Page 84 of Raisa's Cursed Ravens
I open my mouth to scream, but nothing comes out. Instead, there’s a flash behind my eyelids, a burst of blue-white light so intense I think I might burn up from the inside out.
The world goes electric.
The brothers gasp, bodies jolted by the blast of magic. Shade grabs my calf, his grip bruising, while Sable yowls and clings to my waist like a life preserver. Grim and Talon flinch as the energy arcs over us, licking at their bare skin, raising goosebumps, and leaving trails of color in the air.
A dome of shimmering light erupts above the clearing, stretching from root to canopy, humming and shivering like it’s alive. The air inside is suddenly warm, the scent of sap and musk and sex intensifying until it’s all I smell.
The magic races over my brothers, painting their bodies in light. Wherever it touches them—hands, throat, the inside of a thigh—it leaves a mark, a tattoo of swirling, inky black edged with the same blue-white glow.
The marks are never the same twice.
On Shade, the tattoo winds like a serpent around his wrist and up his arm, bold and sharp. On Bran, it’s a spiral at the base of his neck, right where I like to bite him. Sable’s mark is a tangleof feathers across his ribs. Grim gets a black star across his chest. Rune’s is a chain of blue light around his fingers. Talon’s is a slash of red on his jaw, Onyx’s a perfect circle over his heart.
And mine is seven perfect ravens, scattered across my body in places only they will ever know.
When the light finally fades, we’re left blinking, panting, coated in sweat, and something like awe.
I sit up, naked and trembling, and look at them. They stare back, dazed and a little afraid, but also proud, as if they just stole the sun and brought it home.
Sable looks at me, his eyes bright with tears. “What did you do?”
“I made you mine.”
He kisses me hard, not caring about the taste of the magic still humming on my lips.
I run my fingers over Shade’s new tattoo. He shudders, eyes closing. “You branded us,” he says, his voice rough.
“No,” I whisper, “I claimed you.”
Bran laughs, shaking his head. “I’ll never get used to you.”
“You don’t have to,” I say. “You just have to love me.”
Grim grins, the black star pulsing with his heartbeat. “Try getting rid of us now,” he says, and there’s more joy than threat in it.
Rune threads his marked fingers through my hair, tugging me down for another kiss. The others pile in, arms and legs and mouths, pressing me into the bedding until I can’t tell where I end and they begin.
We lie there, breathing together, the magic settling over us like a second skin.
I trace their tattoos, one by one, marveling at the visible proof of what I’ve always felt. We belong together. Not because of a curse, or our defiance of our father, but because we choose it, every night and every morning.
15
One Final Kiss
Onyx
If there’s a lastquiet before a war, it sounds like this: the crunch of frost underfoot, the slow exhale of seven men who have killed for less, and the shivering hope that, today, they won’t have to.
I move near the front of the line, my boots treading over leaves and bone-white roots, barely raising a whisper. The woods here remember us. They bend to make way, or maybe just to watch.
Behind me, the others fan out in a loose V, all eyes forward, no one talking. Even Sable keeps his mouth shut, the curve of his lips tight. I don’t know what I expected, but it’s not the absence of birds and a hush so deep it’s chilling.
Raisa walks at my side. Or rather, she glides. There’s no other word for it. She’s too regal for trudging, toootherfor stumbling. Her head is up, her mouth set, her eyes two bright knives in the dawn.
I study her from the corner of my eye, like a fool staring at the sun, but I can’t help it. Every time I look, she’s changed again. Grown a little taller, a little brighter. The perfect lines of her face are as sharp as broken glass. Her hair is loose, black as midnight, and the wind wraps it around her throat like a living thing.
She could be a goddess, if you squint right. Or a monster. Same difference.
