‘Mutti, where do dragons come from?’
‘They hatch from eggs, darling.’
‘Eggs? Like the ones Omi always makes us eat for breakfast?’
‘No darling. Giant eggs – bigger than the moon. But sometimes, just sometimes, a dragon comes into being a very different way.’
‘A different way, Mutti?’
‘Yes. It’s said that if a heart is cold enough, and wicked enough for long enough, then the conditions become just right.’
‘Just right for what, Mutti?’
‘Plug yourself in, my sweet, and I shall tell you a story. A tale of bitterness and cruelty as old as Mount Hlasek itself. But, no, Loris, my sweet, I’m getting ahead of myself… For the truth, we must go back to before the beginning. Back to an ancient land called Yørk Of The Shires, a thousand millennia ago. They say Gisele was an angry woman who ran a gasthaus as empty as her soul...’
‘A gasthaus, Mummy?’
‘Yes, LoLo, a gasthaus. In those days it’s said travellers would dwell in a home from home, rather than connecting to boosta pods. This was before CogniChips had been invented, so the people were primitive. Sleep was still a requirement, and there was no such thing as the iRay, so they’d pay to spend the darkened hours on mounds of foam and cloth. Gisele was the owner of one such gasthaus and received travellers from far and wide. Only one day a traveller arrived who would change everything. A shamed wizard who had been cast from the land for using his magic to beguile a young girl. Not just any young girl, but the daughter of King Tescø himself. When news of this treachery reached him, the king called for the wizard to be GPSd and vaporised. Fearing for his life the wizard fled. But before he could escape the shire, he knew he had to right a wrong – a wrong that had cost him his conscience and a right that could just maybe save his life. And so he found himself standing in the eingang of the Chöstle Haus, the sour-faced Gisele glaring at him expectantly. A woman so heartless, bats clung to her rib cage.’
‘Mutti. I hear footsteps. I’m scared…’ by Beth
Excellent. Transporting. How now to complete a circle?
ReplyDelete