"Let your mind start a journey to a strange new world... Leave all thoughts of the world you knew before... Let your soul take you where you long to be... Only then can you belong to me." - Phantom Of The Opera

We Are One

The first thing that she noticed when she woke up was that he had covered her with a wing and had snuggled against her side. He did not even have the excuse of needing warmth-sharing against the cold to do this. The second thing that she noticed was that he had wrapped his tail around hers. That could not be by accident. The third thing that was clear was that he also smelled more of wanting.

She stared at him as he slept at her side. His eyes were peacefully closed as his head lay on the mossy ground next to hers.

Have you finally realized what you want, Shadowwing?

She carefully got to her feet, unwound their tails, and slipped out from under his wing without waking him. She flew off the ledge to attended to the necessary waking routine. Down to the lowest level she flew and dove into the deep water. She hunted the familiar fish in that deep pond and did not catch anything, but it was still warming to freely swim in the deep waters and wildly snap at the tasty fish.

She hauled herself out, shook herself dry, drank her fill, and flew back to the high ledge where Shadowwing was still deep asleep. But her flight did not take her straight to his side. Instead, she flew back to the clearing where she had hunted and grounded the four-leg prey. There was something else in that place that was now important. It was not the tiny four-legged prey scurrying between the plants for cover.

Where are they? I know I saw them here somewhere. Grr, found them!

The large flowers that glowed white from within were growing in the shade of one of the larger trees. Her warm purr filled the area as she bounded over to the plants and considered the pawful of the strong-life-hatchling-flowers. There were ten of the large flowers within snapping distance.

Dam said that only two of these help make for a strong hatchling.

She ate all of them and turned back for the ledge. Her brief glide carried her over to his side. She sat down next to him and hummed warmly at him.

He did not stir.

She lightly brushed one of his ears with a paw.

He did not stir.

"Shadowwing, get off your tail."

He did not stir.

She sighed and grinned.

"You brought this on yourself, you sleepy kin."

She bent down and gently nipped at his exposed ears. He scrambled awake with a muffled cry of alarm and rapidly blinked his eyes in waking twisted-thinking. She laughed heavily at his confused expression as her swaying tail also betrayed her amusement.

"What... you... you..." he groaned while rubbing at his pinched ear.

She only rolled her eyes at him.

"Why did you do that?" he cried.

She laughed and started prancing around him, which only made him more confused.

"You should get up off your waste-end..."

"Luna!" he bellowed.

"... and play!"

She nipped at his flanks and dashed away from him.

"You! Twisted kin!" he shouted.

She jumped off the ledge and dove for the far distant ground. He followed closely behind her and dove for the lowest level near the water. They both landed in a grassy clearing among the alien forest. She dashed forward toward the mushroom trees, paused, looked back at him, and stuck out her tongue at him.

"Ground race to the water!" she shouted and turned tail on him.

All his waking exhaustion was now thoroughly gone, and he ran after her through the strange mushroom trees and glowing shrubbery.

Oh, you will pay for that!

It was not hard to follow her distinctive color in this pale light, although she was quite fast and could twist more easily with her smaller frame than he could. The long grass tickled his tail as he ran and ducked under the branches.

"I will catch you!" he bellowed.

"In your sleep-visions!" she shouted back.

Faster he ran with his greater stride and slowly began to close the distance as she wove and twisted among the narrow trunks. Small game prey bounded out of the way as they crashed through the shrubbery. The number of trees began to lessen as they ran down the slope and toward the nearby lake. Bounding over rocks, weaving back and forth, and following her joyous laughter. But again, just like in the flight in the world above, she reached the clearing and ridge by the sandy shore well before he could tag her.

She jumped from the alien forest with a triumphant cry, winged down the ridge to the small beach, and spun on him. He stopped at the top of the ridge and glared down at her as she stared up at him.

"I won that race," she teased and roared aloud her victory.

"Only because you started first!" he shouted down at her.

"You sad little Alpha, is your liver chilled by losing to me?"

He huffed at her words, held his shoulders high, and stepped forward to advance down the ridge.

The sandy ridge.

The steep ridge.

The gods hate-

He lost his scrambling footing with a bellow and tumbled sideways down the ridge, unable to stop his fall. A white mass leapt out of the way as he fell. He rolled to a stop on his side with his tailfins on his face and sand in his ears, nose, and mouth.

