Of Serpents and Servants and Sally Dog Tales

There is a serpent. Its scales are vermillion and indigo. I can see it under the cellar of the new house. I can see it through the cracks in its walls. It is circling and spiralling, crawling and stalking the servant and I in the house that should be safe.

We run. We run from the house, down the driveway and into the street. Sally is trapped behind the gate. She is trapped for I cannot reach her. She is trapped for she cannot reach the road. The serpent crashes through the ceiling of the new house, rams through its roof, and as it hoists its feathers-shaped wing of white and blue and green geometric patterns towards the sky, I realise it is not a serpent, but a winged and serpentine dragon.

Now Sally hoists a wing to the sky as well, geometric patterns and hues of green, blue and white identical to the beast’s. I understand that this is happening because I do not wish her to be squashed or to be killed. This is my will exerted upon the fabric of the dream within which I now exist. She will be seen as kindred to the serpent, she will not be seen at all. Either way, she is safe. The servant and I run. We run down the road, with the dragon in pursuit.

We board a van in Speightstown, hoping to lose ourselves in the human horde. The van drives off, but no one else onboard seems to notice the beast flying frantically behind us, searching for the servant and her master. When they finally do notice however, no one is more surprised than I, that no panic or chaos ensues, but rather that all falls silent instead. We can feel the dragon eyes, feel it evaluating and analysing our energy signature, trying to seek us out in the throng.

We watch with baited breath, wondering if the dragon will rend and tear the bus from the rear. We watch with baited breath as it flies past us, onward, in its seeking to destroy. We watch with baited breathe acutely relieved that it did not capture either of our eyes. We watch as it makes the left and turns, rounding the corner by Rock Dundo, and disappearing around the bend.

The servant and I return to the house in search of a runic glyph in a deck of card hidden in the tween-where within the walls. This card will destroy the beast. But it is very clever our dragon, it is gloriously clever, and it doubles back upon us, trying to reach us before we can reach the card of death. The entity which gifted us with the card returns to reclaim it as well. It is the quintessence of desire, this race against time, this race against hope, this race without end.

Unlike the dream in which the racing itself does begin.