The Other Side

She heard the sigh of waves against sand as she arrived, smelled the tang of salt and living things, but that was just her god-senses getting ahead of her body. The ocean was barely even visible form her current vantage point, which was at the outskirts of a small town.

There was no welcome sign to tell her this village’s name, but her map had identified it as Kine Peak, which she’d never heard of before. It had probably once been a small but prosperous settlement linking Atlas Isle to the mainland; now it was just another group of people struggling to get by in a faltering world, sandwiched between numbed-out gray lands and the sea. Although one thing that Chuva could say for little villages was that they tended to go a lot less rotten than the cities did.

She kept walking forward. She wasn’t sure if she liked this place, with the gray lands behind her and the living ocean waiting ahead, but she wasn’t planning to be here long either way.

First things first: she had to find some way onto the island, someone with a boat who was willing to take on the dangerous job of chartering to a stranger to someplace forbidden. (If you can even afford it, a pessimistic voice nagged inside her head.) It was getting late, and people typically didn’t like it when someone they’d never seen before came banging on their doors at night to ask questions, but surely a town like this would have at least one boat shop? One that hadn’t closed for the evening, hopefully?

She found a paved road, followed it to the town center. There was no real marketplace, but clusters of two- and three-story buildings advertised establishments open for business on their ground floors: a tavern, a general store, a boardinghouse. Wooden vendors’ stands, some well-kept, some ramshackle, stood empty at the sides of the road, awaiting tomorrow’s wares and customers. There weren’t even any peddlers around.

The first sign of life came from the tavern, where a small group of men suddenly pushed their way into the street, laughing loudly. They were more drunk on socialization than they were on actual alcohol. When they noticed Chuva, they began to wave to her, and she waved back; she hadn’t always had the best experiences with guys coming from bars, but why be unfriendly when they hadn’t done anything wrong yet?

“Hello, lady!” called one of them, provoking another round of chuckles from his friends.

“Hi,” she replied, carefully setting her mouth into a neutral smile.

The excessively friendly guy tilted his head slightly. “I don’t think I’ve see you around here before. Are you selling something?”

“No,” answered Chuva. This wasn’t the first time she’d been confused for a traveling vendor, what with her patchwork clothes that spoke of great distances and her shoulder bag that could have easily contained merchandise. “I’m just visiting. Say, do you know where I could rent a boat around here?”

Friendly Guy brightened, nodding eagerly. “Of course! Head towards the beach, and you’ll see a small pier with a little shack in front of it. That’s Mel’s-On-the-Sea. She has kayaks and canoes, and a couple of larger fishing boats, as well.”

“Okay.” That wasn’t exactly what she was looking for, but it would be a place to start, at the very least. “Thank you for your help.”

“No problem, lady. And welcome to Kine Peak!” His friends were starting to drift away, and he hurried to get back in step with them, his laughter soon rejoining theirs.

Chuva, suddenly very aware of her solitude, turned to hurry on her way.

The sea was a strange sight to her. Her hometown, Saint Valdez Point, had been in the center of the northern landmass, far from any shore. Sometimes her parents had brought her on special trips to the beach when she was a very young girl, and she’d fritter about between the sand and the waves, but that was before her wings…before Silas. So when she saw this ocean, even though she’d never been here before, a small piece of her heart began to pine for faraway nostalgia, and for something less abstract, too.

Her double was so close. For a split second, she could physically feel it, almost like her starstone wasn’t broken anymore.

She hastened to the pier, her cape snapping in the sea breeze.

MEL’S-ON-THE-SEA, stated a sign planted before the pier in small, economical letters. BOAT SALES, RENTALS, REPAIRS. A number of small vessels were moored to the tiny dock, none of which looked hardy enough to get Chuva all the way to Atlas Isle. Nevertheless, she straightened out her clothes, then approached the bungalow that served as a business office and briskly knocked on the door.

For a moment, all she heard was a series of thumps from inside: objects being banged down on tabletops, feet clomping down a staircase. Then a bolt was drawn, and the door slitted open, a squat chain glittering between it and the doorframe. “Yes?” asked a woman’s voice, caught halfway between suspicion and the manufactured cheerfulness of a sales clerk.

