Realm of Wings

Jade, proudly looking towards Miria:

“Hey there.” I said while taking Miria from Echo’s arms. “Did you have a good talk with Echo?” I asked her kindly and she shook her head.

“Yep, he said he’s going to take me to a safe place.” She replied and I quickly switched my gaze to him.

“Jade, I know you want to keep-

“Where are you going to take her?” I interrupted him.

“To my father.” He answered.

“No! You are not going to bring her to the castle! She won’t be safe there!” I yelled, holding Miria tight and keeping her at a distance from Echo. Even though I have to keep her safe, as that is what Neil has told me to do, I have grown quite fond of her the last two days.

“Wait what? How do you know…-

“That the Oracle is your father? Kallan fought with you, and you told him that I’m your niece. You might not know to what degree or how far you and I are related, but we are, in fact, related. And me knowing that our little girl here has a destiny of her own to fulfil and you mentioning your father, I know it must have been the Oracle, as he said to be my uncle.” I explained, nearly sighing in disbelief at the people that kept underestimating my intelligence.

Sure I have made mistakes in the past and I probably will make more in the future, but seeing connections and figuring things out is something that comes quite natural, most of the time.

“Yes, you are right. I’m sorry for disrespecting you.” Echo said, honestly making excuses.

“Thank you. But you are still not taking her to the castle.” I said determinedly.

“How do you say this on Earth, there are more ways that lead to Rome?” He asked and smiled. “Jade, you are supposed to go to the castle to empower the three orbs you have, how you are going to do that, is your problem to figure out. What I’m going to do is take Miria with me, to keep her safe at my father’s lair, but I will use a different route. The door inside the castle is just a portal and there are several others to reach his realm. So, she will not be in any near vicinity of the castle, and I will keep her safe at all cost, you have my word.” He said, putting his hand on his chest to ground his statement further.

I dropped my shoulders, knowing that I couldn’t possibly keep her with me at all times, especially not when we are going to infiltrate the castle somehow. But can I let go of her and let her travel with Echo? Can he keep her safe until he reaches his father?

“Miss Jade?” Miria asked for attention, in the way Neil always did and it shook me for a moment. “It is okay, I’ll be okay.” She said, putting her hand on my cheek. “Neil is with me.” She then said and I looked into those brightly lit eyes of her and smiled gently.

“Yes, I know, I have seen him too.” I kept smiling while I tried to stifle my tears. “You keep listening to him, okay? He is one smart man, always follow his advice.” I said sternly and tapped her nose with my finger and she nodded agreeing, chuckling as I tickled her.

I put her on her feet again and she grabbed Echo’s hand to let her be guided by him. “Come we are going to get the blankets from our bags, to get some sleep before we leave in the morning.” Echo said and Miria followed him while yawning.

“Don’t you dare lose her Echo, I’ll hurt you if you do.” I threatened and he smiled in return.

“Never.” He replied and walked towards the door. “Oh, Zeph, you are going to stay with them, they could use your power to get into the castle, on the other side.” Echo said and Zeph pouted.

“Why did you tell them! I wanted to do that!” He whined like a little boy and I looked surprised. He murmured something about not having a partner and feeling left out in our odd group, and that he wanted to tell us about this himself to make us surprised for once. But Echo had taken that pleasure from him too.

So, he wasn’t too fond of not having that card to play anymore but I didn’t want to tease him with it. He will still have to explain what it is that he could do with his power, and knowing that I can copy it from him, for a little while, is something I’m looking forward to as well.

On a side note, Charlie was the one that had guided everyone here, and as he spewed out some berries for me to have, I picked them up and put them in a small bag for me to give to him later. He was happy to be with me again and immediately jumped on my back and sat on my shoulder again.

“Can’t he go with Miria?” Kallan snapped and Charlie hissed in return.

“Why? What did you do to him?” I asked Kallan accusingly.

“Me? What about him?! He was the one that threw those freaking nuts against my head! I didn’t do shit!” He yelled, clearly feeling betrayed by my loyalty towards the furry creature.

“No, that’s not possible, right little Charlie-warlie?” I cooed the Mandibore while scratching him between his little antlers at which he started to purr like a kitten. “See, you must have done something to anger him because he is so cute towards me.” I accused Kallan again in a teasing way.

“That little… I’m going to…” Kallan murmured while making fists and walking over towards the door where Trixie went to with that woman I met earlier. “Trix, wrap it up! We need to make up camp!” He said after he slammed on the door.

It didn’t take long for Trixie to come out, her hair in disarray and a smile on her lips that could reach the stars. And right after her, came the woman I’d met earlier and this time I was really surprised! Her hair wasn’t in that tight cloth anymore, in fact, it hadn’t been her hair up there at all! She had several snakes coming out the top of her head, all hissing and all squirming in delight… and did one of them have some slicky wetness all around its face? No! Don’t let your mind drift there!... Shit!

“You should come back again, darling.” She said while kissing Trixie and the snakes reached to the front to give Trixie each a kiss on their own as well. Trixie embraced the woman and gave her a tight hug until the woman realised that I was here as well.

“Oh, too bad I got distracted halfway through your trial, otherwise I would have made it more difficult for you to get the orb. I’d loved to have you as my new trophy, but I guess that’s out of the question now.” She chuckled as she drawled her finger through her nest of snakes. “I’m curious though, are the voices of my snakes the only voices you hear? Or are there more?” She asked then and I had nearly forgotten about the voices I heard when I had come into this house, as they were indeed hissing voices, those of her snakes apparently!

