"You know what, Anna, I think you're an idiot," Kim said as he laid his spade cards on the table.

I glared at him from across the table and followed suit along with the two other members seated. It would have been a lucky win if not for the suspicious amount of time his hands laid concealed under the table. He was cheating and we were happy to let him have his fun. But Kim wasn't talking about my loss in cards. When he finally met my gaze, I had to look away. His genuine concern for my intellect was both embarrassing and insulting.

I gathered up the cards for my deal as his concern compounded.

Kim shook his head and said, "I mean no offense, Anna, but telling us people from the sky are going to pick you up out of some windstorm and take you to their king is making you sound a copper piece of crazy and this ain't even the first time you've said it."

The player on my left sat rigid and silent, but the one to my right, Jace, shook his head grinning.

"Kim maybe she's not an idiot. Maybe she's just crazy."

I slid down my chair in a false pout, reaching out my feet under the table. I could tell that they were both trying to ease the mood in their own way. They could sense my anxieties as well as I could feel theirs.

I reached up from my lowered position to offer Jace the deck of cards. As he reached for the stack of worn papers, I made my move. My feet wrapped around the leg of his chair and jerked upwards.

Jace's mouth made an "O" of shock as he arms lashed out for anything to grab onto, but it was too late. He fell backwards, the chair making a satisfying thud. Kim had been chuckling silently to himself but now he roared in laughter.

Jace scrambled up from the ground smiling and lunged. I yelped, feeling my chair gave way and soon I was on the floor next to Jace laughing so hard I thought I'd never breathe again.

The chair to the left of me pushed backwards. Out of anger, maybe. Jace's head shot up to look and we both stopped laughing. I glanced up to Kim for any clue as to what triggered the motion, but he shrugged helplessly. The left side player stalked to the door of our one-room home and opened it. It was eerily quiet outside; I desperately wanted to ask the color of the sky. He peered out of the doorway for a second then turned back to us.

"Are you leaving again?" he hissed at me. Anger sparked again. I realized he was remembering last week.

As the first storm had approached, I decided it would be better if I had left without telling anyone to make it seem accidental, unplanned even, when I had subsequently gone missing. And then the twister had come through, rampaging the other side of the city, and the person who had been taken by the storm was not me.

I had realized my mistake soon thereafter: Yulimer, a thief and assassin, would not first think that I had been snatched up in a storm. He wouldn't have even thought of the possibility that I had run away. It would be something like a rival of his finding where he lived, a kidnapping, a murder, an imprisonment, or even getting caught for some crime I had committed months ago. When I had returned that night to the house, the reception had not been pleasant.

"Where were you!" Yulimer had spoken softly, but he voice was cold. I had flinched away from him, but it did nothing to soften his gaze. Yes, he was worried. There had been no denying it. But the anger was so overpowering I wondered if he had even noticed the underlying emotions himself.

I snapped myself back to the present.

"I said," Yulimer repeated, "are you leaving again?" His voice cut through the air.

"Yes."

"THEN GET OUT!" he roared. He carried himself back into the room to a single desk, backed turned and fuming. My temper flared.

"Not that it would matter to you," I retorted.

I scrambled up from the floor and grabbed the extra shirt that had been hanging on the back of my chair before it had been knocked over and I fumbled to get it on properly. I didn't grab anything else. I shouldn't be needing it. I made for the doorway and Jace got up and followed me out. I pushed the curtain in the doorway to the side and stepped into the street.

Unlike the usual bustling of bodies, there were only a few people still out as the city collectively braced for the possibility of another windstorm. I was thankful, at least, for the empty streets. The lack of stares at my disfigured frame was freeing. The clouds hung low and changed from their usual blue to a murky green-black-gray color. I absent mindedly pulled and adjusted the small bits of cloth wrapped around my wrist. Jace came to my side and grabbed my arm.

"Listen, Anna, you really shouldn't be like that, you know he's just worried," Jace started.

I pulled my arm away. "More like angry," I said

"Well he's always angry"

"Well, I'm angry too."

Jace chuckled. "Well," he mocked, "you're always angry."

I rolled up the sleeves of both of my shirts as we walked on. It was late summer and the slowly increasing breeze did nothing but blast more hot air into our faces. I made a turn to the left out of the city. Jace glanced up at the sky then back behind him.

"Are you really leaving?" he asked.

I expected him to still be joking over the subject, but the usual jocular tone was replaced with seriousness,

"Not exactly, I would say, more like taken."