That went well.

After righting himself and shaking himself of all the sand possible, he looked over at Luna. He realized that she was struggling to breathe in between her fits of laughter. It was both mortifying and heartwarming that he had brought her such amusement in his clumsiness.

She eventually recovered herself and took several very deep breaths before she managed to speak.

"An Alpha who does not know how to walk!"

"Flying down would have been better," he admitted.

She resumed her laughing at him, this time with her tail thrashing as well.

He leapt at her without thinking and swiped a forearm into the sand, sending up a spray of sand into her face as he stopped in front of her.

A moment of surprise passed as she stared at him. She started sneezing out the sand and wildly shaking her head while blinking rapidly.

"Got you!" he teased.

Something changed in her eyes in that moment after she got out the last of the sand. She narrowed her eyes slightly, stepped back from him, and growled happily.

"I won the ground race. What about the sky race?" she taunted.

She threw out her wings and jumped for the sky with a cry of challenge.

Flying huh? Again? Good luck with that!

He threw out his wings as well only a moment later and followed after her with only a few lengths between them. They set out down the shore and began to rise into the hidden sky. Their wings beat in tandem with all haste as he fell in behind her and thought vanished. Nothing else mattered except catching those white wings fleeing before him.

So near and yet so far.

Up against the rocky side of the chamber, up and over massive crystals burning with pale light, vertically up the slope, around another glowing spire, across a high and rocky ridge with a stream, down a waterfall toward a different lake, close to the water's surface and toward the shore, up over the crowns and between the trunks of alien trees and tall mushrooms, between the supporting columns of rock that themselves glowed all shades of blue, purple, and green, through dark patches of the cavern where little light shone, through a chamber filled with mist at its base and swarms of very tiny orange dragons he had never seen before, between more spikes of glowing crystal, through the faint wild winds, down a narrow passageway, and into the open air of a new and very green chamber.

All with no awareness or strain of wings to tell how long they had been flying.

It was as they flew over a large lake flanked by the cavern wall on one side and bright white rocks, grassy ridges, and a more normal looking forest on the other that he finally made an amazing realization.

She was very fast, and he could not close the distance separating them.

Wow, I do not know about this...

His gaze narrowed on the soaring moon only a few lengths ahead of him. She seemed to be flagging in her flight very slightly.

Ok, time to cheat...

The shot flew from his maw, soared past her, and erupted in a bright, harmless flash of fire.

With a surprised cry, she angled herself up and over the fireball after forgetting only a couple beats of her wings. But her flight was just slightly disturbed.

He tagged the tip of her tail with his nose.

She spun away from his strike, and they settled into a slow flight as he flew up next to her.

"You twisted kin!" she shouted over at him.

He smiled a toothy grin back at her.

She visibly rolled her eyes and let herself drift higher.

Yes! I have caught this mighty...

She fell into him and flipped him to foul his flight. Once he recovered himself from her wild attack, he saw her flight angled down toward a rolling, grassy plain, also interspersed with mushrooms, by the large lake, and he followed after her. Her flight was not one of haste though, and she seemed to fly with purpose and direction for a while as she passed over much of the plain before she dove. They alighted at the top of a small, grassy ridge, and he warily hopped back from her when she immediately pounced at him.

"You broke the rules!" she hissed.

"What rules? You never said that I could not use my fire," he protested.

"What rules? We both have wings. I do not have my fire."

He rolled his eyes and sighed heavily.

"So?"

Her eyes narrowed on him as she started walking around him in a circle as he sat down on his rear. It looked like she was stalking... something.

Uh...

"You know what else we both have?" she continued.

"What?" he warily asked.

"Teeth," she smiled.

Teeth? Wait a moment...

She lunged at him and tackled him. They collided and rolled down the grassy ridge heads over tails in a mass of flailing limbs, eventually coming to rest at each other's side between the grassy knolls.

She bit him on the shoulder.

He bellowed in alarm as she stepped back. He realized that it was not a true bite and did not even come close to drawing blood.

But it did pinch a lot.

"One," she hummed.

"What is this! That hurt!" he massaged the bite-pinch.

"I would hope it hurt. You do not know what this is?"

He rubbed at his shoulder a bit more.

"I think you should learn while doing," she taunted.

She started stalking closer to him again, crouching to pounce at any moment. He warily stepped back while sinking to the ground himself.

