A/N: Sorry for the slow update! I've been busy with college, which is pretty much killing me. What was I thinking! Oh well, things are slowing down, so the next update should be faster ;)

Enjoy!

Chapter 10: Birds of a feather

Free.

It was the first thought that entered my mind.

I was free.

The sensation was nearly impossible to describe. The crows were like my limbs, attached to an invisible body. I could control each one of them like the fingers attached to my hands. Separate, yet one whole. My whole life, I had always felt like something was missing. As if deep down inside, a hidden part of my soul lay dormant until the Sands of Time were unleashed and jolted it awake. For two seconds… two blissful seconds… I felt complete. Then suddenly, realization hit me like a ton of bricks and I instinctively panicked, the birds that were my form doing the same. They shrieked and wildly flapped their wings in a desperate attempt to stay airborne, but failed to find the right rhythm and spiraled down, crashing on the bleachers in a messy heap. The second the flock touched down, I lost control changed back to my human form.

"Wha…. What?" I mumbled, my head still reeling. Still in a daze, I got up and ran my fingers through my once red hair. It had reverted to its original color, purple strands now framing my face. My clothes were damaged from the fall, hanging from my body in shreds and revealing various cuts and bruises. Strangely, my wounds were healing at a ridiculous rate, disappearing before my eyes.

What had just happened?

A black feather with a purple shine floated down and landed at my feet. I picked it up, my memories slowly coming back to me.

"Birds… I changed into… EEEEEEEEEEEEKK!!"

I shrieked when a large hand grabbed me once again and yanked me off my feet.

"Oh, hell no! Not this again!" I yelled, managing to grab my sword and plunge it into the creature's thumb. It howled in pain and loosened its grip, allowing me to squirm my way out of its grasp. Without thinking, I ran up the beast's arm, climbed onto its face and plowed my blade into its remaining eye.

I listened to its agonized roars, satisfied that I had successfully blinded the monster. Then I blinked when I realized that there was just one slight problem:

How the hell was I going to get down?!

"Dark Prince? Farah? Little help up here!" I yelped when the creature started running in circles, blindly clawing at his head trying to get rid of me.

I was too panicked to even think about what had happened to me earlier: I was clinging to the straps of the monster's mask for dear life, my mind feverously racing for a way out of this mess.

Dark Prince slashed away at the monsters calves while Farah shouted and flung rocks in an attempt to distract it. My life flashed before my eyes when the creature violently tossed its head back and threw me off.

I heard the Dark Prince laugh and Farah scream in horror as I plummeted towards the ground, but something soft caught me in my fall and slowed carried me down onto the grass. When I looked, I just caught a glimpse of a cloud of sand dispersing and vanishing into thin air.

"Sis," a squeaky voice asked, "Are you alright?"

"Yeah, I'm…"

I never finished that sentence. My eyes widened and my jaw dropped when I saw Kai floating above the grass, surrounded by a whirlwind of magical sands. His hair was blowing upwards, defying all laws of gravity, and the sheer energy that radiated off him was almost impossible to bear.

His eyes suddenly rolled back in his head and he fell to the ground, his face pale as a sheet. I now noticed that he had ripped his clothes, his chest broader and his legs far too tall for a ten-year old boy. I now also realized why his voice had sounded so strange: In less than an hour… he had aged three years and was going through puberty far ahead of schedule.

Dark Prince looked mildly interested, until the monster growled and the temptation of supersized mindless slaughter became too much for the demon to resist. While he charged at the blinded creature like a giddy schoolgirl, Farah kneeled down next to me, brushing some hair from my brother's face.

"How did you children get these powers?" she asked me, worried.

"Powers?" I repeated in a daze, and suddenly, without warning, everything came back to me. Shaking, I looked at my hands, half-expecting them to turn into wings.

Crows…

But how…?

No…

No…

No…

No…

No…

It was so obvious… so ridiculously obvious, that it had not entered my mind even once. It explained everything, from my cold-blooded inner swordswoman to my strange ability to fly.

My parents had not been kidnapped by sand creatures… they were the sand creatures.

A vision danced before my eyes, of me and Kai running from our house and then later escaping from the hotel, the Crow Master hot on our tail and pleading with us to stop.

I believed he was trying to trick us, but only now did I realize what he had been desperately trying to tell us. He wasn't our enemy… he was our father.

I think my brain blew a fuse at that point, because I followed Kai's example and fainted at the spot. Before darkness overtook my mind and I lost consciousness, I had one last vision: a crow flying straight at me, it's glowing eyes meeting my own. And a incredible sense of peace overwhelmed me.

"Robin… Robin… hey, are you alright?"

I groggily opened my eyes, looking at Prince who trying to bring me back to my senses. His hair was soaking wet and Farah was standing next to him, holding a now empty soda can that someone had left behind. I always got annoyed at people who littered, but needless to say they were now forgiven.

Which was more then I could say for a certain Prince of Persia…

"Why didn't you tell me?" I hissed, jumping to my feet and glaring daggers at the royal.

"Tell you what?" he asked nervously, only increasing my anger.

"That I'm a friggin sand creature, you pea brain!" I yelled, throwing up my hands.

"Human/sand creature hybrid, to be exact…"

"WHAT?"

"Your mother didn't start out as a Harem Girl, she was born human. Your father on the other hand… well, that's a different story," he said sheepishly, scratching the back of his head.

"What's going on?" Farah asked confused and I rolled my eyes.

"Well, according to Prince boy, apparently you tried to kill my parents."

"You mean those sand creatures…" she started, her eyes growing large. Then she leaned in closer and whispered: "They can do that?"

"Oh dear god, thank you so much for those mental images!" I exclaimed when her remark sunk in. Like I had not been scarred for life already…

"Robin, does it really matter?"

I blinked at Prince's question, not sure what he meant.

"What do you mean?"

"Didn't your parents raise you? Feed you? Protect you? Love you?"

"I guess," I muttered, looking away. Yeah, mom and dad were a bit quirky at times… especially dad… but they had always been there for us and I wouldn't trade them for the world.

"They might look differently on the outside, but on the inside they are still your parents, Robin," the royal continued. "You must forgive them."

"Why should I!" I yelled, tears burning behind my eyes and anger suddenly welling up inside of me. "If they cared for me, then why would they hide something like this, huh! Why did they lie to us! Do you know what it's like to always feel like something is missing? Like a part of your soul is asleep? How it feels to stare at the sky for hours and have this unexplainable desire to join the birds burning a hole in the core of your very being! It hurts, Prince! It hurts! And I will never forgive them!"

"Robin, wait!" he shouted, but I had already turned on the ball of my foot and ran for the exit. With the beast defeated, the barrier was lifted and I raced through the corridor. I didn't even care about the potential danger on the other side, escape the only thing on my mind.

I closed my eyes shut for a few second, fighting back the tears that were forming and threatened to run down my face. I had to get away… away from Farah, away from the Prince, away from every damned thing that had to do with videogames.

My father was a sand creature, the words kept repeating themselves in my mind. He had lied to me, and so had my mother. Why hadn't they told me the truth? Had they never seen me looking at my pet parakeet Socrates in envy, my jealousy of his ability to fly slowly eating away at me? Had they never seen me desperately stare at those ancient samurai swords during our latest visit to the museum, wanting nothing more than to yank them from the wall and take one for myself? All my life I had struggled with these strange desires that I didn't understand until now. I had felt so alone, so incredibly alone, and they never told me why… He had never told me why.

"I won't forgive you for this, dad," I angrily wiped another tear from my eye and continued to run down the street. "I will never forgive you for this…"