A/N: Erabex is what I call them when I'm talking about both of them together, don't hesitate to ask if you are confused. Also, I'm reasonably certain that I've got the timing right, but correct me if I'm wrong.

Chapter One

The sun's last rays shimmered on the horizon, their light shining across two figures. A boy sat on the hard packed snow, watching the sunset reflect on the water in the lake that stretched out before him. A falcon was perched on a bent stick that he'd stuck in the ground beside him, her intelligent eyes riveted on the shadows that were gradually chasing away the last traces of light.

As the sun disappeared, the boy sighed, the sigh turning into a heart-wrenching screech as he and the bird seemed to switch positions, feathers replacing skin and wings beating loudly in the still air.

In the place of the bird that had sat on the bench, girl stood, hand outstretched to the bird she knew would be beside her. Turning to look when no weight settled on her arm, she was stunned to see the falcon still sitting on the snow next to her, but rather than bird eyes in a bird head, a very human gaze met hers.

She crouched slowly, hand hovering only a breath away from the gyrfalcon. She wanted to touch it, so much, but she was afraid if she did it would disappear. Was their curse breaking?

But no. The bird cocked it's head at her and all humanness disappeared. The girl sighed, for a moment, she'd thought... no, it couldn't be possible. She held out her arm to the bird that was her twin brother, resigned to her fate.

:::

"Era!" The girl called for her twin. She was standing on a snow-covered slope, her long, reddish hair swept about by the midnight wind.

A piercing screech cutting through the air announced the arrival of the gyrfalcon. About two feet long, with a wingspan of just over four feet, Era was an impressive bird. As dark as his twin was light, he blended in perfectly with the midnight sky, nearly impossible to see as he flew.

When Bex, the girl, was in bird form, she was a gyrfalcon, about the same size as her twin, but lighter in color, almost white, with spots of grey.

They were solitary creatures, Erabex, rarely communicating with anyone other than themselves. They always seem to be near each other, though, and almost never asked for help, unless, of course, one of them was gravely wounded, because it is very hard to remove an arrow or stitch closed a wound when you have talons rather than hands, and that happened often enough.

Falconry was a rare profession, and both twins knew that no one would understand the curse that had been placed on them, so they stayed out of the way of humans-well, most of the time,-so they didn't attract attention.

"What is that?" Bex questioned, pointing to a trail of smoke on the horizon, darker than the night itself.

Era didn't need further prompting, they were in the territory of the one who had cursed them, and it paid to be careful. He launched off his twin's arm, gaining altitude with smooth, powerful strokes of his wings. In less than a minute, Bex was just a dot on a hill in the far distance.

He flew on towards the source of the smoke, almost falling out of the sky with shock when he reached it. The dragon was out of his mountain, and he was attacking the town! Laketown, Era remembered it was called, was up in flames. He just hovered, for a moment, it was all he could do to keep his wings beating. He had a bad feeling about this.

Suddenly, a huge ball of flame scorched past him, singeing his feathers on its way. Screeching in alarm and just little bit of pain, Era spun on a wingtip to get out of there as fast as possible, winging away like and arrow, all shock pushed to the back of his mind as he focused on not dropping out of the dark clouds again.

And then he saw it, the first pale streaks of dawn, peeking above the clouds, shoot, he thought, and was just about to head for the grounds when he heard it. It hit him like a shock wave, sending him tumbling downward, head over tail, helpless against the force of it. A roar, just one, as unseen to Era, the light went out of Smaug's eyes. The roar of a dragon already dead, like the toll of a bell, sealing the twins fate.

Smaug was dead, and Era, plummeting towards the ground, was still a bird. Their curse would not be broken.

:::

Bex saw the lifeless shape of a gyrfalcon falling from the cloudlands above and he heart fell with it. She knew instinctively that it was her brother. She started running as fast as she could go towards the forest he was plummeting into. But then she stopped dead.

The shockwave blasted her backwards, ripping a scream from her throat as she covered her ears from the terrible sound. Normal people wouldn't have reacted like this, but the death of the curse-caster tends to have this affect on those cursed by him. Especially if the curse remains unbroken.

Bex held her head in her hands as she came to the same conclusion Era had.

The curse remained.