𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐆𝐔𝐀𝐑𝐃𝐈𝐀𝐍 𝐎𝐅 𝐓𝐑𝐎𝐋𝐋𝐇𝐔𝐍𝐓𝐄𝐑𝐒 [𝐣𝐢𝐦 𝐥𝐚𝐤𝐞 𝐱 𝐨𝐜]

Chapter 17 | Always Be Afraid

"And when I do..."

Turning her head over her shoulder, her sight trailed from the end of the blade up to its wielder, wide turquoise eyes meeting with sharp glowing blue.

"I will kill you..."

Then, Gunmar strikes down, the Decimaar Blade piercing through her heart.

"Guardian."

Liz jumped awake, gasping for breath as she sat upright in bed, her legs tangled in blankets and her pillow dropping onto the floor. Remembering the Decimaar blade piercing through her heart, she grabs at her chest, but she feels nothing. She exhales a sigh of relief, pulling her legs up until her chin rests upon her knees, her hand rubbing at her aching head.

A knock on the door drew her head up from her knees as a voice called out to her. "Love, are you okay in there? I heard you screaming earlier."

Glancing at the alarm clock on her bedside, the time reads 12:01 A.M.

Not wanting to walk to the door, she waves her hand, the door unlocking itself and swinging open to reveal a ruffled-haired Douxie in a black tank top with the word "Back in Black" and dark grey sweatpants. Liz rests her chin on her knees once more, closing her eyes and hugging herself into a ball, unaware that she was shaking the entire time as her mind replays the nightmare in her head.

Douxie sat beside her curled form, wrapping his arms around her and setting his chin atop her head, rubbing his hands along her upper arms to calm her trembling. "Another nightmare?"

He felt Liz nod slowly. Douxie sighed. "Did you forget to take the potion last night?"

Liz shakes her this time, surprising Douxie, wondering why it did not work this time.

Every night before going to bed, Liz would take this potion made specially by Douxie to keep the nightmares away. Nightmares have haunted her dreams since the night she used magic for the first time. And that was eight years ago. There was one night when she had forgotten to take the potion, resulting in an onslaught of nightmares coming back and waking up in a completely different location from her bed. To prevent similar incidents, Douxie made sure that Liz had her potion available at her bedside that replenished itself when empty.

"Do you want to tell me about your nightmare?" Douxie asked. Liz opened her mouth but couldn't speak for a moment. She takes a deep, shuddered breath to calm herself then answers. "This nightmare...i-it's slightly different than the rest."

Douxie raised his chin from her head, glancing down to see her face. "How so?"

Voice trembling slightly, Liz begins to explain. "L-Last evening in Trollmarket, I-I had a vision of sorts like the ones before. I didn't see anything this time, but I heard Bular's voice. He was saying that his father has waited centuries and that the Age of Gunmar is at hand. The words repeated themselves in my nightmare and...I saw Gunmar again, but we were in a different location this time. Some kind of dark, underground cave with a throne. I fought him, but...he killed me in the end." 

Douxie's arms tighten around Liz's form at the mention of Gunmar, his mind going through flashbacks that he wishes he would forget. In his mind, he tells himself that it was just another nightmare like the rest, but what Liz said next unsettles him.

 "I think Bular's planning to release his father from the Darklands."

Douxie's eyebrow furrowed beneath indigo-colored streaks of hair, his calm expression turned to complete worry. "That's impossible. They needed the Killahead Bridge to open a portal, and that bridge was broken apart to pieces and scattered across the world many centuries ago. There's no way Bular can rebuild the bridge."