Lilly Ravenhart's Story

In the village near Lepark a long row of children were running with all of their energy and passion until they suddenly slowed down after a tree.
"I won!" a little boy yelled.
"No! I did!" a girl in her tweens replied.
"Nonesense! I was first!" a boy in his early teens said.
"Well... perhaps not having a line watcher was a bad idea." Lilly said. "And we always lose the finish line ribbons."
"Lilly! Why don't you go as the line watcher? Just once more?" an older girl asked.
"Line watching. It's just like running, but you don't actually run... or have fun." Lilly replied.
"Come on! Pweeaaasee!" a little girl begged.

Lilly sighed and gave in - just as always. It wasn't only about line watching. When it came to something none of the children wanted, they stopped drawing out sticks long time ago, as the purple-haired princess always agreed to save the rest. There was one particular reason why none of them wanted to be a line watcher. It wasn't only because of the lack of running.

"Hector won." Lilly announced.
"YES!" the teenage boy yelled in joy.
"Come on! You've mistaken! I'm the winner!"
"No! I am!"
"I was first!"

After some time of arguing the children decided to play a different game - this was something usual. Soon the night was getting near and everyone went to their respective homes. Lilly returned to the castle and stumbled upon her father.

"Did you find the last ribbon?" he asked.
"Nope." Lilly replied, causing the king to sigh.
"You must be more caring to the things you give other people. Okay, I understand. Your friends have lost four ribbons brought by you. What's next? Lending someone the whole kingdom, but they never bring it back to you?"
"Don't worry about me, dad. I'll watch over things,"
"And how come you're the princess and they command you to do things?"
"Come on. They don't command me,"
"No wonder Lanie stays all day long here, reading books. She doesn't want to go trough what you're going trough. She doesn't want to be pushed around by some peasants just like you are. See you at dinner."

As the night came, Lilly went to her bed.
"Commanded? Pushed around? I'm not being pushed around by other people. What's dad talking about? I just want to avoid conflict between my friends." the girl thought before closing her eyes.

Soon appeared a glowing woman in Lilly's dreams, hypnotizing the princess with her beauty. The purple haired girl couldn't stop looking at her, yet she listened to every single spoken word.
"I need you. I need you and others who have seen me and heard my task to save Espio. The whole world is endangered by..."

"The demon called Gilose." Lilly murmured in her sleep. "Yellow orb... Athen..."
Lilly's eyes slowly opened. Suddenly, she stood up in a sitting position.
"Lanie?" she whispered to her sister. "Oh, Lanie! You're awake!" her voice went normal.
"You will never believe what dream I had just now!"

The Next Day...

Lanie sat up in bed and looked over to her sister who had just waken up. "Oh, Lanie! You're awake!" Lilly started. "You will never believe what dream I had just now!" Lanie brushed purple strands of hair out of her face.
"What exactly was this dream you had about?" Lilly got of bed and jumped up and down. "There was this beautiful maiden, and she said I have to save Espio! Who knew I had such an imagination!?" Lanie went wide-eyed and jumped out of bed running over to her sister. "Oh my! I had the same dream!" She exclaimed.
"Do you think it's real?" Lanie asked as Lilly danced around her full of energy. "Of course it is, silly! If we both had this dream!"
"Ok, so do you know how we are supposed to save her?" Lilly crossed her arms on her chest.
"Yes, she told me a life potion was in a forest north from Athen." Lanie got dressed.
"Well let's go ask if we can go to Athen!" Lilly dragged Lanie out of their bedroom and to their parents' bedroom.

The twins didn't tell them the real reason why they wanted to go, but luckily the King and Queen allowed them to go. As the girl's packed up, Lanie noticed something peculiar. Whenever she got close to a lit area, it would get darker. She shook off the thought and continued to pack up clothes.
The packing was soon done with, and a carriage carried their luggage and themselves to Athen. The twins suddenly glanced at one another with worried expressions. "I feel something, or someone... somebody like us in a way..." Lanie whispered. Lilly nodded. The carriage had stopped, and the girls stepped out of the carriage. They would soon help a little someone that saw the dream as well....

Dawn arrived and Kari was finally able to open her eyes. She looked around and saw the metal bars around her disappointment sunk in, yesterday really had happened. Kari struggled a bit banging on the metal cage bars when she suddenly stopped and remembered the dream she had. It was a little bit silly for her to believe that maybe that dream wasn't actually a dream but at this point she didn't care. If somehow she had gotten magical powers then this was the time to test it out.