“Good evening,” said Chuva, deliberately not getting any closer to the door. “Someone told me you were the one to see about getting a boat?”

The woman nodded, reaching up to release the chain, but not opening the door any wider just yet. “Yes, that’s right. You’re not from around here.” It wasn’t a question.

“I just got here,” agreed Chuva. In small towns, everyone knew that a stranger was in their midst at first glance, unlike the sprawling cities were even lifelong residents were often lost in the crowd.

At last, the woman opened the door fully. She was about Chuva’s height, burly, with an amiable freckled face. “Well, normally I’d say that it’s a little late to be doing business, but seeing as how you didn’t know any better, I can forgive it. Come on in. I’m Mel, by the way.”

“I’m Chuva. Thanks for helping me.”

“I haven’t helped you yet,” remarked Mel wisely. “But hopefully we’ll get there.”

The bungalow was, as Chuva had suspected, both a living and a working space for Mel. A wide desk and a few chairs stood in the middle of the floor, surrounded by sketches and even rare photographs of boats on all sides, and a roped-off set of stairs led to a partially visible loft bedroom. “So, what are you in the market for? Something to fish in, or a leisure craft? I’m afraid that my supply has been pretty limited lately, but I’m sure we can find something that will work for you.”

Chuva’s feet ached from her all-night walk, but she remained standing for the moment. “Actually,” she began, “I had something else in mind. I’m trying to get to Atlas Isle.”

She had expected her host to gasp, to recoil, to do something in line with the forbidden nature of the island. Instead, Mel just sighed softly. “Aren’t we all. Unfortunately, dear, you’re wasting your time. One of my boats would never get you there, what with the barriers in place…”

Normally, Chuva hated being called anything like ‘dear’, but right now she hardly noticed. “I don’t think you understand,” she said firmly. “This isn’t some little spur-of-the-moment trip. I’m deadly serious. And the barriers aren’t going to be a problem, I’m sure you know how weak magic is now–”

“It’s weak here,” interjected Mel. “But things are different on Atlas Isle.”

“You let me worry about that,” responded Chuva, her eyes narrowing.

Now Mel looked incredibly grave, although that was partially a trick of the jittering shadows that the room’s oil lamps threw about her. “The sea is still treacherous, and Atlas Isle isn’t exactly right in our backyard. If you want to buy a boat from me and try anyway, I can’t stop you. But you’d never make it. My advice, dear, is to just forget about what you’ve been told, whatever it may be, and focus on living your life to the fullest. We may not be as charmed as the islanders, but we can still–”

“You aren’t listening,” snapped Chuva. It probably wasn’t in her best interests to get pissy, but she wasn’t about to sit here and be condescended to by an ignorant villager a good two or three decades younger than her, who thought that she was some stupid young runaway getting ready to throw her life away chasing fairytales. “I’m not going to Atlas Isle to seek out a better life or find my fortune or whatever, I’m looking for someone!”

Mel blinked, suddenly a lot less sure of herself. “You’re looking for someone?” she repeated.

“That’s what I’m telling you! I’ve been trying to track him down for three years, and I found out that if he’s anywhere, he’s on Atlas Isle.” A thought occurred to Chuva, and she squeezed her starstone brooch, bracing herself for disappointment even before she asked the question. “I mean, you’ve never heard of anyone named Silas, have you?”

Mel shook her head. “The name doesn’t ring a bell. And it’s an unusual name, so I’d have remembered it if…”

She trailed off. Chuva was not even mildly surprised. In large cities, she would check the public records on the off chance that Silas had settled down somewhere, but in a village as small as this, all she had to do was ask. She still did it as a matter of course, but she more than knew where he really was – she felt it, in the way that only a god could. “See, that’s exactly what I mean. I literally came here from the other side of the world, looking for him, and I’m not giving up now. So if you know any real way to get to the island, please tell me. If not, I’ll be on my way.”

“I see.” Mel’s eyes gleamed with curiosity in the lamplight. “This Silas must be very important to you if you’re trying to reach Atlas Isle for him. Is he family?”

“No. He’s a friend…a special friend.”

