6. Defeated

My garden! My garden! Cosmo took her and the rabbits in his claws and zoomed to the camp. He was fast, and still most of camp had already been destroyed. Several elephants didn’t fight: they carried whatever tents and weapons remained in baskets on their back.

Fifty hungry soldiers, with barely any power left in their paws, had to divide their attention. A part kept the enemy at bay. The other part tried to sneak away. Far away enough that they could build a new camp in the dark woods without being seen. Quili saw it all happen from up high—she hoped the enemy soldiers below did not notice.

“Put me down! There!”

“Pardon? Why?”

“My garden!”

“Your …”

Cosmo landed in the middle of a stirred-up patch of dirt. Quili could only recognize her garden through a part of the fence that was still upright. The running and digging had brought the seeds back to the surface. Now they lay scattered like marbles that had collided and then rolled away.

Cosmo grabbed one and studied it. “This confirms it,” he muttered to himself.

“Confirms what?” Quili tried to talk through the growing pile of seeds between her teeth.

A pack of wolves had seen them and came for them: the biggest in front and the others in a V-shape behind it. She put her entire trust in Cosmo and continued gathering the final seeds.

And indeed, the God of Air waved his wings once—and you’d think the wolves had suddenly become birds. Their surprised squeaks completed the imitation.

When she was done, she climbed back on Cosmo’s wing, like a mountain made of feathers, and ended on his back.

This was why they fought for the gods. Cosmo allowed it, without hesitation, and took the weight of her and the rabbits as if it was nothing. The gods just wanted more life. Why did the enemy’s only goal seem to end and waste as much life as possible? Who would do something like that? Cosmo would protect everyone and—

“There! More seeds!”

“A battle rages, dear Equid.”

“Doesn’t matter!”

Cosmo dove. He fit precisely between a fighting elephant and a group of eagles on the other side. A trunk almost hit Quili in the head. Cosmo turned elegantly, grabbed the two seeds, then took off again.

“And there! And there! Why are there so many seeds here?”

Of course, Cosmo saw them too. He had eyes just like the eagles. Quili was still too happy to stop yelling. They repeatedly dove at frightening speed, as if Cosmo was crashing, only to pick up a seed with incredible precision.

Two Gosti threw spears at other Gosti. Confusing. She wasn’t sure who was on whose side. Tibbowe thought so too, as he’d distributed some sort of bracelets. Some Gosti now wore a colorful ring of leaves around their paw: they belonged to her.

A flock of doves came for them. Always so many. Hundreds of doves tried to bring Cosmo down. No help from the eagles came, or other birds in her army. Probably because they assumed Cosmo could do it alone. Beaks jabbed at her fur, paws, nose, ears. The rabbits were able to chase away doves with their long, sharp teeth. But for each dove that vanished, three new ones seemingly appeared.

“Hold on tight,” Cosmo said, as he spit white feathers.

“How?”

Cosmo suddenly turned upside down. Quili clung her hooves around his thick neck to stay put, but she wasn’t sure for how long. The rabbits formed a chain below her, their long ears the only way to grab each other. Most of the gathered seeds flew out of her mouth, forcing her to loosen her grip and reach out to safe them.

The doves registered the turn too late. Cosmo’s wing batted them away, as if playing a sport, to the other side of Traferia. Cosmo flapped his wings once more. Because he was upside-down, this made him go down, which surprised the doves again.

He twisted below a surprised elephant as Quili saw the world in the usual way again. Four wolves were about to kill the grey, giant beast. Cosmo landed between them in a whirlwind, which bent the trees backward until they broke and fell on a group of snakes.

The gap in the foliage finally revealed the sun, whose rays illuminated Cosmo precisely. He caught his breath and waited until Tibbowe was with him.

Quili saw a basket in the distance. She and the rabbits ran for it, threw all their collected seeds inside, and jogged back to Cosmo.

Wait. A basket. Isn’t this exactly …

She looked back. Exactly at the location where they grabbed the basket, a seed revealed itself.

They took Epoh too.

A new whirlwind, this time of the feelings within her. Her friend! What if they did something horrible to her? What if she was dead?