Kallan chuckled at her question as if that was preposterous to ask in the first place. I mean, who could hear voices, other than reading thoughts, right?

Right… well…

“Why do you want to know?” I asked her back, not entirely avoiding her question which made Kallan scoff in disbelief. “Kallan please, I don’t even know who it is.”

“So, you do hear voices?” He asked and I nodded. “I can’t believe this.” He said as he threw his hands in the air.

“Well it’s not like I’m hearing it every day, and I can’t seem to talk back to it either!” I pleaded my case.

“But you could’ve told me.” He said hurt.

“Yes, but I didn’t know how to tell you. It’s never a good sign if you can hear voices, most of the time it means that you are creating an alternate character within your mind. Split personality kind of stuff.”

“Yes well, even if that might be, I’d still like to know, we are a team remember? Are there more secrets you are hiding?” He asked as he sighed and I actually felt bad about keeping this to myself.

“Nope, I think that’s about it.” I replied, hoping that he wouldn’t get angry with me, as I didn’t have the energy to fight him about this stupid subject.

Suddenly, a fierce and massively loud roar bellowed from somewhere within the house and I tried to bury my face in between my shoulders.

“Well… there might be one more thing I need to tell you guys.” I hesitated to say but to be fair, I had completely forgotten about the creature that was caved in behind two walls. So, I wasn’t completely to blame for not telling anyone about him, right?

“For fuck sake, don’t tell me that sound is Connely.” Kallan said while rubbing his face in annoyance.

“Well… he is a werewolf that is magically energized with green shards that he bites on. And I guess that he has used multiple now, considering his roar is pretty loud.” I tried to say as quick as I could, somehow thinking that I wouldn’t get more angry looks thrown my way if I talked fast.

But that was just wishful thinking of course, as I could hear Kallan curse while I kept my eyes closed.

“Chariah, can’t you teleport him to the King’s palace, after killing him with your bricks?” I suddenly heard Trixie ask the woman and she seemed to think about that for a moment.

“I could, but who is going to pay for all the mess to clean up? It’s going to be expensive.” She smiled at Trixie.

“Oh, I haven’t paid you enough already?” Trixie smirked in return while stepping closer to her. “Maybe I should remind you some more, about my payment.” She continued as she put her hand in between the snakes on Chariah’s head, forcing her to tilt back and for her neck to make room for Trixie’s onslaught of kisses.

“I guess it’s our turn to take a walk this time.” I chuckled at Kallan but he still wasn’t really happy about me holding back a secret of my own. “I’m sorry okay.” I sincerely said.

“What was that? The almighty Queen says sorry? I think I haven’t heard that right.” He said, teasing me while he guided me outside the house.

“Kallan, you better make her pay for that!” Trixie hollered, not being happy about it either. I know that we are going to talk about it later, especially since I have been angry with Trixie for keeping her secret. But as she was busy with pleasing Chariah now, I knew she wasn’t that mad at me.

“I’m not going to repeat what I said.” I said chuckling, letting Charlie down on the ground, for him to roam around some bushes that were close by.

“My head is spinning from all the things that we still have to find out and do. So I’m really hoping that we have most of the things clear now.” Kallan said and I couldn’t agree with him more.

While setting up camp without Trixie, we spend some time talking, planning some things as to how we could exploit my new power and find out how many different powers I can absorb before the time ran out of me losing it again.

Then we talked about all the things we have done so far, reminiscing about different things such as how Kallan and I met at the Shigatse police station; how I was trapped inside my protective bubble when entering Kyalthemar; then how we went through the rift and ended up at the King’s castle, and finally we went through all the stories of how we managed to get all four orbs.

But it felt like we were only halfway through our story, as there are still so many things that we have to accomplish.

First, we need to get the orbs energized at the tree of origin, but as the King knows I have to energize the other orbs, as he somehow knows that I have four to gather, he will probably guard the tree and thus also the castle with enough guards to not let us in easily.

Second, if we manage to get inside, we need to retrieve the orb of protection, if he hasn’t destroyed it already, and then energize the other three I have.

Third, we have to leave the castle again, safely, and find a way to take down the rift and actually do that, and restore the connection between the tree of origin and the other fountains that are on the other side of the rift.

And last but not least, we need to return to the tree again, hoping to find that it has been either healed on his own, but it won’t be that easy I’m sure of it, or help it heal by giving it my all.

And hopefully not die while doing it…

Besides, between all those things, we still don’t know what role Miria is going to play; who the voice is that I have been hearing; how time has passed for me to live in this era, instead of that of a few generations ago; why I don’t have wings or how I am going to get them back and many more things that we still have to find out…

And all the while I’m thinking of all of this, I hear Connely screaming in the background as he is being squashed between two rock walls. Echo guarded a sleeping Miria against hearing the torturing voices from a dying Connely, using some sort of barrier made of a deep humming sound. Clearly, Echo had heard her devastating thoughts about losing her family as well and wanted to do everything to keep her from more terrifying things. And as soon as the screaming ended, I knew that he was teleported to the castle, to send King Qai a message of terror.

Even though I hadn’t been the one that killed Connely, I knew by his screams that he has gotten what he deserves. Besides, I need my strength and imagination to put King Qai in a much worse fate, I’ll promise you that.

But for now, we can rest a little. I laid my head back against Kallan’s chest, which was sitting against the bark of the tree, and pulled up the blankets to fall asleep.

“I love you, my Queen.”

“I love you too.”

END OF PART ONE

A/n: There is still so much going on that I have to get all the information straight in my head. So, please, give me the possibility and patience to do so, and I will start writing the sequel as soon as possible! Thank You!