A man was trapped between his wings and the well at the center of the courtyard.
Human. Dressed in leather armor, dark and well-worn. A cloth mask covered the lower half of his face. A crossbow hung at his belt, and a curved dagger gleamed in his gloved hand.
He was pressed against the stone, surrounded by ravens that circled but didn’t attack, held back by their king’s silent command.
“Who sent you?” Cador’s voice was different. Deeper. It resonated in my chest, in my teeth, in the cold hollow where my heart used to beat.
The man laughed.
It was an ugly sound. The laugh of someone who knew he was going to die and didn’t care.
“The aunt,” he said. “The one whose inheritance you’re sitting on. She’s getting desperate. Told everyone you had a breakdown. Loss Recovery’s been looking for you for three months. Then someone spotted you at a Bride Market, very much alive, and suddenly her whole story falls apart.”
His masked face turned toward me, finding me in the shadows by the door. “She sent her Lawkeeper friends to drag you back legally, but they move too slow for her taste. I’m the faster solution.” A wet laugh. “And you, little bride... you’re the girl who won’t stay buried.” The ravens shrieked.
Cador’s wings snapped forward.
But the assassin was faster.
He ducked under the sweep of feathers and ran, not toward Cador, toward me. The crossbow came up. I saw the bolt leave the bow, saw it spinning toward my chest, and I knew I should move, should dodge, should do something.
Wings wrapped around me, blocked my vision, blocked everything.
I heard the bolt strike.
A dull thunk, then a hiss of pain that wasn’t mine.
Cador stood in front of me, breathing hard, a crossbow bolt embedded in the meat of his left wing. Black blood dripped down the feathers, spattering the flagstones.
He didn’t seem to notice. His eyes were fixed on something behind me.
I turned.
Too slow.
The assassin was already there. He’d circled while Cador shielded me, moved through the shadows like he’d been born to them.
His gloved hand closed around my throat. His dagger pressed against my carotid, the same spot where Cador’s thumb had rested earlier, searching for the pulse I didn’t have.
“Don’t move, Raven King.” The man’s voice was calm. Almost pleasant. “The aunt wants proof she’s dead. One little slice, and I’ve got all the proof I need.”
The ravens fell silent.
Cador stood frozen, his wounded wing hanging slightly lower than the other, his face unreadable, eyes fixed on the blade at my throat, on the man’s gloved hand, on my face.
“Let her go,” he said.
“I don’t think so. She’s worth a lot of money dead, you know. The aunt’s offering double if I bring back the head.” The assassin’s grip tightened on my throat.
“Now, I’m going to walk back toward that wall, and you’re going to stay right where you are, and when I’m over the top, you can have whatever’s left of her.”
I grabbed his wrist.
Not the hand holding the dagger. The other one. The bare one, the hand that had closed around my throat, the hand that was touching my cold, dead skin.
And I pulled.
The sensation was a door opening inside me, a hunger uncoiling.
