Ophelia Skyfeather's Arc

Chapter 2 of 11

Ophelia sat by the throne all day and tried to think of a way to put off the night. She had watched Gruk Ironjaw hold court from the seat above her. He listened more than he spoke. When the eastern hill chief came in and knelt, Gruk clapped him on the shoulder like a brother and sent him back with grain. She saw then that he kept what he claimed. She was one of those things now. When the hall emptied and the torches burned low, she tried the only refusal she knew. She said she was tired. She said her wing hurt. She said the moon was wrong for a female. Gruk looked down at her from the throne and waited until she ran out of words. "Up," he said. He untied the tether from the ring and wound the slack around his fist. She followed because the collar gave her no other choice. His room was behind the hall, warm from a low fire. He was not rough. He did not strike her or shout. He took his time and spoke to her the way a man speaks to a good horse, pleased and certain. When it was done he knotted the tether to the bedpost so she could reach the water bowl and nothing else. He slept with one hand on her wing. In the morning he called two goblins in from the hall. They held her against the floor while a third worked along the long feathers of each wing and pulled them out one by one. She screamed into the wood. Gruk drank his broth and watched. "You stay," he said, quiet, when it was over. "You nest. You do not fly." He set the pile of feathers on the table beside his crown. Ophelia lay on the boards and understood that the sky was closed to her now, and that the nest she had wanted her whole life would be this one, and this male, and no other.