Birds of a Feather

Chapter 5 - The Bond

5 - The Bond

He sat there dumb founded on the floor with his lips still tingling and his jaw feeling like it would shatter. The unit held only him, but the echo of the door slamming shut still rang in his ears. A kiss was the last thing he expected from her. Then what were you expecting, asked the voice in his head. He didn't know. Azur often described her as reserved and withdrawn, rarely ever speaking. That was not the Cerisse he had come to know during the trahin trip together. She was courageous, occasionally outspoken, unpredictable, impetuous, and a bit sadistic. This person... this woman calling herself Child of the Earth... who is she? She is a mask of cornucopia.

She had grabbed his lapel and met his lips with hers in a tender brush. Her gaze locked with him with such intensity he was lost in it. That was the moment she push him and hit him with an uppercutt at his jaw, and left. Talk about mood swings.

"What the hell!" he stood up abruptly and got out of the unit. He almost ran into Rama and Azur who were conversing as they walked down the hall. He could see the confusion from his friend's face dissipate and turn to acknowledgement. No doubt, Zeine's eyes were twitching and his face was red as a grape tomato.

"Do not even," he warned with a deadly glare before stalking off. He had to find Cerisse. Who did she think she was just kissing him and running off? He was usually the one who did that to women so his pride was a bit hurt. You're usually the one being the one chased by women. Now you're the one chasing one. I can smell the irony. The voice in his head must have hated him if it kept mocking him.

Zeine checked on the roofs, in the dining cart, in their unit, and even in the conductor's car. He asked around but no one had seen a girl of his description. No one, but the two people he didn't want to speak. They were the ones that caused him the scenario in which Cerisse stole a kiss from him.

"We did see her," smirked the top-hat wearing man. Their was something family in his bone structure. "She was crying in the caboose."

An image of Cerisse weeping with reddened face in his mind almost froze his heart. He couldn't understand this feeling of pain at seeing a person he hardly knew, who vexed him in different ways. His anger rose at his own weakness and that's when he noticed that the two men were inadvertently absorbing the easily releasing essence of this anger. With a deep breath he calmed himself.

"We can take you to her," suggested the other man.

He gave them a straight face. "That won't be necessary. I'll find her myself."

*

A fine, whispering rain fell as the trahin descended a level in the sky. The movements of the engine could be felt vibrating against her skin. Her face was pressed to the floor and her wrists and ankles were bound together. Her suspicions of the two men were warranted. The two men worked with the Furi she sent back to Dement. With their meeting and the kiss she gave, her own power was depleted. She rolled her body up into a sitting position and then she stood up. The caboose car was densely packed with cargo, mostly due to them trying to barricade her away from the rest of the trahin, but she wasn't trying to go and find her friends.

There were many questions in her mind, questions she was determined to have answered. Before she met Azur when she was twelve, for two years she was taken care of a sage who was educated in the ways of the four realms and the power that holds them together, the same power that created the two Black Birds, than anyone else she knew. He would be able to help her out, though she doubted that he would want to see her. They didn't exactly leave on the best of terms. The last time she saw him was seven or eight years ago.

Cerisse let her back slam into the locked back door just as she heard thr front one swing open. "Resera." She made sure her whisper was clear. The latch on the door spun to unlock and she pushed it open with a push off her back. There was nothing but cloudy skies beyond the door so she fell. The rain hit her like fiery bullets, biting into her skin. Her body tumbled haphazardly in the air. Out the radius of the two energy-stealers, she felt like air was returning to her lungs plentifully as opposed to the suffocating feeling she felt before.

Her training, before she was taken away from her family, taught her to control the powers inside of her. The power to control the hydrogen-related molecules in the air and sea and change its temperature, and crystallize it. The power to see the waves of sound in the atmosphere and grasp it with her own breath. The power to reflect, absorb, and manipulate all forms of light and coloration. And lastly the power to create growth, stimuli, evolution and more. Her powers were the shadows of her polar opposite, who no doubt, by the way he handled (rather badly) those Furibunda last time, knew not how to harness his own powers.

Part of her told her that it was her job to teach and help him with this. The other part told her that it was better to be away. Apart, they could not be tracked and would remain safe. As a child she was told that they were two halves of a whole, like the whole soulmate theory--one soul inhabiting two bodies. Their bond, their powers, their calling was stronger together. What was the point of being together though if one of them were to die in the process? These thoughts bounced in her head as she crashed through the water and remained submerged. The crash was enough to awaken her senses and give her the strength to rip the bonds that restrained her apart. There were reddened lacerations from when she struggled at first, but all she cared now was that she was free. It was a few minutes later that she broke through the surface and stared up at the sky. The trahin was long gone. It could travel seventy yards in five seconds.

Placing her hand on the water, she made it so a thin sheet of ice formed under it. She climbed up on it and gathered her energy. It wasn't so much, but it would get her where she needed to be. After taking off her padded boots and carrying them in her hands, she walked on the ice, creating more with each step which made a kind of ice bridge though thin and narrow, heading due north.

You should go back.

You finally found each other.

He is your forever!

Her body seemed to inhabit to spirits. The one that was hers with all its logic, rationality, and just plain sanity. And the other one, which was driven on emotion, and desire, and ambition. It rarely made its voice heard but ever since meeting Zeine it never shut up.

*

Zeine heard something from the back of the caboose but before he could check it out, he was impaled from behind by some kind of spear. He grabbed the spearhead and pulled it out from his stomach, turning around. It was those two again, looking disappointed and mad. Something like that should have had him on the floor, gripping for life, but all that remained in his mind was that kiss and the question where is that damn woman? He looked to wear the two stared, still holding the spear by its head. The wound was closing up rapidly. Bone over bone, muscle over muscle, tissue over tissue, blood cell over blood cell, skin over skin, well you get the idea. It felt like his entire body was being struck by thousands of bolts of lightning that should have left him paralyzed or reduced to dust. His attentions turned to his attackers who found this unpleasant though not at all surprised.

The shorter man cursed. "Dammit, they've bonded!" In a puff of smoke similar to the Descension Curse Cerisse put on the two Furi via dagger, the two were gone.

Bonded?

"Bonded?" He repeated in the silence.

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