A Court of Whispers and Song

Chapter 31

Her eyes remained locked on the wet cavern wall ahead. The battering storm outside synchronized the crackling embers. The fire barely replaced the chill seeping into her bones.

Catrin.

Shutting her eyelids, Gwyn's mind once again moved to the deceased male still mounted out in the woodlands. The one Azriel killed. The former soldier her twin had been seeing—who used Catrin to get insight on the temple. Abused her twin's goodwill and naivete. Exploited her insecurities against her to ply information. Used her sister's body.

Now Gwyn simply wished she was the one to have driven that stake into his foolish throat. Though, if Gwyn were being honest with herself, she hoped she could have asked him more questions. Because now that's all Catrin left behind; her Invoking Stone and a whole bushel of whys and hows.

Cauldron boil and fry her. How many times had Catrin begged Gwyn to accompany her to the tavern? Too many to weigh. And now? What had her sister gotten herself into? Why hadn't she told Gwyn? Truthfulness and honor had been very important between them. They were twins, for Mother's fucking sake!

The past was becoming clear now, like frost slowly vanishing off a temperate glass pane. Catrin's hurried words that evening, her frantic packing, and pleas for them to leave. Gwyn thought her need to leave was part of her sister's distaste for priestesshood. But now?

Gwyn's heart and gut tensed at the thought Catrin knew what was going to pass that night.

Could Catrin have stopped it? Any of it? All of it?

Despite her efforts, Gwyn's vision could not escape the crumbling stone facade in front of her. Or the self-portraits she and Catrin drew around the age of eight. Catrin's much better, full of detail down to the pleats in her flowing light blue robes, while Gwyn's was barely a glorified stick figure wearing a burlap sack.

Gwyn, always competitive, added some coal to her twin's portrait, sketching a curly black beard and mustache. As soon as Catrin noticed, her ears practically gushed steam. The same treatment was soon given to Gwyn's picture. Henceforth, the two pirate priestesses would be immortalized forever.

Gwyn's nose and eyes stung as she held the tears at bay, her sister's cobalt stone a cold, heavy burden in her pocket.

"What did you know, Catrin?" She asked in a whisper. As the shadowsinger rubbed against her, she cursed inwardly. His faint exhales brushed her hair once more as he settled.

Several hours ago, Azriel passed out from exhaustion, not only physically but also emotionally. So Gwyn took the first watch, a hand steady on the dagger attached to her thigh. While the other was clutched in the shadowsinger's grip as he leaned into her, using her head as a pillow, one wing tucked tight to his back, the other draped over them both.

She often glanced at his hands, imagining what had happened. What he had endured as a youth. To this day, Azriel often bound cloth dressings around his fist beneath his gauntlets to cover his scars while in public, the damages inflicted on him so much more than just to mere flesh.

Gwyn wondered if his horrid parents and brothers were alive. Because deep down a new fire roared, blazing in her chest, urging her to defend him. And if they were? One day, Gwyn would surely make them pay.

The distant howl of a wolf drew her concern from the shadowsinger. Her ears had been perked the entire evening, tracking anything beyond the voices of the forest and the rainfall. Her nose was keenly aware of the dampness of the cave. Of the petrichor and crisp foliage beyond the secret entrance. But it was the shadowsinger's chilled night air and cedar scent she couldn't elude surrounding her. Comforting her as much as the weight of his wing.