“Ember, I have something to tell you,” her father was saying. “Come here.” She stared at him, agape. Not only was he here—somehow—but his wiry arms and flat belly had filled out again, like when they had lived back in Maple Valley outside of Vargas. Never mind that the world was distorted as if looking through a magic mirror; it was enough that she could talk to him and hold him.

“Dad!” She exclaimed, throwing herself into his arms. He was tall enough to lift her up again, as things should be. “Thank god, I had the strangest dream…”

“Ember. Listen to me!”

She withdrew, looking at his face. It wasn’t like him to speak so firmly, and his kindly features were contorted with worry. “What’s wrong?”

He bent down, taking her hands and looking into her eyes. “It’s your mother. Something has happened.”

“I thought that she was traveling for work?” She asked, her voice coming out awkwardly, an octave higher than usual.

He shook his head. “She was, but… I got a letter saying that she’s not coming home. I put in a missing person request, but the police tell me that she’s okay… that she’s moved on. And her parents say the same.”

“W-what?” Ember breathed, feeling tears start to prick in her eyes. Her ten-year-old brain strained, trying to understand what he was saying through the strange haze. “Why? Why would she leave us?”

Ember’s father shook his head, and she could tell that he was holding back tears. “I don’t… I don’t know, sweetheart. But it wasn’t your fault, not at all.”

She held him tightly. “Will she come back?”

His silence was enough of an answer as squeezed her with his strong arms. “There’s something else I have to tell you.”

She drew back, terrified of whatever was coming. “What else?”

“Her parents, well, they’re grieving, and… they’ve withdrawn their support.”

Ember blinked, confused. Nothing made sense, as if she was swimming through some viscous liquid. She recalled vaguely that her house was on her grandparents’ farmland and that her father worked at the slaughterhouse that they owned. “What does that mean?”

“I’m so sorry, honey. But we are going to have to move somewhere else, somewhere I can find work. I’ve found a place in Ciradyl.”

Ciradyl. She knew of it from the travelers that passed through each spring, an industrial city down south where people spoke with strange accents and wore stuffy clothes. No! she wanted to scream. No, no!

“I don’t want to move,” she said meekly.

“Think… think of this as a good thing,” her father said, his words rushing out of his mouth and stumbling over themselves. “You’re a very bright girl, and in Ciradyl you’ll have more opportunities. You can even go to university if you want!”

“But-” Before Ember could finish her sentence, the world slumped and slowed around her, devolving into colorful dots. Her dad’s grip weakened and then vanished completely as his form melted away. She reached for him but the setting had already transformed, coming together as a new scene that clutched her in an unwelcome embrace.

She was laying in bed in complete darkness. The room was familiar yet unfamiliar like a lullaby heard in early childhood. Maple Valley again? she questioned, becoming aware that the sequence was a figment of her imagination.

Her brain worked sluggishly as she wiggled her legs, finding that she couldn’t reach the edge in any direction. Either the bed is larger, or I’m a lot smaller.

Creeeeak. She twitched, startled, and huddled under the covers as a ghostly hand drew up her window. The moonlight illuminated the first leg as it came through the door, and only seconds after a figure ducked underneath the pane and stepped into the room.

Ember opened her mouth to scream almost reluctantly, unsure if she was capable of breaking the blanket of silence.

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

“Shhh!” the figure said, leaning closer to Ember. “It’s Momma!”

Ember closed her mouth and stared upward with wide-open eyes. Framed against the open window was a woman with long brown hair, dressed in all black and holding a heavy-looking backpack. She was translucent, immaterial, and her golden eyes glowed far too brightly in the dark room.

“I’m sorry I woke you up, baby,” the woman said gently. She trailed her fingers over Ember’s head, making her shudder, then crossed the room and pulled open the door to the hallway.

“But Momma,” Ember whispered, her mouth moving of its own accord, “why did you come through the window? And why are you all dirty?”

Ember’s mom turned around again, smiling softly. Then, completely at ease, she held a finger up to her lips. “Hush, my baby. You’re only dreaming.”

