by L. R. W. Lee
I giggled. “You’re quite the scholar.” He’d innovated with his magic, but I’d never seen him learn a completely new skill. Any I’d had to learn, he’d already mastered so it was fun watching him. I’d become the wizened teacher and he the student. How things changed.
He contracted his wing the rest of the way and it folded neatly into place against his back.
“You did it!”
Sweat beaded his brow, but he smiled then concentrated and pulled his other wing toward him and folded it similarly.
He blew out a breath. “They’re bulky but not as heavy as I expected. My muscles are sore, but I can manage.”
“Try it again.”
He looked up into my eyes. “I knew I shouldn’t have been so hard on you during training.”
I snickered. “Turnabout is fair play.”
He shook his head but got to work, grunting as he attempted to extend both wings simultaneously.
My mind wandered as he worked. He wouldn’t fly this sun. Frustration flared for a heartbeat. We were so close to home. I longed to see my family and rescue Alfreda, but Kovis needed time. He’d been so patient with me while I was learning; I’d give him whatever time it took. I could do no other.
I itched to fly. I’d stay low, so I would be near if he needed me, but I had to fly. I informed him of my plan and barely waited for his response before launching. The wind nuzzled my face and wings, and my spirit soared. I’d forgotten how free I felt when flying. I rose and swooped, banked and rolled in the balmy air, nothing compared. I scanned the distant horizon as I flew and oriented, and it wasn’t long before I knew which way home was. Longing rose in me. But I needed to be patient.
To his credit, Kovis was a fast learner and strutted, wings furled, as the sun neared the horizon. I couldn’t help but smile. He was so darn cute. And when he extended those great black, feathered pinions, he beamed. He could flex them without the feathers dragging on the ground, and it brought no end to his mirth. I’d peeked into our bond. He was focused on wowing my family. Such a male! Well, that and exploring new heights of intimacy with me. I chuckled. Definitely food and sex.
He’d been practicing where we landed, on the gravel foothill of Porta, but we would need to find shelter overnight, for while the weather was balmy, a host of vile creatures roamed these lands in the dark, many of the ones we’d just missed and no doubt a host of others I had no desire to meet. And without his magic, we couldn’t set wards let alone defend ourselves, at least not with Ice, Water, or Air.
Clumps of tall, leafy trees rose up to meet the rocky base of the peak. Fallen boulders had crushed several but couldn’t defeat their spirits for they grew up at odd angles from beneath. Unfortunately, none were large enough to provide the shelter I sought up off the ground. I’d flown near Porta and over the rocky valleys, hills, and a mountain or two not far off, so I knew this was typical of the terrain. It was foliage-covered, but rocky, desolate, and inhospitable and would prove a challenge.
The dream canopy, at least that’s what I’d concluded we’d fallen through despite it being inside that mountain, had relieved us of our capes, so we had absolutely nothing to help our cause, not even flints to start a fire, let alone anything to kill prey we might venture upon. The facts left me feeling anxious.
“If you can bare to stop playing with your new toys,” I said, “we need to find a place to make camp.”
He drew a hand to his chest. “You wound me, madame. But alas, you are correct.”
We descended, slid more like, in many parts but finally reached stable ground. Kovis stopped and picked up several rocks before the gravel surrendered to stubby grass as the terrain leveled out.
“We’ll need to fashion spears as well as a blade if we are to eat.”
My stomach grumbled at the thought, and my mouth was suddenly parched.
He handed me two of the stones and took to chipping the two he’d kept, one against the other as we walked. The sounds of his work, chattering birds, and chittering animals, while serene, did nothing to ease my angst.
He handed me his crafted rocks at some point, then left the animal path we’d been following with instructions to wait. He returned with two branches that were nearly two thumbs thick and nearly my height.
“Let’s go this way,” Kovis said some time later.
I cocked my head.
“We need water. You probably didn’t realize it, but more and more animal trails are converging. Water can’t be too far ahead.”
My jaw dropped. I’d known he’d had to survive in wild conditions while fighting in his father’s campaigns, but never had I imagined... “What else—”
Shhh. He nodded at a pair of trees ahead. Grunting of sorts emanated from beyond. We crept forward, clutching the pair of spears he’d crafted with the stones he’d chiseled. He was a regular outdoorsman.
We reached a good hiding spot with visibility to what it was that continued grunting. He knelt, I followed.
A pair of juvenile javelinas rooted in the bank of a modest creek. What had probably been pink snouts were caked with mud. Their activity had masked our presence.
Dinner, he said.
Music to my ears.
Go for the one closest. On my count.
I raised my spear and watched as his three fingers counted down. Three. Two. One. I drew it back and threw as hard as I could. While longer than the dagger I’d practiced with, it felt much the same. I knew before it struck that my throw was solid. The animal squealed as my spear sank into its eye. Kovis’s hit it squarely between the ribs, finding its heart. Its companion fled, and we emerged from hiding. Kovis made quick work of the animal, killing it before it suffered more.
We picked up drinking where the javelinas left off. It was clean water—they wouldn’t have drunk if it smelled “off”—and while it was warm, I savored its wetness.
