Imagine Dragons (updating so slowly that it's ridiculous)

Clouds

Where am I even supposed to go? I'm super confused about this. What do they expect to happen? For me to magically find them, like it's no problem?

Well, I guess they didn't make this to be easy. I will be a citizen of Fäntäsiä, I just know I will. I have to be. Where else would I go? Fall asleep, back into that ridiculous dream? No. I won't. I refuse!

My arms are aching from waving around to keep me in the air, so I flail a little harder and make it up into a current, which I decide to let blow me around. I don't really have any idea of where to go. 

The fae are so graceful when they fly, and I look like a drowning rat. I can do it, fly, I mean. I just can't look like I know what I'm doing.

The clouds absorb me, pulling me in and making me sneeze. Immediately after I sneeze, I hear gasps. What, are there cloud people too now?

"Has a faerie flown too high?" I hear someone hiss. "Someone's passed into our boundaries!"

The wind, which I am now too weak to fight, pulls me up higher into the clouds, which I realize is probably not good if I want to live. I try my hardest to fight it, but I can't move; the wind is too strong. Are the creatures up here hostile? I certainly hope they'll let me go. What if they're controlling the winds, not letting me get out?

My head pokes through the top of the cloud, and no matter how hard I try, I can't stay below it. The wind continues to drag me into visibility. I decide to at least make it clear that I'm not hostile or a threat even if I was, so I let the wind pull me up into where the cloud people can see me. 

They aren't cloud people. 

They're mermaids. Aren't mermaids supposed to live in the water? 

Ugh, that was that stupid dream! Before it was just an annoyance, but it's getting in the way of me actually getting things done. My memory just needs to let that stupid place go. It didn't mean anything then, and it doesn't now. It was just a dream. I need to forget it. 

Right. Mermaids, finally, and by complete chance. Well, I got lucky this time. That's good, but I know that something is going to go wrong since so many things just went right. Except for the ghulari. Will that counterbalance the good thing that just happened and will this go well?

I hope so.

"Uh, hey, I'm Stella. I heard that I was supposed to come here next to become a real citizen of Fantasia...? Are you going to kill me?"

The mermaids have white skin, so white it almost blinds me, and bright tails of all colors - except for being the typical, gilded kind we think of from storybooks, these have odd fins down the sides, warped and ugly. Built for speed, not appearance. Their faces, however, are far more frightening; fangs puncture their bottom lips, and their eyes are completely black, with no iris or anything. They also look angry, which probably adds to the fear factor.

"Why have you intruded past the boundaries clearly set for the mermaids, faerie-tree-mutant?" One asks, who has a green tail, bright like neon. Her glare hurts a little, but I try to ignore it. Instead, I think of my gills. Ah, right! But what are they for, if real mermaids live in the sky? Maybe it's to filter air in so that when it's less concentrated I can still breathe. "And how are you still breathing?"

Yep. That's what the gills are for.

I pull back my hair, revealing the slits along my neck. She (I assume it's a she) gasps and recoils. Her head snaps around to face her kin. "Which of you has gone against your vows and loved one who isn't a mermaid? Which of you?" Her anger is frightening, making me instinctively ball up a little tighter - or at least try to pull in closer. The winds keep me in place, so I can't go anywhere. I'm trapped. 

"No, you don't understand! I'm not from here. I'm doing the whole becoming-a-citizen thing and I just passed through the trees, who gave me a gift of yours. Do you not remember the Queen?" Many of the mermaids shudder slightly, and I know that they understand now. The one who seems to be in charge with the green tail turns to face me again. 

"You are not welcome here. It seems that you will never be a citizen, or not by this tribe. Go, or I will kill you." The winds tighten around me, pulling me in, crushing me. I know that the only reason I haven't snapped like a twig is the bark coating me like a glove. Thank you, trees, I say mentally. 

I don't reply to the mermaid, and the winds pull in tighter. The bark won't hold out much longer, and I'll break. Just like that. Like glass breaking. I can't help hoping that my blood will stain their stupid, perfectly white cloud. Why don't they even let me try?

I guess this is how it will end. 

Suddenly, out of nowhere, I hear a voice like the tinkling of the bells, ringing out from behind the green-tailed mermaid.

"What are you doing? You haven't even given her a chance." A mermaid with a pure white tail and white hair air-swims into view, and the green-tailed mermaid pulls back immediately, fear etching itself across her face. 

"I didn't mean it, please. I just meant to destroy possible danger, not to do anything against your ruling -" 

"Cut the babbling, Haloriana. Please, guards, remove her for now to a Cirrus." Haloriana is pulled away, her face full of horror, but completely limp against the two red-tailed mermaids pulling her away.

The white-tailed mermaid turns to face me with a somewhat creepy smile. "Here, now, let's start over." The winds stop, and I fall. I expect myself to drop through, plummeting too quickly to pull my wings out, landing splat on the ground. Instead I land lightly on top of the cloud, which feels oddly like stepping in dryer lint.

Goodness, that stupid dream again!

"I'm Yamilonian. You are?" She asks, cocking her head to one side while watching me attentively. I smile and do my best impression of a curtsy, which seems to confuse her, but she smiles and nods like she gets it.

"I'm Stella."

"Okay, then, Stella, let's get down to it. You want to be a citizen? We have to work a little, then."

She claps her hands, and mermaids appear from everywhere, all with red tails. "Oh, how exciting!" She cries, grasping my hand and tugging me deeper into the realm of the clouds.