Cloud Shifters

Instructor Kade started the lesson of the day without preamble. “We are on a Cloud System of Earth.” Cadin scrambled to his seat next to Lep, gave him a quick high five and settled in for the lecture. Sun’s waved at them.

Instructor Kade continued after everyone found their seats. “We are tied to Earth, as Earth is to us. There are certain rules and obligations that we have towards all living creatures, but most especially to the humans. They are our brethren of a sort—the land equivalent of angels. We know a bit about humans, just as they know a little about us. Our ambassadors to Land are of course Guardian Angels.”

“Are there human ambassadors to the cloud-lands?” Treven asked.

“Yes. It is different for humans in that they don’t all believe in angels or understand the connection between us. They have a society that receives a Guardian Angel to bring an official human ambassador to the clouds once every fifty years. There have been a few occurrences of accidental visits as well. Two humans named Amelia and Fred accidentally found the passageway between Realms. They lived for forty years on Lark.”

The lecture continued the whole morning—some of the time being filled with Cadin discretely playing a game with Lep under the table. Just as Cadin made a difficult shot and his tightly folded paper ball flew through Lep’s hands, Instructor Kade wound down his lecture.

“Alright everyone, this is as good a stopping point as any for your free time. I encourage all of you to be productive, and I would like to remind you that the first Archery Club practice will start in ten minutes in Yi Field.”

Cadin waited anxiously for Lep to get his stuff and for Vincent and Jade to join them from the other side of the room as he watched Sun and Instructor Kade head out to Yi field to prepare for the Archery Club meeting. He would have liked to walk with them, but the meeting didn’t start for a bit, and his friends seemed slow to gather. Lep was still stuffing his things into his bag, but Cadin started to pull him along anyway towards the group that was headed for the door leading outside. He walked quickly towards Yi Field. When Treven called his name, Cadin turned around, confused at seeing the rest of the group heading off in a different direction.

“Where are you going?” Treven asked.

“To the Archery Club meeting of course,” Cadin answered. “Aren’t we all going?”

Jade giggled a little bit, hiding her face on Vincent’s shoulder. Vincent smirked, while Lep wouldn’t meet Cadin’s eyes, Xeno was staring longingly at the trees and Treven shook his head.

“No, mate,” Treven said. “We are going to hang out in the forest today. Remember, Xeno is going to show us where to find tree snakes?”

Cadin remembered talking about tree snakes the prior week, and being really excited to look for them at the time.

“But, the Archery Club starts today,” Cadin said. “We should show our support—we can look for snakes any old time.”

“Sorry, Cadin, but archery does not interest me.” It was Xeno who spoke this time, giving Cadin a little friendly punch to the shoulder before turning and heading toward the forest. Vincent and Jade followed without another word.

Cadin turned to Lep, hoping that at least his best friend would join him.

“Lep, how about it?”

Lep looked up from his shoes and into Cadin’s eyes. “Sorry, Cadin—maybe next time. Why don’t you come to the forest with us today, and go to the Archery Club another time?” Treven nodded along.

“I can’t, I want to go and train. I meant what I said yesterday about finding a better outlet to test my abilities. I have to start somewhere,” Cadin could see that he almost had Lep swayed, but then Treven started laughing.

“Geez, lighten up Cadin. We are just first years. We have plenty of time to train to get into a University or Academy and even the Core. You have to relax a little bit,” Treven said before turning to Lep. “We can still catch up to them before they hit the forest.”

“See you at lunch then,” Lep said.

“Hello, Cadin,” Sun said quietly, snapping Cadin out of his daze. Looking around, Cadin was a bit confused. Instructor Kade was there talking to the only other student in the field besides Cadin and Sun.

“Am I early?” Cadin asked Sun.

“No. Late, actually.”

“Oh, I’m sorry about that.”

“Better late than never,” Sun said, a little more cheerful than she looked.

Instructor Kade walked over to them with the boy. He was older; Cadin guessed in his second year in Commons school by the fact that he had a bright white Aura and large wing calluses, indicating his wings should sprout before the end of the school year.

“Hi, Cadin, glad you made it,” Instructor Kade said. “This is Bartholomew of Galen, he moved to Glade this last summer. I knew his family when I lived there.” The boy had a tall, gangly frame, brown hair and eyes, and freckles on his face and forearms.

“Nice to meet you,” he said as he shook Cadin’s hand.

“And you,” Cadin replied.

“So where is the rest of your clan?” Instructor Kade asked, looking around as if they were hiding behind the only tree in Yi Field.

Cadin blushed, ashamed of his failure to bring his friends. “They aren’t coming today. They said that they weren’t interested in archery, and would rather look for tree snakes in the forest.”

Sun looked shocked, and a little hurt that there were angels that would rather search for snakes than learn how to use a bow and arrow.