Thirst quenched, Kovis retrieved our weapons, skinned the animal, and extracted only the meat we would eat, leaving the rest for other animals so as not to attract other beasties overnight. That done, we headed back into the darkening trees. We’d get far away before we built our fire and cooked dinner.
We may have changed realms, but we stuck to our long-established routine as we located shelter. We found a shade tree that looked to be flexing its muscular branches a good ways above the ground. It would do. Then we prepared dinner and ate. The familiarity eased some of my angst.
“Sad,” Kovis said as he bit into the tender meat.
“What’s that?” I asked from beside him, sitting on the log I’d pulled up.
He looked up. “If we sleep up there, I won’t be able to tease any of your special spots. How I miss my magic. We could have floated above it all”—he flicked his brows—“and had a little fun.”
I snorted, sensing his true level of excitement through our bond. He was like a child, impatient to experience all that was new to him in this big world of possibilities. He’d never known any of this existed, and I would get to rediscover my own familiar world through his eyes. What would he notice that I took for granted? What would he want to try? What experiences would he fall in love with? My excitement grew the more I thought about it.
“You’ll just have to be patient, my Dreambeam,” I teased.
He yawned before long.
“Come on. Let’s turn in,” I said and stood, my leathers again cuffing my neck.
He rose, caught my arm, and turned me toward him. “Before we do, show me just one of your special spots… so I can dream of it.” He rustled his furled wings, one against the other. He had no idea how seductive it was, and I lost it.
I reached up, pulled his face down to mine, then planted a claiming kiss on his lips.
He grinned beneath it.
It was all I could do to keep my voice even as I turned around. Heat blossomed between my legs as I said, “Do you see where my wing bends? Right inside.”
He reached over. “Here?” He stroked ever so gently.
I moaned, and
my legs wobbled.
“I’m going to love getting to know your spots.” He nuzzled my neck and kissed my cheek, then mounted the tree.
I took several deep breaths before following him up.
From the comfort of my drawing room, I stared at the serene backdrop of waves pounding the sandy shore outside. I’d leaned back in my leather chair and placed my black wings indolently over the back. My sandaled feet I’d propped on the ebony desk.
Sleep refused to claim me, and I’d tossed and turned all sun. Frustration had finally forced me to rise. Unlike most things, I couldn’t control my mind to quiet the tempest of my thoughts. I sipped on a cup of chamomile tea in hopes of quieting it and returning to slumber.
“Why is Alissandra so committed to that human charge of hers?” I couldn’t staunch a growl. I’d been pondering the nettling question since this whole fiasco began. My mind refused to wrap itself around what seemed to be the case, that she cared for a frail mortal more than me. I was her father. She owed her very life to me. Where was her filial piety?
Of late, angst had consumed me, dealing with her equally misguided sisters. They’d aligned with Alissandra and drawn my family into a war with sides drawn all because they’d deduced my plan to take Wake.
I’d initially decided to claim the realm because humans fascinated me—they had since I could remember, even when I’d granted them dreams—so I’d chosen to take them for my own. Many would call my reasons selfish, but what did it matter? I’d never had a nurturing relationship with them, more that of a scientist with study subjects. There were too many of them to have a significant relationship with any individual. Yet they enchanted me, nearly like a spell cast over me—they were weak with short lives, yet many found fulfillment… just like I’d felt way back when. But a sense of fulfillment and I had parted ways of late, and I missed that. Hades help me if anyone ever discovered my flaw. I’d look even weaker.
I understood that a sense of fulfillment stemmed from feeling valued—or at least that’s what I’d deduced. I was a god. My value was innate. Humans had to earn their value; I did not. I was above all that. Or so I’d believed. But I’d begun to question.
Call it what you will, but I wanted that feeling of fulfillment, of meaning, back, and if controlling humans would grant me that, that is what I would do. It was clear Alissandra had found fulfillment by helping humans or her relationship with this one wouldn’t have become intimate. And if she felt fulfilled, why couldn’t I too? There was nothing wrong with wanting it. I didn’t care what others thought.
But Alissandra disapproved, they all did, because they believed I would turn humans into catatonic beings. I had no such plans. Some called my designs ambitious. Perhaps, but I was a god. Go big or go home, it’s what I’d always believed. I never did anything halfway. Why would I?
A knock at the door had me look up. “Enter!”
A servant bowed low.
“Rise.”
“One of your soldiers is here with a report. May I show him in?“
I nodded and several heartbeats later Lethold, one of my commanders, appeared. His rumpled uniform and windswept hair told me he’d come in haste. After he genuflected, I motioned him forward as I put my feet on the floor and sat up. “Report.”
“My liege, according to your description, our troops spotted Princess Alissandra at Porta Peak. Golden hair and black wings”—I hadn’t mentioned wings, he must have assumed—“and she brought that human. You ordered that we inform you immediately if she was observed.”
Alissandra had made it back and she had wings. I staunched my surprise and kept my expression neutral. “Yes, thank you, Lethold.”
Alissandra had come home. They’d made incredible time.
“Will there be anything else?”
Anything else. I leaned back in my chair once more and steepled my fingers. Nearly a sennight before, reports had come to me that the pair had been spotted in Cochem Pass. They were being blamed for upsetting operations at the outpost.
