After discovering that human minds are created by creatures living in the atmosphere Tonya must discover the truth of who she really is before it's too late.
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Fifteen-year-old Tonya is a neglected teenager from London who...
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Sakuru tried to comfort Muku who wept in her arms. Muku had cried for Tamashi every day since she had disappeared in the storm, pleading with her grandmother to help find her missing sister.
Sakuru knew she was holding onto false hope that her grandaughter hadn't died in the storm that night, but she couldn't bear to tell Muku just yet, she was so young and already been through so much pain.
Sakuru felt helpless as she listened to the foreign sound of explosives as they hissed and cracked in the sky around her.
She had got used to the constant taste of metal in her mouth and the sounds of the bombs overhead, but she could never get used to the sound of the families crying out for loved ones each day as hundreds of dead Samsara bodies floated into space.
Grief had spread like a plague amongst the homes in the city as the war ripped their lives apart.
In normal circumstances Sakuru would have encouraged Oba and Muku to flee and take the dangerous risk to cloud climb to other safer cities across the sky's atmosphere. However, the unusually icy weather conditions meant that they wouldn't get far, and they were afraid they would die on the journey.
As a result, most of the Samsara took cover in their homes, hoping with all their hearts that the bombs wouldn't fall on them and their loved ones.
Sakuru had seen more death in the past couple of weeks than her entire lifetime, so that night she decided to go up and see the Harp. She knew if she told anyone they would think her mad.
The Harp had been dormant for fifteen years, but she was desperate. Her son, and now her granddaughter were both gone, perhaps it was her grief, but she needed answers.
She had never been up to the Harp before, even when it was operating, as usually such a visit was by invitation only. The journey was dangerous and, in the past, had only been undertaken in times of need, but she longed for an answer to its closure and wanted to see it's dilapidated form for herself. Perhaps if she were to touch it, somewhere, someone, would hear her prayers.
Sakuru scratched a note to Oba and Muku into the wall of their living room – she didn't like goodbyes – and left them sleeping in bed as she ventured out into the bitter cold winds of the early-morning sky.
She was lucky that the boulders of crystallised clouds created icy platforms for her to move on and the bombing had seemingly moved onto the other side of the city.
She knew that with the Harp's light out for years no one else would be attempting this treacherous climb, but she was determined to try herself.
She couldn't rely on floating up to space as the winds were too treacherous and could easily blow her to her death, or worse she could get spotted by an Incubus and killed. So, she made the dangerous decision to climb the clouds.