Shit. That came out wrong. Now Mel had started smiling knowingly, when in reality she didn’t know jack shit, but if she wanted to think that Chuva was a hopeless romantic searching for her long-lost lover, then whatever. It was a simple narrative that might rouse some sympathy, and besides, Chuva and Silas’s actual relationship was so complicated that it would require several hours and a rigorous theology course to properly explain it.

“Well,” answered Mel, still with that infuriating know-it-all smile on her face, “it’s very admirable that you’re willing to go to all of this trouble for your special friend. But it will still be quite a dangerous journey. I may not be the best person to help you, unless…oh…hmm.”

“Unless what?” pressed Chuva impatiently.

“A fellow I know has been planning to make a break for Atlas Isle. He’s putting together a good ship, and I’ve been providing him with building materials. He was going to go alone, but I’m sure that for a suitable fee, he’d be willing to take you along.”

“What kind of suitable fee?”

Mel stated a reasonable estimate, which Chuva might have just been able to afford if she hadn’t been robbed back in Noto City, but was now over twice the amount that she currently had on her.

Noticing the expression on her face, Mel added, “He still has a while to go before he’s ready to leave. I bet he’d let you work for him to make up the difference.”

“Oh. Good idea,” said Chuva, her skin crawling at the thought of several more months of menial labor.

“He lives just down the beach. It’s a one-story green house on the southern side of town – you can’t miss it.” With a soft expression, Mel laid her hand gently on Chuva’s arm. “Good luck finding your friend, dear.”

Chuva repressed a sigh. “Thank you. And thanks for the help,” she added, though she wasn’t really sure if it would turn out to be helpful at all.

She returned to the beach, but she didn’t head south or look for a green house. Instead, she walked north, in the direction of the bridge.

Long ago, the bridge had been a world landmark, spanning from Oneira City on the mainland to Cumula City on Atlas Isle. Cumula City, the City of the Gods, had constructed the bridge entirely out of alloys as a testament to their wealth and power, but it was another material that allowed it to support the weight of chariots and pedestrians over such a great distance: magic. Which meant that once the world’s magic had started vanishing, the bridge had become a flimsy piece of architecture ready to heave and collapse into the ocean. The king of Cumula City had closed the bridge, Chuva recalled hearing, trying to stem the flow of refugees after the numbing started and thus cementing the island’s forbidden status. And shortly thereafter, barricades and guards no longer became necessary to prevent people from crossing.

Now the bridge was a ruin of contradiction. Some sections looked to be completely intact, aside from a bit of rust and tarnish; others stuck partially out of the water, deteriorating girders poking up at the night sky; and still others had been swallowed up completely. From this distance, the whole thing looked like a bunch of scribbled lines and slashes, crisscrossing the faint stars. It wouldn’t be a good idea to get any closer than this – Chuva knew very well that Oneira City was completely numbed out these days, and that demons had frequently been sighted there. She could fly over, of course, but –

But what?

The idea had been festering in her mind for so long, she was no longer even sure when she had first thought it up. Why not just fly across the sea to Atlas Isle? Why not?

Someone might see me. But that hadn’t stopped her on half a dozen other occasions, had it? It’s a really long distance. Well, it had been short enough for them to build a bridge – a magically enhanced bridge, but still. It’ll be hard and exhausting. And working trash jobs for three years wasn’t?

Staring at the empty sea and the ruined bridge, the truth rose up undeniably in her chest. For so long, a fairly dominant part of her had been trying to delay her arrival at her destination, because she was afraid. Afraid that Silas wouldn’t be on Atlas Isle after all, afraid that he would be there but wouldn’t remember her, afraid that her lifelong endeavor had been nothing but chasing a dream. Afraid of failure and afraid of success. Afraid of change.

Now that she knew the fear was there, she cornered it angrily, wrenching it into the light of rationality where it could be pulled apart and denounced. She wasn’t like a mortal, following some random “intuition” that she merely wanted to be true – she was a god, and when it came to Silas, she’d always known things. And even if she was wrong and he turned out to be gone for good, she still would have made it to Atlas Isle, the only magical place left in the world. She still would have succeeded where so many others had failed.

And what was the use of being a god if you had to abide by the limitations of mortals?

Chuva yanked sharply on her brooch, and the cape fell away to let her wings emerge, so rapidly that it almost looked like the fabric had transformed to become a part of her body. She folded the cape until it was a tiny square, stuffed it into her bag, and planted her feet firmly on the sand as if to challenge the sea and sky.

