"So you're taking a team with you this time?" Katrina asked Tyler, her arms crossed as the two sat across from each other at the table in Tyler's living room.
"I've finally found what I've been searching for. Once I have the ability to command any Einherjar on the battlefield, no one will be able to stop us from executing our revenge." He noticed that she wasn't looking him in the eye as she typically did.
"Listen, if you want to try and kill them yourself one last time, I've got no problem with that. It won't change what I'm about to do. If you succeed, great – bring me their bodies and we'll savor the victory together. If not, then those Ylisseans will suffer our wrath as well." She looked back at him.
"Okay. One last attempt. Based on the intel your scouting team gathered, I think I can figure out a way to kill them. I know you're getting sick of me asking, but why won't you come with me? Would you really give up the opportunity to see her try to plead for mercy? You, of all people, should want to watch her spirit break before your eyes. What's your problem? Do you still feel something for her, Tyler? Is that why you've been holding back?" Tyler slammed his fast on the table and stood up, glaring at Katrina.
"No! If I still loved her, would I have let you try to kill her as many times as you have? Would I not be with her, trying to protect her from you and everyone else? You're right. I'm the one who should be leading these assassination attempts. Hell, the both of them would probably be dead already if I had. But then what, Katrina? So we kill them and satisfy the call of justice. We still don't have a home to go back to. This place is a dump. None of us deserve this crap. If we want to live a decent life here in the Outrealms, we need some way of protecting what little we have. It's not all about her. It's about the rest of our lives after she's gone, too." Katrina stood up and said nothing, the two staring at each other in silence for a moment before she spoke again.
"Fine. You go do what you want. I'll be back." She went back to her room to grab her things, leaving Tyler standing at the table. That woman had always hated Mina, ever since they had first met as teenagers. Her grudges against her ran deep, her desire to see her suffer stronger than anyone else's. She truly would endure going hungry, homeless, and broke if it meant she could break Mina's spirit. She didn't understand that the others, though willing to bring Mina down, were not possessed of the same conviction. All they really wanted was a home.
Katrina came out of her room wearing her sword, bow, staff, and cloak. She headed for the door without saying a word to him, but stopped as Tyler spoke again.
"Don't get yourself killed, Katrina. I'm not about to lose anybody out here." She turned her head towards him and looked him in the eyes one more time, seeing the honesty behind them. Still too nice for his own good, even when he wanted someone dead. Would've been admirable if it hadn't delayed Mina's death for so long.
"Worry more for yourself than for me." She left the rundown house, warping to the Gate that lead to Ylisse. She looked up at the sky, which was gray with thick storm clouds, and briefly stopped to feel the cold winds caress her skin. It reminded her of that fateful afternoon, when she witnessed the first attack. There hadn't been enough healing magic in the entire city to fix the wounds those people suffered. It satisfied every burning muscle in her body to hear she was responsible for it, since that now meant her hatred was justified. Tyler had the proof with him. He carried it on him to remind him of the truth, but it seemed that even with that, he still cared more about the people than about his own desires.
"Of course you're right, you hopeless romantic. But you did once love her, no matter what you say." She tied her cloak tightly and stepped through the Gate.
The party had found the Gate behind a layer of rocks, tall trees, and a bear that unfortunately had to be killed. Noire was still teary-eyed from seeing the animal go down at her parents' hands. They went through the gate and came out at the base of a hill covered with greenery, and all were awed at what they saw.
"I'm not dreaming, right? Father, we are seeing the same thing, right?" Morgan looked at Hale, who was grinning from the sight. In the distance, up at the top of the hill, was a city with tall, tall buildings and wide-open spaces. What was remarkable was not the city itself, but the inhabitants: individuals with wings of all different shapes and colors were flying about, as if they were giant fairies in a world of their own.
"Oh, would you look at these! More Groundhogs!" An older man's voice said from above them. They looked up to see a plump, middle-aged father with large, brown wings like that of an eagle's floating above them. Two little brown-haired girls with ivory-white, rapidly-oscillating hummingbird wings flitted down to see them, giggling at the strange wingless people that had come through the Gate.
"Now don't make fun of them, you two. Come on, your mother wants us to get her that medicine so she can get better. Let's go." Hale burst into a fit of laughter as the flying people left, marveled by what had just taken place. This was the last thing he had expected to see coming across the Gate – a place where his childhood dream was a reality.
"The existence of a world where humans can fly is truly remarkable. However, Hale… I believe your reaction to this is, to put it bluntly, hilarious." Miriel couldn't help but smile at her husband, although Laurent was looking away, embarrassed at seeing his father act like a little kid. Yes, of course it was impressive to find a realm where humans were part bird. Was it truly necessary to act so childishly in their presence, though?
