Excerpt: At the End of Things

The journey to Bruindard was long and uncomfortable, and the carriage driver wondered at the small girl who would not utter a word to express her displeasure with how things were. From the nearby city Mirylea was guided to another form of transportation - a caravan, this time - that carried her deeper inland, nearer Bruindard. It took her the total of three months and twenty-seven days to reach the city.

During this time, the closer to it they got the stranger her dreams began. The young girl could not understand why she suddenly dreamt of horrendous things like blood and battles and blood-curdling screams, when all she had ever dreamed of was vague colours and flashes of light. Mirylea expressed her distress to a midwife who was married to the leader of the caravan and was given herbal tea to help her sleep better.

The dreams prevailed. The imaginery in them changed finally, when Mirylea was already on the brink of giving up after one too many sleepless nights. She began to dream of the city itself as it had been in the past: bustling with fair-skinned people who all wore long hair that was braided in one braid or more; glorious and rich in colour with flowers and bushes atop houses and in the streets.