~Serana⚜️

My breath hitches as a spear clips the left side of my helmet. Stumbling back, my right wing collides with Treale and makes me flinch.

I'm barely able to recenter myself before the woman attacking me thrusts her spear toward my neck again. Out of sheer instinct I swing my spear at her like a club with every bit of strength I could muster. The miss use of the weapon worked in my favor as the shafts collided with a resounding crack and her's went careening off the small cliff we were standing on.

Without pausing to glance at her lost spear she grabs the end of mine and jerks me toward her.

A memory from my first training session flash through my mind; the guards wing continually whacking me in the side of the head when I would lunge and knocking me senseless. Before I know it the arch of my wing is sailing toward my opponent, but instead of aiming for the helmet my wing collides painfully with the rebel's exposed throat.

I could feel a pop and peculiar snap against the arch of my wing. It occurs to me a moment later what I've done, when the woman collapses. Wide icy blue eyes meet mine as the woman claws at her throat gasping for air through her crushed windpipe.

My muscles completely seize as I watch her struggle for breath. Her talons coming out and slicing the fragile skin around the collar of her mail in her desperation to breathe.

A violent shutter runs through me as I continue to look into her eyes and see such terror. Skies no one should be able to look so terrified and hopeless at the same time. I could see it, in the curve of her brow beneath the helmet, she knew there was no fixing what I had done.

Another violent shutter ran through me, but this time I staggered and my eyes broke away from icy blue. Looking around I see that the fighting has stopped and instead everyone is swarming the skies trying desperately to find a path that seems to be anywhere but toward the center of the shelf. Confused I look around to see that rebels have thrown down their weapons and turned tail, but the guards have also abandoned their posts in an effort to follow the rebels.

"Serana!" I hear Treale's voice shriek over the cacophony of flocking wings and terrified screams.

Whirling around I find him a good few wingspans away. When did he get so far? He was just next to me. I go to call back, asking what's going on when I hear a terrible crack and the ground gives its most violent shutter yet.

I can feel the pressure around my eyes from how wide they've gone as realization sinks in. The shelf is breaking. Panic seizes my heart as my eyes meet Treale's. "Go!" He bellows stumbling as he tries to take off. Bracing as much as I can, I follow suit and leap from the edge.

Treale is in the air shortly after following behind me as I dive and swerve around countless others, all panicking to get away. The air is forcefully knocked out of my lungs as a weight crashes into my back. A scream tears at the walls of my throat while I flail my wings desperate to right myself.

Crashing into another body stops my spiraling long enough for me to regain my balance. Before I could continue to climb up and away from the shattering shelf a hand latches on to my right ankle. Staggering midair I look down to see Treale doing the same with his left hand holding a white knuckled grip on my foot. Right, chain flying. It was one of the first lessons we were taught after learning how to fly. When in fear of loosing your flying partner grab their ankle and let the stronger flyer lead. It's what we were taught to do when flying through tricky passes with too narrow gaps between the rocks.

This is just like flying back home, fast moving rocks that you need to dodge. I assure myself. Giving Treale a firm nod I take off into the chaos, letting instinct take over as I dove and swerved, allowing my flight partner to pull me back when I couldn't make a gap.

I passively notice other flight chains as rebels who grew up in the Mounts also fell back on the technique. With more people using the flight chain method it became easier to fly and we began to spiral up and out.

The guards from other regions were still panicking and struggling to find their way up and out. It struck me as I watched two then three crash into each other that they didn't know how to make a flight chain. That they had no reason to learn the common flogging method, because it probably wasn't useful outside of the Mounts region where the landscape actively moved.

Mira! The thought struck me like an eight prel team wagon. If the guards couldn't hardly fly in panicked crowd then she wouldn't be able to either.

The insane urge to flank the wrong way and head for the center of the shelf struck me, and I lagged behind the rest of the spiraling groups. Treale gave my leg a shove, telling me to pick-up speed before we fell out of the pattern.

Turning my focus back to the issue at hand I give my wings a few hard pumps to regain my ground. Mira will be fine. If I don't focus on getting out of here Treale and I are both dead.

