"What about this one?” Elia muttered to herself, levitating a spare screen over her prototype. She analyzed the screen with extreme care, practically gluing her eyes to the glass frame as she considered its possible inclusion from all possible angles – overall design, manufacturing cost and quality control – but ultimately shook her head and discarded it, letting it crash into the bucket with the rest of the unwanted frames. This one wasn’t fitting her standards either. It had a smudge.

She pushed off her naum rings onto her work desk, removing her ability to levitate objects about, and ran her fingers through her kinky black hair anxiously. If she was to make a comeback on the international stage, her invention had to be flawless! Not only that, but this prototype had to be completed by tomorrow; Big Sister Soránne was going to be assessing it. It took weeks of planning and constructing to get it to this stage. However, if she brought it the way it currently was, incomplete and sloppy-looking and without field-testing… Her stomach began to ache.

“Elia,” Kyré squawked. “Elia! Elia!” Out of the corner of her eye, she saw his bright turquoise wings flap persistently near a pile of glass screens that she hasn’t reviewed yet. “Elia! Elia! Look, look! Elia, look! Elia, look!”

Frustratedly, she slammed a clench fist on her desk and turned towards her pet kirili. “For the love of Nakoi, what is it, Kyré?” she roared furiously like a lion. “Can’t you see mama’s inventing?”

Instead of responding, he just stood there and shook frantically like he was just doused in this morning’s snow water. Kyré wrapped his large, gorgeous wings around himself, shielding his light brown underbelly and his strong legs. “Calm, e-e-Elia,” he stammered. “Your powers. c-c-Cold. r-Really cold.”

Seeing her beloved pet tremble and shake pacified her anger. Her Weapon Wielder powers always leaked out whenever she was too into her emotions, making the air around her freeze and icicles grow. If only she had more time in the day to train and control it. Inventing is all she seems to do now, from sunrise to sunset. Like a drug, it takes ahold of her and lasts for weeks, consuming her and leading her to lash out when things aren’t going as she meticulously planned… But no one, Kyré included, deserved to be at the brunt of her anger; Elia wasn’t like Empress Amphitrite the Great, the sixty-fifth Weapon Wielder of Athesan who, despite conquering the other three realms and giving birth to the prosperous Athesanian Empire four hundred years ago, was simultaneously known for treating the other three Weapon Wielders and the colonies that she ruled over with extreme force and brute laws, such as mandating Athaese to be the sole spoken language used in schools, businesses and institutions of higher learning all across the realm as a method of control. “Sorry,” Elia replied softer and calmer. “Better?”

The kirili glanced upward for a moment, his small black eyes squinting in thought. “Much better,” he replied with a bob of the head. “Warm, good. Cold, bad. Very, very bad.”

“Yes, I know.” With a smile, Elia scratched underneath his long and sharp pointed bill, making her small companion tweet with pleasure. “I’ll be very careful next time, I promise. So, what was it you just had to show mama, huh? Go on, I’m all eyes and ears. Just be quick, okay? Mama’s a little busy right now.”

As though fishing for newly hatched tadpoles in the pond beneath a grand Essence that hovered high in the cloudless sky, Kyré used his strong beak to swiftly move the mound of glass frames from side to side until he just stopped. “Found it,” said the bird, rotating his head like an owl to peer back at his owner. Then, he realigned his body in a snap and climbed up to the Weapon Wielder of Athesan’s shoulder. “Go on.” He playfully tapped at the four-year-old sapphire-studded nakaf piercing that sat beneath Elia’s bottom lip. When she first entered her menstrual cycle, she received the piercing along with her breast scar in a holy Nakoic ceremony; from that day forward, she was now considered an adult of marriageable age and Nakoi’s constant protection was forever etched into her very skin, reminiscent of the way the Great Snake Mother protected her defenseless human children from her jealous draconic kin as told in the sacred stories. Elia took great pride in them. “Go on,” Kyré repeated. “Go look.”

“Alright, alright,” Elia replied with a chuckle. She slid her naum rings back on and tapped the frame; bright green light radiated from the two objects but quickly simmered down, resembling a faint flame. With exaggerated care, she hovered the glass and steadied it. Using the soft afternoon light that filtered into her bedroom, she analyzed the small, translucent substance. No smudges or scratches so far.

