Page 107 of Suncatcher

Pearl turned. Driz ignored everything else, reaching and folding Pearl into her arms, curling her wings until they were completely enclosed. She would keep Pearl safe in her fortress of stone.

Pearl struggled. The rope that bound her hands snapped easily. Someone had tied her up. Someone had touched her. Someone had made her scream.

They would all die. All of them.

Fury unlike anything Driz had known was fracturing her from the inside out.

In the sanctuary of her wings, all was dark and calm. But within Driz, the rage would not subside. She growled and shook with the need to destroy. To obliterate everything that threatened what was hers.

“Driz,” Pearl said again.

Driz was here. And she was stone. Pearl would panic about that later. Right now, she needed Driz to let her go.

Pearl reached up, cupping the familiar, yet unfamiliar, face in the darkness of the stone prison of wings. She repeated her name, uncertain if Driz could hear her.

Beneath her hands, Driz vibrated, a menacing growl emanating from her.

“Let me go,” Pearl begged, tears sliding down her face. “My mother…”

The growling grew louder and the pressure around her increased. Constricting her. “You’re hurting me,” Pearl gasped, though it wasn’t quite true.

The shaking grip eased, and Pearl managed to breathe. Driz had heard her.

Beyond the imprisoning veil of stone wings, the muffled sound of voices and calls of panic spiked the fear clawing inside Pearl’s chest. More gunfire. Several shots reverberated around the interior of their private winged hollow.

They were shooting at Driz.

Her mother was bleeding out.

“Please.” Pearl pressed her hands against Driz’s chest, but she didn’t give even an inch. “Let me go.”

“No.” The single word was spoken slowly, as if with great effort. It rumbled around and through her. Terrifying, and also giving Pearl hope.

Pearl gripped the back of Driz’s head, her hair stiff and sculptural instead of soft strands. All of her was so hard, and yet moved as stone should not. Pearl pulled herself up and pressed her lips over Driz’s cold ones.

Driz didn’t react outwardly, but the growling quieted.

“Please,” Pearl whispered between soft, coaxing kisses. “Please, Driz. Come back to me.”

After an agonizingly long time, Driz’s lips twitched, responding, even if slightly, to Pearl’s.

“Yes,” Pearl breathed. “That’s right.”

Driz’s growl began again, but with a different timbre as her stone mouth opened more, parting Pearl’s lips. Her hands curled, pressing Pearl closer again.

“Don’t crush me,” Pearl gasped, dismayed that a quiver of fear shook her voice. She trusted Driz. But she also knew this wasn’t entirely her Driz. Not right now.

“I…keep you…safe,” Driz stated, her slow promise rumbling through Pearl’s chest.

“Yes, I want that,” Pearl assured her. “But I need to keep someone safe too. And she’s right there. She’s in danger. I need your help. Help me.”

“How?” Driz asked, her body shaking harder.

“Open your wings. Let me see her.”

After a long, trembling silence, the curtain of darkness slowly cracked open, letting light and the world through. Her wings parted, yet the hold of Driz’s arms remained unyielding.

Pearl twisted around, searching frantically.