((I'll post dreams you all have here and there during your travels.))
Dreams during your journey to the Lost Wood:
Keth
Forests of black trees and gold filigree leaves surrounded Keth as she wandered to find just the right one to enter. Despite knowing this dream, the very steps that would happen again and again, she could not help herself but search out the entrance that would lead to Sireeliar.
A fluttering shadow rushed between the trees, giving chase as she ran among the boles.
"Keth!"
The voice was painfully familiar, one that engendered trust and concern. Yet the hunger for the stairs, to see the burning eyes of the king, to feel his touch still consumed her. Hands grasped her shoulders, twisting her around to peer into a face not as beautiful, marred with the scars of humanity and wrinkles about the eyes. Eyes so very blue and deep as a river. His lips moved, voice spoke her name, that tasted of her life. So many things about she knew, and some she did not.
"Sinclair?" Furrowing her brows, she connected the name and feelings for him rushed through her. Memories cascaded until she could scarce breath. "Sinclair! How...where..."
"You are sleeping. I can only imagine where. I'm so...so sorry to intrude." Those eyes held regret and yet a deep abiding need. His fingers loosened, gathering her long hair. Words fumbled around in his throat, wanting to be spoken, yet he couldn't say them. "I ...I ah...was...looking for you." He cringed wanting to kick himself in the ass.
"I've always been here. I keep returning, but I don't know why."
"No...you are dreaming and sleeping but...well...I'm not. You'll know when you wake. But where are you? Are the others safe?" Those fingers trailed along her jaw, holding her chin to pull her closer. Was he seeking her, or she dreaming this need to kiss him?
"We ...we left the...the markets. Such large markets." Her mind was drifting, pulled by the dream. It felt so much stronger while traveling in the wyld.
Yet Sinclair would not release her. "A market. Underground? Within trees? Streets?"
With a soft purring, her eyes closed as vines of gold reached forth and curled around her becoming lovely garments. Magics ancient and branding deeply within her soul awoke to lure her away, a flavor and geas he knew intimately.
"Yes, cobbled streets...lovely streets..."
Quietly he followed as the dream played out over and over, feeling terribly for his actions so very long ago. "I'll fix this, Keth. I promise."
Dragotha
A fire blazed before him, the tips dancing merrily throwing shadows looking like demons. Across from him sat his father, arrows embedded in his shoulders and back, forming a macabre crown of a warlord around him. The forms of dwarven fae loomed near, murmuring low as the hum of a heart within a mountain lending a majestic touch to what he witnessed.
The old man leaned forward with a wizened voice and steely eye. "The mountains have not forgotten ye, son. Been ages since walking the crags it feels. There be many tales, and many mountains to come. Some ye may not recognize keenly."
"In the places I walk between, I hear the great rumbling in the earth, far deeper than any dragonblooded dragon lies. It's the sound from another world. I cannae ken if it be from the ghosts of our past, or those of your own deeper age. How far beyond me ye have gone."
He sharply tugged free pieces of wood and stone from near his feet, tossing them into the blaze. "A darkness wells within ye. Though lost I cannae help but sense it, even so far from ye. I only ask, lad, that ye not forget where the girl dances her last. Upon the stoney tor."
The further he spoke of things most strange the dimmer the fire fell until the edges of the man looked as the dark silhouette of a mountain Dargotha spied in his journey.
Theon
The night streets held a mystery of danger and excitement for Theon as nothing else could. His steps were as quiet as he could make upon the cobbles, some wet from recent spilled baths and wash basins. The backstreets of the whore houses and shops near Trendle Lane. Ah, he knew this place so well!
A few bodies thrusting and groping in the throes of passion met his eyes if he spied them out between closed shades. The sight alone making him wanton and frisky. Straightening his coat, he knew this task had to be finished. Why, he couldn't say. It seemed so painfully familiar.
Again he stood at the base of the long stairs leading from one district to the next in Nexus, close to where he purchased his first disastrous book. The one that he coveted and feared. But he had a new book now, the first. Or so he thought. Frustration pounded in his temples like the staccato drumming of steps two at a time. But finally, whether intended or not, he was at the meeting place.
A nervous man stood, pacing back and forth in huddled dark clothing and hood. Turning to the sound of Theon's approach, he drew much closer.
"I was about to leave. I can't stay long. Something like this...it's dangerous. I don't know if you are ready..."
Theon pulled to hard stop. For a dream, it was very inaccurate. The man did not say those things. He had practically threw the book and ran. "Look friend, I know what I'm getting into. Let's trade and go on our way."
But what Theon held forth was a hand that dripped in black. The other did not react, only touched the hand as if to pass something. What laid in his palm was a beautiful stylus of purest white, the length a horn carved own to a beautiful nub for ink. The figure whimpered oddly trying to pull back, but Theon could not let go.
A pale face peered up to him, unseeing from blinded pale eyes. He knew him, gripping his shoulder that felt thinner now. "Do not weep for me. I will live on, my friend, just differently. But you...you accepted this fate as surely as I. Pen through my bones the words of our bitter end, Theon. You shall see the king for me..."
Eyes closing, Opal thinned away to nothing, leaving the most artful writing device he ever owned in Theon's clasped hand. Ink from the Broken Wing Crane consumed the pure white until deepest black.
Ivory
The clarion cry of hatred shrilled the air until trees and rock exploded from the force. Within the heart of maelstroms Ivory Storm Hunter stood upon land that felt brittle and hollow. When she took a step, the earth erupted upwards. Holding ever so still, she tried not to disturb anything, but again the cry came and lines of destruction followed.
"What in the..." The destruction raced through the land and up her leg, along every vein until it broker free and bled rusted old blood. But she felt not pain, only the bliss of great drugs eating away at her sanity. "No...no no this is..."
"Wrong?" Ivory froze as the slithering voice curled about her ears from the darkness above. Two bright orbs of flame opened high above as a dragon moved against the nightmare sky. "What brings you to this land, little one? This is my lair."
A gout of flame exploded from his maw as she shifted to become pure ice. So small against the great night, and yet, part of her knew she could win.
Except for the poison slowing every muscle.
Archimedes
High above the world in a thin walled hut, Archimedes found himself again in his ancient tree. Every joint and bone ached terribly as he tried over and over to get out of his bed and sit in his favorite chair.
Lying there, his eyes followed the whirls of wood in fanciful patterns he memorized ages past. But why would he ache still? Was he not special, chosen? He lifted his arm, the length of it shaking as if from a palsy, mottled with spots, covered in wrinkled skin that hung limp.
Another hand took his, fresh and youthful. Eyes so bright and strong, even white teeth, a face he had long forgotten met his. "I must thank you, Archimedes. Without your aid I never would have gained this form to walk this world."
Licking cracked lips, he tried to understand. "What do you mean, Perenales? That...that is MY body. Not yours."
"Our agreement is beyond comprehension. But worry not. I will do well by your memory. Vile. Nialle. The Hand. Even Theon will never know the difference. The world will be mine, one soul after another."
Growls snarled free as Archimedes tried desperately to rise, a voice from beyond whispering to him. If you but accept, I shall offer my aid. Thrust a blade into your heart, speak my name with your dying breath, and all shall be perfect again.
An offer, but with a cost. He had waited for this day for ages it felt. Finally, he was being summoned, welcomed, to another. "I accept."
Pain lanced through his heart as he screamed the name of the Mask of Winters, but unlife did not well back into his form. Instead he felt a maw bite into his throat, and coppery blood fill his own mouth. Sputtering upon the rarest taste of blood, Archimedes felt indescribable pain as his vision swam.
Not the Mask of Winters, my child.
Home 
