Milori steadied himself on his owl as it took off from the ground. He was going to see Tinkerbell and ask her about the little mission he had assigned to her. She was a very gifted Tinker and was good at keeping a secret when asked. Wow never thought Tinkerbell and good at keeping secrets would be used in the same sentence.

The owl crossed then order between worlds. Warmth suddenly flooded Milori's body and the rising sun made him feel even warmer. His owl landed and Milori leaped off. He made his way through the Tinkers' Nook, passing several fairies as he went. Eventually he made his way up to Tink's platform. "Good morning!"

Tink looked up, "Oh, hello, Lord Milori."

"How is our little project coming?"

"Fantastic! That gem you found is perfect."

"Thank you. When do you think it'll be done?"

"Before breakfast, you can stay if you'd like. I might need some help."

"I'd be glad to."

Time went by and now Milori was holding a metal ringlet and being forced to stand perfectly still. His stomach grumbled loudly and they both began laughing. "Don't worry, I'll be done in just a minute and then you can go to breakfast."

Milori let out a sigh, focusing on keeping his hand steady.

Five minutes later, "Finished!"

He instantly slouched and the sudden relief of tension, "Thank goodness, I don't think my neck and arm could take much more if that's!"

Tink took the ringlet and wrapped it neatly in a cloth. "There you go! She's going to love it!"

"Because it was made by the best Tinker I know."

"Very funny, she'll love it because it's from you."

"Alright, I'll tell you how it goes!"

"You better!"

Milori left and went in search of finding his owl. It took a while considering she was known for wandering. "Anastasia!" He called out.

Eventually he came to the animal training center. There a bunch of fairies were training bear cubs. Today they were being taught to climb trees. It was adorable how much they were struggling. There was a chirp from above and Milori looked to see Anastasia on a branch above, a cub sat beside her. Luckily the branch was thick enough to hold their weight. Anastasia flapped her wings and looked at the cub. It stood on it's hind legs and flapped it's arms like her. The cub slipped and was suddenly dangling from the branch, it let out a terrified moan. Anastasia hopped off their branch and hovered below the cub. She pressed her head to it's legs and flew upward. Moments later the bear was safely on the branch again. Pride showed on Anastasia's face as the fairies and animals cheered over the successful rescue.

Milori chuckled and called out to her, "Anastasia!"

The owl looked down at him suddenly and hopped off the branch. She landed beside him and nudged the satchel he was holding.

"Hey! Be careful, that's not for you, and it took a lot of time to make it!"

Anastasia huffed and turned away.

"Oh come on! Not today!"

The owl chirped.

"Yes it's for Clarion!" Milori snapped in reply.

She flapped her wings awkwardly and screeched back.

"Look can we do this later, I'm starving and I don't want to walk to the dining hall."

Anastasia hopped away from him.

He let out an annoyed sigh, but then a smirk came across his face, "I didn't want to ask this, but you've forced me. So are you actually jealous of Clarion?"

She froze before turning to him. Suddenly Milori was pinned to the ground and Anastasia was screeching in his face.

"Okay! Okay! Okay! You're not jealous!" He laughed. "Now let's go, I'm hungry!" Milori hopped onto the owl's back and she leaped into the air.

The flight to the tree would only be a few moments, and with Anastasia, sometimes even quicker. Though their journey would be quick, it wouldn't end very peacefully. A shadow cascaded over Milori and the owl and at first they thought nothing of it. Then a fairy below screamed.

"HAWK!"

Anastasia and her rider looked up to see a hawk diving down towards them. Milori snapped the reins, trying to steer them out of the way, but they weren't quick enough. His owl was tackled aside, causing him to get knocked off. The sparrowman was falling without wings to be able to catch him. He could hear the terrified screams of fairies below. In his mind, Milori begged for Anastasia to catch him. Then his voice came to him and screamed out in fear and desperation, "Anastasia!"

Suddenly a pair of talons wrapped around him and he stopped falling. When the sparrowman looked up, he realized a hawk was carrying him up high towards the clouds. Where was it taking him? The bird suddenly hurled him through the air and Milori went through a cloud and back down again. Another hawk grabbed him out of the air as he fell back towards the ground. This one must have been the leader, but that didn't concern Milori any at the moment. The hawk was holding him in his beak by the his shirt and its talons were digging into his back and chest. Pain filled him and the Lord of Winter began to wince and whimper. Then he saw Anastasia thrashing underneath two hawks pinning her to the ground.

