As the sun began to dip behind the jagged peaks of the Tayrangi territory, the sky transformed into a bruising palette of violet and molten gold. The constant gales of the canyon, which usually roared like a caged beast, softened into a cooling breeze. For the first time since his arrival, the air felt tranquil—not a threat to be managed, but a medium to be explored.
Saeyla found Mark near the edge of the docking platforms. He was sitting with his legs dangling over a three-thousand-foot drop, his eyes fixed on the horizon where the floating mountains—the Hallelujah Mountains—drifted like slumbering giants against the orange glow.
"You look as though you are trying to pull the sky closer with your eyes," Saeyla said, her voice a soft melody against the wind. Her ikran, a sleek creature with wings the color of a stormy sea and markings like shattered glass, let out a low, vibrating trill behind her.
"I'm just... I'm trying to calculate the orbital resonance of Polyphemus against the sunset," Mark admitted, his eyes flickering cyan as the System struggled to process the sheer beauty of the light. "But the math doesn't do it justice. It's like the atmosphere is literally burning, but without the heat."
Saeyla smiled, a daring spark in her golden eyes. She didn't care for his numbers, but she cared for the way they made him look—as if he were seeing the world for the first time. "Stop calculating, Mark Turner. Come."
She didn't wait for an answer. She vaulted onto her ikran's back and reached out a hand. Mark hesitated, looking at the sheer drop and then at the massive, powerful predator. The trust he saw in Saeyla's gaze, however, was more compelling than his fear. He took her hand and climbed up behind her, his arms wrapping instinctively around her waist.
Flight through the Floating Rocks:
With a powerful snap of its wings, the ikran lunged into the abyss. Mark's stomach did a somersault as they plummeted, gravity momentarily losing its grip, only to be caught by a warm updraft that sent them soaring upward.
"Look!" Saeyla shouted over the rush of the wind.
They wove between the massive, moss-covered boulders that hung suspended in the air. Mark watched in awe as the System highlighted the magnetic flux lines—invisible ribbons of energy—keeping the rocks afloat. They flew so close to one that Mark could see the individual wood-sprites drifting in the shade of its underside, their bioluminescence beginning to wake as the light faded.
Saeyla banked hard, the ikran's wings nearly brushing a waterfall that spilled from the side of a floating island. The water didn't just fall; it shattered into a million diamond-like droplets that caught the dying sunlight, creating a shimmering veil of gold. She steered the creature into a hidden grotto tucked behind the falls, landing on a ledge slick with mist and glowing with azure moss.
They sat in silence for a moment, the roar of the water providing a rhythmic, heavy heartbeat to the quiet. Saeyla looked at Mark, her face wet with spray. "Do you see it now? Not the 'flux lines' or the 'resonance.' Do you see why we fight for the sky? Why we do not let the metal-men touch it?"
Mark looked at her, and for the first time, his HUD went dark. He didn't need the data. He reached out, his fingers brushing the cool, damp moss. "I see it, Saeyla. It's... it's everything. It's the first time I've felt like I'm actually here, and not just looking through a screen."
She leaned closer, her presence warm and grounding. In the twilight, the bioluminescent dots on her skin pulsed in time with her breath, a soft violet glow that seemed to harmonize with the grotto. She felt a profound comfort with him, a bridge between her wild, instinct-driven world and his strange, analytical mind. For a few minutes, the war, the clans, and the RDA didn't exist.
The Return and the Sentence:
The flight back was quiet, the sky fading into a deep, velvety indigo. But as the docks of the Tayrangi came into view, the peace was shattered. The village wasn't asleep; it was waiting.
Standing on the main platform was Olo'eyktan Rì'al. He stood like a statue carved from obsidian, his arms crossed over his broad chest. Beside him, Kìreysì looked down at his feet, his posture radiating a desperate, silent warning.
As Saeyla landed and Mark dismounted, his legs feeling heavy and clumsy after the grace of flight, the atmosphere turned arctic. Rì'al's eyes moved from his daughter's wind-swept hair to Mark, his expression one of suppressed, volcanic fury.
"You take the Dreamwalker into the sacred heights without leave?" Rì'al's voice was a low growl that vibrated through the wooden platform beneath Mark's feet. "You show him the veins of our home while the sky-demons still hunt for our blood? You bring a ghost into the heart of the mountains?"
"He is not a demon, Father!" Saeyla protested, stepping firmly in front of Mark, her tail lashing with defiance. "He is learning. He sees what we see!"
Rì'al stepped forward, his shadow towering over them both, blotting out the remaining starlight. He looked at Mark with a gaze so sharp it felt like a physical weight on his chest. "He is a guest of the healers, Saeyla, not a pilot of the Tayrangi. You forget your place. You forget that he carries the taint of the ones who burned the forest."
Then, Rì'al turned his full, terrifying attention to Mark. He raised a hand, pointing a long, trembling finger toward the fleet of Medusoid ships anchored in the bay, their bells pulsing softly in the dark.
"Hear me now, Sky-Ghost," Rì'al thundered, his voice echoing off the canyon walls like a landslide. "You are banished from my ships. You shall not set foot on a single hull, nor touch a single tether of the Windtraders. The secrets of our growth and our flight are closed to you forever."
Mark tried to speak, to explain the "smart materials" or the piezoelectric fibers he had found, but Rì'al's eyes flared with a warning that silenced him.
"If your shadow so much as darkens the deck of a vessel," Rì'al continued, his voice dropping to a deadly hiss, "or if you ever attempt to speak to my daughter again, your life-debt is settled. You will be cast into the abyss without wings, and Eywa will decide if your soul is worth catching. Do not test the patience of the wind, Mark Turner."
Mark went cold, a hollow sensation opening in his chest. He looked at Saeyla, whose eyes were wide with shock and heartbreak, but Rì'al stepped between them, his massive frame a wall of muscle and tradition that cut off their connection.
"Begone to the lower caves," Rì'al commanded. "Before I decide the abyss cannot wait for morning."