Realm of Wings

Jade, feeling helpless, sitting in a cart:

“Don’t talk, Miria. If you want to ask me something, think about it, alright? I can read your mind.” I told her, as she sat in between my legs, curled up in a ball in my arms.

I had tried to say my goodbyes to Kallan and the others, trying to use some of my energy to heal Zeph’s wounds to get him conscious faster, but Connely hadn’t given me much time to do this as he had pulled me away quicker than I had wanted.

So now, Trixie had come around but Zeph was still unconscious and they had molested Poseidon by tearing away some of the feathers of his wing, to make it impossible for him to fly towards us anytime soon; my compass was taken by Connely, as soon as he had forced me to check the direction of the next orb and Miria and I were pushed into an energy-reinforced cart.

Connely could have decided to kill the others, as that wouldn’t leave a loose end. But if he should have decided to do that, there wouldn’t be a thing left for me to lose, and who knows what I would be capable of doing then? I might have ideas, but he surely doesn’t. Coward.

Kallan, not being calm:

“Fuck!” I cursed again and again, pulling my hair out as I saw those fucking humans take away Jade!

I know that I made this decision, of letting her go, as I knew she didn’t want Miria to get hurt any more than she already had suffered, as her complete family had been murdered in cold blood, even after telling them where we had been headed. But still, I was rethinking my actions.

Should I have been urging Jade to keep on fighting, possibly losing Miria in the process as well? But no, that wouldn’t have worked out for Jade as losing Miria would have been another loss that she didn’t want to have on her name. Jade couldn’t have processed more failures onto her mental state right now, so even though it hurt me like hell, this was the only solution as of now.

“Kallan, what happened?” Trixie said as she had come by minutes ago, but hadn’t understood how Jade had become captive of this Connely.

“Those men have been tracking us, for a while apparently as ordered by King Qai. And now they have taken Jade in their custody!” I yelled in frustration.

“I don’t know how these humans were able to knock me out, or stay at a safe distance without us noticing them, but they were pretty strong and fast! My head still hurts from that blow!” Trixie said at which I was impressed that she had noticed for them to not be Fae.

But now that she mentioned it, they were indeed stronger than any other human I’ve ever encountered. Sure, they were here with greater numbers and had the element of surprise on us, but I don’t think I could have won a battle against ten of those at the same time, even though I could have before.

“And what happened to him?” Trixie pointed her head towards Poseidon, who was furiously trying to rearrange the feathers of his wing. I told Trixie what those men had done to him and she cooed the creature as if it was a baby. “Jade won’t like it if we leave Poseidon here.” Trixie then said and I agreed to that statement, but we have to get going quickly if we want to catch up to the cart.

“Yes, but we need to chase after them, and we can’t do it as fast if we have to stay on the ground.” I told her.

“True. We should get to the next village, let Poseidon behind with some caretakers there and wait for Echo to join us. We could definitely use his skills to get Jade back.”

“She is WHAT?!” Echo roared, nearly frothing from anger, which I couldn’t deny to feel as well. “Why didn’t you keep fighting? She is the most important being on the planet!”

“You haven’t been with her, the last couple of weeks! You don’t know how she is feeling! They had us cornered by using that little girl!” I shouted, right back in his face.

“Her feelings?! You should have pushed her harder! There is no time for feelings!” Echo claimed and I nearly wanted to punch him in the face for what he said.

“Wow.” I said, slumping down my arms. Echo looked surprised by my comment, taken aback that I wasn’t yelling in his face again. “Echo, I don’t know if you have realized it, but she already knew that she wasn’t going to live much longer. She had nearly given up on everything because she was afraid of her own powers and their consequences.”

“But…”

“No, ‘buts’ Echo. If I would have made her fight, and she would have lost the little girl, she would have been broken.” I shook my head.

Echo took a seat on the chair in this lavishly golden room which he rented, and sighed. “Tell me what happened.” And so we did.

We had taken an hour or two in this village, to explain everything, take some time to gather new supplies, for Zeph to wake up and to get back to the place where they took Jade from. Poseidon was no longer with us, as he was still wounded on his wing, but he was put in the stables of the house we had our meeting in. There were some nature Fae there and they were being handsomely paid for taking care of Jade’s horse.

