Maverick took off out of the fortress and high into the air before heading south towards the coast, following the river through the hills and into the plains. Maverick had flown this route many times while heading to his birth town of Porcur. The sun was sinking in the sky and just getting to the point where its bright yellow rays turned orange and started to cast a long shadow over the land. With the cool breeze seemingly pushing his body towards the coast, Maverick felt that it was going to be a peaceful evening. Eventually the river canyon gave way to the ever stretching plains that tracked all the way to the coast, just as he cleared the end of the canyon he noticed a smoke plume rising out of the hills to the east.

Maverick thought nothing of it at first, for it was the beginning of hunting season after all and having a hunting party camping out with a small fire was not unheard of. He continued his flight south until he realized there was too much smoke for a simple camp fire. In fact the smoke was beginning to fill the sky at an alarming rate. Quickly he shifted his weight and caught a breeze towards the darkening cloud of smoke.

As he cleared the last hill he shuddered slightly. The smoke was billowing from a series of wagons that had circled up for the night. Maverick landed gently just outside the ring of wagons, his great wings folded in behind him. From around his neck he pulled out a silver whistle, the whistle of the Guardians. He started to blow into in a pattern that only other guardians could hear or understand. Maverick hoped another Guardian was on patrol close by so they could lend backup, in the meantime Maverick decided to investigate. He pulled his sword out from his sheath strapped to his leg. As he moved around the burning wagons he heard the high pitched screech of a whistle answering his call. Maverick walked out back to the clearing where he landed. Using his sword, he reflected the fading sun’s light towards the approaching Guardian, alerting them to his location.

“Well well, what did you find now?” said the other Guardian as she landed gracefully beside him. She gazed over the burning wagons before casting her brown eyes on him. Her sly smile turned into a frown when she realized that he was not looking at her and instead looking towards the fire.

“What do you think happened here?” she said dropping the flirty act and speaking plainly.

“I don’t know. There are no bodies, no tracks, nothing but burned carriages,” Maverick said as he walked closer to one of the burning carriages and tried to see if there was anything inside. He turned around just in time to see Lauraine, with her back to him, stretch with her hands reaching up to the sky and her golden colored wings spreading their full span out to her sides. He did not miss the slight forward bend she did. Of the Guardians he knew, she was the most flirtatious. She was never far from a group of guys, most of whom spent their time coming up with reasons why she should be with them instead of others. Maverick shook his head clearing his mind and picked a stick up from off the ground and started poking through the flames.

Lauraine turned around to face Maverick after her long stretch, wearing the most innocent look she could pull off, only to realize once again that Maverick was staring into the fire. Frustrated, she stormed off to the opposite side of the camp.

The campsite was situated between a series of low hills that covered the eastern landscape. A number of small trees were scattered along the trails that lead through the land, this particular site had a large clump of them near the entrance to the site. Lauraine moved towards the clump of trees still disgruntled over the fact that Maverick was ignoring her. As the last of the sun’s rays disappeared behind the horizon something moved in the trees making the branches shake.

“Aaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!” she screamed, dropping to the ground and pulling her wings over herself.

“Hahahaha!”

Lauraine peered out from under her wing to see Maverick bent over laughing.

“I could have died!” she screamed, only to see Maverick point to the trees on the other side of her. She turned to look, only to see a squirrel sitting on a branch staring at her with its head tilted slightly to one side. Embarrassed she pulled herself off the ground and dusted herself off. She glared towards Maverick who was trying unsuccessfully to compose himself.

“The great Guardian, floored by a squirrel looking for his nuts…. Hahahaha!” he burst out laughing again, ignoring her death glare. “The High Hall will sing hymns of this day, commemorating your brave efforts against the dangerous squirrel”

“Shut up! For all I knew it could have been someone trying to kill me.”

“Next time they should hire more squirrels,” said Maverick still laughing.

“Oww!” he stopped laughing and grabbed his arm where the rock hit. He looked up just in time to see Lauraine hurl another rock towards him, hitting him square in the chest.

“Alright, alright, I’m sorry, just stop throwing rocks,” he said rubbing his chest and arm.

Lauraine smiled triumphantly and dropped the third rock she had picked up. By this time the fires had died down quite a bit with only a stray flame rising from the smoldering ashes of the wagons. The moon, chasing the sun’s path was slowly ascending into the night sky. Lauraine walked over to where Maverick stood and sat down next to the embers. Maverick looked at her seriously for the first time. She was as beautiful as everyone said she was, but there was something about her, something that turned him off.

Lauraine sat quietly and watched Maverick walk around the camp making sure it was secure. She knew that she should join him in checking the area but she had become so tired that she could not muster the energy to move around. Still sitting next to the embers, Lauraine began untying her leather jerkin finally managing to pull it off after much effort. Having wings certainly had its downsides she thought. Every morning and every night it was an enormous task to get dressed and undressed. Trying to do it sitting down and by yourself made it that much harder.

Lauraine breathed a sigh of relief when she felt the cool breeze against her body. Her loose white undershirt was stained with sweat, a problem she would normally address immediately, but tonight she didn’t care. Her hair was matted with dirt and sweat as she let it down and laid down against her leather jerkin. She stared blankly into the sky while playing hide and seek with the stars that were gleaming between the billows of smoke rising from the smoldering fire.

Maverick stopped examining their surroundings to look at where Lauraine had gotten too. He saw her lying back on the ground and moved towards her debating if he should ask if she was okay or not. He thought better of it, thinking it was just another ploy to try to get his attention. He kept looking around until he was satisfied that whomever had done this had left the area. As he moved behind the smoking carriages he came up behind Lauraine. He was going to crack a joke about her looks but as he got closer Maverick realized she was already asleep.

