Page 128 of Empowering the Wolf's Heart

I bowed my head. “Thank you, kind sir. Please, take your rest. I will visit you with more water later.”

He smiled. “It’s the least I can do after you saved my beloved before she perished.” He bowed his head and then jumped in the water trough with a splash.

I smiled. His beloved was an elf who was still recovering after losing her leg in a rogue pack attack. They had barely escaped with their lives. My Reds had found them shortly after.

“Let’s go,” I said to Ran, mounting her and hooking my legs beneath her wings.

She released a high-pitched trill and leapt from the roof, shooting straight up as her wings beat the wind into submission, guiding us further into the sky. She brought us high enough to be just beneath the orange moon and snapped her wings open to catch the air. The orange light highlighted her silver scales and made her glow with the outline of the moon at our back.

She tucked her wings and I leaned forward against her neck, hooking my knees further under her wing joints. My eyes watered as I tried to keep them open, but the wind was too much.

For a split second, I imagined tumbling off the side and just free-falling until I hit the ground.

Keep the vivid imagination to yourself, Rider,Ran grumbled.Iwon’tlet you fall.

I grinned at her disgruntled voice. She flung out her wings, catching the air with a jolt that I stuck with near ease—again, because of all the practice she’d put me through.

She fluttered down to the square, gently landing with her back legs and then her front. The people were staring at me, their mouths wide and eyes glittering in the fire.

I slid from Ran’s back, thankful I didn’t fall flat on my face at the landing. She was dratted tall.

Ran curled her wings to her body and yawned.

The people circled around. Some had apples in their hands from the tree and others were staring at Ran with wonder. Others still looked like they wanted to stab me. At least it wasn’t everyone; we were getting somewhere.

“You all know my goals,” I began.

“Ya’re a bleeding heart who will run us into the ground!”

I tried to find the person who spoke, but they were lost in the crowd.

“Perhaps I am a bleeding heart. I am a heart that feels, that loves, and that will give you lives we never could haveaccomplished before.” No one spoke, which I took as a good sign. A few even looked confused or interested. “We have struggled in the past. We have had droughts where we lost many good people. We have dealt with crop failures which resulted in starvation.” I paused, staring at those around me. “I lost my older sister many years ago to a ravaging disease because we did not have enough food to keep her healthy.” I had to pause as my voice cut off as a hollow ache formed in my soul. Grief never died, it just became easier to live with. “But now? We have a chance. A chance to change things. To make them better. It will not be easy. It will come with bumps and hardships and pain. But what good thing ever came easily?”

More heads nodded than I expected.

“I trusts you, Matriarch Alia!” someone called out. A man with a bald head was wringing his hat in his hands. He saluted me with a hand to his heart, and I smiled at him. He wasn’t starving and had a business because of Ran’s scales. “You did right by me and my family, Matriarch. Saved us. We thanks you!”

More voices joined in, drowning out the bad. It was funny. It took a hundred positive voices to drown out the one that was negative. But where there was positive, negative was choked out and obliterated.

“Ye kept my family from starvation!”

“That werewolf saved me child from a cougar in the woods.”

“A fairy helped my child find her schoolwork.”

“Ya helped when no one else would listen and saved my sister and I from our abusive father,” another said.

Others spoke up, until it was a patter of what had happened, how they had been helped, and who had helped them.

My lips trembled as emotion ran through me, seeing all those we had helped the past weeks being brave enough to stand up for me. I held up a hand and they quieted. “Thank you. All ofyou. With the help of our new friends, we can make our tribe stronger than ever. By working together, there is nothing we cannot accomplish. Are you with me?”

A cheer rose and I smiled, raising my hand. Ran’s throat grew red before she released a massive blue and red flame into the sky.

And as I watched my people, I grew hopeful.

If my people could come together and conquer their prejudices, perhaps there was hope for all the worlds.

CHAPTER 46

---