“Meadow of mirrors”

  This time he wandered alone, focused primarily on not losing his way in the great labyrinth as he was returning to the place where one's life had departed. He gently stroked their brother's body, no longer sure if it was dead or a statue. The dragon tried to return the torch, placing it in the creature's mouth, but it didn't work.

  He dug its body out of the dust and set the creature up like a statue. And then it grabbed his paw with ebony claws and pointed at the torch.

  The dragon shuddered at the touch and looked into the creature's extinguished eyes. He tried to give it the torch again, and then the creature's eyes lit up with an amethyst glow.

  To the dragon's disappointment, the creature refused to follow. He gave the dragon a strangely judgmental look and fled into the forest of stones and words. Instinctively, the dragon set off on a wild chase, racing through unfamiliar terrain until they reached not the bottom, but the summit of a hill. There, amethyst fire blazed from a great hearth. The creature lit his torch there, and its aurora became luminous and vibrant.

  Then the creature closed its amethyst eyes and bowed to the dragon. The dragon responded in kind. And then the creature vanished.

  The dragon remained alone on the crest of the hill. He recognized the light as one of the dots he had seen in the distance, lit by lightning. He placed his paws in the amethyst fire, but it had no effect. He slapped his paw several times on what looked like glowing coals, but it had no effect.

  After a thoughtless moment, he looked up, seeing a herd of twelve creatures around. This time without torches. The dragon's pupils became circular. This time, without the fog above his head, the sky was illuminated by crystal points, and on the distant horizon, the fortress once again loomed, reminding the dragon that something was calling him. The great valleys were filled with thick fog, but from this perspective, he could see potential paths.

  He looked at the beings, and they looked back at him, this time with a completely different vibration. He didn't know what to think, what they wanted, but he felt something sublime in that moment. Something important had happened, perhaps for him, perhaps for them. Every so often, lightning bolts would strike randomly from the dense mists, rising high like storm clouds. From there, he could see more fires.

  These simple, strange creatures seemed somehow dysfunctional to the dragon, but the dragon reasoned that if he had to help one, perhaps there were more waiting somewhere lost.

  His gaze focused on the thick mists as the weather window was closing again. Something was, something was passing. He had seen these mysterious creatures avoid the mists before, so the dragon avoided the mists too. Oblivion resided in the mists. He sensed the presence of something bad there. This led him to think that his goal might be the very thing he was avoiding. Finally, he realized that the potential paths he saw were in no way leading him directly to his destination.

  Far on the horizon, he saw the tower from which he had set out. A purple light also burned at its peak. His gaze traveled from tower to tower, counting sixteen of them. His mind was paralyzed by a strange split, as if he were being asked to think and act quickly at once.

  In the herd, he found the one he had rescued from the dust. The dragon approached the creature, noticing certain differences between them. This one had strange marks on the side of its body. It looked as if something had struck it with a sharp claw and defeated it in battle. Each one seemed different to the dragon, but in a way he couldn't quite place. The same light, a different vibration, burned in each eye.

  - “The Path of Light.” He whispered to the dragon.

  Hearing this, the dragon immediately straightened. With widened pupils, he looked at the one who had spoken, then followed the creature's gaze, which led him to the hearth. There were indeed symbols on the hearth's pedestal, but not in a known language.

  - “Can you speak? Are there more of you here?” The dragon spoke, but the words and his voice formed something completely different from what he intended, something incomprehensible. He received no response, either. The beasts around him seemed to ignore it.

  The dragon decided to memorize the symbols written on the hearth. To do this, he copied them by scratching them in the sand with his claw.

  - “The Path of Light.” He whispered to the dragon again.

  Then the dragon realized that what had guided him from the beginning was the path of light. He didn't have to think and decide, he had to act and follow. So he followed his instincts. Where he had rescued one, he indeed found traces of a fight, a broken obsidian sword, and tattered fragments of history.

  - “The Path of Pain.” The rescued one whispered after the dragon.

  The dragon realized the herd was circling nearby, in a strange vibration of reconciliation.

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  To memorize the symbols, he traced the inscription from the hearth in the sand with his claw again.

  - “The Path of Light.” The creature whispered to the dragon again, reading the text he had written.

  This made the dragon think they couldn't communicate through speech, but they could read this language, alien to him. Only after a moment did he realize that the creature hadn't spoken at all. This speech had appeared in his thoughts.

  He returned to the peak to gaze at the sky once more. The herd returned behind him, once again forming an irregular circle. Missing… how many missing? He positioned himself in the center, by the fire, and as he looked at the herd, another enlightenment came.

  Each one was a representative of a tower. Behind each being and each void lay a tower, but far, far away on the horizon.

  Four were missing.

  The tower from which he had come had no representative. The path to the others was filled with mist and lightning.

  The strange swirl in the sky seemed to reflect the endless parallels the dragon saw around. He even returned to the underground to see the larger chamber again. There were twelve places. Wasn't there anyone missing here? He thought. Twelve torches stood in their positions, illuminating the chamber evenly.

