Chapter 2 continues

A posting from "William" who graciously has offered to assist in this effort:

Her talons barely touched the ground when she saw him run to the courtyard, grinning broadly but showing no teeth. She swept her long, slender wings to the rear and with a gentle push she was off the ground and rising into the blue sky, circling over the courtyard below. Her hazel eyes swept the horizon and returned to the figure on the ground.

She was a magnificent creature, not large or small but somewhere between. Her color was a piercing saphire that was easily distinguished from the sky that surrounded her, although as she gained great height she became harder to spot against the sun. She used the sun to shield her approach as her color was no camouflage at all.

She was on her second human, a strange species to be sure, but that was her destiny. She had lived a long time and longed for a relationship like the Black had with his human. She was almost too high to see from the ground before her rider could question her uncharacteristic whimsical behavior. "We were on the ground, what on earth are you doing?" he asked, truly astonished that she had taken flight again without a hint of notice. Again she scanned the horizon with those sharp eyes. She was going to be sure that no harm would come to them, to him, not before she had the chance to again gain the sky to sound the alarm and act. No, there was no danger there, not within sight, not for awhile. She looked back to the ground and with the graceful movement of a dancer, she stood on one wing and with a pirouette, spiraled to the ground, touching gently down again, not raising a hint of a breeze with her powerful wings.

There he was, now standing with his hands on his hips looking at her, all eyes looking at her as if to ask, "What in the world was that all about?" No one would know. She wouldn't let them know. Not now.