Like the birds that stopped at my village’s oasis, my bravery was migratory. It came and went, curled under their wings as they skidded over the surface with an exhausted landing, dipping their heads to indulge in the fresh, cool water.
My lover was very much like the sand swans he studied—lanky and beautiful, narrow, focused eyes, and a slender neck that arched gently like a palm tree. His wings were slim and sharp, meant to cut through the sky rather than glide. Despite us both being pegasi, he was a creature of alien beauty.
At night, while the swans rested and preened their feathers, we would sneak to the outskirts of town to make love in his tent under the cautious orange glow of his lantern, letting our moans ride up the dunes to be whisked away by untamable winds. And when we lay in our sweat, breathing hard, he would tell me about his studies—biological functions, aerodynamics, dissections—all in immaculate detail. He would run his hoof through my mane while he did so, playing with my disheveled hair. Despite the cool nights, his touch always felt as hot as the Saddle Arabian sun.
Once he was done discussing his studies, he would try to convince me to leave my village.
“Come with me, Fadheel, my stallion of the sands. Let us fly together under the moon and all of the stars. Just you and me,” he would say.
As much as my heart yearned, I could not. By ancient law, the stallions of my village were not allowed to leave. Only the mare-folk could set hoof outside the oasis, just as the Wanderer had done thousands of years ago when she blazed her holy trail across the desert. In some parts of the desert, stallion pegasi had their wings clipped at birth to deter them from leaving. And if one did decide to journey out of their home, they would be treated as an exile, shamed from ever returning.
My lover understood this, but would still push me further with each passing season. He would arrive with the swans in the cold months and plant his rebellious seed in me. I would leave my father and my mother and sisters and never look back. They would forget me eventually, and I them, and that would be my path.
I would promise him that we would depart together once he made his way back to me in the warm months, but as soon as he left, I felt so heavy that I thought I would sink under the dunes. I would spend six months trying to nurture that rebellion—that new bravery inside me, but the deserts were not good for growing things.
This pattern repeated itself for five years. Wings, love, promises, then excuses.
But this year, he did not arrive with the birds, and he did not come back with them, either. There was no sign of him or his beautiful neck or his dancer’s legs or those crisp wings that cradled my head so gently in his tent. I wept that night as the swans circled each other and preened their feathers, floating aimlessly in the clear waters.
In my moment of despair, however, I felt that seed of rebellion flourish into my own bravery, beautiful and strong in its own way.
Now, I stand at the edge of my village, staring up at the guardian pillars that have confined my entire world. It is dawn, and the sand swans are flying overhead in their arrowhead formation, pointing me where I need to go.
With a final step, I cross the threshold, hold my head up high, and kick into the air, joining the birds as they guide me into the unknown.
I do not look back. I do not think of anyone else except him. Wherever I land, I know he will be waiting for me.
Mother and Father weep in court, and they don’t dare look at me. Their tears fall into the clouds that make up the Grand Hall, unnoticed by the other pegasi glaring at me from the stands. I think about their tears falling through the clouds, collecting what little moisture there is before dropping into the sea below, lost to the endlessness before evaporating into clouds once more.
I wish I could do that now. Evaporate. Slowly break myself into tiny bits of rising steam and feel my entire essence disperse into the atmosphere. But the guilt in my chest is too dense, holding me together. My hooves keep sinking into the thin floor as if the weight of my sin is pulling me under.
Great Nimbus stares at me from his chair, the most solid piece of furniture our tribe could manage to gather out of the remaining vapor. His wrinkled, sagging forehead sits like an anvil over his eyes, and I wonder if he can even see me. I hope he can’t.
“Filthy ground-trodder!” somepony yells from the crowd. I can’t be sure, but it sounds like the kelp-catcher’s daughter. Great Nimbus holds up his staff, strings of empty crab claws tinkling together like a wind chime. The room is silent. Not even a breeze dares interrupt him.
“Sky Feather,” he rasps. “I am disappointed, but I cannot say that I didn’t expect to see you like this.”
He speaks like a cold front, pushing all warmth from the building. Despite the blazing sun shining through the arching roof, my hooves chill with sweat. Baba barks out another sob, bowing as if his muzzle were made of steel, as if my shame had latched onto him, too.
“Is it true, Sky Feather?” he asks. The other pegasi leer at me as if they can see the shameful flecks of sand buried under my hooves.
I try to look brave, like I don’t regret my decisions, but my aching heart has sprung a leak, flooding my chest with grief until it reaches my lips, making them wobble and crack. “Yes,” I say.
Somepony spits from the stands—the ultimate sign of disrespect for a Namuzzlian. But such disrespect is worthy of the highest of taboos, which I have broken.
I let my hooves touch the earth below.
I have soiled myself, drifted astray from the pure winds that have carried my tribe across the desert oceans for centuries. We Namuzzlians are few, but we are proud to live and die in the stratosphere, for the earth beneath us is tainted with greed and fools and other impurities. Impurities that cannot be washed away once exposed to.
When the horse latitudes pushed our homes over the Plucked Isles, I grew restless with fantasies that had been whipped out of my head with a kelp lash when I was a foal. Curiosity and its unquenchable needs piloted me that night as I wheeled under the stars to find the smattering of land that resembled gull shit.
I still remember the way the sand felt under my hooves—rough and cool, nothing like the clouds I’d been raised on my whole life. The sensation was infectious. I raced up and down the beaches bucking wildly, kicking up great chunks of grains and dust. Only the kelp-fishers could dare to get that close to the surface.
It was then that the shadow of my home drifted across the moon, casting the shadow of realization on me that I fled, dipping my hooves in the brine to wash away the evidence of my debauchery.
I thought my actions would be lost to the sea, just like Mother and Father’s tears as they continue to fall through the floor.
Great Nimbus rises from his seat, opening his old, creaking wings that fall somewhere between divine and decrepit.
“The sentence is as it always has been for our kind. There is no longer a home for you to return to, Sky Feather. You have forfeited your right to food, shelter, and kindness among your people. May the winds guide you.”
Heads nod and muzzles murmur in agreement. Great Nimbus swipes his wing in front of him, and a piece of the floor blossoms open in front of me. Miles below, the ocean churns, hungry for me with its white-capped fangs.
I try to speak, to plead, to beg. My chest is hollow. I feel lighter than the air itself as I step forward, taking one last look at Mother and Father. They are gone now, hidden behind the other pegasi eager to watch a piece of tainted history be wiped clean. Taking a deep breath, I plunge into the open emptiness, snapping my wings out to sail into the barren sky.
