Luc

I am never honest.

So I try to surround myself with honest people.  Their openness, their sincerity, their stark goodness are all a refreshing change from everything I know and am.

And it's easy to hurt them and cut ties when I have to move on.  They never want me back and it's better when I go, so I don't destroy them.

I am a liar, a cheat, and a thief.  I am the powerless son of a dark wizard who loathes me.  But I know his secrets and I made him need me.

-------
Characters talking in my head!  Always exciting.  :)

Starlit Dreams

She let go of an anticipatory breath,
Lungs releasing a thousand pinpricks of light
That filled the night sky of her dreams
With a soft glow of incandescent happiness.

Wild Thing

She let the thunder roar and the lightning flash like sparks of white flame around her.  "I will not yield!" she cried to the wind, which howled its response, whipping debris across her face, her arms, her legs.

--

Though I am tested, I shall not be won.  My heart is solid and strengthens my stance.  Earth shall not move me, nor Fire, Air, or Water.  For I am of them all.

---

They all watched as she limped back into the village the next morning.  Her limbs were bruised and bloody, her hair full of sticks, her jeans ripped and stained with mud and her eyes were hard, reddened with the Nightstorm she had weathered.

--

The sky was clear and blue.

--








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"Everyone has questions,
But no one wants to know
How far the anger in someone
Can really make them go."

- "Wild Thing" by Noah and the Whale

This song has always intrigued me with its imagery of a girl emerging after spending 9 days alone in the woods and the public wonder at what turmoil would make her do such a thing (above lyrics).  Just a little something.

Red Sands

With the first breath came the sun, all fire and heat.  Alone in the cold darkness, he let a drop of his fire fall into the vastness, which became the heart of the Earth.  As time passed, the Earth grew and cooled, with blue waters and green lands forming upon her skin.  The Sun marveled at her beauty and loved it so much that he moved around and around to warm her.  But he could not keep both sides of the Earth warm, so he dropped another bit of fire on her other side, that he could light from afar, so she would always know how his love shone for her.  Thus came the Moon.  

Yet, despite his adoration of the Earth, there came a time when the Sun fell in love with the Moon as well.  The Moon crossed between the Sun and Earth and from that union came the stars.  When the Earth felt the shadow of the love between the Moon and Sun, she wept.  In her anger, she took her fire-heart and crushed it into dust.  This is our home - the Red Desert - where the Earth broke her own heart.

--------

This is a legend of the people who inhabit the red-sanded place described in the little fiction from a week or so ago, entitled "Laelani."  Just something that popped into my head tonight, enhancing a novel idea that has been with me for a very long time.

Laelani

It was the same dream.

She was running, always running. The Blue One led her by the hand and she could sense the others behind them. They sprinted past rocky outcroppings, the only thing that could grow in the surrounding, vast red desert. Heat shimmered over the cracked earth, their feet breaking though its illusory pools of water.

Her dress was drenched with sweat and it dripped from her face like endless tears, the salt stinging her dry and broken lips. She couldn't speak to the Blue One for want of breath and as her legs gave out from under her, her slick palm slipped from his. The others ran past her, unseeing. She felt her voice break as she tried to cry out, but no sound came.

Then the Green One turned, sensing her absence, and the others stopped at the command.  They seemed to call out to her, waving frantically, but she couldn't hear their voices. She tried to stand and fell again, scraping her arms in the rusty grit.

The Yellow and Blue Ones began to run back to her, suddenly seeming a mile away. She noticed a sharply cold rush of air from behind and, turning, saw what they had been running from. An endless expanse of darkness covered the land and sky inched steadily over their tracks, with snake-like tendrils feeling the way towards her.

At the sight, she struggled to rise, but her body was leaden with fatigue. She felt the others running toward her and watched the darkness creep to engulf her and then a gasp caught in her broken throat.

"I can see."

Then her eyes would snap open to the constant darkness.

Song of the Morrow

High will rise the dawning sun
O'er the land where all are one
So shall it be from sea to sea
In the green land of the morrow.

Sweetly will the rivers flow
Through gentle hills where time is slow
Birds will sing and hearts will ring
In the green land of the morrow.

