Tuesday Tales: The Island

*This post occurred before I changed the WIP title.*

Tuesdays are the day I have set aside to get my creative mind rolling by writing flash fiction. For the time being, these stories will be set in Teorre, the world of my current WIP, The Crystal Bearer.

I'm a little behind today. I usually have these written ahead of time, but I wasn't up for it (and I also noticed I saved two other prompts to use, so I should work on those). I Googled "flash Fiction prompts" as usual and picked today's topic from storybutter.com:

Islands in the Sky: You’ve lived your entire life with your grandmother on a floating island far, far above the unfamiliar world below. Today you’re leaving. Today will be the first time you escape the clouds.

Questions to consider: How do you feel about leaving? Why are you leaving? Where are you going? What happens when you get there?

The Island

We thought only a few years had passed. Our Prince left for war and told his betrothed he would send a messenger with word of the progress. Well, someone came, but it wasn't the messenger, and the message she brought was quite a shock. The war was lost by both sides. The King killed his dueling sons.

That was over 100 years ago.

Grandmother cried. I wish I could, but I remember the ascent. The ground shook with great tremors, and my body felt weighed down, but really our island was being uprooted, pulled up from the waters and into the sky--and apparently out of the laws of time. Fog and stone have been our skies. No one has dared to venture out to the edge, but falling was never my greatest fear; our Prince's power was.

Though I dare not speak it aloud, I'm glad he's dead.

We are leaving now, returning to a world that has changed far beyond our recognition, until someone can figure out how to return our island--if we can return it--to the ocean. Grandmother doesn't want to go. She was born and raised on this island. Anyone any of us has known outside of it is dead. She says she will feel like a stranger among strangers. Not I. I want to see the Trollics again, hear the tales of the Sprites. We have been isolated from the other races since our scholar died. The great-grandchildren of his grandchildren now run the temples.

My grandmother clutches my hand as we stand next in line to board the airship. How these ships have changed! How long does it take to create one so large? What does it take to keep it in the sky (though I suppose the same could be said about our island)? The propellers beneath, though not nearly as large as the propellers above, dwarf us and whip my loose hair every which way they can. The hull curves both inward and outward and comes to a point at the aft and bow, and the air is thick with its pine scent. I can't wait to stand aboard this beast and look through the glass that protects its insides.

The scholars who have come for us say it is a short trip, once we navigate the floating rocks that have barred anyone's attempts at reaching us before. The trick was to navigate up, not through. So, we will navigate down to a world that has moved past us in ways I haven't yet thought of. There is a century's worth of history we will have to learn, new royals and parliamentarians to meet, styles and ways to which we may need to adjust. As we climb the plank up into this floating behemoth to leave our own floating wonder, I can only say that I am ready for whatever may come.