Gift of Nightmares
an excerpt

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What have I done?
The world is bathed in fire,
Drinking flames like its own blood
And laughing into the mouth of darkness.
The eyes of madness have consumed
The sky and swallowed stars
Until the earth wept death.
And sanity wept, and memory wept,
And reason comforted them.
What have I done?
The voices of the dead reach out
From the forbidden abyss
And caress my ears with songs of grey
And white and red,
Their faces smeared by time
And stained by sorrow.
I hear them speak with broken lips
And invisible voices.
What have I done?
My hands and feet are bound
Under the ground clothed in a skin of sand
And burning water.
Foreign colours of a lost and fading planet
Dance across my vision and
Are dissolved upon my fingertips.
I cannot touch what is not there.
What have I done?
Transparent universes overlap through
Veils of consciousness,
Transcending fragile boundaries of words,
With my mind ravaged from the inside out
By revelations…
Prophecies and feelings wrapped in
The fabric of thought that travel
Through infinity within one breath.
What have I done?
I’m lost inside a labyrinth of dreams
With endless corridors which redefine eternity,
Filled with the smells, the sounds, the sights
And the sensations which shape the tapestry
Of existence and reinforce reality.
I’m lost within a maze of a thousand
Lives I’ve never lived…
What have I done?
I closed my eyes.
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Chapter One: War of Words

There was nothing but darkness but she couldn’t care less. All the filled the still night air were the slow, tactful steps, gliding along the cobbler along the intimidating 30 feet stone wall. She focused on not picking her feet up to high as she stalked along the wall, feeling every few bricks hoping that the wall would eventually just disappear. She of course knew it wouldn’t. She had lived inside those walls for the last 13 years and she hoped that this would be the last time she’d have to see them again in her lifetime. She heard a sound. It had to be footsteps, but she thought it was her mind playing a game with her or that she just heard her steps and mistook their echo or something, but when she heard it again she became as still as the wall itself. They seemed to be move alongside her, but at a distance.
Am I being followed, she considered but waved the notion from her mind. Her plot for freedom was flawless thanks to her newly acquire talents. She put faith in the merchant she purchased her scroll to form a double of herself standing at the window of her third story room in the northwest tower. She could still see her necklace gleaming in the moonlight, she touched her chest making sure she still had the real one, the only real thing she had of value but she could never sell. Choking back a tear, trying to forgot the fact that she was alone, cold and could be capture at a moment’s notice then forced to return to her dreary life in the drab dust gray monastery, she listened and heard the footsteps stop. Their voices filled the night air.
“So,” the voice was deep, slow but seemed filled with disdain and controlled rage, “Where is it?”
She could hear knees clattering even though she was a good 20 yards away from where the conversation was taking place, “M-m-my Lordship… sir… I-I.”
“Better have a good reason not to lose another finger.” The deep voice bullied.
“Please,” the second voice, higher and seemed young, a tad bit crackly pleaded, “You have no idea the number of wards and guards they have watching over the girl.’
She her a loud smack and something, or someone hitting the cobble, “I do not know.” He raised his voice, “I do not know, you are a mere insignificant gnat in the grand scheme of things. I have knowledge of things you and never will have the slightest chance to even consider. And you dare to betray me, Pavil?”
Pavil! Her heart was racing. Pavil was a mere child, younger than she was that helped his father raise horses in the stable on the monastery grounds. He was a good two years younger than she was and he was being bullied by an adult. But nothing was new. This was how life was at Ashari Monastery. She herself had received more beatings than she cared to think about, but she had never been called insignificant, just that she would end up like her parents, dead, if she continued to disobey her elders.
Then she heard something that intrigued her. Words of magic, derived from the archaic tongue of a race that was long dead and nearly forgotten. There was a huge burst of purple energy that blinded her while the screams of the young stable hand, Pavil deafened her ears. Then the world was nothing and even the stars turned black…
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She was sitting up along the wall but wasn’t sure how she got that way exactly then she opened her eyes and saw a redish silver blob dancing in the moonlight. She shook her head trying to regain a grasp on what was happening.
“What… what was…” she started but was interrupted by the cold, armor covered hand of the figure.
“Shhh,” he spoke.
“Darios?” she asked through her muffled lips. She already knew the answer, Darios was an unmistakable man. Still young, but known for his prowess in combat and his tactics in war. He had taken up residence in the Monastery since the last war with the Southern Kingdom, training the next generation of young commanders and tormenting her on a daily basis. She’d be told to parry this way and would do it wrong, get hit with the wooden practice blade and told to pay attention, then told her feet are positioned all wrong and that if her were dancing with her he’d be thankfully he only owned chain mail boots. But for all his gruffness, he was one of the few people in her life that she trusted, even though he was mean and rude, he at least was consist in his way he treated her. Other people at the monastery seemed to loathe her one moment and then tell her all about her “potential” the next. Darios just told her she wouldn’t take heed to his listens until she was half-dead.
Quietly Darios said, “Maeghan, you will die soon if you don’t listen to my words.”
Blunt much, she thought to herself but just shook her head in agreement.
“There is a man of great of power here, possibly close by. I am unsure why, but praise Shu that I was unable to sleep tonight… I thought that it had to do with the funny way you’ve been acting lately but it seems now that is was more.”
He paused and swiveled his head several times then pulled her up with his other hand by the nape of her neck. Mae whimpered a bit but stifled her voice as she was upright.
He released his hands and said, “We may have to fight our way out.”
Out?! She was getting her wish and now she wanted to recant. She could leave the only place she knew as home to be blasted and burned and tormented by some power hungry rogue. “But,” she started to argue however she was already being pulled threw the garden.
