A Precious Memory

Evil Stairs And Who's Circle

":Another ten minutes of the walk towards the South now that we've reached the North Ford bog entrance."

Tom hummed with a nod, walking after Hadrianus silently, resulting in almost bumping into him when the other teen suddenly stopped.

"What is it?"

"You may want to back off a bit, I'm about to unfurl my wings."

"Why?" Tom asked, baffled, but he did obey and backed off a feet when the majestic pair of gleaming wings unfurled from Hadrianus's back. The dark forest almost lit up from the brilliantly luminescent wings as they fluttered and stretched out behind Hadrianus's back, then folded back in to hang off his shoulder like some sort of fluorescent cape made of pure white feathers.

"I've noticed that all the creatures like my wings, and I'm hoping to befriend one of the shyest of all creatures at the moment." Hadrianus shrugged, the feathery cape moving with the gesture, before he started walking again.

Tom gripped his wand tightly, now on high alert, trying to notice even the slightest change of environment that indicated a bigger predator nearby. If Hadrianus's wings could charm shy creatures like mooncalves, it may attract predators as well. Besides, the light from his wings may capture unwanted attention!

":We're here.:"

Tom followed Hadrianus's eyes to the herd containing at least fifteen mooncalves a few feet ahead in a glade. Their bodies were smooth and pale grey, with bulging round eyes on top of their heads and four spindly legs with enormous flat webbed feet.

As the boys stepped on the glade, they had their attention immediately. A ripple of caution, wariness and intrigue spread across the herd.

To Tom's further surprise, all Hadrianus did was spread some sopophorous beans around himself and then sit down on the glade, folding and arranging his wings to cover himself from the cold midnight breeze.

"What are you doing, sitting on the ground?" Tom hissed, utterly disgusted with such behaviour. "You'll get dirt all over your clothes and wings." Oh, the poor wings!

"Ssh, you'd scare them away. Sit down."

"No." Tom refused to sit on the dirt. Merlin knows what kind of creepy crawlies are roaming on the forest floor.

"Fine. At least stand still, no sudden movement."

That, he could do. Tom sighed, but agreed to do so. Tom stood leaning against the oak tree behind him, switching between watching Hadrianus and the herd. Hadrianus was simply staring at the herd as if waiting for them to make the first move. The only movement was the luminescent feathers swaying with the gentle breeze.

Minutes flew by. The moon rose higher in the sky, the sounds of crickets grew louder as the night slowly progressed. Yet neither the herd of mooncalves, nor the teenager had moved. Tom was admittedly confused.

Slowly but surely the herds' curiosity overcame their wariness, or maybe their interest in the sopophorous beans made them bolder. The biggest mooncalves of the herd cautiously approached Hadrianus, sniffing around him and his wings, before eating the beans from the grounds.

On noticing the humans had not harmed them, the shyer of the herds grew braver. They soon started to approach Hadrianus, eating the beans he had spread just by him while Hadrianus had simply sat on the ground, and stared at them with all the patience of a nun.

Tom watched the scene unfold in awe. It was like watching a master at work. He was mesmerised by those multitudes of colours and patterns of furs on the mooncalves - like, deep blue striped, light blue striped, brown striped, black-spotted, and the silver-white colouration, all gleaming from both the moonlight and the light coming off Hadrianus's wings. He had never seen one so close. He was half tempted to touch them, but did not care enough to actually do so.