Boon

Beneath the green-golden bower of the forest canopy – lulled by the heat and the hum of cicadas, he falls into a deep sleep.

When he wakes, he wakes in the shadow of a woman.

She traps him in a gaze the colour of dying leaves. She is draped in a thin cloth the colour of the sky at twilight. It is not just the cloth that is ghostly-thin. Her entire being radiates with insubstantiality, as though she may fade with the morning mist. Even her hair is like the gossamer threads of a spider’s web.

She bows her head. “I would recommend that you soon go inside. After the sun sets and the lights are out. That is when they leave.”

Jonathan sits up. “When who leave?”

She does not reply, but produces from the folds of her gown, a flower, and holds it out to him.

It is still in full bloom, as though freshly picked. It is a trumpet flower, but ringed with several velvety petals. And it is golden as the sun, medallioned with pollen like fine gold dust.

He gently takes it, and she is careful not to let her skin touch his. When is it secure in his grasp, she releases it and steps back.

“Get them out,” she says. “They do not belong in my dominion.”

“Who?” he asks, baffled.

“Get them out,” she says, before the sky darkens and soon it is the world around him darkening too.

He wakes with the golden streaks of sunset in his eyes, the horizon painted in shades of red and orange.

He cannot tell if what transpired was a dream or not. It cannot be real.

But a smell, deep and rich, like honeyed wine, draws him to the golden flower in his lapel.

Art by K.Y. Craft

Text by Lucie MacAulay