Z. E. Wayland

 I. Dad says, "It's as true as the sky is blue." When white clouds arrive to paint the sky, above the wedding tables where I hide, they change the light, the color, and the hue. When cold rain flies in, it will grey that truth, like the colors I'll wear down a wedding aisle. When the sun rises, it explodes the light from dark to white, blue, pink, and others too. This I want to turn and dispute his fact and catch his sky-blue eyes, steady as storms that hurtle across the world, drowning rafts, airplanes, and islands in unknowing wrath. I would be next in its path to be torn, so instead, I look away, "Okay, dad."

The warrior sails through tide and turns so she could take her blade, broken in two, back to the base of the volcano. Her boat settles against the soft island sands along a familiar pathway. Here, the island grows endlessly from the constant flow of lava drifting across the floor. The path back is a little longer than she remembered. The warrior carries the two pieces in a wrapped cloth cradled across her arms. She rests them gently where the lava forks a circular path around stone. With reverence, she steps back into the constant rising hear of the elevated plateau and holds her hands up towards the volcano's top. "This, child, is broken beyond repair. Cast it into my flames and let it sink into the earth," the volcano says. Its voice a rumble of the earth, a popping of a flame, a slow certainty of the world. The voice echoes all around her like the gentle touch of wind. The warrior clenches her hands together and shuts her eyes. That is the answer she was expecting, but...