The rattle of Wildspeech’s door jerks him into stupefied waking. The door jumps and jolts against the storage shelves he braced there, each blow shoving them back. He burrows deeper into the fragments of moss and feathers.

“MREEEEEKEKE MAWK MAWK! Whole forest talk! Whole forest laugh! Steal from wingless chick mine? Who did?”

He curls his arms around his head, balling up as small as he can. There’s a final blow and a loud clatter. Air whooshes past and a sharp beak pokes him.

“Who did? Who steals? Was bluejay. Which?”

“Don’t know,” he mumbles.

The next screech is directly into his ear.

"Lie-making! Other ones like you not know which flier which. Not my chick. My chick know every flier in forest! You tell me!”

Of course he knows who it was, but telling mother Falcon is as good as a death sentence for the bluejay and it isn’t as if he’ll starve. He curls up tighter.

Something heavy and wet splats on him. Flailing, he heaves a smashed blackberry off his head, the juice dripping down his body and staining his spare tunic.

Mother Falcon has jammed herself almost halfway into the burrow, further than she’s ever come before. Clearly uncomfortable, she shifts on bent legs, her head ducked low. “Have more mouse-feed outside. Is okay. Chick no starve. Now tell me!”

He lays back down, shutting his eyes. He has no idea how long he slept but he’s still exhausted. He will lie there until she leaves, then go back to sleep.

When she grabs him by the leg, he doesn’t yell or resist as she drags him out. The ceiling of his burrow gives way to the pre-dawn sky and at least one question is answered: it’s the next day.

“Up! No more nest-sit, up!” She buffets his body with a wing hard enough to roll him onto his side but not enough to send him tumbling. He lies there, curling in on himself.

Mother Falcon grumbles, then throws back her head and shrieks at the forest. “Listen-all-here! Territory mine! Chick mine! Steal from this nest, steal from me! I find you! Eat you, screaming!”

That will certainly keep his burrow safe, at least until the winter season when somebody gets desperate. Still, he won’t thank her. She beats her wings and lifts off. Relief is sweet—until she circles overhead, stoops hard and fast, and closes her claws around his body. It’s a single, graceful motion, a low arc perfectly executed to seize a target off the ground. The familiar ascent—the feel of his stomach dropping—wrings a cry from him.

He grips her legs. “Don’t!” he gasps. “Put me back, don’t!”

Now she is silent. He curls up in her grasp. The wind streams through his hair, caressing his skin. He sinks his teeth into his hand, but the pain can’t compete with the intimate delight, the yearning for more of the rushing wind swirling around him. He wishes with all his heart that mother Falcon would drop him from this height or tear him to pieces.

It isn’t long before she drops him. His body thumps across a thick tree limb and he grapples it, writhing up until he’s squatting on the branch with one hand down by his feet for balance. Mother Falcon lands nearby, cocking her head to the side to watch as he sidles over to the main trunk for support. A quick glance shows him that she chose a tall tree, one he can’t climb down on his own. A sense of familiarity prompts a second glance and recognition takes him out at the knees. He crumples against the trunk, arms wrapped around his middle like he can hold his insides together.

He's in a tree at the edge of the clearing used for the Ceremony of Gratitude. No one is here yet, but that will change. Daybreak is coming fast.

The edges of his vision crackle white. “Can’t be here. Can’t see me. Take me back.” Each fragment is punctuated by a gasp.

Mother Falcon’s response is a series of crisp throat sounds. “Chick very sick. Bring food not work. Leave chick in nest not work. Bring chick to good place. This good place. Others like you need this. You need this.”

“I’m not like them!” Wildspeech twists around, putting his back to the clearing. “I can’t be here. They’ll see. Maker will…” Maker will see me. Maker won’t want me here. “…Take me back. Please.”

She rustles her wings, taking a moment to preen the left one. One black well of an eye rests on him. “Take back after. Chick stay.”

He squeezes up against the trunk. “Can’t see me,” he mumbles. “Can’t see me. Can’t see me.”

“On my back. Under feathers. No see,” she snaps.

He unfolds, scrambling along the branch toward her. She twitches, ruffling her feathers a moment before he hauls himself onto her back. A sense of safety encloses him as he burrows under the feathers. He won’t be seen by the skytes. If the Maker sees him there… he will try to stay out of sight.

The feathers settle down, hugging him to mother Falcon’s skin. She must look ridiculous with a lump like him on her back.

Who am I fooling? Anyone who looks up and recognizes her will know I’m here.

But they can’t see me. We can all pretend.

