"They are eyes," chirped Hura with certainty. He swivelled his head to Oris, his elder brother, and blinked his own eyes, gleaming yellow in the starlight and filled with imagination. "They're eyes, watching us and waiting."

"Waiting for what?" replied Oris. He recognized the look in his fledgling brother, and he smiled inwardly. "To watch you as you learn to fly? What will they say when they see it?" That was absurd, of course. The stars do not speak.

Hura spread his wings and gave them a short stroke, swaying to keep his balance on his perch. "Watching! To see what is in our world!"

Both owls looked upward to the night sky, Oris chuckling softly. After a quiet moment, listening to the rustle of leaves and feathers in the evening breeze, Oris spoke again. "They do not change," he murmured. "Surely they already know what's in our world."

Hura thought about this for a long, solemn moment, turning it over and over in his imagination. "Maybe they made our world. It's so big, so many things to see..." Oris could not help but smile again at the wonder in his optimistic brother's voice. The fledgling had never yet been beyond the branches of their tree.

"I remember when I first learned to fly, and I began exploring the forest." He turned his head, peering through the branches, outward over the meadow, and then toward the ground. "There was always more and more to see," he went on, turning his gaze back to his brother. It wouldn't hurt to encourage the fledgling. "You'll find out, soon enough."

Hura beamed, and then both of them turned their heads as one toward the nest as their mother called to them in the dawn twilight. Oris nudged his brother, preening lightly through the youngster's feathers with fondness. "Dawn's coming. We'll see the stars again tonight," he promised. "Let's go to bed."

#

Late afternoon sun shone red and gold through the summer leaves, and Hura paced back and forth along the branch on which he stood, his wings partly spread, head bobbing low. "Come on," urged Oris, flitting to a branch a few wings-length away. "It's not far, you've done it before!"

Arai stood quietly beside him, her looming, motherly presence casting a deep shadow across the owlet. She crooned soothingly. "Wings wide, a flit, and feet forward to catch your next perch." Simple, of course, to anyone who has learned the use of his wings; but to a fledgling, the gap between branches seemed an endless chasm.

"It's too far!" Hura was beyond trying to keep the nervousness out of his voice. "I'll try a closer one... I know I can do that."

Arai was patient, speaking over the encouraging but less-patient elder brother still calling to him from the far branch. "You can, yes," she agreed, "but that is why you must try the farther branch. If you only go to the branches you know you can reach, you will never reach the branches you have not yet visited." And then, knowing the wonder he held for the world, she added most casually but with a smile he could not see, "You'll never reach the stars..."

It was perhaps a little unkind to play on the young owl's dream--nobody ever reached the stars--but her smile widened at the grim look of determination her words brought to his eyes. The owlet spread his wings, lifting them up behind him, and then brought them down as hard as he could, willing his feet to release their secure hold. Then came the terrifying, exhilarating sensation of flight, wings bearing him up, the distance closing across that interminable chasm...

It took only a moment to cross the gap, Oris cheering him on and skittering sideways out of the way, his own wings lifted in excitement at seeing his young brother taking flight. His feet reached forward and he gave another flap of his wings, talons waiting to feel the next branch securely in his grasp... then flexing and grasping at empty air as it took longer than he hoped, exhilaration swiftly giving way to unease and then to panic. He grasped at a leaf he felt brushing his toes, but his outstretched foot hit the branch too low and the other too high. He half tripped, half bounced back into the air, then gravity took over and he was falling, panic gripping tighter and tighter.

"Flap your wings!" Oris' voice was distant, barely audible through the wind rushing over his feathers. Hura did, though, flapping frantically, twisting in the air and catching a glimpse of the ground rushing up toward him.

His wings caught air, his tail flicked open, and with a swoop more graceful than he realized, he was flying again, out away from the tree which had always been his home, out over the forest meadow where his mother and his brother hunted.

Panic dissipated as abruptly as it had set in, and he was barely aware of his brother in flight beside him, catching up and cheering him on. The grass of the clearing swept by beneath him and excitement returned, his breast full of pride at his sudden accomplishment as his head filled with wonder at the world below. He turned his head, looking down, then to the side to see his brother, pride swelling still further, and then looked up as he caught the shadow of their mother soaring over them, watching.

Sudden resolve filled him, and he flapped his wings again, stumbling only slightly in the air, then again, and again, angling his wings just so and feeling the wind push them up, push him up, and up and up. The oncoming trees concerned him, but the flex of one wing and his tail brought him into a turn which came naturally, leaving him giddy with excitement.

Soon, though, he began to realize that his wings were quickly growing tired. He felt the twinge of panic again, and looked to his brother. "What... what do I do?" he called, his voice sounding tiny in the rush of the wind.

"Land!" laughed Oris, still excited to remember the frights of his own first flight. They each flapped their wings, Oris smoothly, but Hura's motions beginning to show desperation.

Arai joined them on Hura's other side. "This way," she called, her voice calm and reassuring, and when Hura's head snapped to look at her she turned gently, guiding him back to their tree.

Hura calmed, but doubt returned. He began flying, he remembered, because he unceremoniously bounced off the branch upon which he had intended to land. He was travelling much more swiftly now. Could he catch the branch, alight and end his flight? Or would he miss, bounce again, and be forced to remain in flight until his wings gave out and gravity sent him plummeting in a tumble to the ground..?

