He steps out of the shadows and into a rain of gold. Coins spin in the air around him, offering glimpses a haughty monach’s profile stamped upon them.
He almost doesn’t recognize the haughty, sullen face of King Richard, Rose’s father. A woman with thin lips and flaring nostrils follows, stamped with a similarity in her shadowed eyes to Richard’s. Perhaps she was his mother?
A voice speaks; echoing with many voices in a cavernous space. Christopher realizes he’s in a cavern.
The Voice: She was Queen Merlicent. She was the mother of the current monarch of Dawn and Twilight.
Christopher looks around for the voice, but more coins are falling, landing with a clatter upon a mound of them. Jewels are mixed with the coins.
He’s standing in a sea of treasure, yet mingled with the wealth are half-melted picture frames. Once they were of cold and silver. A few have the tattered remains of a portrait in the center.
Another coin tumbles in front of his eyes. A melancholy man gazes at nothing in particular from its golden surface, a man who looks somehow familiar.
The Voice: He was Reynard the Romantic. Humans accused him of being too romantic.
Christopher: (looking up) Why is that?
He can see he’s in a great cavern. The voice is coming from high above him. Something glitters like pearl; scales upon a long, sinuously serpentine neck.
The neck lowers, giving Christopher a glimpse of a triangular head with trailing whiskers. Slitted golden eyes, as gold as the coins gaze upon him.
The Dragon: (for it is a dragon) This Reynard loved his first queen so excessively, he lost all interest in living after he lost her. He neglected his duties, along with his only child, leaving her upbringing to various court members and the palace staff. He let himself be enchanted by a golden-haired maiden whom he made his second queen. So smitten was he, he hardly noticed when his daughter disappeared.
Christopher: (unable to look away from that golden gaze) He’s Princess Blanche’s father, isn’t he?
The Dragon: (smiling to show razor-sharp teeth) Not much of a father or a king, would you say? Why did he merit such happiness, Happily Ever After?
Christopher: (with a slight shiver) You have the advantage of me.
The Dragon: Perhaps. You did appear within our lair, little shadow. Do you like our collection? Do you like our kings and queens?
Christopher: I’ve only met one of them.
The Dragon: Not a bad ruler, young Richard. We do have high hopes for his daughter when she awakens from her enchanted slumber.
Christopher: We?
The Dragon: We are dragon. Larger than most living beings, beyond gender, we speak with many voices. We echo ages past. We see much that is present. We are gifted and cursed with teasing promises of the future.
Christopher: You are a we.
The Dragon: Aren’t you as well, Happily Ever After? Aren’t you composed of lost thoughts and memories? Don’t you use those to guide others to a more joyful destiny?
Christopher: I am and I’ve tried to. I chose to live as Christopher.
The Dragon: You cling to the name and life your beloved Damian Ashelocke gave you, yet you are caught between the Tower and the Garden, tasting the many faces of fate. Someday you may have to embrace your destiny as a we.
Christopher: Someday I may, but today I am Christopher, drawn into a world that is not mine, speaking to one who has many names.
The Dragon: We are dragon, but we are not nameless. You may call us Prunella if you like.
Christopher: Prunella?
Prunella: Is our name so odd?
Christopher: It’s not what I’d expect a dragon to call themself. Themselves?
Prunella: Yes. A little dwarf once called us Prue. We rather liked his nickname.
Christopher: A little dwarf?
Prunella: One of seven brothers silly enough to follow a kobold into the Forest of Tears. We fear he sleeps off his folly in a crystal coffin, but there’s a certain nobility in his particular foolishness.
Christopher: Yes, there is.
Prunella: You’ve met him.
Christopher: In this Cauldron between worlds, yes.
Prunella: Why are you here, Christopher? What brings one such as you to our lair?
Christopher: I’m not sure. I’m not even sure where this is, other than your lair which must be somewhere near the Kingdom of Dawn and Twilight.
Prunella: Kingdom. Once upon a time it was a queendom. Too well do we remember the maidens whose union formed Dawn and Twilight.
Christopher: Too well?
Prunella. They were the only humans who came to our lair for advice, not treasure. We enjoyed our conversations with both of them.
Christopher: You miss them.
Prunella: We loved them. Too few mortals are like them. We can only hope certain mortal may rekindle some of the magic they carry with them.
Christopher: Mortals such as the Princesses Rose and Blanche?
Prunella: Tempting us with a happily ever after, Happily Ever After?
Christopher: You did say you had hopes for Princess Rose once she awoke from her enchanted sleep.
Prunella: We did. We do. We’ve dreamed of Dawn and Twilight being reborn. We followed a vision, made a request of Quartz when he came with his brothers to gather crystals to create the bed in which a princess might heal, sleep, and awaken as someone greater.
Christopher: You did?
Prunella: (letting out a snort) We didn’t think Quartz himself would sleep in this bed. He called it a coffin, but it’s for the living, not the dead.
Christopher: (trying not to wince at the stench of brimstone) You were already aware Quartz was sleeping in this bed, not Rose. Whatever powers it has, she may not be able to use them.
Prunella: Don’t be so sure. As we said, we have high hopes for this young princess. We have high hopes for her affinity with the princess who did sleep in that bed.
Christopher: May your hopes not be disappointed.
Prunella: Thank you…Christopher. Now we will sleep.
The dragon lowers their long neck as gently as they can to their golden bed. It still sends coins and jewels flying.
Fortunately, Christopher is already fading. The objects pass right through him.
Christopher: Sweet dreams.
Prunella begins to snore, steam wafting from their nostrils, as Christopher vanishes completely.
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