A giddy smile appeared on her face as Elia moved with budding excitement. With a sudden flick of her hand, the glass glided over to her prototype’s sturdy, oval structure and, upon evaluation of all the design and monetary viewpoints….

“It’s perfect,” she whispered. All the nervousness and stress that once clouded her mind vanished, allowing true ataraxy to reign freely.

“I know,” cried Kyré with a proud tone. His wings flapped with excitement.

Feeling an overwhelming sense of relief, Elia began to twirl about her bedroom like a vortex of water. Kyré followed his owner, flying and singing brief toons; blurs of her cluttered bookshelf and unmade bed whipped about–

CCCCCCCCCRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRAAAAAAAAASSSSSSSSSHHHHHHHHHHHH!

Halted in the middle of her tracks, Elia’s heart slumped into disbelief and her eyes grew wide. Laying on the floor in front of her door was the remains of her prototype’s screen, shattered into chunks, large and small.

“No, no, no,” the Weapon Wielder of Athesan murmured in a hurry, rushing over to the mound of broken glass. “Please, rise.” Her dark umber hands moved about, but not all the glass pieces rose. Before her very eyes, all of her hard work was slipping through her fingers, becoming all for not. Tears began to sprout. Biting her lip and batting away the tears as best she could, she pushed off her naum rings and reached for the glass with her own two hands.

“Elia, don’t!” Kyré squawked and began pulling at her hair.

Elia ignored the bird’s plea and pushed him back with her hand, replying, “I’m fine, Kyré. Just stay in the air, okay? I don’t want you to get hurt.” One by one, she placed the pieces of shivered glass in her palm, all as sharp as a needle. After a few moments of carefully pushing them about with her finger, some of the glass fitted together more or less. Staring at the broken fragments, she wondered how she’ll make these small pieces become whole again… Glue? No. That’ll take too much time. But… Elia thought. Maybe this will be far quicker.

Inhaling as much air as possible, Elia’s chest rose and sharply fell as hard frigid air flew from her lips, freezing the assembly of shattered glass together. At first she believed a solution had been found, but upon seeing the cracks in the glass shine through the block of ice as clear as the morning light on freshly fallen snow, making her surroundings look large here and then small over there, discovered the idea to be a cheap one.

All of her hard work… One moment she had finally finished it and then it fell into shambles all due to her carelessness of keeping her naum rings still coiled around her fingers when she was jumping and twirling around the room. Sucking up the air, the block of ice came undone in large chunks, leaving the pieces of glass to crumble to the floor. The chunks of frozen water flew back into her mouth, melting into cool water upon contact. Though refreshing, the water that rushed down her throat didn’t impede the tears from falling.

The sound of Kyré’s flapping wings waned and the touch of his talons wrapped gently around her shoulder. “Elia, don’t cry,” he told her, softly nuzzling his beak against her hair. “No tears. Tears, bad. Happy smiles, good. Helps feel better.”

“But how can I smile when it’s all over?” Elia sobbed, moving her hands about with much frustration. “All of my work… those two weeks of nothing but work, day and night, are gone and what do I have to show for it? Nothing! All I have is an incomplete project that’s due tomorrow and it’s all my fault!”

The kirili’s van caressed his owner’s cheek and tickled her enough to have her icy blue eyes turn to the pair of small, bulbous black eyes that peered back at her with pity. “No.” Kyré shook his blue head. “Not incomplete. You have time. Much, much time. But, take break. Break, good. Go eat. Go see Father. Enjoy eighteenth birthday. Relax. You do much better after.” The edge of his beak tapped at her nose with much care and suddenly caressed her cheeks, drinking up the orbs of water that raced down her face. Suddenly Kyré shivered in disgust and clenched his eyes closed. “Tears, no good. Too salty. Karhihimos,” his voice croaked nauseatingly.

As she watched her bird squirm in disgust, Elia began to smile. The Athesanian word Kyré truly fitted the kirili; he always acted histrionic if it’s meant to cheer her up. The Athesanian Weapon Wielder moved him off her shoulder to her wrist and held his head close to her bosom. “Thank you, Kyré.” She petted his back. “I don’t know what I would do without you.” She picked herself up and walked over to her pet’s food bin, using chopsticks to pull out the carcass of a plump rat pup. “Here is a treat for helping. You deserve it.”