No. Her “friend” had made very clear that she wasn’t her friend. And she had destroyed her garden!

Cosmo spoke his final words to Tibbowe. When the sunlight dimmed, Cosmo flapped his wings again, but in a different way. Leaves, twigs, dirt, and even insects all took off and created a suffocating, dark brown mist. Quili could see nothing. When she was grabbed and placed on somebody’s back, she could only trust it was alright.

It was alright.

They soon left the mist. Their army had been prepared for it and used it to sneak away. A new camp had been built, close to a stone formation which spiraled towards the sky. Its path was wide at the bottom, but the further you turned upwards, the more it all came together in a singular point.

The enemy still roared and tried to find their way through the mist.

Tibbowe bellowed at the eagles. “How can this happen again and again!?”

“We don’t see them coming! They must have magic. Something special.”

“They do have something special,” Cosmo said. “My Windgustwing.”

The king frowned. “How can you be sure? Are you sure?”

Cosmo held up a few superseeds, and then a few of the supersized glowing eggs. “These items are not normal, of course. They come from animals under the influence of my Heavenmatter.”

“I thought the wing only allowed you to fly faster.”

Cosmo shook his head and placed the seeds in Quili’s basket. “Why do you think we made our Heavenmatter? I made mine before I was banished and became a bird here, which means it does far more than bird-related magic. It contains powers I don’t have without it.”

“Such as … make large seeds?”

“It enlarges. It strengthens. It works for all, though it is most potent with airborne animals. Whenever a bird eats a plant or fruit, it will poop out its seeds a while later. That’s how plants normally spread to different areas. But if that bird is under the influence of my Windgustwing …”

“Superbig seeds,” Quili said in awe.

“Frankly, its magic is still much of a mystery to myself. It’s so strong that I can’t even be close to my Windgustwing for too long.”

“That’s why you don’t wear it all the time!” Quili interrupted him. Gods must have incredibly patience to allow her all these interruptions. A bit like kings.

“I have to be away from my Heavenmatter part of the time. Don’t touch it, don’t come close. Otherwise my body, my brain, maybe my magic breaks. Like … like a Gosti who can be strong thanks to a spear, but if you take it with you to bed, you will accidentally hurt yourself badly.”

A soft paw nudged Quili’s side.

“See? You don’t want to break your brain,” Didrik said.

Tibbowe entered his tent and came back with two baskets of food. All that was left after their rushed flight.

And nothing was left.

Oh, yes, the baskets were filled with things. Bits of meat, some berries, lots of dead mice. But it had been stored for several days now, so it had started to rot. Mold grew over the pieces of fruit and Tibbowe couldn’t even smell it without pulling away and dropping it. Epoh wasn’t even here to bring fresh food today.

The army sank to the floor, defeated. They were exhausted. Their bellies rumbled like thunder, all equally empty, singing the same song of impending doom.

Quili sought a new location for her garden. Somewhere halfway the spiraling stones, protected by some pointy rocks, she found an empty patch of land. Didrik and her replanted the seeds.

The eagles quickly came to help.

“How did you find so many?” one asked.

“During the battle, the ground was littered with them.”

Maybe the secret spy did accidentally leave them behind. All soldiers of the other army were under the influence of the Windgustwing. They couldn’t help leaving behind magical things regularly.

“Maybe … maybe tomorrow you need to go back to find more. You have no idea how our stomachs ache.”

“We will need it,” a Gosti sighed. They also helped rebuild the garden.

“They are plants!” a lion complained to Tibbowe. “We can’t eat those. We need meat. Have you ever seen a meat garden?”

“Have you ever seen magical seeds? Would you like to walk back to enemy territory now to hunt?”

The seeds were quickly replanted once the elephants also came to her aid. And the queen. At the end of the day, an exhausted Quili looked out at a flat garden, wishing stalks would appear.

Tibbowe and Cosmo walked back to the only tent left. “We can’t take this any longer. I will not watch as every animal, every single one, dies of hunger. We will pull back and let the enemy have Darus’ Heavenmatter.”

Cosmo clacked with his beak. “You have now seen the power of these objects. They can not have Darus’ object, or the war is over.”

“But—”

“I might know where to find it.”