Dream to Fly

Chapter One

Dream to fly, dream to fly, spread your wings and fly high.

Straight and true, straight and true, we are coming after you.

I release my arrow and it does fly straight and true, impaling a doe in her side. That chant has never failed me. It almost seems magical.

I have been tracking the doe because of the limp she has. It slowed her down from the rest of her herd and now she has fallen behind, allowing me to injure her with my arrow. The amount of blood loss she will endure to will probably kill her within a matter of hours.

I retrieve my arrow from the doe's side, and my hand faintly brushes her warm brown fur. I feel bad about taking the life of a poor, innocent creature, but survival is necessary. I have taken so many lives to keep myself content and fed, it almost seems brutal.

Cleaning the arrow off in the moss of a green tree next to the doe, she heaves a final breath and dies, much sooner than I expected. Her blood pools around her and clumps in her fur. I can feel the life seep out of her body as I arrange a way that I can pick her up and carry her back to my home without straining myself too much.

I try to drape her across my strong back, but the drying blood sticks to my tunic and makes it nearly impossible to move her around. Before the blood can dry any further, I dump her back onto the ground and try to think of other solutions. I decide to wait for some time so the blood can dry to a non-tacky state.

As I wait, I observe and appreciate the beauty of the clearing. The trees in this part of the forest are fairly mossy because the river runs near here, through the woods and out into the village beyond the trees. I have never been to the village. At least I have no memory of it. I have forbidden myself to go anywhere near it. I have only seen it from the farthest point I can without it fading from my view.

The trees are also tall and leafy, their branches praying to the sky which they will never reach. Most of the trees have little branches close to the ground, but the underbrush here is thick and difficult to travel through. The deer offer a lot of help, clearing their own trails which I can then use to navigate the dense forest.

There is a part of the forest that is newer and thinner, but I avoid it as much as possible. I have a fear of being discovered in these woods. As much as I want to see the town and meet other people, they scare me. Not just with their words and voices, but also with their ideas of murder. I am also scared of them because of what they would think of me. They would think of me as the weird girl who can't talk and has a large scar covering her left eyebrow. I don't have to talk in these woods, so why do it? There's no one to talk to and I'm pretty sure that if I did try to speak, my voice would be so unused it would collapse and my entire head would hurt for days. Of course, I do make grunts and other noises, but all of my thoughts and conversations are in my head and stay in my head. I have never uttered so much as a thought out loud.

Soon enough, the blood on the doe is dried, and I once again heave her back onto my shoulders and slog through the underbrush and trees. The bushes scratch my face and scrape the doe's fur as I push through the thorn barrier around my home. My home, my tree, the only place I have ever known with warmth beside the occasional forest fire here and there which I stay far away from. The forest is usually wet enough that the forest near me doesn't catch on fire and even if it does, it spreads slowly and the river cuts it in half. It is always contained to one side. I have only seen three fires rage through this woods and only one of them came close to me. I had huddled in my tree in fear, hoping that its size would spare me from the fire.

Now I stand before my tree, after yet another hunting trip. Even though this tree is basically my life, it still amazes me every time I stand before it. Vines dangle from the towering trunk and grand branches. Moss encircles the base of the colossal tree and winds its way up, disappearing about a third of the way up the bark.

A hole starts near the base of the trunk and yawns open to a crater in the tree. This is my home. One disadvantage of my tree is that it has flooded before. Luckily, I had almost had nothing that could get ruined, and so I had been safe. I managed to save the precious dragon scroll that I now see sitting on its shelf as I drag the doe into my home.

The dragon scroll is the most valuable possession that I own. It is a scroll that tells the tales of the dragons that used to inhabit the forest. There is evidence that they still roam through the trees, but I have never met one. Ths scroll also has beautiful depictions of what the dragons looked like. Although I can't read, I can look at the drawings of the majestic figures posing in their fiercest manner they can muster. I love the scroll. It is one of the reasons I feel so warm in the cold roots of the tree. Sometimes they grow into my furniture, the roots, I mean. Sometimes they have a mind of their own. I might go on a hunting expedition and find that one of them has seized a chair and is climbing up it, inch by inch.

I couldn't believe it when I first saw the evidence, it seemed that it all happened way to fast for a tree to be capable of, but this forest has its surprises. I often spot oddly colored birds in the trees with plumage of colors that would be spotted from miles above the trees. Alluring tunes travel out of their beaks and into my ears and every once in a while, I will find a dazzling feather lying on the ground. I have a collection of them next to my dragon scroll. I have found about five or six exquisitely colored feathers. My favorite one is the orange one that I discovered. It doesn't seem too bright. In fact, the shadows seem attracted to it, but there is an undertone of brilliance in the soft, downy plumage.

As I set to skinning my doe, something catches my eye. A fleck of jade-colored material has fallen off of the dragon scroll, or so it seems. It is a milky green color, the color of my favorite dragon in the scroll, an Earth Dragon. Or that is what I assume it is, as it is depicted with chunks of earth rising off of the ground and seems to have a mossy look to it. It is my favorite because it looks so fierce and yet so loving at the same time. I think the thing it would like most in life would be to just bury itself in the dirt and let the soil wash over it. Somehow, I think it could also defend its land with all of the fierceness a mother could have. Like my mother. She died protecting me--I think. I have one of her bones that I found when I was finally old enough to realize what the corpse next to me really was.

The earliest memory I have is of me waking up from the night and eating berries that grew near where my mother died. That's it. I don't remember anything until maybe a year later when I remember leaving my mother's body and starting my own life. I remember the first time I saw my tree, the first bow I carved just by instinct. I remember the warm feeling I felt after eating my first meat and then using the skin of the bunny to make a hat. I still have that hat. I realize now just how horrible of a hat it was, but it is still a fond reminder of how far I have come. Anyways, it doesn't fit me now.

I don't remember anything about my mother except for her corpse. I can't remember how young I was when she died and I don't know how old I am now. I don't remember my father either. I don't even have anything of him for me to remember. He's a myth to me, just a whisper in a non-existent breeze. Sometimes I wish I did know my parents and sometimes I'm glad I'm alone and independent. It makes me feel strongly that I've grown up without knowing anything I'm doing. I taught myself how to hunt, make a fire, cook food, make clothes, furniture, and so many more things.

I cook the doe over a small but scorching fire. She will only last a few days before the meat will go bad, but I take advantage of her and eat as much as I can, wrapping the rest in leather and placing it in the coldest corner of my cavern. The meat is succulent but I wish I had salt for it. I had found some a few years back, but it's all gone now, thanks to my greedy self.

After finishing the meat, I wash my hands in a small stream just outside of the thorn barriers protecting me, and I get ready for bed. This means dousing the coals only after I light my torch and stick it in the ground next to my bed. Then, I retrieve my dragon scroll and curl up under the soft rabbit and fox fur blanket. This has been my ritual since I arrived at this tree. I have reread the scroll countless times and can paint the depictions of the dragons on the back my eyelids.

I look at some of the dragon pictures and put back the scroll, blowing out the torch and closing my eyes for the final time that night.