It would be a difficult trip, especially since she had to fly with her bag, but she couldn’t leave that behind unless she wanted to arrive on Atlas Isle as a starving, stinking beggar. If she absolutely had to rest, she could try landing on the bridge; it was unstable, but it should be able to hold her weight for the length of a short break or two. Otherwise, she just had to fly low and steady, and it would probably take her the rest of the night to get there. Well, no one would see her, anyway. And it wasn’t like she would have been able to fall asleep.

The membranes of her wings trembled with anticipation. She’d always liked competitions and challenges, especially when she emerged victorious. This time, she’d be challenging herself. I bet I can fly all the way across the ocean without stopping.

She pushed off, and her wings took joyfully to the air, as if they had never known fatigue. Maybe someone from the village was watching her…but if they were, they would probably think that she was just a bat, swooping towards a freedom that no ground-based creature would ever know.

It was a long way, longer than Chuva had expected. And it was boring.

It was impossible for her to get lost as she followed the course of the bridge. She flew diagonally at first, until she was directly above the elongated ruin, and then it was straight ahead until she sighted land. And for a long time, all she saw were old rusting girders and featureless black water. She’d always heard that the ocean was supposed to be beautiful, but from her current vantage point, it looked about as appealing as old laundry water. When things got too repulsively dull, she did flips and pinwheels to amuse herself, but that became impractical as the muscles in her back started to ache.

First she was tired, then she was weary, then she was borderline exhausted. The temptation to flop down for a rest on the bridge was strong, but its jabbing, jutting surface didn’t seem especially welcoming, and her impatience drove her to keep flapping onward.

When the horizon had barely begun to discolor with the oncoming dawn, Chuva’s worn-out eyes finally realized that some of the darkness below her was actually a fast-approaching landmass, and not long after, she made a dive for the shore.

Soon she was stumbling up the bay side of Atlas Isle, half-crawling up a stony slope, smooth-worn pebbles retreating from her every step. Her wings dragged behind her, weighting her down, each one feeling so tremendously heavy that she wondered how she’d ever gotten off the ground. She paid attention to her surroundings only enough to find a place to sit; as soon as she spotted a tree, she collapsed against it, huffing and panting.

She was at the edge of a sparse ring of vegetation surrounding the bay, a swatch of deep green against the blue shore. The trills of night-birds and insects warbled in the air, more than she had heard in any other part of the world, and the patches of grass beneath her felt as soft as the carpeting in an aristocrat’s house.

Chuva sagged against the tree, her eyes dull. Her wings, crushed flat against her, grumbled dully of their exertion; by tomorrow they’d be screaming it. She really ought to put her cape back on, then go about getting out her sleeping bag, but she found that she wasn’t in the mood for any of that…and it was a warm night, anyway. Or warm morning.

She stretched out among the grass and the sand-ferns, their leaves pleasantly cool against her skin. Shutting out her battered body and whirling, pounding head, she laid one arm across her eyes and attempted to get some much-needed sleep.

It didn’t go so well at first, and every time she began to drift off, her heart suddenly started pounding with the dawning notion that she was here, she’d done it, Silas might be nearby even now! Thinking those things only irritated her. She didn’t want to get excited right now, she just wanted to sleep. Her thoughts cycled between eagerness and annoyance, the two conflicting emotions chasing one another in circles, until…

Chuva opened her eyes.

The yellow-white light of early afternoon lay dappled across her body between the shadows from the tree overhead. She didn’t remember falling asleep, but she must have really gone out, because she wasn’t even left with any dream fragments as she awakened. She was still in almost the exact same position as last night.

What had brought her back so suddenly, though…?

A noise. That was what. And even as she lay here thinking about it, she heard it again: a rumbling bass roar that vibrated in the depths of her eardrums. It could have been distant cannon fire, or the sound of the ocean as it rushed up over your head to drown you…but the worse, and likeliest, explanation was that it was a demon.

