To Dream a Reality

[Jetamio]

In all their years of marriage, Stormfollower had never once raised his voice to her...not once! She sat in stunned silence for a moment, watching him bind the body of Remis. It took her until he was half done to realize that those were not the knots he usually favoured, and the almost frenzied manner in which he did so was uncharacteristic of him.

She touched the ground and spoke a soft word of arcane origins. The roots of the nearby Aspen trees burst through the earth and bound themselves around Stormfollower's lower legs. With her other hand she shot a great burst of fire into the sky, willing her magic into the shape of a wolf before it began to fade, a sign for those that Mujbura might not reach to come to their Sacred Aspen Grove.

[Gilliadson]

Zask smiles. "I am no leader M'Lady. I am here to serve you." The young bard pulls his drum out and beats a cadence that fills their legs with energy, lifts them above the ground and renders them invisible. "Lead on M'Lady"

[Stormfollower]

"What?" Stormfollower grabbed at the roots around his feet as he screamed.
"What treason is this?" He struggeled against the roots to no avail. "Traitor! I demand you release me!" His eyes were that of a madman, scittering left and right searching for something with wich to strike at the grasping roots.
"Release me now woman!" His lips drew back over his teeth into a snarl, practically foaming at the mouth. He thrashing so wildly that it looked as if he might break his legs.

"You will ruin everything!" he screached through his tantrum.

[Jetamio]

Blinking back tears she shook her head at him.

"Why must you make me do this my son?"

She spoke the ancient word again, calling the Aspen spirits to answer her call and bind him further. More roots burst out of the earth, the existing vines creeping up his legs to his torso while the new ones sought out his frantic hands and wrists.

"I will bring ruin to you... I warned you and yet you still proceed with your madness. You will not use our people for your own selfish mission, nor will you use your Father against me... if I have to destroy him to stop you, I will...and he knows it."

[Mujbura]

Mujbura smiled up at Zask, his being so humble a bit of a surprise to her. While she had not known Bards, she had always heard of them being arrogant and self-promoting.

Still holding his hand she begins to lead the group across the tundra. The trek seemed so long, yet danger seemed to avoid them. She could only believe it was the influence of the Gods that kept them moving safely and swiftly along.

They reach the remainder of the tribe and are met with hesitant, but more accepting arms than the last. They had conversed, each taking their turn speaking and the resolution obtained. They would rejoin the tribe accepting those who did not support their leader previously.

A flash and the sign of the wolf appeared in the sky, a summons to the tribe of Stormfollowers people. They packed their belongings and moved quickly across the storm driven snow to the sacred grounds.

“What are you doing?!” Mujbura yells at Jetamio. Quickly, she speaks to the roots who obediently remove themselves from Stormfollowers legs and sink back into the ground. She runs up to Stormfollower wrapping her tiny arms around his waist while burying her face into him, “I’m sorry, I didn’t know she would do this. Please forgive me.”

[Gilliadson]

"Wait M'Lady!" Zask calls out. "During all my time with the Shadowbanes and in all their dealings with Lady Jetamio and Master Stormfollower I know this one thing... She would never harm her Husband without due cause. Something is amiss here." Zask quickly sings a tune to try to render Stormfollower immobile long enough for Jetamio to explain what is going on. "Please M'Lady do hear what Lady Jetamio has to say before acting any further. If you are not satisfied with her explanation then I will release Master Stormfollower and let them sort it out." Zask holds his hand out to Mujbura.

[Jetamio]

Jetamio had not anticipated Mujbura's reaction and was caught off guard. But seeing the tiny woman embrace the form of Stormfollower in the manner she so often herself did brought on a hot flash of jealousy, which also caught her by surprise. It was not an emotion she often felt but her nerves were raw and exposed. Considering the destruction of ones own son was not a matter taken lightly.

Taking a deep breath and composing herself, she once again called upon the aspen grove to bind Stormfollower, prising Mujbura off in the process.

"He is not himself Mujbura... compose yourself and look beyond his appearance. Remis has control, which means my husband's spirit is still drifting, or worse yet held captive by Cerissa."

She kept her eyes on the thrashing shaman as she spoke, her tone tight and controlled.