Jace's voice was wry. "Right, because the storm is coming for you and is going to some place unbeknownst to everyone except for you.**"

I nodded along to the absurd tale. He sensed my growing fear and somber attitude. I rarely hated being constantly prodded by the feelings of the people I lived with or the people walking down the streets, but everyone seeming to know my personal feelings at any given moment? That, I could not stand.

Jace thought for a moment. We took an abrupt right turn.

Finally, he said, "I don't think Yulimer is going to let you back for a second time if you're wrong."

If I had not been still angry with Yulimer's anger, I may have answered differently. "If I am wrong then there is nothing keeping me here. Yulimer has kept me from working in this city for over a month, and if there is no work, there is no money. I will not wait however long it takes for him to get over him to get over his grief and let us thieve again."

At some point Jace had slowed to a stop and we stood on the edge of a dirt road.

Jace shrugged, his body forced painfully into a pretense of being casual. He spoke softly. "Anna, if the only thing keeping you with us is money, truly and honestly, then maybe all of this is a good thing."

He looked at me, nearly prompting me to disagree with his words and offer some better, alternative idea to Yulimer not allowing me back.

But I had none. His face was impassive as feelings tangled into an almost unreadable nature. He looked for the last time to the sky then turned to walk away.

If it were any normal day, Jace would have left, knowing that our conversation would not progress until my aggravation had eased. I Jace would have spent the rest of the day lifting pockets, and I would have gone back to the home, probably to sulk before any evening or nighttime work that Yulimer had found for us. I would be home before dinner, and, if I had sacrificed my pride, there may have even been a whispered apology or explanation.

If I planned to keep my pride intact, then there would be no mention of day-time disagreements or hurtful words either of us had spoken, and life would go on much the same as before. If there was anything still to be said, it would be solved while we were working in the dark of the night.

The sky was turning black now and there would be no opportunity for sacrificing pride.

The world felt eerily silent and another breeze of wind cooled my face. I shuddered. There was no telling how much time I had left before the inevitable storm struck.

I desperately wanted to run back to my home and explain everything, years and years of secrets from start to finish in a way I had never wanted to before. I was on the edge of the city, and the housing was more spaced out, allowing for a clear view of the rolling farm fields and a distant forest. I could feel the wind much stronger now, and the tops of the trees were starting to bend. Clouds overhead that usually remain stagnant started to move.

I could feel my hands shaking. Brought to this city more than six years ago, my only thoughts had been to get back home, to my real home, with my family. My mother and father and siblings would all be there when I was taken back. My favorite younger brother would be there.

Then in the weeks following, I met Jace and Kim, and then I met Yulimer and Yulimer's friend George* (wrong, fool). We were all so much younger then, Jace and I were only thirteen and Yulimer was just turning nineteen. I had made a new life for myself as quickly as possible.

I smiled bitterly at my own incompetence. It had taken me six years to realize that I didn't want to leave.

Suddenly, a flash of white cut through the sky and thunder cracked in my ears. I was a quarter of the way between the edge of the city and the small forest. I realized it truly did not matter if I was in the forest, the city, or somewhere in between. The storm was still coming. I kept walking.

The wind was increasing. As I reached over my shoulder to adjust my shirt, I felt a drop of rain. Then another. And then it started to pour. I looked miserably back at the edge of the city where people were inside and very dry, but I couldn't be there. Only last week the storm had carried into the city to find it's target, leaving destruction scattered in its wake.

A gust of wind caught me and I stumbled to the edge of the small path I was on. I looked up and gaped in awe. The whole sky was spinning above me into a massive spiral. I leaned into the wind. Holding up my arms in a feeble attempt to keep the rain from my eyes, I looked up again.

I realized the sky wasn't spinning, but rather a small portion of the clouds were creating a wedge shape in the sky. It was happening. I was going home.

I was terrified.

My heart pounded in my chest as the wind ripped at my clothes. It was roaring in my ears as the trees across the fields bent sideways. The wind changed directions and pelted my face with rain. It hurt.

The wedge shape descended over the trees until it touched them. It seemed to be getting bigger. It wasn't until I saw it break free of the tree line that I realized: it wasn't getting bigger. It was getting closer.

I wanted to step away from the tower of spinning clouds, but it pulled at me. I tried to take a step back. Instead, I stumbled forward, one step after another. It was getting so close now. I felt like I couldn't breathe.

And then it was on top of me. Something hit my cheek. Something else slammed into my leg. I realized in horror that my feet were no longer on the ground. My eyes were squeezed tightly shut. I tried to pull my legs to my chest, but I was being pulled apart...

