The Weight of a Wing (The Stolen Wings Book 1) (20 page)

“Honey, we’re home!” Rafe called in a sing-song voice when
they entered the apartment. His shirt was stained, but his arms were clean
after having healed himself in the car.

Alise slipped around him and propped her hand against the
cabinet next to the door. While she untied her sandals, she lifted each leg,
hobbling in the corner of the entryway.

“Oh, good!” Cassie yelled from the kitchen. “The dinner will
take a little while longer!”

“Great!” Rafe walked into the kitchen and dropped the fruit
onto the counter. Then he stole a few crackers. “I’ll be in the shower!” He
winked and carefully closed the door. Back in the corridor, he got distracted
by the way Alise’s body was bent as she struggled to undo the many hooks of her
sandals.

“What’s she making?” Alise asked, her head still down at
knee level.

“No idea, but Vale was scared when he left.”

“That’s why it takes him so long to return?” While she
didn’t look up, the sarcasm was clear in her voice.

Rafe had no answer prepared. Vale wasn’t going to return
until he found some answers, possibly from Nate, if he could get to that
particular troublemaker without raising suspicion. At least that was the plan,
so he crossed the corridor, whistling to himself, and walked into the bathroom,
shutting the door behind him.

* * *

Twenty minutes later, more than enough time for a decent
shower, Alise knocked on the door, asking for her turn. Bickering and minor
threats managed to drag him out.

Sometime after that, she walked into her room, rubbing hand
lotion into her skin because she liked the way it smelled, not for its
therapeutic effects. Rafe sat on the edge of her bed, shirt undone and hands
resting upon his knees. He gazed at her, making her feel self-conscious of the
way she looked, from the pinned up hair with wet tendrils falling down her
neck, to the white kimono with hand-painted cherry flowers all over the silk,
to her bare feet.

“I didn’t know human soap was supposed to be acidic, or did
you make it like that on purpose?” He feigned a smile that came out more pained
than amused and held up his hands. Both were covered in blotches going up his
arms and into the sleeves of his new shirt.

Where had he gotten that shirt
? The wounds weren’t
new. They had simply reappeared at the contact with the water. Tricky bugger …
That muddy monster hadn’t been as harmless as it had seemed.

“Don’t be silly,” she muttered. “I would have been more
creative than that.” She could have had his drink poisoned. The word was that
Guardians were incredibly funny when intoxicated, although not many people had
lived to see it happen, and the recent experience with Vale told her that might
not be true. Or she could have had his blades turn sideways, which would have
annoyed him to no end since the blades were more precious to the Guardians than
their own children, assuming they ever had any, which they didn’t. But, of
course, she couldn’t do either anymore. It was nice to dream about it, though.

Moving closer, she placed her small hands on top of his.
Grayish vines circled her wrists, trembling at the surface of her pale skin.

“No, stop…” Rafe shook his head and tried to push her away.

Alise grasped at his hands. “Don’t.” Maybe if she lost all
of her magic, she wouldn’t go insane that fast. Maybe they could both gain
something from this. At the same time, part of her was painfully aware she
needed his touch. She needed his magic. The poison was eating her from the
inside out.

The healing process took its time, and she didn’t let go
until any signs of wounds were completely gone. This time, it would hold.
Healing stones dealt with basic healing. They couldn’t adjust to special cases,
but she could.

Rafe’s piercing stare fixed on her face. She grimaced,
thinking about the way she looked. Her golden tan was fading, leaving her
complexion ashen. Her eyes were losing color, becoming translucent, and reddish
streaks that weren’t normally there had appeared in her dark hair. She felt the
changes just like she felt the vines constricting and struggling to survive.
Unable to hold Rafe’s gaze, she released his hands and lowered her eyes,
preparing to step back.

It didn’t come as a surprise when he reached for the lapels
of her kimono and pulled her towards him. Faces inches apart, they stared into
each other’s eyes for a long, peaceful moment. There was no tension, no
quickening of heartbeats, no blood rush. There was only acknowledgment of what
was about to happen next, what needed to be done. Her craving for magic had
increased tenfold just by looking at him, and even if she wanted to stop him,
she wasn’t able to. Her body had a mind of its own.

The kiss came naturally at this point. Rafe initiated it,
but Alise followed his lead, tilting her head while their breath mingled. The
magic drew her in, she could not deny it, but he wasn’t forcing her. He let her
take what she needed from him without imposing his will on her. He might have
if she tried to resist, but she had no intention of doing that.

