by Raine Thomas
Caleb frowned. The acting Mercesti leader for the past eighteen years, Kanika had experienced her share of struggles attempting to bring her class under control. After centuries under Grolkinei’s evil guidance, the red-eyed class was still decades away from possibly integrating with the nine other classes. Even with the help of the other elders, Kanika’s leadership was, at best, tolerated by the majority of her class. Caleb found it quite feasible that a group of Mercesti operated outside of her knowledge or control.
“The fact that these disappearances and likely murders are occurring at the same time that these rumors have surfaced is a coincidence that can’t be ignored,” Knorbis said, making Caleb realize he had been applying his Wymzesti powers of insight to the situation. “From what we have been able to determine, this group is hunting someone or something. I sense a connection between Luvania’s death and the rise of these rumors regarding the rogue Mercesti.”
There was a pause as they considered this. Caleb glanced at Gabriel, who looked between him and James. They all shared the same thought.
“Do you think Zachariah is in league with the Mercesti?” Gabriel asked at last.
“I’m afraid it’s a distinct possibility,” Knorbis replied. “It would certainly explain his absence these many years.”
The words didn’t sit well with Caleb. He had deeply respected Zachariah as a second commander and considered him a model Gloresti. This news rattled him.
“What could these Mercesti be searching for that would drive them to such extremes?” Amber asked, her golden eyes reflecting the concern they all felt.
Jabari sighed. “That’s another reason we’re here. The fact is…we don’t know.”
Sophia hadn’t considered the fact that Quincy would have to carry her up to the top of the cliff until they were out of the forest and standing at the cliff’s base. Even then, at first she just paused and looked up, remembering how her dad had carried her up to the top for her first flight lesson about a month ago.
Her parents had been so excited. So had her aunts and uncles, who came along for the trip. She had wanted to share that excitement, but the fact was, she was scared to death. She couldn’t help but worry about something going wrong.
Still, she listened obediently to all of their instructions. She knew Clara Kate had just the month before managed to bring forth her wings with little effort after her eighteenth birthday, which meant their class could fly. According to everything her parents and aunts and uncles so eagerly imparted to her, all she had to do was have faith and she would be on her way.
After weeks of attempting to fly, she determined that the only one who didn’t have faith in her was her.
“I’ll take you to the top,” Quincy said a bit hesitantly, pulling her thoughts back to her current circumstances.
She glanced at him and frowned in consideration. She supposed there was really no getting around it.
“Fine,” she said coolly.
She hated that her pulse quickened when he touched her…hated that she wished his hands were on her for a reason other than obligation. A flush of heat built in her neck and cheeks as he scooped her off the ground and she registered the strength in his upper body. She deliberately focused on the cliff face as they lifted from the ground. She was absolutely not interested in his piercing silver gaze or the poetic curve of his lips. And she wasn't at all affected by being pressed against him. Definitely not.
When they landed a moment later, she didn’t look at him or speak as she quickly and purposefully pulled off her sundress to reveal her bathing suit underneath. She didn’t want to see his repulsion or his pity over her waif-like build. She carefully folded her sundress and set it aside, then crossed her arms and stared down at the water below, fighting the urge to jump just to put space between her and Quincy.
“Flight is about—” he began.
“Faith. Yeah, yeah. I get that. That doesn’t help.”
“Actually, I was going to say that flight is about aerodynamics,” he corrected, surprising her into looking at him. “Your mind works differently than most of your kin. You need to understand how something works before it makes sense to you. That is in complete contradiction to faith. So we’ll need to try a different approach with you if you are to fly.”
She opened her mouth, but couldn’t think of anything to say, so she closed it.
“You can assume the form of most any animal about your size—except for those that fly. Don’t you want to be able to change into those forms, too?”
She hadn’t ever thought about it that way. And why hadn’t she? she wondered in bemusement. But now that he issued the suggestion, she felt her first real surge of interest and excitement over this lesson. So she nodded.
They spent a couple of minutes discussing the mechanics of flight, which she found reluctantly fascinating even though she already new most of it. And then she allowed him to touch her again so he could toss her off the cliff.
It didn’t work. Disappointment sat like a bitter morsel on her tongue as he flew down to fish her out of the water. Her only satisfaction was that he got soaked as a result of his efforts.
He set her on her feet back at the top of the cliff and she fought the urge to kick him out of sheer frustration. This had been a perfectly awful day, and it didn’t appear as though things were going to improve. How could she face disappointing her parents yet again?
“That’s okay,” Quincy said patiently. “Let’s just go over it again. There’s probably something you don’t—”
“I understood you perfectly well, Quincy,” she snapped, reaching up to re-secure her hair as it started slipping from its knot. “I’m not an idiot. As you’re the one who assisted me in my first physics lessons, you know I’m familiar with these concepts.”
“You’ve heard of them, yes,” he agreed, irritation now filtering through his tone, “but you haven’t experienced them first-hand. You need to actually sense what it means for the air to hit a wing at a certain angle, how it feels when a current of wind creates a lift—”
“And just how,” she ground out, “am I supposed to do those things when I can’t extend my wings?”