Then the wind stopped. I could still hear it roaring but everything felt still. Then my ears. My ears felt like they were being filled with cotton and wind sounded muffled. I tried to breathe but it felt as though the air was being pulled out of my lungs. I was dying.

There was a strong pull on my arm, and I opened my eyes in the new quiet. There was a hand pulling me up above the storm. I heard a popping sound in my ears as the pressure released. My lungs drew in a breath.

Gravity pulled at me again and my feet found purchase on the ground—no, not the ground. There was grass, and underneath it, dirt, but that was as far as it went. I was truly standing on the clouds. My only thought was to look up, and I had never been happier to see the brilliant, blue sky above me, completely cloud-less. Home.

I looked around. There were people, dressed in dark blues, browns, and greens, aligned in formation as they worked to continue the remains of the storm below. A small group of them wearing nearly black made a circular motion with each arm coming inward and drove their arms into the clouds. Lightning cracked as another similar group repeated the motion in reverse to receive the electricity.

I gaped. In all my years growing up, I had heard about but had never seen weather being made for earth in the clouds.

Beyond the weather-makers stood another city; this one positioned above the city on the ground below. Then behind the bustling city stood a castle elevated oh higher clouds, more magnificent than the ones on earth, but perhaps not more beautiful. The early afternoon sun glinted off the ice on the castle walls. And, as I knew it would be, the air was fresh and cool.

It made the cities on earth seem so foreign.

As I fully took in the people around me, their clothes, and their accents, I realized that after so many years, I was foreign too.

The hand that had been resting on my arm relaxed and I jolted away from my thoughts. I turned my head to look at the man who had grabbed me from the storm. He was probably in his thirties, and, unsurprisingly, was dressed in all green. He was a wind-controlling weather, then. He would have to be if he was capable of pulling me out of the windstorm.

Out of formality, another man came to his side with a piece of paper. The three of us were standing far enough away from the rest of the crowds that the rest of the weather-makers paid us little attention.

The man read from the paper, "On the date of seven moons and three days after the fifth new year, Anna Chase is to be relieved of her dismissal from the clouds and will then be allowed to attend a private conference with the standing king to plead a case to be welcomed back into the clouds. Long live the king of the clouds. Long live King Syhoven."

I inwardly grimaced at the name of the king who had banished me in all but name over five years ago and outwardly made a formal gesture and bowed.

My physical appearance remained neutral, but my mental reaction was not lost on the man before me. In turn, he stiffened, and I felt him become wary. There was no way for him to know the terms of my "dismissal." For all he knew, I meant serious harm to the king or country, and my reaction was not helping matters.

After another moment he returned my gesture. He then nodded his head at the man beside him and said, "we will escort you to the king. Please, walk with us."

I gave him a nod without speaking. He was still wary of me, but now my anxieties were growing too. I considered myself mature, but I knew that next to these two men I was a child. I would not be able to take either of them in a fight.

I mentally shrugged away the thought. I was not here to fight anyone, and I was not here to cause myself trouble. After the conference with the king, which was truly nothing more than a symbolic proof of my loyalty to my kingdom, I would be allowed to go home or anywhere I pleased.

I walked behind the man who has read from the paper, and the other, the one dressed all in green, walked behind me as we entered the city.

In the city, the lack of rain caused places that would otherwise have grass to be bare and dry, cracked dirt. A few shrubs grew, but mostly the scenery included houses made of wood, a few shops, and a few more elaborate structures made of ice.

While the city I had lived in on earth had a walled-in castle in the middle of the city with houses packed tightly around it, gradually becoming sparser at the true edge of the city, the houses in the clouds were arranged in a fan shape with the palace walls on the edge.

There was no farmland either. The clouds we built our cities on could travel at speeds unknown to humans, and produce could travel across the sky faster than ships on the ocean. All of our food was grown elsewhere. We had plentiful supply of bugs just outside of the city, but animals were supplied by both those living in the clouds and on earth.

The city was also considerably smaller. It was a well-known fact that we were less in population than those on earth.

As we walked closer to the looming castle, I started to recognize more buildings. I looked through the faces of people walking in the streets for anyone familiar. I wondered if they would recognize me.

On earth, I had stuck out clearly as a foreigner. My skin was lighter, my voice was accented even when I tried to hide it, and above all else, my back appeared disfigured and hunched, though on careful inspection people with half a brain would see that I walked straight. Here, my skin tone was normal and my accent was familiar. If not for my back, I looked like everyone else.

I thought for a moment that I may have recognized some people that we passed, but we were on the side of the city that I was not familiar with. The walk to the castle was extremely uneventful and I wished we could've by passed the city and traveled with moving clouds.