[Mujbura]

Sad eyes look over at Zask. "How could he be in on this? What would be the point?" More questions flooded her mind than answers. She looks at his hand, a hand wherein she had trustingly placed hers a few times before. He had sworn an oath to the Ancients, but was this all some plot?

She looks up at Stormfollower, the man of strength and wisdom she had known for too many more years than any would believe. Her heart aches and she knew she had to protect him, she had to protect the tribe through him.

As Jetamio calls upon the roots once again Mujbura is pulled from Stormfollower, even though her tiny arms struggle to hold on to him. "Stop this! Stop it now!" she screams. "Stop or..." She had never threatened another soul out of anger and the words just can't seem to come forth.

The roots push Mujbura until she is in front of Zask who still has his hand extended. She looks at his hand and then Stormfollower. Her mind tore at the thought of leaving one of her descendants helpless. She had a decision to make, and she had to make it quickly.

[Gilliadson]

Zask still holds his had out to Mujbura and looks at Jetamio. "Are you saying that your son has taken over your husband's body?" Zask looks toward the bound up and gagged Remis. "Then your Husband must be in your Son's body or there would have been no reason for the one to bind the other. Lady Mujubra, you have trusted me on this journey to help you gather the members of your tribe who had been scattered. Please trust me in what knowledge I have of this couple. Neither of them would ever harm the other, they love each other too much."

[Stormfollower]

Suddenly, he ceased his struggling. The stolen body of his father went limp. He still looked out from within yet his spirit no longer controlled any of the non essential functions of the body. Remis was caught. Yet again his evil plans had been foiled by the earthen magic of his mother. He felt the love that surged forth from her into the ground and up through the roots and though they grasped him firmly their grip was one of protection rather than confinement. His skin crawled in revulsion from it. He had also felt the love from Mujbura in thier brief embrace. The love she felt for his father further sickened him and he realed now from nausea.

His eyes flashed over to his own body. Useless as a vessel for ultimate escape it struggled against the ropes and gags as Stormfollower found his spirit contained inside his son’s body. Yet at least a return to it would offer him surcease from the feelings that surged through the roots to him from his mother. He would still be trapped, but not by these feelings. Remis eyes met his father’s in that moment and he released control. The colours of their irises exchanged and then returned to normal. Now he looked into his fathers real face. The eyes that stood firm in that stolid face, one emerald green the other clouded by its far reaching gaze into worlds beyond, were the eyes of all truth.

The roots transmitted the sense of intamately familiar calm from Stormfollowers spirit so he need not utter a word to Jetamio for her to be aware of his return. Then, as the gripping sub-earth branches of the ancient aspen trees released him he rose slowly and began to unbind the bitingly tight gag and ropes from Remis.

Remis said nothing. Stormfollower said nothing. Only staring at each othe for what could be said to one whose mind you had shared in whole. All around was silence in the sacred grove. Sunbeams mutely speared their way through the crown of the circling trees and even the light breeze was speechless. The world turned and communicated a great calmness in its quiet. He set about untying the mess of knots about his son’s wrists and ankles and it would have remained soundless for a great time longer but for the smoky “whoot” of an owl high in the treetops overhead. This startled Remis and he shrank back against a rock as soon as he was able. Stormfollower stood before him and drew Jetamio beside him with one great hand upon her delicate shoulder.
He brought up his forearm level with the ground and in a silent swoop a huge horned owl alighted on it, talons digging deep into the heavy leather armbands of the brawny shaman.

“Tell me great mother owl, for we are at a loss... what should we do with our iniquitous young one?”

The owl rotated its head around to peer deep into Remis’s one good eye. The other showing signs of ill healing from the deep red spider web of veins that spread out from beneath his eyepatch.

“WHO!” The giant raptor challenged him with a great pump of its wings, bobbing once deeply on Stormfollowers arm.

Remis still said nothing, choosing only to return the stare with a cold calmness of a stark opposite extreme from his earlier ranting.

[Jetamio]

Jetamio shook her head sadly. She was certain by now that her youngest son was beyond saving, his soul too corrupted to ever bring him back to sanity.

"What do you suggest my love?"

[Stormfollower]

Approaching his his son slowly as one might approach a wounded animal, Stormfollower knelt before him.

He looked deep into the darting eyes that searched for escape. Like a caged tiger his sons head bobbed and swayed in agitation.

