Chapter 10

I already regret it.The moment the little envoy uttered my full name, I knew this journey wouldn’t give me what I’d hoped, but it’s too late to turn back now.

The shuttle’s been descending long enough that I’ve grown accustomed to the numbing vibrations against my folded wings. We’ll be landing soon, I’m almost sure of it. When I imagined coming home, I visualized Jace walking the paths of the eyrie and pictured what his face would look like while his pale eyes took in my world. Returning felt vital, like a compulsion that I needed to fulfill to keep all the roughened, worn pieces of our love in place. I want—need—a life with him, but when we step outside that shuttle, it won’t be about us. It’ll be about them.

My parents will be waiting. The nestmates who remained here in Fallil. The community I left behind seven years ago. I may have thought of them all from time to time since my self-imposed exile, but I never looked back. I wasn’t supposed to return.

My thoughts feel too volatile for my body to contain, like they’ll burst from beneath my hide if I let them. I don’t realize my hands are shaking until Jace reaches out and grabs one, pressing my left palm against his leg while he winds his fingers through the spaces between mine.

“Shh,” he says, the sound a subtle, breathy thing that shouldn’t be a word at all, but he makes it so. The command is illogical—I’m not making noise. He should’ve told me to be still, but somehow it works anyway. My hand doesn’t move under the solidity of his grip.

“Stay close to me,” I tell him.

I speak softly. I don’t want Zana Losla to overhear. The young one looks distracted now, and he doesn’t appear to be watching us, but I need to be careful. Maybe breathing in the trapped air from the shuttle is what finally woke me up. I can almost taste the sharp tang of the northern breezes and the damp, earthy flavor of rock layered upon rock. I swallowed down that air, and now I’m aware—I’m anxious. I don’t know why I anticipated a warm welcome. Nothing will be simple. It never was.

“Stop worrying. I won’t do anything stupid,” Jace replies. He’s not whispering, but he’s looking across the shuttle, seemingly ignoring me as he speaks. He understands well enough I want this bit of conversation to stay private.

It’s a good thing we’re all firmly restrained. The shuttle suddenly tilts. I bang the tips of my horns against the wall behind me when I startle, but Jace just wraps his free hand around his chest restraint and shifts his stance. He looks like he does this every day, like it comes as naturally as breathing.

The ride smooths out, and Zana Losla lets out a faint chuff, but no one would believe he was amused, not if they could see his rigid posture and the shiny-slick sheen of fear in his eyes. “We’re almost to the eyrie. Your family is eager to welcome your home, gazla,” he says.

I dip my horns in acknowledgment, but I don’t reply. For years, I hadn’t heard my language in a voice other than my own outside of the recordings I brought away with me. The closest I came was listening to Jace speak my people’s words, but he made them anew, incapable of forming the true sounds of our tongue. It hurts to hear the young one speak, but it’ll pain me far more to hear our words again from the lips of my fathers.

The interior lights flash orange, signaling the end of our transport. “We’re here,” I say quietly for Jace’s benefit. He’s quick to drop the hand wrapped around his chest restraint, and I smile faintly. He was always what he calls a quick study.

The shuttle’s landing gear absorbs most of the impact when we touch down, but it’s definitely noticeable, and we get rocked around a bit before everything settles and the restraint system retracts. The lowlander piloting the craft rises from his stool and grabs our baggage without looking up or speaking. I can see Jace watching him, and I can sense the questions piling up in his mind. Hopefully he can contain them until we’re alone again, because there’s no way to give him a satisfactory answer with an audience.

The pilot opens the exit hatch and steps out, presumably to deliver our baggage to some waiting youths. They’ll take our things to whatever accommodations we’ve been granted for the duration of our stay. Zana Losla glances our way and stands taller, his wings flaring slightly before he leaves the shuttle. I take Jace’s hand and lead us out after him, bracing myself for the sight of my people.

“Open your eyes—you’re going to trip,” Jace whispers from behind.

I did close them, didn’t I? I puff up my chest and lift my wings the same as Losla as soon as my foot touches the weathered stone of the home cliff. I’m returning to my eyrie the same way I left it—bare of any alien coverings, clothed only in my pride. Jace squeezes my hand, and I curse myself for bringing us here. This isn’t like before at all; I brought home a mate. A mate.

The glimmer of mica on the ground catches my attention first, but I don’t allow myself the luxury of looking down for long. Jace doesn’t let go of my hand as he moves up to my side. I lift my face, and I freeze.

Lohnya and more Lohyna…so many of us it doesn’t even seem real. My eyrie is teeming with us. The cliff is painted bright with the bodies of my people. Gatherings of nestmates sit crouched on the ledges, wings folded and left pointing downwards into the open air. Those who could be my brothers stand guard in front of the path that leads to our residences, ensuring the safety of every Fallil nest. I swallow thickly. I recognize the group standing closer than all the rest, even if their faces have changed along with the slope of their shoulders.

