There was light.

It danced off the sand throwing a myriad of reflections into my startled eyes. A sound... the shift of sand in the wind filled my ears. I was sitting in the sand, the sun above me beating down mercilessly on a lifeless desert.

I was alone.

I stood and granules of coarse sand slid down the burgundy robes and hood I wore as I looked around me. Stone markers with holes near their top and symbols on them all but erased by time, sand and wind stood about me everywhere tilted at odd angles. They had an odd melancholy about them I didn't understand. Some meaning I should know nagged at the edge my empty memory like an itch. I could tell they were not natural formations though how I knew that was a mystery. At the top of a hill in front of me there stood particularly tall markers with fluttering lengths of red scarf tied about them. Curious I advanced. The sand shifting beneath my feet made a noise that sounded loud in the stillness. The sun beating down on me was hot but I felt no discomfort, only awareness. The motions of walking were already familiar.

Who was I?

I crested the hill digging my feet deep into the sand to scale the dune. Getting ever closer to the tall markers but only able to see a short distance from where I walked. I crested the hill and forgot entirely about the stone markers.

A Mountain.

Faded against the dusty hue of the sky it rose impossibly tall in the distance. A Mountain split into two peaks with a soft luminescence emanating from the cleft. I felt inexplicably drawn to that light by a force greater than my comprehension. I stood transfixed, testing my will against that compulsion and trying to understand it.

I braced myself slightly and slid surefooted down the side of the dune wrenching my gaze from the compelling majesty of the mountain and spotted a raised structure ahead made of a dusty red and cream adobe veneered granite. I could not tell what sort of structure it once had been but it had broken into pieces like irregular stairs allowing me to climb easily to the top. I saw the darting moment of something red at it's top that for a fevered moment I thought was someone who could tell me why I was here and dashed forward.

The movement I had seen were short pieces of red cloth like silk scarves that danced in the breeze and I felt a momentary pang of loneliness. In front of me was an odd symbol that sparkled as though it were made of pure light. To my amazement and wonder it shifted in to another symbol and then another. Was this a message of some kind? A warning?

I hesitated but stepped closer to the strange symbol. Behind it was a broken marble slab with some kind of carvings on it. It looked like some kind of marble statue but I could not tell of what from just this broken off stump... There were symbols carved on it that much I could tell.

I ventured closer to examine it and froze with puzzlement as my ears filled briefly with a chorus of low voices, as though a room full of people stood around me murmuring too softly for me to pick up a complete word. The glowing symbol fractured into tiny runes trailing darts of light that wove themselves to the back of my hood to create a red scarf with two saffron yellow lines down the back on either side. The colour matched my robes exactly, the yellow even matching the odd repeating pattern at the hem of my robes. If this wasn't odd enough the cloth pieces which had fluttered in the wind came down and brushed their slightly rough sides against me, lighting on me for an instant and sending the the oddest feeling through my body; a lightness, as though I might jump and not fall back to earth. The empty length of scarf blazed with new symbols like those the glowing glyph had changed to. I cried out in surprise and my voice issued out as a deep musical gong with a force that rippled through the air around me and an odd glyph appeared like a faint ghost above me...

The scarves rustled as though whipped by a high wind and with a stab of fear I felt them ripple around me drawing me up into the air as though I weighed nothing! I flapped my arms in reflex sending the sides of my cloak out to either side of me like wings and to my shock I felt that lightness draw me further up.

I could fly!

I fell to the ground landing hard on my feet but I felt no pain from the fall. Turing my head I saw the symbols were once again absent from my scarf and stood dumbstruck. Who I was had been mystery enough but I had given no thought about what I was.

I lifted my arms before me and examined them. They were insubstantial, more a part of the cloak I had taken for being a simple garment then actual arms. Indeed I could not pull it off or explore beneath it as it was like skin that felt like a rough spun garment. My torso and legs were of the same fabric but unpatterned and of slightly softer weave and on my chest was a glowing sigil like the one that had appeared above my head when I spoke. I spoke again, softer this time and a series of chimes issued from me softer than before.

They were not words. I recalled not exact words themselves but I knew how they sounded and the sounds I made bore no resemblance to a voice that could speak those words. Lifting my wings to my face I met a smooth featureless surface.

A mask?

No. It was a mask but I could feel there was no face beneath it. I was a creature of air and cloth and clay. Not alive but living.

I immediately disliked the thought of being some sort of animated poppet that someone had abandoned in this harsh clime but I reasoned that if I was at least I had a will and thoughts of my own. At the moment the nature of those thoughts were emotional. I wanted for someone to comfort me. I was alone and new. I couldn't help but be just a little afraid.

Looking up I contemplated the mountain and began to march toward it. In the distance I saw more flying scarves. I tried calling to them when I drew close and they came to me like before and bore me aloft. The feeling of lightness was a pleasant one and I sought to lose myself in that sensation. The cloth creatures drew me up and in the distance I glimpsed two structures. One massive and another substantially smaller. The small one seemed less daunting to approach than the larger one so I made it my first destination. It stood only one story high and appeared to once have been a part of a larger building that once had a second floor.

