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                               Sangrelysia

                          by Vivian Darkbloom

And Here We Meet the Princess

   In the dream, I was playing leapfrog up the aisle of the ancient
   church with two naked young girls. Between the battered dark
   wooden pews, one over the other we scampered, and I must have
   been naked as well, because I remember the distinct sensation of
   my penis gliding delicately along the vertebral bumps of the tiny
   spine under the smooth skin lit in the mystical rainbow aura of
   sunlight filtering through the stained glass.

   "We'll climax at the altar!" shouted one girl, lifting her smile
   joyously to the heavens. Just then the priest kept nudging
   pesteringly at my shoulder. Invisible in the dark, the hand at my
   shoulder kept shaking me, until the dream vaporised, leaving
   darkness around me, but still the sensation of a hand poking at
   me, a young feminine giggle in the darkness.

   "Well, are you going to just snore all night?" demanded a
   familiar voice. Damn. The princess.

   "It would seem customary," I ventured, still immersed in
   stertorous breathing, groggily befuddled by my surroundings, and
   uncertain whether I had really woken up or maybe instead emerged
   into a different dream.

   "I'm here for my lesson," she said.

   Damn, repeated my inner narrator, having concluded by some
   obscure logic that she never would have been there for her lesson
   were it only a dream. No, I was really going to need to get up.

   "Very well," I said, rubbing my eyes, rising to a sitting
   position, shoving aside covers.

   I could smell her young body across from me in the darkness,
   scent of the sweet workout she had gotten from ascending the
   stairs of the secret passageway.

   "Some light?" I said.

   She giggled. "I can't," she said. "I tried."

   "Ok," I said, snapping my fingers. Instantly, all around the room
   flames sprang up from a score of oddly assorted lanterns
   scattered here and there, with the effect that the room was fully
   lit, but not glaringly. Thick crimson velvet curtains across the
   window would help ensure privacy.

   A smiling Princess Sylvia wrung and twisted her hands together,
   little-girl-like. So unlike her uncle, the King, that it was
   difficult to believe they were related. As she bounced in front
   of me, her pale pink nightgown fluttered and floated, unable to
   keep up with her energetic gesticulation.

   "Hi," I said.

   "Hi," she replied.

   "You're awake."

   "So are you," she teased.

   "Right. So have a seat," I patted the spot on the bed next to me,
   and pulled my hand out as she leapt over to set her cute little
   fanny down on it.

   "Oops!" she squealed, falling across my lap temporarily.

   Feeling her warmth, I gently squeezed her delicate frame to me as
   she sat up again. Affectionately, I ran my fingers through her
   long black hair, feeling it's unexpectedly silky featheriness.

   "So," I began. "We were talking about time."

   "Time," she repeated softly.

   "Now, imagine," I said, pointing to a dust-smothered globe in the
   corner, surrounded by a transparent chart of cosmic sphere marked
   in astrological glyphs. "Think of the entire universe that you
   can see. The earth and the stars, the bed, your nightgown, the
   crickets, the wind, everything in all of creation. Imagine all of
   that space being the size of a tiny little dot, the size of a
   speck of dust."

   "Really? That small?"

   "Smaller, actually. A point in space without dimension
   whatsoever."

   "Hm. That's very tiny."

   "Right. Now think of a thread, like this one." I tugged at a
   stray thread, a strand of gold that had straggled outside the
   borders of the sleeve she was wearing. She giggled again.
   "Imagine that speck of dust, or maybe a bug that's the size of
   that speck of dust, traveling along the thread. Where it had just
   been would be the past, and where it's going would be the
   future."

   "Ok."

   "Now think of this --" I grasped the hem of her nightgown. "All
   of the threads of time woven together."

   Her eyes widened. A precocious child, blessed with a vivid
   imagination, she could be startlingly clever. Who knows what
   mischief such a metaphor might wreak? I let her think.

   "Ok, now add this," I added, indicating the unruly tangle of
   bedding beside her. "Layers of woven threads, representing
   evolution of the timestream."

   "So, I don't get it. That would mean if you went like this," she
   curled the thread around into a loop, "You could go back to the
   past, or into the future."

   "That's right," I said. She was so adorable, brows knit in the
   struggle to comprehend. I could almost feel her brain heating up
   with the exertion. "Let's start with something simpler. Over
   here. . ."

