This prequel novella in the Windborne YA nature fantasy series is set two summers before the events of The Witch of the Meadows.
Chapter 1
An Innocent Game of Stickyball
The Isle of Giuthas, in the Windborne Irish District
Mid-June
The whistle blew. Raven of the Meadows tucked his black feathered wings and dropped into the grove of towering Scots pines. He darted away from his winged friends and zigzagged around the needled treetops to throw off any followers. The other four teenage wizards did the same, vanishing into the canopy.
With fifteen seconds to go, he flapped hard, rising up through a tight chimney of close trunks he’d scouted earlier. The perfect hiding spot, a hole in the foliage near the top, lay two hundred feet above the ground. It came into view. He rose above it and flew toward the yards-wide limb. Barely landing on his boot soles, he dashed into the shadows to press his chest against the rough bark.
The whistle blew again, a longer whine marking the end of the first thirty seconds during which everyone had to hide.
Folding his wings, Raven turned around. Needled boughs splayed left and right, creating viewing holes forward, up and down. Half of the pine grove lay within his view, and by going around the other side, he’d overlook the rest of the three-hundred-foot-tall ancient pines filling the gap between two mountain ridges, the designated boundaries for today’s game.
Now to wait for the others to show themselves. He intended to win this game of stickyball by showing off his newest wildlife tracking skills. Beri—nearly his brother since Dad was raising him, too—knew how much he’d improved. The others didn’t, not even Willow of the Forest, the lass who lived closest to them. What better way to prove his progress than to track and knock out every player?
They hadn’t played in a month, and he’d known after the morning’s lesson of honey harvesting in the Meadows that everyone would be ready for stickyball. He’d suggested the nearby location when they’d been turned loose, and had prepared by wearing his best camouflage for the pines—his usual brown canvas trousers and a nearly-outgrown shirt his gran had dyed green.
Raven formed a ball of sticky, orange-brown energy in his hand. In this friendly game, the goal was to prove they’d hit each other, not to hurt anyone. Arm up and ready to throw, he scanned through the pine limbs.
Willow was stationed at the tip of the tallest tree in the grove as today’s whistler and judge. Knowing she’d be able to see every player’s moves—well, mostly—and surely some of his, made Raven feel…like this was a performance he had to do well in. He wasn’t sure why he wanted her to notice him, just that it seemed important she did.
Each time the whistle blew for a new round, every player had to change hiding spots. A player could move in-between whistles, if they liked, and that was where many players slipped up. That timing was up to the game’s whistler and never was a precise thing. Willow was notoriously patient.
The whistle blew a short blast. Raven checked his surroundings one last time, then fluttered his wings and hop-flew through a tunnel of branches to the next limb over and ducked back into the pine-scented shadows. Technically, he had moved. Now he scanned for movement…
None…then two trees over, higher up, a sway of a single bough. Raven cocked his arm. Only the tips of brown feathers flashed as a clue when the player ducked behind dense needles. Raven held his magic, on his toes in case the wizard reappeared.
Unless the light had caught Beri’s reddish feathers wrong, the glimpse of brown could only mean it was one of the Seas siblings, Salm or Coral. Seventeenth-year Salm might be two years older than Raven, but his endless energy gave him the patience of a seventh-year. Fourteenth-year Coral had jumpy magic and frequently gave away her position with errant shots of energy. However, her aim was improving.
Because the Seas family had been away doing rounds on their schooner, Salm and Coral didn’t know Raven and Beri had applied for a trial in the Pines habitat.
In this particular grove.
The long whistle blew to end the round.
Raven half-expected Willow to point out the unfairness, but she’d simply rolled her eyes when he’d proposed the grove. Salm would have demanded another game location if he’d known how much time they’d spent scoping out protected spots—while they’d prepared their trial application, of course. Beri hadn’t given it away either, perhaps because he thought he had a better shot of winning.
The whistle blew. Raven began counting in his head. The hidden player—Coral—leaped from the branch, brown wings spread, and glided down. She tucked her wings to fall faster.
Raven threw. His stickyball raced on target to her back…
She twisted aside and threw a ball of blue energy downward.
What! She couldn’t have seen his stickyball—
A ball of green energy hit Coral in the belly and splattered around her. Beri’s magic, thrown from somewhere below. Raven’s went sailing past.
