The Reflection

"When the gods return from the ends of the fasting sky, they'll stand in the rain and knock and knock." The line falls from Phora Bidden's lips with the heft of a habit.  A mantra from his childhood, the words had acted as a lullaby, warding off the nightmares and dream demons.  Chuckling at the memories, he hops from the truck with a box of bedding in his arms.  Tossing it to the ground, Phora licks his lips.  His forked tongue slips across the skin like a whisper.  As soon as the packing's done, he intends to find a lake to slip into.  It's hot; the air is drying him to a crisp.  He needs the slide of water across his scales.  Phora shakes his head, grabs another box from the truck, and gazes down the street.  Drooping potted plants wave from his neighbors' porches, their leaves a sick, spotted gray.  The pamphlet his last therapist gave him hadn't been kidding; he's been here one day, and hasn't seen the sun yet.  It's his type of place: dark and desolate.  It's the perfect place for hiding out.  He glances around, his pink eyes narrowing into slits.  "What the hell?"

At the end of his red-asphalt drive, the mailbox is smoking.  A floral reek trickles from the painted dragon head. Setting the box--"Kitchen and Dishes"--down, he covers his nose with a clawed hand and casts his neighbors a baleful glare.

"Oh, dear," a woman murmurs, patting at the curlers in her blue-gray hair and straightening the front of her smock. "The new guy's gotten a Summons."  She spits the last word like it burns, like she can't wait to be rid of it.

A murmur runs through the gathering crowd.  Children, drawn from their computers and television sets by the noise, seek shelter behind their parents' knees at these words.  They've been taught about Summons in school.  It's one of two words they've been told they should fear.  The other is Reflection, but that idea--terrifying as it is--has yet to reach the High Chambers' list of priorities.  Phora's mailbox, named Skunk for the racing stripe painted down his snout, shrieks.  The lavender cloud pouring from his nostrils deepens to a putrid violet.  Glancing at Phora as if he's the one making a scene, and not the dragon head, the neighbors turn their backs to him. Dropping water hoses and gardening shears to the ground, they rush their children inside as if the street is poisonous.  Breathing in the smoke, Phora thinks it is; the air reeks of the paths traveled in nightmares.

"Hey, new guy!" A man--Phora thinks his name is Leeda--yells over his shoulder, the breeze sweeping his golden locks from his pointed forehead.  The rasp of his voice carries in the wind, a sound like sandpaper across skin.  Phora shudders.  "Get yer mail soon. Leave it too long, yer dragon will explode...and take yer house wit' it. Heppened to the last guy."

"Yeah, but..." Phora begins, his long uni-brow pinching in the middle like a caterpillar's contracting muscles. The street around him is empty, the neighbors snapping their doors shut in unison.  "But what am I being summoned for?"

The shrill whistling of the mailbox answers him, a dark sense of foreboding creeping through the smoggy air.  Stepping toward the mailbox with his hand stretched before him, Phora closes his eyes and takes a breath. The wood is warm under his skin.  Flipping the lid open, he snatches the envelope from the dragon's teeth and juggles it between his hands, the tips of his fingers burning.

"Shit."

Fifty pairs of staring, unblinking eyes weigh on his skin.  Rippling his shoulders and plastering on a smile, he waves at the curtained windows, stuffing the envelope into the back pocket of his jeans.  Phora turns on his heel, turtle-slow, and tries not to sprint toward his front door.  A new scent fills the air:  burning denim.  Covering his butt with his hands, Phora takes the stairs two at a time, slams the front door, and does the first thing he thinks of:  stops, drops, and rolls until he stops smelling smoke.  Fishing the Summons from his blackened jeans, Phora blows a strand of wavy hair out of his eyes and rips a nail through the textured paper.

