In the Bye and Byron

Mount Aero awakened under her fire. Aero’s eastern spires danced under her scorching song, sending snow tumbling to the world below. It graced my fur with a tinge of gold, and I saw the embers, crimson ghosts floating from peak to peak. The flames were so powerful that even the fiercest fire on Earth couldn’t match them.

How was anything supposed to supersede such poise - the glimmer of a million little stars that stare blankly back? Her spine’s scales trailed down to her tail, capturing my attention.

The greatest humour was in the Fates, that gods be borne blind, not knowing the world they ruled. She was not a god, but a dragon-snake, the muse of beasts written into Antigone. Is this, perhaps, what Lord Byron thought as he felt the world unfurl? I should not fault him. He simply watched and waned - and blessed the world with his little illusions.

I snapped my muzzle back up to the sky, and she glared toward the mountain shield I stood on. Her silhouette was rife with the melody of lust and longing. The sun waned in, following the moon as it fell back toward the darkness. My ears perked up; I heard her voice. She sang again:

In all the end, in all the end,

They ran their course, and now they lie

In graves, the dusts of death now die.

One change, the wrath of hopeless scorns:

A crown in Life that Love adorns.

The death of Love, the reaping rain,

The innocent blood of loving pain.

They dance in the depths of their great strife:

The exile of love, the death of all life.

I shivered. Even in dusk, we hide our pain. There was sorrow, even when I sorrowed the least. And here, when her words were tender tips that brushed my fur, I was still empty. My paws shifted. I breathed harder.

The greatest honesty is a wolf admitting their mistakes, and I was wrong. There was more to that echoing dirge than I could have known. I hadn’t known her soul; I never knew the pain that coursed through her reptilian frame. There was something there that ached to escape: a secret longing to touch me.

I was a wolf with no agency but desire. Of course, my fledgling flames had everything right about me: the truest vanity is that which pleases us well. I was pleased, and yet nothing sated my soul more than seeing her surmount the sky, glossing the midnight canvas in every shade of blood and bone. She passed overhead, seeing me as just another remnant of the past—a speck of drifting dust. After the Quake, life had little meaning—no more, at least, than to weave our spiteful webs and throw our pride to the wolves. What was the purpose if we wolves were to pick up the scraps of humanity? Titans such as her ruled the skies, dominating every wile and wonder of the air.

My curiosities fragmented, spreading off into distinct schisms that trailed every desire and hope. Yet, it all felt sickeningly self-centred.

Crash. A bolting breath. A tower of thick muscle and scales. At the flick of her silver tongue, it was hard to miss that she was enraged.

“What little life are you to watch me dance? To hear my song? These are the musings of your perverse dreams,” she hissed, a cocktail of saliva and scorn thrown back to me.

“Nature had gone deaf to our cries. Even my howl, as haunting as it is to me, never ceases the sensation of being alone,” I whisper, not daring to bring my gaze higher. The slits of her eyes narrowed, looking me over. She huffed.

“Nature has deceived you. You lust for the mythos: me…something that is beyond your possibilities. This is why your mourning means nothing to me. Do you wish I would lower myself to suit you? It is inconsequential, a trite scar that fades with time. I will be here forever; you will be dust.”

“A dove without a wing, a lyre without its truth,” I falter, “…The greatest wyrms of the English word have said the same: that you are my ambrosia, and I am a god when you exist.”

For the first time, I saw hesitation in her eyes. I savoured it.

“You dare love me, even when your life holds little worth compared to mine?” she asked, almost as if she were her own audience.

“Love prevails even where my kind prey,” I growled, pointing my snout to the rest of my body. “That’s what he said, isn’t it?”

“What care would I have about what Lord Byron preached?” she hissed. “The aegis of his petty words is long since gone.”

“Then what of love, the only undaunted spirit left?” I whispered. “The passing of time does not mean we should pass by our hopes. We are our own royalty, and we wear the crowns of our dreams.”

When she spat embers, I let my paws hit the ground in an indignant huff.

“And what of these waking years? Has it not pleased you that you still exist, even in the disrepair of this dismal world?” I asked.

“It has, indeed, been a long, little life,” she mused, though still, I could feel some sense of honesty there.

“That’s not what I’ve asked, and you know that,” I replied through gritted fangs. Her scales contorted as she arched her back, jets of solemn smoke erupting from her nostrils.

“Why should it matter what you ask? You’re just like humans, scorching yourselves with your curiosities. You don’t know what you desire. Those humans that you speak of,” a black-clawed hand shattered the mountain’s edge, “are long gone! They ended their own lives in vain—all because they couldn’t hold themselves in place. Because they thought that love was vain itself. I speculate that’s why their race disintegrated like dreaming dust.”

Her apathy sunk its fangs into my fur.

