Kealen's Arc

Chapter 1 of 1

Kealen wanted to win the sky-riders' championship, the race that crowned the best athlete across every realm of the Aetheria Expanse. But you could not race without a sky-mount, and Kealen had none. The qualifying trials opened in three days. He stood at the cliffside stables with every coin he owned knotted in a cloth, and it was not enough. The breeder ran the finest racing stock in the realm. Her stalls clung to the rock face, weathered wood and stone, hay stacked in every window. Winged mounts stamped and snorted behind the gates. She counted his coins twice, then pushed them back across the rail. "This buys you a saddle," she said. "Not the beast under it." She wiped her hands on her apron and looked at his gold ear stud like she might weigh that too. "Trained racers cost ten times what you're holding. Come back when you're a man with a purse." Kealen felt the heat climb his neck. He was tall, built to ride, and he had trained his whole life for this. But talent bought nothing here. He gathered his coins and walked out before his face could betray him. He did not go home. He went to the mountain. Everyone knew the peak crowned with cloud bands. Wild sky-mounts nested in its high crags, unclaimed and untamed. Breeders called them worthless, too fierce to train. Kealen called them free. He climbed until the air thinned and the clouds wrapped the stone like wool. On a ledge near the summit, he found one. A young sky-mount, gray as ash, one wing scarred and half-folded. It hissed and backed against the rock. The scar was why no breeder had taken it. It was also why it was still here. Kealen crouched low. He did not grab. He held out a strip of dried meat from his pack and waited. The wind pushed at his back. The creature watched him with yellow eyes. An hour passed. His legs burned. He stayed down. The sky-mount stepped forward. It snatched the meat and flinched away, then crept back for more. Kealen laid his palm flat on the cold stone between them. Slowly, the creature pressed its nose to his hand. He climbed onto its back before nightfall. The first leap off the ledge nearly threw him. The scarred wing beat uneven, and they dropped hard before it caught the air. But it caught. They flew, ragged and low, back down the mountain as the light failed. Kealen had his mount. He could enter the trials now. But the wing would not hold a full race, and he had three days to fix what no breeder could. He landed in the dark and pressed his hand to the scar, and the sky-mount let him.