“I see,” said Instructor Kade. “We must do something about this attendance. For today at least we can talk and get to know each other, and maybe Sun here can show you the basics of archery.”

Since Instructor Kade already knew everyone, he left to get the targets set up while Sun, Cadin and Bartholomew walked over to the little tree and sat underneath it.

“Well I guess I can start,” Sun said as she plopped down on the ground and began sorting the pebbles in front of her. “To begin with, I just want to say that I am grateful to both of you for showing up today. I had no idea that it would be this difficult to get Gladers interested in archery.”

“Gladers?” Bartholomew asked.

“Oh, that is the name we use for angels from Glade over in Lance.”

“Got ya,” Bartholomew laughed. “Please continue.”

“Well I am quite disappointed that this club has not started out at all how I had planned,” Sun said. “I thought the Archery Club would be a great way to meet everyone and make friends here while doing something that I loved, but—well, you Gladers are harder to impress than I imagined,” she finished, still playing with the pebbles on the ground in front of her, building a miniature pyramid.

“Hey, kid—no worries,” Bartholomew jumped in. “I know exactly how you feel. I have been here for five months and still haven’t made any friends. And I am not even from a different Quad, just a different Commons. I think that most people are just scared of things or people that are a little different than they are. I heard about this Archery Club and figured that I should make a bit more of an effort to reach out to people and let them get to know me and vice versa.”

“Yeah, but nobody is here besides us,” Sun said, knocking the top pebble off her pyramid.

“I am not disappointed,” Cadin said with a smile. “It is nice to have today to get to know both of you. Don’t worry, Sun, others will come on their own time.” As he finished, Cadin picked a pebble near him and placed it on top Sun’s pyramid, making it whole once again.

“I’m all set up over here,” Instructor Kade called from the field. The trio stood up from under the little tree, smiling more as they made their way toward four large targets, all set up at different heights. Instructor Kade stood a short distance away from the targets next to a stand holding up several old bows that looked as though they were made from old brooms and one shiny new bow that was sleek in shape and nearly white.

“When I heard about the Archery Club,” Instructor Kade said as the group approached, “I asked the Headmaster about any school gear that we could use. He gave me access to the storage shed, and let me tell you—it was a ridiculous experience trying to find anything in there.” Cadin smiled as he glanced at the storage shed which was the size of a large barn and used to store all the unused items in the school for the last twenty years or so.

“Well, I was lucky after about five hours of searching I found these targets and bows,” Instructor Kade said, indicating the old broom bows. Cadin asked about the white one.

“Oh, that one is mine,” Sun said happily, skipping over to Instructor Kade’s side and expertly extracting the bow from the stand. “I won this bow in a tournament. I don’t think that I had ever wanted anything more when I learned that it was the prize for the Lavine Championship Games.”

“You won the Championship Games?!” Cadin asked, flabbergasted that someone so young could enter, let alone win the Games.

“Yes, but it was just the Young Division, which is offered at some Games to encourage early competition.”

“Wow,” Bartholomew said, as Cadin just shook his head in amazement.

“Well, would you like to show us how to begin, Sun?” Instructor Kade asked, handing her a beautiful quiver full of arrows.

So quickly that Cadin almost missed it, Sun pulled an arrow, spun on the spot and shot at one of the targets. The arrow was quivering with recoil where it landed—dead center of the highest target.

“Wrath’s-eye!” Bartholomew shouted, breaking the silence. Sun giggled at his exuberance.

“Wow, that was great, Sun,” Cadin said in an amazed voice.

“Oh, boys,” Sun said while still giggling, “that is nothing. Just a basic shot at a non-moving target. Thank you anyways. Would you like to try it?”

“Yeah,” said Cadin.

“Great,” said Bartholomew at the same time.

“I too would like to give it a go,” Instructor Kade said. “It has been a while.”

“Well grab a bow and arrow and spread out evenly in front of the targets,” Sun said confidently.

Cadin grabbed the old bow that Instructor Kade handed to him and picked out the straightest arrow he could find before standing next to Bartholomew. Instructor Kade strolled up to the other side of Cadin and Sun began the first lesson.

“Obviously, the goal is to shoot your arrow and hit as close to the center of the target as possible. Now grab your bow with your left hand and one of your arrows in your right. Fit the notched end of your arrow onto your string like this, and rest the arrow on the top part of the handle.”

The arrow would not sit still as he attempted to follow Sun’s directions. Instructor Kade had no problem and was at the ready before Sun finished talking. Cadin wished just then that he had paid more attention in middle school. It was required that they at least try every common angel weapon for a week, though the teachers gave up on bow and arrows after only a couple of days.

Cadin finally got everything set, and turned back to where Sun was giving instructions, only to find that she was no longer there. Just then, Sun tapped him on the back, making Cadin jump.