As Ember narrowed her eyes at the illusory woman, the world went haywire again, and she found her body disconnecting from the bed below. She floated higher and higher above the frozen scene, nearly colliding with the ceiling, bobbing and drifting…so wonderfully weightless until she plummeted somewhere and sometime else altogether: atop an overgrown hill in dreary winter.

Ba dum da dum. The drums sounded, playing the funeral march of Vargas. Ember’s head spun uncomfortably, and she stumbled a few steps to one side. Her feet felt like lead weights, and she looked down to see shiny black shoes that even her phlegmatic brain instantly recognized as the pair that her father had bought to honor the woman who had abandoned them.

Ba dum da dum. The cold wind of the north blew back the tall grass, revealing the gravestones that lay nestled like hatchlings in its somber embrace. Ember swore that they were marching up toward her, threatening to swallow her within their ranks.

“Come,” her father said gently. “Don’t look if you don’t want to, but come back to the gathering.”

“Funeral,” Ember corrected dully.

“Okay, funeral.”

“Why?” she asked, her cheeks flushing with frustration. It didn’t matter if the scene was some strange imagination: she was still angry, still betrayed by her callous mother. “Why should either of us go?”

He crouched, taking her hands and giving her a slight smile. His skin was too warm and too rough to the touch, too intense to be lifelike. “She was your mother, Ember. I don’t pretend to understand why she did what she did, but I know she loved you until the very end. Besides, the city of Vargas paid for our stagecoach tickets, and you liked the horses.”

“Fine,” Ember relented, grasping her father’s hand and following him down the hill. Ba dum da dum. By the casket, the sound of the drums was uncomfortably loud, and Ember resisted the urge to plug her ears with her fingers. Her father dropped her hand, gesturing for her to stay as he joined the line waiting for the viewing. Without thinking, she meandered after him, finding herself sandwiched between two strangers.

Ba dum da dum. Ember stepped forward on the beat, turning her eyes to the body that lay cradled in the wooden casket: her mother, grayer than in life but untouched enough that she could have been sleeping. A moment passed in perfect stillness, then another, and Ember’s anger was split through by a melancholy so complete that she thought she would never move again. Her mother’s face seemed to lift and float in front of her, whispering, tempting her into guilt for her anger. Then, someone brushed up against her and she startled, rushing through the rest of the line and into her father’s arms.

As she nestled her head beneath his shoulder, her eyes met—coincidentally—those of a man that did not possess even an inkling of familiarity. His gaze, analytical and calculating, cut right through the dreamscape and locked onto Ember and her father with the air of someone who has encountered a distasteful inconvenience.

Ember shot awake, panting and clutching the sheets like a patient awoken from the dead. She touched her arms gently, wondering for a moment if she was still dreaming, but recognizing quickly the substantiality that comes with the waking world. Why did I dream of those things now, after so many years? She swung her legs over the bed and reached into her bag until her fingers touched the wooden star. It glowed faintly, comfortingly, and she took a deep breath as she looked at it.

Is that really how things happened? Ember asked herself, struggling to differentiate truth from fantasy. Was that a dream… or a memory? Who was that man? Did my mother really sneak into my room? Either way, she knew that the answers would not be forthcoming anytime soon.

Suddenly restless, she wrapped herself in a blanket and pulled open the door to the hallway, her feet sinking into the soft soil floor. She felt mildly feverish: her stomach flipped uneasily, and her head was still half-stuffed with cotton. The building was louder than usual at this time of night, and Ember had the sense that she wasn’t alone in her wandering.

There was a rustling as a figure hurried down the hall. Ember recognized her as Mrs. Marmee, the middle-aged Linnaean who managed the unaffiliated dorm. Her arms were full of first aid supplies, and she looked pressed.

“What’s happened?” Ember asked shakily.

“Oh dear,” Mrs. Marmee said, taking her by the shoulders. “I’ve just learned that the beef served at supper was contaminated with desert toad toxin. It may cause some minor hallucinations, but it should wear off very soon.”

She handed Ember a small pouch of oblong-shaped leaves, instructing her to crush them and drink them with water to calm her nerves. Ember thanked her and retreated into her room, dragging a hand down her face and sighing deeply.

Ah, yes… what a good day to be Linnaean.