the night. Ice burned through Kelyn’s body as blade met wing, bone, skin and muscle, and severed each of the four wings cleanly from his back. Overwhelmed by a searing agony, Kelyn choked back the urge to scream and dropped forward onto his elbows. His fingers dug deep into the cool moss. He gritted his jaw, biting the edges of his tongue.
Behind him, Valor screamed.
He wasn’t aware as the demon gripped his severed wings and, in a shimmer of malevolence, flashed out of the Darkwood.
Bile curdled up Kelyn’s throat. His stomach clenched. His wingless back muscles pulsed in search of flight. Clear ichor, speckled with his innate faery dust, spilled over his shoulders and dribbled down his arms to the backs of his hands. The violet sigils about his wrists glowed and then...flashed away, leaving his skin faintly scarred where the magical markings had been since birth.
The witch muttered some sort of incantation that felt like a desperate blessing wrapped in black silk and tied too tightly for Kelyn to access.
He wanted to scream. To die. To curse the witch. To curse his own stupidity.
But what he instead did was nod and suck back the urge to vomit. The task had been done.
He would not look back.
Suddenly Valor’s body lunged forward, her hands landing on his bare feet. The tree roots had spat her up, purging her from the earth. She scrambled over them alongside him. The demon had kept his word, unpinning her from the Faery side.
Good, then. His sacrifice had been worth it.
“Oh, my goddess. Your wings.” Valor gasped. “I... Kelyn?”
“Go,” he said tightly.
“What?”
“Leave me, witch! Get out of this forest and never return. This is not a place for you. Be thankful for your life.”
“Yes, but—I’m thankful for what you’ve—”
“We will never speak of this again,” he said forcefully. Still, he crouched over the mossy ground, unwilling and unable to twist his head and face the witch. “Please, Valor,” he said softly. “Go.”
If she did not leave, he would never rise. He didn’t want her to see him wingless and broken. Hobbled by his necessity for kindness, to not abandon a condemned woman.
“You need someone to look after those wounds,” she said. “I might be able to find a proper healing spell if you’ll walk out of here with me.”
“I need you to leave,” he insisted sharply. “I will walk out of the Darkwood on my own. When I am able. Do you understand?”
He sensed she nodded. The witch’s footsteps backed away from him. She uttered a sound, as if she would again protest, and then the soft cush of her boots crushing moss moved her away from him.
And Kelyn let out his breath and collapsed onto the forest floor.
Two months later
Valor walked down the street, her destination was the gas station on the corner. She had a craving for something sweet and icy that at least resembled food and that would probably give her a stomachache. It was what she deserved.
When she spied the classic black Firebird cruise by, she picked up her pace and then halted on the sidewalk but a dash from the parking lot where the car had pulled in to stop before a hardware store. That was Kelyn Saint-Pierre’s car. His brother Blade had fixed up the 1970s’ vehicle with spare parts and a wicked talent for auto body reconstruction. She knew it was Kelyn’s car because she’d been trying to speak to him for months. Ever since their harrowing encounter in the Darkwood.
When he had sacrificed his wings for her.
She wanted him to know she had not taken that sacrifice lightly. That it meant something to her. But she didn’t have a clue how to tell him that. To not make it sound like a simple yet dismissive “Hey, thanks.” And she’d been racking her brain for ways to repay him. But how did one offer something equal to the wings that were once his very identity?
She’d researched faeries and their wings. Wings were integral to their existence; when faeries lost them, they lost so much more. Like their innate strength and power. And sometimes even the ability to shift to small size, as the majority of faeries could do. And Kelyn could never again fly.
The man had to be devastated. And now, as she watched him get out of his car and stride toward the hardware store, Valor couldn’t push herself to rush after him. But she had to. She owed him.
A tight grip about her upper arm stalled her from taking another step toward apologizing to Kelyn. Valor turned and shrugged out of Trouble Saint-Pierre’s pinching hold. Built like an MMA fighter, the man exuded a wily menace that also disturbed her need to give him a hug. They had once been friends.
Had been.
“What?” She rubbed her arm. He hadn’t been gentle.
“You looking to talk to my brother?”
“Yes,” she said defensively.
Bravery sluiced out of her heart and trickled down to puddle in her combat boots. Trouble was the sort of man who could be imposing even when asleep. The two of them had once been drinking buddies. Now he avoided her as much as Kelyn did.
“I have to—”
“No, you don’t,” he interrupted with that gruff but commanding tone that warned he meant business. “You stay the hell away from my brother. You’ve done him enough damage.”
“But I want to apologize. I know I’ve hurt him. Trouble!”
He shoved her aside and strode toward his brother’s car, but as he stalked away, he turned and thrust an admonishing finger at her. And Valor flinched as if he’d released magic from that accusing fingertip.
She would not give up. There had to be a way to get Kelyn’s wings back for him. And she wouldn’t rest until she did.
Two months later
It had now been four months since that fateful night in the forest, and Kelyn had survived the loss with his head held high and his dignity intact. He could no longer shift to small size, nor could he fly. The faery sigils had disappeared from his wrists and chest, rendering his magic ineffective. But he still had his dust and—well, that was about it. His strength? Gone. When once he could beat Trouble at arm wrestling in but a blink, now his brother did his best not to win, even though Kelyn knew he was faking.
And he’d lost his connection to nature, which had once been as if his very heartbeat. Senses attuned to the world, he’d navigated his surroundings by ley lines and had listened to the wind for direction and tasted water in the stream for clues to weather and more. As a result of losing his wings, he now always felt lost.
But he wouldn’t bemoan his situation or complain or even suggest to others what a terrible life he now had. Because he was thankful for life. Such