“Whops, sorry. Didn’t mean to surprise you. Just wanted to tell you to turn your arrow so that the middle feather is pointing out rather than in.” Sun helped him fix his arrow and returned to her spot.

“Everyone note the color of your feathers,” Sun said.

Cadin felt silly that he had jumped, and even sillier that he had not remembered the basic feather rule. He glanced at the three stiff feathers attached to his arrow, thinking that he liked how the middle blue feather was flanked by two yellow ones. It gave a fast and accurate look to it. In fact, the arrow itself completely outshone the bow with which Cadin intended to shoot the beautiful arrow. They seemed quite mismatched.

“Alright, time to give it a try. Why don’t we all aim for the lowest target this time? As you pull the string back toward the corner of your mouth, breathe in, hold the bow steady and take aim. As you breathe out, release the arrow.”

Cadin looked at his bow and arrow, and then glanced down the field at the lowest target. The center of the target had a black circle the size of a fist. Just outside of the black center was a large red ring. Three concentric circles radiated out from the center before reaching the edge. Cadin focused on the black center.

“All together now,” Sun said.

Cadin panicked a little trying to remember the simple steps that Sun had just recited.

“Breathe in…” Cadin could barely hear Sun as he quickly gulped three or four breaths and raised his bow.

“Take aim…” Where did the target go? Cadin thought in a hurry. It looks so much smaller than it did a second ago.

“And release.”

The sound of four arrows whistled through the air, followed by three thuds. Cadin tried to focus his eyes on the target, having lost sight of his arrow the second that it released. An arrow with all yellow feathers sat center of the target once again. Next was an arrow with green feathers that just missed the center red by a thumb’s width. Lastly, one arrow hung off the bottom of the target, the tall grass obscuring the color of the feathers. Is that my arrow? Cadin wondered. What happened to the fourth arrow? Did I miss completely? How embarrassing.

“Let’s go and check it out,” Sun said brightly. “Before we cross the shooting line,” Sun said quickly as Cadin had begun to walk towards the target, “we all have to put the bows down and confirm that it is safe to walk out to the targets. It really is no fun being accidentally shot on the practice field. So, I will call out ‘all clear?’ and you shout back ‘clear’ if it is safe on your end.

“All clear?!” Sun shouted out in a carrying voice.

“Clear,” everyone said back in much quieter voices, there were only four of them.

“Let’s go get ’em,” Sun said, marching down the field. Cadin couldn’t help but laugh, forgetting his worries that sprung up when he shot the arrow. If he completely missed his first shot, then he missed. He would just have to try harder the next time. Approaching the target, Cadin focused on the arrow hanging low in the grass, but still attached to the target. He thought that he saw a flash of blue and got excited. When they reached the target, Cadin confirmed that it was his arrow sticking to the target and hanging low. He felt so excited that he jumped up giving a shout.

Sun laughed, and then said, “Good job, Cadin. And a very nice shot from you Instructor Kade,” pulling out her own arrow. “But what about your arrow, Bart?”

Bartholomew looked at Sun, apparently amused by the nickname. “I think that it flew straight over the top.”

“No problem,” Sun said while sidestepping the target. “Your arrow had red feathers so it shouldn’t be too hard to find.”

They located Bartholomew’s arrow far afield, and Sun commented on the distance like that was just as impressive as hitting the wrath’s-eye. Cadin decided then and there that he liked Sun and he was glad that she had moved to Glade. Bartholomew was a good guy too. The Archery Club was worth attending, they just needed to find a way to get more people to join.

They continued shooting for the rest of their free period, trying some of the higher targets. Cadin found those much more difficult, missing one or two shots completely. Bartholomew hit the target a few times before the end of practice and was utterly ecstatic each time. Sun never once missed, though she was a little off dead center a couple of times when she demonstrated trickier techniques. Instructor Kade hit the black wrath’s-eye on the third shot, resulting in high-fives from everyone.

“All in all, a good first practice, everyone,” Instructor Kade said as he broke down the targets. Everyone grabbed something to help carry back to the storage shed. Upon entering, Cadin was overwhelmed by the piles of junk that only opened enough for a narrow path through the middle. There were hundreds of shelves lining the walls, but Cadin guessed that those had been filled up long ago, the unorganized piles building up after the shelves were full.

“Now you understand how lucky I was to find all of this for us to work with,” Instructor Kade said. “Sun was kind enough to let us borrow her arrows today, however, I will speak with Headmaster Tripharian about purchasing some for the school. I have cleared out this area on the floor for us to store the archery stuff, as most of you can’t fly yet to access it up high.”

“Well, when should our next meeting be?”

“Tomorrow,” Cadin said just a little bit faster than Sun or Bartholomew.

“Alright then, enjoy your lunch.”

Sun, Bartholomew, and Cadin all headed for the cafeteria, excited about the club and what it could mean for each of them.