Flipping on the light above his head, Phora steps out of his imported snail-leather boots.  His reputation preceded him to LaMarm; he sniffs, pressing his palm to the wall.  Beneath the tang of rotting timber and fresh paint is the scent of something missing.  There is no asbestos--or insulation of any kind--behind the plaster.  He sniffs again, tasting the air.  Metal.  They reinforced the walls with sheets of government-issued metal.  They've heard of him, and that complicates things.  Pulling his fingers from the paint, Phora tugs a sheaf of paper from the envelope and holds his breath.  Letting the pages fall open, Phora begins to read, his tongue sliding across his teeth with gunshot force.

"Dear sir... Has been noted... Sacrifice of faith... Summons to the High Chamber... Trial by jury... Will be collected... Tomorrow..."  Phora stops, staring at the page.  He swallows, his spit sticking to the back of his throat like the suction cups on a squids tentacle.  He finishes with a gasp.  "Noon.  Noon?!"

For a moment, Phora forgets he no longer has to breathe.  Hysteria, as acidic as carbonated soda, bubbles up his throat.  This isn't supposed to be happening.  Six years ago, he'd been acquitted.  He was a child back then--twelve, in fact--and vulnerable to the whims of innocence.  He hadn't known any better, hadn't been taught the right ways.  At the end of a long and trying day, the courts had sent him home with a slap on the wrist and had wiped his records clean.  At least, that's what they'd promised to do.

"So how...  Shit."  He drags a palm down his face, his claws catching in the parenthesis of his dimples.  If he's being Summoned--and the paper, which smells of the city and political ass-kissing, suggests he is--then Reflection has occurred.  "They've done it."

Three years ago, the High Chamber had called a week-long session with the Gods.  Too many criminals were slipping through the cracks.  There were too many loopholes and too many vague laws.  There was too much room, the High Chamber had said, for interpretation.  The solution they'd come up with was guaranteed to work.  It would be harsh, they'd explained.  It would mean taking away people's rights, they'd murmured.  But criminals didn't deserve to be human.  Criminals were just taking up space.  

They'd called it Reflection.  They'd planned to use magic--granted to High Chamber officials by the Gods under the Code of Magical Intervention--to turn the convicted into the animal their crimes most resembled.  Thieves would become rats and birds; murderers would become leopards and wolves.  Once changed, they'd be relocated and released into zoos around the world, where they'd be maintained until death.  Because criminals didn't change even when given the chance, they'd be made into entertainment slaves.  But the Gods had hated the idea; they'd left the session laughing and shaking their heads.  Reflection had been pushed under a bench and left there to collect dust, just another idea with a crater-sized flaw in the center.

Clutching the letter in his hand, Phora stares at the words, his muscles bunching and coiling under his scales.  Somebody in government hadn't forgotten about Reflection.  He wonders what made the Gods change their minds about changing the laws.  The paper drops to the floor with the noise of a brick meeting concrete.  Stepping over it, Phora rushes out the front door and off the porch, gasps wheezing from his lungs.  He mustn't panic; panic dehydrates scales worse than the heat.  Casting a glance over his shoulder at the letter crumpled on his hardwood floor, Phora trips over a box and sprawls across the lawn, his chest heaving.  

"What am I doing?  Stop.  Panicking."

"Hey, new guy!  Yah talkin' to yerself?"

Phora glances up.  The curler lady stands at the end of his drive, her hand settled on Skunk's snout.  The crinkle at the corners of her eyes belies amusement.  Embarrassed, Phora sits up, brushing mud from his palms and jeans.  "Maybe.  That against neighborhood watch codes or somethin'?"

She chuckles, a grating sound that floats to him on the breeze.  Picking himself from the ground, Phora studies the wrinkles in her turquoise bathrobe and the fuzzy material of her matching slippers.  "No.  Just weird, is all."

"Yeah?  Huh.  I'll keep that in mind."  He rolls his eyes, a throbbing settling into his temples.  "Can I help you with something?"

