An Artificial Night

I was only supposed to be there for a few minutes. I didn’t mean to fall asleep. That part just came naturally. And I dreamed . . .

The world was blue and gray and amber, ringed by mist that never fully lifted. Sometimes it retreated into the stones, sometimes it hovered among the trees, but the mist itself was eternal. Smudged charcoal lines defined the landscape, sketching the outline of endless plains broken only by mountain’s stone and dying forest.

Dying? No, living. The mist retreated as I moved closer, leaving behind a wood I didn’t recognize. The trees were lush and healthy, green and gold and springtime yellow. Willows stood sentry, reaching out with hungry fronds to grab intruders. This was Blind Michael’s land. It changed, but the heart of it remained the same. The heartbeat of the land . . .

The land’s heartbeat wasn’t mine. Who was I? I fought to remember my name, my purpose, anything. The mist twined around me in a lover’s embrace, trying to pull me closer, taking me farther and farther in . . .

“Aunt Birdie?”

I knew that voice, and because I knew it, I had to know myself: one demanded the other. I shrugged the mist away, turning. “Karen?”

She was standing in the trees, still wearing the robe she’d gotten from Lily. Yellow and brown butterfly flowers were twined in her hair. She looked frightened. “It’s not safe to dream here, Aunt Birdie. You shouldn’t. He’ll know if you do.”

“Baby, you’re awake!” I started toward her. The ground snatched at my feet, but I wrenched myself free and kept walking. “We’ve got to get you out of here. It’s not safe—”

“I know, Aunt Birdie,” she said, moving to reveal a small girl crumpled by the base of the nearest willow. “It never was.”

The little girl couldn’t have been more than ten years old, dressed in a tattered nightshirt, feet bloody and bare. She was obviously of Japanese descent, slat-thin and used too hard. Her long black hair was knotted at the base of her neck. Tears had washed streaks through the dirt on her face. Three silver-furred tails were curled behind her, and silver fox ears were pressed flat against her skull. Kitsune.

She wasn’t breathing, and I realized with slow dread that the grass around them was dead, crumbling into dust. “Karen, your friend—”

“Her name is Hoshibara. This is her place.”

“Honey, she’s not breathing.”

The look on Karen’s face was infinitely sad. “I know.”

“Karen—”

“Aunt Birdie, you have to listen now,” she said. Somehow her voice filled the world, and I stopped, watching her. She shook her head, something ancient and tired lurking in the faded blue of her eyes. “I’m not really awake. I can’t wake up while he has me. Something’s wrong, Aunt Birdie, something’s very wrong. You have to find her before it’s too late.”

“Find who?”

“The rose’s daughter, the woman made of flowers who wanted to be a fox instead. The Blodynbryd queen.”

“Karen, I don’t understand. I need to take you home. Your parents are worried.”

She tilted her head to the side. “Home? You can get there and back by the light of a candle, they say. Where’s yours?”

My candle? I realized that my hands were empty. Where was it? We couldn’t get home without the candle. I turned, looking for the familiar flame, and found it on the horizon, far away and moving farther. I shouted, “Wait here! I’ll be right back!” and ran after it. The years fell off me as I ran, until I was a child again, as lost as the rest of them, and I ran . . .

. . . and ran . . .

. . . ran . . .