It wasn't long before the group, with the steady aid of their animal companions, reached the end of the glacial plains. Their steps were heavy but sure, and though they were weary, their bond felt stronger than when they had entered. Every stumble had been caught, every hand lifted another higher. They were no longer merely children surviving together. They were becoming something more.
And without warning—without even the rush of wind that usually came before—they were gone.
The next moment they appeared in a vast plain of cracked, sun-scorched earth. The horizon was endless, shimmering faintly as if under a desert heat. A dry wind cut across the land, carrying no sand, no scent, only emptiness.
Marisol took a cautious step forward. Her foot pressed to the ground—then lifted of its own accord. Her other followed. She gasped as her body rose, weightless.
A startled cry came from Jimena, then Jaime. They, too, had begun to drift upward, their limbs flailing in silent panic. Only Xolo's sharp bark and whine, frantic and commanding, kept them from spinning into blind terror.
Marisol acted first. A rope of obsidian shot from her palm, anchoring into Jimena's arm. The two girls snapped together, spinning awkwardly before steadying themselves. Another line of black glass whipped outward toward Jaime, who floated further and further away.
"Grab it!" Marisol cried, straining to hold the chains taut.
Jaime's fingers closed around the dark rope just as he began to roll onto his back. With gritted teeth and kicking legs, he reeled himself closer, until at last the three of them collided, tumbling into a clumsy knot of limbs and armor. They clung to one another, breathing hard.
"Well," Marisol muttered between gulps of air, trying to hide the shake in her voice. "That was… exciting." She forced a smile. "We should probably stick together from now on."
She didn't need to say more. One by one, obsidian chains extended from each of them, interlinking until they formed a triangle that held firm no matter how the strange current of the air pulled. Still, the ground beneath them receded, the cracked plain growing smaller and smaller.
Marisol's heart pounded. She had no idea how to stop their ascent. The chains kept them together, but together they were still rising higher into the barren sky.
Then the owl stirred.
It had been silent until now, content to nestle among Jaime's hair and crown of feathers. But suddenly it flared its wings, chattering with a rapid mix of chirps, hoots, and shrieks. The sound was half nonsense, half meaning—strange, broken words stitched together in the minds of those who listened.
"Not up—not ground—between," it cried, wings fluttering like frantic signals. Its golden eyes bored into Jaime's as it shifted and snapped its beak. "Flow, not fall—ride the breath!"
Jaime frowned, straining to understand. "It's saying… it's not about pulling down. Not about staying up either."
Jimena's brow furrowed. "Then what?"
Marisol looked out over the endless horizon. The wind that brushed her cheeks was faint but constant. It wasn't pushing them down, wasn't lifting them up. It was… flowing.
"I think," she said slowly, "we're supposed to move with it."
The owl shrieked once, sharp and satisfied, as if confirming her thought.
Together, the children adjusted their chains, no longer straining against the invisible pull. Slowly, carefully, they leaned into the unseen current. And for the first time since arriving, their drifting steadied.
They weren't falling. They weren't floating away.
They were moving forward.
They spread out in the rushing air, fingers locked together for balance. Jimena, steady at the center, let obsidian flow down her arms and spine, shaping into dark, wide membranes. Her new wings caught the currents, and the siblings drifted in unison, like a tethered flock.
The owl on Jaime's head flared its feathers and hooted sharply, pecking at his ear. Its chatter was insistent, urgent. Jaime frowned, then finally understood: imitate her.
Marisol followed Jimena's lead. Obsidian spread from her wrists to her ankles, taut like a glider's sail. She tilted into the wind, and for a brief, dizzying moment, she truly soared. Her laughter rang out, high and reckless.
They could fly.
The wind pulled them faster with every breath, dragging them toward some unseen destination. The eternal sun blazed down, the cracked plain below stretched endless, but the air was cold and biting. The animals clung close, whining warnings the children struggled to decipher.
