The girl sets down the pen with a sigh. She has yet again written through the night. This last story has been intense and somehow as she writes it down, retelling and sometimes copying directly from the old parchment sheets that her father wrote with his own hands it is as if she has lived through the experience along with him.

When the next evening falls she returns to her work. The story has a kind of momentum now, and it seems to almost tell itself.

“Though this story is about both of my parents, much of what I write comes from my father’s life more than my mother’s. This is partially because Father simply wrote more. Mother was never comfortable with the printed word. Her people had no written language, and she never truly mastered it, but Father often spoke with longing of the great libraries of his home world, where thousands of volumes lined the shelves. Printing is known in Mysteria, but printed books are still comparatively rare even now and he said that reading a good book was one of the few things he missed about Earth life. So it is no surprise that Father also loved to write. He seemed to have enjoyed setting his life down on paper.

“But it isn’t only the sheer volume of Father’s stories that puts him in the center of this account of mine. Father also had an incredible knack for getting himself in trouble. He was fairly skilled at getting back out again, but of my parents, Father had more scrapes and accidents by far.”

The aurora borealis burned brightly overhead. It created a spectacular display. Sheets and waves of cold fire, as if the sky itself were somehow burning, swept across the starry expanse. The colors were a dazzling rainbow array that swirled and mixed together in flowing patterns that painted the pristine white canvas of snow covered hills below.

Beneath this spectacle, two figures sat on top of a low hill. Lying on his back and gazing up at the sky, Aidan Rhiannon, aerian vampire and part-time thief, didn't feel the cold. He fanned his pure white wings idly back and forth, creating a peculiar kind of snow angel. His sapphire blue eyes were riveted on the display above his head, and he kept brushing a stubborn strand of raven-wing black hair out of the way so that his view would be unobstructed. Beside him his wife, Flame Song Firedancer sat, purring contentedly. Her own emerald gaze spent as much time resting on Aidan's face as it did on the sky. She too was impervious to the chill bite of the winter air, being protected by her thick white and orange fur. She was a firecat, and her people had always lived in the frozen northern lands where few others ventured.

"What are you thinking?" Flame Song asked, softly.

Aidan smiled up at her. "Just that I'm still amazed sometimes how lucky I am. Back on earth I used to daydream about this kind of life. I never thought I'd marry someone as amazing as you, I never thought I'd be a father, and," he added, getting to his feet, "I never in a million years dreamed that I'd be able to do this!" He leaped into the air and flew a series of dizzy spins and circles around the hill, laughing. Flame Song laughed too.

"You're in a good mood tonight."

Aidan landed next to her and sat back down on the ground. "Yeah. Nothing could get me feeling down tonight." He flopped over onto his back and stared again at the sky. "It seems like everything is going right."

Flame Song smiled at her husband's exuberance. She had wondered over the past year if his cheerful nature would ever return. Sometimes it seemed like the happy-go-lucky man she had married had indeed been killed for good when his heart had ceased to beat just over a year ago.

Last winter a vampire had come to the northern continent of Mysteria, the land they both now called home. He had planned on conquest, believing the far north, where the nights could last for weeks, to be the ideal place for his vampiric empire. He had failed, killed by his first victim, Aidan. But not before Aidan himself had died, and returned to life as one of the undead. The next few months had been hard for their little family. Their daughter, Littlespark, had remained largely unaffected by having a vampire for a father but Aidan struggled with depression, often wishing that he had simply died and stayed dead. Several times he contemplated suicide, and only the thought of Flame Song’s and Littlespark's grief had stopped him. Some days he seemed better, and others worse, and Flame Song herself felt drawn down into depression by the sight of her beloved's suffering.

Come spring the delivery of a small package from the eastern continent had lifted both their sprits. Tara, the Dragon Queen, had sent it. She was the ruler of all of Mysteria, and Flame Song and Aidan both regarded her with respect and devotion. She was their monarch, but more than that, she was their friend. The amulet it contained provided magical protection for vampires, allowing Aidan to see the sun for the first time in months. His spirit was buoyed up by the sight of sunlight, and even further lifted when he read the letter that accompanied the protective amulet.

"My dear friends,
My heart went out to you when I learned of your troubles. I cannot imagine what it is like for you, Aidan, to have to suffer through this. But know that my thoughts and prayers are with you both. May all turn out for the very best. The gods sometimes know what we need better than we. Know also that whatever happens I and the Clan will be there when you need us.
With love,
Tara Stargazer"

It was a letter, not of command from a queen, but of caring from a friend. Though brief, it said what Aidan most needed to hear; that, vampire or not, his friends would still be there for him. From that day on he began to recover and now, almost nine months later, he was at last back to his usual cheerful self.