The darkness that overwhelmed me is entirely gone the moment my eyes open.

... maybe 'gone' isn't the right way to put it. It's still dark, but I see my own skin through my eyelids. A bright light, directly in touch with the sunlight, just in a sheltered place.

Right next to the light, my nose is the first to react. A strong herbal smell ... leaves being crushed and cut. The aroma of flowers, stronger and more fragrant than I usually smell them on the fields, meaning they are probably crushed along with the leaves. The smell of wood, a fresh pine scent even. A hint of slightly acidic pungency, just barely. Probably a fruit? Some berries?

I frown a little, pressing into my eyes with my brows. Noises of morning birds chirping. A buzz that I've never heard before. The murmur of people. The rustling of leaves....

Wait. The murmur of people?

Rustle.

That was not the rustling of leaves.

A few things happen instantly. I jump, immediately realizing that it's a bad decision—my right leg hurts—and my eyes open much faster than my body could move. Light floods my eyes, mercilessly, and I have no choice but to feel just how overwhelming it is to have all my senses and my own body struggle against my unconscious commands. I take one step back, stumble forward, my eyes covered.

I groan. And that's when I heard it—a woman's voice.

"Sit down."

It sounds so weird. I sit down, as she commanded. I can make out her words just fine, but it sounds ... wrong. It's like the sound of a winged person who has never set foot on Kunoi branches before, but learns the language elsewhere ... maybe through writing, or through imitating the sounds of a Kunoi person. If the sentence did not make sense, it would have seemed like someone who just gargles out syllables from a Kunoi person.

The way she says the s sounds weird. The way she says the ow sounds weird. She just ... doesn't sound native.

She doesn't sound winged at all, in fact.

As I settle down, and my breathing returning to normal, I can finally start to see my surroundings more clearly. I'm in a wooden ... house? Room? It's a living space, this much I can tell. I'm currently sat down on the floor. A protrusion hangs over the walls furthest from me, probably functioning as a table with its height—whether for dining or cooking, I can't be sure. The table hangs near a very bright source of light—a large, open window facing the direction of the sun.

I look up. The ceiling is cluttered with a scale-like texture. Oh, wait, those are not scales. Those are ... handlebars? They look like some of the toys on the backyard of our school back in Takamatsu Village roost, mainly used to help winged children strengthen their backs before they can take flight. However, the handlebars in Takamatsu Village were connected to the ground and number few—many of the taller ones were used not to train the back muscles, but for the kids to perch on together. The handlebars here are numerous like scales, facing various directions with no real rhyme or reason, and they all hang from the ceiling instead. Oh, and their heights all seem to be about the same.

I look around again. More tables hang from the walls, more wide-open windows, a wooden pillar in the middle of this large room ... is this a reception room of sorts? Or maybe a family room?

Then, right there, on one of the tables, were a pair of very large gray wings.

And by large, I mean large. Each wing is probably even larger than an adult winged person's wing, and an adult winged person's wingspan is nearly twice their body height. In there, slouched in between the bent gray wings with orange streaks of feather, is the dreary-skinned body of a gray-haired woman. Unlike the deeper gray feather on her wings, her hair is a much brighter shade, nearly white even.

I stare in awe before realizing that she has two clawed fingers protruding from where her wing spurs would be, and both claws are grabbing onto the handlebars hanging from the ceiling.

She seems to be cooking something on a wooden bowl, and I only now truly realize that she's cooking with her legs. She has protruding thumbs down there, which she uses the way I use the thumbs on my hands. Her wings connect directly to her shoulders, so it seems that she does not have arms the way winged people do. She's something else.

She's not quite a winged person. Close, maybe, but not really.

... I've never met other creatures that resemble winged people like she does.

I have so many questions.

Where is Kotengu? Where am I? Who is she? Why am I here? What is she making? How did I survive? What happened after I Fell? How long was I out for? What is going on?

I find myself groaning again. "I—what—?"

"Hello," the gray-haired woman says without turning to look at me. She still continues to do whatever it is she's doing with her bowl. "Must heal. Eat."

