The sparrows nesting in the nooks and crannies of Staple Inn took more than a passing notice of Shrike as he perched in their territory. Their song turned from a warning chirrup to an angry trill. Shrike puffed up his own feathers and fixed his keen eye on the figures within the window-glass.
The death of Felix Knoll did not affect Shrike quite so much as it perhaps ought. Mortals died every day; most of them undeserving of their fate. Felix, from what little Shrike had known of him and what fragments he’d heard from Wren, might have deserved his fate more than most. It wasn’t for Shrike to say. His own concerns lay entirely in how the death of Felix would affect his Wren.
The mystery, likewise, lay beyond Shrike’s power to judge.
The happenstance of following Tolhurst to the temple hadn’t given Shrike as much insight into the man as he thought Wren might have gleaned in his stead. Fortunately for Shrike, Tolhurst had seemed happy enough to carry both halves of a conversation. Shrike had only to point to the Green Man in the roof to explain his purpose in the temple to Tolhurst’s satisfaction. And the leather oak-leaf mask, with Wren’s ingenious sigil, glamoured away any hint of Shrike’s antlers to Tolhurst’s eyes.
But despite Tolhurst’s friendly regard, Shrike remained wary. In the fae realms a smile all-too-oft served to bare fangs.
Shrike had merely the barest glimpse of Miss Flora. Which struck his curiosity all the more. If Wren needed to solve the mystery of Felix’s death, then Shrike could do no less than seek her out and discover what role she had to play.
A shrill cry was all the warning Shrike received before a particularly bold sparrow swooped down. Shrike whirled to shriek his riposte. The sparrow veered off back up to the rafters to continue its angry chirrups.
Shrike paid it no heed. He posed no threat to sparrow fledglings. Nor did the sparrows themselves pose any real danger to him.
The remainder of the afternoon passed into evening without further incident. Mr Grigsby left the office without taking any notice of Shrike yet perched on the window-sill. Soon after, Wren emerged. From the moment his boot-heel touched the cobblestones, he turned his head in all directions in search of Shrike.
Shrike flitted down to land on his shoulder.
Wren jumped in astonishment, which threw Shrike from his perch, but he regained it soon enough.
“Forgive me,” Wren murmured, and ventured to stroke Shrike’s feathered head with gentle fingers.
Shrike didn’t think Wren had done anything to forgive, and he hoped he knew it from how he chirruped and flew up to follow Wren down the lane to Hyde Park.
~
They passed through the toadstool ring to the Grove of Gates. No sooner had Shrike regained his true form than Wren cleaved to him, taking Shrine’s arm in both his own and leaning his head against his shoulder. The tedium with an undercurrent of dread that prevailed in Staple Inn drained him. His only consolation throughout had been the thought of an evening in Blackthorn in Shrike’s company.
Yet as they drew near to the wall of thorns, Wren halted at the sight of dark spots on the path ahead. He glanced up at Shrike to find his attention likewise fixed on the crimson drops crusting to black.
“Is someone hurt?” Wren asked.
Shrike said nothing, though as he continued, the length and speed of his stride increased, forcing Wren to trot to keep up.
Wren’s worry came to a head when he turned a corner in the tunnel of briars to find a hulking figure looming before the cottage. As broad-shouldered as Shrike was tall, with a waist slender as a whip, and bones jutting out one side. He couldn’t see a face or even a head—they had their back to the path.
Then the figure turned toward them. In the same instant, the sun sunk beneath the canopy. The figure was no longer silhouetted, and as Wren’s eyes adjusted to the change of light, he recognized the face.
It was Nell.
With a dead stag larger than her own body slung across her shoulders.
“Oh good, you’re home!” she said. “I’ve been knocking for an age. I didn’t want to kick the door in because, well…” She levied a knowing look at Wren.
Wren cleared his throat. “Your discretion is appreciated.”
Nell laughed. “Since your royal duties detain you from the hunt so often, I thought I’d bring the spoils to you.”
Wren, who still felt rather stupid about mistaking Nell for a troll, couldn’t keep from thinking of a cat. A cat who, seeing its human companions as very poor hunters indeed, might lay a fresh-slain dormouse on the threshold to sustain them. He had to admit venison made a more palatable offering.
Shrike accepted the stag from Nell, bending to allow her to shrug it from her shoulders to his. For a moment, Wren feared the stag’s antlers would lock with Shrike’s own, but Shrike righted himself without further trouble.
“I’d stay to butcher it,” Nell continued. “But I’ve a friend expecting me in the Court of Hidden Folk.”
Shrike, seemingly unbothered by the blood smeared across his shoulders from the hollowed cavity where the stag’s entrails had once lain, wished her well.
But as she began to depart, sudden impulse seized Wren. “Wait!”