How a human and… how two weak humans could exact that much damage was beyond me. I’d suspected someone wasn’t willing to confess to what had really destroyed all of the explosives stored there, not to mention all the raw beetle eggs. I suspected incompetence, foremost. And right when we’d been about to launch an attack on the next gem mine. No matter, that situation was being dealt with—tongues had been straightened.
I’d burst out laughing when the next report arrived saying the pair had narrowly escaped, flying away across the depths of blizzard snows. Preposterous. Someone had been imbibing. But what else should I expect from humans? Afraid of taking responsibility. Weak is what they were. But I’d known that. Was I mad for wanting to control them? I wouldn’t answer.
If those reports were true, which was highly doubtful, it meant they were heading for Sonmel Island. Their course had been nearly a straight line to the peak based upon earlier sightings. Perhaps those rebels were telling the truth, at least about them flying. No matter. What was done was done.
A smile blossomed across my face. My Alissandra had figured out the old stories and she’d come home. She’d found that door. Yes, that door. I’d known of its whereabouts for eons and been tempted many a time to venture through, but I’d always stopped myself, lest I became mortal. I shook my head. This whole business would have been so much easier if I could have just gone to Wake myself. Ah, well, in time.
Alissandra had found it. Call it pride, but I had hoped she’d see reason in time and it seemed she had.
I sat up. I didn’t need to force anything. I was more curious to see what she’d do next. “Continue to watch them in secret. Keep me informed.”
“It shall be done, my liege.” Lethold bowed then turned and left.
I picked up my cup and took another sip. Alissandra had come home, and she’d brought her human. Good girl. What story she’d told the man to persuade him to risk coming to Dream, I looked forward to hearing. It must have been good. Either that or he’d convinced himself he truly loved her. Naïve fool. They deserved each other. What lengths would he go to to protect her? We’d soon find out.
I grinned. There was a reason Alissandra was my favorite daughter, and she’d just proven it. I had thought I’d lost the opportunity to use the crown prince with her escape, so I’d settled for having his brother at my command. But with their reappearance, I would again have the crown prince to help me. I’d have both of them.
Kovis sprawled on the ground, wings extended, below the branch we’d shared. He wobbled as he staggered up. “I'm all right. I'm fine. Don't panic.”
I grinned, not the least bit dismayed. I’d warned him he wasn’t high enough up for his enormous wings—yes, he’d mentioned or in some way alluded to that fact, no less than five times already this sun—to catch sufficient air to fly, before meeting the ground.
We cooked the rest of the meat Kovis had cut from the javelina and quenched our thirst in the stream before setting off. Undaunted by his first attempt at flight, Kovis practiced furling and unfurling his wings as we walked—each time we approached a pair of trees, he’d bring them close, then unfolded them again once we passed. The clumps of trees eventually surrendered to meadowlands, and Kovis took to seeing how fast he could unfurl them.
“I want to try flying,” he said as the sun stretched toward its zenith.
“You think you’re ready?”
“My muscles still pain me, but I’ve felt far worse in training.”
Somehow I had no doubt based on what I’d endured.
We stopped in the middle of the meadow, and for the first time ever, I thought explicitly about how I moved my wings to create lift. “Stand aside, I need to show you.”
Kovis wagged his brows. I frowned, then concentrated on the feel of launching. I extended my wings and moved them forward, then down. The motion felt awkward with no speed, and I second guessed myself. I closed my eyes and felt through the stroke again, a bit faster. Yes, forward, then down, that’s what I did.
I brought my wings up and repeated.
“You try it,” I said after explaining it to him. “Slow at first. Get the feel of it.”
Kovis stretched out his wings and did as I’d instructed.
“How’s it feel?” I asked after he’d done it several times.
“Good.” His eyes danced with excitement.
“Then do your downstroke faster.”
He did and rose up on tiptoes as he caught the air. “Woohoo!”
Sweat beaded his brow as he practiced, but his face was alight with determination. His feet left the ground at points, and while he lacked grace with the landings, stumbling and nearly falling over several times, he grinned from ear to ear.
The sun had reached its peak when I said, “I think you’re ready to try flying. I want you to crouch. When your wing bites into the air on a strong downstroke, jump. That will get you airborne. Then keep moving your wings, forward and down, like you practiced.” I demonstrated several times.
“Moment of truth,” he said and took a deep breath.
He crouched and brought his wings down hard, but with all the concentration, forgot to jump. He laughed at himself then held up a hand. “Yep. Got it. I need to jump if I’m going to do this.”
His next attempt had him jumping before he finished his downstroke and he fell hard on his behind. “I’m okay.” He dusted himself off and stood.
His third try, he stepped out of his crouch too soon. And so it went over several more attempts.
He panted, sitting where his lack of coordination had left him after a twelfth failed try, wings pulled close. He shook his head. “You make it look so easy. I can’t seem to get the timing right.” He frowned.
I attempted to encourage him. “I’ve flown my whole life. You’ll figure it out. I know you will.” I sat down next to him and looked out across the meadow. A pair of birds flew over and alighted in a tree across the field.
