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Justus finished supervising the unloading of Ferdinand's belongings from Lessy. As much as Ferdinand complained about Lady Rozemyne's highbeast he had no problem taking advantage of Lessy's convenient features. Once the last box was removed she changed her highbeast back into a stone and returned it to her belt. Flanked by Fran, they made their way down the hall to Ferdinand's room.
"One of these days you're going to have to explain how you can make that highbeast to fly."
"The same way you do." Rozemyne replied confused.
"But there aren't any wings."
"Wings?" Rozemyne looked at him shocked. As the door opened she called, "Ferdinand! Justus really thinks highbeasts use wings to fly!"
"Don't yell, it's improper. And before you, I also held the belief that wings were required." Ferdinand huffed without even looking up from his task.
"So you really don't understand how flight works at all then?" Rozemyne said, tilting her head to the side.
Ferdinand sat back and looked at Rozemyne quizzically. "You do?"
"A little. I’ve read books about birds and aviation… I mean, avian fey beasts... and all the things about their bodies and behavior that allows them to fly."
"There are books about that?" Justus asked.
Ferdinand waved him off that line of questioning. Rozemyne had gotten a little too comfortable referring to knowledge from her past life and briefly forgotten that Justus wasn't one of the people who knew. From her understanding Justus thought it was all coming to her in her dreams, blessing from the gods or something.
"Yes, but unfortunately I no longer have access to it. But having wings is only a part of what makes birds fly."
"What else is there?" Both Ferdinand and Justus focused on her with rapt attention. Their curious minds latched on to the new information she had for them.
"First off, birds are really light for their size. A bird's bones are mostly hollow, they have large chambers in them that make them incredibly light."
"Highbeasts are light. They only weigh as much as the stone they are formed from." Ferdinand said.
"And in spite of that, they have the strength to hold multiple adults. Birds also have unique breast bones that allow the attachment of the large mass of muscle it takes to power flight. Highbeasts have neither muscles nor bones."
"Rozemyne, what is your point?"
"On top of that, because of the energy it takes to power all those flight muscles, birds have to eat a large quantity of food relative to their body mass. If there existed a winged lion the amount of food it would require would be insane. And all that food has to go somewhere. You would have droppings everywhere." She chuckled at the mental picture of dung all over the noble quarters. People running around with umbrellas to protect themselves as it fell from the sky.
Ferdinand did not look nearly as amused by the idea. Golden eyes pinned her with murderous glare, his words were spoken with a strained but deliberate calm. "Rozemyne. A lady should never speak of such things. Besides, in case you have forgotten, highbeasts do not eat."
"Of course they don't, Ferdinand. They don't have bones, or muscles, or a digestive system. They don't have any of the things that birds have developed, and need to have, in order to fly. So why, if highbeasts don't need any of those other things, would they need wings?"
Ferdinand and Justus stared at her, stunned.
"Highbeasts are magic. They work because of magic. And they fly because of magic. Highbeasts only need wings because you all are too small minded to imagine something flying without them. Don't be mad at me because you limit yourselves." While she talked Rozemyne took her highbeast stone from her belt and set it on the table. She ran it through some of the shaping exercises Ferdinand had made her do before she first made Lessy. As the stone cycled through shapes, transforming into a ball, box, and spiked blob it rose in the air and slowly spun in a circle. Then with a plop it turned back into a stone in her hand.
Rozemyne sat down at the table and grabbed the top piece of paperwork from the stack and started working. "It's magic. It's all equally impossible, which means it's all equally possible once you figure out how to make it happen."
Ferdinand closed his eyes and rubbed his temple, groaning, "I'm not sure how much more of this I can handle."
"If it's giving you that big of a headache then ignore it. We can just do the paperwork. There's enough of it here to distract us both for at least a full bell. You can ponder the impossibility of the possible some other time."