Page 64 of Antiletum

This is nothing but pure starvation to love and be loved without any betrayal or guilt or pain.

I put distance between our faces. At my retreat, he turns his head quizzically to the side. Blinking in question. Like he doesn’t understand at all why I’ve pulled away.

But of course he doesn’t. He’s only an animal. One who has managed to imprint on me, despite his age when we found each other. And my behavior in letting him preen me and bring me gifts and give him mice to munch on in return isn’t helping matters. He’s been courting me, and I have arguably been courting him in return.

Physical displays of affection are too far.

“This is wrong,” I whisper sadly. “We shouldn’t be like this with each other.”

The plummeting of my heart disagrees with my words. Quieting that thought, I shake my shoulder lightly, giving indication for my owl to abandon his perch.

Preceded by a look of resignation (or is that frustration?), he huffs out a deep breath in an almost human gesture and gives me a glance that practically screamsYou asked for this.

Reluctantly, he leaves. Flying away from me so that I can watch him retreat.

Fear radiates from my chest that perhaps he will feel so rejected he’ll never return to me. A thought I simply cannot bear. “Wait!” I yelp, trying to call him back. He doesn’t listen; his tail feathers are a dispersing wisp of smoke as he flaps away, taking the last pieces of my broken heart with him.

But then…

My eyes narrow. Something peculiar is happening. His feathers are shifting in a way entirely different from flight, elongating and changing form as well as color. As does the rest of his body until…

In one harsh, disbelieving blink, I’m not staring at an owl in flight at all, but a bare back belonging to a mountain of a man. Just standing in the grass. Surrounded by gravestones. Without a single stitch of clothing. His head level is taking up space where my dark barn owl should be.

Briefly, I’m drawn to the perfectly sculpted ass on display, the tiny dimples above it. And I think I might just die if I don’t press the pads of my fingers into them andknead.

As rapidly as the intrusive thought proves my clearinsanity, everything is wiped away. My mind melts into nothing of coherent substance, thieved by the tattoo covering the entirety of his back: a barn owl, wings spread wide, etched in delicate black lines that sprawl across defined muscle and numerous visible scars.

Unfathomable.

That’s the only word that crosses my mind, absorbing the fact that I have just witnessed a true shift from animal to human. Owl to man. And exactly who that owl has become. Who he has been all along.

“Val?”I barely manage to squeak out past the rapid closing of my throat.

Moonlight glints off of his midnight hair as Valledyn turns his head over his shoulder. Grinning. My husband disregards my shock, turning to me fully. His giant, naked form waltzes in my direction. Spellbound.

“Iknewyou loved me,” Val claims, enraptured.

Triumphant.

I have to grab onto the headstone behind me to keep from falling on the ground—thanks to the sudden weakness in my useless little legs. Acid burns in my stomach, scratching at my throat.

“I’ve been waiting for you to admit it. For you tosee.” Val’s eyes gleam. He takes another step towards me, enthralled. “Tonight—whatyou said…” He starts tripping over his words in his excitement, coming towards me faster. “I was right! You love me.”

Utter horror is consuming. Not only over the things I said tonight, includingI love you, but every time I ever talked to my—

Theowl.

Not mine. Not my owl. Not my anything.

Yet another sense of loss crashes through me. Ilovedthat owl.

A strangled noise that could be a laugh or a cough falls from my lips, my husband completely oblivious to my internal spiral. I’ve been doting on him for months. Allowing him to do the same to me in return. Pouring my heart out, including about my husband, who he happened tobe. The whole time. I said they should meet each other because they were alike. A suggestion met with obvious amusement.

What a fool I am.

I built him a perch in my room!

“Oh,deos!” I hang my dizzy, embarrassed head in my hands. “It was you. At the manor. After the party.” A wave of mortification drowns me. So strong, I may just use my necromancy to direct a pair of brittle bone hands to pull me underground with them.