Desert Rain

Filia headed toward the shrine.  It was a beautifully clear night, but thankfully, for her purposes, the moon was not yet risen. 

She wouldnever have risked this normally, but these were unusual circumstances.  A dream from her childhood had returned, and she felt driven to understand it.  Little did she know that even with all the precautions she hadtaken, she was being followed.


Xellos was curious.  That was a curse of his, curiosity.  One might almost think he was a cat from the urgent flashes of curiosity he got.  Ah yes, he was a curious one…and that Dragon Maiden had his curious senses on overload.  He watched her, observing silently as she snuck out of the inn.  There was something strangely familiar about her, but he couldn’t place it, and that, too, fuelled his curiosity. 

He sighed in longing as he watched her.  She thought herself unobserved, so she let herself loosen up a bit, lengthening her stride and flipping her mantle back over her shoulders, exposing the beautiful pale alabaster ofher perfectly-formed arms.  Her skin gleamed to his eyes under the dimlight, almost seeming to glow. 


Filia walked down the street out of the small town, feeling strangely free.  She revelled in the damp breeze playing over her face and teasing her hair, and flipped her mantle over her shoulders to feel it on her bare arms aswell. 

She strode hurriedly but not anxiously out of town and into thedesert beyond.  Looking up, she saw that stars were beginning to blot out in the west.  The gusts of breeze turned into a real wind, and thesky got darker and darker, the clouds rolling in with a speed they only had in the desert.  Only a couple of minutes later, the first warm, heavydrops began to fall, andbefore long it was a downpour. 

Filia giggledin childish delight and spun around in a circle, arms upraised.  Sheopened her mouth and tried to catch the drops on her tongue, then began todance happily, all her cares forgotten in the wake of this rare event.


From behind a wind-sculpted outcropping, Xellos watched her, and the sight of this beautiful Dragon Maiden in such an innocent, happy state stirred amemory deep within him.  He had seen this in a dream, he was sureof it. 

Mazoku need little sleep, and when they do sleep, they rarelydream, so what dreams they do have tend to stick fairly firmly in their memories…and this was one of his.  The darkness…the rain…the barely-visible figure dancing elatedly in the desert…all of it was familiar because he had seen it before in a dream.  He felt himself drifting, the memory of his dream so perfectly overlaying the reality before his eyes that heforgot to be concerned as she got closer and closer to his hiding place.


Filia closed her eyes as she danced, and let the big, full drops splatter down onto her face.