She speaks Kunoi. Roughly, but she knows Kunoi words. And she seems ... to make sense. As in, I can tell what she tries to say, although the fact that she doesn't turn to look at me kind of confuses me about whether she's really addressing me. I don't know what to make of that. Who taught her Kunoi? Is Kunoi language known in this area? Is she Kunoi? No, she can't be, her body looks very different from a winged person's—her legs are significantly thicker and looks closer to a bird's, unlike the winged people with their flat feet and straight limbs. Her wings are also bigger, and she has spur-like clawed fingers on her curving joint. She also, again, has no arms or hands—her wings are in place of where a winged person's arms would be. A winged person's wings protrude from their backs, but hers are clearly from the sides of her body.

She turns to me.

I can't make out the color of her eyes, but they look white ... almost similar to the monster I saw right before I Fell the second time.

The monster—

Red. No, crimson.

I cover my head and cower down.

Where's Kotengu? Where is Kotengu? Why can't I feel him? Where is he? I need Kotengu. I need to feel Kotengu's feelings. I need to feel Kotengu near me because if I have to feel again like the monster is nearby when Kotengu isn't here I'm going to jump and scream and run away screaming and—

"Wait sorry! Sorry!"

It feels like there's thumping on my temples, and it isn't until another two seconds that I realize that I am hugging myself, crouching on the floor, shaking and sweating whole beads of sap. Why am I here, again?

Where is Kotengu?

Flap-flap-flap....

Kotengu....

Kawk!

Kotengu! "K-Kotengu!"

I perk up. I'm still shaking, but I can feel my body more clearly now, and if nothing else, I can finally hear again.

I try sitting back up. Kotengu starts flooding my mind with relief—something along the lines of, thank the skies you are alive!, if I understand him correctly—but the process is slow. Very slow. Much slower than usual. I usually feel Kotengu's feelings immediately, almost instantly, even, but this time it feels like his emotions had to sludge through a very thick, slimy surface before they can enter my mind.

"Ugh ...," I groan, pressing my eyes again.

"Okay?"

The female approached me, letting go of her grasp over the handlebars, bringing herself closer to me with a small float—those eyes—

I draw a deep breath, and she seems to understand. I don't want her closer to me.

"Sorry," she says.

There's something odd about her voice. Not just her command of Kunoi—her voice in general sounded off. Just like her entire body.

Really, what is she?

Why is her body so much like a winged person, and also very different?

Why does she sound like that?

Why does she have the eyes of the monster?

I lose balance again for a second, but quickly recover my stance, cautiously keeping her shadows in my sights.

Kawk.

That's Kotengu. Half a second later, are you okay?

"I'm fine," I croak. Ugh, my throat doesn't feel right. My entire body feels like it's all out of control.

It takes me another second until I realize why my breathing feels weird and my body feels heavy—the air here is incredibly thick. Not something my body can't tolerate, but definitely much thicker than the air of the stratum I first Fell to. Which can only mean one thing: I really have Fallen much further down the Tree.

Does that have anything to do with my brain receiving Kotengu's emotions late? Not sure. This has never happened before.

"Eat," the female says, pushing forth the bowl she was mixing with her feet.

Go eat, Kotengu says.

Very cautiously, I let my eyes properly focus. The wooden house is decorated—there are sheets of cloth and ropes with beads everywhere around the place. There are painted motifs, ones I've never seen before. I only now realize that there are what seem to be multiple curtain lines that can probably close all the open windows here so tightly not even rainwater can make it in.

And there's the female. I now notice her expression: that's one of a very wary worry. I'd recognize that look anywhere. My mother had that exact same look when she first heard from my teacher that the winged children were picking on me.

... maybe she isn't so bad, after all.

I gingerly accept the bowl.

"Name," she says. Then she scratches the top of her head with her left wing, as if rethinking what she just said, before then tilting her head a little. "Name?"

Her tone changes into a question. I sniff the bowl—it smells like leaves and berries, the same scent I smelled when I woke up. The mixture in there looks whitish, and there isn't enough there to even fill my fist. The stick in the bowl that she used to mix the ingredients turns out to have a flat end on the inside, making it both good for crushing and also a decent spoon for sticky stuff.

I eye her once more. Her expression is still that of cautious worry, but the worry is definitely there. There's a rough, rudimentary feel to everything in this room, and even to the single sheet of cloth that she drapes over her body. It's as if she was a relic of civilizations past.