“Don’t speak of humans again,” I growled. “And you say they ended themselves in their own ignorance? You lie!”

“This is the life I get to live, even at the end of time, wolf? Disrespect and discord?” she fumed, throwing a mocking glare down to me.

“There are more petty things than humans, of course,” she whispered. “Do you not believe me?”

I couldn’t say anything. I felt more vulnerable under her stare than under her fire.

“There are lessons that call for you, pup. You will see the way of humankind yourself. The shifts that ruined them.”

She reached her titanic claws to grasp me, though I initially slipped from her grip. Her second attempt was successful, though. I writhed in discomfort as she constricted me, pushing every breath from my canid lungs out into the unwelcoming world.

“This is the reason you’re so delighted, isn’t it?” I asked, and she brought her eyes to mine. “Because you just want an empty world, just for your pride.”

The glint of her scales made me wince.

“Our world is fruit for mortal making: in the absence of the gods, we are gods. Our hopes: the frigid fox. Our grief: the ember sloth,” she spat, her forked tongue licking the air.

I didn’t continue to struggle against her. Surely, there was an imperative reason she needed me, even if it was for my benefit. When she brought me over the mountain, I saw emerald valleys become stiff in the frost. Downy tufts fluttered in dancing spirals through the air, and I caught a few on my tongue. We came to rest on a sullen road, a long walk from the city centre. For most of the journey, I couldn’t look at her, yet I felt her throw daring glances at me. We came to rest where the gates stood tall.

“I will continue as a ghost of their image,” she said. Before I could look to her, my ears perked up. The crackling of bone boomed. A force thrusted me to the ground.

My concentration, held solely by the thudding of my heart, was fading. The spiral of my little world was wrapping me in its tender vertigo. When I tore my gaze from the ground, I searched for some feral form to loom overhead. I couldn’t find her.

“You miss your masters, mutt,” I heard her voice. My fur stood tall, my paws throwing my frame from back to front. My eyes danced over her.

She brought her shoulders up, and her chest protruded outward as she yawned. With every step, I could see her ebony gloss - the silken hair that fell over her creamy skin. It wrapped around her shoulders as if in some feral desire. She was distinctly human. It was apparent that I was staring for too long, and she smirked. That fiendish grin told me my shock was evident as well.

“Such as the seasons change, I change," she mused.

“And you wear their skin, even though you scorn them?” I asked. She relaxed, allowing her shoulders to fall.

“I wear their faults like a crown of thorns, their scars like a vile coat. At least there, my coat isn’t marred by naivety.”

I recoiled, realising that it was mockery, but it didn’t piece together for me until she replaced her apathy with pride.

“This is the aegis of humankind: absolute annihilation. Though perhaps your lovebird, Byron, was a poet, a seer of the darkness that surrounds your beloved little race,” she hissed.

“Where are we?” I huffed, ignoring her taunts. My senses tensed, jerking my gaze from wall to wall.

“This is your little earth: a world without love.”

I almost snapped, hackles raised, as she trailed her fingers through my fur. Even in human form, there was a depth in those eyes that left my desires waning from breath to breath.

When I brought my gaze back up to hers, she wasn’t glaring at me wickedly. Something deeper pulsated in those irises, something that seemed startlingly remorseful. I couldn’t search deeper, as she broke our stare and continued on through the street.

“This is the fate of those who cannot see the evil in themselves,” she sighed. “Humanity lost the thing that bound it: love. In the absence of love, it all fell apart, like a sparrow torn into feathers and bone.”

I shuddered, though she was not so amused.

“Don’t pretend you’re not a beast as well,” she said, following the trail of blood past the gates. “We are all monsters at some point, in some way. Some kill. Some betray.”

Her human skin taunted me, casting a gleaming gaze onto my chocolate fur.

“Don’t give in to that tantalizing sense; there is nothing here that might harm you. At least,” she paused, “not one that you would see coming.”

My snout pointed to the sky; I inhaled the wind. I could taste fear, a dovetail flavour of sweet and sour. It stayed in the hot air, even after all that time.

“We’re near the houses,” she said, “and as decayed as they are, it should be easy to climb through the rubble.”

We came to the place where the homes collapsed—where the cities lied in ruin. As I continued to sniff the air, a searing sensation coursed through my nose like a breath of fire. It was the scent of forgotten love. The smell of self-loathing and sexual frustration, the aroma of dying compassion, and fruitless existence. It was the smell of loss.

“There are many ghosts here,” she said, and my ears perked up at her words.

“Ghosts?” I asked. Suddenly, I found myself more on edge. “Where are they?”

“They’re the ones you cannot see—the spectres of disdain and discord.”

Though her words were vague, I winced.

“Look into my eyes and see the truth,” she whispered.

“Your eyes?” I asked.

