My apologies for the long wait. After this chapter, we get into some action. Enjoy!

Chapter 5: Assembling

They did not speak as they flew.

Unlike geese and many other flocking birds, ravens as a rule did not talk while flying, saving their conversations for when they roosted together.

But this silence was thicker. Diaval realized he was trying to pry into Maleficent's mind. She flew ten wingspans to his right, just level with him, neither ahead nor behind. That was a bit unusual, besides the fact that her power had increased such that now she was shapeshifting herself. Diaval was used to being habitually one step behind her.

She made a gorgeous raven, as he might have anticipated, despite her strange brown color, which was, of course, the hue of her natural feathers. Diaval thought of the brown feather he had stolen, even now helping to keep his left wing aloft. He would never be able to be truly free of her. He was glad she was flying to his right.

Why had she come for him? He could think of two dozen reasons already, but which combination was true? He had been away for less than two days, but it seemed she had sought him immediately. Clearly she missed him, but what of him did she miss? Merely his service, or had she missed his companionship? She had never given him a clear indication that she valued Diaval as a creature in his own right—at least not beyond the respect she had for any nonhuman. Diaval gave a few flaps of his wings that were a bit too strong, pushing the energy of his irritation out through his wingtips as much as he could. This cycle of doubt and frustration was why he had left.

And now he was going back. With her. It seemed to Diaval that he would be trapped in service to someone he could never have, forever doomed to limbo.

But he was not going back for Maleficent. That was Aurora's voice they had heard without hearing, undoubtedly. Diaval could not simply abandon Aurora to whatever fate had made her cry out for them like that. How she had gained the ability to speak mentally was a mystery that didn't matter right now. Diaval and Maleficent were coming.

What they were coming back to, Diaval did not know. But they would face it together.

"There's no need to keep us locked up apart, you know," Aurora tried again.

Creighton turned pointedly further away from her, tilting his chin up at the iron ceiling. Aurora was ever more glad of how much magic had been forced into her body as an infant. Not only had she been able to call out to her godmother and Diaval using the remnants of Maleficent's curse, but the enchantment her auntie had given her that everyone would love her on sight was saving her and Beatrice at the moment from being raped, and probably other kinds of torture.

Creighton—Aurora had gathered his name through listening to the kidnappers' conversations—had dragged her and Beatrice, blindfolded and gagged, out of the castle and onto a horse-drawn cart. After an uncomfortable ride Aurora guessed was about two hours, she and Beatrice had been hustled down some wooden stairs and finally into an iron box of a room. Or should she say prison cell. Aurora now had iron chains on her wrists, and Beatrice was in some other part of the building. Aurora was using all the will she could muster to extend her blessing of lovability to Beatrice to keep her safe. The queen could feel her magic layering over her guardswoman, which was a relief, but now she had no magic to spare to contact Maleficent again.

The young woman wondered if their captors even knew she was enchanting her bodyguard. The young man who had taken Beatrice's knife to the thigh was nowhere to be seen. The traitorous castle guard whose arm Cheer had mangled was missing as well. Aurora had heard the wiry one—Anvil, Creighton had called him—ordered to stand guard at the door, and the older one, Jeremy, had been ordered to watch Beatrice. Creighton himself was now sitting on a rickety wooden chair in the narrow doorway of the iron box into which he had tossed Aurora. His face was blotchy red and white with pain from the knife wound in his right arm, and his breathing was wheezy.

"That looks painful," she tried again. "I do have some skill in healing. If you would but show me to the kitchen—"

"Shut up, dumb bitch," the fat man grumbled, but there was less acrimony in his voice than when they had first abducted her. The queen wondered how many of her castle guard were corrupt. Were any of them loyal, searching for her now? Being queen surely should come with some level of loyalty and assistance.

Apparently Aurora had more work to do to unify her kingdom than she had thought.

She had to find out who this Creighton was and what his problem was. So she tried a different tack. "You said the kingdoms would never be unified." Perhaps appealing to his perspective would work better than straightforward kindness.

"Damn right," he growled, flicking his gaze at her and then back up the stairs. "Magical freaks of nature have no place with respectable people. Cheaters and liars, the lot of them."

Aurora thought of the wonder and exhilaration she had felt the first time she had ever been in the Moors. Even though it was only a few moments before Maleficent had rendered her unconscious, she remembered it as an exciting realm full of potential. The fact remained, however, that Maleficent had then technically "cheated" by blacking her out, and had lied about her curse for months after. "But should not such power be put to our advantage? With the faeries allied with us—"

"I will never ally with scum," her captor barked, and spit on the bottom stair.

"Scum?" Aurora persisted, annoyed now. "They deserve just as much respect as any of us, in their own right."

He glared at her finally, watery, bloodshot blue eyes squinting through pain. "And that is why you cannot be queen, little girl."

Aurora sat up straighter and glared back. "We are queen," she 'mstated. "Queen of the United Realms. We command you to release us and our guard. If you return us to the castle now we swear no harm will befall you."

