Chapter 4

An Awkward Meeting

One minute later, Mercury flew back through the hole he came through and out with someone else and they landed near Kassidy and Holden. The bat that was with Mercury had a golden blonde mane and hair, he was sky blue and had light green eyes. He looked to be around Kassidy and Holden's age, but he was shorter than them and Mercury.

The short Silverwing started to smile at them. "Hi! You two look like you're getting better, last I saw you guys you didn't look too good."

"You're the Silverwing that saw us?" Kassidy asked.

He nodded. "Yeah, that was me. My name's Shade, what're your guys' names?"

"My name's Kassidy and this is Holden."

Holden slightly nodded at Shade. "Hey, man."

Shade looked up and down at Kassidy and Holden. Kassidy noticed that Shade was looking mostly at her. "Hey, you guys are Silverwings just like us." Shade then tilted his head in confusion. "How come I've never seen you around the colony?"

"You three can talk to each other later," Mercury said. "Right now we need to get to the elders. Let's go."

Mercury took off, with Kassidy and Shade following behind him. As they flew out the entrance, Kassidy saw so many bats roosting all over the place. Everywhere she looked she would see a bat. This astonished her; she had always wanted to see a whole colony of bats that this was even on her bucket list, one down more to go. She couldn't wait to get out her bucket list when she got home.

As she flew up the tree, she saw the Silverwings start to stare at her. They started to whisper to one another and while they did, she noticed that some of them were looking a little petrified of her. She didn't like to be stared at because it usually made her uncomfortable. She tried not to show she was uncomfortable and knew that these bats had never seen her before, so she tried to ignore them.

"Hey!" Kassidy, Shade, and Mercury stopped in midflight and looked down to see that Holden was on the ground near the entrance. "I can't fly!"

Kassidy closed her eyes embarrassed, remembering that Holden had no idea how to take flight. Crap, she thought. She could now see and hear the colony whispering not only talking about her but also Holden. Kassidy could already tell that this was going to be the main talk of today.

Kassidy looked up at Mercury. "Mercury, could you hold on a sec? I gotta go help, Holden." Without waiting for a response, Kassidy flew back down to Holden. As soon as she got near him, she landed. "Holden, did you try taking off?"

"Yes, I did and I couldn't get in the air. I wasn't born to be a bat!"

"Everything okay?" Shade landed confused.

"No! I'm the only bat here that can't fly and these wings are practically useless!"

"Would you keep it down!?" Kassidy snapped while whispering. "You're making a scene here and the colony is staring at us!"

Holden looked up and instantly looked back at Kassidy when he saw eyes were on him. Holden swallowed some of his saliva nervously and he looked as though he regretted looking up. He rubbed his neck and Kassidy could tell he was trying not to look back up at the colony.

Damn it, why did it have to be today?

All Kassidy felt like doing was putting a sock in Holden's mouth so he would shut up. Kassidy got annoyed by the fact that he was loud and talked too much. He was like that shepherd boy who wouldn't stop tricking the villagers that wolves were attacking his sheep in the story The Boy Who Cried Wolf, except the difference, was that Holden was crying out that he couldn't fly.

Kassidy could feel the anger spread through her and she instantly realized it and took a couple of deep breaths to try and calm down. Kassidy couldn't blame Holden, this was his first time being a bat and he didn't know where to start on his flying. Learning how to fly takes time and this was a problem for Holden because he now had to try and take off. Even though Kassidy didn't like Holden, she knew she had to help him like she helped him with his school work and studying. Plus she didn't want to turn into a hot head.

"Okay…" Kassidy started, "try jumping in the air and once you're high enough, flap your wings the best you can."

Holden looked up-without looking at the colony-and tried to do as Kassidy said. Holden jumped as high as he could and tried to flap his wings, but he could only get a few inches in the air and then he flopped onto his stomach. Some of the bats started to laugh at Holden's failed attempt to fly and this only made Holden's face burn red with embarrassment.

"Oh, god…" Holden muffled. "I'm even more flightless then a penguin…"

Kassidy and Shade looked at each other. They then looked at Holden and helped him to his feet.

