excerpt from [erythraean]

I met a Persian princess in the desert one night.

     The days were long but the nights were longer, back pressed into sand the color of moonshine and curving around my hips, molding itself around me until the sun broke and I never slept. I had battled the sky with tribes of Arabian men and danced with the king of Babylonia, but always, always I came back to the unbidden solace I found in the solitude of the sands. They were different, here.

     I mostly remember the stars. I was trying to map the constellations against the sky but the sky is so big when you’re standing on the back of the planet with a horizon identical to exactly where your feet meet the earth...it’s hard to figure out where you are. I’d been walking the dunes for weeks and I still didn’t know whether I’d crossed any distance at all. But I’d memorized the stars. Each one beaming in reckless abundance, resilient, washing out the edges of the sky with white-light brilliance. I could see the galaxy hanging above me.

     The king had offered me a flute before I’d gone. Seven nights I’d spent with him in his palace sitting atop the cobalt capital of his empire--seven nights spent not sleeping--seven nights spent drinking red wine from gold goblets and rubies--seven nights with his hands around my waist; he had eyes of old moons. Oh, he had offered me jewels. And yet, this was the finest of all his gifts.

     It was made of ivory, a sheen like pewter coalescing against midnight. Cold against my lips.

     The night I met her was the first night I’d played it since I’d last seen his palace. The kingdom of Babylonia was long in my wake and this was the first night I couldn’t see its torches against the horizon and though I had only stayed there a week I couldn’t help but miss its strange familiarity. There were many strange things there, strange and marvelous things I must not be remembering quite right.

     This was the song of the desert, one of magic and pride and delight. When we danced, he told me tales of gods and great beasts and asked me what I had seen. I suppose I prevailed something of an enigma to him. I had seen many skies and walked many earths but I did not tell him where I had been. Breathing into the ivory in my hands, I could feel us moving, just quite. It sounded like silver.

     “Your music is beautiful,” she spoke suddenly and I stopped, fingers stuck still in the air. I did not turn around.

     “Who are you?” I said quietly.

     “Look at me, and you will learn.”

     I placed the flute against the sand dune, paling upon the night. My bones rattled as I stood and faced the woman behind me.

     It took me a moment to I see her. Before me stood an African elephant, all seven tons of it weighed into the sand, and there she was, the Persian princess sitting atop it, barebacked in the middle of the desert.

     “Where are you from?” I asked, stuck still on the elephant. Its eyes were dark.

     “Your bones creak when you move. You have been traveling on your feet for many moons.”

     I looked at her then. She did not wear a crown, but I could tell who she was--who she must have been--from the gold pressed into her neck. Long coarse hair falling in front of her shoulders. She was smiling at me, a sort of luster in her eyes alluring me. She knew something I did not.

     “It hardly seems customary for a princess to be traveling alone at night,” I commented.

     “Hardly.”

     I stood unwavering. “You’re far from home.”

     “As are you,” she said. “Your accent, it is unfamiliar.”

     “Well, I’m not from around here,” I supposed. For being the truth, it sounded too much like a question.

     “Nor am I.” She tilted her head. Extended her arm. “Come with me.”

     “Why should I?”

     “Don’t you trust me?”

     I could feel my eyebrows drawing together, the corner of my mouth lifting, just a little. “Why should I?”

     She whispered to the fantastic beast below her and slowly, it bent to its knees. Its head bowed. She met my eyes again. “Why shouldn’t you?”

     I did not speak when I put my flute back in my bag. I was curious.

     She held me by my ribs as I lifted myself to the elephant’s back, onto the thin blanket she was sitting on. There were golden designs I recognized as belonging to the Parsis.

     “You aren’t dressed as you should be,” I said.

     The elephant stood slowly and I was holding the blanket in my fists to keep from falling.

     “I did not know my lack of concealment would be offensive to you.”

     We started moving. “No, no, it’s not offensive,” I said. “It’s just, well, not what I would believe to be allowed.”

     “It is illegal to bear myself in the cities, yes, but we are alone here.”

     “Isn’t it strange, though, that a princess is wandering alone in the middle of the Western Edin Plain?” I asked.

     “Do you not think me capable of surviving without the hand of a man?”

     “No, I’m just surprised you’re not at the palace.” I paused. “Attending to your people.” I am thinking of the king again. “It seems to be the primary role of royalty.”

     “The people of Persia need not concern themselves with where I am,” she said swiftly. “Or rather, where I am not.”

     I nodded. I watched the dunes. I was level with the skyline, and I could see where the moon had risen. Without the laden footfalls of the elephant beneath my belly, we were wading inside the stillness, the quietude spreading out below the stars, unto constellations we couldn’t quite see.