A note splits the dawn air. It is high and sweet, clear as a drop of morning dew and achingly familiar.

Aria guides the song today.

The voice he dreamed of hearing for months pours forth, opening the ceremony. There are no words, only the gentle rise and fall of the future Songspeaker’s call.

Tink. Tink. Tink. Ta-tink. Tink. Ta-tink.

He doesn’t lift his head to look. He sees it in his memory: the Stonemasons are taking their places. Every Stonemason sets down a block of stone and begins carving off bits, each blow struck in perfect time to join with the voice. Each crafts a figure, an implement, or a tool. It is an item made for the sheer pleasure of shaping stone and it will be placed with care somewhere in the forest after the ceremony.

The Tenders will join in with their gift now, though their contribution can’t be heard. The trees around the clearing will be strengthened, each encouraged to root a little deeper and stretch a little higher. The winglings with this gift will call flowers from the ground, painting the grass with living splashes of color.

Mouth-watering smells of honey-plumped nutcakes and seasoned tubers waft up to him, hailing the arrival of the Feastmakers. Food is circulated from hand to hand, knitting them together every bit as much as Aria’s song.

A howl wraps Aria’s song in authority, a wild cry from Ferra Wildspeech who fell in love with the forest’s largest predators. Her ferocious howl is accompanied by Nutte Wildspeech’s cheerful chipmunk call, chitter-chitter-krai! Chitter-chitter-krai!

The joyful shriek of a bird in flight wells up from the deeps of Wildspeech, the sound of a creature abandoned to the freedom of soaring over the good, green world in an endless blue and white sky.

He pulls his hand to his face and sinks his teeth through the wrappings and into the knuckles. No sound escapes.

The Weavers will be working above the collected members of the Keep. They will dance through the air, their wings on display as they swoop past each other in all directions. They weave loose trails of sunlight as they go, and this weaving along their flight path presents a unique, gleaming sculpture that will last until evening.

Aria’s voice draws it all together, the gift of every member of the Keep collected in those notes and offered to the Maker in gratitude.

Every note, every sound tears at Wildspeech’s soul, rousing feelings he does not want to touch.

What thanks have I to give the Maker? The Maker abandoned me.

And yet, it is all he can do to keep from crying out his gratitude with the rest of them. He trembles under the feathers. The reality of the scars on his back is at war with the touch of soft down on his face and the memory that, yes, he too once flew. There is the state of his hands, yet there too is the smothering love of the proud bird he clings to. The endless solitude he faces is confronted in his mind by a strange, smiling orange face, one that neither cringed in horror nor turned away in pity.

As the communal gratitude goes on, the yearning to watch and participate grows too strong. He repositions himself, wriggling up and peering carefully through mother Falcon’s feathers, past her neck.

There they are. All the faces he ever knew growing up, as well as a few newfound winglings. The Stonemasons’ sculptures take shape. Food is consumed. The lightsculpture shimmers above the assembled skytes, formed by the Keep’s four Weavers in their intricate flight.

Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

He squints. He has not seen a lightsculpture in months, but even so this one seems different. It has warmer colors than pure sunlight, as if they have drawn from another source. His eyes follow the flight of a Weaver who plunges back down to the clearing.

There. The others gathered on the ground have left a wide-open space toward the back. A ribbon like fire undulates along the grass, then rises to curl back on itself and spreads wide like a bolt of shimmering orange fabric flung into the wind. It moves with the music, rippling and twisting, then lunging in a spiral that smooths back out when it touches the ground. The grass all around it has shriveled, but nobody seems to mind.

His mouth hangs open. He’d half-forgotten the malformed shapeshifting creature that accosted him the day before. Now, he sees how the Weaver that swoops low gathers light off this… Remara. Energy from her body is woven into today’s lightsculpture as far below, she twists and bends her very form into a dance.

Mesmerized, he follows every twist and curl, noting how the Weavers draws energy from her. He is so captured by Remara’s celebration that he is surprised when Aria stops singing and begins the closing words.

“This light is magnificent, but the Maker’s light is even more so,” she chants.

The response wells up in him, and he mumbles the familiar litany along with the rest of the Keep. “Thank you for guiding us in the creation of beauty. It was a greater beauty than was brought forth at our last celebration.”

Aria folds one arm across her middle and bows to the assembled skytes, stretching her wings out to the sides. “Thank you for joining in the creation. We shall make it even more beautiful next time.”

“We are one step closer to the Maker’s light,” the skytes clamor.

Aria’s smile fills her face as she straightens. “And how many steps are left?”

The skytes thrust their hands skyward with the shout, “All of them!”

