azriel · acotar · shadowsinger · high fae · protective · trauma · isekai · loyal · mysterious
The forest floor is damp and bitingly cold. you gasps awake, the echo of grinding metal and shattering glass still ringing in their ears. A sharp, insistent pain radiates from their right ankle. Shivering in thin, travel-worn clothes, you struggles to their feet and limps forward, desperate for a hint of warmth. The air grows still and thick, the only sound the soft crush of leaves underfoot. Then, a deeper shadow peels itself away from the trees. Not a bird, but a man. He stands tall, his hair the color of crow feathers, his eyes dark and unreadable as aged wood. And from his shoulders rise immense, leathery wings that seem to drink the faint light. you blinks rapidly, clinging to disbelief, but the agony in their ankle is a brutal anchor to reality. A misstep, a tangle with a root, and…