SKY OF PAPER: AN ASIAN STEAMPUNK FANTASY

CHAPTER 64

Purple, yellow, and then green. Those are the colors that a proper, healthy, cheinkuu ko's eyes mature into as he is trained and his skills develop. Someday, when he becomes and adult, the green eyes sometimes turn brown, the common color of our people, and his ability to see the ocean of ki, disappears. Any other color, and almost certainly, there is something wrong with that child.

I was crying that night, hiding away inside one of the palace's study rooms, thinking about what Lai had said, the shocked expression Madame Quoli gave when she first saw the strange color of my eyes and the uncertainty of Miss Nishio's reaction. I knew that there was something wrong me, but to hear it affirmed from him left me shocked and paralyzed with despair. I wanted to be angry at someone, to blame anyone for my sickness. But even then, my mind numb with grief, I could not bring myself to hate a single person. Instead, I took whatever expensive objects I could find in that room and threw it on the ground and at the walls, smashing them without a single care.

That was the night I truly had lost all hope.

I was once told that we remember the moments of our past not because of what happened, but because of the emotions we felt. How strange it is that when I think of that night after Lai had confessed to me about my sickness, I could hardly recall the feelings that surged so fiercely within me. Perhaps my mind had since blocked them out, fearing that I would grow insane if I were to experience it again. But what I did remember, was how the knowledge of the frailty of my mortality had driven me to dream again.

I don't remember falling asleep that night, but like many of my dreams before, the dragon returned. He was lying upon the beach, his withered body lapped by the ocean waves while his head lay resting against the warm sand. He looked tired, barely able to stir as I approached. The pale, orange glow of the sun setting beneath the watery horizon saddened me somehow.

"Why do you look out there so longingly?" The dragon asked. "Is it because you think you can somehow reach out across the horizon, pluck out the sun and make it your own?"

There was no reason for me to fear him anymore. Rather, I felt pity for him. His eyes seemed dull and the rich, red color of his scales had faded. I placed my hand atop his head petting his rough, coarse skin.

"That horizon is my future," I said. "It's everyone's future. And yet, I can't go there. I think I'm stuck here with you."

He made a hollow, guttural sound deep in his throat. Maybe it was his attempt at a chuckle, or perhaps he was expressing his disappointment. Either way, it was obvious that he disapproved of my words.

"I will die with much regret," he uttered weakly. "There are no longer any days left for me. But you. . .you still breath. Your face still glows. And you still wonder about the things that could be. You have seen my fire pierce the heavens, but I still have, as of yet, to see yours do the same."