The inside was largely featureless except for a blank bit of wall someone had taken pains to make perfectly smooth. Two pairs of posts stood on either side looking very much like the stone markers outside but with decorative wrought iron on them instead of glyphs. As I approached a pair of these markers to study them they started to burn with an inner light and glyphs appeared on their surface. I cried in surprise activating the second set and like magic light carved a picture on the blank wall before me.

I instantly recognized that the pictures were of those stone markers in the desert. At the base of each marker was a prone figure in a cloak. I knew instinctively that these depicted figures were dead. Those markers were headstones, I was in a graveyard and a rather vast one by the looks of it. I peered back outside staggered by the thought of so many dead.

Was all the world dead and all the people in it buried beneath the sand?

Disheartened I trudged to the bigger building trying to ignore the tombstones I passed. As I drew closer to the big structure I realized it was much larger than I thought. It seemed like a large amphitheatre that thankfully was not completely filled with sand. On it's sides enclosed by protective barriers of delicate ironwork were a series of shrines side by side in a vast half circle.

I spotted another of the glowing symbols on top of a latticework pedestal creation with more of those cloth creatures around it and started making my way toward it. Calling to the creatures when I got close I flapped my wings and landed gently next the the symbol. I strained my ears to hear what the indistinct voices said as I touched the glyph which in the blink of an eye disintegrated into darts of light to add a new length to my scarf. I couldn't make anything out. Not one word.

Glancing around I took notice of a giant iron latticework gate above me with a broken length of bridge that would be an easy hop from a large platform that rose from the centre of the basin. Finding a flight of stairs at ground level I started my assent. Above me on a ledge I saw to my glee yet another glyph which I immediately flew to as though drawn by a magnetic force. My scarf was now rather long and with each new length I could fly just a little farther with no fear of falling since it seemed I had no bones to break or organs to rupture.

Reaching the top of the structure I saw four brown tattered banners that rose from grates in the floor on which I stood. They looked old and brittle as though a casual brush would damage them. I reached out delicately and brushed it's surface with my cloak and drew back with a start when my sleeve glowed on contact. The cloth turned a deep and vibrant red where I touched it. Perhaps it was like the markers and would respond to my voice...

I issued a deep knell which sent it's ripple of force out to envelop the brown tattered cloth turning it bright red with symbols all along it's length for an instant before the power overloaded it and caused it to dissolve. The grates clanked open releasing a large flock of the cloth creatures that flew crazily around me renewing the odd symbols on my scarf. I called again and the mass of them lifted me much higher than I had ever been before, propelling me well over the broken gap and onto a platform. Here was a semi-circle of headstones with that decorative ironwork like those beside the mural set before a triangular looking ornate headstone made of white marble.

Ahead of me there was a long hallway barred by a giant gate made of wrought iron. I supposed I would have to find my way around it since I could see no obvious mechanism with which to open it. Who would say if the gate would even still function old as it seemed. Perhaps it was like the mural, activated by proximity or by sound.

I chimed the loudest I could manage, my body doubling over with the effort and my bell like voice sent its shock wave through the air. The markers by the marble statue lit with their inner fire and light danced in the air before my enthralled eyes to centre on the ground where it became a softly glowing circle of light.

Curious, I stepped over to the circle. I felt no heat from it and no feeling of danger. I did feel a sort of energy in the air. An ancient strength but gentle, comforting. I wanted nothing more than to submit myself to that feeling. I was a child, scared and alone in this land of the dead. I meekly tottered into the light and folded my legs beneath me until I sat facing the marble statue savouring that feeling of belonging when the world went white...

A figure in the distance stood obscured by fog. I took a tentative step forward hoping that this strange apparition was real. It spoke, not with a voice but a sustained shivering note like the whisper of flutes sending a wave of light toward me. Immediately in my mind's eye I saw an sprawling mural. This was not unlike the carving I had seen on the wall though it seemed to be in deep vivid colour. I saw a picture of the cleft mountain. It spewed forth light into the dark sky of the tapestry creating symbols like the one I bore on my chest. They looked like stars. Light flickered as some of these symbols became birds and plants and still more of these glyphs became people which each bore a spark of the mountain's light. Then as I watched the mural showed me a long red cloth emerging from the ground throwing glyphs into the air around it snaking up toward the sky. People gathered around it viewing it with obvious wonder. Could this desert I was in once have been this place? Filled with animals and plants and finally the mystical red cloth that danced on the wind? It was difficult to see this harsh place ever being such a paradise.

The light faded and I was once again in the desert siting before the marble statue. That beautiful light soaked into the stones beneath me and grew dim. With a sudden clank that would have startled me were I not still dazed by what I had just seen the gate began to lurch open. The grind of ancient mechanisms at work filled the air. I rose to my feet and walked forward in a daze so lost in thought for a moment that I almost didn't see the tiny figure at the end of the hallway framed in bright light. "WAIT!"I screamed, the word emerging again as that deep metallic boom. I raced forward as fast as my legs could carry me forgetting for the moment that I could fly.

"PLEASE!"