Please enjoy a segment from my upcoming novel, The Willows of Wyr,
Book 4 in The Hidden World of Wysteria Series due to be released in 2020.
Chapter One of The Willows of Wyr
Copyright 2019, Owl Willows
Autumn had fallen as we were now, drifting towards the ground in our star light sweaters, towards a wet ground in a new town. We came here like leaves from far away, yet no one could see us. Aleka had always wanted to be invisible on the Earth, and now she could be so, with me. On the way, and it had been a jolly great distance, we wrote poetry on each others arms and in a composition notebook made for such scrawlings.
We had gone backwards in time, to the decade in which Aleka had been born. Demons and others such spirits did not have the same time constraints as the living where time must go in a straight line, always. Wysteria was far from us now, and it was painful to leave it tucked behind the clouds.
Aleka’s hair looked so beautiful when it was windblown, with leaves as barrettes. I’m not sure if she felt the same way, for she shook it all out and looked at me with eyes that needed sleep. We had not figured out what it was that made us so tired, but I joked that it was the Earthly oppression.
“Rightly so. Do you think we can find somewhere in the museum to sleep?”
“Yes, we’ll find somewhere completely secret to dream, like The Hideaways,” I said, so full of heart that was taken with her.
“Yes, we’ll find somewhere completely secret to dream, like The Hideaways,” I said, so full of heart that was taken with her.
We looked around us, through the fog and rain, and saw a peaceful New England town. As we traveled Zeferaus had written a letter to us, sending it somehow through the vast Universe. It had been in regard to Dathatel, terrible Anubis Jackal- cat beast, the betrayer. He harmed those he once called friends, attempted to overtake Wysteria, the gentle land he once called home. This demon sought out to destroy peaceful places and people.
Aleka and I stood on the gray sidewalk beneath a white Roman Revival Playhouse building. It was a circular shape with a willow before it which partially obscured it in mystery. To our left, was a park where more sleepy willows lived. They watched over old wooden benches which overlooked a lake of swans.
“I knew we would love it here,” I whispered to Aleka.
“It is like walking through a dream…” she returned.
I danced across the crosswalk in a nonsensical swirling motion, and she followed me. This was our usual joyous way of travel. It was unseasonably cold for fall, but we were glad of it.
“Perhaps it is Zeferaus’s doing,” she said, with a grin.
“Yes. He knows how much we favor the cold weather,” I said, just before I lost my footing. I felt my feet sliding over rocks and icy wetness of the pond. As I fell, Aleka tried to catch me, our arms and hands grazing one another’s in an attempt to save me from the inevitable crash.
Unfortunately, despite our best efforts we upset the swans, and they fluttered their long weeks in desperation to get away from me. Animals are more sensitive to spirits than humans, and they were terribly flustered, as was I.
I stood up, leaving the water behind, to look across it. The sky was so overcast, but behind some clouds golden autumn sunlight fell upon fall foliage which encircled the lake. At about twenty paces across, it was a commendable size for a town park. We watched as the swans drifted in pairs through the water, beneath a crumbling stone bridge which connected to the other side of the park.
I knew that as we drifted through the autumn leaves on the ground, or in the sky alongside seagulls and crows we would immerse ourselves in Rainville and find ourselves as the steps of the museum.
If we had been still alive, with heartbeats and human electrical systems, the bridge wouldn't have been safe. As spirit bodies, we could go anywhere and do anything as silent as the wind. Ducks and turtles meandered on the other side of this bridge, the swans seemed to just be visiting.
“Look,” said Aleka. “It’s like we've stepped into a little village.”
Large stone fountains with wide bottoms and a poised statue in the center overfilled with rain water. Two stood before us down the center of the sandy path, but I knew that more of these fountains lurked about. Most people, when looking behind the fountain would just see a pile of fallen leaves. However, we stood there together surveying this enchanting world. This park encapsulated the sort of world our hearts and souls were accustomed to. She pulled at my long starry cardigan, and off we went into a world which welcomed us, with purpose of befriending and protecting a girl named Startasy.
***
Willow trees lay everywhere, more than I had ever seen in one place on Earth in all of my existence. Families of willows gathered together over a cemetery within this park. They draped their long, blue-green leafy branches over the stones and resting bodies beneath. Overgrown weeds and an ocean of leaves led us to believe that nobody came here anymore.
“Perhaps they do, but such obscurity lends to the charm and mystery. I want to sing and dance here, to talk to the willows forever,” Aleka raised her hands towards the high, high willow branches. Rain cascaded down on us from the sky, through the leaves of the same colour.
Artwork Copyright 2019 Erica Barcel
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