Spontanéité

Fledglings 🔹 snapshot

So this is something I wrote in February this year (2018) on a whim- a spontaneous whim- that ended up prompting me to write up more snapshots of a similar kind, in the same world, I guess. I wrote those also in February and some of March. To help identify these as belonging to a series, I guess, I'll be putting this: 🔹 at the end of the snapshot (edit: also in the chapter title). I wrote quite a number of them, some of them from different perspectives and stuff. What I liked and still like is the fact that they are all nameless, so they're kind of anyone you want them to be. Anyway, I hope you like this. Them. :)
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They look so afraid down there, huddled amongst themselves in the crevice that keeps the wind from them. They shiver from the cold and from their own anxieties, anxieties not unusual, but exasperating nonetheless. "You are Children of the Airs. Get up and begin." The woman on my left has impatience in her tone, but that's understandable, given the fact the fledglings have been hiding themselves from the Airs for more than long enough.

So the children force themselves to their feet, drag their steps from the hiding-place, and are immediately resisted in their stances by the winds. Hair thrashes, cloth flaps, and the children squint, attempting to steel themselves against the force of the Airs. It takes a significant while before they manage to haul themselves onto the ledge to stand before us, shaking like leaves or blades of grasses. They wait, but we do not speak. It is us who have been waiting all this time.

They prepare themselves, closing their eyes, breathing deeply and deliberately, retrieving and strengthening and attaching their wings. My gaze slides past them, past the Citadel of the Sky, past the lowest platforms and the ladders leading to the depths, past all of these. Below the summit, covered in thick, snow-blanketed forest, I know the Packs are hunting, Pack with pack with Pack with pack. The wilds are fleeing from their pursuers. I look past these forests, look past the mountain itself.

Too far away for me to see as anything but a mound of dirt encircled by stones is the Fortress of the Land. Somewhere inside the Walls, a Man of the Earth stands by a window, the curtain bunched in his hand as he looks upward to a land he doesn't know. A people he hasn't met. A life he hasn't begun.

I turn slightly, loosening my grip on the side of my cloak and let it ripple in the winds as the fledglings take their first True Flight, wings outstretched above their heads, their arms taut, their hands clutching at their rods as they ride the Airs, gliding, soaring above. Higher, higher, they fly, circling lazily. Delight is etched into their faces not yet lined with tiredness, because they are only fledglings. Their whoops, shouts, yells, of victory echo across the mountaintops like the cries of the Guardians.

And here the answering Guardians come, carried across the Airs, their wings outstretched, their directions guided by a mere flick of the outermost feathers. They call to us, circling the fledglings once before continuing on their way without stopping. Majestic creatures, they are, and we are privileged to share the skies with them.

"Every round of fledglings is the same. All annoying. But it's worth it, you know?" she smiles at me. "Watching them take their first True Flight..." She shakes her head, pale hair writhing around her. "I never tire of seeing it."

I reply with a noncommittal sound. Below the skies where the children glide, within the Citadel of the Sky, a Woman of the Airs walks slowly from platform to platform over the bridges, blind to those around her as she moves, barely conscious of the vessel of crushed stone in her hands. Her heart is not in her chest, it is far, far away in a city she has never stepped foot into. It is carried unknowingly by a Man of the Earth, who now steps away from the window, the curtain falling back into place as he turns away.

"Are you alright?" my companion asks softly, her voice almost lost to the winds.

I watch the Children of the Airs begin circling more deliberately for their descent.

"Yes," I say. "I'm fine."🔹