Landed Wings - By Skylhur Tranqille
CHAPTER 1: ASHLYNN
At a glance, the world seems to be much as it was;
Not too bad, but not as good as it could be either.
People fly everyday without incident;
Children play on swings, happy and carefree.
But underneath it all;
In the sewers of humankind;
Like a fat black rat with eyes of gleaming ebony;
Lies a slowly killing poison;
Waiting for its prey to take one false step;
To eat the rotten apple;
To stumble on its hard surface;
To listen to its lying, seductive promises.
It waits,
It waits for one.
There is always one.
Six months earlier…
ASHLYNN
The face reflected in my mirror stands at 152.4 centimeters with a wingspan of 121.9 centimeters. Everyone knows I was born to sing. I’ve started my career the way most people do I guess, with a youthful dream of greatness. In the beginning, no one would pay me, I would sing, unmasked, at bars and clubs, birthdays, sky festivals, community events, and nature ceremonies – for nothing more than the whispered promise of a future booking. Everywhere I could sing, I did. I always knew I was special, born…no, destined to sing. Didn’t people everywhere tell me so – even if they had to tell me secretly? Everywhere I go, they whisper, "You have a gift" or "You have a special purpose" or "I wish I was as brave as you".
People say that my wings are as spectacular as my voice. They are covered with dark, rich black feathers that look almost blue in the moonlight, outlined with a fire red at sunset. My voice and my wings are my only salvation. When I need to be alone, I can go to my hideout just on the edge of the quarter and fly as high as my wings will take me, singing all the way. I never look back, only up… spiraling up up up into the beautiful cacophony that I release from my mouth, dream of with my mind, and follow with my soul. I am young, that is a fact, young and naive in the way that I think all young are. Immortality… okay maybe not immortality but definitely longevity, is guaranteed. Now that I am seventeen, I’m close to breaking the bonds of my childhood and taking the path I choose. For years I’ve dreamed of my future, and now it’s finally clear. In my mind, life is handed to me on a beautiful silver platter, engraved with symbols of purity, love, innocence, and devotion. And through it all, this wonderful life I imagine, I will sing. Through singing, I will break the barriers between the SkyBound and LandBound. I figure that we all want to get along but sometimes it takes one person to show everyone how. My world makes sense to me and really it’s pretty simple. Singing is a doorway to the soul. When we open our souls, when we express ourselves so clearly, with such emotion, is there not a sort of epiphany reached, a pinnacle of gorgeous release? I know if I can share this feeling with the others, my fellow SkyBound, I am sure I will succeed in uniting our people. Nothing can stop me, and even if it seems impossible, I will always find victory. At seventeen I have no time for doubts and worries. My concern is flying, singing, and being free, untethered. My mother Cocoa is not a supporter. She says I’m reckless, immature and unrealistic, that I can’t see below the surface. She’s constantly sniping.
“You only see what people put in front of you”.
She’s a hard woman with the heart of granite but you wouldn’t know it by looking at her. For some reason, she is a soft looking woman. Her wings are chocolate brown… literally. I mean that if you hold running, melted chocolate against them, you won't be able to tell the difference. Her eyes are a dark black, like my wings. Her hair is slightly lighter than her wings with artificially blond tips. When she was young, she tells me all the girls dyed the tips of their hair. It was a fad that quickly grew outdated but my mom never got the memo. Even so, she is beautiful, in a regal way. Of the three in our family, she looks the most avian, because of her eyes. If my mother was a bird, she would have been a heron - violent, primal, and dangerous. Don't get me wrong, I love my mother. But she can be poisonous. When she doesn’t like something, she let’s you know about it.