Grooohhhhhhh…

Chuva sprang up, then hissed an obscenity at the hollow ache pushing down her wings and back. She’d thought that there weren’t supposed to be any demons here! Of course, many of them could fly or swim, and simple probability would lean towards at least one of the craftier ones managing to find its way here. There was meant to be a magical barrier as defense against malicious forces, intact even in these troubled times, but maybe it was only Cumula City that they couldn’t touch, and the rest of the island was fair game.

Her hands tore into her bag, snatching for her cape, then cinching it around her shoulders. As soon as she’d fastened the brooch in place, she lost all sense of her wings, and only a few minor twinges remained in her back. The muscles that were sore had been temporarily disconnected from existence. Magic could be a wonderful thing; it was a shame that there was so little of it left.

There was one more thing she needed from her bag. It was by far the heaviest thing in there, although she’d gotten one that was as lightweight as possible, and she kept it sheathed in sturdy leather when it wasn’t in use. Sometimes she wore it on her hip, and it felt more comfortable there, but people tended to be a lot less welcoming when she strolled into town with it visible.

She unsheathed her sword, the hilt settling between her fingers like two pieces of a puzzle snapping into place, and set off to go kill a demon.

As she traipsed through the ring of vegetation, the roaring began to sound less like thunder and more like the grating bellow of some ferocious engine. She searched for a towering shape between the trees, but saw none; hopefully that meant that she was dealing with a smaller monster. Her movements were deliberate, graceful in their way, but utterly focused on technique and function. This wasn’t like the scuffle with Frannie’s siblings back in the city; it wasn’t the time or place to play up her toughness for the sake of intimidation, because demons wouldn’t give a shit. This time, she was getting ready for a real fight – and a real kill.

When it came to predators and prey, demons thought that they were at the top of the food chain. Chuva’s job was to challenge those expectations.

Reaching the end of the trees, she abandoned her bag among the foliage, then stepped out into the open. She almost wished that the demon had heard her; then she could just wait until it tried to pounce her and jam her blade down its throat, instead of having to waste time figuring out where it was. It had to be close, it was just a pain in the ass figuring out what direction to go in now that she was out of the –

Grooooooohhhhhhhhh!

There! She charged up a gentle slope, then dug in her worn shoe-heels at the top, surveying the situation below her.

At the bottom of the hill was a farm, its main field all picked-over, a pen of sheep cozied up to one side of the spacious barn. This was where the demon had focused its attention. A slimy, bulbous mass of tentacles and other less identifiable body parts, the kind of creature that had clearly crawled out of the deepest fathoms of the sea; maybe it had been busy numbing out the ocean floor. The sick, mucusy gurgle it made punctuated the frantic bleating of the sheep, and whenever the terrified creatures got too loud, they’d be blasted into trembling silence by another roar.

“HEY!” bellowed Chuva, charging down the slope with her sword squeezed in both hands.

It oozed around to face her, looking like the black sludge left in a frying pan after you cooked something greasy. She estimated that it was less than twice her size – a downright runt in demon terms, but she didn’t let her guard down. The small ones often had hidden tricks to bolster their strength.

A tentacle lifted to intercept her, and she hacked at it…but not hard enough. The edge of her blade wedged in its viscous skin, and when she tried to wrench it free, the burn-colored flesh itself sucked at the weapon with more strength than an industrial vacuum. While she was still struggling with it, the demon opened its tooth-ringed maw and spat some treacly stuff at her feet. Puffs of acrid smoke rose up from wherever the substance pooled on the ground near her.

Chuva yelped and hopped back, managing to wrench her sword free in the process. The demon yowled, not a roar this time but a bubbling scream of pain, and she saw fleetingly that thin grayish blood was seeping from the open wound. Then she found two more tentacles thrust towards her; she slammed her foot down on one to immobilize it, hacking at the other with all her strength. After a moment of sawing, it plopped to the ground like a beached eel.

The demon opened its mouth again, and she had just enough time to observe that it looked more like a giant sucker than a real mouth – a perfectly circular opening with a fleshy interior and a ring of crooked spikes around it – before she had to start dodging more sprays of acid. And this time it wasn’t spitting mindlessly but aiming, spewing at her purposefully.

She zigzagged erratically, sometimes running, sometimes hopping and having to scramble to stay balanced. No judge would have given her extra points for form, but form didn’t count for shit when you were trying to stay alive. And where the acid squirts landed, patches of grass became stiff and withered, fading from green to sickly gray. If it hit her, maybe it wouldn’t burn, but it would certainly suck all the life and livelihood out of her until she was as numb as the gray lands.

