Spirit Animals: The War For The White Bloom

Silverdew

Asked her if she'd like a "creatively" named chapter too. She volunteered to chop my head off. Welp, guess I love my head?

Silverdew splashed ice-cold water on her face.

What had she done? 

The assignment could have changed her life. She could have gone off to the Hundred Isles, bought an island and spent the rest of her life is solitude, without a care for the world until unless it was going to implode.

Or she could have done the other thing that she'd always wanted to do, but hadn't been able to yet, thanks to the lack of financial assets.

Instead, she had killed a fellow assassin and spared her target. She blew it.

She had been left disgusted to find that the Oathbound had employed multiple assassins for this small a package. So, killing that man who was shouting crap anyway wasn't that bad. He needed to die.

Sparing Raisha, however, messed it up. 

She ripped off the notices at the walls of the Wellishere Palace proclaiming death for anyone who helped the lady assassin in a brown cloak and a mask, and a gorgeous reward for anyone who gave any information about her. The glue had barely dried. 

She'd have to hide for some time. 

Never mind. I've been hiding well enough already.

Now that Silverdew had checked off two of her actions to be right, she debated about if Raisha could've been right.

About the group of people like her.

What had she called them? Red cloaks? Silverdew found the name very weird. Then again, she'd always wanted to be a green cloak.

After Sil's death, she hadn't been very much into socializing. She'd thought that her differences would make people hate her. Now that she'd heard about the bunch that had ex-Conquerors who were, well, like he, a small part of hers wanted to meet people like her, who could possibly be friends. 

The rest of her clung to the past, which came rushing at her as she sat cross-legged at the top of the Wellishere Clocktower. 

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Her family was a part of a Zhongese community had joined the Conquerors, who'd come with the promise of a new Zhong, one free of the imperial family and the oppression that came with it. The imperial family had many haters, obviously – they publicly oppressed the working classes. It had gotten worse. Their tax system clearly favoured the nobility, and the poor and the middle class were ending up worse-off.

The Conquerors also came with a special concoction that "forced the bond". Her father was impressed by the fact that he could be in control.

She was looking forward to a permanent bond with her spirit animal.

The Bile, as they called it, bonded her with any animal she wanted to, they said. She said that she wanted a Falcon.

"Falcon?" the guy who delivered the Bile and stood next to her father laughed. "The only falcon that ever lived was Essix. You've got no other falcons."

Then, when she summoned her spirit animal, he staggered a few feet back. "That's... not... possible...", as she preened her Amayan Falco. The bird's eyes shone like silver, and from that came the name.

Sil.

Sil's species were always confused with the great gyrfalcon. They were similar enough to be revered by the forest dwellers of Amaya, and rare enough for others to not have a clue about it.