And now we were flying above the cart’s tracks to find out where they had taken Jade as we wouldn’t know where to find the last orb.

“So, tell me again how they were able to fight off four strong Fae?” Echo asked while flying right behind Trixie as he couldn’t see the ground but could follow her body by using his clicking sounds. Even though we had explained everything two times already, the frustration about this part, about losing to a bunch of humans, kept being the subject of Echo’s irritation.

“They were stronger than other humans. They knocked Zeph and Trixie right out, easily.” I told him after sighing.

“Easily.” Trixie hummed annoyed, irritation lacing her mind about being bested by them. “You don’t have to add that to your explanation!”

“Then fight better next time!” Echo barged in.

“They caught us by surprise!” She tried to object. I shook my head her way, asking her to not react any further, but she just crossed her arms and averted her gaze to something else. I understand her frustration as she is the high elder of her class, when we were at my father’s kingdom, but we simply don’t have the luxury to think back to our former statuses.

“I see something!” Zeph suddenly mentioned, rubbing his head as he had bandages still around it. He was hit by something massive and had been bleeding profusely, if it hadn’t had been for Jade’s minute of healing, the wound would have been larger and he probably would’ve still been unconscious. But luckily he was up and flying with us again, even though he should take a few more days to rest.

We started our descent and followed Zeph’s guide to what he had seen. Unfortunately, the thing that he had seen, was the fact that the tracks had suddenly stopped and didn’t continue their way, even though the cart wasn’t there. The tracks must have magically been covered as there was no way we would be able to know where they have gone to now.

“Besides having more strength than regular humans, they must have found out a way to be able to use magic as well.” Trixie said at which Echo nodded.

I could tell that Echo had something on his mind, as he suddenly was quiet and he closed his eyes – even though he couldn’t see through them – which gave me the sign that he was trying to connect some dots of information.

“You know more.” I stated while getting closer to him.

He opened his eyes again and showed his silvery orbs, pointing them in my direction without knowing exactly where my eyes would be.

“I’m not sure.”

“Even though you’re not, I’d still like to hear it.” I replied to him.

“You have grown bold, Prince. Your love for her has taken away the fear you used to have for me.” He grinned, at which I furrowed my brows.

I don’t think I have ever truly feared him or his powers, but there sure was a certain level of respect for what he was capable of. But I think that that feeling has indeed been broken down, especially since he couldn’t come up with a solution to Jade’s ending fate.

I groaned in frustration, waiting for Echo to continue.

“Each time I came back here, to the Aether side, I did without prior notice to the King. And on multiple occasions, I noticed something strange with him. King Qai’s motives for being absent or the rumours that came in and out of the palace, just didn’t make sense.” He started.

“You mean the sudden deaths among the Fae on the floating island?” Zeph asked, which brought in more curiosity from my side.

Echo nodded and continued. “Yes, but also the rumours of how they perished.”

“Which is?” I asked impatiently.

“It hasn’t been proven, nor confirmed, but these dead Fae are assumed to have been enhanced with magic.”

All sorts of ideas, more questions and confusion rose within me. Has King Qai been experimenting with magic, on Fae? How dark and twisted has his mind become?! What else has he been experimenting on? Wait…

“And with you telling me that Jade has given her orb of protection to him, which might indicate that he used its magic, and now these humans show up… I’m not sure… It’s just a strange coincidence.” He continued.

“So, what, are you saying that the King has made superhumans with Fae magic?” Trixie chimed in, saying what it is that I was thinking as well.

“I don’t know! I haven’t seen these humans you have been fighting with, nor can I believe that King Qai would have agreed to bring them on our planet in the first place! I don’t have any proof for any of these thoughts! But if he couldn’t complete his experiments on Fae, and now tried it on humans, and if what you said is true…” He hesitated as he normally didn’t make any assumptions unless he could prove it somehow. “Then there seems to be no other explanation.” Echo answered.