"Ha! Flying people. What's next, people that can burrow like moles? Wonder if they bleed the same as we do. We should check that." Henry said, raising a finger. Tharja grabbed one of his Reeking Boxes, holding it while looking around at the lush, fruitful landscape.
"Do you suppose the Risen around here would also have wings? I know we're here to find Morgan, but we'd be doing these people a favor by getting rid of any Risen that might be here." She looked to Hale, who had calmed down a little, but was still smiling. Seeing him smile at her like that suddenly made her realize something: if she had wings, perhaps he would like her more. No, if he had wings that she gave him… he'd always smile at her like that. Henry and Noire could get them too – and that new book of curses she just bought could help her achieve that.
"Let's get into town first, okay? I have got to see that city! Come on!"
An hour later and Hale was still aglow with joy at the city of Volstead, one of Kalsoba's Grounded Cities. He turned to his unofficial tour guide, a blonde-haired, green-eyed young man with six ruby-colored, fairy-like wings called Telan. The winged human put his hands together and rested his chin on top of them, smiling coyly at the tactician. He had only come to Volstead to see what the shops had on sale, but noticed the group of wingless people asking around about a person named Morgan and inquired about her. He didn't know where she was, but next thing he knew, he was walking beside Hale's group giving them a tour of the city he wasn't even from.
"You know, I've never seen a Groundhog so infatuated with us before. We don't see too many of your kind around here, you know. A tad jealous, perhaps?" Telan spoke before Hale had a chance to say something, flitting his wings.
"I don't remember much about my childhood, but the moment I saw you all… it came back to me. I had wanted to fly like the birds because the Plegians were hunting me and my mother. I'd wanted to get away and live a normal life. I never quite got that, but what I did receive was a gift that I couldn't live without: my family and friends. It's partially the fact that one of my lost memories is back with me and partially what you said. It would be nice to fly without a pegasus."
"Well, we still ride those around here, you know. By the way, we aren't born knowing how to fly. As your time-traveling son has reminded me, we are like birds in that we must learn how to do it. It is a rite of passage for us; first we learn to crawl, then to walk, then to run, and finally, to fly." Morgan looked behind her and saw both Miriel and Laurent scribbling notes about Kalsoba as Telan described it. She thought that perhaps they too would have wanted to stay here longer, but only to study this world that was so different from their own. She looked back at her father, happy that he had finally discovered a part of his life before waking up in that Ylissean field.
"As such, you'll see a lot of our children living near the Grounded Cities. But now let me ask you something, Hale: what's the deal with this Morgan person you came all the way out here to see?"
"We believe her group has the knowledge we need to protect our own world. We were told her group of nomads, the Xenosouls, have made their camp here." More Groundhogs, Telan reasoned. They were always easy to point out if one was flying by the Grounded Cities, since the wingless folk couldn't easily travel around the Sky World without a pegasus or some other method of flight. If he had seen them out of the city's northern entrance, he would've remembered.
"And they're somewhere near Volstead? Kalsoba is a large place, you know. How do you know they haven't made their way to another city?"
"That's why we're asking around. Are the Grounded Cities all connected to each other? Could we travel between them without a flight aid?" Morgan asked. A single person might be able to get around a place like this without too much trouble, but an entire group of nomads that couldn't fly would have a ton of logistical difficulties to work out before moving around a place like Kalsoba.
"Huh, that's a thought. No, actually – the Grounded Cities are separated from each other. You'd have to use the flightways in order to travel between them. In most cases, each of us was born and raised in one of them. When we get old enough to live on our own, we fly into the Heights and find a place to live up there. Later on in our lives, when we get married and settle down to have children, we pick one of the Grounded Cities to make another home for the kids. A lot of us go back to where we were raised, and so you have entire lineages linked to the regions surrounding Volstead, or Setaine, or Naoberg. Bookworms! You're eating this stuff up, aren't you?" He was referring to Miriel and Laurent, the latter of which was writing down what he had just said.
"We appreciate your summations, Telan. Perhaps you may be able to give us a more detailed explanation when we have found the person we seek." Miriel said to the winged human, who nodded and smiled at her before turning back to Hale.
"You all are making me feel important. I just came down here to see if the shops had anything on sale. Now I feel like I'm getting paid thousands of gold an hour to explain to a bunch of big-wing rich people how different the common folk are from them without offending their snooty sensibilities."
"Do you have Risen here?" Henry asked. Tharja hadn't gotten the opportunity to utilize the Reeking Box, and Henry didn't want to waste one if no Risen would show up for him to blow apart.
