The setting of this story, with its gleaming tower defended by a great serpent, is familiar to anyone who grew up with fairy tales, but the heart of the story is quite different. Where did your inspiration for this piece come from?

I use this electronic typewriter called the Freewrite to write most of my stories, and the same company that makes the typewriter also makes this box of prompt cards. Several months ago, I was having writer’s block, and I decided to order that and try my luck. Two of my closest writer friends Maliha and Sahar and I got into a write-in. We pulled three cards and gave ourselves an hour to just free write. The prompt I got was: “Write a fantasy featuring a monster and the usual cast of heroes, only in this story the monster is the empathetic main character.” I immediately began to type, and it was one of those rare magical instances where the entire story just emerges whole from your mind. I had been reading a lot of Sarah Rees Brennan and Amal El Mohtar’s short stories before I took out the prompt card, and their fairy tale/folktale tone was definitely in my mind. I’ve also grown up with a lot of Grimm’s fairy tales and their Disney versions, but also Urdu fantasy epics like Dastaan-e-Amir Hamza which are about shape-shifting devs and other magical beings. The lake in the story is inspired by an actual lake in the north of Pakistan that is said to be so clear it mirrors the sky and it is said to be the abode of fairies and mercreatures. And then you can see bits and pieces of other things I constantly think about, such as motherhood, changing bodies, the treatment of women, and the search for freedom.

The idea of shapeshifting, both voluntary and involuntary, plays an important role in this story. What drew you to exploring this in your writing?

I’ve always been obsessed with shapeshifting magic. I mean Mystique is my favorite X-men character. Part of it comes from Dastaan-e-Amir Hamza and Pakistani fairy tales about Koh-e-qaaf and shapeshifting devs. Part of it comes from stories like The Last Unicorn, which is one of my favorite books ever. When I was ten years old, I actually wrote a novel about a shapeshifting character, and then consigned it to the dustbin because I didn’t believe it was any good. I plan to bring that novel to life someday.

But also, I am a shapeshifter. As a child I often felt awkward and misunderstood and, to fit in better, I learnt to mirror the people around me. I became a mother before I graduated university and I had to relearn my own identity. I was aiming to go to medical school my whole life and then I ended up somewhere entirely different, with a baby in my arms, so I cycled through so many possibilities before I understood myself. I did social work in Pakistan, I completed an MA in Fine Art, I have worked as an editor, book cover designer, librarian, teacher, entrepreneur, video game narrative designer. The only real constant in my life has always been that I love telling stories.

So I’m a big proponent of shapeshifting. I feel like none of us should ever settle for being just one thing. We contain multitudes and discovering them is a beautiful and fulfilling journey.

I found that the way this story is written both in second-person and in the present tense made the experience of reading it much more personal. What made you decide to tell the story in this way?

When I started writing, it automatically fell into this register because it sounded so much like a fairy tale told out loud. At first, I wasn’t even sure who was telling the story, and then it took shape. Also, there’s an intimate quality to the story and to the love and friendship between the main characters. This choice of POV and tense amplified that quiet yet intense intimacy, I feel.

Several of the characters are associated with fire and smoke. What does this element of the story mean to you?

Growing up in a country that was colonized by the British, I’m equally inspired by English fairy tales and mythologies and Pakistani ones. So it just felt right to have a dragon that was a dev. Devs are horned demons that can shapeshift and are said to be made of fire. In the scene where the prince puts shackles on the dev, I imagined something very similar to the movie version of the Balrog. And then there were some metaphorical reasons that were purely subconscious during the writing process but I can pick apart now: like the idea of walking through fire and women believing endurance is a virtue, or the fact that women were labeled witches and burnt at the stake.

Do you have any upcoming projects that you would like to talk about?

I have a couple of short stories coming out this year that I’m really excited about. My submissions grinder shows I have over a hundred submissions at this point, and this year I’ve finally been accepted to a few dream markets (including Nightmare!). I can say that one of them is at Diabolical Plots, I can’t announce the other yet. Both my Nightmare magazine and Diabolical Plots stories are about motherhood in totally different aspects, and I’m really excited for them to be out in the world.

I am also currently working on my novel. I will let you in on the secret, because I really can’t keep secrets (unless I’m playing Blood on the Clocktower, in which case I will fool you with my bluff), and say that it is dark academia like The Secret History mixed with a revenge arc like The Count of Monte Cristo set in a South Asian-inspired fantasy world. I’m about five chapters in, and I’m currently in the McCormack Speculative Fiction Workshop to workshop a couple of chapters and meet some agents. So, fingers crossed!