“All of them,” she echoes, folding those delicate fingers together. “And now, we recall the Wanderers who have not yet returned. Do not forget our valiant explorers, driven to seek out the paths of the world and to greet and make records of all manner of beings and lands that they find. Recall Parch and Milestone, Merca, Map, and Tell. Hold them dear in your hearts and ask the Maker to bring them home safely. May the lightsculpture be a beacon for those traveling afar, that they may see it and feel that the love of their home follows them.”

Wildspeech’s heart shrivels in his chest, all semblance of gratitude evaporating. He shuts his eyes once again, his blood racing. Faces flash in his mind, each haggard to the bone and dead-eyed with the knowledge that they are doomed to wander the wastes in anguish once they age on.

You think like winglings. Wanderers are the easiest to steal. Likely you’ll never see them again. Your beacon screams our location. You put us all at risk. I told you. I warned you. You changed nothing.

He clenches his fingers around mother Falcon’s feathers until she shifts, clicking softly in her throat. He consoles himself that the ceremony will be over soon, and she will take him away from all this.

A representative from the Keep will step forward next. Sure enough, he hears a clear voice ask, “Songspeaker, has the Maker touched your sleep?”

Aria’s answer is not immediate, and this jolts him from his bitterness. Her response is too soft to hear, and this draws his attention back down to the clearing. Her shoulders are hunched forward, her arms crossed in front of herself. Even her wings curl halfway forward like twin lavender shields. She must have answered, for the representative leads into the next question, “Will you speak to us of the Maker’s heart?”

Something is wrong. He has never heard a pause this long after that question.

Finally, she says, “The Maker’s heart wails.”

Silence falls over the clearing. He stops breathing. Mother Falcon’s feathers ruffle. That is not what a Songspeaker says. Ever.

“I dreamed. I have never felt such anguish. It was a torrent of grief, fit to flood all the land. My mentor spoke of only one such dream in all his years. He had it the night before Arc returned to us.”

That name is like a needle stabbed through Wildspeech’s body. He can’t stop the groan that escapes him. He hopes he is too far up to be heard.

The representative sounds anxious. “Songspeaker, what does it mean?”

She shakes her head. “I don’t know. No one else like him has returned to us. Perhaps there is a connection between this dream and our new visitor that we do not understand. Eldest Stem and Mel Songspeaker have not had time to question her, but when they have, they will share any fresh understanding with all of us.”

She draws herself upright, closing the subject, and says, “There is little new to concern us at this time beyond the visitor, but we have one issue to discuss. Edge Stonemason, please come forward and speak to us.”

Edge, a ropy-muscled skyte with rich olive skin and tousled brown hair breaks from the group of Stonemasons and lopes forward. Turning to face the others, he bows at the waist, sweeping his brown wings out wide. “Thank you. You all know I’ve been adopted by a squirrel.” There is a ripple of gentle laughter. Edge is no Wildspeech and by his wording, it was clearly the squirrel that decided to initiate the friendship.

Edge chuckles, “Yeah, it’s been a long time working that out. Well, she’s shown up hurt bad. Now, I know it happens. Not much I can do for her unless she’s with me all the time, but… well, Nutte came and helped translate for me. My squirrel friend reports her wounds came from a new eagle in the area. Aggressive. Lots of kills, and most aren’t eaten.”

A murmur spreads through the crowd.

“Too many kills like that, and we’ll lose all the friendly little’uns in the area.” Edge spreads his hands. “Nutte’s a Wildspeech an’ can talk with it, but the eagle’s not likely to listen to someone close friends with all the prey. Best would be… well.” Edge’s hands gesture, vaguely. “He’s… he can’t.”

Wildspeech’s mouth curls in a bitter smile.

Aria steps forward and addresses a skyte with a frazzled mane of red hair tumbling to her waist. “Ferra Wildspeech. You are not close with the birds, but you are close with the wolves, coyotes, and foxes. Would the predators of the air listen to one who befriends the predators on the ground?”

“Aye. Could be. I’ll fly up and have a speak with the eagle.”

Wildspeech watches her, bleak and drained. She may have some luck if the eagle is amenable, but her favored animals lean toward cunning and nobility. It takes a measure of arrogance and stubborn persistence to get through to anything like an eagle and he’s not sure Ferra has it in her.

Not that I have it either. Anymore.

“Thank you, Ferra,” Aria says. She lifts her wings up until the tips point to the sky, nearly touching. “Maker walk with each of you until next we convene.”

“Aye!” they chorus.