"Saw yah sittin' out here talkin' to yerself, figured I'd better check on yah."  She strokes a finger down Skunk's pointed fangs and lifts her eyes toward his house.  "Seems yah're okay."

"I am."  Scuffling his foot across the lawn, Phora watches her out of the corner of his eye, wondering how she tastes.  He imagines it's a bit like chewing on rubber; there's little elasticity left in old skin, and she's wearing more makeup than he likes.

"Yeah."  She turns and meanders toward the middle of the street.  Halfway across, she looks back around at him, the corners of her mouth drawing into a frown.  "Wouldn't try runnin', 'f I were yah."

"Excuse me?"

"No sense in it.  They'll find yah, no matter where yah go."

He watches her scuffle across her dead lawn, leaves sticking to the bottom of her slippers.  Reaching out with arthritic fingers, she heaves herself up the stairs with her shoulders hunched.  Closing her front door with a sloth's tree-climbing pace, her one good eye drops to the ground like she's done something wrong.  Scratching his head, Phora worries his bottom lip and slips back inside, plucking the letter from the floor.  She's right; there's no sense in running.  Phora settles in for the night, praying to the Gods for a break.  Praying he's wrong.


He wakes drenched in sweat, his t-shirt twisted around his neck and cutting into his scales.  Phora groans, stretching his cramped legs in front of him and wincing at the pain shooting through his spine.  "Note to self," he murmurs.  "Boxes do not make good beds."

Pushing his claws through his tangled sheaf of blue-green hair, Phora squints at his watch.  3:03 a.m.  The night embraces him, pulsing with the silence.  The Summons is a beacon of despair in the darkness, paralyzing Phora.  Clutching his chest, he glances at the time again.  3:06.

"Damn."  Plucking up his courage, Phora stands and stalks into the kitchen, searching for a distraction.  A coffee pot, still in the packaging, sits on a marble counter top.  Sugar, creamer, and instant coffee packets overflow from a wicker basket next to it.  Phora grins, rips the machine from its box, and plugs it in.  "Coffee," he explains to the walls, "is a nervous man's best friend.  And I am a nervous, nervous man."

He hums under his breath as the coffee brews, a haunted melody of loss and confusion.  Digging through his box of dishes, Phora pulls his favorite mug from the packing peanuts and rinses it off in the sink.  Dark roast coffee warms the air, dispersing the ghosts and energizing his senses.  Feeling lucky for the first time since the Summons, Phora pours himself a cup and returns to the living room, lounging on the stairs.  He takes a sip and closes his eyes, savoring the flavor.  "Ah.  This is the..."

The moment of bliss is cut short as white heat flares across his fingertips and streamers of light dance on the carpet around his feet.  "Oh, shit.  OhshitohshitohshitohSHIT!"  Panicking, Phora tips his mug to his lips and gulps the coffee, burning the roof of his mouth.  As light engulfs him, the mug swings around his fingers, spilling the remaining liquid on his jeans and staining the floor.  With a pop, Phora vanishes.  His chipped mug, the picture long faded by years of use, clatters to the tile at the foot of the stairs and spins like a top as the first morning dove lilts a wake-up call at the world.


Phora blinks, shielding his eyes from the whiteness of the room with a cupped hand.  Taking a breath, Phora walks across the floor, the checkerboard tiles cold and unforgiving on his bare feet.  "Why," he mutters, "can't you ever let me finish my coffee before yanking me here?"

"Because coffee makes you stupid."  The voice echoes, bouncing off the high walls and stained-glass windows.  It's a voice Phora knows well.  He shudders as it finds him, slithering across his scales and wrapping around his chest like a lasso.  It tugs at him, his feet moving across the floor in a dance he doesn't know the steps for.  "Coffee," the voice continues, "makes you feel like running away."

He struggles against the spell.  His arms stay limp at his sides, his toenails scraping against the floor.  "I can walk just fine on my own, you know."

