My Curse is Your Gift

Avacyn was always happy to spend time with her father, but the promise of getting to see so many of the beautiful fireflies had her even more excited than usual. She sat eagerly atop his back, her front paws wrapped securely around his neck to make sure she didn't fall off while her head rested on top of his so she could see where they were going. She had ridden on him many, many times like this and she loved it every time. She liked being up high so she could see the world around her better. Plus, she just loved all the attention her father gave her and how special she felt that they got to have matching dark eyes with him.

Her ears perked when he declared that they had arrived, lifting her head a bit as she looked over the fairly normal looking lake, listening to the sounds of frogs and bugs and all other various late evening activity. At least for now it didn't really look all that different from the lake that was outside the cave they lived in now, but she believed her dad when he said it was something special. "Okay!" she agreed when he told her to keep her eyes sharp, still keeping her post atop her father's head.

Eventually the sun finished setting and the blue and purple fireflies she had seen the other night began to appear. A grin pulled across her features with a delighted gasp and she watched as they appeared from the reeds and almost seeming like they appeared from the surface of the water itself. The marking around her eye lit up as well, shimmering with a bright iridescence as it had been since all of this stuff began. There were so many of the beautiful fireflies around and her dark eyes were open wide as she watched them all. "Wow..." she breathed, her tail wagging like crazy behind her.

A cluster of the fireflies drifted over to greet her and she giggled as they floated around her and tapped her nose, but then they drifted away again and she watched as they moved down to the surface of the lake in front of them. She scrambled up her dad's neck a bit so she could look down over the top of his head at the water and she tilted her head a bit when she noticed a shape in the water. It was a figure like she had never seen before and it was almost like a reflection, but it didn't ripple and move the way the reflection of the moon did. "Dad, what's that?" she asked, pointing it out to him.

"Avacyn Mendacium"