My heart lit up in excitement as I perched myself up on the windowsill. It had finally stopped its endless days of rain! I don’t even remember the last day where it wasn’t pouring. The trees were green, the sky flawlessly blue and the clouds looked like perfect little cotton balls. My trance was finally broken when the loud and piercing voice of my father called us down for breakfast. 

¨BREAKFAST! COME DOWN OR I WILL FEED IT TO THE CHICKENS!” he yelled. 

I grabbed my slippers and did an extra slide at the end of the hall before descending down the stairs. But before I could, my twin sister Luna was right on my trail and was zooming down the stairs. My twin sister Luna was also running. We like to race in the morning. Whoever wins the race gets an extra two pieces of bacon. Her brown hair swept right in my face before I swatted it away. Sadly, she got there first before I did.

“Ugh, no fair! Your room is closer!” I whined, sitting down to a plate of pancakes and two pieces of bacon. My dog ran right up under the table for our usual routine. I feed her a piece of sausage and she doesn’t whine at my feet all morning. I broke off a piece of sausage and lowered my hand down when my dad turned around but before I could he spun around and bellowed, “Neoma, I know you feed that dog every morning,” he bellowed.

My face turned into what was trying to be a shocked face, but I knew it wasn’t when Luna spit out her pancake and started laughing. “Why are you making that face? You look constipated!” she said through her fits of laughter. I broke off a piece of my pancake and threw it at her face, sticking it to her nose because it was doused in syrup. 

“Hey!” she whined, trying to smear the syrup off her. 

My head turned to the window but heart immediately sank when I took notice of the picture next to it. I can tell my face looked different and my mood became down because my dad took notice of it as well.

“Neoma, are you okay? What’s wrong? He asked, tenderly putting a hand on my shoulder. 

“Um, dad? Why don’t you talk about mom?” I cautiously asked, not looking at him. Luna put her face down and played with her food, clearly upset. I couldn’t see what my dads face looked like but it couldn’t be good. I glanced over at the picture again and there she was. She looked just like me and Luna, brown hair and blue eyes, upturned nose and even the same smile. Sometimes I think my mom reproduced us asexually because we are a carbon copy of her. 

“Well, some things are hard. Some things are a bit, well, confusing. But one thing I am not confused about it is her immense love--” he grabbed my sisters and I shoulders “--for you both.”

I couldn’t help but smile. Sometimes I think she didn’t love me, my dad said she died in a car crash but I can’t find anything in the town files to support his claim.  I had to come to the conclusion that she left. But if she left, how could she love us? 

Luna popped up from what apparently was a deep thought and excitedly turned to the window.

“Okay, Neoma, let’s go outside. I’m bored.” she said,  putting her plate in the kitchen. As I did the same, I glanced at the picture one more time and quickly ran up and got changed into some jeans and a random blue shirt. I raced downstairs to get the bird food, as the little birdies must be hungry. Luna came down with jeans and a green shirt and she looked at the bird food in my hand. 

“Really? You’re feeding the birds again? She said questioningly. 

“Yes! They must be starving because of all that rain!” I retorted back defensively. 

“Okay, whatever, come on.”

We ran into the big valley behind our house. We lived in a two story house in the middle of nowhere. But it has its perks. We have privacy and these huge woods to ourselves.

I immediately ran to my bird food tray I made and poured the seed in there. While I was doing that, I spotted something big run in the corner of my eye. I quickly turned and my eyes were in awe. It was a silvery, glowy animal. I think it was a deer, or maybe a fox.

“Reona! It’s overflowing!” Luna yelled, snapping me out of my trance. She was right, I guess I was still pouring when I was entranced by that animal. I quickly stopped and walked towards the animal, who appeared to be eating. I turned to Luna and clearly she saw it too because her mouth slightly opened in shock.

“What is that?” she quietly asked, eyes still etched upon the creature. “Whatever it is I’m not missing it.” and she made a big step forward until I put out my arm.

“No!” I whispered. “You’ll scare it!” 

She nodded her head in agreement and we walked slowly forward together. When we finally got to the valley, we saw it more clearly, it was a-

“A horse! It’s a horse!” she said in excitement.

“I was gonna say that,” I complained. The horse was beautiful. It didn’t even have white fur, it looked to have silver fur...its mane was thick and bushy and its hooves were black. 

“You know I can hear you right?” a deep voice let out. Luna and I jumped back. We looked around in fear and was getting ready to run when the horse turned around. The deep voice spoke again. “Also, I’m not simply a ‘horse’, I’m a stallion.” 

Luna and I were frozen. We stood in place completely and utterly frozen. The voice disappeared altogether from our bodies and we just stood there, eyes wide, mouths slightly opened in shock. 

The horse, I’m sorry, ‘stallion’, spoke again. “Yeah, I guess this reaction is better than screaming. Luna broke the silence and screamed on the top of her lungs before I quickly covered it. 

“Shut up!” I muttered.

“What do you mean ‘shut up’? THAT HORSE IS TALKING!” she muttered back.

