Seasons passed and Valeria grew older while her mother grew frailer. She’d tried everything to help the woman whose eyes were strong, but whose body was failing her.

Valeria braved the fog once with her mother hobbling in her shadow, for the first time attempting to break her unspoken promise that she’d never bring another soul to the sacred grove, but it was just as she’d known it would be. The wall of mist refused to part and only when her mother had staggered out of sight did Tree Mother allow her inside, alone.

She still brought bark and saffron stems to banish her mother’s pain, but that’s all she could do. The dark scabs stretched awkwardly over her mother’s shoulder, a brand of the cost it was to live away from the city and among the treacherous shards of the Obsidian Sea.

“Did mother always have her wound?” she asked Father as they crushed a path through the obsidian. She’d grown strong over the seasons of golden nectar seeping into her veins, enough so that she could wield a hammer and stand alongside her father in the man’s task of clearing the land of malice.

He swung his hammer hard, bringing the scarred metal down onto a stubborn shard that refused to splinter under his blow. He stared at it, not saying a word as Valeria nudged him aside, sending a golden glow into her own hammer as she brought it down hard and shattered the obsidian, its malice screeching a silent scream before it puffed into a dark cloud and drifted away on the breeze. Valeria covered her nose with a damp cloth, not taking in a deep breath until the malice had cleared.

“No,” he finally said. His gaze met hers. She’d asked about Mother and her mysterious wound more than once, and while he’d never lied to her, he’d always dismissed her questions with the words, “Ask your mother.” This time his gaze was stoic, both of them knowing that her sixteenth birthday was on the horizon the next time the sun rose and she’d be a child no longer.

Now the golden whisper of that promise kissed the clouds as a distant sun descended.

“Tell me how she gained it,” she demanded.

Father drew in a deep breath and ground his hammer against a smaller Dark shard before answering. “I believe you understand that you were not born our daughter, in terms of flesh and blood.”

She creased her lips into a thin line. She’d always known that truth, but it had never been uttered aloud. To hear its stark reality sent an unexpected zing of pain through her chest. “Yes,” she replied, and waited for Father to continue.

He continued to grind away at the malice, only managing to bury it deeper into the dried, dusty soil. “You are Windborn. We’re supposed to leave Windborn children in the Obsidian Sea to die, as is the law.”

Her eyes went wide. “Windborn?” she asked.

He nodded. “We haven’t seen another since your arrival.” A weak smile. “Perhaps the gods no longer wish to test us. They’ve seen the joy you’ve brought us, and they have kept the rest of the children for themselves.”

Valeria blinked. She knew that she was of something inexplicably other, but of the gods? Of the heavens?

She shook her head, returning her focus to the question of the here and now. “And Mother’s wound? How did the manner of my birth cause Mother harm?”

Her father’s expression grew grim. He gazed across the jagged landscape. “That night you came, the skies bled and you descended towards the outlands. You were but a golden orb in the sky. Your mother had faith, and strength.” A grimace of pain. His features clouded with guilt as he avoided her gaze. “I should have been the one to catch you.”

Valeria swallowed and followed his gaze. The shards grew so thick in the outer fields that she couldn’t imagine anyone running across them, not even herself with her leather protectors and nimble grace. “She crossed this to save me?”

He nodded. “Yes, and she took the brunt of your descent. You would have crashed against the Obsidian Sea and died instantly. If there was ever a sacrifice worthy of the gods, your mother has paid it.” A shadow passed over his gaze. “Twice over.”

* * *

They didn’t speak as they finished up the day’s work of clearing a path to the stream where they gathered their water and often caught the stray deer or rabbit for dinner. The creatures hadn’t appeared tonight, the stream trickling weakly as if it had been squeezed of life.

Valeria couldn’t express the emotions that roiled through her to know that she’d been the cause of her mother’s painful injury. She’d never stood upright. Valeria had caught her gripping at it when she’d thought no one was looking. She wanted to hurt whoever had caused her mother such pain for so long. But it hadn’t been a demon, or anyone from the human city of Leocivat. It had been because of her, because of what she was.

Pain spiked through her wrists as her nails bit into her skin and she ground her teeth.

“Valeria,” her father warned. He pointed at their feet. “Malice is acting strange today. Be careful.”

She frowned and looked down, surprised to see onyx shards poking through the lush greenery as if she’d summoned them with her pain and rage. She bent down and moved to touch one, but winced when she’d realized her fingernails had bit through her palms and small, red crescents swelled. A single drop of blood fell to the ground and sizzled through the dust.

