Crusaders of Sky

Chapter 1

          Sunlight wafted in through my bedroom window. The shining ray hit the floor at an angle, breaking up the shadows that had been occupying my room all through the night. It seemed that I should get out of bed. I had been laying there all night, contemplating my future. Dust particles could now be seen in the sunbeam as I lazily got out of bed and yawned. My room really wasn't too exciting. Just a wooden bedframe and mattress on a wooden floor, with a crude window, not filled with glass like many of our neighbours' windows. A dresser lined one wall, filled with my clothing and topped by a few wooden sculptures which my father had carved for me in his spare time, which he has lots of. 

          I fixed the sheets on my bed and left the room. Insomnia was common for me lately. We had always managed to get by in life, at least until the Emperor decided to start collecting taxes from our lowly town of Westford, which is widely known as one of the poorest villages in all of Skyloom. For a long time, the Emperor had simply left our town alone, letting us live our lives the best we could. But recently, the Emperor suddenly decided he needed to build more buildings, taller ones, to support more families. As a man of Science, my father scoffed. He thinks that there's more out there in the atmosphere. In fact, He wrote a letter to the Emperor the other day saying that his "band of scientists" would help with building a device if the Emperor was interested. Honestly, my father's the only real scientist in Westford. The other people making up his society are mostly farmers and lumberjacks, but they decided to help because they don't agree with the Emperor either. 

          Neither do I. Skyloom is becoming overpopulated, and also eroded. Skyloom is becoming older by the year, and more trees have been cut down, causing more erosion. A new law was made that trees can't be cut less than five kilometers from the edge, and that more need to be planted there every year. But, now that the Emperor has tried to populate more of Skyloom, that's where most of the trees are. So, many of the lumberjacks in Westford have fallen on harder times, including some of my dad's friends. And so I agree with my father over the Emperor.

          But exploring further than Skyloom would require some sort of flying device. No humans have ever flown in history. The closest we've come is getting lots of people and a sheet, getting someone to sit on it, and pulling the edges quickly away. This is meant to hoist someone up so that they can reach fruit from a tree if no one has a ladder. But that would never be able to hoist someone off the ground so that they can soar. 

          The door opened. Edwyn entered the cottage.  He was holding a basket of fruit. I didn't have to worry about him being hoisted up in the air. Luckily, my dad's friend, Morak, built us a ladder a few months ago. Edwyn's smile seemed to make our dark lives brighter. For my ten year old younger brother, he was very clever and was able to help make even the saddest person in the village happy. The elders realized this a year ago or two when Edwyn saw a little girl crying. He went over to her, and started telling a story about the wind, and how it kept Skyloom in the air. It probably wasn't true that the wind kept Skyloom in the air, as it was barely ever windy, but the story put a smile on the child's face in a mere few minutes. The child turned out to be the granddaughter of one of the elders, and when he found out, he decided to get Edwyn to tell stories at their monthly gathering.

          But most of all, Edwyn was able to make me smile. He was also good with jokes, and my sense of humor was fueled by his. Sometimes we would spend hours in a day telling jokes to one another. And he was a harder worker than me. One example is that he got himself up before me, to go to the orchard and pick arborberries this morning. I got out of bed when the sun rose, but I did so mostly because I had stayed up for a long time when it set. Dad had told me to stay in bed until the sun rose so that I wouldn't be too tired to do any chores. That was another thing about me. I was a master at making excuses, just as much as dad was a master at making sure people pitched in. Half the time my excuses were effective, but the rest of the time, I would have to work like a pack mule from before dawn until sunset. The orchard of Westford bore fruit every morning. Dad said that it's because there isn't too much fertile soil in Skyloom, so the trees adapted to bear fruit more often. It was useful to us, because we could sell the fruit in other towns without orchards, and get enough money to live on for the month.