Primal

Chapter One

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Chapter One

 

There can be no situation in life in which the conversation of my dear sister will not administer some comfort to me. ~Mary Montagu


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“Yuna!” Noor called into the open air, carefully balancing her way across the unstable branch bridge. In all reality, she knew that her twin sister was most likely in the marketplace. However, getting to the marketplace required either flying or taking the long path up onto the tallest tree in the forest. That would simply take too long for her, as her feet were already exhausted from the prolonged day now behind her. Eight years ago it would have taken a few minutes, but a flying route wasn’t possible anymore.

Around her she could hear the birds, their chirps resounding through the air as they twirled. They were dipping and diving, their wings cutting through the air with grace. She wished she could be like them once more; she wished she could be free again like she was once upon a time. That wasn’t possible, and every time a blue blur moved past her a ping of grief hit her heart. It all felt like a distant memory now, and she could barely remember what it felt like to fly. Maybe she had made it all up in her head to comfort herself in times of distress; maybe she had never truly been normal.

 

Her left wing dragged limply behind her feet moving, snagging against the protruding branches that stretched up towards the sky. The paths were worn down and overgrown with vines and plant life; she was the only one in the family that used them on a diurnal basis, so the upkeep on them was fairly poor. After all, when would she possibly have time to go along the path and clean them up? Vines were growing up, wrapping around the wooden paths, sending cracks along the surface of the logs. One day they would snap apart under her feet, but she could guess that there would be a few more years of use from them. Zander had built them for her. He might have cleaned it up if she asked him nicely to, but the awkward conversation that would follow was something that she’d like to avoid. Her bare toe met a sudden hole, her body stumbling softly. She couldn’t catch herself, falling to hit the wood with a gentle thud. She winced, a sharp intake of breath sliding through her teeth. The sharp splinters from the path stabbed into her skin, causing red specks to pop up amongst the pale white surface.

 

“Noor? Noor, is that you?” The voice came from above in response to her sounds of pain, the sound of fluttering wings making their way down to her from behind as they neared her. She hurried to pull herself to her feet, and she couldn’t help but feel embarrassed that someone had seen her looking so foolish. She tried to make herself seem so strong to the public eye, and there she had been, caught falling over a small hole.  “We haven’t seen you in so long, have you given up on your physical therapy? How is…” All of their voices blended together over time, identities mixing into a giant mixing pot of blurred faces and muddled words. All of their conversations with her were the same; full of pity and concern for her wellbeing. That was happening to the person in front of her now, as their facial features faded into a solid black outline. Noor tried to walk away from them, acting like she didn’t hear the voice to begin with. Thin Nocarae fingers reached out, grabbing at her wrist to try to stop her from moving any further. Noor kept advancing forward, ignoring their calls for her name. She had once thought of their tight-knit community as a way of survival, but now she only could consider the people she used to call family mere pests that infected the space around her.

 

Eventually they stopped their calls, sighing audibly before flying up into the air and away from her moving body. Noor was trying to be social with these people, she really was, but whenever she tried to make friends with anyone besides Yuna the dreaded question starter was always brought up. “What happened…” The rest of it could be filled in with many different options. There was “to you?”, as well as “to your wing?”, “to your smile?”, “to the Noor we used to know?” It was gone. All of it was gone. Once a Nocarae loses its wing, they can never recover both emotionally and physically. Each wing was as individualistic as a fingerprint; each wing enabled them to get around. Losing a wing enacts pity, which builds bridges and gifts you dull eyes that follow you wherever your feet now lead you. It made her sick.