40. Scythe

Chapter 40

Scythe

A urelia, in her wedge-tailed eagle form, sleeps in my arms while she heals. Every time Lyle or Savage try to take her, she makes mournful noises.

I just know she needs me. And they begrudgingly know it too.

They are worried that she has regressed into her rabid form as she'd done earlier in the year, but her pain is worse this time, and she doesn't crave isolation or her animas.

She craves me.

I took her to the pack-bed, lying down with her on my chest, careful not to jostle her raw skin. She nuzzled into my neck, shoving her beak into my hair just below my ear, her little bird chest rising and falling with breath. Xander healed her skin, but her feathers had not grown back as I'd hoped. Instead, she remained bald like a newborn hatchling.

I would not have been able to let her go even if I'd tried.

Her tiny heart pounding against my own is so strong and yet it carries such grief within it. I can guess why she'd chosen me as her sole comfort. I'd watched my own father attempt to breed my lifeless mother as a boy, and even if I had not understood what his actions meant, something in my body knew it was deeply evil.

Eventually, evening comes, and after they speak with the animas, Savage and Lyle lie down on either side of me, cooing softly to Aurelia. I catch Savage wiping a tear or two away, and I know he's sad for his regina. He feels her pain deeply, and it's no doubt brought up old thoughts about our own parents. Lyle doesn't express his emotions in the same way, but his aura is dull and slow moving, like a sail empty of wind. Out of all of us, our lion was the one with the kindest parents, for all the good it had done them. Their fate had been the cruellest of them all. And Xander, for his part, took Eugene outside to smoke his feelings away. He'd been the one to bring Aurelia down when Lyle's telekinesis didn't restrain her. Our powerful regina. I bet that had been a surprise for Lyle.

To my own surprise, somewhere in the night, perhaps from the cold, Aurelia shifts into a lioness, her weight heavy and warm on me, although her pelt is patchy and thread-bare. At some stage, she becomes a wolf, making tiny whining noises. Savage shifts then too, returning the whine and laying his head on my other shoulder. Her mental voice mumbles sleepily in our heads although the only discernible thing I recognise is a faint, "We do not react, we respond." Which makes me want to clutch her tighter.

But somewhere in the darkest part of the night, my animus perks up in utter delight, bringing me out of my light doze.

Aurelia still lies on me, but not in any form I've seen her in before.

Her skin is smooth and grey. Huge, triangular teeth lie dangerously close to my carotid. Five gill slits search for a current and, finding none, dilate uselessly. A fin swishes somewhere beyond the end of the bed.

My heart skips a beat and I almost leap out of bed, stopping myself just in time. In this form, she does not need hair or fur or feathers. It's perfect.

Without any water, her anima shifts back into her eagle form and she takes a deep lungful of air.

"What's happening?" Her voice is a tired whisper in my head.

"Do you want to come to the water with me?"

"Yes?" she says hopefully.

Something happens to my face that has rarely happened in the last ten years.

As carefully as I can, I get myself and Aurelia off the bed, cover her in a blanket, and barefoot, walk us out of the animus dorms.

Christine lets me into the anima dorms with a sleepy, gargoyle mumble and wave of her spindly fingers. Since Marduk destroyed the pool I normally use, I've had to use the underground cavern Aurelia occupied as her hideout during her rabid phase.

I head right through the dragon portrait at the end of Aurelia's old corridor and down the spiralling staircase, the orange flames of the dragon wall sconces spluttering to life as we pass.

Aurelia must scent the place and recall it because she raises her head as we arrive at the wide canal with the ancient wooden boat. I kneel down on the black stone floor.

"Want to try again?"

She lets out a breathy sigh through her beak. "Roll me in."

Aurelia shifts as I oblige her wish, splashing into the water and shifting at the same time. Her body rapidly elongates, her skin changing and becoming thicker as she becomes something older than trees themselves. Her beak transforms into something much more ferocious. The backs of my eyes prickle as her dorsal fin pierces the surface of the water. She was always beautiful as an eagle, but it takes my breath away to see her as a Great White shark.

And something ancient and primal at my core roars in triumphant agreement.

She does a lap of the water, exploring this new body, because this has the feel of something new and novel.

Returning to me, her broad nose skimming the top of the water, she whispers into my mind, "Let me see you."

In a trance, I unbutton my shirt and pants, sliding them off me with the type of disbelief that assails a man who's always walked a world apart from everyone else. With a deep exhale, I drop into the water and shift.

My bones breathe a sigh of relief as they crunch, and my skin grows warm as it thickens. My mind calms and expands, settling like a baby held by its mother. Five gill slits open along both sides of my neck and only when I'm completely in my animus form do I turn to look at Aurelia.

Her mating mark glows white under the surface just above her gill slits. The beat of her heart resounds through the water, a song that calms my own rapid drumming.

We circle each other. Simply watching. Simply existing in the muffled sounds of the canal, away from the horrors that await both of us above. I wish I could take her into the heart of the Pacific and show her the beauty that lies there. The great depth. The great wisdom of the water.

But I realise something now. That the enchantment of the sea pales in comparison to my regina. She is a thing of profound beauty, and I would forever rue the day I ever thought to end her.

I never expected this. Had never dared to entertain the hope of experiencing the water with a pack member, let alone my regina.

Aurelia does not say anything. But her eyes, brilliant and blue—they tell me everything I need to know.

The tragedy of the truth is written in blood upon my own heart. Every first of ours would be a last. And every last, I would cherish until my final day upon land.

I owe my regina that.