Tuesday comes along, and with the dawning of this day, new words form up into a story for you to drink up like water in a desert.

Another chapter of The Wings Take Shape is coming at you!

If you’re new to the story, head to Part One and start from the beginning!

Last week, Captain Renee Mollen and her Winged Riders hid in the bloody wood, the Red Forest, seeking shelter for a little rest in the dangerous forest. Renee was worried about Jon, who had turned into a cougar in front of everyone, revealing his Skinchanger nature and violently murdering Renee’s Scout Irons in his rage and escape. She took to calling for him in the woods, but he didn’t appear.

Sergeant Marie Mollen, Renee’s twin sister, came to Renee and discussed their future and the wisdom in seeking Sadie out knowing that her nephew Jon’s fate was uncertain. The twinner bond they shared was weakening just as they needed it most, but once it starts to go, it is said nothing can be done.

Farsight Poul saw something in the woods creeping upon them, and a pack of cougars set upon them, snarling and ready to attack, but a larger cougar, what must have been Jon, scared them away.

He attempted to Change back to his normal human form, but it failed midway and he fled back into the bloody wood, still a cougar, still wild. They pressed on to find Sadie and hopefully some help.

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The Wings Take Shape

Part Eight – Sadie Skinchanger

by Rick Cook Jr.

Another town burned to the ground. Renee was sick of the sight. She brought her Wings to the edge of the bloody wood and they stared at the smoldering wreckage of Sadie’s village.

Marie’s fingers clenched around Renee’s arm. “Is she dead?” she whispered.

“As hard as she fought to keep herself alive against the cadshee? I doubt it.” Renee pulled her arm free and tugged on the reins, making her horse follow into the village square. The rest of Renee’s Wings and recruits came soon after.

It smelled only of charred wood and linen. No scents of burning flesh. No bodies to speak of. That was good. Where had Sadie gone? Had she taken the townsfolk to safety? Her children? Continue reading →

Another chapter is here for your viewing pleasure! Part Seven of The Wings Take Shape is coming at you.

If you’re new to the story, head to Part One and start from the beginning!

Last week, Captain Renee Mollen and her squad were taken captive by foreign soldiers at the trading town Danver’s Table. Amidst questioning, Renee distracted their guards long enough for her twin sister, Sergeant Marie Mollen, and her adopted Sergeant Regina Hughes to free themselves and mount a rescue of the rest of their Winged Riders.

They free the Wings and take control of Danver’s Table, and in the ensuing discussions, Renee presses all the able-bodied men, women, and teenagers into service under her Winged Riders. If they want to be protected, they can help protect.

They have decided to flee for the home of Sadie Sawyer Paige, Jon’s aunt and wife to Jeffrey Paige, a Winged Rider in Captain Claire Claymonte’s employ. Sadie is a Skinchanger of a different ilk, having absorbed the powers of the cadshee, shifting into any form at will. If she still lives and they can find her, Sadie may prove a capable ally in the coming conflict.

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The Wings Take Shape

Part Seven – Shadow of the Cadshee

by Rick Cook Jr.

They fled south and west, taking every backwater trail the twins could muster, trying to avoid the main arteries of the empire’s roads. Twice in their desperate, exhausted flight they had run the horses ragged fleeing foreign patrols and taken sanctuary in the bloody wood. And both times they had slept little or not at all.

Marie certainly hadn’t caught more than an hour’s rest. Between Renee’s worry infecting her and Private Wander trying to cozy up to her despite their desperate circumstances, and a needling feel that eyes watched them in the Red Forest, sleep was an old friend gone a long time.

It was her imagination or it wasn’t for that last worry. Maybe it was Jon? Renee patrolled the border of their encampment, calling to him when she thought no one could hear. Wherever the fool had gone, he wasn’t coming back right now. And even as she thought of Renee she realized something else.

Their twinner bond was weakening. Continue reading →

Tuesday has arrived and with it another chapter in the epic tale of The Winged Riders as they struggle against a great force, seeking to take back the empire that was stolen.

If you’re new to the story, head to Part One and start from the beginning!

Last week, morale was low in Captain Renee Mollen’s Winged Riders as they searched the countryside for any signs of life capable of joining her on her insane mission to retake the capital. They came upon a village still standing at long last, Danver’s Table, and got their bearings from the leader of the town, Danver Jr.

