Clipped

Chapter 28.

​The embers in Rhiannon’s hearth had crumbled into grey silk, but the fire in her mind was still a roaring, neon-blue inferno. Every time she closed her eyes, the sound returned- snip, snip; the cold, metallic kiss of the shears. The word "Evil" felt like a brand seared into the back of her throat, tasting of ozone and ancient, collective hatred.

​Restless, her skin feeling too tight for her spirit, she pulled her charcoal cloak over her shoulders and reached for the door handle.

​She didn't expect to see him there.

​Fenris was standing in the dim light of the corridor, his large hand raised as if he had been seconds away from knocking. He looked uncharacteristically fractured; the predatory certainty that usually draped over him like a mantle was gone, replaced by a raw, jagged worry. His blue-gold eyes searched her face with a frantic intensity, looking for the cracks she had shown at the fire.

​"I..." He trailed off, his voice a low, rough vibration. "I couldn't hear you breathing through the door.... you went quiet."

​Rhiannon looked at him, seeing the Alpha who had pushed Sora forward to catch her. She saw the man who had respected her boundaries even when she was falling. The pull in her chest was no longer a tug-of-war; it was a steady, rhythmic pulse.

​"I couldn't sleep," she said softly. "I still hear the shears."

​Fenris’s jaw tightened, a flash of something lethal crossing his features before he smoothed it over. "Then don't stay in the dark. The dark is where the memories have teeth."

​"I want to show you something," Rhiannon said, stepping past him. "I did... something today. In the Glen. I'm not sure what it means, but you like information. Maybe you can use it."

​To ease the suffocating tension of the hallway, she led him out of the Great Hall and into the bracing, midnight air. The moon was a sharp silver hook in the sky, and the snow was so deep it swallowed the sound of their footsteps as they trekked toward the Silent Glen.

​When they rounded the final bend of silver birches, even Fenris stopped.

​The Glen was no longer just a clearing. It was a cathedral of glass. Under the moonlight, the thousands of crystalline flowers Rhiannon had accidentally created shivered and glowed. Every branch was heavy with translucent, five-petaled blossoms that reflected the stars, casting a pale, ethereal light across the snow. It was a scene of haunting, impossible beauty- a garden of ice that defied the dead of winter.

​Fenris stepped into the center of the clearing, his boots crunching softly. He reached out a hand, his fingers hovering inches from a shimmering petal. He didn't touch it. He moved through the space with a reverent, slow grace, as if he were walking through a temple.

​"You did this," he whispered, his voice thick with wonder.

​"I didn't mean to," Rhiannon confessed, leaning against a frost-covered trunk. "I was trying to find the song, and my magic... it just reacted. It felt like it was finally breathing."

​She looked at the glass flowers, then at the massive man standing amongst them. The setting was romantic enough to ache, the kind of moment stories were written about, but the air between them remained steady and platonic. Fenris didn't use the beauty as a bridge to close the gap between them; he didn't try to touch her or whisper empty comforts. He treated her magic like a sacred site, honoring the power without trying to claim the woman behind it.

​"Fenris," she said, her voice trembling slightly. "In the fire... I saw them. My people. They called me 'Evil.' They were screaming it while they took my wings. I heard the shears, Fenris. I felt them."

​She looked down at her hands, the blue hair falling over her face. "If I am evil... if there is something dark in me that I don't understand yet... all you have to do is tell me to leave. I won't bring that to your mountain."

​Fenris turned to her then. He didn't move toward her, but the intensity of his gaze was a physical weight.

​"Look at this place, Rhiannon," he said, gesturing to the glass cathedral. "Look at what you do when you are afraid. You don't burn. You don't destroy. You create something that the world has never seen before."

​He took a slow step closer, his hands clasped behind his back to ensure he didn't crowd her. "My kind calls it a blood-rage when we lose ourselves. Your kind called you 'Evil.' But I’ve lived a hundred years, and I’ve seen what real evil looks like. It’s Gorgon. It’s the men who kept you in that room. It is not a girl who makes flowers out of frost."

​He looked back at the crystalline blossoms. "They didn't cut your wings because you were evil, Rhiannon. They cut them because they were afraid of a song they didn't know how to sing."

​Rhiannon felt a sob catch in her throat, not of grief, but of a sudden, staggering relief. The snip in her mind went quiet, replaced by the humming resonance of the glass flowers.

​"I don't know what I am yet," she whispered.

​"You're a citizen of the Nightshade," Fenris replied, his voice firm and unyielding. "And as long as I am the shield of this mountain, no one- not even your own memories, will tell you otherwise."

​They stayed in the Glen for a long time, two outcasts standing in a garden of ice, watching the moon move across the sky. There was no romance in the touch of skin, but there was a deep, soul-level intimacy in the silence-a promise that the North would hold her, even when the rest of the world called her a monster.