Enceladus

December

It was a month later and we were about to land on Enceladus’ spacecraft dock. My world was dark and cold, no sun. No sun meant crop growth problems. So our scientists who lived in the E Division (control of the elements) came up with an artificial sun system hundreds of years ago.

Our temperature never got above sixty degrees Fahrenheit. And if it ever did, we’d be in trouble. Our planet and our bodies wouldn’t react well. That was why during the summers in Ohio, I left to somewhere colder.

We landed on the dock. I handed Lainie several layers to wear because of the cold. We stepped out and it was terror. We were slightly above the city and there were fires as far as the eye could see. Even though I had never really liked Enceladus, my heart went out to the citizens, especially the children.

There was shooting below us. Enceladus didn’t have guns. At least not the dirt poor citizens. We used swords. My father had declared fire arms outdated and outlawed decades ago because of our abilities. There must have still been some guns in our weaponry.

I grabbed Lainie’s hand. “How do we get to the kingdom?” I asked Lynx.

“Fly.”

I looked to the sky. There were a handful of Enceladians in the sky. I didn’t know which people were part of the coup.

“I won’t let anything happen to you crown Princess Cassiopeia, Princess Amelia and Prince Lynx. And you too, Lainie.” John bowed.

That seemed like an unnecessary mouthful. Especially since we all knew he had sworn away his life to protect us.

“We should hide you, Amelia,” Cass said. We had made up since the fight but I still wasn’t feeling any sisterly love from or towards her. I didn’t ask why she wanted to hide me.

John grabbed a hooded blazer from the ship. I put it on and we set out into the sky. The royal palace was sixteen kilometers from the docking station. We flew past a grove of trees, past Planet Hall and Square (the equivalent to a city square or circle) which was overrun with rioters. I wasn’t sure what they were rioting. The king and queen were dead.

John was carrying me again. I struggled to keep my hood up against the wind. I desperately wished I had my own wings.

Then all I saw was a flash of white wings as someone flew into John and I fell from his arms.

“Amy!” Lainie screamed.

I tried to scream as well but nothing came out. I was falling at least six meters. I couldn’t see the ground yet. Clouds.

Through my whipping black hair, I saw both John and Cassiopeia racing down after me. Cass didn’t love me but she didn’t want me to die. I’d call that progress.

Why was I joking right now?

Probably because I was about to die.

John was close to me but not close enough to grab me. I fell faster than he flew. Points for me. My arms and legs were flailing and I still wondered why I wasn’t screaming.

I was getting closer to the ground. I could see bright orange fires on the side of the cobble road. I would soon be flat on the dirt road and no one could help me.

Suddenly I felt an immense pain in my back. It hurt so badly, my eyes watered. I again tried to cry out but no sound came. The ground grew closer and closer. I closed my eyes.

Abruptly . . . I stopped falling.

I opened my eyes. I was nearly a foot off the ground. I looked around to see what had caught me. John and Cass had just landed, staring up at me curiously.

My brows came together. Lynx? I looked behind me.

I had caught myself.

My wings had come. But that wasn’t the weird part. The weird part was that one wing was white and the other was black.

John and Cass were staring at me like I really was the môn.

I shrugged and my wings moved with my shoulders. It was so strange to have wings. Like I had an extra body part. I felt the wind rustled my feathers as if it was rustling my hair. Weird.

“Amy!” Lainie and Lynx landed. She ran into my arms. “Are you okay?” Then she stepped backward, looking at my wings. “They’re beautiful,” she whispered. She hugged me again, arms tight around my torso. “I thought you were going to die.” There were tears streaking her beautiful face.

“Hey, I’m alright. See?” I flexed my wings. They were huge, bigger than any of my siblings’. And they knew it.

Cass looked at me with envy and John looked awestruck.

“Okay, yeah, your wings are lovely. We don’t have time. Del and Cal could be dying and we’re just standing here,” Lynx said in a rush.

We took off and this time I got to carry my girlfriend. The takeoff was a little rocky but as soon as I was soaring, I got the hang of it quickly. I was shocked. It took Enceladians a few years to master flying. We went to Ability/Wing school until we were 130 years old.

We landed at the palace. I barely recognized it. The gates surrounding it were completely gone. The windows of the king’s part of the castle had been damaged, like citizens had flown in that way and killed him and mother in their sleep. I could tell Delphinus and Caelum had tried to keep the citizens out of the palace. It didn’t look like it was working. The castle itself was scorched from multiple fires, some still lit.

