Since Esmera was abandoned on a stranger's doorstep as a baby, the only person who has looked out for her is herself.
Until a lark starts visiting her, leaving behind exotic flowers and iridescent pebbles that the internet doesn't recognise.
Esmera...
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With her arm looped through Tauram's, Esmera felt almost like they were a lady and the King she was betrothed to walking down the streets of the capital they would someday rule, his familiar winding around their ankles in his usual manner while hers glided above their heads.
But if they were who they were born to be, they wouldn't have walked with their hoods over their bent heads, two fugitives whose pasts had banished them from their homeland.
They'd have strolled tall and proud, clad in silks and jewels, and everyone would've bowed as they passed by. It was a wild daydream, but only as wild as everything else that had happened since Esmera had arrived in Milatanur.
People made way for them, either out of subconscious reverence or fear of the identities they masked with their cloaks. Small wildcats trailed after bright silk scarves that waltzed in the wind. Birds and squirrels sat on shoulders, keeping somehow steady even while their sorcerers dashed about the town.
Esmera's skin crawled at the sight of dark flecks sneaking beneath collars. It brought to mind the skittering legs of the insect familiars she hadn't known existed until she visited SUAF.
Her head was overheating from all the sounds filling the air, the shouts, the laughter, the thumps of feet on the ground, the scraping of chairs and tables as vendors rearranged their wares to catch the eyes of their next customers.
Esmera couldn't escape it. It was too loud, too overbearing. She would drown here on dry land, beneath all these thoughtless noises.
Then Tauram was speaking, his voice cool, giving Esmera a focal point so she could drown out Parnakshi's din. "So, how does it feel?"
"What?" Esmera's eyes flicked to him.
"To be reunited with your familiar." He flashed her a grin that she was fortunate enough to see beneath his hood.
She cleared her throat before he could notice that her breath had caught in it. But that didn't matter. What did matter was that Esmera had noticed. She was so starved for kindness that an offhand smile from a near stranger did unspeakable things to her.
It was sad. Almost as sad as a baby bird who had been left to yearn for a girl who didn't know who she was or where she had come from, let alone of his existence and what he meant to her.
"Esmera?" asked Tauram.
Esmera gave a soft smile. "It's everything you said it would be. I feel complete in a way I've never felt before." She wasn't without her cracks, but she didn't tell Tauram that.
She had the biggest piece that had been missing from herself. Maybe she could start putting herself together. For the first time since she left Stephan, healing felt within her reach, even though she would no doubt have to stretch for it.
Esmera looked up at the cottony sky, seeking a familiar, greenish streak of glitter among the avian forms swooping across the sky.
Jammas darted out of sight but returned to hover over Esmera before flitting away again. She smiled, watching him until he disappeared among his flying fellows. He had never known this kind of freedom, the freedom where he could stretch his wings for as long as he liked, knowing he would never have to return to the cage that was the only home he had ever known. Esmera was glad she had finally claimed him. It had freed some deep, dormant part of her too.