   I led her over to one of the workbenches against the wall,
   shuffling aside a clutter of parchments, herb-filled
   apothecaries, an alembic plugged by a cork stopper with a spiral
   glass tube sticking out, a skull, several sheathed blades of
   various sizes, a gold chalice or two, several smoldering censers,
   a few dust-covered ponderous leather-bound tomes clasped and
   arabesqued with gold filigree, titled with gold-leaf runic
   lettering on the cover; and brushing aside crumbs from the
   brownie I had eaten for lunch, I set down in front of her the
   gigantic hourglass I kept on the shelf.

   "What's that?" she asked, pointing at a small crystal ball,
   scarcely large enough to fit in one's palm, half concealed behind
   a white mortar and pestle.

   Rumple, the orange cat, jumped up onto the table, knocking over a
   (fortunately unlit) candle with a sweeping gesture of her tail.

   "That," I mused, reaching over to fetch the clear crystal globe
   from the pile of rubble, "I acquired somewhat surreptitiously
   from among your uncle's last collection of plunder. I noticed
   that it had the aura of magic about it, something inside me
   couldn't stand to leave in his inept clutches. Only I have not
   yet been able to discern its true secret. It seems to be a
   message of some sort. Here, what do you observe?" I placed it in
   her palms.

   She gazed into it, fascinated, transfixed, and almost instantly,
   gave a brief shiver. "I hear someone crying. No words, just a
   voice calling out for help. And it's cold. Dark. Underwater." She
   continued to gaze for a few minutes, then abruptly broke away
   from it with a gasp of emotion, forcing it back into my hands.

   She ran over to the hearth, and sat wordless by the fire, holding
   out her hands to warm them, eyes filled with shadowy
   contemplation.

   Calmly I waited, sitting in the wooden chair I had appointed for
   her. The cat leaned against the timepiece, curling its tail
   around the gracefully lathed curves of the support post, and
   stuck her nose in my face. I scratched the top of her head. She
   purred.

   After a while, I joined the princess by the fireside, nudging
   myself behind her, reaching my arms around to hold her, gently
   rocking. "You saw much more than I did," I said quietly,
   half-whispering in her ear. "You have a powerful way with magic."

   She turned around and put her arms around me, placing her head
   against my breast, sighing. I felt the smooth soft young skin of
   her precious cheek pressed delicately against me. "You always say
   that, but how come I can never get magic to work?"

   I chuckled. "Don't worry, dear. It will happen in time. Would you
   like to try another lesson?"

   "Alright," she said, now with a hint of sullenness. She arose,
   and seated herself once more in front of the hourglass. I drew up
   a stool beside her.

   "Now," I said. "Use your concentration to slow down the falling
   of the grains."

   "Make them go against gravity? Like a feather?"

   "No, no. Slow them down in time."

   She furrowed her brow in frustration. "Why do you always say
   stuff like that, but never explain how?" she protested.

   "Don't worry," I replied. "Just continue with your intent, and it
   will start to happen."

   "How? I don't get it."

   "Remember what the root of magic is?"

   "Love."

   "That's right. The Love that created the entire universe is at
   the center of your very being. As you connect with the true
   nature of your identity, the dream-symbols in your mind begin to
   open the valves behind the substance of reality, causing them to
   ebb and flow at your whim. But always start with Love. That's
   where you begin. In the all-powerful ultimate reality of Love,
   all things are possible."

   "Love," she said.

   "That's it, just relax. Go with the flow. I'll see if I can
   help," I said.

   I watched as she concentrated, feet dangling, tiny shoulders
   swaying almost imperceptibly with the rising and falling of her
   breath, the falling wisps of long dark hair. My detachment as her
   teacher slipped, and I found myself entranced by the beauty of
   her face, her pale smooth translucent skin, her cute little nose,
   the expression of stubborn determination that seemed so beyond
   her years.

   In fact, it escaped my mind that I had intended help her, but
   wound up instead just watching by her side, feeling the soft
   warmth of her body as the grains of sand gradually, but
   decisively, came to a dead halt.

   Then, in pure hypnotic astonishment, I continued to gaze as the
   particles inside the hourglass began to rise -- slowly at first,
   but then gaining momentum until they were moving upward at a
   velocity that exactly mirrored their `previous' falling.

                                                           Chapter 3

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