"Are you finally done? Geez, if getting into this thing will always take so long, maybe it wasn't worth making it after all."

Henry scoffed and attempted to kick Thanatos yet found himself unable to. "Yep, I have now successfully achieved not being able to move my legs. You proud of me?"

"Oh, this is perhaps the one perk of it all."

Henry stared down at the straps that tightly locked him in place on the flier's back, he had been so proud of earlier, with contempt. Now, this was certainly going to take some getting used to.

He tugged at the broad belts around his thighs that connected down to a pair of leather pieces, that resembled the front halves of boots he had strapped to his normal footwear, in the front, and the back. It all was specifically designed to lock his legs in place as firmly as possible, yet as comfortable as the position was and as flawlessly as the mechanism worked, Henry suddenly found himself having second thoughts.

The whole idea was to erase his leg movement from the equation, and from what he experienced here it worked like a charm. He just didn't know if he liked the thought of that anymore.

He nervously tugged at the other belt around his waist and checked the two hinges on the insides of his knees that connected him to the collar-like saddle directly. He could not dismount unless he arduously removed all the gear again. He could not even move on his own. The thought brought with itself fear yet Henry suppressed it.

Your legs dangling about hinders the mechanism of the saddle, Teslas spoke in his head, like this, not only will the movement not be obstructed, but it will also distribute your weight better and aid Thanatos, as well as yourself when rotating. And, of course, it makes it utterly impossible to fall off, no matter what kind of crazy stunt you perform.

"Feel restricted yet?"

"Hey, not fair", Henry traced the strap of the saddle and leaned backward to double-check the contents of the pair of bags they had added to the whole thing, to relieve his own backpack. "You can't get all sassy now, not when I can't do anything about it."

"Oh, I will be sassy alright", the flier spread his wings and Henry reluctantly sat upright again, to double-check all his other belts and pockets. "We have a forty-hour flight ahead of us and I will use every second of it to make you regret ever strapping us into this thing."

Henry hesitated, then flicked at the flier's ear with his finger. Thanatos hissed in protest, "Alright, alright, you still have your hands, I guess."

The exiled prince laughed and tightened the clasp of his sword belt. "And I'm not afraid to use them. So come on, give the saddle a chance!"

"Never." Henry rolled his eye and scooted around as best he could, with the tight straps when Thanatos spoke on – "You didn't forget anything, did you? Who knows when we'll come back, and your backpack was only half full when we left the colony."

"All I left were most of the supplies and those figurines", Henry grumbled, "for the pups to play with. And besides, you got nice saddlebags now, to relieve my backpack."

Thanatos hissed and dug his talons into the edge of the steep cliff ahead. It went straight down, maybe two hundred feet, below Henry made out the foaming waves that made up the outskirt of the waterway. It must be close to where we washed out before the current carried us to the jungle, he thought, yet chased it at once. He had promised himself he was done with the past.

His hand brushed the straps of his backpack, then darted over to the neatly lined-up hilts of his weapons. Mys at his hip, as usual. Charos' long, double-handed hilt with the flier-pommel right by his head. And next to it... Henry smiled as his hand gripped the freshly re-bandaged hilt of... well, he'd have to come up with a name for it now, probably. Igniter was high up on his current list, as that was exactly what it did now.

Of course, when he had presented him with the broken stump of his old sword, Teslas had reforged it. Yet he had done a little more. I had to use a nigh-literal ton of ignifer and I really don't want to forge another blade like this ever again, yet for all that's worth, it now lights on fire without the need to apply ignifer separately. Should save time, I suppose.

Henry grinned ear-to-ear and felt an urge to draw what had once been his original sword to inspect the new, polished blade that now shimmered in many colors when you held it close to a flame, though held back.

He recalled his own awe when the nibbler had first demonstrated its new ability. I guess I can trash my dispenser now, the exiled prince had stammered yet Teslas had convinced him to keep it, as well as a small number of pellets. For emergencies. Oh well, he patted his backpack, it was somewhere in there. And now, the sword was no longer inferior to the rest of his, by this point, fairly impressive array of weapons anymore either.

The only weapon he did not wear on himself was the golden dagger he had taken back from Tonguetwist's corpse when Thanatos, Dalia, and he had gone back to loot Longclaw's camp. He had claimed to go for the crown, to take it back for Luxa, yet he had wanted to have his dagger... Hamnet's gift... back just as much. He was not in any hurry to wear it on his person though. Somehow, when he had then finally closed his hand around the hilt again, he had felt like he had outgrown it.

And of course, the slingshot, Henry remembered it in his backpack also. He'd get around to using that too, but certainly not now.

"Ready when you are", he called in Thanatos' direction and the flier shook his head. "I'm always ready." Faster than Henry could perceive he spread his wings, leaped off the cliff, and caught himself on a steady current. Henry ducked when the current abated and the large flier proceeded to fight his battle with the streams like last time, until, a couple minutes later, he caught a good one. They were propelled forward and Henry couldn't help but grin. "Onward."

"I am waiting for you to begin complaining you're bored again, by the way." Henry groaned. They hadn't even flown for ten minutes and the flier was already jabbing at him again.

"Oh, I'm not bored", he double-checked if his backpack and his sword belt would hold, then his hand darted down to the rotation lever. "I have this thing to have fun with now." Without further warning, he firmly pulled it and this time, managed to let go in time for it to only rotate by an exact ninety degrees. The saddle snapped into place and Thanatos let out a surprised yelp, then began reeling through the air sideways. "Hey... HEY... AGH this is bad... rotate down at least, I can not keep myself straight very well when you're on the side like that."

