Page 60 of Ruby
She lets out a hum of frustration, the sound a rich break from the toneless language of the male who saved her. “They were angry. I wasn’t.”
She flexes her hands, showing me her new claws, clean, curved, precise against her pale fingers.
“They didn’t expect me to fight back.” When she lets out a hum, there is pride in it, controlled but undeniable.
I look at the bruises blooming dark against her neck, dark yellow staining white skin. “You were injured.”
She meets my gaze without wavering. “I injured them more.”
I still feel the guilt spreading, cold and relentless. “You should not have needed to fight.”
Her hum turns angry. “Szhe’ka. It’s my body. My fight. You don’t get to decide how I feel about it.”
The rebuke is precise. Clean. Correct.
I tilt my head. “You are correct.”
She crouches to wash off the blood coating her arms and the blue and yellow remain, each becoming clearer and richer with each stroke. Integrated. Natural. Like my own coloring. Feathers woven through her long red threads echo the tones along her skin.
She runs her hand over a healing wound and winces, then stiffens. Her shoulders lock. Her hand flies to her head.
“Szhe’ka—” she gasps before doubling over. I am beside her instantly. “What is happening?” Her breath fractures. “I don’t—”
She covers her mouth, dampening the sound of her scream as she falls to her knees, splashing water onto my feathers as I catch her, then arches her head back, eyes open wide in her panic.
As I watch, unsure how to help, her right eye darkens. Not the pupil — the entire eye. Black. Absolute. Her left eye shifts next, red giving way to blue, deepening, inner green igniting until it mirrors my own.
One void. One mine. The transformation is fast and brutal. She screams, losing control of her volume, the sound tearing through the quiet valley. Blood spills from her nose, vivid yellow against pale skin. Then from her mouth. She coughs, yellow staining the water beneath her.
Her body convulses as claws gouge the more delicate skin along my shoulders. Then she clutches her stomach, shaking. “It burns,” she manages.
“Breathe,” I command, though my own voice is unsteady.
She coughs again, then gradually stills. The black eye blinks once. The other narrows with startling clarity. Her breathing slows, though tremors continue to ripple through her frame. I realize my own hands are shaking, the larger set violently trembling.
“Why is this happening?” she croaks out, between ragged breaths.
“Know not. But not only you,” I tell her. “Ree has traits of Thivoll.” Ani’s mismatched gaze lifts to mine, one eye abyssal, the other unmistakably kin to my own.
“Probably all of us are changing,” she says.
The stream carries the last traces of blood away. She reaches for one of my upper hands, steady despite everything.
“I’m not afraid,” she says.
I wish I could say the same. Instead, I tighten my grip around her fingers and stare at the water as it flows past, knowing with cold certainty that we are no longer merely adapting.
The pattern of our song is changing.
Azoeul interrupts us with a pouch of supplies, and emotion surges again at the sight of him.
I resent him for saving her, even while grateful he did. But it should have been faster. Both of us were too slow. Why wasn’t he there sooner? Could he not have stopped whatever they did to her?
“Ready,” Ani calls, pulling me from my thoughts.
“Azoeul gathered food,” she says tonelessly. “You found rope. We can leave.”
Is she really this unmoved or is it just the language? My head spins with too many emotions, and the thought of her feeling unaffected makes me feel…
