Chapter 2. Dark and Light

Scene 2: Dark and Light 

 

The 2 birds begin to search around for one other knight, a very good friend of Aqua who lives in one of the tribe’s villages, Glacier Village. The young Melody had never seen anything like it, solid clouds on the ground. They slip through the icy floors and pass between the giant glaciers until they discover a village full of ice houses they called Igloos. There they found many penguins and in the distance loud music could be heard coming from an igloo. They followed the uppity mellow music, it had such a jazzy background to it. Finally at the front door, the blue dive bird filled his chest with air and let out a great shout,  

“Who is the grooviest penguin in this world?”   

The music suddenly stopped and loud thumps could be heard, Aqua steps back from the door and Melody was right behind him. Then the door opens with a great gust of wind knocking them back. A melodious penguin slid out on its stomach and landed in front of the birds. 

“♫ Jazz is the name and singing aloud is his fame… oh yeah baby! ♫” he sings. 

He looks down and spots his friend Aqua, rushing quickly, an unbreakable hug greets the two friends and there Melody sat watching the friends rough house with each other. Jazz notices the humming bird and quickly lets go of Aqua who falls to the ground.  

“♫ Hello there beauty of the sky, my name is Jazz The King of Groove. ♫” 

Melody smiles as the penguin stretches out his flap to greet the bird. Accepting his friendship she reaches for his flap and he kisses her wing. She laughs. 

“Do you always sing everything you say?” 

“♫ Of course I do my young valiant maiden. ♫” 

“Cut the act Jazz.” Aqua says slapping him behind the head. “She is one of the knights and now we can do what we have always dreamed of!” 

“You don’t mean…” 

“Yes Jazz, the Silver Wing.” 

The Penguin starts to dance foolishly and is very happy with the day he has waited for in a long time. Jazz runs up to Melody and hugs her tightly in his flaps. He then backs away for a second and re-hugs the confused humming bird. 

“Ok, ok Jazz, that’s enough.” Melody says pushing him off trying to turn her face to catch some air.  

“Do you want to know a secret?” the penguin asks with a smirk. 

The young Melody stares quietly without knowing what to expect, “Yes.” She replies with a sigh. 

Jazz huddles in with Aqua and Melody looking around just to make sure no one is listening. “I saw Nube…” he whispers and smiles. 

“That’s a big fib for a little penguin like you.” Aqua whispers back. 

“No, I’m being serious… last night I saw her dancing on a cloud.” Jazz implies. 

“Did she look like this?’ Melody takes out her black book and there laid the picture of a beautiful Caladrius with clouds around her. Jazz and Aqua quickly snatched the book away from her. “Hey! Give me back my book!” Melody shouts trying to jump over them. 

“How did you get this?” the penguin asks with his back blocking Melody from any reach. 

“The Old Owl gave it to me.” She responds pushing Aqua aside and snatching the book from the penguin. She reaches into her waist bag and closes the book inside keeping it safe from the two.  

“Well, it’s decided! Tomorrow our adventure begins…” the penguin hops. 

“What? Tomorrow?” Melody heatedly stomps 

“You heard him, it’s getting kind of late any way and we need all of the energy we can to travel that far.” Aqua says following Jazz into the Igloo. 

The anxious humming bird slowly skips into the igloo as well and finds all of these weird shaped metal things hanging from the iced walls. She stares at them with the widest eyes ever.  

“What are they?” she asks 

Jazz turns around with a smile “These are my collection of instruments (the penguin hops on his rotating stool), trumpets, saxophones, clarinets, bassoons, every wind instrument you could imagine.  

The marveled humming bird looked around the gold glowing walls and attempted to reach for an instrument, stopped by a flapping wing of the penguin she snaps out of the hypnotism.  

“I’m sorry Jazz, they just look so beautiful.” She says shamefully. 

“Well, they are my beauties, maybe one day you can try them out. Lets just rest up for tonight, tomorrow will be an adventurous day!” Jazz soundly yells polishing his instruments.  

“ Yes, we should rest guys and I will be the first one off to bed.” Aqua cuddles with the cozy quilt. The other two birds nod and find a cozy spot for themselves. The birds were sound asleep as the night too closed its eyes to rest, but it wasn’t until a little later on when Melody was suddenly woken up by a fierce wind, the instant smell of terror frightened the humming bird, a loud flapping of wings split the silent night and her heart began to race. She walked outside thinking it was a snow storm but was blown back in with the hard wind. The fear meter was way over the top and she begins to call out for her friends. 

“Jazz, Aqua, wake up! What’s going on?” There was no answer, the birds were missing, and there she saw a giant shadow lurking from the corner of the room. The shadow was approaching Melody growing in size as it got closer, an arrowed beak was spotted in the light of the moon. Melody was terrified and couldn’t move an inch as she was disturbed with a terrifying laughter. 

“Get away!” Aqua rushed through the door and head butted the creature, Jazz behind him waiting to strike.  

“Stay back Melody, we will handle this!” Jazz runs into the giant shadow but both the brave birds were blown out of the igloo with a gust of wind. The giant shadow rushed over to Melody grabbing her in his claw pulling towards his face as she was able to glance upon the dark ruby eyes. Black Feather… 

“I have been waiting for you! (He flew out of the igloo) I know what you are trying to do, but I am going to stop you right now!” Black Feather tightens his grip trying to force out the air of little Melody. As she is close enough to faint a bright light appears revealing the true ugliness of the Shadow Bird. Quickly letting go of the small bird by the blinding light, the heavens open as down came the majestic Cloud Bird casting away the darkened heart back into the shadows, dusk redeemed the sky.  

“Nube! (The little bird coughed) you came to rescue me.” The beautiful Caladrius descended and the blinding light grew dim. Hovering on a cloud, she stood in front of the three awed birds. 

“So these are my valiant warriors. I am deeply appreciated with the help you are willing to give me. From now on, I will be your guide.”