You have never seen the like of me before.

I am not the sort of beast men dream of these benighted days. I pace, silent, watchful, my footfalls never leaving tracks because I am a chimaera, a pipe-dream, a will-o-the-wisp, a figment of the deranged imagination, unfitting for the adult world.

My name is Phulaxe. Pronounce it properly - though it cannot be spelled properly with these letters. Each vowel is there for a reason, and that reason is to be pronounced. It is a Greek word, and it means 'guardian'.

Shall I step out of these shadows in your mind and let you see me, then? What manner of unspeakable monster is too much for the world to bear? Who owns this sweet deep woman's voice, most likely a deception to lead you into deeper nightmares? Shall I appear to you?

Yes. I shall.

Do I walk awkwardly to you, or gracefully? You think these legs were not made for a biped, and perhaps they were not, but they move smoother than yours, foolish one. How can you call yourself graceful without a tail? How can you move silently with flesh against fabric, whereas I move only with the whisper of fur on my legs. I can move like a ghost - see how my grey-patterned fur seems to vanish in the shadows, like mist?

You are afraid of what else this body might reveal, so you do not raise your gaze from my feet. They are cat-feet, yes, you have had the time to determine that several times over. They have grey leathern pads - see? See me flex the toes so the pewter-colored claws arch out? Why will you not raise your eyes?

A pox upon manling worries, manling fears, manling taboos. Look me in the eye, human!

See? They are eyes. Dark eyes, you cannot tell the colour, can you? I will tell you. They are brown, of times, other times a rich honey-gold, always dark, always deep. What do you see in those eyes, manling? Nothing that you can identify? Good.

Now let your gaze expand to the face - faces are harmless, are they not? Woman's face, patterned in light fur, not so thick and rich as the other, tawny and grey patterns. It is a younger face than you thought, is it not? Dark mahogany hair, with touches of red and gold where the light hits it, spilling like a mane about the shoulders, is this so frightening? Or is it my ears that upset you so, cat's ears, tufted grey fur, emerging from that dark mane?

See, now, I stretch my wings. There is colour to me, is there not? Or is it this plumage that distresses you, scarlet and violet and gold? They are only wings, manling. They glitter with the light of their substance to you? They leave trails like a flare in the night? Perhaps that will provide you with insight into their meaning.

Now you are fascinated with my embroidery - ah, you have dared to check to see if I wear clothing! How quaint. It is only a vest, man, an embroidered vest, it is true, silks and velvets and colors, with the threaded patterns - you can see no pattern? You look poorly - the threaded patterns rippling around tiny gems that catch the light of my wings.

No, I see no reason to wear more than that vest, and the belt that rests about my hips. The vest gives me pockets and keeps the wind from my thinner fur. The belt holds my knives.

Oh, now you start to see my posessions. Do you see the jade hilt over my right shoulder? Shall I draw the blade for you to see it better, man? See how it glows, blue-silver force - oh, you can learn, manling! Yes, it is of the same matter as the wings. So is the long dagger at this hip, and any of a number of other things about me, which you have not the dreams to see.

Now you start to ask questions, as if the presence of a drawn blade should be the catalyst for thought. Do you fear me, now, all of a sudden, having assembled the comic intersection of my parts without understanding my nature?

You ask me of my nature, you ask me about dreams. You ask about the strange substance of my form, and how I came to be. These are all complicated questions, but they all have the same answer. Will you sit and listen, man, and be silent? Then I too shall sit, and put the blade beside me, whose true name I will not give you. Call it Dawn, or call it Dusk. Both are true enough.

Now then, I will tell you a story.

I tell you, man, that a soul is a piece of music, looking for completion. Imagine you, a very young soul, with only a few notes to its name. And it lives, and goes about, and gathers more sounds, more things that it thinks suit it, and builds of itself a more complicated theme. Then it goes away, and thinks it over, and tries again, building more and different themes around the same few notes. Suppose that this very young soul started as cicada, with their sweet songs and strange years of rest, and then comes back again as an oak, listening to the cicadas until it falls in a storm. There will always be the thrum of the insects in its song, that soul, the softness of the rainfall, strength of roots, and now the violent crash of storm.

