Whorls

In the dream you pull your phone out of your back pocket with a trembling hand, never taking your eyes from the still-smoking arcane whorls burned into the wooden floor. The faint sound of smoldering embers finds its way to your straining ears. 

Maybe this will help me find her. you think to yourself, dazed. 

You line up the camera viewfinder with the sprawling circle, careful not to step beyond its edge, and press the button. The flash explodes across your vision, and you jump.

You awake suddenly to stars dancing behind your eyes, and as you grasp blindly for your nightstand to check the time. You see the picture, all pale wood and char, peering up from within your most recent photos. The burning morass of looping lines and occult pictograms seems to glare solemnly at you from the tiny screen. You squint your eyes against the screen’s intrusive brightness in your darkened room as the scent of burning cedar gently fades from your nostrils.

Maybe this will help you find her.