Kari closed her eyes and concentrated on the metal bars. She wasn't sure what she was expecting to happen, but when she opened her eyes the saw the bars were vibrating ever so slightly. She tried again, this time with her eyes open. The bars vibrated slightly again, but this time she also noticed a bit of the dirt outside of the cage raising off the ground. There wasn't any wind so seeing the dirt start to fly around was odd. She tried again this time concentrating on the dirt, a mini tornado formed. Kari smiled, she could control the air.

She spend some time practicing her powers and then she saw a little mouse, the prefect test subject. She focused on the mouse and created a mini tornado around it and the controlling it she brought the mouse towards her. Once the mouse was in reach she put her arm through the bar and using one talon on her finger she skewered it killing it instantly. The test run worked perfectly, she swallowed the mouse whole enjoying the reward of her success.

In the distance she could hear footsteps, using her amazing hearing she focuses in on them and could make out a conversation. It was the men from the previous night they must be coming back for her. "I can't believe some guy in Fernon actually wanted to buy this crazy beast. What does he want her for anyways, Fernon usually tried to keep all wild animal out of their borders, especially after that horrible incident, where all but two men were killed."
"I have no idea, he said he could tame her. Maybe he wants her to hunt for him. I wouldn't be surprised though if the guards killed her as soon as we hand her over. The captain of the guards own son was involved in that incident, luckily his son is still alive, but I bet they want to get some revenge on these monsters."
They men stepped in Kari's line of sight. The first man approached the cage and put the lock in his hand and took out a key. "What are you doing you IDIOT!" shouted the other man, causing the one with the key to stop in his tracks.
"What? I'm just opening the cage up to fed it. We can't let her starve to death or we won't get our money."
"If you do that she'll escape! Just throw the food through the bars."

'Darn it,' Kari thought. Them opening the cage was what she had been waiting for. Once they opened it she'd have been able to use her new powers to blow them away and then escape. Unfortunately being able to control air meant nothing if the lock was still locked. A few mice were thrown at her threw the bars, at least she had food.

"Load her onto the kart so we can start our journey, but be careful!" The men the moved her onto the kart, she did manage to scratch one of them not that it actually did her any good, but it was satisfactory. The two men got in the front and got the horses to start moving. They were heading to Fernon, away from Kari's home.

Kari practiced using her power to make the beginning of the journey hard on the men, she created a large wind storm that she isolated just to the kart and she tried to knock the kart over, but she wasn't very successful. She needed to keep practicing. Then in the middle of her attempts to cause the men as many problems as she could she saw a carriage in the distance. Out of the carriage stepped out two young purple haired girls. They were both wearing beautiful dresses, 'They must be royalty,' she thought. She knew they wouldn't do anything to help her, no human wanted to help her, but something seemed different about those girls.

The kart continued on, starting to pass the young girls. Kari continued to created drastic wind storms around the kart, hopefully she'd be successful in knocking it over at some point.

Lanie had glanced at the passing carriage. "I feel their presence in there." She pointed toward it. Before Lilly could stop her, Lanie ran toward the carriage catching up to it just before they were out of sight. She knocked on the walls of the carriage and it slowed down. The driver opened the door and hesitated, quickly bowing while still sitting in his seat. "O-oh! Your Highness! W-what brings you to Athen?" Lanie shifted her eyes toward the back. "I feel as if something is back there. May I take a look?"

The young man gulped at stuttered,"P-princess, I a-assure there is absolutely n-nothing back there! There is no need!" Lanie glared at the man with a cold aggressive stare. The man stepped out of the carriage in pure terror and went to the back, opening the doors. What Lanie saw was horrible. A poor girl a few years older than her, one of the hybrids, in a cage. Lanie yelled at the man,"What a devious man you are! How could you hold a living creature like her captive! And a peasant like you shouldn't sell any parts of a living creature! Get out of my sight!" The man shivered in fear and ran off.

She climbed in the back of the carriage and unlocked the cage with a key she found in the front seat. When it was open, she led the bird girl out onto the dirt road. Lanie smiled and curtsied. "Hello, I am Princess Lanie Ravenhart. You are safe, now what is your name fair maiden?" She hoped they would stop talking soon, because she could'nt put on the smiling act for much longer...

