Wings of Fire: Chapter 1

	April, and spring has yet to come to the coast of Windia where a long winter of evil
has held sway for nearly half the young woman named Kara's thirteen years. She stands on the
cliffs overlooking the sea. Behind her, higher up on the cliffs stands her lifelong home.
	"Kara!" calls an older woman as she approaches. "There you are, child! You gave me
an awful fright when I couldn't find you, Kara. What are you doing out here on the cliffs
alone?"
	"I'm waiting, Aunt Mara," Kira says without turning, "For my mother whom you say
sailed across the sea when I was young... and never came back."
	"That was a long time ago, child. I've told you to abandon hope. Your mother will
never return. Now come away from the cliffs, they are dangerous." Then, as if an
afterthought she adds, "And you know you can't see. Let the dog lead you."
	"Sibilant?"
	Although the blind child can not see the coal-black mastiff, she senses it's
approach and backs towards the cliffs. The dog anticipates her movements and places himself
between the child and infinity. Suppressing a shudder, Kara allows herself to be led towards
the stone-hewn stairs leading to the cliff house.
	Before her goes Aunt Mara, her guardian of many years. Behind her pads Sibilant, her
pet since he was a pup. Blind, she sees neither.
	But of late a light has entered Kara's darkness.. and within the light a strange,
solitary figure.
	:Who are you?: she thinks to the figure. :Are you some angel who will come to
reunite me with my parents? Oh, please come - do! I've waited and prayed so long! Please,
please come!:
	Sometimes prayers are answered...

* * *

	Deep, dank, and dark as death, the fog embraces the old house on the hill in a bone
penetrating cold. Within the nursery - the room she has occupied since she was a baby - the
girl-child Kara shares her sorrows with her oldest - and only - friends.
	"You remember mommy, don't you?" she says to a large stuffed animal. "There was so
much laughter when she was here... and so much light."
	She remembers her wonderful childhood. It had been so full of color, so full of
life. She could see then, she wasn't blind. No, the darkness came later, with Aunt Mara,
when she told the hysterical child that her mother was gone, never to return.
	"The doctors aunt Mara brought said it was the shock that took my eyesight," she
says to her playthings, "Why did mommy leave me here, in the dark, in the cold? If she still
loves me, why doesn't she come back?"

* * *

	Carried on leather wings of death, sinister screaming shapes pilot unerringly the
gathering gloom to converge on the cliff house.

* * *

	Mara opens the think wooden door on cliff house. "Welcome, brothers and sisters."
	"Greetings Mara," each reptilian shape replies.
	"Enter. Though the fog has hidden your arrival, it is said the stars have eyes,"
Mara says. "If so, the stars are all we ever need fear, for all human sight has been
extinguished at this house. Our magic had seen to that!"
	On the balustrade, Kara listens, having been drawn from the nursery by the sound of
voiced below. :Guests?" she thinks, :Aunt Mara /never/ has guests!:
	She silently pads down the stairs. :I wonder who they are? It's been so long since
I've heard any voice save Aunt Mara's!: Kara nears the door she heard Aunt Mara enter with
her guests. :I must listen!:
	Curiosity, they say, killed the cat. Tonight it slays all faith a young blind girl
has ever known.

* * *

	"It's been years since we slew the mistress of this house and began using cliff
house as a base.." says one of the strange snake-like creatures.
	"..And yet we have let her child live, Mara! Why?" another finished the thought.
	"Because she is young and vulnerable, perfectly suited to our greater purpose!"
Mara says.
	"What /is/ our purpose, Mara?" asks another, voicing the question they had all
wondered.
	"See you not this dog?" she says, motioning towards it, "Silibant was but an
insignificant puppy before our sorcery transformed him into a savage, slavering hellhound.
A telepathic tracker, fierce and uncanny, and totally subservient to his masters, us!"
	"Thus far we have only changed animals. I would like to see if our arcane arts would
work on a human... The child!"
	Just outside the room Kara gasps at the words of the woman she had trusted so long.
:My mother never sailed away and left me! She was murdered by Aunt Mara and her guests! And
whatever horrible thing they did to my dog... they now intend to do to me!: 
	In a happier world, Kara would be entitled to the privacy of her own thoughts.. but,
as Mara said, the hellhound is a telepathic tracker, and he's caught the "scent" of the
child's thoughts! 
	:I've got to run! Got to get away!: In a panic the girl turns to flee... 
	She bangs against a table and the vase on it falls and shatters thus giving away her
presence. 

* * * 

	Mara turns towards the door. "Someone is the hallway! Go, Sibilant!"
	Once a dog, a dog no longer. Sibilant is a hellhound. He leads at Mara's command. He
has become an unearthly arcane cur to whom no barrier is unpenetrable...
	Not even solid oak doors.

	Kara runs with tears streaming from her unseeing eyes. She hears a growl behind her
and realizes she is being followed.
	:I've got the get away - reach the cliffs! I'd rather die than let Aunt Mara do
something awful to me!: She struggles with the front door but can't get it open.
	With fear born of desperation, the blind child heaves her frail form against the
unyielding portal -
	To find that it does yield, opened from without! Kara senses someone, another
presence.
	"Stand aside, child," the stranger says, "I will deal with the hound of hell."
	"I came in search of your master, beast! But when I heard your baying, I knew they'd
corrupted another creature in it's weakness," the stranger says to the hellhound.
	Kara sense the use of magic close by and hears the stranger yell for her to run, to
hide. She does as the stranger bade her and runs. But her savior does not know she is blind
and that the cliffs may not offer safety, but death!
	"There!" Mara points to the vague form of Kara fleeing into the mists, "We must
have her back, she is too valuable to loose! After her, brothers and sisters!"

* * * 

	Kara runs, her unholy hunters on her trail.
	But they are strangers to this land, while Kara walked the paths about the cliff
house, dreaming of her happy childhood. Though blind, she knows every inch of these cliffs -
	- But will that knowledge be enough?

	The stranger later finds her hidden under the bows of a large tree. "Fear not,
child," he says as he dispells his seeking magic, "The evil here is gone."
	"I can't see you, but somehow she shine a light through my darkness," she says.
	"You are blind? And yet you fled alone across the cliffs!" he asks in surprise.
	"Memory guided my footsteps," she says, "This is my home, I knew I would be safe."
	"But what of those who pursued you, child?" he asks as he holds her.
	"This was not their home! I felt their cold closing in on me, sensed their darkness
close behind! I knew I would die before I'd let them take me! Then I heard them scream, and
soon the screaming stopped. I knew the cliffs and they did not. And the cliffs protect their
own," she answers with a freirceness not there before.

* * * 

	"Thank you, good sir," a tall, richly dressed woman says.
	"I only wish I could have come sooner," the purple haired man replies as he lays the
sleeping child on the bed. "To save your daughter. She looks so much like her mother."
	"Yes, and I hope not to drive her away like I did Nina," the queen says, brushing a
lock of blond hair off the girl's face.
	"I shall never have a second chance with Ryu though," the man says sadly.
	"He is more forgiving than you think, lad," she replies gently. "He let you survive
the final battle, didn't he?"
	He does not reply but simply looks at the child of one of his best friends.
	"You should come back to visit some time, Teepo. You are an uncle now," she says.
	He grins, "I suppose you are right, milady. I can't afford to loose another family."
	He turns to leave and she calls out to him, "Be sure to visit Rei sometime or else
I'll have to order you!"
	Teepo turns one last time to bow and then leaves the castle.