A LITTLE DOVE'S DREAMSCAPE

[ibiou 2397]

Spoiler

 

   he subtle breeze brushed by curtains, dimming the candlelight upon the mantlepiece. Its flame flickered with much intention, trying to stay alight, yet were snuffed out before their attempts could become of use. The height of the night had fallen upon Nowa Warsovia. Dream sequences; heavy sweats, unable to be cooled. HEDWIG tossed and turned. Sleep came and went for her, yet in bursts did she find herself swallowed in its embrace. She had been lost in the realm of dreams for days upon end. This one, in particular, was different.

 

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Half-bird, half-man; an abomination far known to the likes of Hedwig Jazlowiecki, yet ached with familiarity. With its human hands he reached out for her, skimmed with fingertips the back of her own, before joining them in union. The beady eyes of the bird’s head looked back.

 

“You have betrayed the very thing you swore will fulfil you in this life, little dove.” The voice, clear, rang in Hedwig’s ears. There was an uncertainty to whether she could even respond in this realm, wherever it may be. She, aware of her slumber, only looked on with a distorted stare. The voice continued with question after question:

 

“Do you yield? Will you cower, and accept it as it is?”

 

“Why should I?” Hedwig sorely replied, croaking. Her tone had surprised her almost, that her eyes largely widened. She was too stubborn, too headstrong, too proud. Why should she? Yet she did, so invitingly, that it sickened her with a gut-wrenching feel she could not swallow. Her insides felt as though they were being wringed out like a wet cloth. 

 

The more she looked towards the bird-man, the more she was able to pick his features apart amidst her nausea. The head of a crane sat on the shoulders of a grown man, donning an attire of all-black. What spouted from his back were a pair of wings. The way he appeared was too natural for the hybrid to be in existence. One would assume that he was a frankensteined creature, but it did not appear to be the case. He was a mystery.

 

“Little dove,” He started, “I have not come to you to give into your needless self-sacrifice. Rather, I possess the power of perspicuity. Obsessed with knowing, with certainty, that you forget yourself. You depend upon the actions of others that you tear yourself apart to make them whole. When will you have your share?”

 

Hedwig, taken aback, pressed her lips shut. The bird-man continued. “Your suffering does not come from a place of honesty to yourself. If you were, would you not be content in your hurt?”

 

“You ask so many questions—”

 

“And yet, little dove, you answer none.”

A moment, then, did Hedwig pause for her next response. “I cannot give you the answers you desire, for what I have done has passed. I cannot change what happened.” Little did she speak, yet in her words did she prove him right. If a beak could contort itself into a grin, it would have. Instead did the bird-man look blankly at her. She was too self-conscious. “I swore to myself not to come to regret my decisions.”

“I did not mention regret.” His words, stern, were somewhat contradictory to his softened tone. He let go of Hedwig’s hands and turned her back to her for a few moments. She caught a glimpse of his wings speckled in cosmos and starlight. In other circumstances, she would have asked to touch the feathers; not now, in this state. Curiosity had always gotten the best of her. “You were willing to carry the burden of a thousand lifetimes and it still was not enough. Do not seek out pity from the earth and wallow in it. Metamorphosis—become, adapt, change. There is still hope. You are more than you think you are.”

“And what, then, will I become?”

He turned around, at last, to reveal the sharp talons where his hands once were. Sprouting with feathers was he directly at his chest, and the bird-man grew in size. Before Hedwig did he morph himself into a majestic crane. He was ten times the size of her now, that if he stepped closer he would engulf her completely. She was mesmerised by his otherworldliness. Those wings that belonged to the night sky stretched out on either side of his body and flapped, once. It was the sound of a beating drum, though much louder, echoing within the void they found themselves in. The gleam in the crane’s eye was vast and unreachable. He was another being now. Her stomach churned.

 

“The depths of your possibilities are endless, little dove. You do not have to become a martyr for your cause. Watch then, the flames of rebirth embrace you to be something greater than they will ever behold.”

The sounds of rhythmic drumming — his wings — once more ensued. Faster this time, more frequent. He was to fly off. His legs lifted from the ground and he swung himself around, soaring. As the crane went off into the null distance, Hedwig’s vision blurred… 

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Bloodshot were her eyes when she found herself awake. It had hit her hard in the chest, gasping for air, panicking. Immediately did Hedwig’s gaze fix itself to the window. The rosy dawn grew brighter and brighter, spilling sunlight across the wooden panels on the floor. Her hands lifted to her cheek, and felt her eyes, for the first time, fill with tears. The dream—vivid now more than ever. She wrapped her arms around herself and weeped.

For the rest of the month of Godfrey’s Triumph, little was seen of HEDWIG JAZLOWIECKI around the Apostolic Kingdom of Aaun.