The wind scatters beneath my wings, lifting me higher and faster than the one following. Those appendages burn with heavens fire. Yet I feel no pain, only pride, only joy. I could look around, look…mostly for sweet and delicious mice-- or better yet ‘hawks’. Who didn’t love good avian meat? Nobody!! Well….somebody… My bonded didn’t appreciate a good feast; he chose to nibble on ugly looking weeds, day in and day out. Midas didn’t even like to watch me eat, much less kill weaker ‘brothers’and ‘sisters’ that were considered cousins to my species. His feelings are rather disappointing to me…a warm freshly killed blood bag— sent shivers of pleasure down my spine. But it made his mind grow tense, so I kept all these glorious thoughts to myself. Such a pity he didn’t feel as I did. My beak clicks together with justification. I was a leader in this wide sky; everything in it was my prey. Everything! Well….not the dragons or horses. They simply didn’t appreciate being looked at like dinner. Even though they were just as much a prey creature.

Did I mention how much I love….meat?

He often used the words, ‘bonding,’ I wasn’t sure what this meant, nor was I certain why his eyes got all soft and honeyed when I slept near Cera. As if I was an injured creature in need of attention!? Nay, my body was strong and I would show him. I wasn’t a weakling, I would be worthy of his true praise one day and not just his gooey eyes. These nerves could feel each flaming feather, each muscle that stretched from gizzard to beak.

I would show him.
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Fina flew ahead of me, aqua eyes searching not for danger or anything of use. But for nourishment that I didn’t believe she needed. I mentioned this time and time again. ‘You are hunting because you’re bored’, I told her though our soul link, yet my wisdom and images did little to stop her onslaught of tiny innocent creatures. I was growing the opinion that my bonded mostly did one of two things, sleep and eat—and when she wasn’t sleeping, she was eating. One would think with the amount of meat Fina took in every day, she would be a plump little rascal. But no, this little phoenix didn’t get fat; if anything she got longer and stronger. Talons grew sharp, and mind even sharper. She was growing bolder by the day, testing the limits of my patience by diving for earth at heart wrenching speeds and then pulling up at the last possible second to speed off into the distance, a laughter trailing in her wake.

Together we went along in silence, simply enjoying the company of each other. Until a wide span of blue ignited the distant horizon and always stirred heart into a sense of admiration. Two figures walked the beach, both of which appeared small, and featureless at our height. My little bonded took off, speeding toward the fish she could surely smell. I banked right and followed the edge of timber, lingering…debating. Debating only until I noticed that the two that lingered on said beach were known by me. In polite greeting I called out to them from above, my wings thrust to carry me nearer, “Apollo, Nadira, hope your day is faring well."