Glass Desires

  Chapter 2 – Worlds Stacked Upon the Shelves...

  I like to count the snow globes that sag my bedroom's cheap book shelving when I am feeling most exhausted from my cancer treatments. I count those snow globes and wonder how my wall can possibly support so many worlds. I don't know how my apartment complex doesn't collapse beneath the weight of those worlds contained within those glass globes. Fay's magic is such a strange and wonderful thing. Searching for any science explaining the snow globes will only fire migraines behind my eyes. So when I feel so exhausted that I have no desire to stand from bed, I count the snow globes crowding my shelves and marvel.

  With Fay, it is best to let the science of her powers remain unknown. The learning a trick seldom feels as satisfying as we first hope.

  The snow globes lining my bedroom's walls teem with worlds that have stolen my breath. Next to Fay, I have trekked through the warm caverns of Lush-Phel, where the thick roots of the Spliner trees crisscross throughout the subterranean world with underground foliage of flaming oranges and crimsons, where none walk upon the surface to see how such branches stretch into the unseen sky. I have sat cross-legged in those dim chambers and shared tea proffered by the short people with such small, dark eyes. All the teas of my world taste tepid by comparison, and daily my tongue yearns for that green concoction served in Lush-Phel.

  With Fay, I have answered an invitation to the silk-threaded castles of Arahn-Nep. I have stood in the terrible Spider Queen's chamber when the twin moons Aerich and Arod peaked in the night sky. I have heard the rapturous music played by the silken-stringed instruments of the Queen's orchestra. I have watched, spellbound, as her many legs stepped her intricate dance. And I have watched, when the twin moons rise together so high in the dark sky after a cycle of a hundred years, as the Spider Queen refused to become food for her hatching children and instead devoured her young in turn.

  Next to Fay, I have sailed upon the windless Spectrum Seas, where our boatsmen's oars ripple colors of purples and blues across waters shaded turquoise. I have laughed while watching the one-eyed porpoises leap from those waters, and I have seen Fay blush when those dolphins clatter flirtations in her direction.

  I have wept with Fay at the song of the Monarch Court, whose maidens sing notes brimming with desire as their olive skin and flowing, dark hair stir so much desire, though even the slightest touch shatters their crystal bones. Fay is not one for any simple display of affection. But Fay clutched my hand while we listened to that tragic court's song.

  Traveling with Fay through her snow globe worlds, I have looked upon the silk balloon cites of At-Leigh, where citizens with prehensile tails struggle to eat enough breads and sweet cakes to stretch their bellies and expand their weight so that their world's cruel, emerald sky does not lift them, prematurely, to their deaths should their hands slip from the ropes linking one balloon to the next. For in the world of At-Leigh, gravity pulls everything up into the cold, lethal heavens instead of dropping everything to the ground.

  Fay and I have stood in the burning city of Greahlysh Fie while the dead king's pall-bearers walked barefoot upon the brick streets to carry their dead monarch's burden to the waiting ash pile. I have watched pall-bearers collapse from their toil and from the heat, each quickly replaced by a volunteer from the mourning crowd before the fallen king's coffin might tumble.

  I have witnessed with Fay the weddings of the Everanon, whose new wives are blinded and new husbands disfigured so that envy will not stain the marital bed. I have infiltrated the Wymarch herd with Fay and laughed to hear the chiming eggs of that stampeding beast hatch and give birth to new horns and hooves.

  I have seen such things and much more with Fay in the world's contained within those snow globes that line my bedroom's walls. How can I dream of denying Fay's knock when she brings such magic? How could Fay fail to inspire me to rise from my sick bed when brings a snow globe each time she arrives at the corner of Water and Fifth?

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