"Miyako," I answer her. "Karasumori Miyako."

She nods. "Kurangaituku," she points at herself with her right birdlike foot. She says it like kuran-gai-tuku. She enthusiastically wiggles the toe she uses to point at herself. "Kura. It is nice to meet you."

I did not expect her to suddenly pull off such a complete, formal phrase. The only way she could've suddenly learned that would be if somebody taught her that exact phrase, unlike the disjointed words she's been using so far.

So somebody did teach her Kunoi.

"It is nice to meet you," I reply. I eye the bowl once more. Leaves, berries. What could go wrong? I take a spoonful of the cream and quickly stuff it in my mouth.

My tongue explodes with flavor.

I'm not sure how to describe it. There's a strong salty taste, similar to the taste I get when I tried licking the saltwood we grew in our pluck—then again, we use flakes from the saltwood very often to keep certain ingredients fresh for a long time, and it tastes good, so maybe it's common knowledge among any creature that knows how to cook. The saltiness, however, was nicely carried by the pungency of the crushed berries and the aroma of the leaves, and tempered by something that feels ... what is this, creamy? It was an odd experience overall, but not one I find especially unpleasant.

The only problem is that there's definitely not enough of this for a meal. Didn't she tell me to eat?

"Heal?" she asks. Ah, right, there's also that. I don't really feel the difference, but at least it's clear that she means no harm.

"Heal," I answer as I finish gulping her mixture.

If what she gave me was truly a healing concoction, I can only hope that it does heal me, and fast. I'm finally awake, and it finally starts dawning on me just how out of touch I am with the current situation. I figured there's no way I can really tell how far down I've Fallen now, and I don't want to send Kotengu up as always, so I'd at least like to know how I survived the Fall at all. Kotengu has returned, so that's another issue solved, but I realize I don't have my sling with me.

Also, apart from this woman's identity—she called herself 'Kura', if I caught our little talk correctly?—I know absolutely nothing about her or her kind. Who is she? What is she?

What is going on here?

How do I climb back up?

I can still breathe, so I assume the timberflyers could have reached this place, but did they ever make it back? Will I still have familiar things around here that I've read about on the juhi tablets? Can I still consume things here without risking Kotengu's health and safety first?

Knock, knock.

Both I and Kura turn to the source of the sound at the exact time—one of the walls facing outside. Standing out there is a silhouette ... a very familiar one. Standing upright, almost four forearms tall, with arms to the side.

No wings on the back.

I jump back—it's another wingless person.

"Kura-san," she starts, "Taka-san says he needs you to check if his pendance looks okay."

No. Not quite. That woman has long, sharp ears, unlike my round ones. That woman has proper bird claws on her fingers, unlike my clean fingernails. The amber mirror in my house really helped me realize how different I am from the other winged people—and that woman has winged people traits.

Kura nods, and leaves through the window. And that's when I saw it: the back of the winged woman who spoke fluent Kunoi.

Wing stumps.

My heart sinks.

I'm not sure what's more shocking—me thinking for a second that another wingless person exists, or the fact that this very woman is, unmistakably, either a murderer or worse.

She was no wingless person, she was winged; her wings were just cut. And there's only one way a winged person's wings could be cut so cleanly near the stem like that: the single-strike slash ritually performed just before their Falling.

The Falling is serious business. It's a heavy punishment, reserved only for the worst of the worst. Kunoi Cluster hasn't recognized death penalty for a good amount of time now, and apparently the current Matriarch wishes to uphold that decision. We actually discussed this in class thanks to me—I just wanted to kick the bullies in my class down a peg by threatening them with a force beyond their control, like the patrollers or the Karura, maybe humble them a little and make them realize that hurting other people should have consequences, but I accidentally started a whole class on Kunoi constitution instead.

Not only did I find out that the Kunoi Cluster doesn't recognize death penalty, I earned the extra ire of my class for raising a long-winded topic way above their understanding. I had no trouble with it thanks to my habit of reading juhi on my free time—my teachers know that I'm a whole cut above the rest academically, it's really my one saving grace in class—but that was definitely not the case with the rest of the class. So, uh, yeah, another session of making a run for the articularium that day. Not a successful one, either.

