As he took a step towards her, she ran forward and plunged from the cliff. His breath stalled in his throat. He raced to the edge as she dropped from sight.
"Sheleigh!" His stomach plummeted as the contraption dropped. He sensed people standing beside him and whirled. His gaze riveted on the guard while murderous rage filled him. "You! Why aren't you doing anything?"
Bateleur looked over the cliff and back to him. "There's no need to do anything, Avatier."
Kleet gritted his teeth and turned to the others. The pregnant young woman spoke before he could.
"You'd better jump if you want to catch her, Avatier."
"What are you talking about?" His voice cracked over her like a whip.
"Look." The young man pointed out into the canyon.
Kleet whirled. The rays of the rising sun sprayed out over the canyon. Fully arrayed in its fiery glory was a metal bird in flight. Its variegated-colored wings were the hues of the orange-red of Sheleigh's curls coalescing into the dark brown of his own hair. Sheleigh hung suspended from the wings. She could fly!
At that moment, when his heart could hold no more emotion, she banked gently to the right, into the heart of the morning. The metal gleamed, the orange color burned like fire, as did Sheleigh's curls. She was the goddess of the sun. She was his mate.
"Go to her, Avatier," the young mother-to-be said.
"I can't fly!" It was a cry of torment. It was a cry to the sun god and to his people.
"Let us help you," the black-haired girl offered.
He stared at his mate. She was as beautiful in flight as any bird. Sheleigh banked right again and now he could see her with the great artificial wings arched above her filled with thermals. His heart pounded like it had when they were newly mated. If she could fly ...
"Avatier?" Tinae queried.
"I have to do this on my own. I still have one wing that works." He took a deep breath and jumped out into the air, arms spread out to the sides and feet together. A scream sounded behind him on the cliff.
He'd done this a thousand times ... but that had been with two wings. His undamaged wing opened and caught the air. He gritted his teeth against the strength it took to keep upright with drag on only one side.
His heart raced, his lungs burned. Where was she? There was a glimpse of orange to his right. He could hear nothing over the wind rushing past as he fell. Then there was a strange hollowness to the air around him, and Sheleigh dropped into the space beside him on the right. He grabbed the triangular bar, placing his right hand between both of hers.
"What took you so long?" she asked. Her voice sounded strained.
He spared a look at her. Her face was white, her pupils contracted. He'd frightened her. He was overcome by tenderness. "I'm stubborn," he huffed.
Sheleigh gave a little laugh. "That you are. Do you have a good hold? I want to show you what I've been practicing."
He moved further onto the bar. "Show me."
Sheleigh leaned to the left and the hang glider banked left. They raced along the canyon until it intersected another canyon. There the glider caught a thermal and Sheleigh leaned right to circle in the warm air. When she leaned right again, he leaned with her, earning a smile from her.
It was much better than being in a transport. The wind brushed his face and hands like when he flew. His breath stilled. He was flying!
A laugh escaped from his throat. Sheleigh looked at him. "I'm flying," he told her.
She smiled. "I told you that you could."
"Let's go over there, to the left." He nodded the direction with his head.
They leaned left into another canyon. The air here was colder and the hang glider rapidly lost altitude, but Kleet didn't care. Darkness had dropped from his mind and heart. That hard coldness had been like a blanket suffocating him. Now he was free ... to do a lot of things.
His feet touched the ground and then Sheleigh's did too. They placed the control bar lightly on the ground. He reached up to unhook Sheleigh from the glider, and then drew her out in front of it. He caressed her upper arms.
"I flew and it felt good," he admitted.
Her eyes were deep pools of green. "I love to fly. I wish I could have told you ..."
He placed two fingers on her lips to stop the words. "It's all right. I understand now."
"I would never betray you, Kleet. I love you."
His heart swelled. He took her warm, ripe body into his arms and rested his head on her windblown curls. "I know that now, too."
"Do you?" Her voice came muffled from his shirt front.
"Yes. Only someone who loved me would go to the lengths you have to show me. It's quite an invention. Who made it?"