Her father ignored her, his focus pinned to the horizon as his brows knotted in worry. He looked up at the roiling red sky. “Best get home,” he said.

Carrying only their jugs of water and their stomachs growling with protest, they walked together towards the oasis of emerald green that now seemed to thrive even amidst the sea of black that threatened to poke through. While they hadn’t made a find, they’d done the necessary work of clearing a path so that the critters would find their way to the water, choosing to linger instead of migrating further inland. They’d check again in the morning for a meal.

Valeria had continued to ferry Tree Mother’s bark and saffron blossoms throughout the seasons, and while it hadn’t healed her mother of the Dark sickness, it’d had an effect on the land. Grass no longer was dry and shriveled, but now a lush green that crunched beneath her protective leathers. Small sprouts of trees had enough soil to take root, and the young oaks bowed against the dry winds with stubborn, thin branches that stretched towards a sun always hidden by menacing clouds.

It was an uplifting sight to see hope coming back to their world. As they rounded the last bend of jutting obsidian shards, there should have been a cottage waiting with its cheery warmth that stuck out in a sea of death. Instead, there were flames.

“Altera!” her father screamed, tossing his hammer to the ground and running towards the house.

Valeria was faster. Fear caught in her throat and she delved into the warmth that sang through her veins. She sped across the grassy hills until her feet barely touched the ground, feeling as if she could fly and reach her mother before it was too late.

They were so careful in the outlands, this place at the edge of the worst of Mehmet’s power where the land withered and dried until crisp.

The grasses, she realized with a jolt of guilt and dread. She’d revived their plot of land, only to have it serve as kindling for a single spark to bring forth a flame.

She couldn’t know how the fires had begun, but now the air singed with heat as she neared the cottage that roared, red-hot tufts licking at its sides.

“Mother!” Valeria screamed, stuck at the doorway as she faced a wall of heat that clawed around the opening.

She was just about to delve into that power Tree Mother had given her, the golden sap that lingered in her veins… when she saw him.

Broad, brilliant wings spread over the cottage and dwarfed it in his glory. Valeria choked on the smoke and staggered away from the frame to stare up at the mythical creature that couldn’t be real.

“Angel!” her father warned as he caught up to her. He gripped her leathers and tried to pull her away, but she’d frozen in place. “Stay away, Valeria!”

The angel’s eyes were on her and captured her in a moment of pure terror. Brilliant gold like Tree Mother’s sap multiplied by a hundredfold bled over his sharp cheekbones, the ruby flames that engulfed the cottage reflecting across his pristine wings as if they were made of metal.

A crash sounded, thunder on the horizon and Valeria realized the rubies across the landscape weren’t just from flames. The sky itself bled with a red so deep, it could only mean one thing.

Demons.

“Where is my mother?” Valeria shrieked, demanding answers of the angel that lofted over the cottage as if he held it hostage. “What have you done with her?”

The angel didn’t reply. Instead, his head jerked as he cast his golden gaze upward towards the clouds that swirled with the heat and rage.

She would have demanded more of him, until she saw what he was staring at. An angel that wasn’t an angel burst through the clouds and a thick murkiness trailed him like sludge. His wings were better served for a bat, long stretches of veined skin with sharp talons that serrated the air as he jerked through the clouds and reached for the angel.

“She’s mine,” it roared.

The angel reacted, reaching for a golden spear at his back and moving so fast that he blurred.

“Come, Valeria,” her father pleaded. “We must flee.”

“Flee?” she screeched with incomprehension. She stared into the funneling shadows of smoke that escaped from the cottage. Tears stung at her eyes. “But, Mother.”

“She’s gone,” he snapped, his voice breaking with fresh pain. “She would not have you die with her.”

She swallowed the dry lump in her throat. He’d said the only truth that could have unrooted her from that spot as the angel blurred above, his spear meeting talons and sparks flying through the air. He was right. Her mother wouldn’t wish for her to sacrifice herself if there was a chance to live.

She allowed her father to drag her away from their home, leaving it to blaze under a battle of mythical creatures.

That’s when the realization came.

“This is my fault,” she sobbed as she staggered, her father gripping her wrist so hard that she couldn’t wrench free. “They’re here for me.”

They were creatures that could fly. They were of the skies.

They were her true family, and they’d come to take her back.