remembered dream.
Like a partly erased dream.
The small owl on Wynter’s shoulder nuzzles her neck and sends out an aura of affectionate concern, as if prompting her to delve deep.
“I hid in my room,” Wynter quietly admits. “It was...too hard to go out and see the hatred in everyone’s faces when they looked at my wings. To see Mother and Father’s misery over what I am. But...sometimes, I was content. Cael and Rhys would bring me art supplies and sit with me. And with them, there were moments that I was almost...happy.”
Wynter’s voice breaks off again as other childhood memories intrude.
Sorrowful memories.
* * *
Of her secret attempts to fly into the air and into the white blossoms of the wild plum trees, spring filling her heart with joy as her bird friends flitted about, happily calling for her. And then rising, rising straight up toward the center of the celestial canopy, the cloud-white flowers surrounding her in an embrace as warm sunlight kissed her wings.
And then the painful grip around the ankle, wrenching her to the ground. The blows rained down on her as she cried out and screamed and writhed on the grassy ground, her beloved wingeds chittering their alarm, diving for the priestesses only to be struck.
To be killed.
The memory of the silver robin felled beside her, one wing torn asunder.
The terrified look in the bird’s eyes shattered Wynter’s heart as blows connected with her own wings, the pain excruciating as she screamed and begged and promised she would never, ever fly again.
And then, she was dragged off to be educated by the priestesses. Forced to read passages in the Alfsigr holy book, the Ealaiontorian, again and again and again.
Passages that spoke of the evil of the wingeds, and that her whole spirit railed against.
* * *
And then, the rapid shift to another memory.
She wandered into a room where a brazier was lit, her whole self entranced by the fire leaping in it and toward her, as if in happy greeting, the fire power inside Wynter growing warm and golden.
Her small finger thrusting into the flame, unharmed by the lovely warming fire that sparked straight through her body and bristled through her wings.
Her whole self coming alive.
Her wings coming alive.
And then the shock of cold hands. Wrenching her away from the flame. Hauling her to the head priestess. Then being thrown into a cell where her small form was doused with icy water again and again as she cried out for her brother and cowered on the floor in penitent robes. Struck with sticks. Made to recite verses about abominations who play with hellish fire.
Verses every shred of her being recoiled from.
* * *
But then, the cruelest memory of all.
When her own time to wear the Zalyn’or came.
The minute the necklace touched her skin, a terrible knowing descended. And she finally understood, beyond the shadow of a doubt, that every last passage about the “wingeds” in the Ealaiontorian was true. And that the priestesses had been right all along.
She was an abomination. Dirty and evil and unclean to the bone. Even a lifetime of penance could never wash away her terrible stain.
Newly subdued and distraught with contrition, she threw herself into her art, glorifying the whole unwinged Alfsigr—that group she could never be part of. That shining, blessed thing.
Unlike her.
But there was something else flowing from deep inside her. Something the Zalyn’or could not extinguish—her love for her kind brother, Cael, and for Rhys, who refused to give up on her even after the necklace claimed them all.
* * *
“Did you have fire?” Ysilldir asks, breaking through Wynter’s tormented thoughts. “Before the Zalyn’or?”
Wynter winces with contrition and nods, almost imperceptibly. Wanting to disappear from the cruel weight of her shame laid bare.
“I want to get this Zalyn’or off,” Wynter says, feeling as if the words might detonate the end of Erthia. Her gut cinches, her wings tightening to the point they risk a tear.
Ysilldir’s silver eyes widen, fierce struggle in them. “I, as well.”
“I can barely think it,” Wynter admits tightly.
“Nor I,” Ysilldir says in grim agreement. “Wynter...” Ysilldir starts then stops, and this hesitancy catches Wynter’s attention, cutting through the owls’ collective drone of warning. “Do you think the other things that Sylmire said could be true? If the Alfsigr were all free of the Zalyn’ors...” Ysilldir stops again, then looks at Wynter dead-on. “Do you think we would feel desire?”
This surprises Wynter—not only the nature of the question, but the idea that the Alfsigr would cease to