Echoes of Stars — Prelude: The Monsters
When she was a child, she used to dream of the monsters.
Pale prodding digits, pink like skinned flesh, would reach for her. Beyond them, eyes too large for the craggy, irregular face stared, and a red-rimmed mouth filled with an unyielding wall of teeth deafened her ears with their screeching.
Until she woke to her own screaming and cried out for Mother.
Sometimes Mother would come; other times, one of her older brothers. Eldest brother Keidey would laugh at her fears until she was so cross she forgot to be afraid, and Second brother Rana would stay at her side, murmuring soothing words. Neither of them, it seemed, had ever dreamed about the monsters.
Mother said it was a daughter’s task to dream of the monsters, not just the great and happy dreams. Brothers were meant to live in the present. Mothers and daughters, though, are the link between the future and the past.
That didn’t make her feel much better, but then Mother would sing of stars and sunshine, and the monsters would fade away. Until the next time.