"It's a human invention, but the engineers made it. Kleet, non-wingeds can use it to fly."
He laughed and squeezed her body tightly. She would spend her life helping others. It was the right quality for the Avatier's mate.
He held her away from him and looked into her luminous eyes. "I love you. I'm sorry for all I've put you through."
Her eyes grew moist. "You were hurt. You needed to heal."
"You healed me."
She swallowed. "I had to."
He took her lips then in a passionate reaffirmation of their partnership. Her sweet lips tasted of wind and passion. The mate-bond roared and swelled through him, firming the old connection and layering new ones over it.
In the shadow of the man-made wings he held her tight. This woman had come millions of miles to give him strength and courage and to lift him up on the wings of love.
Epilogue
The boys raced ahead to the cliff edge, shrieking as they ran. Kleet followed behind his sons at a more sedate pace holding Sheleigh's hand. They walked like mature adults, even though they were as eager as the boys. Kleet would give her another child today, and he was bursting with satisfaction at the thought of getting her pregnant again. They both wanted a daughter and he wanted one with orange curls. The boys wanted a baby brother--they had no use for girls. They hadn't much use for anyone or anything that wasn't flying.
"Wait until I check the harnesses," Kleet yelled to his sons. Their hang gliders were as safe as the engineers could make them, but the little rascals didn't like to wait to fly.
His sons were non-winged. They flew as Sheleigh did--using a hang glider. But from the moment they were born they had had the Averan love of flying. From the time they were little more than babies they had leaped avidly off the cliff. And since they'd learned to walk, and then to run, there was no stopping them from flying solo. Their flights with their man-made wings were heart stopping for him to see. They were meant to fly, any way they could.
He wanted another child of Sheleigh's body. Those human genes were a marvelous addition to the Averan ones.
They rounded the final corner and he spotted his sons stamping the ground impatiently with their tiny feet.
"Hurry, Papa!" they chorused together as they often did.
The sun had just risen and a streamer of light showed the russet in the boys' hair. More of Sheleigh's DNA, he thought with satisfaction.
He checked their harnesses and gave a nod to each small boy. "Be careful. Your mother and I will be above you."
He watched them race for the edge with their man-made wings, squealing with joy. Their small gliders caught the thermals and they soared in the rosy haze of the dawn.
"It's time, Shel." He stripped off his clothes. Sheleigh stripped from the waist down. She quickly strapped herself into her hang glider and took a running leap from the cliff. For a moment he possessively watched his mate soar. She loved to fly, and he was proud to watch her do it.
He leaped after her, making the fast dive to her. Her legs were free of the harness and spread wide to receive him. He reached her and grabbed her shoulders. He aligned himself at her entrance and thrust hard against the wind. She squealed and he thrust hard again. She grunted as he seated himself against the mouth of her womb. He could feel the primal virility of the ma
ting flight burning in his loins. He pumped several hard strokes against her womb, until he exploded and saturated her womb with his seed. He heard Sheleigh gasp, and then her loins convulsed heavily as her body accepted his seed.
He knew they wouldn't need a second mating, although he would take the opportunity to do so. He felt the resonance of pregnancy in her womb and knew the doctor would find another set of twins. He hugged his mate tightly to him. She was generous in giving him children.
Since his mother was at USP for the next year, he'd allow Sheleigh's parents to be with her for the birth of this set of twins. Avera was speeding into the future with Sheleigh leading the way.
Love overwhelmed him. "Once more, love. This one's just for us."
It was a hard, fast mating, as most mating flights were, and he enjoyed hearing her gasps and moans. They'd been mated almost four years now and he could barely remember the time before she was his. There couldn't have been happiness and fulfillment before she came. There certainly hadn't been love. She was his heart and the best part of him.
As he flew with her, deep in her body, his one good wing spread to catch the wind. He was safe in the canopy of Sheleigh's man-made wings. His first set of children were flying out in front of him, his second set were in his mate's womb. His heart almost burst, it was so full. It was true that love lifted you up and gave you wings to soar. He was living proof of it.
The End
Mating Flight Page 28