“It’s only a dream” your mother said when you woke in tears.
“It’s only a dream” your mother repeated, when the next day you couldn’t be left alone.
“It’s only a dream” your mother said and said and said.

But she had lied.

Just like in your dream, you see her die.
Her body hauled by the current, to never be seen again.
“You lied!” You shout with tears in your eyes.
A vicious wave is the only answer you receive.

You open your eyes.
Is dark. Is too dark. Is imposible dark and infinite and so so dark.
You shout. You cry.
You claw at the sand in panic but the light won’t come back.
In tears you cry for your mother to come.
But then you remember that she lied.

Somehow you reach food.
It feels like plants but everything you can taste is ash and dirt.
Maybe is your whole being that’s broken, not just your eyes.

Sleep is the only thing that calms you. Sleep is the only place in which you’re protected.
A place where you can escape from the cacophony of sounds invading your ears.
A place where you can see.

You dream of your home. Of your clan.
You dream of a mother that did not lie.
You dream of a world that is right.
But it never lasts.
Not even here can you be happy.

Because She always comes.

She’ll destroys the land.
Everything She touches will burn.
And no matter what you do, every night She’ll cover the world in darkness.
Every night She’ll cover you in darkness.

So you walk.
Without a home nor a place in which you can be protected, there is nothing left but to walk.
Little by little food stops tasting like ash.
Little by little you get accustomed to the loud world around you.
Little by little the darkness becomes reconfortating.
Unlike your dreams.

More than once you have meet other dragons.
Once you wanted nothing more than to hear another voice again.
But soon you had to deal with the harsh reality.

The vision felt like the raging waves. Violent and unstoppable.
You saw him call for help, for them to stop.
“Why, Father?!”
But nothing he did could stop them from taking away his wings.
Nothing he did could stop Her from finding him.
For a moment you were this stranger. You were the chained one. You were his pain and his fury all at once.
You were The Emperor.

He had just asked if you were fine.
You had repaid his kindness with your claws high and a howl in your throat.

As time passes, you feel less.
The visions are as fierce as before, but what could once be a tearful revelation, now is nothing more than a lifeless estatement of the facts.
“You and those you love will die soon.”
“Stop looking. There is no place to call home.”
“No matter what path you follow, you’ll always end in darkness.”

Sometimes you ask if this is better.

You tell yourself that this is only a dream.
That you’ll wake back home.
But then you remember your mother lied.