Wind Wielder

Chapter 1 - Like calls to like

Part one: The Reveal

The winds were angry this morning. They never liked change, and the whole world seemed to hold its breath at the tremor in the air.

The world sat on a precipice, teetering on its edge.

The beasts of the middle crawled out of their depths to scent the air, the kelpies and other otherworldly creatures lifting their snouts to the sky.

The wind wielder could not see them, but she could feel them. She could feel the familiar sense of the wind brushing through her hair, the way she had heard it's song before the tongues of fae or man. The winds whispered to her of the beast's restlessness, which certainly matched her own.

Every tooth and scale and wing and antennae shuddered this morning. The morning of the High Lords meeting. The morning where the highest powers of Pyrinthian would decide their fates. If they went to war, or not.

Where they would decide if Thesan would finally let the wind wielder out of her cage, or not.

Zara Aphelion's steps were deathly silent as she prowled down the corridor, dressed in a cloak the darkest navy shades of Dawn. The tall female bore loose clothing underneath. Loose enough to hide her bound chest and long tresses of wild chestnut curls beneath the cloak. No one knew what the wind wielder looked like beneath that famed navy cloak, nor their gender or identity. All they knew was the dark mask hiding the face from the nose and down, and the infamous, terrifying eyes of emerald green. Those eyes that were rumored to pierce a male's soul in their intensity. As her father bade, Zara had them lined with kohl and smudged in darkness far above her brows to cover all the exposed skin remaining on the upper half of her face that was not concealed by her hood. To cover even the soft arching shape of her brow and the tan of her skin. Not that anyone was able to stare long enough to notice such features. Not with that emerald green stare, and the fact the wind wielder was hardly seen in public, certainly not in broad daylight such as this. It was only the High Lords meeting happening here in Dawn, today, that could have warranted such wildly out of character activity for the wind wielder as she made quick work of gliding through one of the Dawn Court Palace halls.

Courtesans and servants gave the wind wielder a wide berth as she passed, her dark cloak flickering in the ominous breeze that constantly surrounded her like a protective bubble. Awed whispers and the scent of fear covered the hall.

Wind wielder.

Zara Aphelion was a legend given flesh. A fairytale of old brought to life, only to be sequestered into a closeted life of secrecy.

The wind wielder, the only known one in Pyrinthian in the last seven centuries, was the most well kept secret in the continent. Only the residents of Dawn knew she existed, most even then believing she was a bedtime story, a ghost hidden within the walls of the Palace. Only three residents of Dawn knew of her true identity, her real name.

The wind wielder was Zara Aphelion. Daughter of Zephyr Aphelion, the esteemed Peregrini High General of Dawn Courts armies. Zephyr Aphelion, lover of the High Lord of Dawn, Thesan.

She had every right through birth alone to be treated like a princess of the Court. Like a high ranking lady or noble, subject to a life of peace in humble servitude and prosperity. And yet, Zara's tumultuous life had been anything but.

She had been left of the steps of a temple on the coast of Dawn as a babe by her birth mother, a mere note explaining her heritage to the priestesses who would find her and quickly discover her abilities. A babe who had been born ten years prior to the first year of Amarantha's rule, whose legendary powers were kept secret within those temple walls, being raised as a priestess. It was only after a great storm in Zara's seventeenth year of life had that temple collapse, where she was discovered and brought to Under the Mountain as a gift for the High Lord of Night, Rhysand.