The Songbird and the Wolf

[ XXI ] Stolen Claws

Elodie's heart beats so hard she fears the very wind can hear it.

"Thank you," the word comes from her lips before she can drag it back.

That gives the stranger reason to pause, tension rippling across broad shoulders, but it lasts no longer than a heartbeat.

A moment of tension, half muttered whispers that her ears strain to catch but the conversation is so quick she doesn't stand a chance.

The younger woman nods, and is gone in a flash as she yanks her mount into a turn, and with a firm kick the woman is off at a gallop.

She tracks the pair to the horizon, the black blur disappearing over the horizon, the thunder of hooves echoing in her ears long after she can hear the sound.

Warning the Palace, no doubt.

Two more of the Corvus Guards dismount, and approach her. It takes her brain a moment to catch up with what is going on, and by then they are already touching her.

Searching her, prying hands patting her down firmly.

Elodie draws in a steadying breath, trying her best not to flinch beneath the touch.

Astor, on the other hand, isn't quite so subtle in his reaction. His fingers closing into fists, the man appears to root himself to the ground, so tense she could trace the line of his tensed jaw.

Quinn's fury is a quieter thing, something her aching eyes have to search for - and even then she almost misses it.

But he tracks not her, but the hands, his gaze unchanging, almost infuriatingly calm.

However, there is something undoubtedly calculating about the man.

As though etching something quietly into the back of his mind.

Both resisting the urge to jump to her defence, and had Sam been close to conscious he no doubt would have been the same.

She mouthed the words, "I'm okay," to both of them.

Even though it feels like a blatant lie.

And, as if that wasn't indignity enough, they come for her blades next.

It is only when they come for her daggers that she makes a sound of protest, a snarl that she doesn't quite control enough for it to go unnoticed.

This does not deter them, however, they continue their work until they are certain she is of no threat.

Even with the absence of her daggers, it does not prevent her fingers from reaching for them. Her grip painfully empty without the shining hilts between them.

Without them it feels like a part of her has been amputated, slashed off without care, she feels the ache of it.

But she makes no verbal complaint.

It is Astor they go for next, and she can smell the ice on the male's gaze as they move about him, searching him from head to toe.

They are, perhaps, needlessly thorough with Astor - more proving a point than anything else. Her wings furl tightly against her, prepared to spring into action but she keeps herself still.

Still even as they subject Quinn to the same treatment, a much quicker job than Astor or herself, coming away from that encounter empty-handed.

And mildly fortunate that they still had their hands.

"Don't," that word snaps from her with a fury even she doesn't expect when they move for Sam. Her word is met with something near laughter, but the line she draws goes deep into the moorland underfoot.