That was how I came to understand the real gravity of the Falling. It was an ancient punishment that's been around since even before Takamatsu Village became part of Kunoi Cluster, if the legends were true, but only became strictly reinforced after death penalty was outlawed in Kunoi. That's big, because Takamatsu Village originally had another name, and only acquired its Takamatsu name after the village joins the Cluster and a distinguished Karura of that name was given the territory.

The Takamatsu name always came attached to the Karura career, by the way. That was the job of the first Takamatsu to lead the village, and the job of his oldest son, and the job of his oldest daughter, and the job of her children, and so on and so forth until it became the job of Takamatsu Taiju, my father, who retired to the territory just a little before I and Gekka hatched. If the pattern continues, Tsubasa nii-san should also be given the honor very soon.

... I wonder how he'd react if he hears that his youngest sister has been Fallen.

No, actually, he probably wouldn't mind as long as Gekka is safe. We were never too close. Amane nee-san or Tobi nii-san, however, would probably worry. That said, even they both love me and Gekka equally. How would they feel when they hear that Gekka Fell me?

Well, whatever they feel, I think they'd be more shocked to find me following a Fallen woman.

A Fallen woman who is also, by the way, casually conversing with a woman from a strange species that is uncannily similar to the winged people.

I shiver a little, and decide to follow them out of the house. Kotengu, loyal as he always is, hops onto my shoulder to join my little journey. I somewhat understand now why Kura's posture is so hunched—she walks on all fours, with her very long wingspans making it very easy for her wing folds to touch the ground as forelimbs. Huh. So she uses those to walk, too. What sort of environment does she live in?

As soon as I hop out the window, I finally gain an overview of the place for the very first time.

It's a grove. A whole thicket of similar giant trees, each one with large enough stems to carve an entire room in without disrupting the trees. In fact, in many of the trees, there seem to be holes carved, similar to the windows of the room I was just in; it's as if the trees also function as rooms stacked atop one another.

Right across from the grove, a field of smaller crops—tall trees with fruits and short plants with vegetables, vines that grow up the tree with shrubs covering their roots. The layout doesn't look anywhere as neatly arranged as our village pluck, but it's unmistakably a field, and one very well-taken care of at that.

Moving between the grove and the field, walking around with produce or just basking under the sunlight, are more people.

Wingless ... no, people with wing stumps on their backs.

Each and every single person in this thicket, with the exception of the uncanny woman, is Fallen.

I draw breath. There are some very gruff-looking winged men, of course, and unmistakably winged women of equally rough looks, but there are some very timid winged people among them too. There are old men and old women, young men and young women. Not one of them a child my age, and surprisingly no familiar faces—the execution of the Falling was always a public spectacle, after all.

I take a peek behind me. The tree I just left is the same tree as the carved-out grove.

Kura turns back, as if she catches my hesitation. She spreads her left wing, like showing the entire thicket to me. "Good," she says. "People, good."

Good people, she meant? Maybe? How can they be good people? Only bad people get Fallen. How could a Fallen be a good person?

... huh. And what does that say about me?

The woman leading her way turns back too, and a ripple of visible shock passes through her face—as if she just realized that I was there.

"Kura-san ...," she starts, "why ... why is a child down here?"

Kura eyes me, and then the woman. "Didn't ask. No time."

The woman wavers for a second, taking a couple of deep breaths like seriously thinking about what to say next, but then she kneels to bring herself to my height. Swiping away a strand of hair from her face, she gives me a very warm smile.

"Hello," she says. "What's your name?"

I look at her wing stumps again through the corner of my eyes. "Miyako," I say. "And yours, Onee-san?"

"My name is Misaki. It is nice to meet you," she says. Oh, are these people where Kura learned her Kunoi from?

I eye the people down there, over at the grove and out in the fields, and turn back to Misaki onee-san. Is there a nice way around this? I don't think so. I also don't have my sling to defend myself with. If Kura doesn't choose to help me here, I'd probably be dead anyway. Kotengu senses my fear, and takes off to the skies—as he always does when he prepares to help me fight.

"Misaki onee-san," I say, "why are you Fallen?"

It's as if somebody just lugged a tree. The silence that drops so suddenly, the very oppressive feeling of the air churning on and around my skin, the sense of knowing that something has been cut beyond return. I'm almost sure that Misaki onee-san's eyes died for a second.

