Tales of Avalon: The Maid and the Falcon

✧ Chapter 1: Beneath Her Wings ✧

Penny woke with a start, panicked at the tight feeling entangling her legs.  She kicked furiously and lashed out, fire roaring to life in the palm of her hand.  The feeling of being bound vanished, and as the sleep cleared from her eyes, Penny realized that she had incinerated the sheets tangled around her legs.

"Lady Penny, what–"  Penny turned to the pale, shaken-looking sylph who had just burst through the door.

"I'm sorry, Willow.  It was... a bad dream."  There was no point in explaining.  No one who was not a Champion could understand the sheer helpless terror in feeling imprisoned.  Despite the fact that she meant well, Willow could not understand, even if Penny explained it to her.  Then Penny remembered the sheets and eyed them with regret.  They had been silk and quite expensive.  "I'm sorry about the sheets, Willow.  Will you have to pay for them?"

"I doubt it, Lady Penny.  Seila is still in charge of the household."

Penny nodded.  Seila was a sylph, like Willow, but unlike Willow, she was universally gentle.  If Seila had the final say, Willow would not even be scolded for her lady's actions.  That would be preferable, but if the Queen learned about the incident, Willow would have to pay the cost of the sheets and more besides, no matter how unheard of it would be for a lady-in-waiting to pay for some damaged sheets.

"Then we will have to be sure this goes no further than Seila."  After a moment of quiet thought, Penny sighed.  "How is she, by the way?"

Willow shook her head slowly, her deep green hair brushing against her paler green face.  "She seems fine, at first glance, but... I think her eyesight is deteriorating, and her hands aren't as sure as before."

"Is there anything that can be done?"  Penny had asked the same question a hundred times, but she always hoped for a different answer.

Willow stared at the ground for a few minutes before replying.  "No, my lady.  Not in Avalon."

"Then somewhere else?"

"I have no idea, but we discussed this last time, Lady Penny.  Avalon still needs her Champion."

Penny sighed, thinking of Seila with her soft purple eyes, glimmering golden face, and wings like a tiger swallowtail's.  Letting Seila die of city consumption was unthinkable; leaving Avalon unprotected was even more so.  Was her only option really to let Seila die so painfully?  She couldn't bear the thought.

Abruptly, Penny stood and pulled her nightgown over her head.  Willow gasped and rushed to the great glass dragonfly wings that formed both the windows and the doors to the balcony, pulling the curtains over them before anyone in the courtyard could catch an improper glimpse of the Champion.  Penny stopped and looked at her nightgown guiltily.  "Sorry, Willow."

Willow settled her delicate, leaflike wings from their outstretched alarm position and sighed, resuming her graceful demeanor.  "Lady Penny, I do wish you would act with some dignity.  After all, as your lady-in-waiting, I would like to be able to act with some dignity, and it is difficult to do so when you make me fling myself across the room."

Penny dipped her head a bit further.  "I know, I know."  Her voice sank.  "I just... I couldn't stand thinking about Seila."

"I know that.  Your heart is good, even if your head is impulsive."  Willow smiled slightly.  "Now, you should hurry and get ready.  You have a long journey today, if I'm not mistaken."

Penny nodded.  "Right, the ambassadors from Marel."  She had been ordered to accompany them from the borders of Avalon to the gates of Crista Magna, the capitol.  With a sigh she began unbraiding her flaming orange hair, considering how to best complete her mission as Champion of Avalon.