I felt for his hand with one of mine and took it, while I pressed a finger to his lips. The bird was overhead again. Circling. Circling. Soon, the Claws would be here, too. It was only a matter of time. My heart was racing as I pressed closer to Osprey. My eyes following the large spirit-bird above. Would I have the strength to fight when eventually we were found? Would my bees be back to full strength by then?
It felt as if we, too, were deep in that cavern, lost together. But Osprey’s mother was not coming for us. I would have to be there for him right now.
Beside me, Osprey swayed lightly, and he leaned on me with more weight than I thought he would if he was fully well.
My heart was still thundering as the raven finally flew away again. I removed my finger from Osprey’s lips.
“House Apidae?” he whispered.
“Yes?”
“You are the one so precious to me that I would walk any path to save you, face any danger to find you, pay any price to keep you from harm. When this feather has left me, I will prove that to you.”
“I don’t need to be safe,” I said. “I need to be free.”
“I know,” he said, and he leaned in a little closer so that his face was tucked in the hollow of my neck. He kissed me there, almost reverently. “I will honor that.”
I hesitated. “Vasyklo?”
He shivered slightly at my use of his name.
“House Apidae.”
I reached up and cupped his face with my hand and in response, the feather in my chest seemed to almost stab me with pain. I bit my lip against it and shivered a little when he leaned into my hand, his rough stubble chafing my palm.
“Are you – are you upset that I am married? Does it make you hesitate about me?”
“I don’t think you’re married, House Apidae. Did you say vows?” His voice was deep and burred.
“No.”
“Did you commit yourself before the stars and the skies?”
“No.”
“Then it’s very simple. You are not married at all.” His tone was almost light.
I helped him up from the tangle we were hidden in, half-pulling him up when he seemed to sag at the effort. My feather burned in my chest.
“I am in the eyes of the law.”
“A law that we plan to overthrow. You want to be free? I want you to be free, too. Free of oppression. Free of evil. Free of a man who would take you against your will. And I will give my life and all that I am to give you that. But House Apidae, can you lend me a little strength? I think I’m almost out.”
I was already letting him lean on me. What else could I do? I wondered. An image of his mother, gathering a young Osprey in her arms came to me and I shifted so I could wrap my arms around him in a hug. I could feel his sigh in my hair. Gently, I reached for his face with both my hands, and when he pressed into them rather than pulling back, I leaned in and slowly, gently, kissed him. Kisses, it turned out, only became more addictive the more you had of them.
Even when every one of them sends a stab of pain from that marriage feather into my heart. My head was spinning, and nausea rolled up through me before I was finished and I had to break away – gasping and trembling – before the pain left nothing but a dull ache behind.
“I need to find you somewhere safe to rest before your strength fails,” I whispered.
“Keep kissing me like that and I might just fly without Os.” But his whisper wasn’t entirely honest, and he leaned on me heavily as I helped him along the forest floor.
I felt an almost wiggling feeling in my mind and then he stumbled beside me. I caught his arm, but I knew what it was by instinct. My bee was going deeper. It was burning out more of the Forbidding inside him.
He was swaying badly by the time I found a path and began to follow it through the trees. It would be safer to go deeper into the forest, but I needed somewhere to hide – somewhere warm and safe – and that meant people.
I should have had a better plan than this – but I hadn’t expected to kidnap him. I hadn’t expected to be chased. This was all new to me.
The pain in my breast seared through again so that I clutched my chest with one fist as I tried to catch my breath. Time was limited. Eventually, either Juste would pull me to him with this feather, or I would have to set one of my bees loose on myself and hope I could maintain the strength to heal while healing myself – somehow that seemed impossible. I gritted my teeth and pressed on.
We spoke little, and despite Osprey’s claims that my kisses could fuel him, I could tell he was digging deep in himself to keep himself upright. I tried to tell him stories of my own past to keep him with me. Stories of my brothers and sisters and our small adventures. Of the time Abghar had to cut my pony loose from the Forbidding with me still on its back. Of the time I’d climbed a tree and been stuck up there until Helissa brought a ladder, scolding me all the while. Of the time our cat gave birth to thirteen kittens and the troubles they caused that winter when all of us claimed one for ourselves and we found that Raquella had hidden the extra two in the attic.
I thought it must be helping, because he kept on stumbling forward, leaning often into my strength.
And all this talk of family clutched at my heart and finally set my feet on a firm path. I would bring Osprey to my family. They would know what to do next. They would help me figure out what to do about my marriage. My belly rolled at the reminder that I was married – as if being married to Juste Montpetit wasn’t bad enough, this feather was making me ill for it.
I just had to find them. I whispered into my hand, thinking of it.
“Come to me, friends. Come. I need your vibrant spirits. I need your fast flight. I need your quick wits. Be like shooting stars. Be like flares of dawn. Be like the Forbidding itself – ever cunning, ever reaching.”
Osprey mumbled something beside me as I brought us to an abrupt halt. Two bees tumbled into my palm and I blew on them.
“Fly fast and true,” I whispered. “You must find me a safe place to bring Osprey. Look for the Single Wing. And you must find my family and guide them back to me. Fly fast. Fly true. Fly to the heart of things.”
Words had power. And I hoped mine had more power than ever as my heart ached, watching them fly. Hopefully, they wouldn’t be caught along the way.
“Hold on,” I whispered to Osprey as I led him down the path. If my words had the power to change reality where my manifestations were concerned, maybe they could do it for Osprey, too.
As we walked and he stumbled along, leaning on me, half in and half out of reality, I talked to him again, but this time I told him how he was brave and strong and how he had tried to save me but how, in the end, I was going to save him and all the children he’d loved and cared for.
Eventually, we found an old cabin with a caved-in roof. By then, it was nearly dark, and Osprey was growing so heavy that I could barely hold him up. I stumbled through the door of the cabin, dragging him with me, and found that while the roof had collapsed over what had once been a rough-hewn table and fireplace, the old straw tick and rope bed was still intact with half a roof hanging over it.
Exhausted, I helped Osprey fall onto the tick, trying to ignore the way it rustled as the vermin in it that were hidden deeper in the straw. I sat on the edge of the bed and tried to catch my breath.
We’d made it one day alive. I had no food and the only water was likely in the mossy rain barrel I’d seen in the yard. It was curious that this old cabin hadn’t been taken over by the Forbidding already, but I was hardly going to complain. In a moment, I would go draw us water from that barrel – somehow. There wouldn’t be a fire. We didn’t dare risk the glow or the smoke. But at least this place provided good cover from spirit-birds flying overhead, and the state of the place suggested that no one called it home anymore.