He flinched and started to look away, but she lifted her hand and stopped him, forcing him to look at her.
"What you have inside you right now is a battle between that gentleness and the wildness. It's not you against the bird, do you realize that? It's a battle between the two halves of yourself. You've kept the wildness so carefully controlled that you never even realized the war has been raging since the day you were marked. Not until the spirit trap wrenched away your ability to control it. Before that happened, the hawk spirit suffered from your denial of the wildness, but you didn't realize it. You do now. And you're both suffering. Only by embracing both halves of yourself will you heal." She stroked his cheek. "You won't lose your humanity, Hawke. What happened to Aren was a simple matter of your both being in the wrong place at the wrong time. And your being a very-newly-marked Feral."
He was quiet for long seconds, his gaze grazing her face, his thoughts awhirl in his eyes.
Finally, he made a frustrated sound. "I understand what you're saying in theory, Smiley, but I have no idea how to do it short of shifting. And all I know is that if I shift, I won't come back."
She didn't know what to say to that. Because she didn't have an answer. And neither, unfortunately, did the falcon. The females might understand the problem, but it was up to the males to figure out how to fix it. Either they'd find their way, or they wouldn't. But if they didn't . . . and soon . . . she'd lose the man she loved forever. And the thought of it was killing her.
Hawke pulled away from Faith, burning with frustration. He knew that what she said was true, that his breach with the hawk spirit had reached critical stage. But he didn't know how to fix it! He and his bird had been one for nearly a century and a half. He thought things had been fine between them. What did the damn bird want? Trust, Faith said. And how was he supposed to trust a creature who would steal him away for thirty-seven hours?
What if he gave himself up to the bird, and the bird took off and never came back? He'd be useless to the other Ferals, nothing more than a wild hawk until he flew too far from the radiance for too long and died. It would be far better for all involved if the connection severed, if he cleared the way for another to be marked. A bird shifter who, like Faith, might have a way with his bird as he himself had never had.
Goddess, he'd never known it could be like that - darting and shifting with breakneck speed and perfect precision. He was good, but it had taken years of practice. And he'd never been able to do what he'd just watched Faith do. When she'd first taken off and zipped into the trees, he'd been terrified she was going to crash. He'd thought she'd kill herself. How could she possibly have darted faster than he could? Yet she had. Far faster than any normal falcon.
He heard Faith move behind him, felt her arms circle his waist, her cheek press against his back.
"I don't want to lose you."
Her words tore at his heart, and he turned and pulled her into his arms. All these years he'd waited for the one who would make his life complete. And now he'd found her. Too late. He rested his chin on the top of her precious head and grieved for all he would miss - Faith's smiles, her laughter, her body swelling with his child. The fire in her eyes as she trained as a warrior and fought at his side. The glow that would shine from within her as she realized her true strength, her true worth.
"Any shifter who can fly like you can will be an asset to the Ferals." He kissed her hair and arched back a little so that he could see her face. "You're going to have a place with them, Smiley. They're going to need you."
She looked up at him, pain darkening her eyes. "You're giving up."
He released a frustrated sigh. "I don't know how to do what the hawk wants me to do. You tell me to trust him, yet he digs his talons into my head trying to claw my brains out."
"He's trying to hold on to you, not hurt you."
"You can't know that."
For a moment she was silent, her eyes unfocusing as if she listened to a noise he couldn't hear, as if she were listening to the voice of the falcon.
"The connection has been splintering. That's the pain you feel. He yells at you to help him, to do something, and he clings to you to keep the splintering from getting worse."
Hawke stared at her in stunned silence. And felt the truth of her words wash through him. That initial, lightninglike pain he always felt was the connection fraying. The hawk's cries were of anger, as he'd suspected. But maybe not for the reason he'd believed. If what Faith said was true, he was mad that Hawke did nothing to fix the damage. And he'd been trying to do it himself.
Slowly, the band that had been squeezing his chest began to loosen, that feeling of betrayal. He'd thought the hawk had turned against him. He'd thought he'd been trying to punish him. Instead, he'd been trying to save him.