  From the top of the hill, he decided to fly towards the fortress again, but this proved impossible when luminous discharges cut off his ability to head towards the stronghold. He didn't want to experience any more accidents, so he quickly landed safely on the gray dust.

  He began his search for the Path of Light, or anything that might contain that familiar inscription. He tried to recall everything he had seen along the way. The herd was always with him. He had few paths to choose from. Once he descended the ridge, he could only wander through corridors or through the forest, amidst mists and crevices.

  The storm continued to rage overhead, sending lances of light in various directions. A long trek and low flight led him to the tower from which he had come. An inscription was written above the bricked-up gate, and a fire still burned on the tower. None of the creatures offered any clues.

  He risked flight to reach the top. There, he found another beast's body, a raging hearth, and a strange medallion with amethysts. He took this thing that seemed to have a strange connection with the hearth and decided to show it to the brothers of that creature.

  But at the sight of the medallion, they fled. The dragon placed it around his neck, expecting some effect, but nothing came. So he flew into the sky again, this time placing the necklace around the neck of the dead creature.

  - “The Path of Memory.” A voice rang out, and the strange creature looked into the dragon's eyes and rose.

  The dragon wondered how this creature had reached a place where only wings could take. The cunning being simply decided to jump down the tower's crooked wall, and as he did so, the firelight calmed and the trembling tower quieted.

  The animals met, and the dragon once again remained pondering what he should do next. With each step, something in his surroundings changed, but this time he couldn't even be sure what had happened.

  He looked at the beast's medallion and then remembered that during his first flight, he had seen the amethyst meadows. It didn't quite match the directions the lights indicated, but the sight of the medallion almost hypnotized the dragon. He remembered.

  Only the one with the medallion accompanied him on this journey. As they approached the meadow, a glow of purple light, like the aurora borealis, heralded it. With each step, the black rocks became overgrown with lush amethyst flowers, until finally the rocks themselves were made entirely of amethyst. Walking through the amethyst meadow was incredibly arduous, constantly having sharp crystals underpads.

  In the meadow stood a four-pillared shrine with a statue in its center. The creature walked in step behind the dragon. Lightning streaked across the sky, igniting the four pillars, and then the dragon noticed the humanoid statue reaching out to him.

  The dragon instinctively sniffed the large statue's hand, then looked into its amethyst eyes. Its eyes seemed to be staring at the medallion.

  He cautiously reached out to grab the medallion. Though the beast was reluctant to relinquish it, he offered no resistance as it was removed from his neck. Rather, there was a certain disappointment.

  - “Four wielded the shadow.” The amethyst lord’s voice announced after the dragon placed the medallion in his hand.

  The scaled beast tried to take the medallion, but the statue's hand closed around it, staring at the dragon, and the statue's eyes became a mirror.

  - “The Path of Memory?” The dragon whispered under his breath, glancing out of the corner of his eye at the creature, who was gazing into the eyes of the amethyst lord. A moment later, the lights on the pillars also went out with a hiss. The statue became complete and deactivated.

  And again, something in the surroundings changed, and the dragon didn't know how to interpret those words or why this seemingly mindless creature had previously tried to take the pendant and place it on the tower. This one seemed more fixated on light and amethysts than the rest of the creatures.

  The antlered quadruped dug lazily with his paw and nose into the amethyst gravel, and after a moment his amethyst eyes were once again looking into the dragon's eyes, as if expecting some action, he was pointing his nose at the dragon.

  The dragon's eyes met the statue's, and only then did something strange happen. The eyes were a mirror. He saw his own appearance. He moved his head, tail, and wings, gazing at the creature in amethyst-colored eyes that mirrored his movements.

  He was part of them, they part of his path. He wasn't one of them. They saw him differently. Far from home. The union with the beasts felt strange again, as if he'd just remembered that this wasn't his herd or his home. This was his path. The meadow was mirrored, each crystal reflecting light and shadow. He hadn't noticed before that the meadow was a meadow of mirrors.

  He could fly, simply fly just over that gravel. This time, strangely pensive, with a strange sense of déjà vu. The journey became sentimental. The purple color illuminated memories as a binding agent for reflection, and thoughts became simple and short.

  At the edge of the meadow, he again walked on gravel, finally on gray dust between black rocks, yet carrying luminous memories ignited by the aurora. The feeling of that dust flowing between his fingers was a great relief and a pleasant massage.

  With a final glance, he watched the statue disappear into the suspended fog. Crystals glittered around him, reflecting the lightning flashes as the dragon and his companion descended the path into the forest of stones bearing names.

  A few of the herd waited at the forest crossroads, the rest somewhere further away. This time, the dragon wasn't considering where to go, but rather his role in this environment, who he was to this herd. And they were a mystery to him.

  He walked forward, choosing his path as if he remembered it, or as if the path remembered him. And the rocks around him changed forms, resembling walls, labyrinths, gates, ramparts...

  ...