"Well… it could've been worse," Shade said. "At least you didn't hit your head."

"Yet."

"Okay, let's do something different," Kassidy said. "We can lift you up and once we get high enough, you can try to flap your wings."

"You gotta be kidding me; you're going to lift me like I'm a puppet?"

"Well I don't see any other way around it, so this might be our only option."

"Well, we should probably hurry," Shade said. "I think Mercury is getting impatient that we're taking too long."

"Right, you take his right arm and I'll take his left." Kassidy looked at Holden. "You ready?"

Holden shook his head. "I don't feel ready."

"Then get ready. When I say go, we lift him." Kassidy and Shade flew to the air and grabbed Holden's arms with their feet. "Alright... go!" Using all the strength they had, Kassidy and Shade flapped their wings and lifted Holden off the ground as high as they could. "Holden flap your wings when we let go." Kassidy looked at Shade and nodded. "Now."

Kassidy and Shade released their grips on Holden and as soon as they did, Holden miraculously flapped his wings and was now flying. Holden's eyes were wide, but he kept flapping his wings.

"That's it, Holden," Shade said. "You're flying!"

"I am," Holden said. "I'm flying!"

"Hurry up, you three," Mercury called down. "We can't keep the elders waiting."

As Mercury flew up, Kassidy, Holden, and Shade started to catch up to Mercury as they followed him up high into the tree. They'd passed countless passageways and were nearing the upper reaches of the tree now. Kassidy could feel the insides of her stomach twist and turn. She had no idea what to expect of these elders, but she wanted to remain calm.

When she looked at Holden, she could tell that he was looking nervous. She's never seen him ever look nervous and she would usually see him have a cool and calm expression on him. Today was not the case.

Mercury stopped in midflight and looked at the three bats and pointed to a ledge. "Land there."

Obeying Mercury, all three of them landed on the ledge Mercury pointed to. Mercury then flew up to another ledge and roosting under it was four older looking bats. Mercury landed under it and then he whispered to one of them in her ear before retreating to another ledge.

Kassidy assumed they were the elders and as she, Holden, and Shade were staring at them, one of them spread her wings out and glided down to another ledge along with the other three older bats and landed. All of them had lines forming across their eyes and they all had silver-white hair. Even though they looked old they still looked like they were in good condition, even for hunting.

One of them being the tallest stepped forward a little and she was inspecting Kassidy and Holden very carefully. She had a light brownish-grayish fur color along with some part of her fur being a dusty rose color, with a brown mane, dark purple wings, and she had long bangs that almost reached down to her feet. She had kindness in her eyes like she could be their grandmother, but also with curiosity.

The elder looked at Shade. "Shade Silverwing," she started, "as we know you found these two in a human contraption hurt with no sight of any humans whatsoever, is that correct?"

Shade looked at Kassidy and Holden and then looked back at the elder. "Yes."

"It was the right thing to do for these two if you hadn't said anything about this we may never know what might've happened if you hadn't found them." The elder then looked at Kassidy and Holden. "Newcomers, please step forward."

Kassidy hopped forward with no problem, but Holden didn't move. Kassidy looked back at Holden and he acted as though he didn't hear the elder. She used her head to gesture at Holden to come on. As if he was just in a trance, Holden copied what Kassidy did and hopped forward until he was next to Kassidy. Kassidy then looked back at the elder.

"My name is Frieda Silverwing, the chief elder of this colony and on my left is Lucretia and on my right are Bathsheba and Aurora."

All of them were looking at Kassidy and Holden with the same kindness and curiousness as Frieda, all except for Bathsheba. She was staring at them with the coldest and iciest expression on her face. Like Frieda, she had bangs that almost went down to her feet, but she was shorter than her and she was plump looking. She had dark gray fur along with her wings being the same color and she had a mane that was kind of silver as her hair, but it was grayish. Her stare was mostly on Kassidy, but Kassidy wasn't disturbed by her.

"What are your names?"

