Teach Me Magic - Teach Me How To Fly

11th Tea part two

It was a matter of seconds and mutual animal understanding. Da Qing himself was amazed at how this actually worked. A second later and there would be a tragedy. But neither him nor the griffins were ready to watch the kind and understanding wizzard that always brought special treats for them, get hurt. Even risking revealing his ultra-secret humanoid form was secondary for the spymaster at this moment.

Seeing the trouble arise, Da Qing quickly changed into his black cat form and sniffed the air, yes, the griffins were somewhere around. He meowed anxiously, hoping they will hear him over the excited crowd. And by some kind of a miracle, they appeared almost immediately, picking up the meows of the well-known black cat amongst the vicious screams. There was a strange quick understanding between the three animals and in a few seconds, Da Qing found himself riding atop Black Rose, heading for the ramparts. They had not a single second to spare. The village people had just breached the main gate when the dapple grey feathers appeared over the castle. Da Qing jumped down from Black Rose and changed to his humanoid form mid-air. He drew out a dagger and burried it in Reiwal's kidneys at the same moment his agile legs touched the ground. He managed to wrestle the blade Shen Wei was being threatened with out of the captor's hand but the wizzard was still forced over the battlements. Da Qing stared at his fall with wide eyes, the few milliseconds feeling like eternity. However, soon he was had to defend himself against Reiwal's last try in retaliation.

Then a whiff of strong wind disheveled Da Qing's hair and snow-white wings ascended from below. "Yes, you caught him!" Da Qing yelled joyfully and dexterously evaded an incomming blow. Spinning slightly he kicked Reiwal into his stomach, making him stagger. Since, they'd already saved Shen Wei and the townsfolk burst inside wrecking havoc all around, there was no need for him, so he jumped down to the middle of the chaos and disappeared in the crowd.

Seeing their griffins swoop in at the last second, Zhu Hong let out a sigh while Zhao Yunlan sprang up, loudly cheering for Snowhite and Rosie. "Those are OUR girls!"

Shen Wei himself, having already parted with this life in his mind when he lost balance and fell down, was quite surprised when something caught him by his clothes and flew with him back towards the forrest. Looking up, he saw Snowhite and her proud golden eyes checking on him briefly, as she held him in her beak.

"Thank you!" he called out to her.

Snowhite averted her eyes, pretending she doesn't care of this half-elf one bit.

Meanwhile, Rosie joined the flight merrily, doing various stunts in the air to show off in front of Shen Wei but he somewhat wasn't in the mood, only hoping Snowhite doesn't let go of him or that his robes won't give way.

A few minutes later, he was gently placed in front of the temple. He sat down right away, as his legs felt too shaky for standing. He took a deep breath, taking in the fresh forrest air, enjoying the sensation of a gentle breeze carressing his face soothingly.

"I... I cannot thank you enough..." he lowered his head in front of the two griffins.

Snowhite turned her head away uninterested or maybe perhaps a bit embarrassed. Rosie already found a huge tree branch, starting to play with it.

Shen Wei sighed with a tender smile. At one point, he thought these creatures surely understood everything, but the next second, they behaved like normal animals, not caring for his gratitude.

About two hours later, Zhao Yunlan arrived at the temple, along with Zhu Hong and Da Qing - already in his cat form again. Zhao Yunlan ran inside, finding Shen Wei talking to the head priest.

"Ha! There you are!" He exclaimed, then stopped in his tracks, seeing the head priest. He bowed to the temple master first, then apologized. "I am sorry for my behaviour."

"Your behaviour?" the head priest raised his eyebrows before smiling because Zhao Yunlan hurried to tightly hug his Shen Wei. "Oh, that is fine. Shen Wei was just telling me what happened. Black magic going on in the castle... Still, your methods, Captain Zhao seem... unorthodox. Almost illegal."

The griffin rider smirked and finally let go of Shen Wei. "Definitely illegal, Master David. But Capitol is far away and the matter was pressing. The tragedy concerned the folk here, not the officials in the Palace of Justice. Isn't it only fair, they were given the chance to pass on the judgement as they saw fit?"

The headpriest frowned. "However, that is why the law exists. Not everyone is fit to pass punishment onto others."

"Tell that to all the maidens that would be murdered until The Court would eveb start debating whether they want to investigate a crime concerning an aristocrat!" Slightly agitated, Yunlan felt Shen Wei squeeze his arm to calm him down.

"Master David is concerned for us, we realize that. Thank you very much." Shen Wei bowed his head respectfully, tugging at Yunlan's coat to do the same.

The headpriest sighed, shaking his head. "I hope, Captain realizes that his position is not bulletproof. This will surely have consequences when you come back to Capitol..."

"I will deal with consequences as they come," Zhao Yunlan nodded and bowed as well.

The headpriest inwardly sighed again. This head-srong young man will surely pay for his confidence and recklessness one day. Let's hop Capitol will leave out their temple. Afterall, it was him who suggested these two investigate the problem of missing girls... Sadly, nobdy consulted him with the highly unethical plan the Captain came up with. If only General Zhao knew how his son is destroying the fragile political balance in the West... But better not be the one who lets the choleric army leader know first...

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Da Qing lazed around in his cat form on Zhao Yunlan's lap, enjoying his deserved back rub, purring. "Mnn... more to the left..."

"Fatso..." Yunlan smiled, complying. "You did good today. Black Rose and Snowhite as well. You saved my wizzard, I won't forget that."

"I'll be sure to call on that favour soon!" Da Qing started to lightly nip with his claws at the man's pants. "Say, Lao Zhao... I hate the smell of burning flesh..."

Captain frowned. "Me, too, fatso... me, too... I can't say I'm happy about the outcome but we did let the people take justice in their own hands."

"They wanted to hurt Shen Wei, too." Da Qing's cat eyes met Yunlan's who frowned.

"I know. I know that... they would probably burn him at the stake, too if they could, right?" It wasn't a question he needed an answer to. Most likely, he'd already known it by heart. "Say, let's not tell Shen Wei how it truly ended, okay? Let's tell him something like that Lady Elisabeth will be in prison for the rest of her life and her butler got beheaded? No need to unsettle Shen Wei even more."

Da Qing snorted displeased. "You know, Lao Zhao... This is the second secret you want me to keep from Shen Wei... Are you sure about that? Doesn't sound healthy to me. He's a man as well, you know. And even as a wizzard, he can stand his ground during a fight. It seems to me, you keep treating him as some princess that you want to keep caged up and restrained in a glass castle."

"Caged up and restrained?" Zhao Yunlan took a sip of the calming chamomille tea. "Heh... somewhat I get the idea it would very well be the other way around..."

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Uff! Finally an update, am I right? XD I somewhat wasn't sure what I was doing with this chapter, so I instead decided for some foreshadowing...