Henry obeyed and rotated by another ninety degrees until he sat upside-down, making a mental note to use the sides only in emergencies. He blinked, then his gaze latched onto his footgear, and a grin spread on his face. I am the first human to ever sit upside-down on the back of a flier, he thought and could have screamed in joy at how well the gear worked. And I nearly took it off again, just because it is limiting my mobility a little.

Henry was in the process of imagining the kinds of stunts they could pull with this thing if only they got used to it properly when Thanatos suddenly lost altitude.

The exiled prince shrieked in shock when the flier sunk so low Henry's head was submerged. Snorting and coughing, he managed to grab onto the gear and pull himself into an upright position. "The hell did you do that for?!"

Thanatos laughed. "I wager I could have warned you. Though, you didn't warn me either when you first activated it."

Henry wanted to be mad, he really did – his hair was disheveled and soaked, plastered all over his face. He wiped it away furiously. Though as much as he wanted to yell at Thanatos, he thought he would have done the same thing, were he the flier.

Instead of wasting his energy on anger he rotated a full circle and found the hardest part was pulling up. "This is phenomenal", he mumbled and Thanatos sighed. "It's strange, is what it is."

"Fair." Henry rotated back down and remained in the upside-down position. His gaze traced the horizon and his imagination started running wild with what lied ahead. Beyond the known borders of the Underland. Above, beneath, north, south, east, west. Soon he would find out. This was more like what he wanted to occupy himself with. Adventure, the unknown. It was so much more enticing than babysitting a bunch of kids, keeping up a stupid cover, and pretending he was not he. Henry of... Regalia?

Henry of the Dead Land, he grinned. Now that sounded great. The Prince of Rats. The Wielder of Light. The Bringer of Buzzer Wings. The Death Rider... he mentally counted his ever-growing list of titles. The list of titles Henry of the Dead Land could call his own was so much more impressive than the single title Henry of Regalia had had. And in contrast to that one, he had not been born with them. He had earned every single one himself.

"You think Kismet is okay?", he asked and for the first time looked back. Thanatos hummed. "I doubt anything in this world could phase her. We'll try again after we get back."

Henry nodded. Despite their attempt to locate her before embarking on their trip over the waterway, she had not been in her former cave. Most likely she had fled from Longclaw's companions, Henry and Thanatos had concluded, and though the flier was right, he couldn't shake a slight worry. He had scribbled down a message for her right away and left it by the cave entrance. With all his might Henry hoped she would find it soon.

"We'll see her again", he muttered and smiled. After all, without her, he wouldn't be here now. Without her, he would have never overcome the issues caused by his missing eye. Without her, he would have died countless times. Without her, he would not have made it past any of these most recent hurdles of outcast life.

This feeling of nigh-limitless power his new skills and weapons gave him was such a stark contrast to how beaten down he remembered feeling back on the crawler island. He had done it, Henry grinned. He had fulfilled his promise to himself. He had found a way out of the second rock bottom as he had out of the first one. And most of it had been thanks to Kismet. "Well, now I can challenge Ripred to that duel when I see him", he suddenly announced and Thanatos above him scoffed. "Maybe... you know what... maybe we should."

"Really?" Henry's grin widened and the flier laughed. "What better time for it than now. And honestly, his constant bragging about being undefeated is one of his most annoying traits. I sincerely hope you will not become like that as well."

Henry's agape-standing mouth shut though his grin remained. "We'll see."

Despite the warnings of both Kismet and Thanatos, with how powerful he felt now, he meant to scream at the world – come at me. Come at... us. His flier and he... they could take it all. Together. And only... together. Now, with the saddle, more than ever so.

For a heartbeat, Henry allowed the faint memory of the most recent pain back into his heart and shuddered. His hand automatically reached to pull himself up. As many lessons as he had learned over this last year, some of them had come at a substantial cost. Everyone can be broken, Kismet's voice sounded in his head yet Henry shook it. He had not broken. Not yet.

He had not broken. Or... had he, and now found a way to piece himself back together? He did not like admitting to it but a part of him knew it had been the latter. He leaned forward and discovered for as little mobility as the saddle allowed, he could still lie down if he faced forward. Henry wrapped his arms around his flier's neck and squeezed his eye shut.

Was it not in truth ironic? A measly couple months ago they had battled to the death in a gnawer arena. And now...

"Is something the matter?"

Henry sighed. "I just find it funny how bad... horrible things seem to sometimes or... well, most of the time, have good consequences."

"Are you talking about yourself or us?"

The exiled prince laughed. "Both, kind of. Though mainly about us. I hate the thought but do you think all this had to happen for us to... well, become... real bonds?"

Thanatos remained quiet for a while. "Well... maybe. Though I don't think it was necessary per se, it might have accelerated things."

"You're right", Henry rotated back down and stretched out his hands until the tips of his fingers brushed the water.

"Watch out, don't let the serpents or the leviathans nibble on your fingers", Thanatos hummed and Henry laughed. "I still got a bone to pick with the serpents, actually."

As he sensed the cool water against his fingertips an overwhelming sensation of limitless freedom overwhelmed him and he barely held back a scream. This was it, what he had feared so much all along. Why he had ever feared it, at this point, he could not begin to tell. There were no limits, no boundaries, no rules, and no restraints. Not for them.

Henry spread his arms like wings when Thanatos gained speed and darted over the shimmering sea... into the unknown.

ooo

Thank you so much for reading!

If you liked the story, please leave a review with your thoughts, and enjoy the outro video featuring original (concept) art on my YouTube channel RinSolo