In Windmere village, the sky was merely something which rested quietly on top of your head.
It wasn't something you extended towards.
It was the background to clouds, the occasional hawk, and, if fortune was yours or a curse upon you, a High Mage passing overhead in a flash of power, robes streaming behind them like a banner. That kind of magic wasn't simply uncommon—it was impossible. Magic flight was a deed of the gods. It was reserved for the elite. The High Circle, the blood royals, the mages able to warp the very air into submission. And even those didn't last long or do it gracefully. An hour, at most. Drove two, possibly three individuals, and made the caster look like they were going to throw up.
Nobody in Windmere attempted flight after that.
Everyone except Edward.
Edward was fifteen, and something was decidedly off about him, most of the village would have said. Not that he was evil. Just… odd. Odd in the way he gazed at birds as if they were saying something he alone could understand. Odd in the way he gathered feathers, and parchment, and bits of metal like they were treasures rather than garbage.
And above all, odd in the way he looked up.
Not only gazed—yearned. In the same way a fisherman yearns for the ocean or a knight for a sword.
Today, he was doing something especially absurd: trying to fly.
From the top of the chicken coop.
Once again.
"This'll do it," he muttered to himself, cinching the straps of his glider—a absurdity of taut canvas and splintering wood that resembled more a tent in a gust of wind than a practical flying machine.
"You said that last week," a voice called from the fence. Elsie, the daughter of the weaver, rested against a post, crunching an apple and appearing rather disinterested. "You landed on Old Marla's pig."
Edward flinched. "I apologized. And repaired her fence."
"She said the pig hasn't slept since."
Edward stepped to the edge of the roof and spread his arms. The glider unfolded with a creak, catching the wind just enough to whisper possibility.
"I adjusted the frame. Lightened the load. Improved the—"
"You're going to die."
He glanced back at her with a grin. "Not today."
Then he jumped.
For a heartbeat—just one—he didn't fall.
The glider caught the wind. Lifted. Tilted. He glided a dozen feet with his heart pounding, air rushing past his face, the entire world beneath him.
And then the frame cracked.
There was a shout, a yelp, a snap—and Edward plummeted into a hay cart with an explosion of straw and dignity.
---
"You'll break your neck," muttered Halrick, Edward's father, later that evening as he sharpened a blade at the forge.
"I nearly stayed up this time," Edward said, touching a bruise on his shoulder.
"You stayed up long enough to frighten the goat and knock over two milk buckets."
His mother, Elna, put a bowl of stew in front of him. "Eat. Then tell me how you managed to destroy my best curtain again."
"It was for science."
"It was for falling."
He gulped spoonfuls of broth, going over what went wrong. The crossbeam had been too flimsy. He needed better wood, but that was reserved for carts and furniture. He'd have to do it again.
Halrick watched him sit for a long time. "I know you've got aspirations, son. But don't let 'em lead you over a precipice."
"They're not leading me. I'm running straight off."
"That's what gives me concern."
---
That evening, Edward sat in his "workshop"—a shed at the back of the smithy filled with tools, drawings, busted wheels, and unfinished wings. Candles cast a warm light over stacks of parchment, each one bearing a new design. He leafed through them: Lift, Mk IV. Wing Curve Experiment. Feathered Rig (Too Heavy). Each was a tale of hope. And failure.
He didn't dislike failure. It meant he was still trying.
What. What he didn't like was the world saying no. No, you can't fly. No, you don't have magic. No, you're not special by birth.
But Edward had another idea in his mind: that you could create what others are born with.
He looked up at the rafters, where the silence seemed to reverberate; then out the window, where the stars shone like diamonds. "I'll get there," he said softly.
---
Old Leonard was the only grown-up who didn't laugh.
The following day, Edward sat beside him outside the tavern, drinking watery cider as Leonard puffed on a bent pipe.
"You remind me of a lad I once knew," Leonard said. "Attempted to create a boat that would travel on land."
"Did it work?"
"Ran down a hill and crushed a goat."
Edward laughed.
"But he never gave up," Leonard said. "Invented the barrel cart.
Edward looked thoughtful. "What if someone already figured out how to fly? Before the High Circle banned all those books?"
Leonard's eyes narrowed slightly. "There are rumors. Machines powered by gears. Gliders from cliff cities. The old ones don't talk about it much. Most of the records were destroyed after the Mage Purge. The High Circle didn't like competition."
"If it's been done, I'll find out how."
Leonard puffed long and slow on his pipe. "And if it's never been done?"
"Then I'll be the first."
Leonard laughed. "You're a fool."
Edward grinned. "That's the plan."
---
Afternoon, Edward and Elsie strolled the hills beyond Windmere. She clutched his latest blueprint in her hand while he walked with a burden of wood across his back.
"Why do you keep trying?" she asked abruptly.
He did not reply immediately. Then: "Because no one else will.
She regarded him sidelong. "You know everybody thinks you're out of your mind."
"I am out of my mind. That's how the ideas come in."
They came to the ridge. Down, the land sloped into a meadow of rocks and sheep. Edward put down the wood and spread out the plan on a boulder. Elsie peered at it.
"This appears. complicated."
It is. But I believe I've finally got it. It's not about defying gravity. It's about dancing with it."
She blinked. "What?"
"Birds don't defy the air. They utilize it. They mold themselves to it. This curve here—" he touched the wing design "—is identical to the wings of a hawk. If I can make it light enough and jump off the north ridge. I think I could glide. For real.
She crossed her arms. "And then what?"
"What?"
"Suppose you do it. You fly. What do you do next?"
Edward gazed out at the horizon, wind ruffling his hair. "Then I do it again. Higher. Longer. I construct a vessel that flies not for a second, but for hours. Days, even. Perhaps one day—over the sea."
Elsie was silent for a moment. Then: "I hope you get through. But don't forget us down here."
"I won't," he replied. "But perhaps I'll return with a bird's eye view."
---
As the sun dipped below the hills, Edward stood alone on the roof of the workshop, arms crossed, eyes fixed on the dying light.
Flight was still deemed impossible.
But Edward had never been one to obey rules.
He'd fall. He'd crash. He'd get ridiculed.
But he'd learn.
And one day—he'd rise.
Not by spells or titles.
By wings.