With Holden being too nervous to speak up, Kassidy decided to answer Frieda's question. "I'm Kassidy and this is Holden."

"It's nice to meet you, Kassidy and Holden. I welcome you two to our home, Tree Haven. It is but a miracle that you two are okay. How are you feeling?"

Kassidy and Holden had some bruises on them and some of the leaves that were on them like they were bandages fell off of them while they were flying. Kassidy was glad that neither she nor Holden was crushed and if they were they wouldn't be alive today.

"Okay, I guess," Kassidy said. "Nothing too serious, but we're okay."

"What were you two doing in that human contraption?"

"An excellent question, Frieda," Bathsheba said coldly as her expression as she got next to Frieda. "I'd like to know as well."

Ignoring Bathsheba's rant like she wasn't actually there, Kassidy began to speak. "The human contraption you speak of is actually called a jeep, it's actually mine. The reason why we were in it is that we're not actually bats." Kassidy took a moment to breathe in and then continued. "We're humans."

Kassidy could hear gasps come out from the colony and they were whispering more to each other. The elders looked at each other with the same expression as everyone else in the colony. Kassidy had a feeling it was going to be something like this, but she kept her focus on the elders as they whispered to each other.

Holden leaned in towards Kassidy and whispered using the side of his mouth towards her while still looking at the elders. "That worked out well…"

The elders looked back at Kassidy and Holden and Frieda cleared her throat. "You're humans?"

"Yes," Kassidy said. "You might not believe we're humans, but it's the truth. I'm actually the reason we're bats now because…" Seeing as though this wasn't going to be on camera, she decided to tell the elders her secret, even though she didn't want it exposed. "I accidentally summoned magic from a necklace of mine… I'm a witch."

All the sudden things went silent. No one gasped or whispered to each other. Everything was dead silent with everyone's stunned expressions on Kassidy. She could feel eyes on her from everywhere in the tree. If she would've said this to anyone that was human she had no idea what would've come of it.

Holden and Mercury were the only ones that weren't shocked-mostly because Kassidy told it to them privately. Even though they knew about this, Kassidy saw they looked a little uneasy that no one was saying anything.

"Frieda," Bathsheba said breaking the silence, "how can we trust them? We have no idea what they're capable of. I don't trust them, especially not her." Bathsheba pointed at Kassidy accusingly. "Look at her, she has these drawings on her, she has some black stuff around her eyes, and she has this thing around her neck that doesn't look right. You don't see a bat looking like this and she looks like a devil."

The colony started to whisper again, taking in what Bathsheba just said. Yes, Kassidy looked like a black sheep compared to everyone else, but she was not a devil. Never in her life has anyone called her a devil because of the way she looked. She didn't want anyone to be scared of her, but some of them were already scared or some had no idea if they should be scared of her or not.

She felt like one of those women being accused of a witch from the Salem Witch Trials. She even felt like one of those communists being accused from the McCarthy Trials. She didn't want anyone to believe she was this evil bat that might cause destruction on anyone. She may have anger issues, but she wasn't a bad person.

"With all due respect, Bathsheba," Kassidy began, "I don't want to cause anyone any harm. I know this is something you're all not used to, but this is what I basically look like. These drawings-" Kassidy pointed at one of her tattoos, "these are called tattoos, these were put on me and I chose them and now they're a part of me forever and the blackness around my eyes, it's called eyeliner, it's what we humans call makeup. Also, this thing around my neck-" Kassidy pointed to her choker, "it's a choker; it's a piece of jewelry that some people like to wear, but it doesn't actually choke you though."

"If I may," Holden finally speaking up said while lifting one of his fingers up. "What she's saying is true. At first, I didn't want to believe she was a witch, but when she turned us into bats I realized that she was one. Even though she looks like a devil she's not, this is just her everyday look."

Kassidy didn't think that Holden would have her back-mostly because he acted like a douche but he did. He stood up for her. She wanted to thank him but now didn't seem like a good time to do that. She decided she would thank him later.

"I can prove to you that I don't mean any harm and that it's true what I said about Holden and I being humans and me being a witch. I can do a spell." Kassidy looked at Frieda. "With your permission of course."