“Let me carry you,” he suggested. “But instead of you sitting in my arms sideways, you’ll wrap your legs around my waist and face me. You’ll be able to see my wings better from that perspective, and you can reach out and touch them to see how the air passes over them.”
The very suggestion of herself pressed against him in such a way had her heart racing, and that pushed her right over the edge. Suddenly furious with the circumstances that put her in this position—having these feelings for someone who couldn’t stand her—she actually growled.
“I have a better idea,” she shouted over the wind that whipped his black tank top and pants and pressed them torturously close to his gorgeous body. His eyes widened in surprise as she advanced and she had a split second to wonder exactly what went through his head as he registered her ferocity. “Why don’t you see how it feels to swim, so you can experience what this is like from my perspective?”
And using her fury to give her added strength, she shoved him off the cliff.
Chapter 5
Tate felt the astonishment on her face as she watched Sophia plummet straight down into the lake after Quincy tossed her off the cliff. Her mouth hung open even as Quincy flew down to lift Sophia out of the water.
She registered that her cousin wore a swim tank and shorts. And she understood then that this was all part of the training process. Obviously Sophia had to learn to fly with a fairly safe landing zone. The lake seemed logical enough, Tate supposed. Though if Sophia knew that the lake would break her fall, would she really need to have the faith in herself required to bring forth her wings?
Well, what did she know? It had worked for Clara Kate, after all.
Shrugging, Tate decided to climb to a higher vantage point so she could see Sophia and Quincy on the top of the cliff. She hoped she might learn some tips about flight that would allow her to
extend her wings with more ease in a few weeks. Tiege would be so jealous of her.
Reaching up, she grasped another chunk of rock, trying not to think about the cramps forming in her hands. Using her boots again for extra leverage, she pushed herself up a couple more feet. She made good headway with a few more careful maneuvers. But when she stretched for an awkward handhold, she lost her grip and slipped. She barely stopped herself from a forty-foot freefall.
Her heart hammering in her chest, she clung to her perch and took several deep breaths. That had been a close one.
She heard Sophia yelling something then, and strained to get a better view of the top of the cliff. Much to her surprise, she watched her cousin shove Quincy over the cliff edge.
“Sophia!” Tate shouted before she thought better of it, and clamped her hand over her mouth.
The movement cost her dearly. She felt herself sliding and couldn’t react in time to brace herself. In a cascade of dirt and rocks, she tumbled free of the cliff face—
—and found herself plucked from the air, all of the breath stolen from her lungs as something squeezed her body like a vise.
It wasn’t until excruciating pain radiated through her chest and she tasted her own life’s blood as it filled her mouth that Tate’s confusion vanished and terror took hold.
Mercifully, by then her heart had almost stopped. She only had to suffer the fear and deadly pain for a few more gasping heartbeats before it was over.
Jabari’s admission that they didn’t know what the rogue Mercesti sought as they killed innocent Estilorians had Caleb’s Gloresti instincts surging. He wanted to be helpful…wanted to stop this group from harming another being. And when he looked between his brothers, he knew the same held true for them.
A sound behind them had him turning in concern. When he spotted Tiege clutching his chest and kneeling on the ground, Caleb’s heart plummeted. Even as he hurried toward Tiege, his son turned and looked behind him, his head moving frantically.
Only when Tiege sprinted for the forest like demons breathed fire on his heels did Caleb understand.
Tate was gone.
Sophia’s anger morphed into embarrassment right after she shoved Quincy off the cliff. For all holy sake…the guy could fly. It wasn’t as if he would actually hit the water.
The sound of her name echoing up the cliff face as Quincy fell had her looking around in confusion. That had sounded like Tate.
A noise echoed from across the lake, like a pile of rocks coming loose from their moorings. Sophia watched with astonishment as her cousin slid off the cliff almost directly across the water. She had the numb thought that Tate couldn’t fly, and if she didn’t get far enough away from the rocks, she would bounce like a child’s toy all the way down the cliff and cause herself serious injury.
That thought hadn’t even had time to fully form before the kragen erupted from its cave within the cliffs and snatched Tate right out of the air with its tail.
Sophia watched in frozen shock as the huge black beast took flight. Its wingspan shadowed half the lake. And when its long, curled tail whipped Tate away from the cliff, a spray of something wet and warm flew at Sophia, coating her like a mist.
She could only think, Quincy.
Her throat wouldn’t work. Her body wouldn’t cooperate. It all seemed like a dream. Until she caught a brief glimpse of Tate’s face and watched as the life leeched out of her cousin’s eyes.
Just as the kragen surged away with Tate wrapped in its tail, Quincy reappeared.
“Sophia!” he cried, landing and hurrying over to her. “Holy light—are you okay? You’re covered in blood! Was that kragen injured?”
“T-t-ate,” she managed.
Why was he just standing there? She wanted to scream at him to go after her cousin. The kragen was getting away! They might still be able to help her if they hurried.