Hungrily, Kyré’s small tongue started move side to side until he couldn’t wait any longer and snatched the carcass up. Holding it tightly in his talons, he began to rip out chunks of its flesh, bones and all. By the time Elia cleaned up the glass and walked out of her bedroom, passing the small pilasters of takium stone that lit the hallways, Kyré had finished his snack and was singing a toon to voice his enjoyment, “Good, good, very good. Rat pup. Rat pup. Good, good, very good.”

Elia giggled with mild amusement. “I’m glad you liked it so much, but you didn’t get any blood on my clothes, right? What about splinters of bone?”

Kyré’s head bobbed side to side, taking in the sights of his owner’s long-sleeved, blue collared tunic made of black wool. Her black leggings and boots had a quick once-over as well. “No. Your yurokos is clean.”

“Good,” Elia replied, scratching her pet’s head. “You know how I hate feeling those pesky bones jab at me while I sit.”

Up ahead was a gallery holding Tsunami, her Holy ewer, atop an adorned column. Engraved into its surface were ancient Athesanian carvings that illustrated when an antlered Nakoi finished molding humans from clays of various shades and colors and sat them down in a shallow river, humans were brought to life – variation in the lore such as the type of hard, permanent horns that protruded from Nakoi’s great head or the size of water that the early humans were placed in were key evidence that Athesan’s other ethnic group, the Kéké, played a role in crafting Tsunami all those thousands, memory-scrambling years ago. It was a pity Elia couldn’t remember that far back… Despite that, she looked on at the gorgeous historical weapon that had been passed down from one Athesanian Weapon Wielder to the next via a grand Coronation Ceremony with much pride and recalled the memories of her own coronation that just took place earlier in the week all due to her busy schedule.

The takium stones outside the Essence shined radiantly under the moon’s orange glow and the nebulous, wisp-like trail that followed the lēfyk, eidolons of fallen leaves, as they flew about the night sky. Freshly deceased or not, the little ghosts, covered in their little dried leaf masks and dresses, fazed through all that stood in their way as they continued their eternal quest of scouring for their Mother Trees before the morning sun rose, hoping that tonight might just be the very night that they reunite with her and are finally laid to rest, Athesanian lore had explained. As though to help (or impede) the poor things, crisp breezes blew in from time to time, blowing the lēfyk to and fro. Snow soon began to sprinkle from the night sky, covering the thatched, slanted roof of the Essence with even more layers of snow as High Naga Karigg, hunch-over and grey haired, spoke, “Just as Nakoi had granted the elemental powers to the four humans who showed the greatest of skill in the war against her draconic son, Elyas, and his siblings, all those thousands of years ago, tonight is when the seventy-fifth reincarnation of one of those special people…” A cold gale blew in from the north, carrying the snow along with it and the harsh rustling of trees that sounded the Essence’s pond below. High Naga Karigg’s robes move and sway violently and so did the lēfyk. The wind was so strong that the continuing words the High Naga had spoken were blocked out, though he didn’t seem to notice nor mind.

The chilly wind didn’t bother Elia; her formal yurokos was of black felt, from tunic collar to the cuffs on her pants, and had small fragments of the dulled red evarn stone sewn into its fabric, furthering the warmth her spindly frame received. The edges of her trousers were stuffed into her tightly laced boots while the tunic was furbelowed with threads of blue and black in wavelike needlework resembling Nakoi in all her draconic, ram-horned glory. It didn’t ruin her hairstyle either, one that took hours of intricate micro-braiding and weaving in blue thread to resemble a flowing waterfall.

But as soon as the wind came, it also left. “And so,” High Naga Karigg’s voice finally returned, “it is with great certainty and honor for me to announce that the next Weapon Wielder of Athesan is Elia Amalie Wynchell ev Odéllham. May Nakoi watch over her with great diligence once she begins her journey.” A few snaps of the photo recorders stirred behind her as Elia rose. This is one of the biggest moments of her life.

With a long yurokiri draped over his shoulders, revealing only glimpses of that historical black-and-gold royal regalia that shielded his dark umber skin from the cold as he moved about, King Kheno iv Kavinto of Athesan, nephew to Elia’s predecessor Derik the Young, presented Elia with Tsunami wrapped in special silk. “Congratulations, young one,” he said with a smile. “May you serve your country well.”