"Ouch!" I yelled. Jessica's hand was tightly gripping the bone of my wing as she attempted to bring them down.

"I'm sorry, but I've never exactly had to treat wings before! I wish you would've relied on Lucifer more, he would've known what to do."

Lucifer had, every so kindly, provided the others with a cart and horses as they left. We ditched the horses for a stronger and slightly more intelligent creature, Zero.

Jessica, our medical expert, had taken up tending to my wings. Yeah, it was working out great.

"You know," she said, "your wings are surprisingly soft."

She rubbed her hands through the feathers of one of my wings. It felt almost like a massage for me. The last time someone did this was, I don't know, fifteen years ago.

"Really?" James asked as he joined in. "They do!"

"Okay, can we stop with the touching!" I yelled, pulling my wings back. "I'd put them away, but I need them to heal first."

"They don't heal when they're in their...tattoo...things?" Luke asked.

"Nope, it's like freezing time for them."

"How'd you get them to do that?"

"Actually, it was a witch."

The others seemed to choke on...air?

"You met a witch?" James asked. "I thought there weren't any more."

"Well, there are a few, but not enough to make a species. When the magic died out so did the witches."

"How'd you get one to to do those for you?" Peter asked.

Damnit! Why'd there have to be a smart person in the group?

"I paid her," I answered cautiously, avoiding eye contact.

"With what?"

"A portal stone," I confessed, looking at him sheepishly.

He let out a long, exaggerated sigh that I probably deserved.

"What does that mean?" Luke asked.

I let Peter answer this one.

"A portal stone is what goes with a portal to transport any amount of beings to Heaven, Hell, or Earth. So, she can't leave Earth."

"I was nine, okay! I didn't think that, maybe, there wouldn't be many left after the Species war. When I found out that the one I gave away may have been one of the last few, I begged the witch to undo the tattoos, but she didn't. She chased me out with fire."

"Can you think of any others that might be on earth?"

"Yeah, first I thought that other Demons or Angels might have them, but the humans who hunted then down took the stones in exchange for their lives. Then, I remembered my sister, who fled to Earth too, and that she made it. So, she had to have one. Unfortunately, I don't know where she is. I've traveled the entire continent, but I haven't found her."

"So, what now?" Luke asked.

"Let's cross the ocean," Jessica suggested.

"What?" The rest of us chorused.

"Well, you said you couldn't find her any evidence of her on this continent, so what about another?"

"Why didn't I think of that?" I asked.

"Akira," Peter started, pulling me into his arms, "don't get me wrong, I love you, but you a tendency of not thinking things through."

"Your more of an act first ask later kind of...girl," Luke said.

"You don't exactly-" James started.

"I get it!" I yelled. "I shouldn't have asked."

They all laughed as I scowled at them, even Zero.

"So," I said, "what continent are we heading too?"

"Well, there are three continents on our little lovely planet. The first one, the one we're on, the plentiful continent of Flora. Next, we have the freezing cold almost completely unpopulated continent of Arctic, that maintains a constant temperature of below freezing. And, finally, we have the desert country of Savannah, an overpopulated continent with a constant temperature of unbearably hot."

"Savannah," I said, "defiantly Savannah."

"What make you say that?" James asked.

"Mizu hates the cold."

"Alright then," Jessica said. "We'll rest a few days and then catch the earliest ship to Savannah."

"How far away's the nearest port?" I asked.

"Actually," Luke said, "I've been telling Zero to head towards the ocean for a while. You know, for a well deserved break. We're probably less than a day's trip away from a port."

"It'll probably take about three days for my wings to heal, so we have time to prepare."

"For the next few days, you're going to do nothing but rest," Peter told me.

"Besides when we sneak you into an inn," Jessica said, "because I refuse to sleep outside for three whole days, especially near a port town. They all smell like fish."

That night, we found a near empty inn on the outside of town. In case you're wondering, when we got slower to town, they laid me down and threw a blanket over me. Anyway, they paid for one room for two nights and helped me climb up the back window.

When I climbed inside, the others came up from the normal way, you know, the door and all that boring stuff. The inn keepers didn't let Zero in and I almost slept outside with him, but Peter said he'd drag my ass inside and tie me to the bed. I wondered how he'd do that without me being seen, or heard, but I really didn't want to find out.

"Why're there only four beds?" I asked.

"Because you're sharing a bed with me," Peter said.

I looked at him, wide-eyed.

"First of all," he started, "I don't want you running away in the middle of the night, and we all know you have a history of that. Second, they didn't have a room with five beds."

"No lovey dovey stuff though," Jessica said. "We all have to share this room."

"No promises," Peter teased. Okay, I knew he was teasing, but still, my face heated up.

Peter laid on the bed first and looked at me.

"You know I was joking, right?"

"I know, but still."

I laid down, letting my wings fall off the side of the bed so they didn't push Peter off in the middle of the night. He let me use his arm as a pillow as he wrapped his other hand around my waist and pulled me closer. At some point, his hand went to my head and stroked my hair, lulling me to sleep.