We approached the walls that enclosed the castle. They were maybe 10 meters high and had a single entrance that was flanked by four of the King's guards. As we entered through the gate, the each made the formal gesture to the man who had read my papers. He returned the gesture immediately. I wondered if perhaps he was important, and I wondered why.

The formal gesture was a simple salute. A person would place his right hand as fist in front of his heart, palm facing down. Simultaneously he would move his left hand to hover above his right, with all fingers pointing to the sky and the palm facing to the right. I supposed it was meant to be symbolic of the earth and the clouds.

Traditionally, it was given to people who were significantly older or higher ranking. The king's or queen's guard, however, did not usually give this gesture to people outside of the royal family or each other. I knew the royal family very well, and he was not one of them, but he also was not dressed in the uniform of the guard.

Past the walls, we walked on a stone path flanked by railings to either side made of ice. Beyond the railings, the clouds dropped away after a few feet, creating the effect that the castle was floating. Behind the castle, I knew, lay elaborate gardens and training grounds for guards and numerous other structures. The cloud the castle sat on was very much connected to the clouds around us. Not that it needed to be. After all, the clouds were all floating no matter how big. The effect still dazzled most people the first time they saw it. I do not remember the first time I saw it, but I do know that I had remained undazzled.

The entrance to the castle itself was two very large bronze doors that took multiple men to move. They were brought open and again the formal gesture was made to the man. There was no mistaking it: I was traveling with someone important. I was unsettled that I did not know why.

I was led through the twisting walkways of the palace. I knew them all too well. I was led up the stairs, as expected, but we took the wrong turn. A conference with a king always would take place in a hall, lined with people including some guards, high ranking officials, and attendants. It was truly as private as possible for a meeting with a king. Of course, exceptions were made for close acquaintances whose meetings had need to be private. We took another incorrect turn, away from the hall used for the daily business of a king. We took another flight. I looked behind me and realized that it was no longer two men escorting me but the man.

There was no denying where we were going; I was being led to a private room. I did not want to any place where words could be said away from prying ears. I did not want my secrets spoken aloud, even if I was the only one present to hear them spoken. But I could not reveal such feelings.

I steeled myself, as I had done before, to exclude as much of my emotions as possible. I detached myself from my thoughts fear and anxiety, and everything else I could think of, willing myself to be numb. As the thoughts disappeared, the worries would follow. I breathed in, held my breath, then out, and repeated it again slowly.

The man leading me faltered, poking my head with his confusion, as he briefly turned to glance in my direction. We had never met before. If my growing anxiety was gradual, he probably had not paid much attention to the change. The sudden change of emotions was disconcerting to anyone who was not used to being privy to my every feeling.

The man's emotions however, were heavy with suspicion. I wonder what he knew about me, or my circumstances of "dismissal", or why the king was expecting me in a private location. I was worrying. I removed myself from my thoughts again. I was comfortable. I was calm. I was confident. I stood up straighter.

There was another flight of stairs. We were in a hallway now; it was bare except for a modest doorway to the right, and the hallway ended barely beyond that. It was no place for a king, but beyond the door I felt another series of emotions that I saw to be impatience.

The man opened the door and ushered me in. I held my breath. Before me was a table with two chairs, one more elaborate than the other, and on the finely carved wooden chair sat a King dressed in a fine robe, a light color in stark contrast with his dark skin. His black hair was pulled into a series of braids flaked in gold. A tattoo of spiraling black lines descended from his eye to his chin, like a tear. He was smiling, and his smile was grim.

Impatience was replaced with a flash of concern, a spark of hope, some anger, and then it spiraled into too many other things for me to make sense of it all. Somehow the turmoil coming from across the room made it easier to remain impassive myself.

The man next to me made the formal gesture and bowed saying, "Your majesty." I followed suit, making the gesture as well. "My king," I murmured.

The king waved away the gesture. To the man the king said casually, "Please, excuse yourself," as if the implication meant nothing more than discussing a game of cards.

The suspicion and anger was sharp as the man stood and removed himself from the room. The door shut with a soft thud. The bitterness stayed pressed outside of the door, but it seemed that the king knew this would be the case. His smile found humor in the situation. I wondered if the man, wherever he came from, was used to being let aside.

I raised myself from my bow and found the king's stare boring into my eyes. In a moment, the king's unrest settled to the single silence of grief.

And then, he addressed me in a language I should not have known with a name that no longer belonged to me.

"Rozpalyty, ti vertes po reignya ti desnavesh?"

My fear exploded into the silence of the room.