She shoved them off and leaped in the after Milori. The owl was nearly able to reach him when the hawks returned. They clawed at her, but she wasn't going to go down again without a fight. Feathers were torn off wings and talons scraped against each other. Anastasia's glistening white feathers became covered with red. The thought of dying didn't waver her, because she would die for Milori in a heartbeat. The owl threw one of the hawks into a tree and slashed at the throat of the other one. This distracted it momentarily, but long enough for Anastasia to make her move to rescue Milori.

The sparrowman watched this all happen and knew that she would die trying to save him. He thought to call out to her and to beg her to stop, but there was no use. Anastasia would keep fighting even if he begged her not to. She flapped her wings as hard as she could, flying up towards the hawk holding Milori. The owl was a mere inches away from snapping him away from the hawk's clutches when she suddenly stopped. The Lord of Winter froze as he stared at the long branch sticking through his owl's chest.

In the next instant, the owl plummeted to the ground and Milori screamed loud and hard enough to make his throat bleed. "ANASTASIA!" Tears were streaming down his cheeks and the pain he felt only magnified.

Below, fairies were running ramped, trying to escape the hawks and being crushed by the falling owl. Clarion had heard the commotion and was now arriving at the scene. Her fairies were terrified, Hawks were chasing them, and to her absolute horror Milori was being suspended in the air. She screamed his name.

Milori looked down at her, "No! No! Clarion!"

The fairy queen tried shoving past the fairies and the birds. Animals were being chased out of their homes and now were running amongst the fairies and hawks. Everything was so chaotic and Clarion was suddenly lost in the crowd. A squirrel or some animal resembling one knocked her to the ground. The animals were stampeding and the queen was being trampled. She screamed in pain and terror, unable to get up or get the animals to stop.

Meanwhile, Milori was helpless to save her. Clarion's screams were torture to him. He struggled to free himself once more, but it only brought him pain.

Then the scouting fairies showed up. They had no idea what to do. There were hawks, hundreds of fairies, and tons of animals, and the Lord of Winter was being killed, it was all too overwhelming. Nyx began shouting orders, the first objective would be to rescue Queen Clarion. They weaved through the crowd at amazing speeds in an attempt to find her. When they did, she was curled up in a ball on the ground getting kicked and hit by things. She was choking as the wind had been easily knocked out of her.

Nyx dove into the crowd and threw her staff into the ground. The animals were startled and began running in different directions around them. She knelt down and lifted the queen in her arms. It was sickening to hear her cries of pain. Clarion managed a small gasp of Milori's name s air began to flow into her lungs once more and she pointed at him and the hawk.

When Nyx looked up, she saw the hawk carrying Milori and began screaming orders again, "Evasive maneuvers! We must keep the hawks away from the fairies. Let me know when you have a shot!"

"Aye- Captain!" the scouts all flew off while Nyx remained on the ground holding the queen.

These scouts were quickly overrun. Two of them were tackled by a hawk. The others were caught up in the crowd. There was only one scout left and she was in a tree above, positioned on one of the tree branches with her bow and arrow. "I have a shot!"

"Take it!"

"Wait, I might hit Lord Milori!"

Milori heard the archer scream and understood. He looked to Clarion and saw her terrified. Then back to the archer and Nyx. "Take the shot!"

"You could be killed!" Nyx screamed.

"Just do it!"

"No! There has to be another way!"

"There's isn't and you know that, now take the shot!"

The archer had no idea what to do and let the arrow fly…

Milori looked down and saw the arrow that was now through his pain was numb, but he could feel his throat filling up. He choked and sputtered blood before both he and the hawk fell to the ground. They landed a yard apart from each other,

Everyone froze and Clarion screamed as she ran over to him. She fell to the ground a foot away from him. Her cracked ribs and heavily bruised back were to painful to even move now. Milori turned to her and slowly crawled over, the arrow still in his stomach. Tears were running down her face and his own eyes were beginning to glaze over.

"Clarion I'm so- sorry!" he managed.

"No! No! No! You're gonna be okay!" she winced in pain.

Milori placed one of his hands on her cheek and kissed her cut lip. "There's something I need to ask you."

"Anything."

"This morning I had every intent on asking you to marry me, and the question is," he paused to cough a few more times, "The question is, if I had had the chance to ask you, would you have said… y-y-yes?"

She nodded furiously until it hurt.

Milori shifted slightly to remove a piece of cloth from his pocket. He unfolded it to reveal the ring Tink had made. Clarion cried as he put the ring on her hand and he grunted in pain. "Clarion, I will always love you-" His last words were interrupted by him choking up blood and the loss of the crimson liquid coming from the wound in his stomach.

Clarion wailed as Milori went lifeless and she hugged and cried into his body.

Nearby, a scouting fairy was screaming as well, she was the one that shot the arrow.