Alene of the Burning Coast

Alene of the Burning Coast
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The morning wind brushed sweetly against Alene's face as she made her ascent, up a vast tower of rock that rose sheer above the jungle. The climb was difficult, as it would have been for anyone, but her strength remained unmatched by any of her village. The worst part of the climb was the way her sword tapped against her thigh, maddening for hours at a time.

But all that was behind her after she made the final push, hoisting herself onto the grassy mesa above. Her prize – a stunning view exploding with color ̶ looked even more impressive than she had anticipated. Below lay a sea of emerald treetops cut by long swaths of blackened earth where huge flaming beasts had once roamed. Mountains shined red in the distance, giving the impression they were on fire as the morning sun reflected off their ruby peaks, and beyond that glistened an endless orange sea. Her village rested somewhere along its coast though out of sight.

She smiled and sat down, swung her legs over the edge and leaned back. A sprig of munroot grew out of the grass beside her, which she uprooted and chewed as she waited for her mark.



Memories filled her head. Always an outsider, different from the glassy-eyed denizens of her village. Rarely did anyone look at her straight, and never with compassion, besides her mother. That's why they chose her for this; she was the one they wouldn't miss.



She awoke in a start at its approach; a hulking beast of metal, twisted together with wood and vine, carrying on its back the towering visage of a city. It loomed above even her mesa, its eight bronze-colored legs screeching with every step as their rusted gears ground against each other in its endless migration. How could it have gotten so close without her hearing? It seemed to have appeared as out of a dream.

The ground shuddered as it drew closer, walls of fetid air assaulted her while it passed.

Alene gritted her teeth, checked to be sure her sword was still fastened to her hip. Then she ran forward, and she jumped, catching one of the many vines that grew long and low from cracks in the platform. The vines thrashed each time the cities legs folded upward and crashed back down, whipping her violently as she struggled to both climb and hold tight.

The force would have snapped her bones instantly, but magic ran in her body and she knew how to harness it. She shut her eyes and whispered, and her veins glowed blue. She practically threw herself up the vine after that, in a panicked effort to reach the top. Sweat burned in her eyes and blood ran down her arms when her palms split, but still she climbed, still whispering. It was little more than luck that kept her alive; the vine shook just as she pulled herself through the breach in the body of the city, nearly impaling her against its jagged edge.

She was inside, surrounded by stale air and the feeble light offered by the cracked she had climbed through. She lay down on a pile of soft discarded things, and in the darkness machinery pounded.


She heard her mothers voice, remembered the words exactly as they had been spoken; "I've been having terrible dreams Alene. And I'm not the only one."