"Not sure what you mean. What are those?"
"Undead warriors brimming with the power of shadow. They tend to attack people, and can even be controlled by those with the proper mastery over dark magic." Tharja explained, wondering in the back of her mind what kind of wings Hale would like to have. Telan's looked flashy and gaudy and horribly unappealing in her opinion, but if Hale wanted wings like that, she would rip them off of Telan and fuse them to Hale's back if that's what she needed to do.
"Ah. Yeah, I've heard of those. They don't show up often where I live. Supposedly, they're not very smart – why else would they attack settlements all the way in the Heights when the Grounded Cities have all the children and pregnant women?" At that moment, a pregnant woman with black bat wings crossed in front of the group, being escorted by her blue-winged husband and a jumpy little boy attempting to hover with his navy-blue bat wings. She gave Telan an annoyed look and flapped her wings once to accent it, which made his wings flit in response as he shrugged.
"Hey, those things are stupid as rocks. There's never been a single death from those… Risen, right? That's what you called them?" He addressed Henry as the family passed by.
"Yep! We've got a bunch of boxes full of stuff that'll have them coming like a bunch of starving dogs once they're opened! Also, question: is your blood red?" Telan knew a dark mage back where he lived. The guy hardly smiled and didn't talk to too many people. His biggest contribution to his town was that he kept the bandits away. He scared them. This guy was disturbing in a different way – unlike the dark mage he knew that would sling curses at you while slicing you to bits with magic attack, this one looked capable of doing the exact same thing except laughing like a maniac instead of cursing. No, the actual cursing looked to be the province of the girl next to him, who seemed far more like the typical dark mage he knew and heard about.
"Yeah. Don't see why it wouldn't be, unless yours isn't. Never seen a Groundhog bleed before, so I don't actually know for sure."
"Trust us, it's red. So, your Risen aren't coming in from other realms, then. They can fly, just like you. Who could be generating them? I think the understanding in our world is that Grima, the evil Fell Dragon, made them from corpses with his magic. Why would they be showing up in a realm where he didn't exist?" Hale asked, and Tharja elected to answer.
"Based on Henry's constant chatterings about tainted blood and cursed tomes, I believe whatever Grima did to make Risen was not unique to him. The right kind of magic can take hold of corpses buried in the ground and make them into Risen. We think it's something that comes about from improperly used dark magic." Laurent decided to write that down as well, even though it had nothing to do with Kalsoba specifically.
"Tainted blood! Mmm… delicious." Henry licked his lips at the thought, and suddenly realized where the original impetus for that idea came from, looking at the tactician's daughter. Hale may have been cleansed of Grima's influence, but Morgan's blood was still halfway darkened. He had remembered the tacticians' blood being possessed of a certain stench to it and had his hunch confirmed after learning of Hale's heritage as Grima's vessel.
"Yeah, I don't think so. Well, was there anything else you wanted me to tell you about? This is the western edge of the city." Telan stood at the front of the group, taking flight to point out that they were at the top of a hill.
"Nothing really remarkable down this way, other than some small villages where families and farmers live. I think it's necessary to add that we still rely on the Grounded Cities for food, since we obviously can't grow stuff in the sky. If you were to visit the Heights, you could see that we've got a lot more flying edible animals than your world probably has. Hunting in the sky's a different deal than hunting on land, that's for sure. That reminds me – I need to send a letter to one of my friends to see if we can go hunting some time. Anyways. Hale. Where do you want to go?" He flew towards the back of the group, looking behind him at the rest of Volstead. In his opinion, there wasn't much else to talk about – if Hale really wanted to get a taste of the Kalsoban element, he ought to go to a city in the Heights.
"Is there an inn close by?"
"Yeah, right around the corner. Come on, I'll show you." They followed him back into the city, Hale hoping that they could find Morgan before she decided to take her group someplace else. He'd definitely have to remember how to get here, though – Kalsoba was starting to become his perfect vacation spot.
A/N: Whew. It may not look like it, but I've written nearly 10,000 words this week. I'm currently working on an original novel as part of Camp NaNoWriMo (that's short for National Novel Writing Month), a summer writing campaign from where I write 50,000 words on a single story over the month of July. It's a challenge to keep up with that and put out updates for you all, so I apologize for the (hours-)late update. I just came back from my cousin's wedding which I had to travel four hours to and from for, as well.
Still going to hold myself to the weekly standard, even with the 12,500 words per week requirement that summer NaNo is putting on me. As always, if you have a comment on how this story is going, feel free to let me know in a review.