Fiction
Fantasy
1 Corinthians 12:4-6(NIV) "There are different kinds of gifts, but the same Spirit. There are different kinds of service, but the same Lord. There are different kinds of working, but the same God works all of them in all men."
With her back against the sun-warmed stone wall of the garden, Azami fingered the fine paper in her fingers and slowly folded one edge and then another. Soothed by the smoothness of the paper, she could almost shut out the whine of her aunt’s voice in the dining room.
"No, no, no, we are seating twenty-four tomorrow night for dinner. Twenty guests and four family members, you fool, not just twenty," her aunt screamed at the housemaid.
A hard slap echoed from the house, and Azami shivered. She sighed as she saw the results of her reaction to her aunt’s temper. Another damaged crane. It seemed she couldn’t fold any of them right. Usually, she could fold anything she wanted, and the paper was a comfort to her hands. Today, it kept slipping and sliding away from her, getting crinkled on the edges, or not matching at the corners.
A long shadow fell over her legs, oddly lumpy in the middle. Late in the afternoon, even her pudgy Aunt could be tall with the sun at her back. "What have you done? Can’t you fold anything properly? This is your wedding! You would think you could make a decent effort!"
"Yes, Aunt," Azami replied meekly. She knew it was no use to mention that the wedding wasn’t her choice, and her cousin wouldn’t notice if the cranes were folded properly or not. His greedy eyes would only be on the wedding feast.
"Hmmph! You’ll have to go to the attic again, until your work is finished."
Azami swallowed nervously. "But Aunt, I will not have enough light to fold by—"
"Nonsense! I’ve seen you fold better behind your back for the raggedy children in the village. Now get up!"
Azami quickly gathered her paper, keeping her eyes focused on her aunt’s lizard-hide shoes. "Yes, Aunt."
Her aunt’s long fingers with their spiked nails grasped Azami under the chin, pricking her skin. Azami was forced to look up slightly into her aunt’s fleshy face, and her hard cold eyes. "You will have those cranes finished by tomorrow morning, or I will teach my son how to whip you, before the wedding."
Azami felt her fear dissipate and her anger rise in her like a wave. "If he dares to whip me, I’ll..." And the anger left her, as she belatedly realized that all her threats would be empty. After tomorrow her cousin would own her like a prize duck.
Her aunt’s grip on her chin tightened and her other hand rose and fell, striking Azami hard on the cheek. The blow was expected, but Azami could still not keep back the wash of tears that rose to her eyes.
"You will not threaten my son! You will obey him, and you will obey me! Now, to the attic with you!" Her aunt’s fat face had turned slightly purple with her rage, and she shoved Azami towards the house. Walking quickly, she entered the overly warm house, and started up the staircase. The housemaid didn’t look at her. A door opened on the second landing, and her cousin’s piggish face stared out at her. He leered, and she shuddered. He laughed, obviously enjoying her discomfort. She scurried past him quickly, finally reaching the attic stairs.
Holding the paper carefully, she climbed up the narrow staircase, and entered the tiny attic door on her hands and knees.
She closed the attic door behind her and locked it. This place had been her prison and sanctuary for most of her life. Here, on a high ledge behind a loose brick in the chimney, she kept her private things. Here, she had learned of her gift, the reason that none of her folds could be perfect. If her aunt discovered it, she would be locked in this attic day and night and forced to create things for her aunt’s pleasure and profit. It would be preferable to a forced marriage to her cousin, but she would not want to put anything under her aunt’s dominion.
And yet here she was, trapped since all of her advocates were lost. Her mother had died of the fever when she was only seven, and then her grandmother had succumbed to old age just a year previously. The joint inheritance that she shared with her cousin would be lost when they wed; that was the real reason her aunt had kept her under lock and key since Gramma’s death. No other creature deserved such treatment, and so her gift had to remain secret.
As if in response to her thoughts, she heard the churring of her kitten. He rubbed himself against her knee and placed a paw on her leg. She ran her hand over his head and back, and gazed into his beautiful green eyes. He was the first and only creature she had made on purpose. There had been others before, but they had been surprises to her, and thankfully had escaped before her aunt had noticed them. The crane had flown away. The frog had hopped into the pond, and seemed content there.