Fertile ground will make the land
Sowed easily by farmer's hand
Head o' the plow ne'er wipes his brow
In the green land of the morrow.

Only tales will be told
Of the warring kings of old
Fighting none, the battles done
In the green land of the morrow.

Warm will be the setting sun
O'er the land where peace be won
So shall it be from sea to sea
In the green land of the morrow.

Flowering III

"Gemma, they're doing it again."

Gemma turned on her heel to face the troupe of deer that had been following about ten feet behind them.  "GO.  A-WAY!" The lead buck seemed to stare at her in indignation for a moment and then turned into the direction of the neighborhood park, followed by three does and two white-spotted fawns.  "You too," she snapped at the two grey rabbits nibbling at grass that had sprouted from a crack in the sidewalk.  They just kept on eating.  "I'm sorry Rhea," she sighed.  "I really don't know what's going on."

"That's obvious," Rhea quipped.  "I'm guessing your plant arms haven't gotten any better either?"

"I figured the long sleeves in the middle of August made it obvious?"  Despite Amy's daily reassurances that it was likely just a weirdly rare medical side effect from some antibiotics she had been taking, Gemma's arm sprouts had continued to grow.  Each of her wrists was now encircled with a purple flowering vine and the original sprouts from her inner elbows were continuing to spiral up her upper arm, gaining a few centimeters every day.

"Did you really try cutting it off?"

"I told you, I did!  It just hurt like a bitch, but the vine wouldn't even give."

"It's just so insane."  Rhea shook her head slowly, "And now the animals."

"Trust me, I'm aware," Gemma groaned.  "They started showing up two days ago.  Wednesday morning I opened my eyes and the buck was just staring into my bedroom window.  And now the rabbits try to get in whenever I open the front door."

"Did you try carrots?"

Gemma smirked in spite of herself.  "What is this, Looney Tunes?"

Rhea grinned back.  "Some version of it."  They walked a little further, not noticing the ever-thickening flock of birds on the telephone wires overhead.  "What are you going to do?"

"God I have no idea."

"I think it's time to go see---"

"No way."

"Gem."  Rhea grabbed her hand, tugging her sweatshirt sleeve up just enough for the flower petals to show.  "This. is. not. normal.  Or even ... human.  We need to go see your aunt."  Her sky blue eyes bore into Gemma's deep brown ones.

Gemma sighed deeply.  "Fine.  We'll go see Aunt Nix."

eARTh

Centuries ago, humans used to speak.  They sang.  They danced.  Painted.  Sculpted.  Drew.

They also argued.  They fought.  Yelled.  Screamed.  Cried.  Hit.  Kicked.  Killed.

Then we invented a way to hear each others's thoughts.  To experience each other's emotions.  At first it took the touch of a hand.  Then eye contact.  Now we can simply attune ourselves to whomever is in the room.  Someday we will have long-distance communication and be able to find each other whenever we need.  They already use this for escaped criminals.

When we took away all of our walls, we didn't need to express ourselves anymore.  We simply understand each other.  We don't need art.  There has been no new music for three hundred years.

But this morning I found music inside of me.

Reflect

He recoiled violently from the train window, jerked from his late night stupor by the sight of his own skeleton staring back at him.  The other two people in his car didn't seem to notice.  What a dream.

He almost laughed.  He was actually scared to look again.  Inch by inch he traced his gaze up the seats in front of him, over, over, up to the edge of the windowsill.  Shock.  Nearly sick.  Three human skeletons sat in the occupied seats of the cold, rattling car.  The lights flickered from a dead spot in the tracks.  The skeletons flickered, too.

Now he couldn't look away.  He raised his hand, slowly; the bones did not.  Relief.  Overwhelming relief.  It's not me.  It's not real.  Dreaming.

But it stood as he stood.  It floated through the other windows as he headed to the doors.  It remained still as the doors whooshed shut in front of him.  It wavered in the passing windows as the train started up again.

Then he was alone, staring at the spot where his reflection had been.