Frieda looked at the other elders and she then looked at the colony. They were still shocked from what Kassidy said and some even started to talk about Kassidy actually doing something harmful to them. Frieda looked back at Kassidy and she slowly nodded. "Go ahead."

Kassidy slightly nodded to thank Frieda and then she looked around her to see what she could do. She didn't want to do a spell that looked dark-even though she didn't do black magic-because she didn't want to scare anyone any further. There was not much she could do in here and everyone was waiting for her to do something.

Kassidy then looked down at her choker and while she looked at it this formed her an idea. She grabbed her choker and took it off and as she did it stretched as it came over her head like it was a rubber band. She then placed the choker on the ground and took a couple of steps back. The colony watched her like this was a magic show they were attending and all Kassidy could focus on was the black, stretchy choker.

She concentrated on only looking at her choker and as she did she slowly lifted her arm and positioned her hand towards the choker. She took a deep breath but didn't blink. Then with the lift of her arm, her choker lifted off the ground. She guided her choker towards her and as she did she could hear more gasps coming from the colony.

"She is a witch."

"She's making that thing float."

"How is she doing that?"

The choker was then over her head and as she used her arm to pull it down towards her, she lifted her other arm and using both of her hands, she gingerly stretched the choker and then the choker went down Kassidy's head and face and back onto her neck. She gathered her hair and then flipped it so the choker wouldn't be on the strands of it. She couldn't believe she actually demonstrated a spell to a whole colony of bats. She only demonstrated her magic towards her family members if they had the time or because they just wanted to watch her. When she demonstrated her magic towards her family it was fun, but she didn't feel the fun right now.

She looked towards the elders and they now had their jaws dropped. She didn't know if the elders would think her spell was harmless or harmful. There was a way for anyone like Kassidy to read others' minds, but it takes time to learn and she didn't know how to do that yet. If she did that she probably would've guessed that they wouldn't be too happy that she didn't respect their privacy. Kassidy wouldn't have blamed them because she wasn't fond of anyone that didn't respect her privacy.

"In all my years," Frieda began, "I've never seen anything done like this." Kassidy held her breath and prepared for the worse. "It was most surprising of what you did there, Kassidy, but I believe you've proven that there won't be any trouble."

The colony started to whisper again and started to agree with Frieda. A lot were no longer looking afraid of Kassidy and instead stared at her in amazement. This reminded her of her cousins whenever she did a spell in front of them. She didn't think it would work, but it turns out she chose the right spell.

"How can we know for sure that she won't hurt anyone?" Bathsheba asked. "She might be trying to fool us or-"

"Bathsheba," Frieda said interrupting. Frieda looked at Bathsheba. "That'll be quite enough. They're our guests and the least we can do is give them the help they need." Frieda looked back at Kassidy. "How long do you two plan on staying here?"

"Until we can transform back into humans," Kassidy said.

"Very well, until you and Holden transform back to your human selves, you're welcome to stay here for as long as you need. For now, I think it would be wise that you two stick around with someone in the colony until then."

"They can stick with me," Shade hopped forward until he was next to Kassidy. "I'd like to help them until they can transform back."

Kassidy was already grateful for Shade. He seemed to be like a nice guy. She's noticed that he looked to be the smallest one in the colony. She's also noticed that he constantly beats his wings more than when she, Holden, and Mercury were flying. Even if that's the case she still thought that he was nice and was willing to help her and Holden.

"Then I will allow you to do that, Shade," Frieda said. She looked at Kassidy and Holden. "One more thing before you go. You, humans, are not familiar with this law but we bats have to fly at night. We are never allowed out into the sun, so you two will have to get used to flying out at night because no bat is allowed out into the sunlight."

Kassidy and Holden looked at each other confused. Kassidy always assumed the only reason why bats didn't go out into the sun was that they hated it. This was something different. If she hadn't known about this law and she was a bat during the day she didn't want to know what would've happened. Why weren't they allowed to go out into the sun?

"I wish you two luck, you may leave."

