Michelle

Michelle wiped the sleep crust from her eyes as she cradled Miranda to her breast. Another midnight feed, every two hours. She could set her clock to it, if she chose. Michelle had not slept a full night in months. Even when John got up to tend their baby, she awoke. Often it was her not so gentle nudging that urged him out of bed to give her a reprieve.

On this night it was her turn, and she’d taken their daughter into the living room so she wouldn’t awaken John. “I don’t know how long I can hold on here, Miranda. Things have turned out so different than I thought.” Michelle smiled down at her daughter, hands curled into tight fists, plump cheeks below brown waves of hair. One of those hands gripped the chain of her small sapphire necklace, an exorbitant gift from John on their fifth anniversary. Sadness furrowed her brow, souring the smile.

“I didn’t mean to fall in love with your father. I didn’t understand why this was called the making place.” Miranda’s eyes were half-lidded while she suckled, a small dribble escaped the corner of her mouth. Michelle unconsciously wiped it away. “But I’ve made you, the beautiful fire soul of my heart. Yet I cannot stay.”

The doctor had called earlier in the day. John had been at work. Michelle had asked for the tests shortly after Miranda’s birth, and now had been able to confirm her fear. Terminal cancer. She didn’t know how to break the news to John. She struggled with this secret even as it shattered her heart into pieces. Only to her daughter did she feel she could confide.

“You are so special, more than you know, more than…” More than what? Why did this feel like more than what she meant? Or was this less? There were echoes of memory she couldn’t reconcile with reality, a dreamscape she returned to in a different life. Elusive. “I can’t lose what we have here.”

“Ow!” she cursed as Miranda broke suction. For just a moment, Michelle thought she saw an orange spark at her nipple when she transferred her daughter to her other breast. She blinked and it was gone. Miranda’s cheeks flushed with warmth as she began to feed again.

Unbidden tears of grief slipped silently down Michelle’s face. Why was God so cruel? To give her this beautiful daughter, only to steal the mother from this world. She fought back her sobs to keep from disturbing Miranda, hoping the girl would fall back asleep.

“Shh shh shh, baby girl. Everything will be alright.”

***

Taelryx

Taelryx slumbered, driven out of mind and body to this other place. Here, its true self manifested as a winged creature of pure flame, the father of fire. It soared with grace its corporeal form hadn’t wielded in perhaps hundreds of thousands of years. This freedom felt right, countered by the nagging feeling of what was no longer right nestled deep in its spirit.

The dragon swooped low above a tumultuous sea, beneath laden clouds gushing forth rain. All about, water got close but sizzled and boiled away before ever reaching its flesh. No waterscape such as this existed in the real world, an ocean so vast Taelryx could soar for months and never see land. The storm crested with fury, blowing water in every direction. Taelryx sliced through, leaving a trail of superheated vapor in its wake.

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A pinnacle appeared on the horizon, a black line impossibly high. Taelryx saw it through the storm, as if even the chaos that surrounded its flight broke away to reveal this sight. All swirled about, but this vision remained unimpeded. The dragon beat its wings, willing itself to greater speed, careening towards the pinnacle with all the haste it could muster.

For hours, Taelryx flew, and the vision grew no closer. Days passed, then months...years? How long could this dream last? Fatigue - a completely foreign thought to its existence - crept into the dragon’s body, mind, and soul. Despair set in, and Taelryx’s strength of mind and body flagged more. Its wings dipped, and it soared lower, wingtips searing away twin wakes in the ocean as it grazed just above the surface.

Drag clipped its speed, and Taelryx slammed into a cresting wave. A concussive shockwave vaporized water for hundreds of miles, sending a wave miles high in every direction. The dragon cartwheeled, tumbling uncontrolled across the wave, skipping past it. Quenched, Taelryx now resembled its earthly form of unbending rock. Having overshot its own impact, Taelryx found itself sinking as the wave caught up to it and bore it along. Rising up, it saw it had reached its destination before the murky depths strove to claim the dragon.

:Climb.: said a voice in its mind. Taelryx lay on a beach of crystal and obsidian shards. It struggled to breathe, retching up water. Why would it climb? Just fly. The dragon spread its wings, bunched its legs to jump - and collapsed. It had no wings. Tatters of flesh dangled uselessly. Where before it could fly with the force of a hurricane, it had nothing. Just massive, rocky bulk. Black mist draped around the wretched ruins of flight, corroding its scales on contact.

:Climb!: the voice spoke more urgently. Taelryx knew it was large in real life, but this pinnacle dwarfed even the dragon. Looking up, the pinnacle continued straight into the sky until its terminus was lost. Even Taelryx could not see its finish. But the dragon was exhausted. Nothing before had taxed its energy like this journey. First it would rest.

:CLIMB!: Taelryx stepped back at the imperious command, and its hind claw broke through the ground. The ocean had vanished, and black nothing surrounded the island upon which it stood. Silent void of darkest night now surrounded Taelryx as the island crumbled around it. Water plunged both up and down as it drew back into the lost horizon. Vertigo took hold. Digging its foreclaws into the tower, Taelryx began to climb.

***

Miranda

Miranda cackled with glee as she ran from her father. John chased her through the playground, around the teeter totters and up the play-place to the slides. She went down one, and he took the other.

“Get back here, you bug!” he shouted playfully. They slid next to each other, and when John reached the bottom he did a clumsy summersault. Miranda roared with laughter. He rolled onto his back and snatched her up, tickling her ribs with his fingers. They both peeled forth in giggle fits as Miranda pried herself free and ran away again. She ran back up, then across the dancing bridge, and through the tunnel. He fell behind.

She didn’t mind. He was old and slow, and she was the fastest thing ever. Miranda waited until he got close, then raced off again, taunting, laughing. “Catch me daddy slow-poke!” She was three and free. New target: the half-kitchen. A sun-faded plastic door hung from half a hinge that she brushed open and hid inside. Would he play hide and seek? She ducked down and put her hands to her mouth, not quite stifling her giggles.

Miranda found it growing harder to breathe while she waited, and her head began to hurt again. Her skin grew very hot. She knew if she shut her eyes sometimes the pain went away. Sometimes it got worse. So she shut her eyes.

When she opened them, mother was placing a cold washcloth on her forehead. Mommy was very thin, and wore concern on her brow. Daddy stood next to her looking down.

“She’s burning up again, John! You know better than to take her to the park when it’s this hot out!” she chided him.

“We were just having fun. I brought her home as soon as I found her.”

“And how long was that? She may need the hospital if this fever doesn’t break.” Miranda could hear the fury in her mother’s voice. “We can’t take her there.”

“Why won’t you let a doctor see her?” John asked, exasperated.

“Look at me, John. It’s not her I’m worried about here.” Mommy took a shuddering breath. “I’m dying.”