Jade Fern Grove chafa

but he was a man, and sometimes men only ever saw the backs of women as they turned to flee. silvertongue did not have the words to explain that they had fled to each other, run to each other; she did not think it was for akavir to know. his next words, his offer; they sundered her; laid her low. for a long moment she only stared in surprise and then a deep, burgeoning anguish. "should the price for this feeling be another broken heart? another broken family?" look how shadowpaw and stormpup had suffered. look how she herself had been taken to a heartless palace for such agonies shared in her own younger life. would he think she spoke of her own existence, or his? he asked more than silvertongue; he asked upheaval and shattering and wren's tears, enough, enough of which had been shed. the desire sparkled there — but it had never been their time. why should this moment be different? and why should he ask now? perhaps akavir did not see the curling tendrils of obsession in silvertongue when she spoke of wren; maybe he had only seen them in her words for crowfeather. did he know the difference? her heart ached; she refused to let tears fall; "let me go, akavir, for both of us." if she was lost to him, then let her truly be lost. a branch breaking. an ice flat cracking. a fire burning a swathe across a meadow. when she went home, crowfeather would be gone, akavir would be gone, and riverclan would be gone. that immediate dissolution of bonds — yes. for them both. she would run, finally. again. she would let herself follow in wrenflight. why not?