When I was younger, my life sucked. One day, I just couldn't take it anymore. So, I ran away. A long time living rough, and no one had found me, or really even looked. I was ten years old, with no home, no family, and no knowledge that I could shift. Worst of all, I was alone.
That was the first time I flew.
I remember that night as one remembers a vivid dream; so surreal and impossible, but it all felt so very real. It was the only time the phoenix ever completely took me over.
I had been living in the valleys far north of my old house for awhile after I ran. On my first day, I found a sloping tunnel made of hard-packed dirt leading to a beautiful old cave. One wall held simple metal shelves packed with food; perhaps it was an old storm house. The rest was simple, formed by nature with bits of quartz sparkling in the walls. It was a spare place, but home nonetheless.
All I had with me was two changes of clothes, a thick blanket, and a nearby stream to sustain me. The surrounding crops fed me, and I was happier than I'd ever been at home.
A bitter Winter suddenly gripped the land one day. I was locked in my cave for a good week before the blizzard subsided.
On the final day, I woke to a world changed. The cold had seized my fresh crops with it's frosty fingers. The stored fruits had rotted somehow, the stream froze over. My last resort stores turned out to be empty, stolen, not by the hands of Winter, but the greedy hands of man.
Oddly, I never grew cold. It was as if a fire was burning in my breast. But I did hunger quickly.
The days of the freeze were harsh and cruel. By the third, I was out of food. But the sixth, I was starving.
Despite the emptiness of my stomach, the imagined fire of my heart burned hotter and brighter. It spread it's warmth throughout my whole body, killing the hunger in my stomach, warming my chilled arms and legs. It's presence was practically tangible in the cave, simmering and pressing in on all side
On my very last running day, the heat was more intense than ever before, and things in the cave literally began to combust. The fire spread though the night, setting everything around alight... including me.
Flames flickered across my skin, cracking, melting, burning. Scream after scream was torn from my throat as the fire bored into my every pore. My skin peeled off and my clothes turned to ash as I rolled around on the floor. I stopped, overcome by fear and pain, and curled in the fetal position, hands sheltering my face. I couldn't let it take me.
The burns boiling my raw body were fearsome and hot as hell, but there was something else. Some part of me was loving this. Some wild, insane part. That part didn't scream. Suddenly my shrieks became laughs. Maybe I am insane, I thought.
Who else laughs as they are cooked to death?
Laughter apparently doesn't put out fire, though, and soon my hair was a veil of white hot flame. Finally, it was just to much to bear. I gave into the madness, and slowly removed my hands from my face. Fire kissed my cheeks, flew into my half laughing, half screaming open mouth and poured right into my ears. I could hear it whispering, tempting me to stop resisting. So I did. My eyes snapped open and the light bored right into my eyes.
I could feel it as it set my very soul ablaze, claiming me as it's own.
The pain of my spirit burning was ripping me to pieces, and definitely not funny anymore.
I opened my mouth for one final shriek, but the sound that escaped wasn't my own. It wasn't even remotely human. It was a sort of caw; high, joyful, wild and free.
Suddenly, the flames encompassing my entire being didn't hurt so much. But now claustrophobia gripped me. I needed to get out... to be under the open sky.
I ran from my new home, contents now in ashes, laughing once more. I had abuse, cold, hunger, and fire thrown my way, but still death had failed to claim me. HA! I started sprinting, and as I neared the exit, I moved so fast that my toes ddin't even seem to touch the ground. My still burning arms pumped so fast, they became blurred, and appeared to be wings.
Then I realized.
My toes weren't touching the ground, because I had none. In their place were sharp talons made of gold. I didn't have arms either, they were now wings sprouting feathers; dark red and bright orange, molten gold and white hot tips.
Was I becoming a bird? Or was I just absolutely off my rocker?
Probably the latter, I thought, laughing like a madwoman. Those giggles didn't sound right, either. They were much closer to that beautiful cawing sound.
Dream or real or whatever, I was a bird... Made of fire. How did that not hurt?
Oh well, there was time for questions after I tested my wings. After I flew.
And fly I did.
I raced out of the cave tunnel and up at the speed of light, emerging above the clouds. Their dew didn't even make my flame flicker. I glided momentarily, lighting my way as the black new moon could not. There was a rolling sea of stormy-gray clouds set against a starless sky at least a mile beneath me.
That was the vivid part. All I really remember afterwards was soaring for hours and hours with no direction or destination.
I woke up the next day, naked and shivering on the front porch of my old home.
That was five years ago.
