Page 58 of Wings of Cruelty and Flame

“Wants us to pick up ink.”

I laughed, the sound carrying far. “So who won?”

“I always win, dearling.” His arms settled around my waist, thighs tightening around Mak’s body. “Always.”

I rolled my eyes, adjusting my grip on Mak’s spike, waiting for the terrifying moment when we leapt into the sky. It was blue above us, the shade of cornflower and lapis. I’d never believe it had stormed for three days straight if I hadn’t obsessively watched it from every possible window.

“I certainly won when I married you,” Varidian said against my ear, brushing a kiss to the sensitive shell. “Ready to fly, Ameirah?”

“I was ready minutes ago,” I quipped. “You’re the one dragging your heels, husband.”

His laugh travelled all the way down my spine, but there was something about it that sounded forced. Shula’s words came back to me; I had to keep an eye on my husband if he was going to pretend everything was fine and he hadn’t lost a dear friend.

I removed one hand from Mak’s spike to squeeze Varidian’s knee and squealed when he chose that exact moment to tell Makto fly. If I dug my fingernails into leather so hard, they bit into skin, that was his own fault.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

AMEIRAH

Wyfell was a large city surrounded by sand-blasted grass and rolling hills. It sprawled across the road that flowed from the north, all the way down past Morysen, through the forestland of Willow Green, and right to the coast where Ship’s Ruin chewed up trade vessels and spat them out in pieces. Whatever ones made it through the dangerous inlet put their wares on wagons and ended up here.

Wyfell was a loud, fragrant, chaotic trade hub and the market that sprawled across most of the southern part of the city was the epitome of those traits. Outside the mark-scribe’s impressive tent, vendors yelled at the top of their lungs, customers yelled back until voices broke, and the smells of fish, spices, raw meat, log fires, and sweat invaded the hushed space inside the thick canvas. It was a reverent place, where bonds were inked in skin and relationships revealed themselves in sketches of magic. I’d never been anywhere like it.

I’d been excited to get my mark this morning, but now my stomach tangled with nerves. What if my mark was a skull for the death I dealt? What if it was just a huge X because our marriage was going to fail? Across the tent at another scribe’s station, a woman burst into tears. That really wasn’t helping.

I jumped when Varidian rested a broad hand on the small of my back, warmth seeping into me. His closeness and reassuring presence made me feel better, and the way his eyes fixed on me even in a tent full of activity and hushed reverence made me feel… beautiful. Even if the borrowed leather trousers I wore had rubbed my thighs and the jacket pinched my boobs until my breathing was an issue. When Varidian looked at me, I felt like a different person.

“Nervous?” he asked in a murmur.

I bit the inside of my lip. I debated lying, but I wasn’t the best at concealing my emotions. “I wasn’t until I got here. But this is all so…”

“Intimidating?”

“Yes.” I shrank at a glare from the old man preparing his station to ink us both, the enforced quiet around us like being in a library.

“I’m right here with you.” Varidian’s lips brushed the top of my head. “It will only hurt at first.”

“I know.” I’d read enough books to know the process, but my stomach still flopped when the man motioned me forward and I took a seat at the high desk.

“Remove this,” he said briskly, tapping my glove.

“If I remove that, I’ll kill you,” I replied, my nerves making me blunt. I shifted in the uncomfortable wooden chair, dreading his reaction.

“Fascinating,” the scribe replied and seemed to mean it. Strange. “Where do you want your mark?”

“Here.” I unfastened my leather coat and slid it off my shoulders, tapping my upper arm.

The man nodded, his eyes focused and serious beneath exceptionally bushy black eyebrows, his brown face littered with smile lines despite the fact he seemed more likely to curse than laugh. “It will hurt for an hour, then the sting will fade. Don’t scream; it disturbs the peace.”

Varidian’s hands settled on my shoulders, warm and comforting.

“I won’t scream,” I told the mark-scribe, though I couldn’t quite pull off the bravado when he filled a wickedly sharp glass pen with ink that ebbed and flowed like the ocean. Its colour was pure black, but there was a glimmer to it like labradorite and opals. Like magic. I held my breath when he set the sharp tip to my skin and punctured my arm.

I stiffened at the bite of pain, but the nerves that tangled in my stomach were so distracting I barely even noticed the sting after a few seconds. Unlike a normal tattoo, a marriage mark was formed of magic and the ink had a will of its own. Once the pen’s tip pierced my arm, the black ink flowed and pooled under my skin. It shifted like a living thing, forming shapes that were swiftly whisked apart to form others, changing over and over. The pen dragged up my arm and punched again, the magic crashing over and over like waves against a shore, trying to form a shape.

“You’re a stubborn couple, I see,” the mark-scribe muttered. His eyes flicked up to me, then Varidian. “Or a powerful one.”

“Both,” I said, gritting my teeth when the second puncture concentrated the sharp scratch of pain until my arm throbbed. The third was even worse. It took four punctures for the magic to gather into a stable shape, for the scribe to nod in satisfaction, and withdraw the wicked tip of the pen.

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