"Oh, I know.  I know."  The voice titters, bird-like, and Phora clenches his fists.  It's the tone of someone superior, of someone who knows that they know better than he does.  He knows the tone well; he'd grown up hearing it every time he'd failed.  It had haunted his dreams for years, taunting him with all his wrong-doings.  Other voices ebb and swell, rebounding off the walls.  The public, come to witness the punishment of the criminals who slipped through the cracks years ago, call for blood and justice.  "But I can't take that chance again.  Last time I let you walk on your own, you found a loophole."

"Yeah, but last time I was..."

"Innocent?  Yeah, right."

"But..."

"No.  No buts.  Not this time."

Phora sighs, pulling against the spell binding him to the voice.  He remembers this walk like it was yesterday.  The same bright air beats at his eyes, blurring the room at the edges.  The air still reeks of disinfectant and betrayal.  Leevee, God of Immortal Souls, looms to his left.  He averts his eyes from the bare-chested portrait.  Ten more steps, and he'll be twelve years old again, shaking in his scales, sweat dripping into his eyes as nameless faces pass judgment on him.  He struggles more, throwing himself against the bonds.  He searches in vain for a loophole, but this time, they've prepared.  This time, there's no escape.

"Welcome to the High Chamber."

His breath hitches in his throat.  Phora stares at his feet, studying the curve of his nails and the bumps of his knuckles.  All these years of running.  All those change-of-address forms and legal name changes.  He wasted all that time trying to rid himself of the past, and it's still come to this.   Reflection has been passed.  And worse...  "Hello."

"Phora Bidden," she growls, casting a look across the heads gathered in the chamber around them, "six years ago you were charged by this court with defiling your family's honor and sacrificing the faith handed down to you as demanded by our laws.  At that time, you were found innocent and your record was expunged."

"I don't deny it."

"You don't accept it, either.  At that time, the naivety of youth was underestimated.  Laws were written to allow for loopholes, to allow a juvenile a second chance if a mistake had been made."  She casts a glance at him, her sky-blue pupils resting on his square jaw and snout-like nose.  He nods, his brow furrowed, unsure where this is going.  "At that time, our laws allowed for forgiveness.  But our laws have changed."

Shuffling his feet, he sweeps his eyes down her honey-blonde curls and manicured claws.  Neon green palm trees are painted across her nails; a ruby shade of lipstick clings to her mouth.     "I...I don't..."

"It doesn't matter.  You said your piece six years ago.  Now, it's the law's turn."  The crowd cheers, jostling one another in the ribs, grins stretching their lips into grotesque grimaces.  "Have you reconsidered our offer?"

He tips his head toward her, a fire licking out of control through his veins.  Six years spent fighting for freedom, and now this.  Forced to choose between the life he gave up...and a life he'd rather die than choose.  "Yes.  I have."

"What is your decision?"

"When I was twelve, you asked me to make a choice.  Either I took my place on the Council as my father before me, and his father before him, and his father before that...or I relinquished my powers and lived half-mortal.  I chose half-mortal then.  I'm not changing my mind now."

"Fine.  Phora Bidden, you are guilty of a sacrifice of faith and of dishonoring our codes.  Please kneel."  With a flick of her wrist, she forces him to the floor, his knees knocking his teeth together with a clink.  Setting his jaws, he holds her gaze, refusing to bow his head in shame as custom dictates.  "The punishment, as stated in section seven of the new laws, is..."

"I know," Phora interrupts, his voice ringing through the tension.  "I will be forced to take on the life of an animal.  I read the codes.  I know the laws."

"Do you?"  She quirks an eyebrow, setting a finger against her sharp chin.

"Yes, I do.  So why don't you skip ahead to my animal, huh, Mom?"

A gasp, followed by a roar from the crowd, assaults his ears.  She smiles, a wicked curve that Phora knows, from experience, means he's made a wrong assumption.  "Phora Bidden," she whispers, her voice dripping with malice.  "Son.  The punishment is death."