Unfortunately, the demon’s strategy kept pushing her farther and farther back, leaving her unable to counter with an attack. It was like the thing could sense how much being stuck on defense-only mode pissed her off, and it wanted to rile her up enough that she’d start making hasty decisions. Well, she’d show it hasty, then!

Pulling back her sword for a strike, she ducked her head and started running, certain that she could best this slow, slithering monster with enough speed. She darted around the demon, and while it was still reorienting itself to face her (she wasn’t even sure where its eyes were) she stabbed the approximate center of the writhing mass of tentacles.

Its ululating scream assaulted her eardrums, and gray fluid spurted against her face – not the life-draining acid from its mouth, but a gray substance that was like the essence of numbness itself, distilled into liquid form. With a small noise of disgust, Chuva wrenched back instinctively, her blade sliding partially free. It was enough for the demon to escape, and it pushed her back with two muscular tentacles before heaving up in a dark, quivering mass.

She got to her feet as quickly as possible, bracing herself in case it struck at her again, but it didn’t even attempt to attack. Instead, it collapsed into itself and began puddling its way across the field, glistening wetly in the sun. It was retreating, literally heading for the hills to try and recover from the blow she’d dealt it. And she would have followed it to eliminate the little piece of shit from the world once and for all, if she hadn’t heard another sound from behind her, soft and unsteady.

Still in battle mode, her first thought was that there were multiple demons, that another was about to spring on her from behind. But when she whirled around, sword drawn, all she saw was a tanned woman in simple laborer’s clothes. Just a farmer…probably the owner of the property, here to ask what the void was going on.

“Oh,” breathed Chuva, lowering her sword. “I thought you were…I’m sorry.” Suddenly self-conscious about the gunk all over her, she drew her sleeve across her face.

The farmer woman stared at her probably-deranged-looking visitor, mouth agape…then she finally gasped, “What was that?!”

Chuva wiped her hands on her trousers, adding another collection to the stain they already displayed. “It was a demon.”

“A demon?! Here, on Atlas Isle?!” The farmer’s hands fluttered and tangled together.

“Yeah, that was a demon, all right. Ugly, nasty, trying to numb us all out. You’ve never seen one before?”

“Oh, no…not here,” said the farmer faintly. “I’ve heard so many stories…but this has never happened before…”

Chuva frowned. In the heat of battle, she’d all but forgotten where she was, but the farmer was right – Atlas Isle was supposed to be a safe haven, totally demon-free. If the stories of the heavenly island had just turned out to be exaggerated, that would be one thing, but the first-ever demon attack happening just hours after she set foot on its hallowed ground? There was something extremely sinister about that.

Now the farmer began to regard her with what might have been wonder. “You knew what to do,” she told Chuva, her voice awestruck. “You fought it.”

Chuva nodded. “I’ve done it before. I just wished that I had killed it in the end…”

“You’ve fought other demons?!” exclaimed the farmer. “You must be very brave!”

A touch of warm pride sparked in Chuva’s chest. When she had to battle a beastie, it was almost always in the gray lands between settlements, meaning that no one else was around to witness or appreciate her feat. A little praise for what she’d done refreshed her like a crisp drink of water.

“Thank you,” she replied graciously, grasping the edges of her cape to perform a rough approximation of a curtsy. A little theatrical, maybe, but it wasn’t every day that she had an audience. “But it was no trouble, really. It’s just what I do.”

“You saved my family and my farm from that creature! Is there anything I can do to show my gratitude?”

“I don’t think there’s anything I need from–” Chuva started, then abruptly cut herself off. “Actually, there is one thing.”

“What would that be?”

“I’m looking for someone who I think is on the island,” she started to explain. “Probably in Cumula City, but I’m not sure. It would be wonderful if you could help me find him. His name is Silas…?”

The farmer pursed her lips thoughtfully. “I’m afraid that I’ve never heard that name before, but I usually only go to Cumula City for the market, and it’s not like I know everyone there. I could tell you how to get there, though, so that you could check their records or look around yourself. I hope that would be–”

“It would be perfect,” interrupted Chuva. “Exactly what I need. Which way do I go?”