Creighton's bloodshot eyes looked like they would bulge out of his head for a long moment. He looked away first and spat a bloody glob on the floor at her feet, then returned to glaring holes in the iron ceiling.

Aurora huffed and glanced around at her prison cell again. It was really just a simple cube of beaten iron, perhaps wide enough for her to lie down in, if she chose. The seams were crudely welded, as were the hinges for the iron door. There were no furnishings save the manacles on her wrists that were bolted to the floor. Aurora tugged on them slightly, but it was clear that her wrists would break before the bolt would. This much concentrated iron would be expensive. Just who was this Creighton, that he could afford to build such a thing in secret?

She refused to let her terror of them locking her in here surface. She wouldn't last long without water. And who knew how much air this thing would allow in? She could suffocate.

She needed to buy time until her family could come and get her.

She drew herself up again, chain links clinking, and glared imperiously at the fat man. "We must relieve our royal person." He'd have to unchain her for that.

"Hold it," he grunted.

Really? she thought incredulously. Does this man's cruelty know no bounds? "We cannot," she stated flatly, watching his face and hands. She didn't really have to pee, not yet anyway, but she became aware that her whole body was tense as a wound spring. She tried to relax before she began to tremble.

Creighton let out a growl as a sigh and made to stand. He leaned forward to lever himself off the chair, his left hand still gripping his wounded right arm. A small puddle of blood had already soaked through the silk bandage he had made from her nice sheets and collected under his chair. He didn't even straighten fully before he collapsed, white-faced, back into the seat. Sweat poured down his forehead and neck.

"Anvil," he ground out, his voice through his gritted teeth a wheezing growl.

"Yeah, boss," came the reply from the taller man from the top of the stairs.

"Fetch me a bucket."

Aurora sniffed in offense. They were going to do everything they could not to unlock her. And they'd made no provisions for her to stay here any length of time. If she really had to use a bucket in this little trap of a room—

—that's exactly what it was. And she was the bait.

I'm so sorry, Beatrice, the queen thought as she pulled her magic away from her guard and back into her body. She needed all she had left, now.

Aurora closed her eyes and did her best to shut out Creighton, this building, even this cell from her mind, gathering all the power she could muster into one final arrow of thought.

The magic felt warm and prickled through her body. She stuffed her memory of the cell, the manacles, the men, and the building into a casing of power. Eyes still closed, she tilted her head up, her mind seeking her protectors. There they were, Maleficent and Diaval, flying toward her.

Concentrating on their minds, she projected her arrow of memory as hard and fast as she could, trusting in Maleficent's own power to naturally return to its creator.

BAIT! she screamed with the image. BAIT!

The power shot out and away from her, leaving her drained. She opened her eyes to see a wooden bucket at her feet, and Creighton's pallid faced staring at her, before the darkness of magical exhaustion took her.

They had her Aurora, and they would pay. Of that, Maleficent was sure. Her power swirled and roiled in her condensed raven body, pushing against her skin until her every feather tingled with rage.

Diaval was with her again. That was as it should be. But for the first time ever he felt unreliable, unpredictable. Wild.

And what had he said, that she had enchanted him for years? Certainly she had transformed him innumerable times, but even if she had left him as a man for days she had always returned him to his natural shape eventually. Perhaps she should have asked him his preference more. A twinge of guilt reminded her that he had certainly voiced his wishes often enough. If she had heard "Not into a filthy mutt!" once, she had heard it a hundred and eighteen times.

Well, no longer. He had freed himself, as he had bound himself, and she would respect his wishes. She would transform him only how and when he asked.

The notion that he was "not fit to serve" was of course ridiculous. He was the most competent, clever, companionable creature she had ever encountered. For years he had been dependable, unwavering, a pleasure to be around, really. His absence these past few days had been—well, it had been like losing her wings again. A void had been carved into her being and only now, with him flying beside her, was she comforted.

She glanced at him now as they soared toward their Aurora, the child they had guarded and nurtured together into a beautiful young queen. Maleficent knew Diaval was still devoted to Aurora. There had been no hesitation in him when the young woman had called for them. Right now he faced front, beak into the wind, determination in every line of his body. He flapped, and she caught sight again of a brown feather among his oily black. Was he graying with stress or something? Of course not, for then the feather would be gray. When she had first caught sight of that feather in his outstretched wing, it had rung a familiar tone in her mind.

The headwind increased on them for a moment and she flapped, then felt stupid as her own wingtips came into her field of vision. It was her feather. But how had he managed to get it, let alone fly with it?

Regardless, he had. Somehow. Maleficent was certain Diaval had not had her feather before his departure. She would have noticed it during their exhilarating flight of victory, that day of the coronation. She still didn't understand why he had dared leave, now, when Aurora's rule was at its most fragile. The audacity was inexcusable. Thoughts of mealy worms and maggots floated briefly in her mind, but her fury at Aurora's captors quickly replaced such pettiness with more satisfying images of blood and gore.

