<div class="floatright">(https://elliquiy.com/elluiki/images/a/ad/Bateman-great-horned-owl-study.jpg)</div><strong>Joint post: Whispers and Starfall</strong><br/><br/>At the head of a wing petite, strix riding warrior girls, Echoes of the Starlight beat wing hard to reach the battle that raged ahead.  This was Starfall and Mistwind's first experience of flight, jerking and jostling through the air, sometimes whipped by the high branches of the treetops they skimmed.<br/><br/>Starfall clinked to Mistwind, eyes squeezed shut tight.  She gripped the young sorceress hard around the waist as the flight grew wilder.  The storyteller pressed her face into Mistwind's back!<br/><br/>Up ahead, Whispers watched as one of her hatchets gouged a horse's flank and sent it away screaming as electrical essence arched over it's body.  The second suffered an ax in the back and barely managed a pathetic sound before it went down.<br/><br/>Holding out her hands for her hatchets, Whispers could feel Echoes cool wisdom approaching her from behind, followed by the familiar warmth of her unit, crying out a Linowan war chant!<br/><br/>In that moment, the ata-beast went down.  As if a spell had been lifted from the Linowan horses, the panicked herd screamed and wheeled to flee into the forest, their former master's corpses still bound to their saddles!<br/><br/><div class="floatleft">(https://elliquiy.com/elluiki/images/d/df/Geisha.jpg)</div>“After them!” Whispers shouted to her unit, slamming her hatchets into the branch she stood on.  As the strix shot passed, she reached out and grabbed Mistwind around the waist, then tossed the girl into Crimson's arms.  Bouncing once on the creaking branch, whispers made a mighty leap through the air and landed on Echoes back in front of Starfall.  She didn’t bother to go for the stirrups, but held on lightly by the knees.  Taking Starfall's hands. She wrapped them around her tiny waist, between the oricalcum lamelar mini skirt and the halter  “hold on, my Starfall.  This is my place.  Share it with me!”<br/><br/>Starfall let out a yelp as she was moved on the owl.  She holds on tight to Whispers now. The storyteller struggled to catch her breath while being taken on a wild ride.  She'd not quite been expecting.<br/><br/>“The horses can go,” Whispers called to her unit.  “But we have to cut the saddles and bury the bodies.  Fly fast, fly low, cut the saddle straps as you pass.”<br/><br/>The great owls veered and swerved hither and yon to avoid hammering into tree trunks at full clip.  Hands still empty, Whipsers caught Starfal's wrists and gave them a loving squeeze.  As the horses came into view she leaned back and gave Starfall a quick kiss on the lips.  “I'm glad you came!”<br/><br/>"G... glad to be here."  The storytellers cheek turn pink at the kiss.  Starfall's eyes began to inch open, though she still clung on to Whispers for dear life!<br/><br/><div class="floatright">(https://elliquiy.com/elluiki/images/a/ad/Whipsers_on_the_Night_Wind.jpg)</div>The girls spread out, bearing down on horses and making sudden dives to lean down and slash saddle straps  Corpses toppled to the ground and rolled across the forest floor.<br/><br/>Raven hair and pink whipped together and tangled in the raging wind.  Whispers cried out in glee and Starfall's stomach leaped into her throat!  Echoes was diving!<br/><br/>Whipsers leaned down without drawing her long knife.  At the last moment, her hatchet appeared in a golden flash and she chopped three corpses free in a single pass!<br/><br/>Then it was done.