“Goodness, you must be in a hurry,” commented the farmer. “Hmmm…are you sure that you don’t want to stay for breakfast, at least? It’s not much, but I really do want to repay you for your kind deed.”

Chuva was about to decline the offer, when she suddenly realized that her last meal had been at around sunset the previous day. After her long flight across the sea and battling a demon first thing after waking up, she really ought to refuel, and her stomach was suddenly clamoring in agreement. Besides, she should really keep up her strength for when she finally saw Silas. After all this time, she wanted to make a good first impression on him, at least as much as she could while being a poor, rugged nomad…

She smiled faintly, no longer thinking about food. Her mind was miles and years away, adrift in bittersweet memories, a past world as immense as the sea.

“Sure,” she said. “Breakfast would be great.”

The home of a magi should have been a reservoir of untapped power and ancient secrets, but things had been changing lately, and the gods had been dreadfully silent no matter how many burnt offerings were left for them. Magic was fading away little by little, and the home of Saint Valdez’s local magi, Magi Corona, seemed to reflect this gradual decline. Her house was old and worn, but not historic. She kept the ingredients for her tinctures in dirty jars and chipped earthenware vessels. Her single shelf of spellcraft books made for a pathetically diminished library. And Magi Corona herself seemed just as tired as her dwellings.

“So what you’re telling me,” she said slowly, “is that your daughter here complained of back pain when she woke up this morning, then developed two bulges in her back that, within minutes, became a pair of wings?”

“That’s what I’m saying,” insisted Saría Maldonna, currently a guest in the home of the honored magi. “And if you don’t believe me, the proof is right there!”

She pointed emphatically to Chuva, who was seated in front of the fireplace, drying her wings in the ever-burning blaze. It was both exciting and unsettling for her to be here; she hadn’t had much experience with magic, as the Maldonnas were not a spiritual family. They never attended shrine ceremonies, purchased fortunes from the marketplace, or kept good luck trinkets around the house. As a result, Chuva’s only encounter with Magi Corona – a middle-aged woman who made her living selling various enchantments – had been a single day, years ago, when the magi had approached her in the street and asked to examine the starstone brooch that she was playing with.

Moments after establishing that Chuva was not seriously injured, Saría had tossed a blanket around the girl’s shoulders to conceal her wings, then whisked her off to this tiny shack that was said to be the oldest building in the village. Saría’s response was only logical, since children obviously did not grow wings without the intervention of paranormal forces. But would Magi Corona really be able to do anything about this? Everyone knew that her powers were not what they had once been, especially compared to those of the magi who had come before her.

“Of course I believe you,” Magi Corona assured Saría quickly. “And I suppose that if I were to imagine this happening to anyone, it would have to be your daughter. She’s always smelled of magic.”

Smelled of magic? Chuva wondered what magic smelled like, exactly. Sniffing the air revealed only the aromas of woodsmoke and herbs…but perhaps those were concealing a less overt odor, as insidious as it was indescribable.

“I’ve felt it in her before,” continued Magi Corona. “This child has clearly been touched, perhaps since birth.”

Saría frowned. “Touched? Is she someone like you, then…?”

“No.” The magi shook her head briskly. “There’s something odd about the magic that she carries. It’s unlike anything that I’ve ever felt before. And besides, magi don’t grow wings.”

“Then who does?” demanded Saría.

“And are they real wings?” Chuva interjected. “I mean, could I fly with them and everything?”

Saría aimed an arched-eyebrows sort of look at her, almost a glare, but Magi Corona answered, “I’m sure that you could, given some time and practice. They look highly functional to me.”

“She isn’t going to be flying anywhere!” exclaimed Saría. “We came here to get to the bottom of this! I want to know if these wings are a sign of something worse coming – you should have heard the way she was screaming earlier!”

“But I’m fine now, Mama,” said Chuva, perplexed at why her mother was raising such a fuss. “It doesn’t hurt at all anymore.”

“You are not fine!” shouted Saría, and the barely restrained rage in her voice battered into Chuva like the blunt edge of a sword. “Get your head out of the clouds and think for a moment! How are you supposed to live a normal life like this?! How are you supposed to go to school, or get a job, or do anything with a pair of giant wings growing out of your back?! That’s why we need to get rid of them! If magic brought them out, surely magic can put them back in!”

