"Ah, yes...so you're the one," the bird said, voice echoing smoothly inside her head.
Nyla skidded to a stop near the cliff's edge, eyes wide. "Wait, you talk? Are you some kind of...dream?"
The giant red falcon perched lazily on a jagged boulder, his feathers glowing like molten bronze. He looked her over with an exaggerated tilt of the head.
"No, I'm just a hallucination you're having from eating too much Nooni cake. Yes, I talk."
Nyla crossed her arms. 'That's not how dreams usually answer."
The bird gave a long, dramatic sigh. "You're already exhausting, I can tell. I'm Bernice."
"Bernice?" she repeated. "That's...not what I expected."
"Oh, should I have been named Doomtalon or something equally edgy? Sorry to disappoint you, Daughter of Earth."
Nyla blinked. "Wait, how do you know they call me that?"
"Because I was there. Listening. Watching. Judging, mildly." He fluffed his wings, then straightened with sudden purpose.
"Anywho..." He said, drawing out the word like a sigh, "Your ancestors sent me. You are the first true Crest-Weaver in generations, etc."
She tilted her head. "So...what now?"
"You've to find the Seeds of Harmony. Three have slipped from the pillars. Each landed in a different world. Chaos is knocking, and if you don't gather them, the whole realm might go kaput. You know, normal pressure for a teenager."
Nyla gulped.
He leaned closer, eyes serious now. 'You were born for this. They've been calling to you for years. It's time."
She hesitated, then grasped her necklace. "How do I get to those worlds?"
"Channel your spirit into the stone. Think about the path ahead, not the one behind."
Nyla closed her eyes. The Wind curled around her fingers, tugging gently.
The necklace pulsed, then burst with light.
Above them, the sky cracked open like glass. A glowing rift hovered just beyond the edge of the cliff, swirling with green and golden mist.
She opened her eyes and stared.
Bernice smirked.
"Well, hop on. It's a long flight to World One, and I don't do layovers."
Nyla hesitated.
"I have to do something first.'
Bernice raised an eyebrow, if birds had eyebrows. "Ah yes, of course. Quest delay number one. Let me guess: need to grab...snacks?"
She shook her head. "No, my parents...they don't know anything. I can't just disappear."
"Very well, you may go." He replied.
She turned and ran back through the moonlit paths, back toward home.
In her room, still tinged with a faint green glow from the necklace, she sat at her desk. The paper trembled slightly as she wrote, but her hand didn't stop.
Mom. Dad.
I'm okay. Please don't worry.
I don't fully understand it all yet, but I know the ancestors are calling me for a reason. Something is wrong in the world, and I've been chosen to help fix it.
I'll come back. I promise. I love you both.
-Nyla
She folded the note and placed it carefully under her carved shell comb—something her mother used every morning to curl her hair.
Then she stepped outside where Bernice was waiting.
"All right," he said. "Moment of tenderness complete. Let's go save the world."
Nyla climbed onto his back, clutching the feathers at his neck. With a single beat of his powerful wings, they lifted off the cliff and into the sky.
Behind them, I'anu slept under the stars.
Ahead, an open sky, and a world calling.