𝐖𝐈𝐍𝐆𝐒 𝐎𝐅 𝐅𝐈𝐑𝐄: Bones of the Living [1]

Chapter Two

Emerging from tendrils of smoke rose a SkyWing.

  Rather than charring from the fire which licked at his talons, he seemed to embrace it, allowing the heat and the power which rose unceasingly from the floor below to infuse with his scales. Each limb of his glistened with reflections of the flame. His underbelly was lit up as if the sun was sat beneath him.

  He lacked any form of an expression. The SkyWing's face was placid, the spirit which had once vacated his body seemingly elsewhere; despite this, he remained beautiful. Startlingly so. Each hollow and rise of his skull was perfectly smooth, reach ridge on his horns proportionate. Teeth, which peeked from under his lip, were without flaw. His eyes were the colour of autumn.

  At last, the SkyWing noticed the flames which continued to dance beneath his talons. His gaze angled downwards- he drew his snout dangerously close to the flames, in inspection. His forearms kicked into motion. He was searching.

  Then from out of the flames, he drew fire.

  A section of the blaze sat clenched in his palm. No- papers. A segment of parchment, trapped in his claws, held fast, long ablaze. In fact, the whole fire was feeding off from papers, which now seemed to scatter out vast across the floor.

  The words on the paper were impossible to decipher. Constantly concealed by the play of the flames.

  Suddenly, all at once, there was a noise, something like a high-pitched whistle, or the whine of a dog- something or other began to echo across the landscape. The SkyWing flinched, just barely- and then the whistle grew higher, until the SkyWing dropped the paper and clapped his claws to his ears-

  Bonecatcher started upwards. Her breath came hard and fast through her chest. She blinked once, and then again, and then slowly, her eyes adjusted to landing back inside reality, so suddenly jerked from her dream- the dream. The one which held so much significance.

  After spending the night outdoors- a night whose occurrence persistently avoided Bonecatcher's memory (she somehow found the recollection of the dream to be more fruitful), her back ached, as if her spine had been twisted in two, as if her wings had been moved from their sockets. Yet somehow, while the pain in her body was staggering, it's thrumming found itself outshined by the dream. A shiver coursed through Bonecatcher as she wondered what it meant. She hadn't had the dream for years- she only remembered it through feeling, not through a series of repeated watches. Its reappearance was decidedly new. And with it came new details that over time she had forgotten.

  For example, Bonecatcher hardly remembered the SkyWing looking so good.

  Swallowing, Bonecatcher hauled herself to her talons. The grass about her was flattened in the shape of her body, curled in a tight, fetal position. Bonecatcher sighed. She traced the outline of the grass with one claw. It was always after a night full of argument and restless thoughts that she slept in this way, as if trying to return to an infant-like mind, in which thoughts were none and she were stuck in perpetual bliss. Of course, it never worked, yet still she continued with the practice. It was why her muscles ached and protested so.

  'Oh well,' Bonecatcher justified, 'better to wake up sore than to have experienced the rest of last night's conversation.' Anything was better, or so she told herself firmly.

  Determined to bring some comfort to her limbs, Bonecatcher stretched out her wings as far as she could. Equally determined, she held fast the picture of the dream in her mind. A beautiful SkyWing, rising from flames. There was no way she was letting this dream become submerged by the rising of consciousness that came with her awakening, no way she was letting the details turn smooth. This time, Bonecatcher resolved, she would remember every moment. Even the smell of scales turning crisp by the flames continual touch. Even the shimmer of light capsulated by SkyWing scales.