Another sky splitting crack reverberates through the air so violently that it actually throws me. Treale's talons dig-in to my flesh as he struggles to hold on as we're tossed through the air.

Renewing my effort I pump my wings as hard as I can, circling back around to the south eastern side of the spiral just barely coming above the rim of the opposing shelf. Gritting my teeth I bank out of the formation, dragging Treale with me. Other chains break away as well fighting to get to the safety of the next shelf.

I barely manage to clear the shelf's edge getting my wing clipped by a rebel as I struggle to remain airborne. A sharp tug and the bite of talons closely followed by a pained yelp tells me Treale caught the lip a moment before his grip brings me crashing down.

My jaw strikes stone with a skull rattling click of teeth. Thick coppery liquid fills my mouth as my fangs tear the sides of my tongue. Screwing my eyes shut I struggle to clear my vision, coughing out blood faster than I can draw in air.

Two strong hands reach under my wings and grab ahold of my rib cage, hoisting me up onto my feet. My ears were still ringing from the impact making me completely reliant on the large hand wrapped around my midsection pulling me along.

As my vision clears I'm able to direct my stumbling so Treale isn't practically dragging me behind him. Pulling away from his larger frame I start push forward of my own volition, slowly regaining balance as the ringing fades to a low roar.

Green eyes barely spare me a glance, just long enough to determine I was well enough to follow without his support.

Barreling through the underbrush, not bothering to attempt flight from the thick gnarled forest floor, I notice the roar getting louder as shrieks of terror pierce the heavy sheet muffling my hearing. A sound that reminds me all too much of cracking ice and the shattering dome that swallowed Mirandiona weeks ago fills the air, riding a wave of molten heat that seared my wings and legs like a too hot fire far too close to the skin.

Treale and I are sprinting nearly on all fours as we struggle to get as far away from the inferno and it's rage as we can, desperately seeking a cliff's edge to retake flight.

A blur of reddish brown fur darts past us to the right followed by a lighter tan to the left. Lycans. My mind supplies as I watch them out strip our clumsy sprint with their long four legged strides.

Struggling for breath I half open my wings and give short flaps to help push myself forward and to keep from tripping over the massive roots and rocks jutting up from the earthy terrain. I quickly gain ground on Treale and see him start to pump his wings out the corner of my eye as I pass him.

More lycans blur past yelling and yipping as they try to coordinate their mad dash through the trees. A howling starts up behind me jarring enough to draw my attention and warn me of something coming. Seeing a few of the lycans throw themselves to the ground behind sturdy trees or over cropped rocks my heart lodges itself in the base of my throat. Without a thought I follow their example and half glide half leap behind a rock ledge landing on a mass of black fur. An additional weight strikes me in the back, pinning me between the two furry bodies as another lycan seeks shelter with us.

Just as I go to suck in a breath I feel what we're hiding from wash over us with unimaginable force, pushing the lycan on top of me further into my back pushing what little air I had drawn from my lungs. Leather straps and the hard pressure of sternum pressing into my wing blade barely registers as the screaming begins.

I can't quite tell what's lycan and what's angelo, both are terrifying. If I could draw breath I wouldn't be able to for the symphony of howls around me.

As if to defy my emotions my lungs force in a strangled breath, pushing my wings and ribs desperately against the torsos above and below me. And Skies do I wish it hadn't.

The acrid scent of burning filled my nose, carried by the waves of heat like the tumble of a waterfall just before the cliff's edge. Feathers, fur, and flesh mixing together in a horrid aroma of fire. Choking on the sent I sputter and cough, fighting to gag and breathe at the same time.

Then came the noise, different from the howling, worse somehow. The crackle of trees snapping like twigs ripples through the air, and by the Drace it sounded like there were hundreds.

The thumping and rattling of impact was something felt more than heard, rattling from one bone to the next in a sickening wave. Rippling from the lycan below me as if our bones could touch and share their terror.

For hours it seemed like I struggled desperately for breath, fighting as hard as I could to push the body stop of mine off just a little so I could breathe. Fumbling around my left arm finds it's way to the soil below and I push with all my might to lift up and breathe. I hear the lycan below me whimper as it draws in a massive breath as if it too had been struggling to breathe.