"That's ...," she chokes. "Um, what about you, Miyako-chan? Why are you here?"

... how am I supposed to answer that? That I was Fallen by my friends? Can they even be called friends? That I was not Fallen because of a punishment by law?

... no, what if it was a punishment? What if I did Fall because I'm being punished?

What is the difference between being punished by adults and by kids my age? Isn't the law also made by people? Didn't the adults around me make it clear how they feel about me being around? Isn't it exactly the same?

If I get punished by people who feel the same, doesn't that mean I also get punished by the law?

Then what's the difference?

I gulp. Misaki onee-san carefully watches my expression, and so does Kura. How do I even answer this?

"... I'm sorry," Misaki onee-san suddenly says. She closes her eyes and takes a deep breath. "It's just ... you're so young. You must be around my daughter's age. I just ... I can't help but wonder about why you would be down here."

Kura stares into Misaki onee-san's face, then carefully watches mine.

"Sin," she coarsely murmurs. "Your sin, what?"

I return her stare. I can vaguely feel Kotengu circling above us. His readiness gives me the strength to stand, because if it weren't for his presence in my head, I would've slumped down since some time ago.

Slowly, I turn around to show them my back.

I can hear Misaki onee-san gasping softly.

"I was born like this," I say slowly before turning back to face them both. I make sure to look at them straight in the eye. "I've always been wingless. My whole life. That's my sin."

Misaki onee-san was clearly left speechless. Kura just keeps watching me. Then, just like that, Kura turns away, as if to return to whatever it is that she was supposed to do. "Taka-san," she says.

Misaki onee-san looks hesitant to leave my reveal be, but she doesn't seem to know what better thing to do herself—so she decides to continue showing the way.

I watch them walk, and decide that maybe I should consider my own safety here. Misaki onee-san avoided answering my question. There's no telling what she'd done that got her Fallen, and there's no telling what that makes everyone here.

... I still don't know enough about this place. I still need to move around.

The Fallen all look Kunoi, and Kura speaks Kunoi, so they should all speak Kunoi, right?

But what if they're dangerous?

Only the worst crimes get punished with the Falling, so of course they're dangerous. But I've survived fighting a lapwing. As long as I have Kotengu by my side, we should be fine. I think. Maybe.

Oh, but that only happened while I had a weapon....

"Is—"

I only started speaking up, but somehow both Kura and Misaki onee-san very quickly turn around, as if they were waiting for something to break the silence. I gulp and continue.

"—is there a way I can find tripvines here?"

Misaki onee-san sighs, shares a look with Kura, then smiles at me. It's an uneasy alliance, but I suppose it's better than the tension we have in the air. "Sure. Come, I'll show you around."

*

As requested, Kura has to give Taka-san a check on his pendance, whatever it is, so I take the walk around the area only with Misaki onee-san. The thicket they live in is apparently much bigger than it seems, although it seems that only a few of these trees get carved into housing rooms. They look almost like burrowed nests that some birds make on certain seasons, except that they seem to all be manually carved into each tree stem rather than being made of branches and twigs.

"This place is called the Totara Pendent," Misaki onee-san explains as she shows me another group of housing trees. "Those who are like Kura-san live in groups called pendents. She said they usually find a thicket of a tree they feel most bonded to, and they usually group up around these trees. The tree Kura-san bonded too is the tree she calls the totara, so this place is called the Totara Pendent."

Pendent.... "So the 'pendance' you mentioned earlier, that's...?"

"Yes—the rooms we carve into the trees. Each member of the pendent makes their own pendance, that's the rule of inhabitation. Taka-san was recovered just a few months ago, his pendance is finally starting to take shape."

I think back to the pendance I awoke in. "What about the curtains?"

"Kura handles that," Misaki onee-san says. "She's very good at knitting, you know."

"What about the ... the pluck? What was that field? Is that part of the pendent?"

"Yes," she answers. She greets another passing old man with winged stubs—another Fallen. "It's not really a pluck, but we developed that ourselves. Kura-san's kind usually hunt their meals, and they can just pick any fruit they want by prowling the area close to the pendent ... but, well, we got too used to our plucks." Misaki onee-san chuckles. "So we built one. We like the consistency, after all."

