The Black Labrador

In a meadow warmed by a kind sun and bordered by golden trees, Raven lived for a time with the Black Labrador.

They had met long ago. She had landed on the Labrador’s back, weary and searching, and to her surprise, he had laughed, a great, warm, belly-deep laugh that made the grass sway and the wind pause.

“You’re lighter than you look,” he had said, tail wagging, eyes full of gentle knowing.

From that day on, they were inseparable. Raven rode on his back through fields of clover and mossy glens, her wings folded as he ran. The Labrador chased her through tall grass, leaping and barking with joy when she veered just out of reach, and she would caw back at him, playful and free.

When the stars came out and the sky turned indigo, they would lie side by side, and Raven would speak. She told him stories of her journeys, of tightropes and glass jars, of cities with gleaming towers and rooms that whispered in codes. She told him about the Kingdom of Trade, where she had once built things that kept others safe, but where she had also learned how brittle beauty could be.

She shared her fears: that the world was shifting beneath her feet, that she no longer knew if she belonged where she’d once soared.

The Labrador never interrupted. He listened with the kind of stillness that wrapped around her like a warm quilt. And when she finished, his voice was calm as deep earth.

“You have grown so much,” he said. “You’ve accomplished so much. Perhaps this is no longer the environment for you.”

Raven blinked. The words stirred something in her chest, something old and aching. She looked at him then, really looked, his dark fur catching moonlight, his eyes steady and full of love.

She nestled into his side, her feathers rustling softly.

“You know,” the Labrador said, pressing his nose to her wing, “time goes fast when you have love.”

And he was right.

In that little meadow, between laughter and long talks, between running wild and resting still, the Raven began to feel something she hadn’t in a long time.

She began to feel home.

In the days before she left, the Raven and the Labrador found a small lake, tucked in a quiet grove where the air felt thick with memory and possibility. She opened the silk-wrapped lotus pod she had carried since the dry riverbed, and together they placed the seeds gently into the water.

“They’ll need time,” she said softly.

“I’ll watch them,” the Labrador promised.

She looked out over the still surface, imagining what might one day bloom. She did not know when she would return, but she already looked forward to it, to seeing the Labrador again, to finding the lake ringed with blossoms, bright and open to the sky.

As she prepared to fly again, she knew she would carry the sound of his bark, the warmth of his back, the way he looked at her and saw everything, and still said, you are more than the names they’ve given you, more than how you’ve been defined.

© 2025 Sarah Dooley. Story and images by the author. All rights reserved.