“Let’s just figure out what it wants,” I assured her, before turning to the stallion. “Um, w-what d-do y-you need?” I asked him. He seemed to ponder the question. He looked up at the sun and then looked back at us. He seemed worried...or scared. It spoke, in a much more worried voice.

“In exactly three minutes, something terrible will happen. The dark force will come back.” he told us. He said “the dark force will come back” like we knew what he meant. He saw the clear confusion on our face but didn’t put too much thought into it.

 “Now is no time to explain, get out of here now! Go back home! NOW!” he yelled.

The last word was enough for us to dart away, we ran with great speed back into the woods. It seemed like we were running for hours. I don’t remember us walking that far away from home.

Suddenly, the light glow we had due to the sun peeking its way from the trees completely faded. It was as if the trees banded together to surround us to make it dark. The temperature dropped and we could see our breath coming out of our mouth.

“Neoma…..w-what's g-g-going o-on?’ she asked in fear, teeth chattering. I couldn’t get the words out so I just looked at her. With that, something dark was coming. Not figuratively...something dark was literally coming closer. It was like a pitch of blackness. It came closer to the point where I could feel it. I felt everything leave my body. I tried to turn to look at Luna but my head was completely still, as if I didn’t have any control over my body. Then, my ears filled with the loudest sound of prancing. The silver stallion jumped over us and attacked the pitch of blackness. How? I don’t know. But he seemed to fighting it. Somehow, him fighting it broke the trance it had over me and Luna and we ran far enough away to watch.  The stallion kicked it numerous times and apparently was down before it pounced right back up and swiped the stallion. He fell down and the darkness quickly turned to us. 

The frozen feeling came back again, until what sounded like big “caw” from a bird. It was a large enough bird to fight. The bird seemed to come out of nowhere and it kicked and hit it until it went down. The bird then flew in front of us and looked at us both, tenderly? No. that wouldn’t make sense. It's a bird! I could finally make it out enough to see what bird it was. An eagle. The eagle turned around, still in mid air, and did this big enough noise that it seemed to cause the pitch of blackness enough pain to burst into mid air. The second it burst, the trees seemed to stop hovering and the light found its way back in. the temperature rose back it it's comfortable warmth. The eagle turned to us before flying away. We didn’t pay much mind to it because the stallion was standing up. For a stallion, its facial expressions were blatantly clear. It had a confused look on its face. He stood up and asked with the most puzzled face, “What was that? Each time I have never seen a bird come in. the bird defeated it!” he said in shock.

“WHAT WAS THAT?” Luna asked, completely ignoring his question.

He turned to her, then me. 

“It’s better if I tell you while I walk you home”

While we were walking, he explained to us.

“That was the Midnight force. It comes back after 7 years. After the 20 days of straight rainfall, it comes back for revenge once it clears up. Revenge for what, I don’t know. But it was never defeated, and the gods sent me. Hoping I could defeat it. As I watched the previous creatures fall to the force, a bird never intervened.” he explained. He looked at us a bit more closely. “Now that you both are closer, I can’t help but see you both look totally familiar who are your parents?” 

I answered before Luna, who still seemed to be processing all the new information.

“My dad’s name is Frank Caster, and my moms name is Lena Caster” I told him. He let out a gasp. 

“Lena Caster! That’s how I know you! I watched how 15 years ago Lena Caster sacrificed herself to save you when the force came to take you. It was a dark night and your mother was holding you both in her arms on a night stroll with your husband, the force came and tried to take you two. But she gave you to your father and she held it back. The force swooped in on you both before your mother jumped in the middle of it and unfortunately died. She was so brave. I will never forget it.”

Tears fell down Luna and I’s face.  Oh my gosh. She saved us? She didn’t leave? I had so many questions but we were already home and the stallion vanished. 

Me and Luna were shocked and confused, so we ran inside to tell dad. But he was staring out the window.

“Dad!” I yelled. But he quickly shushed us and motioned for us to come over to him. When we both came to him, we saw what he was looking at. It was an eagle. I had to do a double take before realizing that the eagle was the eagle who saved us. Me and Luna's eyes met with a deep understanding. We both knew what the other was thinking. 

“Dad…” Luna began. He cut her off.

“Girls, you see that bird? That eagle?” he carefully asked. Me and Luna's head nodded.

“Your mother told me when we were dating that if she ever came back to life. She would come back as an eagle. An eagle who would protect her children from anything. Of course it could be a coincidence but…”

“Oh my gosh,” I muttered Luna was silently tearing up but I was in more shock.

My dad turned to us after Luna wiped her tears and he asked, “Okay, what did you want to tell me?”

Luna and I were silent until we looked at each other and came to the conclusion of something.

“Nothing,” we both said in unison.

All of our heads turned to the eagle who was now looking at us tenderly.

“Hi mom,” I said quietly, tears flowing. 

It's beautifully perched self sat on the gate, looking at us with such a look no normal eagle could make.