After going around the totara thicket for a few more rounds—there are predictably potfruit thickets nearby, because there's no way they could build a whole habitat without water—Misaki onee-san takes me to see the 'pluck'.

Unlike the pendances, the field isn't really much bigger than the field I saw the first time I saw the place. What really stands out, to me, however, was the clever way they set up the field—each plant supports the growth of the others, and all of them can be harvested in turn. This way, members of the pendent can keep themselves fed all year long even without a big field.

And speaking of the members....

I look around again, at the shaded faces of the men and women working the field, at their sharp ears, their clawed limbs; at the stumps of the wings on their backs that mark themselves as the Fallen. "Why ... is everyone here Fallen?"

Misaki onee-san finds a nice curved root under the shades, and sits down there, tapping beside her and inviting me to do the same. While she perches on, I just sit my bottom on the thing.

"I think your question isn't quite right, Miyako-chan," she says. "This stratum is so much lower than the Kunoi Cluster. The only winged people who end up here can only either be timberflyers or Fallen."

I nod. She isn't wrong. "Then...."

"You're wondering why the Fallen gather here?" she offers. I shake my head.

"Not quite," I say. She seems amused by my answer, for some reason.

"And?"

"What...," I scratch my head. "What's the story here? Sure, I wonder why everyone gather here, too, but I can guess that it's mostly about safety, right? But why here? And who is Kura?"

Misaki onee-san slowly closes her eyes, letting the breeze caress herself for a moment. She smiles wistfully, as if remembering something nostalgic—a face I see often when my father talks about Kunoi Village, the centerpiece of Kunoi Cluster, a place he was never too shy to admit was somewhere he wished he were. Not sure why he seemed so nostalgic every time, though, that part he never talked about with me or Gekka.

"It should be clear to a kid as smart as you," Misaki onee-san starts, "but we were all Fallen from different villages, Fallen from different times. To make it clear, no, we are not all of the Fallen—and we never will be. A few things make sure of that."

"Mm. Such as?"

"First, of course, is where we land." Misaki onee-san looks around her, and I follow suit. "It may be a little hard for you to imagine, but ... when a person is used to flying all their lives, they develop some habits in the air. These habits don't disappear even after our wings get cut. And usually, with these habits, we manage to get back into the Tree around this stratum."

That explains why there's so many Fallen people here. "So why does this make sure—"

"These same habits, Miyako-chan," Misaki onee-san continues, "also make us land in very different places all over the stratum. Not all of us find each other, even if we all Fell from the same Precipice. The stratum is very big."

Well. That I understand. I remember navigating only around a relatively small area after I Fell the first time, only an area I can come to and return from within a day's walk total, and I was nowhere near seriously exploring the stratum. The Tree is that big.

"The second reason, of course, is that the Pendent belongs to Kura-san."

Hmm. "And she chooses who stays...?"

"More or less. Kura-san knows that people are Fallen for punishment after coming across a good number of them around here. She knows what sort of company she could expect from the Fallen. However," Misaki onee-san beams a smile at me, "she also makes her own judgment of people. Her kind usually don't really group together, see, that's why pendents usually have no leaders. But she's very kind, and she only wants to keep kind company."

Kind company. That reminds me of the words Kura chose when rephrasing Misaki onee-san's question for me—your sin, what?

"So she's been sheltering Kunoi Fallen," I surmise, "and she selects her company. The ones she likes, she keeps in the Totara Pendent to build their own pendance; and the ones she doesn't like...?"

"She kills," Misaki onee-san says simply.

We fall silent.

"In summary," I say slowly, filing everything I just learned to the right places in my head. "Kunoi Fallen tend to land in this stratum. When Kura comes across them, she decides whether she wants them in her Pendent or not. Those who don't make the cut get killed. Those who do are given a place to stay and ... must be good?"

"That's the long and short of it, yes."

"And what about Kura herself? What is she? Why is she here? Where's the rest of her kind? Didn't you also mention that they usually don't have leaders? Then why is she leading this Pendent? Why—"

"Whoa there, calm down!" Misaki onee-san laughs. "Do you always ask this much in class?"

"It's the only time I get to ask anything without anyone trying to hurt me," I answer. Misaki onee-san's ears droop a wee bit.

