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When the Dove No Longer Sings
Olivia Grape
The mountain side had been completely eviscerated. The definite gouge gave it the resemblance of a gutted deer. The remaining trees were like broken legs, resolutely attempting to support the weight of their body despite the cracking that echoed throughout the barren mountainside reminding us otherwise. The storm was gathering energy, its winds spreading the smoke as much as it was dispersing it. Thankfully, it was thinner than it had been half an hour ago. Instead of trying to breathe in car fumes, it was a gentler campfire smoke. The rain was the only thing that would save us now. We had fought off the Salamanders – which had thoroughly torched this section of the Rockies. All we had to do was hope Zarha was strong enough to put out the remaining fire, and that the mortals wouldn’t question the scar that split the mountain in two when she’d struck their master down.
I looked around, still coughing as I waved the smoke from my eyes. The metallic taste of ozone was mixing with the smoke as I breathed in. It didn’t matter if I used my mouth or my nose – the air simply hurt to breathe. Thunder boomed overhead without warning, scaring me a little. The jump reminded me of the burned cascading up and down my body. I couldn’t find anyone else as the clouds darkened. Orange glows danced at the cusp of my vision, with trees still bearing their glowing embers. Several collapsed, unstable to stay standing a moment longer. The heat was trying to drown me again as sweat dripped into my smoke-stung eyes. The sweat and blood melded, sticking my baby hairs to my face as I readjusted my glasses. The lenses were cracked, the frame bent from when I’d been thrown against a tree. The back of my shirt had been burned away by the tail of a larger Salamander. It had pinned me between its belly and the smoldering grass. Several inches of hair had been scorched off from the end of my ponytail. I knew my back would be scarred for the rest of my life.
My hands were littered with little nicks, my entire body bruised, my head throbbing as I took in the devastating carnage of what we had done. Lightning flashed just before small droplets began to pepper the ground. The rain was a gift. It kissed my exposed, blistered skin as I slowly started walking down the mountain.
Where were my friends? I knew Zarha had to be okay, otherwise this storm would not be brewing. Jennifer, was she invisible? Was she hiding, still waiting for my signal? And Piper, she had been covering me as I’d tried – and failed – to trap their master; she couldn’t have been thrown far – could she?
I opened my lips to cry out, but they cracked and bled. I must have screamed when the Salamander had wrapped me in its tail, but I couldn’t remember. My throat was drier than the surrounding mountain air.
The rocks underfoot gave way. My legs gave out. I know I screamed that time, my voice reverberating off the exposed earth. The raw flesh of my back left a trail of blood in my wake as I slid twenty feet down into the leveled flat of the mountainside. My hands became balls as the pain shocked my body the same way the rain was my flesh. The storm was here in earnest; the droplets becoming pebbles as they pelted whatever they encountered. I couldn’t tell one pain from the next.
“Olivia?!” a voice called from somewhere above.
Piper, I thought as my eyes blurred. The cracks, the rain, my blood, it made seeing so much more difficult than it should have been. With a whimper, I rolled onto my side, towards the shout. My gaze went upwards, towards a crest. There was an orange speck getting bigger against the darkening skyline.
“Olivia, I’m coming!”
Another flash, another whip-crack of thunder, and I could see now that she was coming for me. Piper was going to make it alright. I didn’t have to be able to see to know it would be a while before she got to me. The fires were still blazing, their coals sparkling like forbidden jewels. She would have to get around them. I knew that would take time. I had time. I wasn’t worried. The worst was over.
And then her voice wrapped around me in a way it never had before. It dripped down my throat, easing the steel wool sensation. The charred flesh on my hand, up my arm, and my entire back throbbed less, burned less. Her song filled my heavy bones, settling the acidic uprising in my stomach. My vision cleared some. It wasn’t enough, but it was hope. I knew everything was going to be okay. Piper was coming. She was coming. She would wrap me up in her arms and whisper that everything was alright. I could practically feel her embrace, the warmth of her smile, the beating of her panicked heart. We would find Jennifer and Zarha and we would get home. Home – what a wonderful thought after six days lost in the Rockies, looking for monsters I wasn’t even sure existed. The place her song brought me to was as close to peace as I had felt in months. We were finally okay.
Lightning arced, almost instantly followed by a horrific throttling of thunder. The rain was wetter, completely soaking what remained of my clothes. A throb struck my head, a sob finally escaping before my throat tightened up again. I looked up to see how close Piper was, trying to see her through the smoking remnants of the fires up the mountain. My burns reignited with a fresh dose of pain, tears pooling for a moment before streaking my cheeks. And that’s when I realized why the pain was back.
Piper wasn’t singing anymore.
My breathing hitched hard, slamming into my already damaged chest. I couldn’t see her. Fear sunk its cruel smile into my throat as panic replaced the pain.
“Piper?!”
Was wasn’t she answering?
“Piper!” My cry was blatantly drenched with terror as I shoved myself to my feet. Nothing matter – not the pain, not my wounds, not the possibility of a Salamander still being alive – only finding Piper mattered.
“PIPER!”
The husk of brush crumbled as I smashed through it. Black soot and tree fragments clung to my soggy body and snared my shirt fragment. I looked for any sign of a monster, of a threat, of Piper, but there was nothing.
“Piper, answer me!”
I didn’t register that my voice was showing how close to hysterics I was. She was here. I had seen her, heard her. She couldn’t be gone. That was impossible. My eyes raked the surrounding landscape, but it was like staring into the void. The storm cloaked everything in darkness, the smoke thickening it with every passing second.
A fork of lightning cleaved through the sky, illuminating everything for four long, horrifying seconds. I finally found the orange I had so desperately wanted.
If there had been any lingering wildlife, my scream would have scared all of them away. I ran towards the tree, the sliver of orange, the limp, downturned hand. All the physical pain that was afflicting my body was gone. Instead, an agony that could only have been granted by Misery herself shattered my spirit. My knees splattered mud, a rock embedding in one as they slammed the ground. My uninjured shoulder smashed into the fallen tree with everything I had, but it was not enough to push the tree from her body. It shivered like it wanted to move, but it did not.
I pushed again and again, a mania possessing every part of me as I finally shoved the tree off Piper’s crushed body. There was no victory in the feat as I pulled her into my lap. How was it that she was so much taller than me, and yet she looked so damn small now? How could the gods do this? It didn’t make any sense at all. After everything that had happened, after nearly dying for days, for years, of us scraping our way from Death’s hold, a fucking tree killed my best friend. A goddamned tree. There was no great battle, no monster attack, no emperor to defeat. How the fuck had we been through so much and this was how it ended? I knew the gods could be cruel, but this was the most disgusting thing they had allowed to happen in years.
I wiped the trickle of blood from her mouth, smoothing back her wet hair. Her body was already cold, her eyes closed, soul gone. There was nothing left but the rain striking the mountain, the sky threatening a flood, and a longing to turn back time, back to when the dove was still singing, when there was still hope, and a reason to live.