my bare feet.
“Father!” I call again, louder once I’m away from sleeping ears. He laughs again, and this time I see what I know must be him—a blur of shadows and light sprinting across the terrain ahead.
I don’t think. I just follow, moving farther and farther away from the house until the earth turns to little more than mountain and stone, pain creeping into my soles. I know with everything in me that this can’t be real. It’s a curse. A mirage. Something.
But Father’s right there in front of me. He moves so quickly that, if I want to catch him, I can’t hesitate.
“Wait for me,” I whisper after him, fists clenching as a stone digs into my heel. “Wait a second!”
No sooner have the words passed my lips before a glowing figure emerges before me. A beast made from shimmering blue flames stands tall and proud. It’s taken the shape of a wolf, overly large and burning so fiercely I struggle not to shut my eyes against it.
Its smoking paws stomp impatiently at the ground, a constant stream of fresh embers falling from its glowing fur. Orbs of white fire have taken over its eyes, and I find myself reaching for my dagger as they fix upon me.
Spotting my movement, the beast snorts as smoke flares from its nostrils, as if trying to tell me not to bother. It’s not here to fight.
“Will you take me to him?” I close the space between us and offer a tentative hand to its neck, sucking in a breath of surprise when the flames don’t so much as singe my skin. Forcefully, I work up the nerve to lift myself fully upon the beast, not wanting to stray too far behind Father.
The moment I’m mounted, the wolf takes off in a sprint that rivals the wind, scattering blue embers in its wake. Only there, upon the back of this fiery beast, does my mind catch up to my body, warning me that I’m a fool for following it so easily. This wolf didn’t create itself, and it clearly knows where it’s going. But still, Father’s laugh was too real. Too close.
I can’t turn back, now. Not when he’s within my reach.
Father’s back is to me when we find him, his body made from the red flames he shares with his own steed, a giant elk with silver antlers. Together they charge through the mountains, weaving around geysers that burst into a sky thick with shooting stars, their mist spraying down upon my skin and making the beast beneath me sizzle and steam.
“Look at me,” I whisper, urging Father to turn and face me. Urging him—begging him—to show me his face and prove it’s him, but fearful I’ll wake up the moment he does.
But as I urge this to happen, Father turns and the fire around his body fades. For the first time since I watched him burn, I see his face.
There’s his suntanned skin, wrinkled from years at sea. Warm brown eyes that glow with pride as they look me over. And a smile. Wide and wondrous and beautiful.
“It’s you. It’s really you.”
Father doesn’t respond. Instead, he lifts a hand to the sky, using magic I’ve never seen to draw a string of swirling constellations into his palms. They wrap around his hands and dance their way up his arms and shoulders, swirling between shades of pinks and blues and green. Again he laughs, stretching his hand to me. This time, the constellations swirl between his fingers and through my hair. I laugh as they sweep around me before exploding back into the sky, swallowing me in a sea of magic and stars.
I barely notice my cheeks are tear-soaked as I tilt my head back at them, and I don’t care.
Though I’ll have to wake from this dream, I pray to any god listening that reality will not come for me soon. I want to stay in this moment for as long as possible. Listening to his laugh. Seeing his smile.
All my life I’ve wanted this adventure with Father. Now that it’s here, I pray it will last forever, until the galaxy swallows us whole and our world is no more.
But even the gods have their limits, and they’ve been too kind to me already.
Father’s body begins to smoke at the edges, and with one swift kick to his steed, he’s charging forward again. Only this time he’s lifting higher and higher, as if racing into the sky. I lean into the