"The falcon says that the only way for you to reconnect with your animal spirit is to give up control. Become one mind, one will. But you must do it soon, Hawke. Your connection to him is nearly gone. One more tug-of-war between you, and it'll snap." She looked up at him, her eyes dark with misery. "If that happens, why can't he just mark you again?"
"It doesn't work that way. There is no re-marking."
Pain lanced her eyes. "Hawke." She stilled again. "The falcon says she wishes she could help you, but this is something you have to do on your own."
He lifted a brow. "She?"
"Her voice is female."
He stared at her. "You're really speaking to your animal spirit."
"Not in words, not exactly. Certainly not in English or any human language. But she communicates with me in perfect thoughts. And she hears mine in return."
"That's incredible."
An intoxicating gleam entered her eyes, the gleam of certain confidence, as a smile of self-assurance lifted her lovely mouth. "She chose me. She told me that she fought hard to claim me, that we'd be magnificent together."
Part of him wanted to discount her claim as fiction - never had he known a Feral whose spirit animal spoke to him. But he felt the truth of her words, knew them in his heart. The tiny pinch of jealousy washed away in the gratitude that rushed through him for the falcon spirit.
"You weren't chosen by mistake." Though he'd told her that over and over and tried to believe it himself, wanted to believe it, the evidence had been overwhelming otherwise. But having watched her zip through the trees and shift as she landed, he no longer had any doubt.
Faith stood before him in the oversized blue T-shirt he'd put on her in the prisons, her legs and feet bare, her blue-tipped hair uncombed. On the surface, he'd never seen her look more like a street kid, but one look at her strong stance, at her certain face, at the confidence shining from her eyes, and he knew the waif was gone. A Feral Warrior stood in her place.
He kissed her. "You are magnificent," he murmured against her lips as his hand slid down her back, over her buttocks, to the hem of the T-shirt. Having put it on her, he knew precisely what she wore underneath. Absolutely nothing. If his life was almost over, there was only one thing more he wanted. To make love to this woman he loved more than life.
Tears glistened in her eyes as if they'd shared the thought. "Love me," she said softly.
"I do. I will."
He kissed her, savoring the sweet taste of her mouth and the feel of her soft lips against his. His hand slid beneath the hem of the T-shirt, finding the bare silken flesh beneath. Fire pounded through his blood, turning him hard and ready as he caressed her, digging gently into the soft flesh. She moaned and pressed against him, rocking her hips into his, brushing his already-swelling erection. He hissed in a breath, lifting one of her sweet thighs against his hip and settling himself into the vee of her body.
"Tell me I didn't hurt you before. Or that you don't remember."
"You didn't hurt me. I remember it as a whirlwind of wild pleasure. Intense. Incredible. But . . ."
"It'll be gentle this time."
"Yes."
He kissed her slowly, tenderly, taking his time, brushing her lips with his, sliding his tongue between them to stroke the crease. She opened for him, but he took his time coming inside, wanting to savor every moment, every sweet taste of her. He slid his tongue across one soft lip, then the other before melding his mouth with hers and sliding his tongue deep inside. She melted against him, a moan escaping her throat, and his heart and mind overflowed with love.
Pulling back, he stripped off his shirt and enjoyed the sight of her watching him, admiration lighting her eyes.
"You are so beautiful," she murmured. She met his gaze with a wicked, darling grin and reached for him, sliding her fingers over his pecs and up to his shoulders, then down his arms, exploring, a sensual look of pleasure on her face even as that small smile remained. "I can't believe you're mine."
He reached for her hair, tugging a thick lock between his fingers, sliding down to the blue end. "I've waited for you all my life."
Tears turned her eyes to smoky diamonds. He kissed her again, lifting her T-shirt, pulling it up her body and releasing her mouth just long enough to yank it over her head. And then her small perfect breasts were pressing against his chest, her flesh warm against his, need rushing through his body.