Toothless never actually bit me like that in all the other play-fights. Alright, fine I guess.

He glared at her and tensed as he watched her slowly advancing. They both shifted their weight to ready for a pounce as their tails slowly swayed behind them.

"I am bigger," he teased.

"And slower," she answered.

"And smarter," he countered.

"You pile of-"

Her eyes went very wide as she gasped and looked up into the air behind him. Several wonderful possibilities flashed through his thoughts in that instant. He spun around to look at what she saw.

There was nothing in the air.

"Waste..." he groaned.

She crashed into him again and sent them both rolling. This time he came to rest on his belly with her on his back and her jaws around his neck.

"Luna..." he moaned.

She gently thrashed his neck before letting go and pushing away from him.

"Two," she hissed.

He heaved heavily to catch his breath. He finally did and spun on her with a snarl.

"What are you doing!"

She hopped back from him while giving a toothy grin.

"What do you mean? We are play-fighting."

"No more! I do not want to play-fight with you!"

She blinked and stared, her jaws slightly ajar. Her hurt expression almost looked like she had been struck in the face. She gave a confused grunt, and she slowly approached him. He sat down on his haunches as she did the same immediately before him. She angled her head to the side and blinked at him.

She started batting him on the nose.

"Bad! Bad! Bad! Bad! Bad!"

He bounded back from her in renewed alarm and warily stroked his abused nose.

"Why did you do that! What is in your head!" he growled.

"In my head? What is in yours? No, what is not in yours?" she growled back.

"What?" he warily growled.

"You do not want to play. You do not trust yourself! You have ice in your belly, not fire!"

"What!"

She bared her teeth with a faint growl.

"Yes, you do not know how to play, or fight, or do anything that might spill life-water!"

"I helped fight a Monster Alpha! No, two of them!" he growled back.

"I have not seen that. You have never shown me that you can fight or play like I want to!"

"But you are a female."

She blinked and further narrowed her eyes at him.

"Yes, I am a female. Did you only see that now? Did that not matter to you before?"

And he saw something in her words. His own actions taken before falling asleep at her side returned in full after having been forgotten in the waking playfulness. And breath departed from him again as he was frozen and unable to look away.

"But why does that matter for play-fighting? Unless you fear something else that might happen!" she continued.

He thought he knew what she might be hinting at.

"I am bigger and heavier. What if something... bad happens? What if you get clawed, have your life-water spilled, or break a wing? What if you get hurt?" he weakly objected.

She blinked again and growled softly.

"You would never hurt me."

"And how do you know that!" he shouted.

"You promised! That was the first thing you ever said to me!"

He froze, completely dumbfounded that she remembered that. Her shout echoed out in the otherwise perfect silence.

"What if my wings fail me and I fall from the sky? What if I eat a very rotted fish? What if a Monster kin finds me," she continued.

"Those are different," he weakly groaned.

"No, they are not. Life is danger. Life is not safe. Safe is sitting on your tail in your own den and never flying. What is the cold in you? Why do you not trust your own liver? Are you a Night Fury or not?" she shouted.

Something snapped.

He roared aloud and leapt at her. She twisted to the side to try to escape the strike, but he fell fully on her back and pulled her over. They were a snarling, thrashing pile of limbs and tails as they rolled and struggled.

He pinned her on her back. She squirmed briefly under him and let her head fall back to the ground with a sigh after the brief struggle. And she laughed deeply right in his face, her entire length shaking beneath him with her amusement. The sound of her laughter broke the moment and turned his faint snarl into a wide and confused grin.

"That is better. You did not bite me, so I will not give you one win but better. You might have the liver of a Night Fury after all."

"Useless kin," he mumbled.

"I very much doubt that," she chuckled.

He rolled his eyes as she gave a deep croon that he could feel in his own chest. He could feel her firm and rapid heartbeat and her breath falling on his nose. He remembered everything about before and realized in that one instant that they were perfectly positioned.

No! No! No! No! This is not happening!

Do it! You want her! She wants you!

But he was frozen in place and did not move to embrace her in truth before she sighed softly and twisted to the side under him, breaking the moment as she pulled her swaying tail away from his.

He climbed off her side and stepped back while panting in… he was not sure what.

Oh... my... gods.

Excitement. Fear. Desire. Fire.

All at once.

That... was... too... close... oh... gods... oh... gods... oh... gods...