Shade looked at Kassidy and Holden. "Follow me, you guys can roost with me and my Mom."

Shade took off and Kassidy followed behind. Holden jumped off the ledge and began to flap his wings and he then followed Kassidy and Shade down the tree.

"Shade," Kassidy said as Holden flew next to her, "are you sure your Mom will allow this? We don't want to impose."

Shade looked over his shoulder with a smile. "My Mom won't mind, besides she probably knows by now that you won't hurt anyone. What you did back there was pretty cool, how'd you do that anyway?"

"I just concentrated on my choker and imagined it floating in the air like it was a feather."

"I'm kind of jealous actually, I wish I had magic."

"Yeah, but if you do have magic you would have to do everything you can to keep it hidden from everyone. It's hard for me to do because there's a lot of people in the world that could see me use my magic and if they did they would've recorded me or took a picture of me and post it online for the world to see."

"No kidding," Holden said. "You did a pretty good job of hiding your powers in your jeep."

Kassidy scowled at Holden. Now she didn't want to thank Holden for having her back. She couldn't even imagine how his girlfriend had to deal with him. Did he treat her like this? Maybe she was a gold digger and that's why she's with him. She didn't know, but she didn't care.

"I've so many questions for you guys," Shade said.

He then saw someone he recognized and he flew towards her. He roosted under the ledge next to the female bat and as soon as he did, the female bat hugged him. She had natural red hair-kind of like Kassidy's Aunt-and a natural red mane like she was a lion, with purple fur, and purple wings. Kassidy and Holden stopped in midair and watched as the female bat hugged Shade.

"Shade," the female bat began, "how'd it go?"

Shade got out of the female bat's hug and looked at her. "It went good, Mom."

"A lot were talking about the bat named Kassidy and what she did."

"Yeah, you should've seen what she did and she's actually right over there with her friend." Shade pointed at Kassidy and Holden and his Mom looked at them.

Kassidy wouldn't say Holden was her friend. She was Holden's tutor, but she would rather call it more like an acquaintance. Holden would probably agree with her if she said this to him.

"Mom, this is Kassidy and Holden. I'm going to be helping them until they get back into their other-selves. You think it would be fine if they roosted with us?"

Shade's Mom looked at Kassidy and Holden and she smiled at them weakly. She then looked back at Shade. "Well if they're alright with you then they're alright with me." She then looked back at Kassidy and Holden. "Come on over."

Kassidy and Holden looked at each other and then back to Shade's mom. Kassidy flew towards the ledge Shade and his Mom was under and landed next to Shade. She looked back at Holden and he looked at the ledge confused. He was trying to see how they were perched under it like he was trying to do his school work. He had a lot to learn if he was going to be a bat.

Shade and his Mom looked at Kassidy and didn't know how to take Holden's reaction to this. Kassidy nervously smiled at them and then looked back at Holden.

"So… do I just grab onto something?" Holden asked.

"Land anywhere you like, Holden." Shade's Mom said.

"Just hurry up and pick a spot, Holden," Kassidy said.

Holden looked at the ledge some more then flew towards it. Holden looked under the ledge and then he looked at how all three of them were hanging. He then tried to copy them and struggled with it as he did so, but managed to hang under the ledge. Holden looked embarrassed again and didn't want to look at anyone.

"It's alright, Holden," Shade's Mom said. "I know you're trying to get used to this, so there's nothing for you to worry about."

Holden looked at Shade's Mom and weakly smiled. "Thanks, uh…"

"Ariel, my name is Ariel."

"It's nice to meet you, Ariel," Kassidy said. "Thank you for letting us roost here, it really means a lot."

"It's my pleasure, Kassidy."

"You can just call me Kass for short."

"Then I'll call you Kass." Ariel looked at Kassidy and Holden's injuries with a worried expression on her face. "Are you two recovering okay after what happened?"