Her fingers closed around the waistband of his sweatpants, and she tugged, releasing his heated flesh to the morning air. He shucked the pants, then gathered them and both their shirts, and laid them out on the bracken and underbrush.
"You're making a nest?" Laughter filled her voice.
"I was thinking a bed." His expression softened with the weight of his love. "A bed fit for a princess."
Her smile was the most beautiful he'd ever seen as she knelt beside him, her knees on the clothes. "Your sharing it with me will make it so."
They came together on their knees, kissing, touching. He swept her up and laid her down, her quick laugh a gift he would never get enough of. And then she smiled up at him, her head tilted precisely toward him as if she were a light-starved flower and he the sun.
He lay beside her, propping his head on one hand, his other covering her breast as his gaze skimmed her face, her sweet, smiling mouth. He ached from the beauty of her and the love that welled in her eyes. A love that filled him to overflowing.
With his finger and thumb, he plucked at her taut nipple and she gasped, then grinned.
"You like that."
"I like everything you do."
He chuckled. "Do you?" He tested the theory, rolling her nipple between finger and thumb, watching her expression, watching the way her chest lifted to his touch, hearing the small catch in her breath. He'd studied every conceivable subject since he was old enough to read - art, science, philosophy, history - and never found anything that intrigued him half as much as watching Faith react to his touch.
He slid his hand from her breast, down her rib cage, and over her abdomen, circling one finger slowly around her navel as she watched him as keenly as he watched her. Her quicksilver smile bloomed, and his followed. He'd never been particularly quick to smile, always more thoughtful than emotional, but Faith's smile was utterly irresistible.
Moving slowly, he slid his finger across the top of the curly dark hair that protected her most precious gifts. Her chest trembled, her breath quickening in anticipation. But as he slid his hand to the side and down one firm thigh instead, her breath expelled, a small letdown . . . until his hand rose up her inner thigh.
"You're a tease," she murmured.
"No. I'm learning what pleases you."
She grinned at him, laughing at him. "Uh-hmm. I can tell you what pleases me most."
"I believe I can guess."
"Can you? Why don't we see if you're right."
His smile broadened, but his hand trembled with barely controlled passion as he slid his fingers once more up her thigh, and kept going. Never taking his gaze from her face, he stroked her soft dampness with his finger and was rewarded with the exquisite sight of her sucking in her breath, arching her back, her beautiful eyelids dropping as her face became a mask of passionate pleasure.
Again, he stroked her, then slid his finger around the hard pearl at the top, flicking it lightly, watching as she gasped. He drank in the sight of her as his ministrations sent her into a rocking frenzy of rising passion. The fire in his own body rose until he thought it would burn him alive, his cock hard and distended and throbbing, but he couldn't take his gaze off her. She was glorious to watch.
Her dark lashes drifted up. "Don't send me there alone."
"No?"
She reached for him. "Please come with me?" The smile on her faced matched that in her eyes as her fingers gripped his shoulders and tugged with surprising strength.
He couldn't deny her. He wouldn't survive this torture much longer anyway. Settling himself between her legs, he braced himself over her, grasping her gaze and holding it as he positioned the tip of his cock at her wet opening and slid home. It was all he could do not to close his eyes and throw his head back, but the look on her face was too fascinatingly beautiful to miss. Her eyes widened, her mouth opening, gasping, grinning as he pushed himself all the way in, joining them completely.
Deep inside, he felt a tiny flare of electricity and a warm, throbbing tug. In his mind, he saw it, the first bright promise of a mating bond. His heart clutched, then calmed with the certain knowledge that they weren't truly mated, that she wouldn't suffer when he died unless they completed the bond in the mating ritual of fire, blood, and sex.
He pulled out and slid into her again, slowly, her body gripping him tight and pulling him deeper as her hips thrust up to meet his. Her restless hands slid over his shoulders and arms, clutching, caressing. Her gasps grew faster and harder, turning to moans and small, hot little cries as he slid out and thrust into her again and again and again.