“Sohen Onava, your fathers receive you with gratitude to the winds.” One man steps forward from the group of four as he speaks, the gazla of Clan Onava. “You’ve returned to claim your nest and your mates. Let us rejoice!”

Then he walks towards me, his large frame and broad wings a mirror of my own. My head tips down as I lower my horns without thinking. This man has always commanded my respect.

“My gazla,” I say as his hands clasp my shoulders and he presses his forehead against mine. Our horns clink together, and it knocks me back to another life. This feeling cuts in a way I couldn’t anticipate, and I’m left leaning into my father’s hands, unable to keep my feet beneath me without his strength.

“Sohen,” he says, and I hear the wear of seven years’ absence.

He steps back and releases me, and the others come forward. Illson’s hands are smoother, softer, his voice fluid and loose where my gazla’s was rough. Hands shift and slip away as the next of my fathers greets me.

“I missed you.” I say it to all of them, but I can’t meet any of their gazes. Not yet.

“Jace Cesari, the one who brought our son home to us.” I turn to watch as my gazla embraces Jace the same way he did me, hands on shoulders, face to face. Jace doesn’t disappoint. He doesn’t lose his composure or his balance—he nods at my father with a slight smile.

“I’m honored to meet you and all of Sohven’s fathers,” he says.

They all stiffen, wings rippling and contracting as they share a look that speeds from man to man until as one, they fix their attention back onto Jace.

“Sohen requested permission to return to complete the mating ritual among our eyrie, yet you already name him as your claimed mate,” states my father Illson.

“Forgive me if I’ve offended anyone, but you should understand that we didn’t know whether Sohen would ever be allowed to return to Lohnyal. Our affection for one another isn’t new. I don’t claim him as my mate lightly.” Jace is in diplomatic mode, using pretty words to try and keep my fathers appeased. If I hadn’t completed enough missions with him to recognize it, I might be more alarmed by his sudden change in personality.

The near silence of our initial meeting begins to fade. The soft murmur of low voices rises around us as the rest of the eyrie watches and judges the return of their disgraced gazla. Now that I hear them, I feel the way their eyes turn to me. Ever present, their gazes are heavy enough that it feels like a hundred nameless hands pressing against my hide, all hungry to claim a piece of me.

“We’re grateful that you’re both here, whatever may have come before. By the festival’s end, you’ll be able to name him your mate in earnest, blessed by the winds and the spirits of our ancestors,” says my father Hanen as he addresses Jace.

Jace’s smile is more brittle than before as he accepts Hanen’s words. “I’m looking forward to the festival,” he replies, his calm demeanor slipping slightly when that engenders a round of amused chuffing from my fathers and the rest of the eyrie close enough to have heard him speak.

“We’re all anticipating the start of the festival!” someone calls from behind an outcropping. I don’t recognize the voice, but others must, as his friends snap their wings and chuff again, although some of them look embarrassed by the outburst.

I step back to stand beside Jace. “You didn’t say anything wrong,” I say softly, for his ear only. “The youths just find anything to do with mating alternately exciting and hilarious. Ignore them.”

I look up to find my fathers watching us with varying degrees of approval. Illson’s eyes are on our linked hands before he glances up and dips his horns. “I’ll take Jace with me to prepare for this evening’s initial rites.”

“What? No,” I reply, extending my wing behind Jace to close us in together. “We won’t be separated. Jhevase is mine. The winds of countless planets have already blessed our union.”

Jace wiggles his hand free and sidles out from beneath my wing. “I think we can bear a little time apart,” he says to the others before he turns back to me. “If you’ve changed your mind, we can leave, but if you want to reconnect with your family and complete this ritual, we should be respectful,” he whispers in what my translator identifies as an obscure human language. “Pavok,” he says knowingly as he tips his head towards the device and my ear. “It’s called Czech.”

I’m grateful Jace seems unintimidated by my eyrie. He’s able to think clearly enough to choose a language that won’t be on any standard translation devices on Lohnyal. It may be rude to speak so that my clan can’t understand us, but it’s better we appear impolite than have them hear every word.

“I’ll watch over him. Calm yourself, young one,” Illson tells me as he glides towards Jace. His graceful form is slighter, but my father still stands a head above Jace. I hold back a territorial bellow when his wing extends far enough to curve around Jace’s back. The fact that it doesn’t touch him is the only thing that allows me that much self-control.

Talons rip across my hip. “Stop. It’s poor behavior for a son to be jealous of his own nest-minder. Show Illson proper respect,” my gazla hisses between closed teeth. “Come—we’ll return to the home nest, and then later we’ll show you the one that will be yours.”

Jace turns his head back, most of his face obscured by my father Illson’s raised wing, but his eyebrows jump, and I can imagine his smile. Then he looks away, every step putting more distance between us.

I breathe deeply of the air that I missed so much. The richness of loam mingles with sharp, brisk winds coming off the northern oceans. I shudder as I exhale. I misjudged—terribly, but we’re here now. We’ll complete tonight’s rite, and then I’ll explain that the nest they’ve chosen will remain empty. I fear my next absence will be longer than seven years’ time.