"Shadowwing," she quietly whispered as she got to her feet.

"Luna?" he gasped, not knowing what she was going to say.

He very warily looked up at her and saw that she was looking all around the grassy plain with a very fond look in her eyes. Her warm purring was also an obvious sign that she knew this place well.

"I know this range here. This field and long grass. This is where I wanted us to fly to."

She looked away from the water up to a nearby hill and ran for it. He could not look away as her thin white shape ascended the slope and paused up at the top of the hill where she sat down. He followed shortly after and stayed a respectful distance away from her. His own heart and thoughts were a confusing mess at the moment.

"That is the cave where I hatched," she solemnly hummed.

He followed her gaze and saw where she was looking. A valley with a large pond and thick grove of trees around it had a visible cave near one of the largest glowing crystals up against a rock wall of the chamber.

"These are the skies where I learned to fly and fledged. I hunted fish and swam in that deep pond," she hummed.

"It... looks good... and warm," he whispered.

"I want to fly to my cave alone to find my nest-kin. I will bring them to that clearing in the trees. Will you wait for us there?"

"Yes," he gratefully replied.

She threw out her wings and took to the air without a backward glance.

He watched her as she flew off alone toward what was once her home. He could not look away from her beautiful white shape until she vanished inside the cave.

He leapt, glided down the ridge into the grassy clearing among the thick trees, and limply collapsed with a weak moan.

A few moments passed before he finally got to his feet and began to wander among the dense trees. He needed time to pace and think about life and everything that was so very confusing now.

He had been playing with Luna, just as they had done almost since entering the hidden world in the first place, and it was very fun. She was a fast flier and good play-fighter, even if she played very roughly. That part was confusing, but he had eventually caught her and pinned her after much teasing. After he stopped thinking so much and let himself act.

He felt it all at once.

Strange feelings had come over him when he smelled her wildness, felt her pinned underneath his, and felt their tails swaying together. The part of him that was in control had been terrified and screamed that he climb off her. The other, wilder part of him had wanted to feel her under him, to fully give himself to her, and make an egg with her.

He sighed and closed his eyes with a groan.

He had never seriously considered the possibility of having any children. It was too much. He would need to play with them, bring food for them, clean up after them, teach them how to fly, introduce them to the humans in the village, teach them words, show them how to write to humans, discipline them, and show them how good the world truly was.

Just as his own brother was already doing for his children, more or less.

I do not know how to do that. Such a responsibility. I would make so many mistakes.

The enormity of that task weighed on him. No father could know in advance what it would be like or how much work it could entail.

My dad made so many mistakes with me. Those leave scars that never go away. How do I know I would not do the same thing?

Sigh.

And yet, he did try. He did care for me always even if he was blind in many ways. I was. I do love little Dawn-Singer, Aurora, and Rain-Eater as though they were mine, but I also want-

The soft wind blew above as he looked up around the massive, alien chamber. Another likely reason for all his confusion seemed evident.

Is this more guilt over Astrid?

Another deep sigh followed though without the true anguish that had almost always been before.

No, she has been out of my life for a long time. And I knew that I could never be with her because of what I am. Maybe in a different life where this did not happen to me... that could have worked out for us. I do miss her, but she lived and died a hero. She helped build the world that is today. The way to celebrate and honor her is to live in, enjoy, and protect the world that she helped make possible.

There was a twisted whispering in his heart. A suggestion that he had to consider, and easily rejected.

Luna is not another Astrid to me. They lived very different lives and are different people. Luna was hurt so much but stayed warm somehow underneath everything. Astrid, somewhat like my dad, turned to duty and sacrifice for the tribe. Luna is not tied down to the stupid parts of human duties, culture, or traditions. She is wild and free even if that is confusing and maybe a bit extreme in ways. Luna teases me and jokes in friendly ways, but Astrid never told many jokes. Maybe things would have been different in another life, but I am not living another life.

There was another detail about that terrible day long ago and its aftermath that was now clear to him. It was as he watched the pyre-ship burn and as he sat on the shore while Valka comforted him that he had decided that it was safer to feel nothing at all, to not be attached and be able to suffer the possible loss.

But locking himself in the past like that would only make the loss certain. It would be to make himself a victim trapped in the past. Never able to let go and move on. Never to be free.

No, it is better to feel, to care even if it is not safe. Safe stops growth. Safe is not truly alive.