Ariel seemed nice like Shade and Kassidy liked her like she liked Shade. She reminded her of her own Mom. Her Mom was always caring for others and was considered to be a social butterfly at times. Kassidy didn't take the social butterfly from her Mom, but she did take the caring trait from her. She always had a nice smile on her face and she never hesitated to say hi to anyone and sometimes Kassidy would get annoyed by that, but she didn't judge her Mom for that. She already missed it.

"Yeah," Kassidy said, "the injuries are getting better I would say."

"What do you two plan on doing?"

"Right now I plan on sleeping," Holden said. "I'm really tired after that talk we had with the elders."

"I feel you, Holden," Shade said.

Like Holden and Shade, Kassidy did feel tired after that talk with the elders and after she used a spell on her choker. She was glad she could earn most of the bats in this colony their trust. Bathsheba, in particular, was one of the bats she could not get to trust. She had a bitter attitude like an old neighbor of Kassidy's she used to have back in America. If she had to choose between her neighbor and Bathsheba she would probably have to go with her neighbor because she at least didn't judge her too harshly as Bathsheba did. There was definitely something about Bathsheba that she didn't like and any facial expression on anyone can tell her if she'll get along with them or not and she knew she definitely wasn't going to get along with her.

"Holden and I are going to go back to my jeep to find a necklace of mine, so we can transform back into our human selves and we were actually hoping that Shade could show us where he found us at."

Shade smiled. "Yeah, I can do that. I happen to know where it actually is."

"Well I suggest that you three get some sleep so you can get an early start," Ariel said. "You're probably going to need it."

Kassidy knew that Ariel was right. She wanted to get home soon and she wondered if they were searching for her. She also wondered if Holden's family were searching for him as well. Either way, she knew they had to be worried about them. There was probably even a search party for them. All she could do in the meantime was get some rest and hopefully get her and Holden home as soon as possible.

Walking in the shadows of the woods, the two figures-dressing in all black-walked up towards a black jeep that was destroyed at the front of it. The male figure managed to see through Kassidy's eyes as she was driving her and another boy her age home. He now knew that the boy's name was Holden. As he was looking through her eyes, he saw that she accidentally summoned magic from her necklace and as soon as she did, he saw that her vehicle was getting out of control and after that, he saw blackness.

It took him and his female companion a while to find her jeep, but they managed to find it. They were glad nobody found it yet-which was surprising. As soon as they got near the jeep they looked inside it. They thought they would see Kassidy and Holden's bodies in the jeep, but they didn't. Instead, they saw their things and nothing else.

The male figure grumbled to himself and hoped to see Kassidy's body and maybe hoped to see her lifeless. It wouldn't stop him and his companion however with continuing on with their plans.

The male figure tried to open the jeep door, but as figured it was locked. He then lifted his hand towards the door and then while turning his hand clockwise the car door opened. He then opened the door with his gloved hand and looked inside some more. The first thing he noticed was Kassidy and Holden's phones on the floor of the driver's seat and passenger's seat. He picked up Kassidy's phone and using his other free hand he concentrated on Holden's phone and made it float to his hand at a fast speed. He then looked at the screens of the phones and there were many text messages from Kassidy and Holden's phones. He read the text messages and he knew immediately these were text messages from their family members.

Kass, where are you? It's late.

Holden, where the hell are you? It's the middle of the night!

The male figure's hands then started to heat up and his palms turned into lava and as they did, the phones he had in his hands started to melt into a metal liquid and there was some sparking as the phones were melting. He continued to melt the phones until there was nothing left.

He looked back into the car and his eyes then caught a silver necklace with a blue pendant. It was Kassidy's. He knew he had to take it, otherwise, he knew that if Kassidy and Holden came back to the jeep they would transform back into humans. He couldn't allow that. He grabbed the necklace and then he and his companion started to grab more of Kassidy and Holden's things. They may not have had the chance to kill Kassidy, but they would find her no matter what.

And tonight they would go back to Kassidy's house and take care of business. However, they wouldn't kill them until they had her.

A/N- This chapter took me a while, but I'm finally finished. The figures you've been reading about will be around at certain points in these chapters. Kassidy and Holden will definitely be in shock when they see their stuff is gone. Be prepared for the next chapter. Later.