42. Killian

CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

KILLIAN

H ector was quiet for too long—not to be measured in minutes or hours, but days—after meeting with the southerner.

He was the first southerner I'd ever spoken to who hadn't wanted a bird, so that was... odd. I worried perhaps Hector had gotten a defective southerner, and as such, the answers he'd been given had been wrong or skewed.

Carlyle had never spoken of gods or burning. On the other hand, Hector had never spoken of snow gods before meeting with the southerner. I couldn't help but think gods needlessly complicated things. Especially demanding ones. It sounded like a particularly cruel lord who forced people to grow crops and then demanded more than the total amount they'd grown in tithe. Worse than that, a feudal lord who somehow sent bad weather and then demanded crops that had failed to grow, as though he weren't the very reason they didn't exist.

No, the Nemedan way made more sense. The only people I owed anything to were my fellow Nemedans, and the only thing I owed them was what I could give. None of them would ask for more, not knowingly. Not even the biggest jackasses among them. They'd demanded I give up Orestes, and while it was painful, it was possible.

Nemeda as a whole certainly hadn't ever demanded bravery. It was something not everyone could give, and demanding it was cruel at best. Some people weren't brave, and that was fine. There was no shame in it. They were simply people better suited to work that didn't require bravery. Why the hell did burning souls to ash come into it? What kind of assholes were the gods of these southerners?

Still, Hector had taken it deadly seriously and fallen into silent consideration. He'd invited his sister to the palace, who at least wasn't trying to bore holes into my head with her glares anymore, and they'd closed themselves away and spent days talking.

But I was done.

Not to say I didn't want to give Hector all the time he wanted to think, but I was done worrying about the nonsense with the southerners. There was no reasoning with them, particularly not if they were trying to appease fickle, cruel, malicious gods with their attacks on us. Even Avianitis couldn't solve that. My experience was that a man's god always said precisely what he wanted to hear, and reason never came into it.

The morning after Helena left, though, I knocked on Hector's door first thing in the morning, with purpose.

We had increased guard rotations inside the palace, since that damned southerner had gotten in somehow, and we hadn't figured it out yet.

Hector was dressed and ready when he answered the door, a smile on his face. Almost like he'd been waiting on me. Or at least ready to go back to work. Except that I couldn't go back to work properly, not yet.

Oh, I could certainly go to my office and do more paperwork, but the day I was chipper and ready to go fill out more papers was the day I'd cracked, and they should find someone to take my place in the clan.

No, this morning was time for something else.

I smiled down at Hector's beautiful face, overtaken by the urge to lean in and kiss him softly. "We're going to take breakfast to one of my favorite places," I told him when I pulled away.

Because I'd had the kitchen put together a basket, and we were walking out to a spot on the opposite side of the palace from the wall.

He smiled back, not even questioning me, just nodding and holding out a hand to take mine as we walked. It was perfect, like a painting or a ballad, a beautiful, shining moment that I'd be able to hold in my mind for the rest of my life.

Walking to the overlook with Hector.

It was a beautiful walk too, thanks to my ancestors' artistry and my own people's hard work keeping the path up. Paving stones that led up a great grassy hill and then down the other side, where it turned into steps built into the side of the hill down to a grassy outcropping over a river. On the other side of the river, a small marsh, and then woods, as far as the eye could see.

I could tell the moment we crested the hill, not because I was looking, but because of Hector's indrawn breath.

I glanced up to take it in as well.

The cranes were feeding in the marsh, picking through the reeds looking like long-legged dancers at a party. The whole flock of them.

Most cranes moved with the seasons, like other birds. Most cranes were gray, in my knowledge. But these were Nemedan cranes. They had pure white bodies with black-tipped wings that made them look like they had black tails when their wings were folded as they stood, and bright red crowns on their heads.

"What are they?" Hector asked, fascinated, paying more attention to the birds than the path.

Gently, I tugged him back onto the steps, guiding him down toward the grassy outlook. "They're Nemedan cranes."

His head whipped around and he stared at me. "No. But cranes are gray. And they're so bright."

I pulled him to a stop when we reached the spot I'd intended, pulling the blanket from the basket the kitchen had made, and laying it lightly across the grass. I motioned him onto it, and followed when he sat down. "Nemedan cranes are a different breed," I said, looking down at them, smiling.

"You're one of them," he said. Not a question, an absolute certainty.

"I am."

He huffed a sigh, turning back to look at the birds. "Of course you are. And Paris and Helena are great snow owls. Beautiful. I'm going to be a damned pigeon, you know. Or maybe a mourning dove. Gray and boring and dirty and universally hated."

"Your siblings are owls," I corrected. "Birds tend to run in families. In all likelihood, you'll be an owl as well."

"Half-siblings," he corrected, not looking at me.

This, then, was why he'd not mentioned the change, or flying. He was worried that he would be somehow lesser, and that given a bird, he wouldn't be able to hide it. "Esmerelda is a sparrow," I told him. "She almost died for that sparrow, and it makes her no different a person. She is, has always been, and will always be, a fighter. A tenacious, strong, beautiful creature. Sparrow, hawk, vulture, crane, or any other kind of bird doesn't change who you are."

Still, he bit his lip, staring at his hands as I started pulling food out of the basket.

When I'd finished setting it out, instead of starting to eat, I pulled my hair around in front of me, running my fingers through the mass of silver and feathers, before locating the one I'd been looking for. "You said cranes are gray. You're right. Most of them are. This"—I held up a gray flight feather, worn with age—"this was my mother's. She was a common gray crane. And head of our clan for most of her life."

Tentatively, he reached out and ran a finger across the feather.

"She was small for a crane too. And small for a person. Shorter than your sister, but easily the most dangerous person I've ever known. The best leader." I leaned in and pressed my lips to his again. "I promise, no one will judge you by a bird. Not even if you somehow turn into an eagle."

He scoffed at that, and finally picked up his plate to start eating, watching the cranes wade through the reeds. "I wouldn't even know how to change. It's not like I was born to this."

"Then eat your breakfast, and I'll show you." I leaned across and kissed him on the cheek before starting on my own meal. "We'll have you turned into a magnificent specimen of a bird in no time at all. Whatever kind of bird it might be."