#thought this

...

Fareeha is a hawk shapeshifter who leaves home every morning to perch in the bell tower; awaiting the return of her mother from a war between magical beings (a war that never seems to end, it has gone on for two centuries already). Ana has promised to come back, and so Fareeha waits and she watches.

Angela is a human field medic and keeper of the war bell. It is her job to stay by the bell, at the top of the bell tower, day in and day out and keep an eye out for signs of a siege on the town below.

One day it comes. A massive army, too close and very powerful.

Fareeha, who has spent nearly a year as a hawk sitting at the top of the bell tower with Angela, sees this too, and when Angela rings the bells, Fareeha, who has already begun to fall for the medic, makes up her mind to help defend the woman and the town.

We walk, side by side

“May I hold your hand?”

“Can you?”

A smile

A hand locking into mine

“May I kiss you?”

I turn

I smile

“Can you?”