Rich Shapero (26 page)

Robbie imagined he'd bolted, and Fristeen
was with him. Side by side, hands holding tight, they raced toward the flames.
But he was moving away from them. Dad had swept him up.

Fristeen was sobbing. Grace held her now.
The sound pierced Robbie, and tears welled from deep in his chest. Instead of rising
to join the Dream Man and Dawn, they were headed toward the road and the
snow-covered car.

He saw Fristeen's eyes seeking him. They
gazed at each other, then together, they turned their faces up.

The wings of smoke were no longer soaring.
They were teetering, torn to pieces by an angry wind. Drifting feathers were
stretching, longer and longer. All the dragonflies had vanished, and the
rushing was dying. As they watched, the smoky ribbons rippled together, weaving
a veil across the moon. A night full of dreams was fading from view. The livid
clouds dimmed, and the cauldron drew back into the depths of the sky. And all
that whistling and huffing from the wind and the flames turned into one long
sigh. The Hollow, the black trees—all of Too Far—seemed to be grieving. This
heaven, this glory, the promised deliverance—was not to be.

***

When nothing remained of the Cabin but
embers and chars, the storm left off. The skies were quiet and the earth was
white. The snow-covered woodland seemed at peace. It was the peace of the dead,
for Shivers lay over it, and the bright things of summer lay buried beneath.
High above, a rift in the clouds let moonlight through. The humped crowns of
the Great Place had all been bridged. The Great roof rose undivided, round and smooth
as a chalky skull—some great creature, perhaps, that Shivers had eaten.

As their oracle had foreseen, Robbie went
away with his mother. Not long after, Fristeen went to live with a family that
a man in the courthouse gave her. The two children never saw each other again.
It was hard for them both, but time blunted their pain. They survived, they
grew up, they found homes in the world. But they remembered the summer with
each other, the places they made their own, and the gods they invented.

And the gods remember them.

The northern storms are fierce, and they
blow to this day. Winter's cold withers the leaves, and harsh winds rattle the
skeletal trees. You would think the last joy in the world had fled.

But beside the dead woodland, life is still
stirring. Swirling with breath. A faint hum rides the breeze.

There's a refuge, a place winter hasn't
laid waste to. Warmth is protected—steam rises from the peat. Through the
whisper of loose crystals and the pulsing gusts— A familiar voice is singing of
her endless love. Squeals thread the low hills, frozen in time—the echoes of
children daring to wander, a sweeter life in mind. Here at the world's edge,
their spirits run naked and free, watched over by gods, immune to the seasons.
A place made of equal parts waking and sleep. Where a jay silhouette mounts a
turret of cones, sees the first light and shrugs the snow from its wings. A
place of mysteries, deep secrets and dreams—where the water flows red and the
black trees lean.

About the Author

Rich Shapero is a writer and musician whose
stories pioneer worlds that lie beyond the limits of material experience. His
previous project,
Wild Animus,
hailed by
Library Journal
as
"powerful and complex," includes a novel and three CDs. He lives in
the Santa Cruz Mountains with his wife and two daughters.