Five days later, it was finally time to leave. Ahi, Xavier and I were on the outskirts of the village, preparing to leave. Freya had come to say goodbye, promising that she would soon come to Grasslands City once her cubs were ready for the long journey.
It was sad to leave her, Freya becoming a quick friend and constant in my life, but I was happy that we would hopefully meet each other again. That was if everything went well in Grasslands City.
I was still a little worried that we might get rejected by the king.
After Xavier was done talking to the horrible village elder about the ferals and what not, he shifted into his beast form and knelt in front of me. I hopped on with Ahi's help, the plan being that I would travel with Xavier.
It would allow for us to move quicker and minimize the number of threats that we would encounter. Because even if I had two elemental beastmen protecting me, having a group of rootless beastmen or ferals with no fear of death attacking us was bad news.
I was a little nervous about flying in the open skies, but Xavier promised me it would be fairly safe for me. Ahi would follow us from below, carrying our supplies.
We would fly for most of the day and meet up in the evenings. Resupplying would be done at nearby villages on the way and if we were ahead of schedule, we would rest for a few days there.
That was the idea at least.
"I'll see you soon." Ahi murmured, planting a kiss on my forehead.
"Yeah." I nodded in agreement. "Travel safely."
Ahi smiled and shifted into his beast form, grabbing our bags of supplies. I heard a few growls, likely from the villagers, but chose to ignore them.
Once I was comfortable on his back, I patted Xavier's back to let him know I was ready. He let out a caw in response and spread his wings out, quickly shooting into the air before I had a chance to process everything.
I held back a shriek, closing my eyes tightly as cold wind blasted in my face. My hands gripped Xavier's feathers, almost ripping them out as my thighs tightened around him.
This was the scariest thing I had done and a part of me was regretting agreeing to this. Why the hell did I agree to this? Was I trying to kill myself again via heart attack this time?
Xavier let out a caw, almost as if he was trying to reassure me. Or to loosen up on the feather pulling. I took it as the first one, nervously opening one eye, glancing at our surroundings.
A breath of air left my lungs as my eyes widened in amazement. It was so blue around us, the air so fresh. A flock of birds flew near us and everything was so tiny beneath us.
Still, it was easy to see so much of the wild landscape around us. I even spotted a moving black object below us which I guess was Ahi.
This place was nothing like Earth, even the most remote and wild places on Earth were dull compared to this place. Fear slowly slipped away from me as I continued gazing at everything around me.
Maybe the flight thing wouldn't be so bad.
***
As the sun set, Xavier made his way back to the ground, landing close to a cave. By then, my body was completely stiff and in pain, not used to sitting still for hours on end.
Gingerly getting off Xavier's back, I was ready to melt onto the ground if not for Xavier quickly shifting and grabbing my arms to hold me up.
"Perhaps we should've rested halfway." Xavier mused as he gazed down at me, pulling me towards him.
I could feel the heat radiate off him as he wrapped an arm around my waist. Thankfully, my exhaustion had left my brain in a muddle, so I didn't think much of it.
"No. That would've slowed us down." I retorted. "I just need some food and rest. I'll be fine in the morning… Anyway, is Ahi close by?"
Even if I was in pain, I didn't want to slow us down further. The sooner we got to Grasslands City, the better. We could get rejected quicker, or not, and move on from there.
"You shouldn't push yourself so hard." Xavier muttered before turning his head to scan his surroundings. "And your mate is close by. Probably get here in a few minutes."
"That's good…." I murmured softly. "I miss him."
And I really did. Maybe it was a little weird, but I had grown attached to his constant presence. It felt a little strange not having him around. Or maybe that was just tired me acting up.
A yawn escaped me before I could stop myself. I was ready to go to sleep, not even bothered with washing up or eating. Honestly, the floor looked like a great place to snooze.
And I would probably sleep there if not for Xavier holding me up and my knowledge that in the morning I'd be in a world of pain from sleeping on the hard ground.
"Do you want to sleep?" Xavier asked. "It'll take some time to set up camp and make food. We can wake you up when food's ready."
"No… I should help with setting up camp." I muttered, weakly flexing my arm. "I'm a big girl and you guys are probably just as tired as me… Give me a few moments to get my footing."
Xavier gave me a look like he doubted my words, but didn't say anything. Instead he asked, "Why don't you let males take care of you? You're constantly trying to do things males could easily do for you."
"Because there's no such thing as a free lunch." I shrugged.
"What do you mean-" Xavier started.
Hiss!
We both turned to the loud hiss, a large black snake appearing in sight. I smiled brightly and used what little strength I had to run over to the snake.
"Ahi!" I jumped towards the snake, Ahi shifting and catching me quickly. "Glad to see you finally made it. The journey wasn't too hard for you?"
"No it wasn't." Ahi pulled me in close, nuzzling my neck. "Are you tired?"
"A little." I chuckled "My legs were like jelly earlier. If Xavier didn't catch me, you'd probably find me sleeping on the floor."
"That's so…" Ahi shook his head. "Let's get camp set up so you can rest."