Traitor

Traitor, William.  Age 17.  Brown hair, yellow eyes.  Citizen Level: 3.
---------------

They changed our name to Traitor when my great-grandfather defected from the City in the Great War.  He was never captured, but his family didn't receive his coded warning letter until it was too late.  The police stormed my great-grandmother's house in the pre-dawn of a frigid winter morning, seized the family, and burned the house to the ground.  They were taken to the refugee housing, where traitors' families were re-programmed into the City files through blood tests, fingerprints, and eye scans.

In the years after the Great War, the refugee camps were slowly converted into Citizen Level 3 housing units.  My grandfather shared a small bedroom with his younger brother and three sisters while their mother slept in the living room on the couch of their tiny apartment, which they were granted seven months after the Peace Treaty had been enacted.  "It was a blessing," Grandfather would grumble, nodding to himself, "We got the rooms just before the year's first snow.  Maddelena would have froze to death."

There used to be Traitor Families all over, especially in the Level 3 neighborhoods.  There are still about twenty kids who carry the name in our Village school.  But most families have been able to change their names back.

Traitor Families are required to send their male heirs to the front, until three of them die in service.  Once they have made their sacrificial contribution to the City, their surname is reversed and they can work towards advancing their Citizen Level.  My grandfather was sent to the front along with his brother.  He was almost killed in a skirmish on the Outer Borders, but the rescue teams reached him in time and revived him from his coma after three days.  He was discharged for injury, though not with honor like the rest of the survivors.  His brother was killed in the same skirmish.

My father met my mother when they were sixteen, here in this same Village.  They wed in secret, an hour after his eighteenth birthday and with a foraged note of permission from her parents, who never would have approved of a Traitor marriage.  He was drafted hours later.

Traitor or not, all draftees are given a week before they are required to attend basic training.  A week after their wedding, he left her, pregnant and nearly penniless. Six months later, he was dead.

I grew up without my father.  I am my mother's only child - my family's only male heir.

I am the last Traitor of our line.  Tomorrow is my 18th birthday.

Flowering II

She dropped her backpack on the sidewalk as the bus pulled away and shoved her sleeve up.  What the fu- A small green lump was pushing up from under her skin.
-----------
Early the next morning, she sat up from her sleep deprived daze with a start -- her skin pinched for a moment and then the itching finally stopped.  Thank God.  She apprehensively rolled her sleeve up.  A pale green coil emerged from where the lump had been.  The skin around it was red and sensitive but the bud itself was almost ticklish to the touch.  If she watched it closely enough, it seemed to grow before her eyes, warming in the dawn light coming through her half-drawn curtains.

That's it.  I'm literally crazy.  Or dreaming.  Or crazy and dreaming.  

But it was there when she opened her eyes again.  And when she woke up from a few hours of fitful sleep.  And when she Skyped her Biologist Sister five minutes after that.

"But, Amy, you really see it?"

"Well, yes, I do."  Amy shoved her black, thick-rimmed glasses back up the bridge of her nose.  "I haven't the slightest idea how it's even possible.  But it's certainly there."

"Ugh."

"It doesn't hurt any more?"

"No not really."  She rubbed her forearm.  "I can feel it under my skin still, though."

"Maybe it's a root system in your arm.  How fascinating."

"Yeah that's the word I was going for."

"Hey, you called me, remember?"  Amy leaned into her screen, her wild red curls falling into her face.  "I wish I could see it better!  And you haven't noticed any more?"

"Not yet.  Oh God do you think there could be more?"

"Well, I wouldn't rule out the possibility.  Especially if it's rooting in your veins."

"Fan. Tastic."  She rubbed an itch on her wrist.

"Just -- be careful, I guess?  And go and see someone if it hurts more."

"Okay.  Thanks," she sighed.  Jeeze I'm thirsty.

"Sure thing.  Love you, sis."

"Love you too."

Flowering

It started as an itch in the crease of her right elbow.  She noticed it one morning on the bus.  One casual scratch then back to her book.  But it wouldn't go away.  She adjusted her sleeve, trying to feel up the seam to see if there was something there.  Nothing. By now she was starting to get looks of mild annoyance from the middle-aged business woman next to her.  She sat in rigid silence, focusing her gaze on the words in front of her, her mind focused solely on the throbbing of her arm.