Darios stopped and looked at the scene a few yards in front of them. A huge circle of pure destruction lay at their feet, nothing was left save for a wide, shallow crater and the scent of rotting flesh, although they saw no body.
“It was the Pavil boy, wasn’t it,” said not looking at Mae but she assumed that he was asking.
“Yeah… what happened to him?” she asked knowing but wanting conformation.
“Obviously dead but beyond that your guess would be better than mine,” Mae twitched at this comment, never had an adult told her something remotely close to that… she knew more than he? “My expertise lies is fighting, combat and in weapon craft… the magically world is one that I know as little about as you know of being a tactician.”
Maeghan frowned. She thought she had kept her study of the “aged arts” a secret but it seemed that Darios’ astuteness was used for far more than knowing when and where to fire a cannon blast.
“Did you see it?” he asked. She shook her head no. He grunted as e said, “Serves the little bastard right, shameful for what some people do for a little bit of gold.” She considered this odd, since Darios had been praised all his life for how many people he killed. But she supposed that he had never killed anyone that wasn’t prepared for it. On a battlefield every man knew that their next breath could be their own… but dying at the hands of an ally of sorts on the grounds of your own home…
“Focus, girl,” Darios said a few steps in front of her as he headed to a small bush of roses. Mae ran to catch up and looked at the bushes, she had loved to come and look at them. She enjoyed the entire garden, but something about the roses made her feel safe and warm.
Darios clenched his eyes, seemingly trying to force something out, or keep something in and then muttered, “Goodbye.” Mae was hoping that her only line of defense was losing it. She had read tales of warriors that would start thinking things were more than they seemed right before a battle, Swordsmen Malaise she remembered it being called. “Come, girl... we have to hurry else all we know of will perish.”
She took several steps to keep up with his. She had never notice how much taller he was to her, hard to take account of things when wooden sticks are being swung at your head. His chin was a few inches higher than the crown of her head and was clean shaven and he prided himself on the condition of not only his course black hair but in the cleanliness and gloss of his armor along with his fingernails and even his teeth. He was a stickler for perfection. He considered the smallness avoidable mistake death threatening. Mae was just glad she never had to ride with into combat with him then she might have considered being a prisoner of war.
They continued running, Mae felt dizzy as she remembered the large pack on back with the few articles she had decided to leave with but she felt relieved, at least mentally as they came to the huge golden gates and freedom from the monastery grounds. From that point they had a number of options leaving the magician to guess which path they’d take. Mae plan was to head to Port Deverie and see if she could get a job on a ship at best or stow away at worst. But she was unsure what Darios wanted to do, but he had a lot more connections then she did.
Suddenly there was a loud burst of wind, Mae dove to ground instinctively as Darios turned and tried to stand his ground. He failed and was forced to his back and began tumbling head over heels a few feet before stopping with his right knee touching his nose.
Maeghan then heard a laugh, a frighteningly awful laugh that would resonate in her mind for years to come.
“Darios,” the figure in the dark purple cloak spoke. Mae immediately recognized the voice as Pavil’s killer. “What a pity, having to rescue the child of the woman that wanted nothing to do with you.”
Darios rose to his feet and gritted, “Who the hell are you?”
“No one for someone like yourself to worry about… just an old man reclaiming his birthright,” his pupil-less eyes, all white like the huge skulking moon above bore into Mae as he said this, “Now, shall you move along an allow me to have a… conversation… with my niece are shall I have to do to you what I did with that manure shoveler?”
Darios unsheathed his rapier for his side and took his stance defensively in a blurred motion that awed Mae. He had never seemed to move that fast when they trained… she never considered from all the bruises she received that he was going easy on her, but apparently he was.
“I have no time for this… Pavil,” the magician waved his hand, conjuring a whirl of dust that forged itself into a pale version of the scrawny boy. He… or it… said nothing and the purple garbed man said, “Kill him… make it quick.”
With an unearthly dash the pale skinned boy rushed Darios, who made a lightning quick slash at the boy. But, it move, almost disappeared it move so fast before Mae’s eyes… there was a wave of moves, Darios attacking the Pavil dodging and lunging… it seemed Pavil was landed several blows to the chest of Darios and Darios was slowly being winded.
Maeghan could feel that it was wrong, Pavil could never even dream about fighting that well.. she’d actually beat him up once for teasing her about a hole in her shirt. Mae looked at the magician who seemed focused on watching Pavil… was he manipulating the boy… could Pavil still be alive. Mae remembered the crater and knew it was not possible.
Darios chuckled as he started parrying Pavils punches. Darios cause cuts to him apparently but drew no blood. “This is a clever parlor trick… could you pull a rabbit out of your cloak next?”
The purple magician growled and said something quickly in the old language. Darios’ feet stopped and striking like a cobra, Pavil’s teeth sunk deep into Darios’ arm through his arm and he dropped his blade.
Mae screamed. On pure instinct she recalled some words, though she had no clue were from. “Requietu Mortusu!” she yelled with authority. There was a sudden flash of light and Pavil fell limp to the ground and the mage doubled over.
Darios fell to the ground next to his rapier and Mae, suddenly feeling dizzy again watched as the purple hooded mage vanished into the night air. She stumbled to Darios and felt him still breathing and was relieved. Then she looked at Pavil and was mortified. His skin was peeling and maggots had seemed to make residence in his skull and few wanted to get a little of the night air and crawled along the bridge of his nose.
She tightened her pack, sniffled as she looked at the monastery lights… candles dancing around, it was apparent that everyone had been awoke and soon they’d come looking for her… but she’d belong gone… a whisper in the night.