SHE WAS WITHIN MAGIC
She stood in the midst of magic. Her hands touched the frayed edges of time, of distance, of empathy beyond. She took a breath and slid her fingers into the darkness, into the bleak. She wasn't afraid - how could she be? Everything was as it should be. The lair was in front of her, behind her, it was there, and there, and over there. She breathed it and she lived it - she always had. She had known that this time was coming, this exact moment, ever since her birth - before that even. It was something that had wrapped and twined itself around her soul, had comforted and scolded her, had murmured to her in sleep, and laughed with her in play. She had often seen this place in her dreams. The broad broken tree over there covered in dark green bearded moss. The forest floor liberally scattered with small bleached fragile bird bones, generations of cackling, squabbling crows. The pale blue-green sky with the half yellow moon, the slight breeze through her hair, a half-whisper from a ghost of something as it passed her ear. It was all here, each and every aspect that made up this moment had been played out over and over again, from when she lay in her crib staring solemnly at the cracked ceiling, and as she sat on her mother's knee - silent and subdued. It had been there in every detail when she was vacant and lost at school, staring out at the sky while the teacher droned. And it was there when she was a lonely teenager who had sat in her room surrounded by her guard of books, humming the secret names and numbers. And now she was here. She let her arms slide into the darkness till her breasts whispered against the soft barrier. This was to be her magic, her time, her moment. She had been meant for the unknown, she had been meant for this. She was now home where she belonged, and she was ready. She smiled in comfort, looked up for one final glance at the man in the moon, nodded in recognition of an old friend, then slid her body deep within the magic...and was gone. The forest floor gave a gentle rustle, a crow cackled, the moon winked, and all was as before.