So they practiced. They tilted and folded their wings, tried angles and dives, fought against drag and sudden lifts. Slowly, their flailing steadied. They learned how to move in this strange sky.
Then the world struck.
A furious gust slammed into them sideways. Chains snapped one after another, black shards scattering into the gale. Their grips tore loose.
Fear flared—but panic never came.
Jaime's body locked with focus. Obsidian surged outward, encasing them all in a jagged shell. It tumbled wildly through the storm, but the wind could not tear them apart. His body shook with effort. His eyes blazed gold.
"¡Marisol!" he shouted, voice ragged but commanding. "Haz un búho! Make an owl!"
The pygmy owl shrieked atop his head, eyes burning with the same golden fire.
Marisol's breath caught. Her obsidian stretched wide, forming one wing. Jaime's followed, massive and straining against the wind. Jimena didn't hesitate—chains exploded from her body, binding their creations together, weaving them into a single shape.
The storm roared, but something greater rose within it.
An owl.
Vast and terrible, carved from living obsidian, with a beak sharp as a blade and wings that spanned the sky. Its talons clutched tight to its chest, shone with a wicked glint.
The great owl beat its wings once—and the currents obeyed.
No longer were they prey to the storm. They rode it. Guided it. Became it.
But with control came velocity. The pull grew stronger, dragging them faster, fiercer, toward the horizon where something waited. Something vast. Something inevitable.
And there would be no stopping.
The obsidian owl looked magnificent from afar—broad wings cutting through the sky, a sharp beak angled like a blade, talons poised to strike. Yet a closer look betrayed the truth. Its wings were mismatched, one longer than the other. Its head was misshapen, its legs twisted until they were sacrificed entirely. The construct was no perfect creation, but a patchwork born of willpower, desperation, and faith.
Inside the creature's jagged skull, Marisol and the twins clung to their stations. Their breaths came ragged, each movement of the owl costing more strength than they thought they had left. They had never bound their powers so tightly, never bled so much of themselves into a single thing.
The land below streaked past faster and faster, a dry and fractured plain blurring into nothingness. Far on the horizon, an enormous wall of dust rose like a mountain, stretching miles into the sky. Its looming presence filled them with dread, and every instinct screamed to avoid it.
They tried, pulling, twisting, bending the owl's awkward body against the currents. Yet their energy was threadbare, their timing uneven. Each small change took everything they had to spare.
Then came the gust. A roaring surge of wind that nearly tore them apart, shattering the owl's fragile frame.
For one terrifying heartbeat, it seemed they would scatter like leaves.
But then—something answered.
Their guides stepped forward, unseen but present, pouring faith into their veins. The spark in their hearts reignited, their reserves renewed. The owl shuddered, its crooked form shifting, strengthening. In the silence that followed, the three siblings fell into rhythm.
Marisol took the left wing, her obsidian bending in long, deliberate strokes. Jaime seized the right, sharp and precise, straining with golden eyes aflame. Jimena bound them both, weaving chains into a core that held the body together, tail forming where legs had been cast away.
And so, the owl became more. Not flawless, not divine, but steady—alive.
They sat shoulder to shoulder inside its head, animals pressed close. Xolo's ragged panting, the panther's low growl, and the pygmy owl's restless chattering blended with the pounding of their hearts. All watched quietly, guarding their charges as the children pushed beyond themselves.
The dust storm loomed to their left, a monstrous wall of grinding earth and wind. Yet it was not the storm that drew Jaime's gaze. From within its veil, a pillar of wind stretched between heaven and earth, immense and terrible, like a spear of the gods.
The pygmy owl on his head hooted sharply, feathers bristling, its voice urgent and unrelenting.
Jaime's jaw tightened. His golden eyes flared brighter as he leaned forward, one hand braced against the obsidian frame. Calculations filled his vision, paths and trajectories carved across the sky.
"There," he muttered, voice low but steady. "That's our way forward."