Three blocks.  Two blocks.  One.  She grabbed at the stop cord as casually as possible, inwardly frantic.  The feeling had only increased, spreading slowly through her arm, reaching her wrist and shoulder.  I'm only twenty-five - it couldn't be a heart attack, right?  The driver jerked to a stop and she leapt up while simultaneously tripping over the cranky business woman's feet.  "Sorry, so sorry!" she pleaded to the half-sneer, practically falling out of the doors in her effort to escape.

She dropped her backpack on the sidewalk as the bus pulled away and shoved her sleeve up.  What the fu-  A small green lump was pushing from under her skin.

Black Widow

"I cannot believe you could think such a thing, Lolly!" Virginia Tooley exclaimed, her fan fluttering in indignation.  "Mrs. Crane is not a lady to associate with, according to the word among the highest circles."
"I only meant that --"
"Really. It is a pity that her husband died so early on.  She's young still and could marry again but for pity's sake, she has worn black for three years!  And in all that time of mourning it appears she has never shunned other fellows' advances!"
My eyes followed the gracefully tall figure, swathed in black organza, as she surveyed the ballroom from the doorway.  "It can't be said that she has encouraged them either, Virginia," I protested.  "No one has ever seen --"
"Right, right.  No one has ever seen her with a young man alone."  Ginny's blue eyes widened earnestly as she whispered, "But that doesn't mean it doesn't happen!  And don't you laugh at me!"  A smile must have peeked through my attempt to frown conspiratorially.  "One day we'll all find out and I'll be right!"
Now I chuckled openly.  "And on that day, Ginny, I will give you my favorite hat."
"It's a deal," she grinned.
We turned out again from our place near the punch table, watching the guests of the Allen Family's annual December dance arrive.   The whole town was invited, as always, and one of the highest forms of entertainment was seeing all of the neighbors step out in their finery.  I always looked forward to the laughable Mr. Teasworth, the schoolteacher, in his ridiculous head-to-toe green velvet suit.  And there were the young men to consider - Ginny and I had our eyes out for the Lovett brothers.
"Ooh, there's Mr. and Mrs. Beauchant!" squealed Ginny.  "Look at her diamonds!"
"It's amazing how well his fur trade must be doing to afford such finery."
"Oh I hardly think that's the case - it's her family money that helps with their luxury" a smooth, velvety voice interrupted from behind us.
"Why Mrs. Crane!"  Ginny's voice jumped several octaves.  "How did you sneak up on us?!"
Mrs. Crane's apple red lips curled slyly at the corners.  "Isobel, please, my dear.  You must call me Isobel."

Change

What if I could just wish myself into becoming a new person?  she wondered.  Leave this old self behind entirely and start over as someone else.

It was a bleakly cold end to New Years Day.  The setting sun cast a dim rainbow of color into the dusky sky, silhouetting the western mountains.  A faint glimmer caught her eye - the evening star.

Star light, star bright, first star I see tonight...

She smirked.  Wishes and stars.  How many times had she pleaded on those cold distant pinpricks and they had come through?

Just that once...  No.  She shook the thought from her head, running numbed hands through her tangled brown hair.  The bite of the air pricked her skin and her breath was beginning to materialize in thin white wisps - it was time to head in.  But she felt suspended in the growing twilight as the memories rushed back.

In their eighth summer, her next door neighbor Laney had insisted that three friends were better than two, so they created Jenna.  With curly blonde hair and sky blue eyes, Jenna was the prettiest, most popular, and nicest girl anyone ever met, even if no one else knew it.

No, it was a coincidence, pure and simple.  Imaginary friends don't appear out of thin air and real friends don't vanish without a trace.

Jenna was their favorite secret - the third fairy, the third witch, the third New World explorer, the third musketeer.  That was, until one day when Laney announced that Jenna told her that she only wanted to speak to her.  Suddenly Jenna always seemed to agree with Laney about everything, especially on the fact that two friends were better than three.  Remembering running home in tears that August afternoon still smarted.

That night she had looked out of her bedroom window at the stars and wished with all her might on the brightest one she could see.  I wish Jenna was my best friend and Laney was imaginary and then we could leave her out and she would be sad and alone for ever and ever.

The next day, Laney was gone.