The Hidden (Shadowed Wings #1)(30)

“Don’t fight her,” Ami yells at me, and then my body goes weightless as he strips my grip from him, and I start to fall.





11





I’m sucked into myself, aware but not in control. It’s like I’m sitting in someone else’s body watching them run the show. A screech pours out of my razor sharp beak, and then I’m no longer falling but unfurling massive black wings and demanding the air take me where I want to go. My panic is lost amidst all the new sensations. I can feel and taste the wind. My vision is sharper but more limited in a way I can’t quite grasp.

“Pigeon?” I ask tentatively, aware that some other consciousness is flying me out over the water. I can feel in our muscles that we’re going to turn back, and a determination fills me as we angle toward where Ami and Zeph were standing on the cliff. Just as we do, a large black gryphon dives off of the tall rocky ledge, and a thrill of excitement sounds off inside of me. I’m pretty sure that’s solely the Pigeon’s feelings about the massive gryphon streaking through the air toward us, because all I can seem to do is fight the flashbacks of being attacked by said asshole gryphon and what happened after.

My gryphon cuts hard to the right, away from Zeph, and we pick up speed. I’m not sure how I know, but she wants him to chase her, and as weird as I think that is, I light up with giddy satisfaction as we speed over the water in our best efforts to break the sound barrier.

“Fuck yeah, Pigeon,” I hoot in encouragement as she shows me just what we’re capable of. We move like lightning through the air, and certainty that this is what we’re meant for whips through me and fills me with freedom and happiness.

I can feel her preen with my appreciation, and I laugh, which creates this odd chuffing sound in my chest. It’s like my gryphon and I are separate and yet also the same. I’m not sure how to wrap my mind around it, but I can feel her independently from me, and yet we both have the ability to control the same body. I’m tempted to see just what I can do with these wings, but an image of my hand being slapped like a naughty toddler about to touch something dangerous flashes in my mind.

“Did you just…?” I trail off for a second. “Pigeon, can you talk to me?” I ask her in awe, and I swear to fuck I can feel her roll her eyes. My shocked and manic laugh fills my head, and that strange little chuffing sound starts up again in my chest. I can’t lie, gryphon laughter is fucking adorable. I suddenly feel bad for all the names I’ve called her and just how pissed I’ve been. Then I remember exactly why I’ve been so pissed, and the frustration comes surging back.

“If you can hear me and talk to me, where the hell have you been this whole time?” I demand. “I’ve needed you,” I add, neither of us missing the hurt that tints that thought. A flash of my mother’s ring pops up in my mind. It’s replaced by an image of our reflection in the water, and then I’m overwhelmed by the pain we felt when we smashed into the ground.

“You were hurt?” I ask, as it dawns on me that just because I seemed to escape that whole crash unscathed, it clearly didn’t mean that she did. “Fuck, I’m an asshole,” I confess, and that chuffing noise starts up in our chest again. I smile. “Are you laughing at me, Pigeon?” I demand playfully, and then guilt bubbles up in my chest again. “Shit, I keep calling you Pigeon which is probably rude. Do you have a name?”

Warmth fills me, and I get the odd impression that she likes the name Pigeon. Satisfaction breaks open in my chest at that thought, and I can’t help my surprise. “You like the name Pigeon?” I ask, just to be sure I’m reading this correctly. A feeling that feels like excitement but a little different fills me, and it takes me a second to wrap my mind around what my gryphon is trying to say. “You think it’s cute?” I voice as I’m trying to work it out. As the words leave my mouth, my gryphon fills me with satisfaction again. I laugh, and then an image of a sparrow pops up in my mind. “You think sparrows are cute too?” I query, not sure I’m following this strange way of communicating.

She sends me a mental picture of Zeph as a gryphon, black as coal everywhere except his eyes and a touch of gray on his beak. It takes me a minute to figure out what Zeph and a sparrow have to do with each other, and then suddenly I recall that Zeph whispered that to my gryphon when she started to wake up that day by the hot springs.

“You like it when Zeph calls you sparrow,” I confirm, and my gryphon preens. “You know he’s saying that in the same asshole way I was calling you a pigeon, right?” I inform her, not at all impressed with Zeph the way she clearly is. “I fucking knew it’s been you this whole time,” I chastise, finally confirming once and for all where the feelings of attraction have been coming from. It’s not Stockholm syndrome that’s fucking with my hormones, it’s without a doubt her. “I hate to be the one to tell you this, but your Zeph lust passed the line of desperate creeper weeks ago. It’s not a cute look Pigeon.”

Ryn’s face pops up in my head like a slap. “Of course you want them both,” I grumble. “Why wouldn’t you line up for the two-for-one asshole sale? What the hell are you going to do with both of them?” I scold like some out of touch parent. An image of one gryphon mounting another rises up in my mind, and it takes me a beat to figure out what it means. “For fuck’s sake, Pigeon, keep the gryphon porn to yourself, thank you very much. And just so you know—not that you’ve asked me or anything—but getting it on with those assholes is not happening.”