Page 71 of To Ride the Wind

Gwen held it up. Her hands were sweating, but she had her fingers wrapped so tightly around the golden object they were white with the effort. Even the wind that tugged at them given their height couldn’t pry it from her grip.

“Well, then,” Charlotte said. “Here we go.”

Before Gwen realized what she intended, her friend pushed herself off the branch, pulling Gwen with her. She had angled them away from the other branches, attempting to jump into clear air rather than lower boughs.

She had succeeded partially, but there was still one large branch beneath them—one they had both made use of to haul themselves so high. For a dizzying second, Gwen was sure they were going to collide with it. But then the harness in her hand began to grow.

A blink of the eye later, she had the golden reins in her hand, and the wind beneath her, as steady as any mount. A whoop in her ear and hands clutching at the back of her dress told her Charlotte was safely behind.

“Did that mad plan really work?” she murmured, but the wind snatched the words away before they could reach Charlotte’s ears.

She didn’t know the exact direction of her home, but on the way out, she had been able to steer the wind at will. If they circled high enough over the mountains, eventually they would catch sight of the mountain kingdom. It was too large to miss, especially from the air.

She tried to direct her wind mount upward and east, toward the nearest mountain peak, but it pulled north instead. She pulled harder on the reins, and the wind bucked in response.

Charlotte gasped, grabbing tighter to Gwen. “What’s going on?” She had to shout to be heard over the rushing noise around them.

“I don’t know!” Gwen cried back. “This didn’t happen last time.”

She tried again to direct their wind mount right toward the mountains, but it wouldn’t respond. When she pulled harder, it suddenly disappeared beneath them.

They both dropped, screaming and flailing before it suddenly caught them again. Gwen only had a second to catch her breath before it surged upward, carrying them terrifyingly high.

“This is too high!” Charlotte shouted in Gwen’s ear.

Gwen gritted her teeth and didn’t reply. All her attention was focused on wrestling with the uncooperative reins. She couldn’t understand why they were behaving so differently to the previous occasion.

The wind lurched, almost exactly like a bucking horse, and the reins nearly slipped from Gwen’s grasp. Charlotte threw herself forward and grabbed them as well, the two girls holding on with everything they had.

And all the time they fought the wind, it carried them northward at breathtaking speed, the mountains rushing past on their right. She didn’t know how many valleys had passed beneath them, but they had long since left their starting place far behind.

“I…don’t…understand…” Gwen forced out, her teeth still clenched.

“It’s like someone’s driving it with a whip and spurs,” Charlotte gasped from where she was awkwardly squeezed against Gwen as they both fought the golden reins.

Charlotte’s words sparked memory in Gwen and suddenly everything made horrible sense. There had been two objects on the one plinth—a pair. She had been repulsed by the whip and without thinking had grabbed the halter. It had never occurred to her that overlooking the whip might cause her a problem.

But if the halter controlled the wind, wouldn’t the whip be a matching pair with it? The halter could tame the wind, and the whip could control and drive it. And her mother still had the whip.

“Is the wind getting stronger?” Charlotte cried as their pace picked up even further. “How do we get back to the ground? At this speed we’re going to create a storm and destroy something!”

Gwen pulled on the reins as she had done last time, and the wind thankfully dipped in response. But almost immediately Charlotte cried a warning. Gwen craned to see what her friend was indicating and caught sight of a village approaching below at a terrifying pace.

She pulled their mount sharply back up again. If they went any lower, a wind as strong as the one they rode would rip the town to pieces. As it was, she could see the trees swaying and loose objects blowing wildly about.

She twisted in her invisible seat to see the town disappearing behind them. At least all the buildings looked intact.

Trying again, she pulled the reins up, and the wind lowered them toward the ground. It appeared her mother couldn’t prevent them landing, at least.

But just as she was wondering what to do about the speed of the approaching ground, another cluster of houses appeared. She flinched, starting to direct them upward again, but Charlotte prevented her.

“No, it’s too late!” she shouted. “We won’t get high enough fast enough to miss them. We have to land!”

Gwen realized she was right. As they lowered, the wind was losing strength, so the lower they got, the less force would hit the hamlet.

She pulled with all her strength, no longer worrying about the speed of their own impact. She would have to trust in the object to keep them safe. All that mattered was to slow the wind as much as possible before it hit the defenseless houses.

She couldn’t lower them fast enough, however. Their wind mount swept them between two houses, tearing the roofs off both as it went and filling the air with wreckage.

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