know this angry and vicious male was floating around in there too. Given who his brother is, maybe I should have. Treno just always seemed so carefree and jovial, but then again, it’s not like I ever saw him in any kind of situation that would have invited this side out of him. He was the Altern. In control. In his element and surrounded by people who wore marks that gave him and his brother power over them.

  Guess this further proves that I should be sure exactly who I’m dealing with before I sleep with them. I rub my face with tired hands and ignore my growling stomach as the cave fills wi
th more yelling and accusations. With wobbly steps, I stride over to the fire and steal a meat-filled stick. Ryn doesn’t even notice; he’s too busy furiously arguing with Zeph and Treno both.

  I sit on the warm blanket and ravage the meat. I’m pretty sure I burn off most of my taste buds in the process, but I’m too hungry to have patience. I barely even chew the gamey meat before swallowing it down and ripping off more to fill my mouth. I’m sure I look like some feral animal as I tear into the meal, but I give no fucks. I don’t even care that I’m growl-groaning as I clean the stick of meat from one end to the other.

  The fact that I can hear the wild noises I’m making should be an indicator that the yelling has suddenly stopped, but I’m too consumed with filling my empty stomach and appreciating the taste to pay much attention. Damn, this goat-llama meat tastes like popcorn. It has a salty, buttery quality to it, and I find myself wishing I could bathe in this stuff. I lick the stick clean of any remaining juices and then look up to find three pairs of eyes on me. I shrug my shoulders.

  “That’s some good shit,” I declare as I wipe my mouth with my hand and then proceed to lick the juices off of it. Ain’t no fucking shame in my starving game.

  I look around for a skin of water that I know must be around here somewhere, and Zeph—accurately reading what I’m looking for—picks up one near him and chucks it at me. I pluck it from the air and guzzle almost half of it down before coming back up for oxygen. I sigh contentedly and then turn my attention back to my audience, studying them for a moment. Well, here goes nothing.

  “You’re not going to like this, but I think I know somewhere we can go,” I announce and watch each of them focus even more on me. I swallow down the nerves that crawl up my chest and try to make me rethink what I’m about to say. “I suspect we may find some help there, but at a minimum, I’m pretty sure they could provide some information,” I add, already defending the words still sitting on my tongue, as if in some way it will make what I’m about to say less of a bitter pill to swallow. I wait while doubt, questions, and curiosity pool in each of their eyes.