Magi Corona’s face melted hopelessly, forming the expression of someone whose clients understood nothing about her profession, yet presumed themselves to be experts. Out of nowhere, Chuva was gripped with a powerful longing to be one of the few who did understand, to take control of the magic that had apparently been fermenting within her while she wasn’t paying attention. And as the magi stepped closer to taste the atmosphere around her wings and scent out the power in the air, a part of her – perhaps a large part – hoped that this would prove to be an irreversible change. After all, who hadn’t, at some point, wished that they could fly?

At last, Magi Corona stepped back, shaking her head. “This is something beyond my abilities. I cannot undo what has been done.”

“What?!” protested Saría. “But – you’ve always said that you can remove curses…!”

“I can,” responded Magi Corona, nodding. “But this is no mere curse. Your daughter has somehow tapped into an incredibly powerful force, so much so that what’s happened to her appears to be, dare I say it, divine.”

“Divine?” repeated Saria. Her eyebrows came together anxiously. “What are you saying, that the gods did this? That they’ve broken their fourteen-year silence and it’s just to make my daughter sprout wings…?!”

Magi Corona spread her hands. “Not exactly. You see, magi like myself get our powers by communing with nature, but your daughter is different. What I feel in her is supernatural. It’s always been there, but I think that this physical transformation resulted from it coming forth, like a bud becoming a flower. It’s certainly unusual, but there’s a lot that she could do with such a gift.”

“Hmm,” said Saría. Her face was tight with thought. “That’s certainly…interesting. But I’m trying to think of the practicalities here. Won’t it be difficult for her to move normally with such enormous wings?”

“It won’t bother me!” interrupted Chuva.

“Hush,” snapped Saría. “This isn’t the time for your backtalk.”

“I think that your mother is right, Chuva,” agreed Magi Corona. “You may not realize it now, but I think that soon, you’ll find that your wings interfere with certain basic activities. That much, I can help you with. I could place an enchantment upon a garment, such as a cape or a cloak, that would drape over your back and conceal your wings completely. It would take time, and have its price, but it would allow you to live your life normally…more or less.”

Saría’s shoulders slumped the tiniest discernable amount at the mention of a price, but she hardly hesitated before replying, “That will be fine. I just want what’s best for my girl.”

Magi Corona nodded. “And once I’m finished with the cape, well…who knows? We should really try to figure out the extent of her abilities. I could give her lessons, train her to be my successor – a powerful magi might be just what this village needs.”

Chuva perked immediately. She had just barely wished that she could learn about magic, and an opportunity had already presented itself! “I want to take lessons! Mama, may I take lessons with Magi Corona, please?!”

“We’ll see, Chuva,” said Saría shortly, in a tone of voice that signaled that she no longer wished to speak of the subject.

She wasn’t quite so upset anymore, reflected Chuva; that was good. But her mother was still taut, in danger of exploding at the slightest provocation. It wouldn’t be wise to try talking to her right now.

Saría and Magi Corona began jabbering to each other, a very grown-up sounding discussion about money and physical limitations and other things that most nine-year-olds wouldn’t fully understand, and Chuva began to tune them out. She was a little disappointed with how things seemed to be going. Sure, the emergence of her wings had been frightening, but she’d moved past that quickly when she realized that they weren’t inherently harmful and in fact opened up a lot of new chances for adventure. Unfortunately, her mother still seemed stuck on the frightened side of things.

She frowned up at the ceiling, her eyes drifting about absently. She’d said that she didn’t want this enchanted cape, so why hadn’t anyone listened? She had no desire to hide her wings or pretend that she was normal; it would be much more fun to get used to them, to learn how to fly. Yet the adults were standing around and planning out her future for her, and while she was, like any child, completely used to not being able to make her own choices, she felt like reminding Saría and Magi Corona that this big, huge thing had happened to her, not them. Didn’t they care at all about her feelings in the matter?

Apparently not, because they continued to talk only to each other, and Chuva’s disappointment slowly festered into something a bit darker. She felt her wings stretch and strengthen, as though fueled by the resentment that simmered in her gut.