Alise didn’t protest when Rafe’s hands trailed up the kimono
to cup the sides of her face. She boldly moved forward to straddle him, her
knees resting on either side of him. Her body arched as his hands traced the
lines of her back, and she wrapped her arms around his neck.

Crawling inside his skin was not an option, but she would
get as close as she could. She pushed his shirt out of the way because she
needed to feel his warm skin underneath her palms. The contact soothed her, and
while some parts of her brain cleared, others got fuzzy in a different way. Had
it been the human factor that she had been missing? She had been alone for such
a long time, not trusting anyone since Gorem had scarred her for life.

But life was short, especially for Fairies without wings.
She needed to make the most of it. She closed her eyes, determined to enjoy it
while it lasted. Slowly, her focus switched from the magic to the Guardian who
moved her around and laid her on the bed. When she opened her eyes again, Rafe
was on top of her.

Lit up by the sun setting outside the window, the hair that
had fallen on his forehead looked like a halo of liquid gold. Underneath it,
his eyes shone. “Are you all right?” he asked in a low voice.

Alise nodded. She did feel better. The pain would come later
when the poison and the magic clashed. He had fed her craving, holding nothing
back, and now she felt more balanced, more grounded. And this had nothing to do
with the mountain of flesh pinning her down … or maybe it did. She couldn’t
tell. But once his job was done, she expected him to pull back. It would be the
sensible thing for a Guardian to do.

Instead, Rafe leaned to one side so as not to crush her and
pulled on the silk that kept her hidden from his sight. With gentle moves, he
opened the kimono, unveiling the angle of a shoulder, the curve of a breast,
her ribcage, her waist, a hip… Alise held back a breath.

The poison had left her body horribly marred. The skin
remained smooth, but a dark area spread on her right side, and the vines
growing from it had increased in size compared to the first time she had seen
them. The vines had passed over her ribs in both the front and back, and the
one going down her hip had reached her mid-thigh. They weren’t going to stop
there.

Rafe’s fingers gently traced the vines. Her skin had become
numb on those dead pathways, but it burned everywhere else. He lowered his head
and brushed his lips against her waist, extracting a whimper from deep inside
her. She couldn’t stand that much tenderness, and sinking her fingers in his
unruly hair, she pulled his head up towards her.

He dived for her lips, kissing her roughly, as if wanting to
wipe the pained expression off her face. The gentleness was gone. His body
rubbed urgently against hers, pressed upon her, looking for points of entrance.
Clothes became obsolete, ending up discarded in a pile on the floor.

They exchanged no words, only sighs and moans as nature took
over and had them do what came naturally. The air vibrated around them, sparks
flew out of nowhere, and when he held her tightly, preventing her from crossing
that final bridge without him, she knew this was not about magic. This was
something else…

Rafe zipped his pants and rolled up the sleeves of his white
shirt. He looked pensively at the shape hidden beneath the sheets. Alise lay on
her side with her hands under her cheek. Her face was serene while she slept.
Funny because he doubted she had peaceful dreams. No one who had gone through
what she had been through could escape the nightmares. Her eyelids fluttered,
and a smile tugged at the corners of her lips. At least she was spared for now.

He cracked the window open to let the evening breeze in and
closed the drapes. The lamppost right outside the window gave off an annoying
bright light in the evening. He planned on letting her sleep until dinner, and
by the sounds coming from the kitchen, it appeared that it wasn’t ready yet.
She could use the rest.

He walked around the bed, coming closer to her side, facing
her back. The lightning-shaped scars were barely visible in the twilight. He
had seen the scars before, cut them open, healed them, touched them, kissed
them. But that wasn’t what he found interesting. A shimmer spread across the
sheets behind her, forming the outline of a pair of wings that weren’t there.
They had been once, and her body remembered them. With the recently acquired
magic, it could recreate their image down to the smallest nervure. Beautiful.

Rafe’s fists clenched by his sides.
The bastard tried to
kill her
. Whatever Gorem’s reasons had been, he was going to make him pay.
He took one last look at Alise—the wings fluttered with every intake of air—and
left the room, silently closing the door behind him. He turned around and froze
when he came face to face with Vale.

“Hey.” Rafe nodded. “Any luck?” He made sure to lower his
voice.

