NeverSeen

Sunlight was already glinting off the floor when my eyes opened that day. I wondered for a second why my head was cold and why I had different clothes and sheets. I wondered why my arms were sore, what I had been dreaming of piercing with a fine, glinting arrow in Dreamland…

And then I remembered.

My back popped as I gradually sat up. My leg was numb, and my fingers pulsed with pain. I got in the shower and stood there for a long time, letting the sweet, glittering dust pour down my back and drip off my wings. It healed my fingers and arms and let me remember slowly what I’d seen.

I finally got out and dressed in a cute blue outfit of shorts and a tank. I dried and brushed my hair and put it up in a gorgeous, thick bun. I remembered I was hungry and went and had breakfast quietly. I didn’t really think about why it was so quiet; I just figured the crew had gone off on an errand and let me be until I was ready. Or maybe they were afraid of me. That was a thought I couldn’t bear.

An hour later I sat down and started writing in my dreamlog, surprised to see that I hadn’t written in it for months. Sitting back in my chair, I tried to think of how to start. My routine had been broken for so long that I had to go back and check previous entries to see how I’d done it. I finally turned back to where I was and started writing this:

Dreamlog 12, entry 37. 7-14-9042

Intensity: 11 Topic: Skyglass Perspective: First person

This time it started in an old mine, full of glittering stones, but I wasn’t looking at them. All I focused on was a person running away in front of me, and I was chasing him. I never got a good look at his face, but I think it was a boy. We ran down a passageway full of roots and other weird things and open doors with creepy lights coming out of rooms. But we ran past them all and up a staircase made of some kind of metal, but we didn’t make any noise. There was a doorway at the top that led outside and it was nighttime. Then I realized I wasn’t chasing the person, but running from a fire behind me; there was an explosion or something in the cave we were in.

I looked up and saw the Skyglass Temple against the stars in all its glory—and then I blacked out. The next thing I knew I was inside it, and the whole thing was on fire, and I was trying to find somebody. I had a sword that I have no idea where it came from, and my bow and a weird crescent-shaped shield, and fire was exploding all around me but not touching me for some reason, and everyone was running past me the other way. There was somebody just barely in my sight I was trying to get to, and I think the person had a wand or staff or something, because the figure was throwing fire everywhere. I chased the person to the top of the tree and through the Temple, until we were on the end of one of the highest branches. I dunno why, but I drew my bow and asked, “Who are you?”

The smoke between us cleared a little, and I saw it was a girl in a red dress, with red hair and scarlet wings, and everything looked like it was covered in blood, like she’d been killing people with the black knife in her hand. Then, she started to turn around and look at me, but before I could see who it was, an explosion below us engulfed the branch and she disappeared. I caught fire and screamed. I was falling so fast through the thick black smoke, and I knew I was going to die—and then I woke up screaming still.