“Yes. There, I can show you the past.”

Hesitation clawed its way through me, constricting me like a vice of blood.

“Okay.”

When I brought my gaze up to meet hers, her crystal orbs reflected back onto me. My breaths faltered. Then silence.

Boom.

Baskets and carts roared down the cobblestone. Scents wafted through the way: cinnamon and the stoic poise of sandalwood. With the sun blinding him, a young man made his way through the square, down toward the centre. Maidens washed clothes, throwing the soaked skirts over lines tethered from home to home.

Couples trailed along the winds and slopes of the village roads, and people bought from merchants in the courts. It didn’t seem right. Nobody smiled. Nobody touched each other. My hair stood tall. Dionysis, it seemed, had staved the cask of Hope, drinking every drop of its blood. Something was missing from the world.

The noise jolted me from my thoughts. The dragon and I skittered across the threshold of space, falling onto somebody’s carpet. As I titled up my snout, my eyes locked onto a feminine figure at the table. A young woman.

“There’s nothing left in life for me,” she said, though she was alone.

I shifted, trying to hide behind a coat rack.

“She can’t see us,” said the dragon, dusting off her skirt. I stopped trying to hide and looked over to the dining room.

“Why does she look so sad,” I asked, and she turned to look at the young woman at the table. “Why was everybody from before so empty inside?”

“Because she’s right.”

“She’s what?” I growled. “There’s always something in life for people. Life is about love.”

“Exactly,” the dragon responded. “Human life is about love. Now pay attention.”

“What use is breathing when it only sustains suffering?” the young woman at the table asked. “They cannot restrict our emotions, and everything has fallen because of it. Everything.”

I turned to the human-dragon as she watched the scene unfold. It was almost as if she were smiling.

“They abolished…love?” I asked. It was unfathomable. What would the purpose serve—to rid the world of the ties that bind? Wouldn’t everything unravel? Wait. It did.

Through the window, I saw the prolix of that beautiful end. The streets were golden, yet there was no treasure. It glowed with the fires of their midnight revolt. The gates lit the entire city centre, wrought with the embers of dying phosphor. It was apparent, as the streets were quiet, save a few silent hums of dying men, that there was little left out there in the night. I knew the woman at the table was likely one of the last of humanity. There I sat, though, watching her toil over the scarf that the grave would hold her in. We watched for a silent hour as the memory faded slowly. We returned to the street, in the present day, and wrath and ruin were strewn around me.

“How weak that their world could have such a simple crutch, the absence of a forgotten emotion, and they all fall down. This was the precipice of change: their fall sent a rift down the fabric of the universe, a crackle of frost in a wintry pond. From that, we were born, given the gift of knowledge and the burden of caring,” she said.

I was tense. It was only a short time since she spoke last, yet the silence scarred me within, leaving a million wounds through my soul.

“I don’t believe that,” I said. Our eyes connected again.

“This is our penance for existing: seeing into a burning world—a world we can’t go back and change,” she whispered.

“Surely if time shifts once, can’t it right its wrong? What’s the purpose of existing if we’re the symptom of a sickened world?” I growled, and she sighed back with an undaunted expression.

“Show me more!” I growled again, baring my teeth. “Show me the rest!”

“There is no more.”

“There has to be more!” I roared, gnashing my fangs. “That can’t be it!”

The dragon titled her human head down to me.

“Do you believe that every death has resolve?”

“I want to.”

“The death of humanity was a violent end, chiseled into stone only by their desires. We don’t live within their confines now. At least there, we are free.”

With a blur, she erupted into a storm of phosphor, glowing the limelight like a swarm of fireflies.

I felt every breath leave me one-by-one, and I counted them like sheep. There was nothing I could do for the world. There was nothing I could do for myself. Humanity had a violent end, and in it I was alone. I stood beside a beast of blood, but I was still alone.

Perhaps, that was the reason my envy enlightened me. We’re like comets, leaving things behind. If only the world hadn’t left me behind.

“Dragon?!” I growled. “You threw the weight of their deaths onto me just to disappear? You burden me with blood, the deeds of death coursing through the veins of time, then you run?”

A haunting song echoed through the mountains, leaving a distinct vibration throughout my core.

In time, we learn that those things small

Evoke the emptiness of ease;

In time, we feel the mating call

Of Death and Life with faithful please.

A swath of echos, dying surge.

Feathered, scaled, simplicity.

The crown of thorns adorned on thee,

The King of all, the dismal dirge.

I watched the silhouette of her draconian form, beat-by-beat, by both her wings and my heart as she descended beyond the icy spires.

Her scorn left a bitterness in my maw - one that even God could not sweeten. But he was gone, just as she was. Just as all the brief lives of earth were. A cataclysm. A dying dirge. A wolf in empty time.