She indulged in adding a few details to her fantasies of torture before returning to the puzzle of Diaval. "I can't be around you," he had said. But why? Why had the recovery of her wings hurt him so? Among the raven flock he had had the air of an old and regal king weary and wounded from noble battle. He had grown since she had met him as a young and reckless bird. His energy was grimmer now, darker, but steadier. Surely some of that was due to her influence over what was really most of his life. But now that they had cast down their foe Stefan in victory, Maleficent's heart had been lifted. She was happier than she had been since those days of innocence flying about the Moors. She was stronger, more whole, more beautiful than she had ever been.

The hopeless look he had given her as they had stared across the trees at each other popped into her mind. He had needed—something—from her in that moment, something he could not bring himself to name. He had seemed to be reaching for her, almost, even begging...for what?

To close the distance, she knew suddenly.

To touch him, even.

When was the last time she had touched him? As a raven, stroking his silky head? As a man, ever?

They were approaching the source of Aurora's call, fast. Trees and hills raced below them, and in the distance was visible a human village. If she wanted to test her theory, she had to do it now.

Without warning she swooped below him and flapped hard to come up right beside him, as close as ravens flew in a real flock, the air gusts from their wingbeats supporting each other.

He looked at her with his right eye, studying her. She looked steadily back. After a few yards he looked forward again, allowing her nearness despite what he had claimed before. So he did want to be close to her. After all, he had the whole of the sky to retreat into if he chose.

"CAW!" Maleficent cried, to see what he would do.

He flicked his eye to her again, but then, he answered, "CAW," the untranslatable raven word of I am here.

They cawed together as ravens do, raucously, offbeat and perfect, racing toward Aurora, when a blast of yellow light slammed into them both and forced into their minds a vision of their beautiful young ward in an iron box, manacled and miserable, and one word, BAIT!

The vision was raw, undisciplined, startling, and over as soon as it came on, but as Maleficent came out of the shock of it she realized she was plummeting out of the air in an uncontrolled fall. With Diaval screeching and flying around her, she flapped hard and rolled until she could fly straight again, mere inches from the treetops.

Diaval had recovered more easily from the blinding vision, much more practiced as he was in flying in this shape. He flew one wingbeat ahead of her now and kept his right eye on her, allowing her to use the downdrafts of his flaps to lift her own wings.

Finally they alighted in a tree across from a human inn, a wooden structure long and low. Aurora's calls had emanated from here.

"Do you see anyone?" Diaval asked her quietly.

Maleficent shook her head, but the movement was more jerky and birdlike than she had anticipated so she replied aloud, "No."

"There," he said urgently, pointing with his sharp beak.

Maleficent could see a man of smaller stature stalking along the treeline in a half-crouch behind the building. He had to be young to bend his knees so easily, and he was armed with shortbow, an arrow already nocked.

The young man, wearing a traveler's brown cloak that covered him from hood to ankle, was sidling unseen by any other humans toward the back entrance of the building. Clearly he was an enemy of those within. And the enemy of Maleficent's enemy was her friend.

She flew at him, Diaval close behind, right past the man's face, so close as to almost brush his nose with her wingtips, and back into the trees. The sudden motion of course turned his attention to her where she had landed on the forest floor, a yard or two back in the brush. There she transformed back into her original shape as quickly as she could, keeping the young man in sight as well as possible while her eyes grew from a raven's back to a faerie's. She made sure to include her favorite black robe in her transformation.

While she was adjusting to the abrupt massive change in scale of her surroundings, the young man's pale, staring face came into focus.

It was Philip.

Keeping completely still and silent, she beckoned him with one finger. Diaval was perched in the tree above her, silent as well.

Philip unnocked his arrow, put it in one hand and his bow in the other, and walked as quietly as he could toward them, into the trees.

When they were all sufficiently concealed in the brush, Philip gave a short bow.

"Well met, Prince Philip," Maleficent murmured.

"And you, my lady. Diaval," the prince said, straightening with a nod to Diaval. From the corner of her eye she saw the raven nod back.

Maleficent turned to Diaval in the branch over her shoulder. "I would transform you to a man, that you may more easily speak with us," she offered.

She had never offered before, simply flicking her fingers and changing him at whim, and he knew it. He looked at her for a long moment, then nodded once more.

The golden magic snaked out, and before his feet hit the forest floor he was in man shape again. The expression on his anthropomorphized face was unreadable, intense but almost blank. Then he dropped his gaze to the dead leaves on the ground before turning to Philip.

"Do you know how many are in there?" the raven asked the prince.

"At least five," Philip answered promptly. He stood at attention like a soldier giving a report. Which, Maleficent mused, in effect he was. Philip continued, "I followed the source of Aurora's call to this inn."

"So she reached you, as well," murmured the Protector of the Moors.

Philip's eyes were a bit wide but he was taking the young queen's nascent magical ability in stride, as they were. "Yes, my lady."

"They are holding her as bait in an iron cell," she continued. "Did she send you that vision?"

Philip's brow knit slightly. "No, my lady." He grimaced. "Those sons of scum."

"Aye," Diaval agreed.

Maleficent narrowed her eyes, her magic swirling like a storm within her body. The two males looked at her. "All right," she all but whispered. "Attend. This is what we are going to do."

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