The Gathandrian Trilogy 01 - The Gifting

teaching others. First from the top, a canopy of birds above their heads, and then to the side and around, spreading outwards and ever outwards. Gradually, almost imperceptibly, the net of white wings begins to grow lighter and, one by one, the birds peel off and disappear from view.
    “What’s happening?” Simon’s voice breaks into his reverie; he has almost forgotten the scribe is there.
    “We’ve arrived,” Johan says, as if such an answer could explain all questions.
    “Arrived? Where?”
    “In the land of the snow-ravens, the Kingdom of the Air—it is part of your legends, Simon. Though its reality has been long forgotten by your people. I hoped we would be able to reach here, but I could not be sure of it. We— you —are blessed.”
    “Blessed?” Simon replies slowly. “Because…?”
    “Because if the snow-ravens had not transported us here, we would surely have died.”

    Simon
    Swallowing, he gripped the boy’s shoulder and tried to not follow the conclusion of Johan’s thought; here did not seem to be a place for dwelling on violent death. Of any sort. As Simon glanced at the boy, he caught Isabella’s mocking smile, knowing she’d picked up on his fears. Again. Did the woman always know his failings? Feeling a blush rising, he turned away, concentrating instead on the snow-ravens.
    After a while, the covering of birds above disappeared and the scribe could see through to a further layer of white. It shifted and swirled as if moved by an unknown hand. As more and more birds vanished away, long wings beating as a counterpoint to the silence, leaving only the space beyond them, he realised he was looking at clouds. Not just here and there in the sky, but a city of them far above, to the side, and also beneath. Somehow, they stood in a place bordered by clouds.
    At last, all the birds had gone. In the distance, in the direction in which the birds had flown, Simon could see a long row of what looked like hills, a creamier white against the cloud. Something in him crystallised into the need for action and, for the first time, he felt a frisson of excitement in his belly.
    Without glancing at their leader to see the rightness of it, Simon took a step towards the hills.
    “Come,” he said, not looking to see if his companions would follow.
    They walked for the length of several stories. Not that there was any way of knowing the time of day precisely as this world had no sun, or none Simon could interpret. Still, the sky below and above undulated through all the shades of blue which seemed to him to mark the passage of morning to afternoon and the beginnings of dusk. During all this time, none of them showed any signs of hunger, thirst or exhaustion, and he felt as if he could have continued on this part of the journey forever. Even the boy’s step was light and his expression eager.
    Now they were actually here, in the Air Kingdom, the command to carry the child had not been repeated. Simon was glad he no longer had to carry him, no matter what strength the sky had strangely given him. He was not built for such undertakings. Now the sky-scape they walked through changed gradually, in shape as well as in texture, and always Simon could smell the air—cinnamon, lime and sage. He could see a line of deep valleys alongside their path, but when he took a step towards it, the path shifted and the valley itself moved to be out of reach.
    At this, the boy’s face became a field of smiles and he pointed and looked up, his eyes dancing.
    “Yes,” Simon said out loud. “The view is beautiful, but it seems we cannot reach it. Perhaps we’re creating our own path across the skies.”
    “Or perhaps,” Isabella whispered, “you are creating this path, and the journey is yours. To whatever destiny.”
    Before he could ask her about her strange words, Johan interrupted.
    “It will be better not to question the blessing we’ve received,” he said. “I think it will be wise to reach the cloud mountains before we lose the light.”
    “Do they have darkness here then?” Simon asked. “We’re so far above everything we understand.”
    As he spoke, the truth of it hit him, seeming to explode from within like pain or passion, and he laughed. The sound of it spun through the atmosphere and turned everything to a soft gold colour. Only when at last both Simon’s laughter and the colour had faded did Johan reply.
    “The air kingdom is so vast that you see something different every time you travel