“I couldn’t get to him,” Vale said. “They’re aware Nate’s
been slipping in and out so they’ve forbidden any visits. And there wasn’t
anyone else in the golden cages whom I could pretend to be visiting.”

That was not good, but he would worry about Nate later.

“I did find out something, though,” Vale said. “There’s a
Witch on this side who might be able to help. She can do magic between worlds.”

“That sounds interesting,” Rafe said. It meant she could
drag Gorem back here. “I would like to meet this Witch.”

Vale sighed. “I thought you would.”

“Do you know where to find her?”

“I have an idea … if we could convince her to cooperate.”

“Leave that part to me.” Rafe’s grin was cold enough to
scare anyone, even a Witch.

Vale’s green-gray eyes glanced to the door behind Rafe and
back at him. “You shouldn’t have done that.”

Rafe knew Vale was right, but he refused to admit it. It had
felt too right at the time to suddenly be wrong. It didn’t change the fact that
it was inappropriate. “It doesn’t matter. It’s done now.”

Vale gave him a long look. “You won’t be able to kill her
now.”

It wasn’t a question, and Rafe didn’t disagree. He simply
raised his shoulders. “I wouldn’t have been able to do it anyway.”

Another long look. “There will come a day when she will beg
you to do it.”

Rafe hoped it wouldn’t come to that, although there was only
one way it could end.

“You’re going to deny her that,” Vale said, reading him like
an open book. “You’re going to keep her to yourself and hope to find a cure,
regardless of how much pain she’s in.”

“But I’ll never stop looking for one.” It was the only
answer Rafe had, for Vale or anyone else.

Vale scowled. “That’s thoughtless and selfish.”

He shrugged. “Aren’t we all?”

* * *

“Let them be.” Cassie eyed the couple enjoying the fresh air
on the balcony.

Outside the window, Rafe’s and Alise’s silhouettes profiled
on the backdrop of the city. They leaned against the rail, standing closer to
each other than they had a day earlier. Their faces looked peaceful, too.

“They deserve a moment of peace.” She smiled to herself.

“Not that kind of peace,” Vale muttered, unable to keep a
frown from forming on his face.

Dinner was over, and he had agreed it had been a good one.
She was starting to learn everyone’s preferences. It wasn’t a crowd that was
hard to please, and Vale had even offered to help her with the dishes. When
they finished, he hung the towel in its holder and headed back to the living
room.

Cassie walked after him. “What is it with you? I thought
you’d want Rafe to be happy ... even if it’s with someone else.” She settled on
the couch, facing him.

“That’s not happiness. That’s only going to lead to more pain,”
Vale said and gave her a puzzled look as he reached over the table to
straighten the plate that had one slice of coffee cake left on it. “What do you
mean ‘even if it’s with someone else’?”

“Well…” Cassie bit her lip, fearing she’d gone too far this
time. “It’s clear you don’t like her, you barely tolerate me, and I haven’t
seen you checking out other girls like Rafe does all the time ... so I figured
you might be interested in him.”

“Really? Me interested in
him
?” Vale chuckled. “Sorry
to disappoint you, sweetheart,” he somehow managed to impersonate Rafe’s voice,
“but I don’t swing that way. And before you ask why…” He pressed a finger to
her lips to keep her quiet. “Let me tell you that
that
—” he pointed at
the couple on the balcony, “—can’t work out. We’re not supposed to fall for
people outside our species. I know so,” he said bitterly.

“You know so because...” Cassie’s eyes narrowed. “You also
fell for someone you deem to be inappropriate, didn’t you? What did you do?
Fall for a washing machine?”

The look Vale gave her told her he didn’t find it funny.

“Washing machine?” The room exploded with Rafe’s laughter.
He walked into the living room and scooped up the cake, coming close to
dropping cream on the floor. “I’d love to see her face when hearing that a mere
human compares her to a washing machine.” He was still laughing. “By the way,
how is the Lady of The Mists doing these days?”

“I don’t know. She didn’t call after we killed half of her
guards,” Vale replied, making an unhappy face.

“Ouch.” Rafe’s grimace was half-hearted. “But you must admit
it was fun.” He grinned in spite of the sore subject.

“Yes, it was,” Vale said. “Now, can we drop it?”

Rafe nodded and focused on saving the cream dripping through
his fingers. “Shouldn’t you girls start to get ready for the party?”