Fallen Chapter Four
After a violent clash at the ball, the Main Character only wants to escape to the open skies and freedom.
cover by
TW transphobia, violence
I couldn’t sleep. Even with the sun’s rays lowering in intensity, the bright light of night still seemed like too much. I just needed…something.
I got up and avoided looking at myself in my bed clothing. I paused as I caught the edge of my dress under my mattress. I just wanted to feel good again.
I carefully pulled it out, stripped, and stepped into my dress. I sighed as the cool fabric slipped onto my skin. I pulled off the blanket on the mirror and stared at myself for a moment. I frowned and looked away.
Dona’s bloody smile filled my mind, and I threw open the window.
I needed to not think.
I leaped out of the window, extending my wings and coiling wind around me.
I soared through the cloudless sky, my light brown skin shimmering in the sunlight. A smile broke out on my lips, and I exhaled. I twisted and my white wings curled around me, the feathers iridescent like snow, and dove. My giggle got lost in the roar of wind as I fell as fast as I could. I flew for a while, letting the wind on my skin ignite my soul.
In the distance, I could make out Arna floating in the heavens, Alia, the great waterfall pouring off the side. I had already flown a good half hour out and the air traffic stayed light at night. Hopefully, I would have the skies to myself.
I pulled out of my dive, spreading my wings and darting upwards. The wind danced with me, coursing over my wings and tickling my skin. The summer air filled my lungs and exhaled on my giggles. Around me, my simple white dress fluttered. I coursed air magic down along it to keep it from flapping up and revealing my underwear. It meant an extra use of my air control, but as an expert with it, I could spare the extra exertion.
I twirled in the sky, a brilliant smile kissing my lips. I danced for who knows how long, time didn't exist in the sky, the only thing that mattered was the wind and I.
The wind escaped my grasp.
My dress shot up, covering my vision. I gasped as the air refused to listen to me. I could just barely make out someone’s throaty laughter over the rushing wind. I managed to keep wind coursing around my wings as it should, but it buffeted me.
I grabbed my dress and pulled it down, my cheeks burning.
Dona hovered there, his gray wings shadowed under the moon. "Princesss.”
I cringed and tried to get away from him when I slammed into another body. I elbowed the person grabbing me from behind, a deep voice gasped, but then another pair of hands gripped my feet from below. I kicked, but my legs wouldn't budge. The person behind me ripped my hands away from my dress. It fluttered up around my waist by someone else’s magic. Tears drowned my eyesight as another man pulled my hands above my head. I hung with my underwear bared as someone held me from behind and another bound my hands above my head while the last held my kicking feet.
"Let me go," I said.
Dona laughed. "You have such cute underwear, Princesss," he hissed the last word like the slur against abyssal celestials. I winced despite myself.
"Don't call me that," I said.
"Oh, sorry Prince Reno."
"Don't call me that," I growled. I didn’t want that name, that title.
"I can't win with you, can I?" He squeezed my cheeks and pulled me towards him. "I was trying to be respectful."
I spat on him. His smile turned into a snarl. He backhanded me across the face. Blood scattered on the wind.
Just like that, my pure white dress stained red.
I kicked my feet, but they were immobilized.
"I don't even want to look at you," Dona's voice flat lined. His golden eyes, that marked him as my cousin, narrowed.
I trembled and tried to command the wind to listen to me, but against four wind-bearers I had no chance, even at my power level.
"Then let me go and I'll be out of your face."
"You won't be though," he said.
My lip trembled. "Just let me go, Dona."
"Keep my name out of your mouth."
I bit my lip and stayed still. Maybe if I didn't aggravate him, he would let me go.
"Just do it already," the person holding my feet said. I recognized the voice, Kora, another cousin then. "It's disgusting holding his legs."
I cringed, but held my tongue. If I behaved, they'd let me go. Still, my vision swam with tears.
"You're right," Dona said. "Do it." His voice betrayed no emotion. The person behind me let go and I relaxed, my wings unfurling behind me. I could get away-
Cold on my back.
Pain. Infinite pain. Pain I couldn't imagine. Pain that didn't make sense. I screeched and twisted as fire ripped down my spine. A horrible pull-
Crack…crack.
My vision blackened, electricity traveled down my core. A pull…a snap. A-
Crack!
My scream died on the wind.
My back lightened, and I dipped forward. No.
No.
This couldn’t be happening.
Pain howled out of me.
"Let him go," I barely heard Dona say as my back burned. Wet coursed down my sides. I gasped for air. White fabric weighed down by crimson.
They let me go.
I fell.
There were no wings to catch me.
Cackles evaporated on the roaring wind. Up above four men hung, one holding my beautiful wings gleaming in the light. The vision made me lightheaded. That's what they look like. Long, arching, feathered white and silver. Stunning, radiant, I had never truly known, never supposed to know.
I watched my wings until they were just a speck in the sky. I curled in on myself and screeched at the pain. I couldn’t move anyway without agony coursing down my spine. My stomach tingled from the fall, the wind rushed around me, and finally I peeled my eyes away from my violators and down towards my predicament. Blood trickled up around me like a red mist. Fear tried to weasel in the cracks between my despair, but it struggled to gain purchase.
Suffering echoed out of my mouth as the skies took me. I would fall into the abyssal skies soon, where darkness always reigned, and then I would continue onward into the void for forever.
Until I starved to death at least.
The light blue sky tinted into indigo, and I finally tried to course some air magic around me. It didn't do much without wings to help catch the lift, but it slowed my descent. I could make myself hover in place for a time, but I needed to preserve my energy.
I could barely think about doing that. Crack, crack, crack…the horrible noises wouldn’t leave my mind. My vision blurred.
Focus.
I had to land on one of the Abyssal islands. It was as simple as that. And doing that would take a lot of precision maneuvering and quick thinking.
I had to find an island first.
My gaze darted everywhere below me, trying to spot anything, but the darkness began to be too complete. My stomach coiled in on itself. I knew Abyssal Celestials existed...they had to live somewhere. But I could only think that the void continued on forever, and I had already missed my chance to be rescued.
My body numbed except for the raging wound on my back.
Tears dripped upward, and I pulled my arms in on myself, shivering. The summer air chilled me at this speed and sliced into the wounds on my back.
I wouldn't starve to death. I would bleed out first.
How hadn’t I realized something so obvious?
My mind failing me, I closed my eyes.
At least it would be a quick death.
I barely registered the change in pressure, the difference in the wind's roar, but a subtle change overtook me.
The roar became a whistle, the pull in my core a tickle instead of a yank. I didn't want to look. I didn't want to see myself wrapped in darkness, forever and ever, never to see the sun again.
I stilled. The wind became a breeze.
Arms wrapped under my back and knees. Pressed up against warmth, I opened my eyes.
A person with snowy skin, steel-blue eyes, and long black curls looked down at me. Their gently angular face and rosy lips confused me. I couldn't place whether they were a man or a woman.
"Hello, Angel," the person said. Behind them, a brilliant violet moon made their onyx wings shimmer. They were long with plush feathers and an urge to touch their gently flapping form overtook me. I raised a hand before blushing.
Why would I do something so intimate with a stranger?
Intimate.
No one would ever caress my wings. My love would have an emptiness to it now.
Without thinking, I buried my head in the person's neck. Tears smeared on their lilac scented neck. Their grip on me tightened, and I fell into the abyss of sleep as a stranger comforted me.