Kaia the Argent Wing

Camillo helped me to my feet, only for his eyes to widen as I just kept on going up. “Shit, you're tall— uh, not that that's a bad thing! It's just a surprise…”

I laughed. “Nah, it's okay dude.”

“Silver!”

I turned and met Chloe's fiery gaze.

“Where have you been? People have been saying you were dead!” She demanded, then shook her head. “How are you even surviving out here?”

In the background, I saw April raise an amused eyebrow.

“Uh… I got a little singed, so I was laying low,” I said, giving Chloe a helpless shrug.

I'm sure they'll keep buying it and this won't become a larger problem as time progresses.

Shut up Cynath!

“Laying low?” She asked, rolling her eyes. “At least let us know you're alive!”

In my head, I was gearing up to argue, but then I just sighed. “You know what, fair.”

Throwing her hands into the air, she turned and stalked a few strides away, then whirled and scowled at me. “You’re infuriating to deal with, you know that?”

I was so confused.

I stared at her for several seconds, then shrugged mentally and turned my attention to everyone else. “So what are you all doing out here?”

“Getting materials for the steam engine we want to build,” April said, still smiling with unvoiced amusement.

“Oh…” I said, trailing off. I wasn't sure what to do or say, now. Did I help? I guess I should, but…

“I'm Camillo, by the way,” my helpful healer friend said. “The girl with the blunt object is Ollie. The dark and pretty girl is Immie. Then there's Alec the cocky one, and Scott the shifty one.”

“Shifty?” Scott sputtered.

I couldn't help it. It just slipped out before any sort of filter could be applied to my mouth. “Oh, I can definitely see the shiftiness. Scotty the Shifty.”

A few of my friends laughed, while the others grinned at the joke.

Scott placed a hand over his heart like he'd been wounded. “Excu—”

He didn't get to finish his protestation, because Camillo rolled on into an introduction of the others in the group. Two middle aged dudes stood near the back of the group, looking way out of their element, but the last three were people I recognised. It was the soldiers, including Toby.

“Damn, you have some moves, girl!” He said when the introductions were over. “Wish we'd had you when we were running for our lives through the countryside.”

“I'm nothing special. Just lucky,” I shrugged awkwardly.

“She’s just being modest,” One of the men I didn't recognise said vehemently, stepping forward to pin me with a stare. “You're a damned angel. An agent of god— The goddess. You saved the whole of Edgewood. You're like some sort of figure from legend, come to life.”

I stared down at the snow, unable to think of anything to say in return. This man wasn't quite old enough to be my father, but it was close, and that made the whole situation even more uncomfortable.

“Let’s get moving,” April said, before anyone said anything else weird. “I need the big old natural gas container from the yard, and we should probably load both of these scrap corpses onto the trolleys too.”

 

We pillaged the shop yard for as much crap as we could cram onto the six heavy duty trolleys they brought, then left before anything else could come and cause problems.

A problem that I hadn’t considered was the snow making it hard to pull the trolleys, but thankfully the group already had a solution—April. Her class was progressing to the point where she could create a steady aura of heat that she’d used to melt a path to the shop. All that we had to do was follow that path back to Edgewood.

When we got back, I tried to keep my head down as we delivered the scrap to the workshop, but it was futile. I shouldn't have been surprised, considering my tall, strong, and curvy figure, plus the shining silver hair. Who would miss that?

There were a lot of folks bundled up in warm clothing while practising with their new classes out on the field. Spells flew downrange under the watchful eye of two firefighters, and one by one the would-be warriors noticed my presence. Some just stared for a minute, then went back to their training. Others continued to stare for far longer, and a few decided to approach cautiously.

“You're really Silver?” A woman who could've been my mother asked when she was close enough to talk normally.

Internally steeling myself, I nodded. “Yeah.”

"Lord have mercy, it's a relief to see you alive," she drawled with a hesitant smile. "Folks have been saying the big snow bird got you in that tussle with the monsters. I wouldn't aim to trouble an angel like yourself, but this storm's becoming a real problem. Think you and your goddess can do something about it?"

“Um… that bird is a demigod and I'm just one girl…” I hedged apologetically. “Obviously we'll try… but it might have to be a team effort.”

“Well, we Wooders know a thing or two about coming together in a crisis, so that ain't off the table,” she replied.

Wooders. That was a new name… and not a particularly glamorous one either. Although, Edgewood wasn't exactly the most fortunate of names, so the bar was pretty low.

“Yeah!” Someone said from back in the growing crowd. “Let's go cook that bird now! Our new lady went and done give us magic spells! We can take it!”

“Um… you might need to level up first,” I said, amused at their enthusiasm. “When everyone is a bit tougher we can talk to the Captain about putting together a group.”

“Like an old posse!” The same voice laughed.

Oh goddess. In what world had it been a good idea to let these small town Kentucky folks cast fireballs?

“Angel Silver, Angel Silver!” Another voice called, and I turned to meet the desperate eyes of a woman in her early thirties. “Angel…”

“Hey…” I said awkwardly, watching out of the corner of my eye as my friends began sorting and storing the scrap.

“My husband went out alone after he got his new magic saying he wanted to practise on ‘real monsters’,” she explained, anxiety twisting her features. “He's been gone since early morning. Please can you go and find him?”

I blinked at her. “Uh… which way did he go?”

“Uh, I'm not sure,” said the woman, wringing her hands.

I winced. Chances were I'd never find him if I went looking. maybe I could ask the guards, see if they saw anyone…

“Your fool husband is probably just looting the Chesters’ place for that grill he was always talkin’ about,” someone called.

The worried wife shot venom into the crowd with a glare. “What would he do with that grill now? We're running low on food in the kitchens anyway!”

That caused a restless stir, and I knew I had to do something.

“Alright folks, thanks for coming to say hi, but I'm actually busy. Get back to practising and we'll see if we have enough competent fighters to take on the bird later, okay?” I shouted.

Once the crowd had finally dispersed, I turned my attention back to the anxious woman. “I'm sorry, but without a direction to look and an idea of what he was going to do, I'd just end up as scorpion bait trying to look for your husband.”

Her expression crumpled. “That's what the captain said.”

“I know it was a bit of a meme before the big storm, but you could try praying to Cynath,” I said solemnly. “Knowing that she might actually be listening and willing to help…”

“But Paster Thomas…” she said, conflicted.

“Screw him,” I said with a dismissive wave. “It's worth a try, okay?”

If she does pray, I can attempt to locate and guide the man, Cynath said reluctantly into my head.

I nodded as she gave confirmation. “Yup, Cynath just said in my head that she's willing to listen to prayers. She's still recovering from her long absence as a godly figure, but she might be able to help.”

“Long absence?”

“Yeah, she used to be called Ishtar back in the day,” I explained. “From before Christ, when the old testament stuff was happening. She was a powerful goddess back then, but since people forgot her she lost a lot of her power.”

Hope returned to the woman's eyes. “So my prayers can help her? Then she can find my husband?”

The more people pray, the better.

I nodded and gave an encouraging smile. “She says the more people praying, the better.”

“Oh, thank you!” She said, and turned, rushing back towards the main school building.

I watched her go, hoping that the prayers of her and whoever she got to help her were enough to see her husband safely back to Edgewood. Then the Captain could tell him off for being an idiot. What kind of—

“Excuse me, Miss Silver?”

I turned and found another scared, hopeful face peering at me from within a bundle of coat and scarf. Behind them, another three people were waiting, all with a similar expression. Ah, shit.