Page 21 of A Sword of Ice
“We’vebeen looking for you,” the woman—Shula—said again.
Iona’s eyes narrowed, and she could think of nothing else to ask other than, “Why?”
“Because… we are the Resistance.”
13
Shula Azzarh
The cold winds of Castle Aileach whistled against Shula’s stinging skin. The hidden castle that lay deep in the mountains in the northernmost part of Tuath, on the highest peak, was blanketed in snow and ice. Malicious winds whipped through the sky, making Shula wonder if the unrest was due to the endeavor they were about to go on. Like the elements were warning them of the dangers that lay ahead.
Her hands slid through the tresses of her long, dark hair, pulling the locks over her ears before she caught herself. It was a bad habit she knew she was going to have to break. All her life, she’d been used to hiding what she really was.
First, in the reservation camps. Fae had been tolerated in the small confines, but the Fae who held magic were a taboo in the Empire of Illyk. Then when their hatred for the Fae with magic wasn’t enough, they’d ferreted them all out, Seelie and Unseelie alike.
Her parents had died while Shula had fled straight into the arms of an old human woman, whose name she never learned. But that woman had gripped her twelve-year-old hand tightly, taken her through the weaving darkness of the streets of Tuath, and gently pushed her into a run-down house.
Shula remembered the smell quite vividly. It was unpleasant and pervasive, filled with something she couldn’t quite place. And underneath the stench of the chemicals and the herbs? Blood and metal.
Candles and oil lamps had lit up the dirty room, the dancing flames reminding her of what lived within her own soul. The light glinted off the scalpels, scissors, needles, and other sharp objects displayed on the table.
She wanted to feel fear, but the loss of her parents overpowered everything else in her chest. All she knew was the agony of her new reality, of a world without her Papa and Mama, and how she was expected to cope with it while hiding from the dangers of the world. The weight of it all was nearly unbearable.
So when the human woman sat her on a table and the man emerged into the room, Shula didn’t fight. She’d barely even flinched as the scissors and knife made a slit against the tips of her pointed ears, snipping and cutting off cartilage. Needle and thread sewed them back together when he was done, until the evidence of her heritage was left in nothing but aching skin, black thread crisscrossing and tugging painfully. The wounds behind her ears would eventually become scars.
Shula had taken to growing her hair long, if only so it could curtain the evidence. No one noticed her scars because of her waist length hair. She’d hidden her ears for so long now that it was instinct to keep doing it.
She didn’t have to, though; not anymore.
Because she was no longerwiththe humans, and because her ears wereno longer human.
Pushing the strands behind the tips, Shula smiled to herself, letting her fingers graze the pointed edge. It felt as if they’d never been mutilated in the first place. There were no scars, no phantom pain, no evidence of the difficulties of her childhood marring the surface of her skin.
She had Ryker to thank for that.
Ryker Valda.
Her mate.
He was the one who now bore the scars of her shame and survival. Having used his magic to heal the outer part of her that had been broken and twisted to fit into the confines that Illyk had forced her into, they spread behind his own pointed ears. Just another set of scars he wore on his body like an ever-growing collection.
His skin was covered in them. They bisected along nearly every inch, like jagged puzzle pieces that pulled flesh together on his face, separating a black eye from a white one. Two different colors that stared at her hands as she brushed aside her long hair.
His fingers came down, big hand swallowing hers and giving it a squeeze. It was a gesture meant for comfort, but it was gone as soon as he gave it.
Their relationship had been built from hatred and disgust. Eventually, it transcended into secret glances. Into the quiet but rough brush of fingertips that held on for far too long, only to pull away as if the contact burned far too hot. Like it was forbidden to crave someone so different from themselves.
They might have been stuck in that phase.
It didn’t matter that they’d fucked and bonded the night before. The crescent marks of their canines were a bright wound on their necks to prove to everyone that they were officially mates, that they’d claimed one another.
Some habits died hard.
Like fixing hair over ears.
Like avoiding the touch of someone you didn’t know how to make yourself want.
With time, she was sure they would grow used to each other and the mating bond they’d both denied for so long.