They bedded down for the night in the town’s common building, only to be taken prisoner once they were asleep. In the scuffle, Jon turned into a cougar, losing control of himself and killing their scout as he fled, disappearing into the Red Forest.

What will the Winged Riders do?

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The Wings Take Shape

Part Six – Traitors

by Rick Cook Jr.

Renee spat blood she wasn’t bleeding. The traitors worked over her Sergeants in the small tent they’d set aside special, just for the commanding officers. Every time Marie took a blow to the stomach, or the face, Renee winced at the phantom pain from their bond. Marie was strong. Of course she was, and they’d all had training in how to take a beating, how to survive torture.

But it was too much. Too much for Renee to bear. She cried out, “Enough! You will stop this instant or I will see you hanged for it.”

The townsfolk – bloody bastards – grinned at her over their shoulders. She didn’t know these two men, but it didn’t matter. Traitors were punished and when she got free, Renee would see them all in stocks. Continue reading →

And Tuesday comes, bringing whispers of fiction on the wind…

It’s time for the next part of The Wings Take Shape, the second entry in the serial novella series I run on this here blog.

If you’re new to the story, head to Part One and start from the beginning!

In Part Four, the last known Winged Riders scrambled to gain information and plan their next move. Jonathan Sawyer, Skinchanger, grappled with his emotions over the slaying of an enemy while in his wolf form, Swiftstrike. He felt like he might be losing himself.

Captain Renee Mollen and Sergeant Marie Mollen, twins and twinners, sharing an empathic bond, reassured him that he did what was right and necessary. With Sergeant Regina Hughes, they set out to gather an army from the surrounding villages to take back the capital from foreign enemies, only to find each new village and garrison of Kingsguard assaulted and burned down.

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The Wings Take Shape

Part Five – Dismay

by Rick Cook Jr.

“This is intolerable,” Renee hissed. She booted her mare into motion after surveying the seventh burned village, the second garrison of Kingsguard slain. Marie marked every body as they passed through. These were innocent men and women. Children. Elders. People that had done no wrong.

“We’ll get the bastards, Renee,” Marie said, riding up beside her sister and giving her a small jostle.

“I’m beginning to doubt it, Marie.” Continue reading →

Tuesday is here again, my friends! I hope the week passed for you as fast as it did for me, but perhaps not if you were impatiently awaiting the next part of this story, eh?

If you’re new to the story, head to Part One and start from the beginning!

In Part Three, Wing Captain Renee Mollen conferred with Sergeant Regina Hughes in the Red Forest while learning what she could of the events inside the capital city. The place has been overrun, and Renee’s old Captain, Claire Claymonte, is presumed dead along with the rest of the Winged Riders and Kingsguard remaining in the city.

Sergeant Hughes is now on a mission to round up every Kingsguard and able-bodied adult around the empire and return in force to retake the capital. Captain Mollen agrees to escort her on her mission and help lead the assault, though the thought of acting as a general terrifies her.

Meanwhile, Sergeant Marie Mollen led three of her Winged Riders down the road, hoping to distract the soldiers and keep them off Sergeant Hughes. They successfully trick the enemy soldiers into chasing them, and dispatch them before they can escape back to the capital. A wolf the size of a horse comes leaping out of the Red Forest to stop an escaping enemy soldier, then disappears back into the woods. Marie suspects it was Jonathan, Changed into the wolf she and Renee know him to be capable of becoming.

Before they rejoin Captain Renee Mollen, they discover evidence of the enemy soldiers possibly serving the Totemic Gods, one of which is a cougar.

On to Part Four!

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The Wings Take Shape

Part Four – Madness
by Rick Cook Jr.

Jonathan stalked the bloody wood as Swiftstrike, his throat raw and his stomach empty after what he had done to that soldier. He had deserved it, surely. He was the enemy.

And yet the taste of his blood was sticky in Jonathan’s mouth, coating his muzzle, and he dry-heaved against the forest floor yet again. He had never killed a man before. And it had been so easy.

So very easy.

He was almost back. Just a little farther. But suddenly he felt woozy, dropping to the loamy earth. Continue reading →