I held on tightly to Lainie. If she got hurt, I didn’t know what I’d do.

We went inside the main doors. The house I hated was trashed. And not just with trash. There were bodies littering the floor, most dressed in guard’s armor, some normal citizens. From the smell, I knew they were old, months old.

Lainie had her hand over her mouth and nose. Her eyes started to water. She had never seen such carnage. I unfurled my new wings and shielded her with my black one.

We walked passed the bodies and went straight to the throne room. Lynx threw open the doors. What I saw was almost comical.

Caelum was in the king’s throne and Delphinus was in the queen’s. They were both wearing elegant battle armor.

Del was just as gorgeous as the last time I saw her, with her ash hair and green eyes. Cal was . . . well, Cal.

“Nïx, nïxï.” Delphinus said. “Amelia,” she said in clear disgust. “I see you got your wings. And of course they’re devil wings.”

I flexed them, revealing Lainie. Caelum and Del gasped.

“Fån ôp gïx?” Cal said “who is she”. Hello to you too, Caelum. He matched Del’s appearances (they’d be mistaken for twins on Earth). Cal was more muscular since the last time I saw him.

“Amelia’s consort. Human,” snarky Cassiopeia said.

I rolled my eyes. “Nice to see you too, Cal.”

“Amelia.” Caelum got up and grabbed my forearm as a greeting gesture. I stared, eyes widening. “We are glad you came.” My mouth opened even more than my eyes. I was almost too shocked to engage in the gesture.

I introduced Lainie to Del and Cal. “Now, do you know where the leaders of the coup are?”

“Well, when they killed mother and father, there was only six men. We killed them all immediately but have you seen the streets? The leaders of the coup weren’t the ones who killed mother and father. They sent their followers, the cowards,” Cal said.

“How many guards are left?” I asked. I put my wings away, which was an odd sensation. I had always watched people put them away but never felt it myself. It felt like a limb disappearing into thin air. But somehow I could still feel them inside me even though they just vanished entirely. I knew they slid into my skin like nothing was ever there. My shirt was also ripped from where my wings had torn out of my back, saving me. I hadn’t been wearing an Enceladian shirt that had slits in the back made for our wings.

“About seventy. We lost a lot during the first few months,” said Del.

The kingdom had had at least two-hundred guards. We lost more than a lot. How did that many die? “Well you didn’t answer my first question. Do you have any idea where the leaders are?”

Caelum shifted. He was obviously uncomfortable with my new sense of authority. I wouldn’t let them bully me a second more. “We think they are residing in Planet Hall. The Square is where they fight.”

“Then let’s go.”

Lynx stopped me. “Amelia. You’re getting ahead of yourself. You have no weapons or armor.”

Lainie was biting her lip. “Where will I stay?”

“Here, love. You can stay with our best guards,” I said. “Right Caelum?”

He nodded, holding back whatever disgusting comment he would have normally made.

Lynx clapped his hands together. “Okay. Weapons. Armor.”

Lainie, Lynx, Cass, John and I went to the weaponry downstairs. There were also dead bodies all over the floor. No one was in charge so no one had ordered any servants or guards to clean up the bodies. Not that we had enough guards to spare.

“How are Del and Cal still alive?” I murmured under my breath.

John heard me. “It seems to me that they haven’t fought yet, Princess.”

Of course those cowards hadn’t fought in all three months of the civil war.

I held Lainie close again. Nothing would happen to her. I’d let something happen to my “siblings” quicker than I would Lainie. Minus Lynx.

Lynx picked out some gear for me and it was almost comical. Almost.

He gave me a thick, dark red leather body suit.

“Nope.” I handed it back to him.

He rolled his eyes and shoved it back in my arms. “You have to. You’ll look sexy, nïx.”

I mimicked him, rolling my eyes. “Fine.”

After I put it on, he fastened a metal gorget on me that went around my neck and ended high on my chest. He handed me a type of black corset that was as hard as a human’s bulletproof vest. He looked in the closet for something else. Out he came with two cuisses. A cuisse went around a person’s thigh, hooked on the body with a belt and two fastens behind the leg. Afterward securing those on me, he gave me red gloves, a sword with a sheath, a few knives and a shield. The shield had my initials on it. When I still lived on Enceladus, Orion had shields made for each of us along with weapons.

“You look hot,” Lainie said.

Lynx came up behind her and raised an eyebrow. “I told you so,” he said in Enceladian.