The Owl N' I

Looking back to my days before I was King, I remember laying down under a silent night sky in the open fields of Galagdriz. An acting barrier between two nations, the wheat fields grew up to five feet tall, and they danced with the whispers of the wind around me as I stared up at the stars, dreaming of a better life; a life that would take me far away from the tattered clothes and begging for scraps. As I lay dreaming, hypnotized by the wind, I was startled by a noise, a faint echoed howl. I opened my eyes to see a creature circling above me. I noticed it to be an owl and it first seemed to be a normal barn owl, circling the fields for its next prey. Though as it descended I realized that it was much larger than an ordinary owl. It had its distinct round, flat face with a short stub of a beak and deep, wise eyes; however, its underbelly was untarnished, pure white, and its wings were all colors of red. As she flapped her wings, her feathers reflected the moon and star light in such a way that it looked like she caught the light's fire in her wings and willed it as she pleased. Captured in her beauty, before I knew it she was perched on my chest looking down at me. We stared at each other for eternity. I was drowned in her gaze, falling into her eyes as she peered into my soul. The wind danced and whirled again, only this time I heard a soft, slow, and gentle voice riding the whispers, "Come...and follow me," and she pushed off my chest and took flight. It was not a suggestion, it was a command to be followed, spoken with an authority that demanded obedience despite how calm and small the voice was. Before I could even hesitate I was standing in the fields and following her into the Forests of Bastile, away from the Kingdom of Gamorsia, into the Territories of Talsahan. I tried speaking to her, trying to discover where it was she was leading me and why I was following her. I walked for miles, chasing the night, to the point I had almost convinced myself that I had not actually heard a voice. It must have just been the wind playing tricks on my tired and weary mind. Just as I began to doubt, the owl landed on a branch of a large Redbirk tree, turned only its head all the way around and stared at the horizon from which we came. I followed her gaze and I saw that the sun was rising and I remember thinking to myself, "What a sunrise! How can a simple moment of everyday life begin with such beauty? But this particular morning wasn't the typical sunrise. Yes, it was as bountiful and springing with color, the reds and pinks and blues and oranges and purples dancing in the night sky. But there was a smell in the air that you only get in the late summer's day. After the fires have burned the dead and dying Redbirk trees preparing the forests for the winter and the following spring. The smell of death, but also the sweet smell of the potential of life. I say this to you as odd because only at the time of summer's end does one experience this smell, but it has been recorded from around the nations: that day, twelve years ago, on a midwinter's dawn, people experienced that euphoric smell. And it was rumored, that was the day that the nations began to feel a shift, and the world forever changed.

"So how did you become King than daddy?" a small voice sounded. The man, King of the nations once known as the Territories and Gamorsia, looked down at his daughter and smiled. She saw his gentle smile and couldn't resist the urge to smile and laugh, just out of pure joy and excitement, "So how did you gain the power to best the Dragons? How did you unify the warring nations and bring peace? What is beyond the mountains that you had to journey through? What did-"

"Patience my sweet child," the king said with a voice as warming as his smile, "I am getting to those, don't worry my little owl." He brushed his hand through her long auburn hair while she smiled intently up at her father.

As I looked back to the owl, still perched on her branch, she glanced at me then back to the horizon, "This is the end of your life as a man believing he is no one. You were not born in the ashes of poverty so that you could just hide away, wither and die. You were born to be great," and with that she took flight again and we were off to the races. I was nineteen years old when I left my home, my destitute life in the Kingdom of Gamorsia, and I wouldn't return for another seven years.

The King looked down at his daughter sound asleep on his lap and smiled. Her heavy breathing was enough for him to know she was out, not even an earth shake would wake her at this point. She had a habit of falling asleep on his lap, in the throne room. He carried his daughter to her chambers and laid her in her bed as he took an exasperated sigh while sitting on the bedside chair. He was fully aware of the gaping whole in his back where warm blood was soaking through his royal robes. "I have told you the stories many times my sweet girl," he whispered over his daughter's ear, "You are the heir to the throne, and the crown will never come easy," a saying he would always speak to her every night before she drifted to sleep. She mumbled an inaudible sentence back to her father, which could only be assumed to be her repeating what her father said, unaware it would be her last time hearing it in his voice.

The King leaned back in his chair and looked outside the window. There, he saw an old friend. The owl flapped her wings and opened the doors to the window, flying in the chambers and perching on the bedpost in between the King and his daughter. "Did you finish telling her the stories of your past?"

"I have been telling her bedtime stories since she could speak. She knows her history well," he took in an unsteady breath, pain shooting across his face. "There was so much more I thought I would have time to teach her and show her. But she is still too young to truly understand." Taking in fewer and fewer breaths, "There is no one I trust more to guide my daughter through her life than you, my friend. She will have many more trials in life than anyone her age should have to bear."

"You bore those same hardships my king."

"I wasn't forced to. I reveled in the idea of beating the odds and accomplishing what those before me thought impossible. Here, she will inherit what we built here, but she will also inherit the enemies we made along the way. I can only pray that the Kingdom we made will support her as she grows, and love her as I loved her and my people of this nation."

"We both knew that my time would be cut short, we just hoped I would have had till she was old enough to carry this burden," he took one last breath, looked at his companion, then back to the light of his life, "you will always be my princess, and you will always have the stories of The Owl and I."

As the light faded from the King's eyes, smoke began to rise from his robes. The owl never taking her eyes off her dead king, he burst into flames. As quickly as the flames ignited, they were extinguished, and all that was left was a pile of ashes. She raised her wings and in one strong flap of were sings she commanded a current that sent the ashes into the night sky, "I will guide our daughter as I have guided you, my love." The sweet smell of a summer's end night drifted through the Nation of Tayir, as their King, Alphin, drifted away in the night sky.