"She was right about that..."

He kept walking through the long grass and between the trunks and stared up at the far distant cavern roof through these strange trees.

I thought that it was nothing but duty to care for her when she could not care for herself. I tried to only let her be a friend. Gods, I failed at that too. Obviously I would fail at that. And she was there for me when I needed the help.

He could distinctly remember the anniversary of the loss, that time when he could not keep food down and had been completely depressed. She had spent several days at his side helping him get to his feet when he was weakest, bringing him water in a bucket, and helping to clean up his messes as best as she was able. She had never once grumbled about it from what he remembered. They had even slept at each other's side, and he had not felt at all awkward about it.

So much of what she had done now seemed different to him. There was her care given to him when he was sick, the long talk at the Wintersblott festival and how she had wanted to sleep in his cave the rest of the winter, her glances that he occasionally saw her throw his way, her asking him to fly here with her in the spring, and the rawness with how she played with him so recently. They all took on a very different, heartwarming meaning now.

And her past no truly longer seemed to have any sway over her.

She was not afraid of me when we were playing. Even when I caught her and pinned her. She never looked at me with fear. She trusted that I would not hurt her. And even I... I was not only playing with her for fun, now that I think about it. Covering her with my wings, licking her clean, racing to catch her... basically everything in this hidden world.

Despite her terrible past, she had overcome any of the fears that such treatment might have caused. She had hummed adoringly at Rain-Eater's egg and hatching and was always so gentle but playful with Dawn-Singer and Aurora. It gave him some idea how she would be with any of her own children.

With his children.

He blinked and crooned softly at the warmth that now burned in his heart at the thought.

I really did not see all that for what it was. It was... practice, even if we did not know it. She wants a family of her own. Of course she would.

As do I.

He stopped pacing and thought about the wild strangeness of the world around him. There was only one more possible objection that he could think of. He spared a glance at his wings, tail, and the claws on his paws, and thought about his fire-breath. They were all part of him and had been for so many years.

Am I truly at peace with all this? With being a Night Fury and everything... if I do this?

The only answer he could muster was the image of his brother's entire family and Luna as well. They were part of his life and his heart in a way that no one else, not even Valka, was or could be.

He looked up at the hidden sky and imagined Luna flying always at his side, her dazzling white wings flashing with their every beat. He saw her sleeping at his side with their tails entwined as his brother and Green-Wings always did. And he found that he was humming very deeply as he held his shoulders a little higher and felt a warmth that he had not felt before.

Yes. They are my family. This is my life. All of it. And she is so strong, smart, brave, wild, loyal, and... beautiful.

He sighed and found himself staring off in the direction she had flown.

I have been so blind. How did I not see it all this time?

"Luna, I love you."

He huffed at himself.

Wow, never thought I could say something like that and yet that just happened... even if no one else was here to hear it.

I was trying so hard to not feel anything, to not risk love because it might hurt. She has already changed me so much without even trying.

He rolled his eyes and gave a happy growl.

Maybe the teasing was trying, but I do not care. What else is going to change now? I guess there is only one way to find out. Live it, dangerous and not safe as life is.

I will tell her what she is to me, and she can break my heart if she wants. I really do not think she will though. I want this, and I think she does. And we will fly back to Haven to be together always.

He turned back for the clearing. All the fear, confusion, and self-doubt that he had carried with him in the past was gone from his heart.

It was chillingly and warmingly familiar. The shape of the valley, the pond that was once filled with fish, and the cave-den by a large glowing rock.

She dove, threw out her wings, roughly landed, and froze as she stared into the place she remembered so fondly.

Looking out from under her dam's wing while listening to many life-stories. Many fish and other land-prey for her to eat. Her sire playing with her and dropping her for her first flight on her own wings. Her own gnawing nest-mates chewing on her ears and tail. Her sitting outside the den and looking up in wonder at the glow of the rock-lights in the sky.

But the den was now silent and still.

"Sire! Dam!"

The call echoed from within the den.

There was no response.

"Ear-Biter?"

Nothing answered.

With a very chilled liver, she crept closer to the silent den.

They are not here. They must have left.

Slowly, she continued on into the den's mouth, being lost in many old memories, and walked around the familiar bend in the cave.

And a cold wind spilled into her liver at the confirmation.

They were not here.

The den was empty and had been empty for a long time.

