A pure Soul

Chapter 2: A phoenix migration

I woke up in the rattling wagon, steading myself against the wagon bouncing along the bumpy road. I crawled over to the right side of the wagon and peeked my head above the side to look at my parents. My mother stopped looking at the horse and turned around to face me patting my head while running her long fingers through my hair.

"Good morning, we'll be at your granny's village later in the afternoon Melanie" mom whispered.

" Oh ok, then I can play right?!" I asked almost shouting while barely containing my excitement.

" Sure, we'll pull the wagon over once were at the ridge on the curb. It's not too far honey" she answered.       

I smiled and then crawled back to the left side of the wagon and into the small pile of blankets. I wondered if the phoenix migration would pass around the mountain for a bit before they flew up into the deeper mountains. I had seen the migration 2 years ago but I barely remembered it. Two years ago my sister was still around and she'd seen the beautiful birds emit flames from their wings. But my father was too afraid to get closer to the mountains now because of the incident. Every 6 or so years they would pass around the mountain before they flew up and that was the only time the frightened villagers would see it. The hunters did climb a bit into the mountains to try and shoot a few of them down but usally they didn't get any.

Most of the villagers were now terrified of the dragons coming down and considered going into the mountains a suicide mission. Everybody said my sister was dead and the village children always wondered how I could still not hate the dragons for it. The truth was, I didn't think she was dead because all we'd seen was a dragon grab her and scurry back into the mountain. We hadn't seen her die but that didn't matter to father and mother like it did me. There was a lake around here with very special water, it was said that it would heal and grant any wish people asked if their soul was pure. Nobody believed the legend anymore though because many had come to the lake and bathed in its water, wished and drunk it too. But it had never granted one wish for anyone. We'd never gone to the lake because my father said it was just an old fib and he'd never believed it. I wondered if the lake had ever granted someone's wish.   

I reached over to a small knapsack and dug inside for food. I soon found some bread and cream and happily bit into it. After I had finished my breakfast the wagon veered back around and a ridge that angled down into a small forest was in front of me. My dad lifted me in the air and then lowered me to the ground.

" We agreed to take you to the lake honey since we can't take you to the hills around the North village to see the phoenix migration. You can play in the lake for a bit, then we'll get back in the wagon. We'll be at the village a few hours later and you can see granny." my mother explained.     

I really wanted to see the granny and now I could see the lake. Although, I still felt a little disappointed about not seeing the migration this year. My dad grabbed our knapsacks and we headed into the dark forest to see a lake of legend.