He tucked his sword back into his sheath and walked closer until he was right next to her. He pulled off his jerkin and let it fall to the ground. His bare chest tightened in the cool night air while his arm muscles twitched anxiously. He stretched his arms out to the side, then his wings unfolded and stretched out as well. It felt good as the blood rushed into his outstretched body, relaxing the twitches he had.

Lauraine woke from her light sleep to see Maverick standing beside her with his wings displayed to the sides. This was the first time she took notice of the color in them. She always assumed that they were jet black, but now seeing them with the moonlight reflecting off them she saw that they were so much more. The back feathers were complemented with streaks of dark blue at the base of each feather, they even seemed to sparkle in the light, as if they had been coated in silver dust. Above the wings even his short black hair seemed to shine in the night. The color was black yet there was more to it than that. Lauraine looked at her own hair and wings; she had been blessed with rare golden wings and hair. Yet compared to Mavericks they were so boring. Nothing shined about them, nothing sparkled. They were boring and she hated it. She looked up one more time to see Maverick still standing there. She was envious of him, for the first time in her life she felt like the homely one.

Disgusted with herself she folded her wings around her like a shell. Maverick turned at the sudden noise of someone moving. He looked down at her, now covered by her wings. Never had he seen her like this, she was always up and around proudly displaying herself to whomever was around. He shook his head clearing his mind of such thoughts and settled down on the ground a few feet away from her. His eyes slowly closed as he watched an owl fly silently high overhead.

Lauraine woke up to the rising sun. She rose to her feet and dusted herself off before looking around for Maverick. He was nowhere to be seen however, she walked around looking for marks on the ground until she was able to find the spot where he had fallen asleep.

“What the hell!” Lauraine yelled seeing that Maverick had clearly woken up earlier than her and left.

“I am going to kill him,” she finished before turning around and walking straight into something. She looked up from the ground where she had fallen to see Maverick staring at her with one of his eyebrows cocked.

“Murder seems a bit extreme, especially when that person you want to kill brought you breakfast,” he said holding up two freshly caught rabbits.

“Well you could have at least told me you were going out,” she responded, trying not to blush from her embarrassment.

“What, afraid I was going to leave you?”

“No.”

“Whatever you say princess,” Maverick said while giving her a mock bow. He sat down next to one of the burnt carriages, poking at the embers and adding some more wood to the pile, he managed to get a small fire going.

“I am not a princess!” Lauraine retorted, kicking Maverick in the back and then walking over to where her jerkin lay in the dirt.

Maverick opened his mouth to respond but he could not think of anything to say. He looked over his shoulder towards her, she was standing over her jerkin just staring down at it. Maverick shook his head and started skinning the rabbits.

After he had managed to get the prepared rabbits on the spit to be cooked he looked back to where Lauraine was. She had moved over to where the road crossed the opening the carriages were in. When she turned around to face him he noticed that her jerkin was on, but far from the pressed and clean shape that she always kept it in. He rotated the rabbits on the fire before getting up and heading over to her.

“Alright what’s wrong?”

She looked at him for a minute before looking back into the sky.

“I’m going for a fly,” she said as she spread her wings before Maverick and took off in a gust of air. Sputtering at the dust her take off stirred up, Maverick watched her till she flew out of his sight and over the mountains.

“Damn, she going to get herself killed flying around those mountains,” he said thinking about the legends that surrounded them. No one dared travel too far into the mountains, thick trees and deep caverns lead to ample amounts of hiding places. The problem was that anyone who spent the night on the slopes of the mountains never came back down. The craziest, toughest, and meanest of criminals often ran to their cover to escape from the guardians, and not even they came out alive.

The most notable story of the mountains that Maverick could recall was that of the Black Marauders, a group of raiders that broke out of the prison and ran into the mountains to avoid the Guardians. Only an hour after they had gone in one of the original six men came out covered in blood. His face was torn up and his clothes tattered, he collapsed in front of the soldiers, dead. As far as anyone knew, he was the only man to make it out of the mountains alive, even if it was barely.

By the time the rabbits were done cooking Maverick heard the beating of wings coming towards him. When he looked up he saw Lauraine flying down from the mountains. He grabbed one of the rabbits and tore a piece off it, chewing it as she came in for a landing next to him.

“Miss me?” she asked innocently.

“Were you gone that long?” he said dryly looking up at the sun to try and judge how long she had been gone. She glared at him, walked over and grabbed the rabbit out his hand and took a bite out of it.

“How lady like.”

She glared at him again and took another bite of rabbit before throwing it back at him. He caught it, looked down to see the two huge chunks of meat missing from the rabbit. Maverick pulled off a piece and popped it into his mouth. He turned around to face Lauraine,

“You need to head back to Yyree and tell the Council what happened here.”

“What? Why me? Where are you going?”

“Home, I am on leave for a week,” he said with a small smile.

“Oh…. What is at home?” she asked quietly.

Maverick paused and looked up at the morning sun.

“It’s where I grew up. It has has a lot of memories there for me.”

Lauraine looked down at the ground. She had come from a broken home, her mother had been killed in a bandit raid when she was ten, and her father was a cruel man who exploited everyone he knew. At least he did before he was run through with a sword. She never had the family she wanted; she was ashamed of her past and tried to hide it as well as she could. Though, everyone knew the truth about her, they had learned not to bring it up.

Maverick was still looking over the sky when he felt a burst of air against his body. He looked over to where Lauraine had been standing to now see her flying away from him towards the capital of Yyree.

“Well goodbye to you too,” he called up after her, knowing she would not hear him. He looked off in the direction of his home and with a sigh of relief spread his wings and took off into the morning sky.