Thanatos was soaring over the open water, Henry held out his arms and had to hold back in order not to scream of joy.
They had decided to test the fabric, the spinners had crafted specifically for Thanatos' wing, over the waterway, and the flier claimed he could almost not feel the difference to before the injury. The wing was still broken, but the spinners had stabilized it properly with firm silk and it would surely heal soon. Overall they had worked a miracle – they had had to sever a little more tissue to have a cleaner cut, but Thanatos claimed he would soon fly like before, if not better.
The spinners had given the piece of wing they had had to cut to Henry, and Thanatos had joked he could wrap it around Mys' handle. Henry had taken the joke seriously and done exactly that. It was too little for the entire handle, but it was now serving a purpose again. A different one than before, but Henry had a feeling Thanatos was happier about his choice than he admitted.
"You know, I am starting to get a hang of this entire "outcast"-thing!", he screamed against the wind. He wanted to ask Thanatos to do a few loopings, just for the heck, but he decided to wait until his wing was healed.
"You only notice that NOW?", Thanatos replied, flying a zig-zag-pattern over the foaming waves.
"Kind of. You know – you were right, back at the nibbler colony. It's weird saying that now, after what happened to my eye, but I understand now what you meant."
He touched the spot where his eye had been, now tightly bandaged with fresh spinner-silk, "You know, the part where you said you can only change as much as you let yourself change. I get it now."
"About time", the flier sped up a little.
"Because I did change. Oh, how much I changed." Henry thought about how he had been, half a year ago. The spoilt prince of Regalia, who had taken his power and status for granted, enjoyed rubbing it in everyone's faces that he was better, and played pranks for a hobby.
Well, he STILL enjoyed rubbing it in everyone's face that he was better, and pranks sounded like a lot of fun, but now he realized, the same traits that had held him back in Regalia and made people believe he was an arrogant asshole, had been the main reason he had survived until now.
When his intuition, talent to craft, and wit had always marked him a troublemaker in Regalia, they had saved his life in the Dead Land more times than he could count.
His confidence, stubbornness, and pride had been deemed arrogance and bad mannerism before. Here, they had helped him find the strength to pull through – and to not simply make empty claims, but actually persevere and achieve the goals he had set for himself, be they as crazy as inventing a flaming sword.
Henry realized he had learned more about life in the last six months than in the sixteen years before that. He had learned to recognize shapes in the dark, to speak like a nibbler, led an army of crawlers into victory against an angry armada of cutters, killed a fully-grown rat on his own, without aid, faced a swarm of angry giant wasps with nothing but an underground river to hide in, and ridden on the back of a serpent. And the list, he realized, was far from finished.
"And yet I remained myself", Henry finally concluded. He was certain he was still himself, at least the part of him that he had wanted to keep.
"And yet you remained a clueless idiot, you mean?"
He flicked at Thanatos' ear with his fingers for that. "You're one to talk. Because, while I changed in a lot of ways, you still have the same commitment issues as you always had. Right, "I only bonded to you because it was the only way to get you to allow me to save you" – was it?"
In return, Thanatos quickly rolled around in the air, causing Henry to almost fall off. "CUT THAT OUT!", he screamed, and the flier laughed. "I thought you LIKED stunts so much."
They flew for another five minutes in silence before Henry continued, in a more serious tone – "Hey, I never said thank you, actually. For saving me from the serpents. I mean, you know that I hate saying thank you, and now that we're bonds, I don't think it's necessary anymore, as it's exactly what the bond requires us to do, but as that happened BEFORE we bonded, I guess I have to say it."
Thanatos chuckled. "What an honor then. Well, you know, I only screwed my own wing over in the process. No big deal at all."
"Oh, you will be fine. If anyone will be fine, it's you. Death."
"Is that an innuendo to the whole Death-Rider thing again?", Thanatos groaned, "Yes, yes, you are the Death Rider. Can you act the part too, maybe, and stop behaving like a kid on his birthday?"
"Okay, first of all, I just found out I am my own childhood role model, so my excitement should be understandable. Second, I have finally found a suitable exile-name. You know, for situations when I can't introduce myself as Henry. And third – you said it wrong. I'm not the Death Rider", Henry paused for a second.
"We are the Death Rider."
"And what does the RIDER of Death suppose he wants to do next?", Thanatos' voice was mocking, but Henry could have sworn he heard a little bit of pride in it as well.
"Lay low, if that's okay. I... I need time to wind down and let my eye heal properly. And your wing needs it as well. Besides, we still have the problem where I can't fight efficiently anymore. Overall, I think it's best if we settle down somewhere for the next month or so."
"And what did you have in mind?", Thanatos asked. "Do you want to go back to the nibbler colony?"
Henry shook his head. "Way too far away. That's on the east coast of the waterway, we are in the west. I was thinking of something else. Remember that island of crawlers I told you about?"
"You want to lay low... among a bunch of crawlers?" Thanatos shook his head. "Interesting choice. But sounds like a plan."
"As I said. It's supposed to be us laying low. The crawlers won't bother us. They respect me too much."
"Well, that respect sure isn't mutual", the flier mumbled.
"Who cares, it's crawlers", Henry scoffed. "South we go!", he shouted and Thanatos turned in the direction. Once more Henry spread his arms, and this time, he screamed at the top of his lungs.
Thank you so much for finishing this story! Now please treat yourself to the outro-video I made, it contains information on possible SEQUELS and shares CONCEPT ART I made for this story.
I apologize for the poor quality on some of the pictures, my slideshow maker screwed that up.
yo u tu. be /hojOaW7Zp-o [please remove the spaces for the link to work]