(ooc: Sorry I'm not sure why it posted twice.)

As soon as Lanie opened up the cage to let her free, Kari flew up onto a near by branch. She heard the girl say, "Hello, I am Princess Lanie Ravenhart. You are safe, now what is your name fair maiden?" This completely took her by surprise, she looked closely at the girl and noted that she was one of the girls she saw earlier. Why was any human especially a princess being nice to her? Every human she had ever met was cruel to her, the only explanation she could come up with was that it must be a trap. She kept her distance, but decided to reply to the girl. "Thank you..." She wasn't really sure how to be nice to a human just those two words took a lot of effort, "I am Kari Sairento, one the creatures that your kind seem to have deemed. I do appericate your kind jesture of letting me go, but I will not fall for any of your traps. I do not wish to hurt you, but any other human that dares to approach me may suffer a different fate..." As she spoke she remembered some odd human thing where if you saved someone's like then they owed you something in return. "I suppose since you did help me that according to your customs I am supposed to do the same for you. I normally don't adhere to your people, nor do I take orders from anyone. However I am willing to offer you one thing in terms of my thanks. If you wish I will watch over you if you should ever come to the magical forest that I call home."

Lilly smiled at Lanie's fast and honorable reaction to save the little creature.
"Hello, Kari Sairento." she spoke with a smile. "I see you trust us now, even though humans don't treat hybrids well. I'm Lilly Ravenhart, ready to accept whatever you decide."

The girl scratched her head for a moment. Was it okay to involve the hybrid in their adventures?
"The brid girl kinda has a point to offer us help as our watcher. Come to think of it, two 13-year-old girls just decided to go on a journey becasue of a dream. We did start off quite fast. I also don't know how are we supposed to find the rest." Lilly thought.

"Kari Sairento," she spoke. "Have you ever been a watcher before? Also, you did say that you don't want to be touched by a human, but... can I touch your feathers?"

"Well I can't say I completely trust you two, but you girls can't be all that bad. As for being a watcher, not exactly. I don't take care of humans, but I do take care of those I care about. Most avian hybrids are very protective and territorial. I am not an exception to that rule." She continued to watch the girls closely, noticing every move they made no matter how small it was. She thought carefully about the question young Lilly had asked her. She wanted to touch her feathers, it wasn't an uncommon request for a human to want to make. It's just usually they didn't ask they just did or killed in order to do so.

"How about I give you this instead," she looked for a feather that she was ready to molt, a beautiful secondary feather. The feather was softer than any fabric that man could make. It was mostly brown but had some off white almost lacy looking pattern on it. She jumped down from her perch and handed it to Lilly. "Maybe one day you can touch my wings, but for now this will have to do." Kari looked at both girls and forced herself to make a weak smile. "Well if that is all then I suppose I'll be off. I would like to return to my forest."

Lanie watched Kairi give her sister the feather. Before Kairi could walk off, she quickly ran in front of her. "Have you had any strange dreams lately? One involving a beautiful woman?" Lanie wanted to make sure that she knew if she was one of them or not. She had a determined look on her face. If she wouldn't answer, she would only ask again. It couldn't be helped.

"If you did, you are like us. We had a dream with a similar concept." Lanie started. "Now we can do weird things." She had practiced her powers on the way to Athen. She put her hand out and closed her eyes. Concentrating real hard, she raised her hand and managed to make a solid black figure in the form of a knight appear. "I noticed the carriage you were held in rocked a bit. Is it your doing?" She wanted to get all of the magical people rounded up as soon as possible. Lanie could tell Kairi was one of them.

Kari's eyes widened. She was surprised, these two girls were like her. They had the same dream and they were two of the girls that she was supposed to find. She really hadn't ever intended on going to find the others, but here were two of them, there really was no escaping the task that had been given to her in her dream.

"Yes... I had that dream last night. I've been practicing all morning with the intention of using it against those men when I got the chance. I was going to send them off in a tornado when they opened my cage. Lucky men they are that you two came along. So yes, rocking the carriage was my doing, I thought I might as well make their lives as hard as possible." She could tell that this whole thing was the start to a very long journey and she wasn't exactly thrilled about it, but she knew that the young princesses would need help, it wasn't safe for them to venture into the forest alone. "Looks like I will be joining you on your journey to the forest and finding the others. Do you know where any of them are?"