When he continued to stand there clutching her arms and checking her over as though she was the injured one, anger replaced her shock. She shoved him away and focused on the quickly retreating kragen.
“What’s the fastest bird?” she asked.
“What?” Quincy shook his head in bafflement. “Are you okay?”
“The fastest bird, Quincy!” she demanded.
“Well—the peregrine falcon,” he replied.
“Too small. Something bigger. At least a five-foot wingspan.”
“Sophia, what—?”
“Quincy!”
“Damn it.” He thought quickly. “The harpy eagle,” he said.
Nodding, she ran for the edge of the cliff and jumped.
Caleb followed Tiege at a sprint, the rest of his family right behind him. Although he had no way of knowing whether Tiege knew where he was going, as they didn’t fully understand the connection between the twins, he had to believe they were heading in the right direction.
As he ran, scenes from the dream flashed through his mind. He saw Tate’s face as her terror overtook her. He felt the life draining from her.
Cursing the fact that they couldn’t extend their wings within the area of protection because of the many levels of dampening protections in place, he pushed himself to run even faster. Within minutes, they burst from the edge of the forest.
As they cleared the tree line, Tiege pulled his blessed kamas from the special harness he wore strapped to his back. Caleb drew his sword, his gaze flying along the landscape, his brain registering things on a subconscious level that he didn’t even have time to process: footprints on the muddy bank, pebbles trickling down the cliff face, ripples circling out along the lake’s surface, a turquoise tank top splayed across the rocks, a single, light blue feather fluttering toward the ground.
Then he caught a flash of silver in the far distance. Quincy. He knew he had to take flight after him. He also knew Tiege wouldn’t be able to follow.
Catching his son’s gaze as everyone else took flight around them, Caleb said, “I’m sorry.”
Swallowing hard, Tiege nodded. “Just bring her back, Dad. Please…just bring her back.”
In the form of the eagle, Sophia shared as much of the mind of the animal she resembled as she did her Kynzesti self. She instinctively knew how to judge the wind currents and adjust her wings for more effective flight, something most Estilorians had to train to learn. The large and powerful kragen moved farther with each stroke of its wings than she could. But she was smaller, more aerodynamic and gaining ground.
Fighting against the other instincts of the eagle, she resisted the urge to scan the ground and her surroundings for prey or predators. She focused only on the kragen. She had to stay with it so she could see where it landed and try to get Tate back.
She lost track of time. When her wings tired, she pushed past it. Bringing forth the image of Tate’s lifeless gaze, she ignored the warning signs that usually meant she was losing her hold on the shift. If it had been Tate tracking her—Tate trying to get to her to offer her aid—she knew her willful cousin wouldn’t stop, regardless of how exhausted she got. She had to press on, and she pushed her powers to their limits.
But kragens could fly without landing for days, whereas the eagle was built for speed, not endurance. She never really stood a chance.
Still, she flew until the kragen was nothing more than a small dot at the edge of her vision and the sun had shifted many degrees in the sky. She flew until the ground came closer and closer, and she absolutely couldn’t hold the shift anymore.
When her power failed at last, she couldn’t even care that she was going to crash spectacularly. She welcomed that pain over the other, deeper one that awaited her.
But Quincy caught up with her. As she had slowed, he had been able to catch her and pace her. So when she lost the shift, he only had to dive to pluck her out of the sky and carry her safely to the ground.
She didn’t want him to save her. She wanted him to go after Tate. She wouldn’t be able to live with the fact that he was choosing to save her instead. But the words sat unspoken
in her tight, aching chest. And when her eyes closed against her unavoidable exhaustion, two tears trailed down her cheeks.
Chapter 6
Just before the sun rose on the tenth day after Tate’s death, Tiege leaned on the waist-high wood fence surrounding his mother’s flower garden, gazing at the cherry tree his Aunt Olivia and Uncle James created in his sister’s memory. The garden was a peaceful place, planted not long before he and Tate were born. The two of them had shared many adventures among the brilliantly colored blooms.
He supposed it had been a fitting place to have her funeral, an event he had endured only a couple of days before.
The search to find and rescue Tate had continued for more than a week. In the end, although no one wanted to give up hope, they had to face the reality that there was little likelihood she had survived the kragen attack. Reaching the only conclusion they could, they held a memorial service for her. All of the class lieutenants, commanders and elders attended with the families.
In point of fact, this was the first time Tiege had been alone in a number of days. He found it an immense relief. If he had to address one more “How are you feeling?” he would absolutely lose his mind.
He twirled a light blue feather between his thumb and forefinger, waiting to see the dawning sunlight burnish the thin membrane. The feather had fallen out of Tate’s hair when she died. He had been so close to saving her that the feather hadn’t even touched the ground by the time he got there. As everyone else took to the sky in chase of Quincy, he stood powerlessly on the ground, watching the feather flutter to a stop at his booted feet. It felt as though his heart stopped then, too.
His mother possessed the ability to physically transport herself from one location to another. But she couldn’t transport herself into the middle of the sky, and she had no way to know where the kragen would land. If she didn’t know where she was going, her ability was useless.