Smolder

Chapter 17

The air whipped on Vivi's face. On both sides of them, enormous strong wings slammed up and down with thunderously. Vivi could feel the bones and muscles moving under her feet. She caught the flapping leash out of the air, vaguely aware of the nails digging into her shoulder.

One or two flaps took them a few hundred feet into the sky. It was almost as high as Laa had taken them.

There it slowed down just enough to let Vivi hear Russell screaming through the roaring wind, but it didn't stop. They kept going higher and higher, into the cotton candy clouds that were scattered across the sky.

The cloud was cold and smelled like dust and steam, only colder, more stingy. The inside looked somewhat like a deep fog. The morning sun was an orb of blurred yellow light. The occasional water droplets struck Vivi's face like needles. Vivi had to squint her eyes. Then it passed. And they were above the clouds.

For a moment, Vivi's mind simply couldn't function the image. She just thought, ooh, bright.

Then Russell stopped whimpering like a beaten dog and the scenery hit her with full details.

Words can only go so far to describe it.

The sky above was a shade of blue both striking and mellow at the same time. Vivi was stunned by the sheer vastness of it. You can never properly realize how big the sky is until the ground is gone from under you. Ghosts of last night's stars could be seen scattered around the semi transparent skyblue, as if abandoned by the moon when it sat at the horizon. They flickered invisibly, drowning under the light of the sun which was slowly turning from golden to silver.

The clouds rose unevenly from beneath them like white hills. The sunlight reflected off of them, giving them a blinding radiance. Pillars of vapor shot out of them and went inside again in countless loops. Every so often the clouds curled up in vortexes. They slowly shifted and morphed from one shape to another. From fish to dog, to bird, to just disintegrating like smoke. The bigger clouds cast large magnificent shadows over the sky.

Underneath them, the ground from the sky looked as far as the sky looks from the ground. The trees were so small now that the whole forest looked like one large field. The ground rose into small hills and fell back down. Possibly a few miles to their south, smoke was rising from a grey patch. That was probably the town they left yesterday. At the southern horizon, the vague city lines of the capital could be seen. At their west, the direction they were headed, a river snaked through the green landscape, glistening in the sunlight.

The wyvern's flight had turned into a smooth glide now. A very fast glide, rest assured. The clouds swept past them with unbelievable speed. Fyl went through some, disintegrating them on spot.

And the temperature up here, was freezing. Her sleeves felt non-existent. Cold stabbed her arms like dozens of daggers, digging in to her bones. Beneath the roaring wind, VIvi vaguely acknowledged Russell sneezing," Achu!"
Ugh, how annoying! Gotta take a look at that. Might be a fever. Why can't he take care of himself?!?
But at least the sun is warming up. As the sun had gone up in the sky, the sunlight felt rich and buttery.

Tears came to Vivi's eyes from just looking in front her. She had to squint to keep looking. Her shivering grip tightened on the leash.

Fyl let out something between a screech and a roar and flapped his wings once again. His bird-like tail flattened out and lowered. With another blast of chilly wind, he shot up thirty or so feet, only to dive down and come back to the same height, only twice the speed now. Taking up more than fifty feet from left to right with his wings extended, he swept through the sky at an unimaginable speed.

The sound of another pair of wings flapping drew her attention to their right. It was Orpheus. He was keeping up with them, but he constantly had to flap his wings.

"Slow down!" he screamed over the wind, or at least that's what Vivi assumed he said.

"How?" Vivi asked back.

"Pull back the leash!!" Orpheus said as he came closer.

Vivi wrapped the leather cord around her hand and pulled. The creature's neck bent back. It's wings turned forward, it's tail spread and both sides went up. Vivi almost toppled over forward as it's speed decreased radically. Hail the leather belt!

As the speed decreased to a manageable one and the roaring of the wind subsided, Vivi could feel the nails digging into her shoulder.

"Hey, Elli," she said, "um, nails."

"Oh, sorry," Elli said as she removed her hand.

As the glide smoothened and Fyl stopped threatening to send them hurling down from the sky, Vivi looked back to see how everyone was doing.

Elli smiled back at her. She looked composed. She was holding the belt now. A pair of skinny arms wrapped around her waist, probably Lupa's. Lupa's face was buried between Elli's shoulder blades. Elli had Medusa hair.

Arron had given his coat to Russell.

He looked cold now, but he wasn't sneezing or coughing. His shirt was white. The outlines of the metal rings of chainmail was visible underneath the shirt. Russell was still shivering, but he wasn't red, so no fever. Vivi made a mental note to lecture him about it. You gotta take every opportunity.

Orpheus glided peacefully beside them. His brown wings and Fyl's jet black ones flapped in sync. He was inhaling and exhaling deeply, as if taking in the sky.

She looked in front of her. There was something Orpheus deserved to hear.

"It's beautiful," she said.
"Mmhm," Elli agreed from behind her.
"Glad you like it," Orpheus smiled and passed right to left over their heads.

With the morning sun behind their backs, they flew towards the west horizon.