"What happened to you?"

There was no audible answer. The only answer here was the silence and stillness of the dead nest that had once been filled with the growling play of little ones and the hums of a much warm sire and dam.

She sat down and looked around at the place that had been so warm once and was even now filled with warm memories, though somewhat tainted with the rot of emptiness.

"Sire, dam, I am lost. You said that the winds of life would be warm. They were not. The winds of life had sharp teeth and bit deep."

She hung her head and closed her eyes.

"If you do not fly the winds of life now, I hope that you did not see it all from the sky-breath..."

You are weak prey...

She opened her slitted eyes and looked up.

And she saw it hiding in the back of the cave-den. She bared her teeth and flashed her claws as she crept toward it.

A living shadow.

It was very like her.

The faint scars on its side were fresh, it had no claws, its white wings were torn and useless, it had no warmth burning in its liver, and it weakly lay there on its back waiting to be used without any defiant will.

Her own twisted shadow.

The shadow-thought-hunter that hunted her in so many of her sleep-visions and took so many different shapes. It spoke merely by being there, whether in truth or in her twisted-thought-vision only.

You will never be free…

She growled at the memory of the thrall-males trying to foul her at the wishes of two-legs. But she had not let them.

I am you... This is you…

She snarled at the memory of sun-cycles of hunger and thirst. But they had not broken her.

I am all that you have...

Wrath at the painful lie!

There, in her own desolate hatching-cave and all alone, her white fire sparked to life and poured forth without restraint.

It had been dead far too long.

She weakly collapsed on the ground as she heaved to catch her breath.

The rock where the shadow had seemed to be now glowed where her fire had fallen. The heat from the glowing rock lingered long after her fire ended.

I did that?

They were the first flames she could remember ever breathing in all her life as a free kin. Her life-fire had been dead for as long as she was a thrall and for all the seasons after she had been found and freed.

Free.

That word had a very different and far more profound meaning now. It was not the lack of feeling and the embracing of only her own life that it once had been. That had never been freedom. That had been to make herself a thrall to the hurts of the dead past.

And that shadow was gone now. That past was not something to flee from anymore. Instead, she had looked into that shadow, seen herself as she had been, and had not been afraid of it. The kin, the light wing who had been prey to all that badness, was gone now and had been gone for many seasons. It was not her.

Another glance followed at the destruction she had wrought.

The most painful part, and what had stoked her fire to life again, had not been the memory of the weak thrall-males or the starvation punishment for resisting. It was the lie that the shadow, that the memory of her old self, had been speaking.

The lie that she was alone.

Someone had been there for her as long as he had known her and had only ever thought about her warmth and safety.

Someone had flown from his own range to fly into the unknown here with her.

Someone had seemed to want to give her his life-winds.

"I am not alone."

Her thoughts again turned to everything that Shadowwing had done for the strange Haven-mixed-nest, all the time he gave to her alone when she was life-grounded while asking nothing in return, and how he held Was-Grounded's and Green-Wings's little ones as he would his own young.

How many kin would have done all that he did for her? How many would instead have thought that she was too broken and life-grounded? What he had done was not the normal way of life, which would have been to leave the weak in favor of the strong.

It was the warmth, the fire, that filled her at the thought of him that left her with no twisting doubt. She did not want his life-flight to ever leave the winds of her life. He was already her closest kin, the only kin she truly held in her liver, but that was not enough and could not be enough.

This was the new-life-season. It was not something she had cared about in many season-cycles. But now that her thoughts were turned to such matters she knew it clearly. She was very ready and had known that even before she ate the strong-life-hatchling-flowers. She wanted a nest of her own, eggs and hatchlings of her own to whom she could sing her song of life with all its chills and warmths.

He had never said anything openly in words, but his actions spoke clearly enough what he wanted. For why else would he have flown this flight with her even if he did not know it at the time?

And if he is still uncertain what he wants, I will make him see! And we have this entire hidden range to make our own always.

She strode to the cave-den's mouth, paused at the meeting of the past and the future, and turned back to face the empty den for what she knew would be the last time.

"Sire, dam, I will make you warm in whatever winds you now fly," she whispered.

She took to the sky and eagerly flew to the grove where she had told him to wait for her. It was the same place where her own sire and dam had become one and made her egg long ago.