Her kitten climbed into her lap and settled in, purring quietly against her stomach. Despite the hot humidity of the attic, she welcomed him. She leaned her head back, and let her kitten’s contented rumblings soothe her. She let the paper fall from her hands, and daydreamed of being outside her aunt’s domain.
In the hazy mists of her dream, Azami looked on the gentle face of a man, glowing with white radiance. He held out his hands to her, and in them, he offered her the finest paper she had ever seen. She took it from him and he smiled broadly. She knew somehow, that he meant her to use her gift. He gestured with his hands, and she noticed the scars on them, as he seemed to indicate that she should fly away. In her dream, she almost understood, and she turned to float in blue skies.
With a start, she awoke to an angry pounding on the attic door. The kitten jumped from her lap, and she scrambled to her feet and made her way to the little door. "Yes, Aunt?"
She tried to open the door, but it was stuck, locked from the outside.
"You haven’t finished those cranes, have you?"
"No, Aunt."
"Then I’ll unlock the door tomorrow at dawn, and if they are finished, you’ll have breakfast. If not, I’ll have my son lay stripes on your back."
Azami shuddered. When she regained control of herself, she spoke again. "Yes, Aunt." Azami waited until she heard her aunt’s footsteps fade down the stairway outside. She gritted her teeth for a moment and then made a decision. She would not be whipped undeservedly. She would not subject herself to her aunt’s ways any longer. She would—what would she do? Feeling the soft paper in her hands, she suddenly knew. She would follow her dream. She would use her gift and fly away.
Walking softly and carefully, she crossed the attic and retrieved her precious possessions from their hiding place.
With sure fingers, she wrapped them into an old, frayed pillowcase that had served as some of her scant bedding when she had spent the night in the attic before. She also placed the paper inside it, keeping it inside the pages of the scripture books that had been handed down to her by her mother. Not even the whole Bible, it still contained precious words of wisdom and comfort that had helped Azami keep her strength through the years. She remembered the night she had discovered her gift. Locked in the attic, dreaming a dream like the one she just had, she had woken to fold a scrap of paper she had been saving, and she had felt as if life itself had flowed through her fingers.
Calling her kitten with a soft clicking of her fingers on the floor, she picked him up and carried him and her pillowcase suitcase to the other end of the attic. There, a boarded-up window had afforded her a view of the street. Tonight, she looked out and made sure that there was no one on the street looking up at her aunt’s dilapidated roof. Putting her belongings down, she set herself to the task of loosening the boards on the window. It was a simple job, given that the roof was in need of repair. Her kitten jumped out of the window onto the porch roof, and started pushing at the boards to help her.
Finally, the window was open. Placing her bag of belongings carefully on the slanted roof, Azami squeezed herself through the opening. Taking a deep gulp of night air, she realized that she was afraid once again. She was crouched on the roof, and it felt precarious, as if any moment she might fall. She had never liked heights much. The kitten butted his head against her leg, and she took another gasp, afraid of losing her balance. Slowly and carefully she lowered herself to a sitting position on the roof.
Despite her fear of heights, her plan relied on her ability to handle them. That, and her gift. She didn’t want to call it magic. It seemed like something else. She was creating something. She felt chilled at the thought of comparing herself in any way to the Creator of the Universe, but yet, she had always felt a call to create, even if it was usually only with paper. This was something more, as her warm and curious kitten proved to her one more time, as he poked his nose against her pillowcase.
She took out a single sheet of paper, and held it gently in her fingers. She bowed her head, and offered the paper upward. "Lord, please, accept this as an offering to you...this gift. It could only come from you, as all things created are from you, and blessed as good. Lord, please help me, and lend me your strength. Amen." She lowered her hands, and closed her eyes, folding by feel and not by sight. She felt as if the Lord’s power rested in her hands as she folded. She felt filled with love and confidence beyond her own. Before the last fold, she hesitated. Silently she asked for confirmation that this was the right thing to do, that this work would be blessed. Then, breathing deeply and slowly, she carefully folded the soft paper one last time. She lifted the figure in her fingers, and blew her breath on it, and then reached her arm out to its full length and set the figure on the rooftop.