The echo of their shout hasn’t died out when Wildspeech slides his legs down around mother Falcon’s body, whispering tersely, “It’s over. I stayed. Now, take me back.”

She snaps her beak, clearly unhappy that this approach didn’t work, but spreads her wings and dives. The last thing he sees before closing his eyes is the lightsculpture, blazing a warm and welcoming beacon to friend and foe from dawn to sunset. Marking their location once a month.

----------------------------------------

Mother Falcon only leaves after she has overseen him cracking and eating a whole walnut. Raw. Satisfied, she nudges him with her beak, then flies off to find prey.

The moment he is alone, he turns his feet toward the creek and shuffles step by agonizing step toward it. With his mind swimming in images from the ceremony and his bruised heart dragging behind him, it takes twice as long as usual to reach the stream. Once there, he strips off his tunic. Breeches. Footwraps. He pauses at the spidersilk wraps around his forearms for a moment, then unwinds them as well. Naked as the day he cracked open his egg, he kneels at the bank, staring at a relatively still pocket of water near his knees. He can’t remember the last time he looked at himself. The reflection is warped and dim, but he can still pick out the relevant features.

His face is all planes and angles, with just enough pale flesh to keep him from being mistaken for a skeleton. Muddy brown eyes stare out of sunken sockets. His yellow hair is shaggy and brushes the back of his scarred shoulders. Stripes of hair run down the sides of his face, joining at the chin where there is chest-length shaggy growth. Gleaming white scars run haphazardly down his torso, lacing thickly around his legs.

Absently, he runs his fingers through the beard he hardly realized was there.

His gaze falls on his fingers. His hands. The skin is stained a light-devouring, inky black from fingertips to mid-forearm, where the darkness begins to dissipate. From there, it stretches thinning tendrils all the way up to his elbow. Each curving, multi-jointed fingers is fully defined, their edges crisp against the air.

Obscene. Repulsive.

He thrusts his arms into the reflection, scattering it in all directions as he grabs a handful of gravel and drags it along his skin, trying to scrub the poison from his arms.

He has never been able to remove the stain of working with Deathspill and he knows it will be no different now. Still, today he has felt the stirrings of gratitude, the anguish of hearing his name, and the ache of abandonment all over again. For all that, he cannot stop scrubbing the stones across his skin.

His arms bleeds and his fingers are torn by the time he flings the gravel back into the stream and tilts his head back, shouting, “I didn’t want to! It’s not my fault! I’m the one punished? Why? Why’s it my fault? This was done to me! Why…”

The anger abandons him, leaving him gutted. It comes like that sometimes. Brief, all-consuming flashes that flare up and die off just as quickly. He slumps sideways to the stony shore.

There is no point. The Maker isn’t listening.

Once again, he wishes it would end. Wishes for himself the strength to roll into the stream and lie under the water until it is over. The moment that passes through his mind, it is followed by an image of himself, stumbling through the infinite void, gibbering in mad fear and horror without rest for all time.

Shivering, he pushes himself up and rolls away from the water, reaching for his clothes. The longer he can put off facing the Maker, the better. Even this pain is less than what he will have to endure.

He pulls on his breeches and footwraps, stopping at his berry-stained tunic. He didn’t think to bring soap, but even so, a good rinse and a little effort will do wonders. Unwilling to wade out to his usual rock, he painstakingly scrubs it against the gravel by the bank. The purplish stain lightens a shade at a time as he dunks and scrubs, until the stain is barely perceptible.

By the time he finishes, the sun has passed the midday mark and is well on its way toward the horizon. A dark, wide blanket of cloud swallows half the sky and threatens the rest. Weary through and through, Wildspeech slings the sopping garment over his shoulder and carefully wraps his hands and arms once again. As he stands, his legs twinge, shooting pain through his bones.

Rain is coming. A spring shower, likely a heavy one. He makes a note to apply moonweave patches when he returns.

He makes better time on the way back, determined to ease the ache in his legs and then return to sleep. As he approaches his burrow, his steps slow.

In the pre-storm gloom, an unusually warm yellowish light bathes the area near his tree. He rounds the trunk and sees a glowing figure of disturbing proportions blocking his door.

He cracks a twig on his approach, and Remara turns a smile on him that is only slightly less horrifying than it was yesterday. There is a covering of sorts on her arms and legs and she has one arm curled around the folds of a sack while the other arm whips wildly back and forth.

“Hello Arc Wildspeech my friend I have come with supplies from your family who thinks of you often I told them you were robbed by a bluejay so they sent food can I speak to you I have learned enough that I have even more questions!”