Out of nowhere, a blue stickyball zinged toward him. Not Coral’s. Salm’s. His magic was the same color. Raven dodged, falling from the limb, then catching himself on arched wings and swinging around to return fire—only to see a green stickyball speeding right at him.
Raven lunged behind the curve of a limb. Where was Beri? Hidden, low and to the right. Salm was higher and middle-ish. The sneaky Oyster of the Estuary hadn’t been in view at all.
The whistle’s long whine ended the round. Five seconds later, it tooted short.
Spells. He had to move. Where? Up? No. They’d never expect him to come at them. He leaped, diving, wings tucked and throwing himself from side to side—moving target and all that—like an owl scattering hares.
Salm launched upward, arm cocked, hand cupping around blazing energy.
Raven’s arm rose and swung in a well-practiced move. The stickyball flew from his open fingers.
From the side, a pink stickyball clobbered Salm in the arm, sending Salm’s shot wild and his body sideways, and Oyster crowed, “Yippee!”
Raven’s energy ripped past Salm and slammed a pine branch.
Crack! The branch broke and a large reddish bird rose, shrieking a high-pitched cry, followed by squawks—
Oh flights, no! Had he hit the hawk?
Chapter 2
It Happened So Fast…
Minutes earlier…
Beri hadn’t protested when Raven suggested using the grove for stickyball. He loved being among these giant trees for any reason. Their age and size alone inspired awe, but he also liked that so many animals made their homes here. Every flight they took, he came across another cranny with some animal in it. Nooks for creatures of all sizes, including bigger ones like wizards. Today, he’d darted for the second-best hiding spot he knew of. He’d have used the best, but Raven had headed there. Which—ha!—meant Raven wouldn’t win the game.
He settled into the tangle of branches with a clear view upward. Silence descended on the grove, and a bird winged its way to a tree across from him. It was a large one, a woodland hawk of some sort.
The hawk perched in a nest level with his viewpoint. He shifted. The hawk seemed unaware six wizards had taken over its wooded canopy. It moved in the nest and a smaller head peeked around it.
Oh, there were chicks. Beri craned to see the mounds of mixed downy white and red feathers to either side of the parent bird. Another hawk flew in, carrying something. It handed off the catch—a mouse, he supposed by the size—and the bird in the nest stepped on it and used its beak to tear it up. It passed pieces to each of the chicks. Three of them.
Brilliant. Beri nearly whooped, but instead grinned in silent glee. Having birds of prey to study when they got the approval for their trial in this grove would be much more exciting and a huge jump in responsibility over the pheasant in their last one.
The short whistle sounded. Beri jumped. The birds didn’t even flinch, and he was envious of them. He’d like to stay here, but not moving was an automatic disqualification. He’d come back later.
He looked up in time to see Coral barreling downward. Well, well, easy shot. He stood and feigned a throw, and used her distraction at seeing him to jump and actually throw his stickyball. On an arch of wings, he glided quickly to the next limb down where he crouched behind a screen of needles.
He’d hit Coral. Raven was scrambling from Salm. It wouldn’t be long before they were knocked out and left him and Oyster to finish.
When the whistle blew to start the next round, Beri sat tight for the first seconds. Raven, Salm and Oyster flew into view, though the first two didn’t see the last. Amid a flurry of activity and yelps, an orange-brown energy ball streaked past Beri.
Bam!
Furious squawking broke the silence. The hawks! Their cries mingled with something pattering like rain.
Sticks?
“Blessed Orb!” In one motion, Beri straightened his body and wings. He flung himself off the limb and flew toward the collapsing nest.
Orb help me get there in time!
The adult hawk hovered helplessly overhead, fluttering at one chick and then another as one side of their nest collapsed. Bits of fluff, grass and broken sticks poured out and clattered their way down among the branches.
He. Was. Nearly. There.
Beri wrapped his hands around the shattered nest edge and shoved upward, then ducked as the hawk flew at him, talons reaching to maim. He shielded—automatically—and the bird bounced off, screeching. He fluttered to stay in place and opened his eyes.
A dozen yards below, Raven glided with his arms outstretched and reaching for a mass of red-brown and white feathers.
One had fallen.
***
Double Rescue ‘released’ December 1, 2020.
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