No longer a boy in Stormfollowers eyes, Remis felt no emanating sympathy as he once might have. Just those eyes, the piercing soul searching mental probes that now knew all.

He was not ashamed of what his mind had become. He had spent too long forging it into the cold sharp weapon he had such a burning need for. Now with his evolving power that not only allowed him to bend the dreams of his victims, to control their will as they walked in sleep, to hear their voices even once those bodies had been shucked away, now he could even inhabit those discarded or temporarily vacated husks. What was the next step he wondered. He was no longer trying to find himself in anyway. Now he was only interested in creating himself. His “Power” was growing exponentially now. He had experienced his fathers disciplines in shamanism as their minds occupied the same space momentarily on two occasions now and he had learned. He had felt the earth power from two druids and he had learned. Trapped in a soul stealing gem in a demi-world of death and dreams that held no place in time or space he had learned. He was proud of what he had become.

Stormfollower knew all of this, he saw all the delusions that fuelled the fires of his sons megalomania, felt the daunting reality of their heat. He had experienced the melancholia, the black moods and fits of brooding through his sons memories that he now shared. All the episodes of maniacal, unreasoning, cunning that had afflicted his son since early childhood had been layed bare by their transference and the juxtaposition of their souls in those two instances. Lunacy, paranoia, sadomasochistic fits of the basest rage had flown through his history, heretofore unknown by anyone for his mastery of deception and fine art of concealment. But overshadowing all these diseases was the root cause and principle source for all his evil powers. He had a hebephrenic predilection. A draw so strong away from the reality of his world that his mind was able to fling itself instantly into the ghostly nether worlds layered between the realms of dream, fantasy, and the final destiny of all mortal beings.

He rose after some time and Remis visibly relaxed as he made distance between them, He pulled Jetamio to his chest and held her head in his hands before gently tilting it up to great her sad eyes with a hopeful yet somewhat resigned look.

“The leaf.” He stated solemnly, “I fear it must come to that.”

[Jetamio]

"He had them banish me... he has told them I deserted them. The Artifacts of the tribe are not mine to use." She glances at Remis, then back to Stormfollower. "He has turned them all against us."

[Mujbura]

Her tiny hand is placed in Zasks as she rises to her feet. She nods slowly standing by him then looks over that which is Stormfollower with sad eyes. Her dear friend trapped in his sons body, she looks at the one bound in his fathers body and knows this magic she cannot break.

The transformation takes place and they both return to their respective bodies. She watches, and listens. The ancients had told her what needs to be done. But how was she to tell a mother she must be the one to kill her son? She wasn’t sure she had the strength to do so.

She sighs a bit in relief as the Mother Owl had spoken, and all knew what to do. She wouldn’t have to speak it, unless this “leaf” was not Jetamio’s sons final death. A burial of his body was not enough, his body needed to be burned never to form again, this was the only way to ensure he could not return to it. But, still, the mother would have to take his life before the body could be burned. She wasn’t sure she could tell her, she prayed silently that someone who knew would speak it so she wouldn’t have to.

Still questioning eyes look up at Zask, she makes an attempt at a hopeful smile before looking back at Stormfollower and Jetamio. Her hand squeezes his gently as she prays for the family.

Her prayers are interrupted by the sound of the tribe approaching. Numerous in number, they had worked through their differences and stood in unity once more before their leader.

An elder from the reunited tribe steps forward. His voice was gruff with age, but firm with strength, “Greetings, Stormfollower. Your tribe has reunited, we follow your lead.”

[Gilliadson]

Zask holds Mujubra's hand gently and looks into her eyes. He returns her smile before returning his attention to the scene unfolding before him. Thoughts racing through his head as the rest of the tribe approach and the declaration of their unity is made. Zask had grown up at Gill-Alani since his father was one of the Shadowbane Knights. Zask's mother was a Bard herself. Zask heard the call of music and poetry at a young age and was allowed to train with Mirthan under some of the best Minstrels in Norrath. Zask's father was clearly disappointed but never tried to sway his son from his chosen path. When Mirthan was sent to train under The Tuneweaver Bards, Zask was allowed to accompany him. Zask returned after his training and served the Shadowbane Family as a messenger and entertainer. Now a new song was being sung within his heart... The song of the Wolf...