"Sorry about that," she awkwardly coughs. "Um, okay, Kura. She is a person of the Claws, like how we are ... how I am winged people. The people of the Claws live much, much lower on the Tree, way below ours—there are many strata between our gates and their habitat. All I know are just the things I gather myself, though, so I can be wrong. Is that okay?"

I nod. It's not like I know much better, either.

"Kura rarely talks about herself, but she did mention that she only gained her real name—Kurangaituku—after she came of age. Apparently, the people of the Claws are only called 'of the Claws' once they're considered adults."

"So, Kurangaituku means ... Kura of the Claws?"

"Yes, if I understood her correctly."

"Did you teach her to speak Kunoi?"

"We all did. Anyway, she's here and alone because she flies higher than most other people of the Claws. There are probably a few more people of the Claws in the strata above us, but there shouldn't be many. And yes, they don't usually have leaders, but there are a few exceptions to this. If one person of the Claws in a pendent is particularly aggressive, they usually lead, somewhat. Like animals. Others," Misaki onee-san nods her chin at Kura, who seems to have finished inspecting Taka-san's pendance, "usually just follow who settles first, if they did not inhabit the pendent together in the first place."

I sigh. "Can I rest assured that the Fallen here are good? Because Kura approved them and all."

Misaki onee-san gives another wistful look. "No. Well, you can rest assured that they won't do anything to children like you, but don't assume that we are good. We are Fallen, you know."

That sends a weird chill down my spine. The walk and chat with Misaki onee-san has been relaxing compared to the fight and terror I faced just yesterday, and even more so from my days in the Village, that I already forget one of the reasons I had my guard up just a little earlier. They are all Fallen. And, as Misaki onee-san explained, they were all Fallen from different villages, from different times.

With this many people, there's no way I know why they all got sentenced to the Falling.

... and Misaki onee-san herself isn't exempt.

I've never seen her in Takamatsu Village, so even if she used to be in Takamatsu Village, she must be from a time before I can remember the villagers. The Falling is public spectacle, and it rarely ever happens locally, so the one time I did witness the Falling of a local, I remember the winged person being Fallen. I know for a fact that all my classmates do, too. That person was not Misaki onee-san. If anything, I haven't seen that person here at all.

This is also assuming that Misaki onee-san was from Takamatsu Village. It's much likelier that she was punished with the Falling from another village, and was only brought to the Precipice to be Fallen.

In other words, there's no way I could know what she was punished for. And this stands for each and every Fallen winged person in this pendant.

Even if Kura likes them, even if she thinks that she can shelter them, even if she thinks that they are all good enough people who can be made to cooperate enough to live together for a long time, they were still punished with the highest order of punishment in the entire Kunoi Cluster. It doesn't change the fact that they've all done something horrible, or that they had the capability to do something that horrible.

Like the great lapwing, they were all ready to hurt to survive. Everyone here is.

I can't forget that and let my guard down.

"Well," Misaki onee-san starts. "I say that, but I don't mean you should distrust us or anything. Just be very careful with your every step, don't trust us too easily, and you'll be fine. We all owe our lives to Kura-san here, so if she picked you up, then we won't hurt you unless we have to."

"Thank you," I answer. I can only hope she's right. Speaking of which, where is Kura, anyway?

"Stay here a while," Misaki onee-san finally says. "I'm sure there's a reason Kura-san rescued you, and since she let you live, she'd definitely like it if you stay here a good amount of time."

"I'm sorry, but I have to go," I say as Kotengu perches again on my shoulder. "There's somewhere I must be."

Misaki onee-san gives me an understanding look. I mean, I doubt she really understands, but she definitely doesn't intend on stopping me. Is there a hint of worry there, too? "Well, let's go over that with Kura-san," she finally says. "You can also heal up for a bit before taking off. Besides, I haven't given you your tripvine. What do you say?"

I nod. "Alright."

She's right. I should use this time to rest up and let myself heal. This place should be safe under Kura. There's food. There's medicine. There's protection, and there's shelter. I don't know how they do against monsters, but the field and the pendances look fine—so the pendent should be fine, too, right?

It's a good chance to lay down for a moment and fill up on what I need.

Then, when I'm ready, I can properly start my climb back up.

For now, I rest. And maybe remake the sling I lost.

*