Stormchild: Emeline and the Forest Mage

11 Enter the Mage

Erdil

    The sky bled. Icy white drops of pain, shards of regret splintered into a thousand minute diamonds. Emeline stood at the window watching the heavens' anguish fall to the ground. Counting the snowflakes did not quiet her tumultuous mind's constant protest. Don't go up there. There is only death where the sky is white as the mountains. Don't go up there.

    Her fingers tapped the windowsill.

    Tap, ta, ta. Tap, ta, ta.

    Sunlight poured over the horizon to the east, yellowing the peaks of the Ysberg that loomed over the slumbering town. Emeline was beyond sleep, beyond exhaustion, in that place where reality is obscure, where one's eyes cannot be trusted. Red blood splattered down onto the town, making huge blotches in the snow, streaking the buildings with slash wounds, staining reality.

    Emeline watched the crimson stains idly.

    Tap, ta, ta. Tap, ta, ta. Don't go up there. There is only death.

    Her eyes were glazed over with fatigue, her body unresponsive to the bloody scene. The sky bled, the screams she heard echoed through the cold streets, rang, and squealed inside her thoughts.

    Tap, ta, ta. Tap, ta, ta.

    She'd been standing, waiting for hours. Resisting sleep and hoping for the dawn. Now it seemed she was stuck, somnolent, glued to the window, unable to move or avoid the murder painting the town red. When did my life become so volatile?

    The steady rumble that had serenaded her reminiscence halted with a snort. She turned her head, that cloudy feeling numbing her senses, and watched Avétk's eyelashes part. The length of them flapped once, twice.

    Tap, ta, ta. Tap, ta, ta. Tap.

    He turned his eyes to her, still waking up. Thank the Fathers. Emeline revealed her teeth. It should have been a smile, but nobody was fooled. Avétk nodded at her, a silent acknowledgement of the agreement they'd made. Emeline ambled over to the bed just as Avétk rose from it. He looks bare without that huge axe. Emeline's sleepy eyes focused on him, taking in his rugged state. The moment fled though and the softness of the mattress swallowed her into a fitful sleep.

Träumenil

    The road. Its dust put Emeline ill at ease, without reason. Dreams were always the same at first, but her perception of it was different every time. And this time the dust is unsettling. Her feet disfigured the even surface of the road with heavy footfalls. An unknown urgency bit at her sanity. Dreams aren't supposed to be this way.

    She could not rein the remembrance of her past few dreams in and it trampled her now as she stomped down the dusty way. It started with those icy fingers in my hair, that putrid bog, and the Mage. She shivered involuntarily. Then it was dear Augustus who disappeared, leaving a pool of his blood for me to wallow in. There was the...there was blood. Emeline looked at her hands.

    These dreams have to be connected. What do they all mean? The dream she walked in turned out to be normal, despite the unease she felt, allowing her to analyse her previous nightmares with more intensive focus – to figure out what was going on. And what about those monsters that attacked us on the way to the Ysberg River? Where do they fit in? And then the Warden's strange message... what was that? Reading a history book... Emeline frowned, deep in thought, the dreamscape a blur around her, her confusion most vivid.

    Blood...Prophecies...A Mage...A horse...Demons...Bloody snow. Somehow, she had to figure these out, but no clarity came though she spent a time chewing on the thoughts. Up ahead she noticed a massive tree materialise. She approached it, wary of danger, the sense that something was amiss not wholly departed from her. It looked like a massive oak tree, with acorns and those strange leaves making a deep green canopy, which she soon entered.