The Land of Fire and Ice by Anna Cody (read an ebook week TXT) 📕

The bell rings out the hour of half past six. Grandmother was late for my magic lesson.......again. The hapless children had crowded the parlor for their nightly readings. When grandmother closed shop that night and stepped out from behind the portieres she said “the moons are dark tonight so instead of having your lesson, how about I’ll just tell you a story”. It was about an aesthetic dream-land, one that grandmother talks of so often that I’ve grown to believe that it’s a real place. Occasionally I hike to the most pleasant meadow imaginable and recreate my own dream-land, while the other prosaic neighborhood children mocked the penury with their twisted banal games. I was in the process of learning how to manifest anything and everything; however, my attempts thus far had been unsuccessful. I knew all the meditations, spell casting and potion making are facile as making cereal for me; grandmother had made an admonition that I am far exceeding her powers as it is, so she stopped lessons. Grandmother was like a leitmotif in my life, I was under the impression that she’d always be here with me; I was bemused when she disappeared. I sat next to a box with multiple journals, as my implacable mother has finished her monologue, which had progressed to a tone of complete automatism; I noticed a small worn journal with my grandmother’s name scratched on the cover. Just as I stood up my mother uttered, “Honey she’s in a better place now, a place so wonderful and perfect that it’s impossible to imagine”. Immediately I understood where grandmother had gone, because I could imagine what such a place would be like. Grandmother had made the journey to the dream-land. I quickly stole away to my chamber, my emotional exigencies growing and expanding with excitement. I fanned quickly through the book; the most recent entry dated September 7, 1948 pinioned my mental state for it was addressed specifically to me. Grandmother had clearly written the formula to access the dream-land. I was incredulous about it but I didn’t have the time needed to fully apprehend because in the next line the formula commands that it only be used when the appropriate moon cycle appears and under the most demanding circumstances. An ineluctable fate was spelled out before my eyes one that promised turgid embellishments, one that could protean its definition without being beleaguered by complications. One that was demure as well as supercilious! One that made such a legerdemain that precluded my efforts to comprehend my own thoughts; I stayed immanent in my room brooding for several hours, revising, reforming my imminent actions; my efforts always in vain. After awhile my thoughts took an analogous appearance and my mind was left with in vacuity. I left my cell with the decision of going the dream-land. The meal with my family that last night possessed a nervous atmosphere or maybe that was just me. The “good old” family sat around and ate with vigorous mastication while I was a paragon. I ate nearly nothing just rearranged the food on my plate. My parents asked the same critical questions and I answered with the traditional adverting gaze. My mother tried to sway my opinion about attending the cotillion to which I quickly shot down. Soon, all too soon, dinner was done the dishes washed and I was back in my crusty room preparing for departure from this world. Grandmother is not dead she’s just waiting for me in dream-land; I underwent the journey. Upon arriving I beheld a sickening sight; the tableau provoked pathos within me. I saw my grandmother shaking her head and weeping under a proscenium like gate, she was screaming in the most terrible way, pointing her finger at me between sobs. I looked down at myself startled to see my clothes covered in blood. When one plays in the realm of fire and ice, one is bound to become effete in powers and never return to one’s eminent domain. Too late I truly realized my actions.

Publication Date: 04-15-2010

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