Yuletide: Night Seven
Frost glittered on the window panes, fanning out around the
edges as if peeking in. The jewels were
gone from the mantle and the mirror stood alone. The black dragon swooped down on the hillside
through the gleaming fog that brushed his scales. The rabbit from an earlier performance
clutched safely in one taloned paw. He
returned it to an embarrassed young magician who muttered a spell to return the
construct to a dormant state and hastily stuffed it back into his hat. They returned inside where the kitsune was
disgruntledly picking white fur out of his teeth from his own attempts to catch
it. Alas, the construct only looked like
a rabbit; even its fur tasted absolutely appalling. The fog caught on the black dragon’s scales
gleamed in the firelight as he settled down. “Their encounter in the Plane of Jewels and
Night, of which the phoenix remained unaware, had made quite an impact on the
Ice Basilisk. He wondered if maybe he
could tell his own tale to her, and for once someone might actually listen. But how to tell her without putting her at
risk of freezing, silenced? The opportunity
came much sooner than he could have dreamed.
The very next Plane he moved to: the Plane of Fog and Frost.”
The Plane of Fog and Frost
Cool air blankets the land
Laden with water glistening, obscuring
Cold kisses the ground
Leaving curls of ice in its wake.
Fog as thick as night
Concealing, obscuring, pervasive
Frost as cool as loneliness
Born of fear.
In fear the Ice Basilisk wanders
In Planes whose natures mitigate his curse
In fear the people flee him, save one
In curiosity one seeks him,
Flaming, singing, known to pain
The phoenix undaunted searches
Pursuing a mystery, a question, a purpose
That which she had lacked.
Slipping through the fog
Gazing at the frost
Fondly, heartbroken
The Ice Basilisk roams,
Catching glimpses of white
The broad gleam of scales
Obscured by blinding, shifting, fog
The phoenix pursues,
Her flames burn untethered
Casting orange and red and gold
Into the glittering fog
Catching on water droplets far and near,
The Ice Basilisk looks up from the frost
At the fog once white and pure
A glint of red catches his eyes
A gorgeous gem in distant air,
Alert he slips
Quiet and pale
Into a hollow
Of frost coated shale,
Thoughtful he considers
The nature of his refuge
Thoughtful he eyes his talons
Sharp enough to gouge soft stone,
Quiet and blazingly beautiful
The phoenix flies over
Unsuspecting of the shale outcrop
Embraced by fog and frost,
The Ice Basilisk considers a small shard
Of stone beside his feet
Then slides out from the hollow
Not to flee, but to search.
When the moon of the Plane
Of Fog and Frost
Was almost returning to a familiar face
The Ice Basilisk moved.
Exhausted from fighting
The perpetual fog
The phoenix wandered
Wondering listlessly,
In the corner of her eye
A glint
Not frost, not fog, not random stone
Scales,
Turning on a wingtip
She flew after it
Beating against the relentless moisture
To no avail,
There was naught around her yet again
But unforgiving fog
Naught to see in all the world
But water suspended in the air,
A scrape, as if talon against stone
She turned again
Wondering vaguely
If it was all delusion,
Would some powerful Ice Basilisk
Renowned for destruction
Of lives, of Planes
Have any interest in her save death?
Still she flew, following
A glimpse of scales
A rasp of talons
A hint of cold upon the breeze
That turned fog to ice,
Ice crystals fell
Shattering against the frosted ground
As high as she was, the phoenix thought
That could be her,
Lying on the cold, still, ground
Discarded shards of ice
Robbed of flame of life
Her spirit flown,
Would death be so bad
If death was what she chased
A chance to rest, to not be
Out of reach of pain,
Hallucinating, dreaming, dying, living
She knew naught
When before her appeared, atop a cliff
A mighty lizard gleaming white,
He gazed into the distance
A glint of red in the corner of his eye
Heart pounding he fled into the mist
And froze against a snowdrift, unseen,
A sense of finality came over Lyra
A phoenix in the fog
Chasing some great Ice Basilisk
Surrounded by frost,
Slipping in the air
Her gaze dropped
Losing all knowledge
Of where he had gone,
Gaining more than she yet knew
Before her rose an obsidian cliff
Unchipped, unmarred, by time or talon
But not unmarked,
Writ across the stone in frost
White against stark, gleaming, black
A tale was scribed before her eyes
The history of the Ice Basilisk.
The elf woman smiled and gently stroked the kitsune where he
lay in her lap, his eyes fixed on the great black dragon. The dragon wrapped up the evening’s story. “So, the phoenix found what she thought she
sought. The tale of the Ice Basilisk
writ by his own hand. Of his curiosity
and relentless pursuit for knowledge. Of
the romance that never was in his oblivion to matters that pertained to
himself. Of the curse laid upon him that
felled its caster. Of a Plane that was
destroyed when he sought death. Of a
phoenix’s song in the darkness that gave him hope. Hope that a creature such as he need not be
entirely alone.” After a contemplative
silence applause filled the room.
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