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gikmo9

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            I open my eyes a crack.  All around me I feel the almost silver liquid of the mirror caressing my skin as I walk.  I take one step and then another opening my eyes wider carefully to find that the liquid of the mirror doesn’t get in my eyes or affect my vision at all.  As I move the liquid gets thicker and harder to walk through.  Finally I reach the edge of the liquid in the mirror.

            I take one more step and feel myself tumble through the air as if I had stepped off a cliff.  Once again Shae saves me.  As I fall he catches me in both hands.  He stumbles back a few steps but doesn’t drop me.  I wrap my arms around his neck when he catches me without thinking. 

As soon as Shae gains his balance he leans down and lets my feet drop gently to the ground.  I unwrap my arms and stand looking down at my feet while I straighten my back.  I gasp and look back up at him as I see what we’re standing on.  Shae nods telling me it’s real.  I’m standing on a cloud and I turn to find more clouds swirling up like fog obscuring my view of the area around me. 

“Trust me they’re real.”  Shae’s voice causes me to turn back to him and close my mouth as he keeps talking. “If I hadn’t caught you then you would have found that out for yourself.  When I fell I landed on the ground it felt as hard as concrete despite looking like clouds.  Did you start through right after me?  I waited for almost ten minutes.”

“No I started going through as soon as you had gone all the way into the mirror.  I never stopped walking but come to think of it I didn’t see you walking in front of me at any point.  Where did I fall from anyways?  I don’t see any cliffs or for that matter doors that I could have walked through.”  I look up and turn in every direction looking for somewhere that I could have fallen from.

“You just appeared from thin air.  I had to run so that I was underneath you to catch you at all.  I feel its safe to say that we’re not going back the way we came though.  Hey what’s that?” 

I hear alarm in his voice as he raises his hand and points behind me.  I turn and begin to shake in fear.  Coming toward us is a large bird that looks big enough to call a baby elephant a snack.  It is a deep crimson color with glowing yellow eyes that are focused intently on me and Shae.

“Kira?”

“Yeah?”

“Um… what do we do if that thing attacks us?  It’s too big for us to even try outrunning it.” 

“Let’s just hope that it doesn’t want to eat us because if it does there’s nothing we can do.”  I swallow hard as I watch the bird glide over us.  It turns before it goes too far and comes back towards us.  We turn with it so we can keep our eyes on it hoping that it leaves us alone.

It goes over us again but this time when it turns back towards us it starts to pull its wings in and heads for the ground near where we’re standing.  As I watch it I see something glinting out of the corner of my eye.  I look down and spot Shae’s knife.  He must have dropped it when he was catching me.

“Shae,”  I hiss turning towards him, “The knife.  Right next to you.  We might be able to use it to defend ourselves somewhat.  As I speak I slowly lift my hand up to the pocket of my backpack and retrieve my own knife. 

The bird lands about twenty feet away from us.  It just stands there watching us as if trying to decide what to do.  After several minutes of tense silence the bird walks awkwardly over to us.  I tighten my grip on the knife.  When the bird is within five feet of us I feel Shae grab my arm. 

He tugs on my arm trying to pull me behind him.  I try to shake him off but he’s stronger than I am and by the time the bird reaches us he is in front of me.  He holds the knife in front of himself and tries to look menacing.  When the bird sees the knife it somehow seems to look menacing.  It looks over Shae’s head at me.

“You can put that thing down.  It can’t hurt me anyways.”  The bird nods toward my knife as I stare with my mouth open.  “What did you think I was stupid and couldn’t talk?  Sorry to disappoint you but I’m not like the birds in your world in the least.  My name is Sarika.  Sorry to tell you this but you can’t back to your world the way you came.  Get on.”

Sarika extends a wing for us to climb on.  I move forward slightly and latch on to Shae’s arm as if he’s going to protect me.  He’s still holding his knife and staring at Sarika.  When he feels me touching him he jumps.  Sarika looks at the two of us impatiently waiting for us to get on.

“Are you going to get on or not?”

“What reason do we have to trust you and why should we go with you?”  I ask without moving an inch. 

“You don’t really have a choice.  Either you get on or I carry you and I have sharp claws.  It’s your choice.  I don’t plan on telling you anything more about myself so get on before you make me angry.”

“Wait why don’t we have a choice?” For the first time Shae speaks up in a tough voice. 

“It’s not for me to tell you.  All I know is that you have about two seconds to get on before I get mad.  If you make me made I’ll carry you in my claws and as I told you they’re very sharp.” 

Shae gulps and looks to me to see what I want to do.  Looking at his terrified face gives me the courage I need to walk past his grasp to Sarika’s outstretched wing.  I scuttle up it after a moments hesitation.  I get as close to her neck as I can so I can fit my legs around her body.  I look up as Shae gets on and settles himself behind me.

As Sarika rises into the air flapping to some unknown place Shae wraps his arms around my waist and puts his chin on my shoulder.  I feel my face warming slightly as I bury my hands further into Sarikas feathers and hold on.  The last thing I want is to fall off. 

A little voice in the back of my head tells me there's a reason I just want to keep his arms around me but I push it away and stare ahead.  The clouds rush by so fast that my eyes begin to water and my hair whips around behind me hitting Shae.  I silently wonder where Sarika could be taking us as we fly further and further from the only entrance I know into this world.

If you want me to keep you posted leave me a comment saying so or I'm not going to know.  Sorry it took awhile for this chapter.  for some reason i couldn't get on testriffic last night to post this chapter.  remember to leave a comment to keep u posted. Lemme know if you like it   ; )