He paused at the edge of the trees and saw a glistening white shape curled up in the long grass. Her wings now seemed to even shine and sparkle in the pale light and her long tail was curled around her. He remembered her cleverness, kindness, wildness, and strength in defiance of her terrible past.

"So beautiful..." he whispered to himself.

Slowly, he strode out from the trees and approached as she lifted her head and noticed him. She got to her feet and turned to face him while purring softly.

"Luna, you are back," he hummed.

"Yes, though I am changed now."

"Where are they, your nest? Did you find them there?"

She slightly inclined her head without a moan or whimper of fear or loss.

"They are gone. My sire and dam. There is nothing in that cave-den. No bones or anything at all."

He averted his eyes.

"I feel chilled by that. I wanted to meet them and tell them to be part of the Haven-nest."

"I think they all flew the nest. I do not know to where," she calmly continued.

"Hopefully they live somewhere. What do you feel after seeing all that? Are you much liver-chilled?"

She weighed her words carefully.

"I do not live in the past or in that nest. I am not life-grounded now."

She looked down at the grass before her and brought forth her fire. The white flames filled the clearing with light as the fire spilled on the ground. She stopped flaming and looked up at him, the heat from her flame having warmed them both.

He was cleared awed as he looked down at the smoldering glow where her fire had fallen. But there was also something else in his eyes that seemed different to her. Where before they had always been wide, almost in amazement at everything around him, now they were slightly narrowed. More certain of something.

"You have your fire again. It is hot fire."

"I am free, wild, strong, sky-hatched, and fire-burning," she hummed.

She started walking across from him in a close circle. He fell in step with her without thinking. Neither could look away as they slowly danced in the long grass.

"I can fly the winds of life on my own, but I do not want to. I started out my life-flight in the above all alone. I do not want to be alone," she began.

They passed around each other several more times without anything further being spoken before she broke the silence.

"You have flown far from all that you knew. You flew from Kin-liver, your Haven-nest-range, and your egg-mate who is closest to your liver, all to fly this long flight with me and see this hidden world. Why?"

His eyes narrowed on hers.

"I wanted you to show me a new world," he answered.

She growled softly while still staring at him.

"A new world? There it is," she nodded at the cavern.

"No, not this place. Another world that I cannot fly to alone. I do not want to fly alone on the winds of life either," he hummed back.

She blinked and asked the only question that mattered.

"What am I to you, Shadowwing?"

He took a breath at her direct question.

"Luna, you are the wind in my sky."

She stopped circling, sat down, curled her tail around her front, and stared at him. Several nervous moments passed in which neither looked away. Her enthralling croon only grew more beautiful the longer he listened to it.

"Do... you remember our talk at the cold-season-ceremony?" he asked.

"Yes," she hummed.

"Luna, I love you."

There was a brief pause.

"Which love?" she asked.

He slowly approached her until they could feel the other's breath. She never looked away, blinked, or shied away.

"All of them. What am I to you, Luna?"

She closed her eyes, stepped back from him, and glanced up to the top of the cavern.

"You are the one I will take in the sky, but this here is not far to fall together."

He had one instant to hear her words and understand her meaning when she looked back at him and growled softly. He saw her coil for her strike and he darted under her strike at the last instant without any thought. His jaws closed around her neck, and he lunged at her and rolled her over onto her back into a perfect pin. He released her neck and lost himself in her deep croon and her light blue eyes. She licked his cheek and wound her tail around his.

In the hidden world, among the long grasses of that grove, in the pale light, and for the first time in their lives, they became one.

They lay together long after the fire had burned out from them both, merely holding each other and basking in their shared warmth and croons. She snuggled closer against his neck while giving a deep purr that he could feel in his own chest as he held her.

"Luna?" he hummed while softly squeezing her tail.

"I... I did not think I could be this warm," she whispered.

"You do not know what you have done for me. My life-mate and my sky-light," he nuzzled her nose and licked her cheek.

"What did I do for you?" she softly hummed back.

"Being you, that is what you did. You put wind and warmth in my sky and... stopped me from grounding my life with bad thoughts," he explained.

"We both did. You helped my dying life-fire burn hot again."

He listened long to her loving croon and echoed it himself.

"You know that I would do it all again for you. Everything from the first sun I saw you," he whispered.

"You will not need to, my life-mate," she softly hummed.

Deep and restful sleep came quickly for them both as they lay together and gently held each other in the pale light of the hidden world.