Lycan on top of me begins to push back, trying to force me down but the one below twists and plants a massive paw on my sternum trying to keep our weight off.

We both fight against the large body crushing both of us, but slowly we lose being forced back down. Then suddenly the weight is ripped away with an ear splitting yelp that leaves my ears ringing.

The sudden lack of resistance causes the lycan below me to throw me off and out of cover, but it seems as though the storm is over. Jerking my head around I spot the lycan that must have been crushing me and the other pinned to a toppled tree by a massive shard of blackened stone.

The lycan was caught in the gut still sputtering and struggling, raking his claws desperately over the stone shard as blood pours from his gaping jaws in thick strings like saliva, sticky and abundant.

Another cry of pain draws my attention behind me, away from the slowly dying lycan pinned to the gruesome remains of a once proud tree. And towards a familiar figure in a similar state.

Stumbling to my feet, I struggle to propel myself in the direction of familiar gray and green speckled wings. His right one pinned to the ground by a splinter of wood twice the size of my leg and as thick as my thigh.

Getting closer I can see the full extent of the damage, despite Treale's taloned hands desperately trying to pry the detritus from his limb. The wooden shard mostly struck feather, a little painful but easily recovered from. But about half a hand width struck flesh, harder to recover from but manageable if only it hadn't stuck the arch of his wing.

The first thing that truly registers is that Treale's struggle against the debris is only making his wound worse.

Staggering the last few steps I throw my bodyweight, wing first, into the splintered wood dislodging it considerably but not fully pulling it from Treale's broken limb.

The man at my feet shrieks in agony as I push off the tree fragment and slam my body against it again. It took four more times before I finally heard a snap and felt something wet slide beneath my armored feet. Regaining my balance, I look down to see the wood has snapped away just above where its embedded in the soil, freeing Treale's wing and further destroying it in one fell swoop.

He's never going to fly again. Is the first thought that runs through my mind quickly followed by the realization that he's no longer screaming.

As if this realization startles me awake I finally notice the sheer about of blood pooling around us from is wing barely hanging on by a few tendons. Dropping to my knees I reach over his limp body and rip the red sash from around his waist. Shuffling back I reach out as gently as I can and pry his wing out of the remains of wood still impaling the shreds of flesh.

It feels both unnaturally slick and squishy as his flesh bends and pulls in ways it shouldn't while also being disturbingly stiff from the quills of his feathers and shards of shattered bone.

Finally getting his wing free, save for over half his primary feathers, I lift the 'good' half and slip my knee beneath it. Using the red sash I slip it under his wing and start to they it reaching behind my left wing I grab one of my arrows and use it to make a tourniquet.

Seeing the dangling half of his wing, twirl back and forth I grimes and fight every urge within my being not to throw up. He's going to lose the hand of his wing. The realization was uncomfortable but apparent.

Laying his wing back on the ground I sit back and raise my gaze for the first time since spotting my ailing friend. There was no one left to call to for help, no one but the bodies of dead lycans and angelo littering the forest floor, and branches of both fallen and miraculously standing trees.

I can't carry him. He was too heavy, at least twice my size and over a head taller than me. Pushing myself to my knees, I shuffle over to his head and sit down stretching my legs out behind his back. Scooting down until our backs are parallel. Slipping my left wing below his maimed right, still pinned beneath his frame, I make sure the pit of his wing is hooked with the elbow of mine before reaching back and doing the same with my other.

Heaving with what little strength I have left, I claw and scrabble at the ground to pull up over and onto my back. There was no chance I could stand with him, but I was determined to raise up into a crawl and drag him with me as far as I could.

Planting my palms on the dirt I push up with all my exhausted might, barely getting high enough to slip my left leg under my torso. Only giving myself a moment to breathe I push up again with a grunt of exertion as I slide my right leg up and wedge my knee just below my breastplate.

Taking a few deep breaths I let the brow of my helmet rest against the ground for a few moments before reasserting my resolve and forcing myself up onto my knees and elbows. Looking up I track a path around a few trees that I can see before lowering my head and crawling forward with Treale's limp body half draped over and dragging behind me