REN

  Twenty Years Ago

  “Bam, bah, bah. Badadadadat, bah,” my hands beat the rhythm as I sang amongst countless furry bodies, Peydran dancing with the Blennalachs as though he’d always done so.

  Hadn’t he?

  I stood, voice quiet, rhythm still beating on my chest. Thump-tha-tha. . .

  I smelled burnt caramel on the breeze. No, it was the taste of cinnamon.

  No, it was a sound. A single note of an alphorn, pure, deep and clear.

  “Honey?”

  Did I hear the voice of my love?

  Or was it only a note? Or the smell of burnt caramel? The taste of cinnamon?

  Hands on my shoulders.

  Blue light and silver.

  The Cosmos tore, and fury reached for us. A swirling inferno of infinity. The night sky broken. Cascading constellations and asterisms. An endless torrent of stars and piercing light.

  Kaleidescoping prisms and fractalizing geometries. More beautiful and terrible than anything should be.

  There was symmetry to it and grace. Beauty and definition. It was eternal, but not eternity. It knew itself by name and wanted to be known in turn.

  It would pull us in and command us if we allowed.

  My arms rose to the symphony that was that storm and conducted silence.

  The rent in reality dissolved.

  Panting, I fell back against Peydran, our chests heaving. His arms wound around me, anchoring us to the surface of the world on which we stood.

  Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

  “Ro, what the fuck? That wasn’t Euri!”

  No, it hadn’t been our son, the Wind of Power. It was another force. A mind most powerful. Only one man could have been responsible for something of that sort, and I had forgotten him entirely.

  Larron Sloan.

  “Ronnie.”

  “Thief” meant his name, and we had nearly been stolen away. What was the wizard after?

  I fell to my knees, hands covering my head, unable to ignore what pounded against me.

  The note of the alphorn returned, but it was not Larron Sloan this time. It was my son on the breeze. Euridyne, with me. Knowing.

  Words popped into my mind unbidden.

  I reached into thin air, and a pen was in my fingers, scratching on the parchment that floated before me.

  “Thief”

  You came with fury, unannounced and unwelcome.

  You bore tidings unfair and undesired.

  All who beheld you cast you out.

  For to look upon you was to know disgrace and discomfort.

  They named you “Thief,” and you laughed in quiet corners.

  We called you “True,” for that was what you were.

  “Ronnie,” thief amongst cowards.

  You held yourself close.

  And ever apart, always seeking, forever finding.

  But never talking. Never telling.

  Until now.

  I still do not welcome your call; it tears and rends.

  The star you bear cannot be mine.

  You stand alone, tower of one, light in the dark, star in the night.

  Your song is not mine.

  Your fight is yours alone.

  Sing your own song, Larron Sloan.

  For it is not ours.

  The quiet of Blennalach settled around me, Peydran’s hands on my shoulders. “So, this is still part of it, Ro? We’re gonna keep having music storms?”

  Dazed, I blinked and shook my head. Not to say “No” to Peydran, but to clear cobwebs from my mind. Was I a composer? Did I just write a song?

  I reread it. It was maybe a tick like something I’d seen before.

  Before?

  Yes, Peydran and I had a past. Music storms. Composing. I looked at my husband, eyes falling on his left arm, and remembered. He had a metal arm the first time we made love.

  I smiled at him, and he smiled back. We remembered, and there was a song on the breeze, but not my son’s song. No. . . my song.

  Our song.

  We did have a past. Had it already happened? Or was it yet to come? What was memory? I wasn’t sure anymore.

  “I don’t know, Peydran. This doesn’t look like a song at all, does it?” I asked.

  “Mystical riddles, Ro. Mystical riddles. Do we keep it?”

  I wadded the paper into a ball. I didn’t want to tear reality apart again, but I didn’t want the poem either. So I imagined throwing it to Ronnie and hurled it at the sky.

  The poem disappeared, and we forgot all about it.

  We had a party then, with the Blennalach. Music. Dancing. Purple wine that tasted like summer sun and laughter. Moons rose and fell. There was light, and joy, and goodness. That was all we knew and all we wanted.

  Until the night the sky rent once more.

  ? Consumer of the Fourth Anchor ?

  by Miko Melina

  A little monster with a big heart and an even bigger appetite.