Parasites, weird worms, slow diseases that didn’t show on skin. Before, when she’d planned to leave them eventually and only brush against their lives for a while, she hadn’t cared as much. Distance was its own safety. But now? Now she was agreeing to live under the sa roof with them, sleep near them, definitely share more than a blanket for gods‑knew how long. Marriage changed the risk. She wasn’t going to gamble her body on ignorance.
If she had to die in this world, it would be a clean, dramatic death—ripped open by a beastman, bones broken in a fight, burned, blown apart. Sothing worthy of a story. Not felled slowly by so microscopic worm or naless infection that chewed her organs in the dark.
So all three of them went on the list.
At first it had only been Veer—basic, since she was about to sign herself to him. Then Cutie had quietly stepped in and volunteered, and she’d let him. The sparrow... him she’d dragged in mostly because of that ridiculous body. What kind of beastman looked like a permanent teenager? At least now she knew: he was actually an adult. That ant she wasn’t beating a minor when she smacked him around. Her conscience could stay clear.
Even with the healer’s calm verdicts, though, Kaya didn’t fully believe it.
Beastman physicians here were good at what they did—sharp hands, sharp senses, plenty of experience reading bodies without tools. But they had no machines, no internal scans, no ultrasound, no X‑rays, nothing that could show the hidden parts where real trouble liked to hide. Everything they said ca from the outside: touch, sound, maybe simple blood checks. Useful, but not complete.
Still, she didn’t have anything better.
No clinic from her old world. No lab. No clean white room with humming machines. Just this cave, this healer, and her three idiots sitting there with their hearts beating and their futures tied to hers.
So she accepted it.
Not because she trusted it fully, but because, right now, it was the only net she had before she stepped off the edge with them.
The healer rolled his shoulders and added, almost as an afterthought, "But you should know—sparrow beastn live shorter than vultures or rabbit types. Our kind can live long if we don’t die stupidly. His kind... less. Even if healthy."
The words hung in the air.
Veer sobered a little. Cutie’s eyes flicked to the sparrow, then down.
Kaya’s gaze sharpened.
"So," she said quietly, "out of the three of you, you’re the one with the least years."
The sparrow puffed up. "Oi. Don’t talk like I’m already dead."
"It’s just a fact," Kaya replied. "Vultures live long if they stop trying to impress storms. Rabbits live long enough to annoy everyone. Sparrows burn out fast."
Her tone was flat, but sothing in her eyes had gone distant—calculating, the way soone thinks about ti as a resource, not an idea.
On the way back to their main cave, Veer resud grumbling about pride, Cutie walked in silence beside Kaya, their shoulders almost brushing, and the sparrow muttered the whole way.
"Height discrimination," he grumbled. "Lifespan bullying. Check my spirit, not my size."
No one answered, but none of them drifted far from him either.
Later, when the noise died down and the cave was their own again, Kaya sat on the edge of the bed, elbows on her knees. The sparrow hopped up onto her table, still ruffled.
She looked at him.
"Out of all of you," she said, "you’re the one who’ll probably go first."
He bristled. "Cheerful."
"So," she went on, leaning back on her hands, "try not to waste it being stupid."
He stared at her, beak half open, then glanced away, feathers settling slowly.
"Tch," he said, softer. "Says the woman marrying a walking lightning rod."
Kaya’s mouth twitched.
"Exactly," she said. "I need at least one of you with a shorter death wish than mine."
He snorted, but when he curled up that night, he chose the spot closer to her pillow instead of the shelf—like staying within arm’s reach might steal him a few extra days.
Word spread faster than wind.
By midday, every ledge and tunnel in the vulture tribe had heard so version of it: the young prince’s body was "wrong," his new bride had dragged him to the healer for a full inspection, and maybe—just maybe—he was secretly sickly. Kaya had just wanted to make sure he wasn’t carrying worms; the tribe turned it into an epic of hidden weakness. Veer, once praised as heaven’s favourite troublemaker, suddenly beca the "delicate" prince in whispers.
When Veer’s father heard the rumours, Robert got another beating. No one was surprised.
Back in their cave, maybe because no one wanted to break the thin layer of peace they’d found, no one asked Kaya again *why* she had agreed to marry. Not Veer, not Cutie, not the sparrow. They just... adjusted. Ate together, argued, slept, healed. Life kept moving.
.
.
Kaya hovered sowhere between interested and not.
When soone asked her about food for the wedding, her eyes lit up. "at. This. That. All of it." She could talk about dishes for half an hour. But when they asked about flower arrangents, she just shrugged. "Anything." It quickly beca common knowledge that almost every detail of the ceremony—timing, guests, path, decorations—was handled by Veer, not her.
Unlike her old world, there were no court houses or grand halls here. No ballrooms. Vulture weddings were simple: the couple in special clothes, a bouquet or symbolic flowers, a shared blanket, and one bow to the beast god. That bow was supposed to seal everything.
Except for one problem.
Veer didn’t believe in the beast god at all.
Everyone else did. Kaya had seen it in their eyes many tis—quiet respect, fear, habit. They spoke of "beast god and its disciples" like it was air. Veer was the only one who treated it like background rock.
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