Do you follow? So souls build, and grow more complicated.

Consider, now, the complexity of a dreamer, someone who spawns new ideas, new musics, even, without always needing to borrow and grow. These are humans, sometimes, other beings other places. I am such a partial soul, a variation on the theme of the one who first thought of me. And, like all variations, I have a purpose.

Now that I have explained my origin, and while you think over that, perhaps my nature shall come next. Yes.

I am a Guardian. I look after dreams. You think - I can see it in your eyes, manling - that this means that I must combat nightmares. But no, I do not. I battle those things that would destroy dreams, not dark dreams. Dark dreams are dreams still, and one cannot have the darkness without the light.

I am a twilight beast, could you not tell that? I lurk around the edges of things, both of earth and air, darkness and light, woman and beast. I have human weapons - this blade, this Dawn, the greatest of them - and I have the ones inherent to being animal. You do not wish to think about that. All right.

Understand that I watch the grey lands between waking and dreaming, where the stories live. My maker and my self - for she is both - has set me to this task, I born like Athena from her brow and set to my own affairs.

There are people set into my safekeeping as well. You seem surprised, manling - you think that an insubstantial beast of imagination such as I has no power? But I am one facet of my dreamer, and she is I - and I am a force in my own realm.

There are humans who are dear to me. I love them gently, I love them fiercely, soft fur and claws both. But I always remember that they may choose to shelter under these wings. They, too, are dreamers, walking in my lands, the twilight realms. Do I seem arrogant to you? Posessive? I do not give what is not asked of me, manling, but when it is asked, I give it with all that I am.

I bring touches of many facets to my existence, manling, could you not tell? How many faces do I have, and is this even my true body I wear now? I will tell you, yes, this body is the true one, to allay the fear already in your face. But I can be all of cat, all of falcon, all of many another creature besides.

I have in me absolute rage, did you see that? See it in the scarlet of the feathers of my wings, the anger enough to destroy - but that anger channeled only to destroy that which harms that which I will protect. See the cold anger in the matte black of these claws, the unreadable darkness of my eyes, which also is the echo of the gods who give me some of their power - so that I might guard their holy places from the dream-breakers.

Soft warm, fur - do you want to touch, manling? It is my fur, and it is rich and welcoming, to those who wish to lean against my soft flank and feel my arm about them.

But you see only the strengths - not the helpless pain when one loved hurts, when a dream is wounded, when a hope dies. Do you see the wailing anguish, the inability to act, because the help is not needed, not asked, unnecessary, unwanted? Do you see the silent stone somberness of inaction, when I am a creature born, no, made to act, to be significant, even if never seen? I may be invisible, inaudible, unimaginable, but I am here, I am real, and I bear rejection ill.

My world is a place much different from yours, man. There is more space for grand passions here. There is a place for honour - you blink at the archaicism. I have been told, manling, that there is no such thing as honour. You shrug, but you do not understand.

This blade, this Dawn, this is my honor. It has two edges, and it does not bend - though it does curve. See the sharpness of the blade? I will act only with the edge. It is a guide, it is the road upon which I can set these clawed feet and dig in, and not be moved. Ask me not to choose between my love and my honour, man, for you will have me in a hedgemaze for weeks with the question.

There is not an option when there is a question of honor. To operate outside of it is impossible, it is not in the way I was dreamed. And I have been told, manling, by some that I should make exceptions to this code, this ethic, find the easy solution because the honorable path is difficult.

My world died with honour, manling.

I look at the world you inhabit, and I marvel at your lives, most of you humans. No honour, no love, nothing but this selfishness, seeking of things for their mere possession, others as steps towards a goal.

I can tell you, man, that I would die for those I protect. If my ending would keep them safe, the gods look over my music, and I hope that I be born again.

You are startled.

I seem to startle you often, manling.

There is nothing more important, man, than the memory of dreams. Without the memories, without the dreams, without innovation, passion, poetry, music, science, gods, belief, faith, what a bland, dry, stagnant world you would have! This is my place in the universe, I, a fantasy to defend fantasies.

What is your place in your dull, passionless reality, manling?

I know who I am, and I know why. I am Phulaxe.