The thoughts lurked, but there was no time to dwell on them: the tree to which his mother was guiding him approached quickly. He did not recognize it as home, having never seen it from the outside before, but he fixed his gaze on a branch, desperate to be standing on something solid once more. But no, that branch was too high, so he shifted his gaze to another, then another, and another lower still. His wingtips brushed leaves, distracting him helpfully just as his feet found purchase and reflex gripped tightly. Momentum almost sent him tumbling over the branch, but he caught himself with a final beat of his wings and somehow remained upright, if a little wobbly.

Breathless, he stood with his wings spread for a moment longer, then folded them as his cheering brother and patient mother landed near him. "See, I told you it wasn't too far!" called Oris, more than pleased with his fledgling brother's sudden performance. "I didn't fly so far on my first flight!"

Hura began to feel better, pride and giddy satisfaction returning at his brother's praise, and he looked to their mother. "Is that true?" he asked her. "Did I really fly farther than Oris?"

Arai smiled and nudged the beaming owlet, preening lightly through his wind-ruffled feathers. "You did well."

#

Hura ruffled his feathers up and nestled in between Arai and Oris, watching rain fall from the gray afternoon sky. Each evening had brought him more confidence, stronger wings, longer flight, and he was beginning to discover what his brother had told him, about the wonders the forest held. He could find his way back to the tree so long as he did not stray too far without Oris or Arai beside him, and his elder brother often flew with him while their mother hunted.

Oris turned his head to look at Hura, recognizing the longing in the fledgling's eyes. "It will pass," he chirped softly. "The rain never lasts long. Tomorrow you can fly again."

Arai crooned soft agreement, but Hura was not consoled. The rain was wet, and it was cold, and his chest burned with desire for the aching muscles that came along with the thrill of flight. And, when he looked up, he could not see the eyes of the night sky shining down at him, watching him as he learned.

"It's too long," he objected, a little sullen. "I was going to circle the meadow again above the treetops." He liked that, seeing how high he could climb, then finding his way home again, the branches looking so small beneath him.

"Tomorrow," Oris assured him softly. "The trees will still be here tomorrow."

Hura would not be consoled. With another pang of disappointment, he huddled down under Arai's wing and heaved a sigh. Oris looked silently to Arai, unsure what to tell his eager brother.

After a quiet moment, Arai spoke. "The clouds cover the sky," she said, turning her own gaze up to the overcast, blinking away the raindrops. "But they do not fill the sky. The sky goes on forever until it reaches the stars, but the clouds have tops, just as the trees have tops."

Hura turned his eyes to Arai. "You mean..." he began, absorbing her words. "You mean you can fly above the clouds?" There was a hint of wonder in his voice again, and Oris was glad to hear it.

"Of course," Arai said. "Sometimes, their tops are very high. Much higher than the tops of the trees above the ground. But the sky is always there, and the clouds always move on."

Hura said nothing, but looked out over the meadow, pondering his mother's words. If the sky was still there, if the clouds had tops and you could fly higher and higher until you rose above them, and higher still to where the sky met the stars...

Excitement crept into him little by little as he thought about it, and he nestled in closer between Arai and Oris, a plan beginning to form in his mind.

#

The night was dark beneath the clouds. The rain had grown lighter as the evening wore on, and now there was only a light drizzle from the dense overcast. Too excited with his plan to sleep, Hura had watched the rain fall, until Oris, and then Arai, began to breathe more slowly, their eyes closed in slumber.

Three times he had changed his mind worried he would wake the others, but finally he had slipped from beneath Arai's wing, up to the edge of the nest, then crept silently out along the branch. Now he stood looking up to the featureless sky, and down the the ground below, only faintly visible in the deep twilight even with his eyes wide.

He hesitated. Something inside cautioned him, and he turned his head to look back to the nest, where mother and brother slept without him. But the longing filled him and he shuffled his feet, then spread his wings, resolve pushing out uncertainty.

He swept out of the tree with only a whisper of the wind over his feathers, and once clear of the branches and over the meadow, he began to climb, firm strokes of his wings pressing him forward, upward in ever-climbing circles. In only a few moments, he shivered, realizing he was inside the clouds now, that you really could fly through them... but his elation was short-lived when he realized that the uniform gray had enveloped him and he could no longer see. The ground, until now ever-present, had vanished completely, and there was still no sky to be seen; he began to doubt his plan.

Almost as quickly, he began to feel a little ashamed of the fear beginning to claw at him. Fear has led me nowhere, he thought. Fear has only kept me in the limbs of the trees and on the ground beneath. Fear will not keep me from the sky. Fear will not keep me from meeting the stars!

Resolve regained, he worked his wings harder, faster, climbing higher and higher. "The eyes in the sky will see me soon," he said aloud, the sound of his words reassuring him, while the idea filled him with a thrill of excitement. And then, all at once, the clouds were gone, no rain flew in his eyes, and the stars glittered magnificently overhead.

He shrilled in triumph as he soared in a wide circle, and when he looked beneath him, he gaped in wonder at the magnificent landscape the cloud tops formed, billowing and cascading over each other in starlit glory. A little tired, but unwilling to simply return home--and now, he realized, unable to even find his way back--he kept his wings spread wide to rest while soaring, currents of rising air bearing him upward just as they made the tops of the clouds billow. There was no turning back, not now. With a few wing-beats carrying him higher when the rising breeze faltered, he flew onward, upward, in ever-climbing circles with his eyes now fixed steadfastly upon the distant stars, the eyes above him, knowing they watched, certain they were pleased that he was coming to join them.

--

Pinpricks in the shell of the sky, stars in the heavens: to these shall we strive.

Anon comes the night when we shall break free and fledge into the unknown light,

A destiny our own, should we but seize it.