“Fucking unicorns on a rainbow.” Trixie cursed, using Jade’s words as she had said that once in all her storytelling with Neil.

It was quiet for a moment and Zeph took a seat on the ground, scratching his head while he probed his fingers under the edges of the bandage. With a sigh, Trixie sat next to him and helped him check out his bandages. She told him to take some rest, getting back some energy to help himself heal his wounds.

Jade could’ve healed him in minutes, and because she was limitless in using her energy, it wouldn’t have cost her anything besides getting a bit tired. But Zeph had been hit hard, so he was using up all his energy to heal himself, all the while he had been using it to fly with us as well.

He was slowing us down a bit, but we needed all the hands we could get, should we find Jade and her captors again.

While they were sitting down, I took some time to walk around, hoping to find some other clue as to where they had been heading to.

Jade, sitting in the corner of the cart, still holding Miria:

“Will he know what to do?” Miria thought.

“I’m sure of it.” I whispered to her, trying to sound secure, even though I couldn’t be unless the outcome came to us soon.

A few hours ago, Connely had used a magical item to wipe away all traces of the cart and creatures that he and his men were riding.

To distract Miria, I had asked about those animals and she called them Kuddos, even though she wasn’t sure what their true name was. The closest I could explain was that they are a crossbreed of large dogs, bears and hippos… I think. Because their furry but scrawny skin and barking sounds were something doglike, yet broad hooves and slow movements that of the hippo, and its head was wide and it had teeth like that of a bear. Yet, they were easily tamed and coerced into making them rideable.

But while I kept her busy with things to distract her from her sad thoughts, I was trying to come up with a plan to let Kallan know where we were going to, since he doesn’t know where the next orb is. And as fate will have it, somehow Charlie had found me and managed to get into the cart through the bars. At first, I couldn’t understand how he found us and I wanted him to get away, as he would probably be killed on sight, but soon I realized that we might be able to use him to let Kallan know where we are.

I mean, I had the rune of ‘animal’ on my wrist, and I had found the orb of ‘animal’ as well, but other than rescuing the animals in the moving forest, I hadn’t truly found out what my talent with animals is. Sure, Poseidon could understand anything I said and I understood his actions, but it wasn’t as if I could talk to him in a horselike manner or change into a creature of my liking or something. But on the other hand, I hadn’t yet energized the orb of ‘animal’ either, so maybe besides me being easy to communicate with animals, my true talent with them still had to reveal itself.

However, I had to try and do something, because we had been travelling for some time without leaving any tracks behind. So the longer I waited, the more difficult it would be for Kallan to find me again.

Suddenly, Charlie hurled out some nuts he had in the sacks of his cheeks, slurped up the drool from them as they laid on the floor of the cart while looking up to me as if he wanted to hear a ‘good boy’ for bringing us these ‘gifts’.

“Good boy!” Miria suddenly said, as if she had heard my thoughts.

I furrowed my brows in question, wanting to know why she was praising my pet for this behaviour. “What is so good about this?” I asked when pointing towards the half soaking nuts.

“We can toss the nuts and he will go after them, to eat them.” She had thought, which was actually a good idea.

I had picked him up, threw one nut out of the cart when we rounded around a tree and Charlie went right after it, rolling himself onto the nut, as he always did before he ate one, and then took a few minutes before he actually had finished eating it. He jumped back in the cart, gracefully guiding his horns between two bars, and, after tiring the little creature as we silently played with him for a while, we threw all the nuts behind a tree, so none of the guards would notice it. Immediately, Charlie jumped right onto the pile and started rubbing his fur all over, and we both hoped that he would fall asleep on top of his food, giving Kallan enough time to hopefully find him.

And now, as she had just asked me if Kallan would understand what to do, hoping he would realize this Mandibore was Charlie and not a random one, we were waiting. It was a long shot, a very slim, long shot, that he would find Charlie, but so far it was our only shot.

A/n: Next chapter is called: Boop the floof. 🦝 Where a little bit is written from Charlie's point of view! 🙈

Leave some comments with how you think the little creature should react to finding Kallan and his companions, maybe I will change the chapter to include your idea! 😊