The Road by Brian MaloneSUMMARY: It's all B5's fault, really. Blame him, and certain unnamed moderators.There are many famous roads in this world, and out of it if the dreamers are to be believed. Roads of brick and roads of gold, or gold-tinted brick (maybe that was brick-tinted gold). High roads, low roads, roads that are streets and avenues and thoroughfares. And all the roads lead to Rome, so they say, if Rome is a place that is somewhere else. And all the roads lead away from Rome, if away from Rome is a place that is nowhere. But this, this is The Road.
And it leads through Neverthere to Everafter.
Along The Road stand cottages, in which live kindly grandmothers and evil stepmothers, and there grow the lively glades of the elves between the pixies' meadows and the marshes of frog-princes. A castle looms beyond a forbidding wood and the lonely sound of a woodsman cutting. There flow the streams beside which girls slumber and where water maidens trail their hair laden with lilies. The Road crosses the water by stone arches home to trolls, and bounds along hills toward mountains flashing red with dragons' fire.
All my life I have walked The Road, looking forward and never behind. Whispers beckoned me onward, voices singing just beyond my hearing, bells ringing music in my heart. All my life I have walked The Road, seeing the signs of fellow travelers, their footsteps on the path. And I knew that others follow, though I do not see them and we never meet.
I feel a hand in my hand, soft and trusting. I look down at the girl that walks beside me, a shining face turned up, eyes wide with wonder. I walk The Road with her now, pointing out all that is great and terrible and marvelous. Here, a knight battles an awful wyrm. There, a rabbit disappears into a hole. A hovel rises on great bird legs, and it stalks away through the forest lonely with the sound of a woodsman cutting. A sparkle on the water, laughter, and a splash of a silver tail slapping the surface. I point to a house of gingerbread walls, and one of straw or sticks or bricks. We turn to see a flash of red vanish among the dark trees. The girl with her hand in mine laughs and coos. I hold that hand tight, but gentle.
This is The Road. The best road of all. It leads to nowhere and to neverwhen, through forests and fields, past crumbling towers and faery rings. I walk The Road with her, for now, though I know one day she will walk it on her own. One day she will pull her hand from mine and skip ahead, to chase her own rabbits down dark holes, to catch at her own dreams. This is the one truth of The Road, that it leads to happiness and sadness in the same place. One day she will walk it on her own, but not today.
And that is enough.
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