Page 105 of Beyond the Shadowed Earth

Because she couldn’t hold it in. It was tearing her apart.

Wind rushed past her wings, and on the mountain below were two figures: a boy with a creature beside him, pressed up against his knee.

The sight of him sent fresh pain searing through her, though she didn’t understand why.

He must have wronged her. He must have sent her into the mountain to die.

She let out a shriek that rattled the sky and dove toward the boy.

She crashed into him, knocking him backward into the side of the mountain. She ripped at his shoulders with her talons, tearing into his flesh, watching his red blood pool on brown earth.

She felt his sorrow, a rush of intense horrific power that nearly overwhelmed her. She closed herself off; she could not contain his sorrow along with everything that already raged in her soul. She sent it back at him.

He screamed and fell to the ground, clawing at his skin like he was burning from the inside.

She’d forgotten his creature: a spotted cat. It lunged at her, snarling, and raked claws across her chest. Pain ripped hot into her body.

She screamed and scrabbled backward, almost falling from the cliff.

And then somehow the boy was there, though he still shuddered with pain, pulling her back onto level ground. He stroked her wings with gentle hands, and his voice, soft and certain, coiled around her like honey. “Eda. Eda. Be still, be still. You’re here, and you’re safe. Be still.”

His blood yet dripped into the dirt, his face twisted with the agony that convulsed through his body.

And yet he was so gentle.

The spotted cat crouched and snarled, but the boy held it at bay. “Tainir, hush.”

She shuddered and shook. Pain, in every part of her, tangled with the power of her sorrow.

But she didn’t want to feel it, not anymore.

Her body cracked. Burst apart.

Heat and pain and light.

Feathers falling round her like dark snow.

Huddling against the stone of the mountain, shuddering with terrible, terrible cold; her wings were gone and there was nothing to warm her.

Gradually, Eda became aware of herself and her surroundings.

She was naked, curled up in a ball, icy stone pressing against her shoulders, frigid air biting at her exposed skin. She was human again, or at least had resumed her human form, the huge dark feathers of whatever winged creature she had been scattered around her like ashes.

But the sorrow hadn’t left her; it raged still inside her soul, and power crackled through her like harnessed lightning, barely contained.

The snow leopard who was Tainir came toward her over the freezing ground. The leopard’s body straightened and changed, paws stretching out into legs and arms, feline head and ears shifting into dark hair and red-brown skin and sparkling eyes.

Tainir was naked, too, but only for a moment; Words poured glinting gold from her lips and she was clothed again, in a plain linen shirt and trousers that would do little to shelter her from the bitter cold.

Eda couldn’t clothe herself; she didn’t know what Words to say. She just shuddered against the mountain, the sorrow eating and eating and never getting its fill.

And then Morin was there, hesitant. Careful. He shrugged out of his own poncho and offered it to her, turning around so she could pull it on without him watching. When he turned back, his face was gray with pain.

A tremor went through her. Tears dripped down her cheeks. “What was I? What did I do to you?”

“You were a great black bird. Bigger than the ayrrah. Bursting with power.” His words were soft and slow, but they held no fear.

She bowed her head; she couldn’t look at him. “How did you know it was me? I could have been one of the winged spirits. I could have destroyed you—I nearly did.”