It quivered in the moonlight, and then the edges blurred and light surrounded it. Her kitten jumped into her lap, and she picked up her pillowcase. The light expanded a thousandfold, so that she had to look away. As the light receded she looked back, and there, with its claws gripping the roofing of her aunt’s house, stood her creation. The dragon inhaled heavily and gazed at her, its eyes seeming to speak to her. She felt exhilaration course through her, and her fear vanished. The dragon bowed, and she bowed her head in return. The dragon turned slightly and knelt down.
Without hesitation, although a bit of her fear was returning, Azami put her hand out and touched the dragon. The dragon whuffed air into her hair, and she laughed. God had granted her this wonderful creation; why should she be afraid? She stepped gently onto the dragon’s foreleg and climbed it carefully until she reached the dragon’s shoulders. Once there, she seated herself with her legs rested on each side of the base of the dragon’s neck. She tucked the pillowcase into her tunic, and the kitten made his way into her shirt and tucked himself against her stomach. She reached out and patted the dragon on its supple neck. The dragon turned its head and, as Azami settled herself more firmly in place, gripping with her knees, she heard shrieks from below.
"What is that beast? What is it doing to my house?" Her aunt’s nasally voice had reached a piercing tone. Her aunt stood pointing upwards at them accusingly.
"Dear, I think we don’t want to anger it." Her uncle, usually silent and unseen, had stepped out onto the lawn, restraining her aunt from threatening the dragon.
The dragon whuffed again, obviously amused, and then stretching its wings, it began to beat the air, slowly at first, but then faster, and faster. Releasing its grip on the roof, it raised lurchingly into the air. After that she focused all her energy on hanging on with her legs and knees as the dragon worked its way upward with every wingstroke. They dipped, lurched, and then finally the dragon seemed to find her rhythm. Azami felt the dragon’s muscles relax and strain, relax and strain in a pattern that she could follow. Now she could look around her and down. Her aunt cowered on the ground beneath her.
Azami noticed for the first time how tiny and pitiful her aunt seemed, and her fear melted away completely. Never again would she have to suffer her aunt’s cruelty—or anyone else’s, for that matter. If she could fold a dragon, then who could hold her down? She was free. Free.
The dragon’s flight swept them quickly away from her aunt’s house, but in the dark sky, Azami couldn’t be sure where they were headed. Azami loved the feel of the wind against her skin, cold and refreshing. The dragon’s warmth beneath her would keep her from getting too cold, and her kitten, with his claws clinging to her shirt, added more comfort. She realized slowly, with how bright the stars seemed and how small the lights below were, that she was much higher than she had ever been, and she wasn’t afraid. It was a miracle. Freedom from fear, and freedom from her aunt, all in one day.
She closed her eyes, holding the strange sensation growing inside her. Strange and yet familiar, she realized. She felt anticipation, the first she had felt in so long. It was strangely satisfying just to feel anticipation. If she could fold a dragon, and find freedom today, what would tomorrow bring?
She opened her eyes again. She had to hold this moment, capture it in her memory with reverence. The dragon’s hide shimmered and even sparkled in the moonlight, and Azami looked up to the stars, noting their places. She couldn’t remember most of the constellations, except the one she had learned from her mother...the cup. She searched the skies and finally she found it, and realized that they must be heading west.
Her mother had always told her that her past, and maybe even her future, lay in the west. The sea lay in that direction, and the mainland. According to her mother, she had been born on the mainland, in the Misty Mountains. It sounded like a fairytale name, but she was sure that her mother had told her the truth. Maybe there she could find someone to explain what her gift meant, and how it worked so well. Maybe someone there would know her, or at least remember her mother.
For now, the dragon seemed to know where they were going, so Azami let herself revel in the flight. She was free, truly and wonderfully free. The stars in the sky stretched endlessly above her, and Azami felt as if her life looked as bright as the stars. For the first time in many years, she had hope.
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Copyright 2008, Tyrean Martinson. All rights reserved. Tyrean has enjoyed writing stories since third grade, and has been previously published in the WWU Viking and the UW Commercial Fiction anthology. She is the bearer of an overly active imagination, and likes to read, write, ski and fold origami for fun.
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