The Dream Quest

[Jetamio]

She froze as he spoke, then relaxed slightly when seeing that it was not Jetamio who had seen her. Willowen stood before her, looking at her in a mixture of disbelief and astonishment. She felt her spirit settle back into its Draconic vessel, the realisation of being discovered sobering her, calming the wild energies that still pulsed through her form invisible to most.
Delsari stared back at him, her face lacking the usual calm innocence that they had come to expect from her. Instead stood a being that knew exactly who she was and what she was doing, her avian eyes keeping his gaze locked on hers, celestial energies still burning in their depths. The dawn was the time when she was least mortal, her radiance that was evident even as Delsari at it's strongest. Her act of innocence normally deflected the strength of it, but now Willowen felt the pure unadultered aura of Lestriel.

She was about to speak when a flicker of movement caught her eye. The others stirred. Forcing the luminence of her aura down she broke her gaze from Willowen to see who was waking. She then caught his eye with a meaningful look. Her identity was secret for a reason.

[Sanjah]

Sanjah bolted upright and her eyes snapped open. The sun had barely made its way over the horizon and the cold air left a chill upon the drakkin’s skin. She was shaking and she felt nauseous – the last scene from her dream playing over and over again in her mind.

She closed her eyes tightly and tried to shake it out of her head. It had only been a dream, right? But… Storm had mentioned that through the quest they would learn more about themselves… about each other. She felt her abdomen clench up as she gagged. No… there was no way… it was impossible! She would never actually do such a thing…

She pulled the light blanket up around her and began to rock herself back and forth, trying to quell her shaking and return her breathing to normal. It only took a moment though before she realized that there was something else amiss...

Her eyes widened at the realization that the feir’dal, whom she had beheaded in her nightmare, was no longer in the bed. She began dry heaving again and she felt as if she was going to pass out. Where was he? Why wasn’t he here?

“Will?” she said, though her weakened voice was no more than a whisper. She tried to cry out again, emitting a high pitched whimper before she began to sob.

[Jetamio]

A strangled cry woke her with a start. She sat bolt upright, looking around herself for the source of it. At first she could see nothing amiss. Storm was still splayed out on his rock, the sight of him bringing a strange warmth to her heart as images of her dream were still fresh in her mind. Delsari stood staring at Willowen, whose back was to her, with a strange expression that quickly dissapated when the gold Drakkin noticed she was awake. The hairs on the back of her hair raised slightly, something had happened here, but she shook the feeling off.
Then a muffled sob from the other side of the fire drew her attention and she realised what had woken her.

"Sanjah...?"

[Willowen]

Hearing the spirit-wrenching outburst and Jetamio's concerned query to Feir'dal cast his attention from Delsari, a mystery that he was determined to illuminate later, and ran back to where Sanjah sat, tears streaming down her face. Heart pounding, Will knelt and embraced the drakkin, his eyes quickly scanning the surroundings for anything that could have possibly frightened her. "Shhhhhh," he said into her ear with the soft whisper trackers used to calm spooked animals. "What... whats a matter Sanjah...please...what scared you?" Will ran a hand through her hair, fighting equal degrees of anxiety and fear.

[Sanjah]

Sanjah had calmed down ever so slightly by the time she heard Jetamio ask her what was wrong. She was still unable to find the words to answer, and merely bit her lip as the tears fell from her eyes.

She kept trying to reason with herself in her mind. It would have been impossible for her to have actually killed him while she was sleeping, right? But this... this was a magical dream... what if...

And then she saw him. Her eyes widened with relief and she wrapped her arms around him tightly as she buried her face in his chest. He asked her what was wrong, and she shook her head no.

She looked into his emerald eyes. "I... it doesn't matter. You're here... you're... alive... I just..." her words faltered as she fought with herself over if she should tell him what had happened or not. She was terrified of the consequences, of what the dream would say about her if any of her friends knew of the scene that wouldn't stop replaying in her mind.

She took her hand and allowed her fingertips to trace from the side of his neck to his collar bone and she involuntarily shivered as she frowned. She shook the image from her head and took a few deep breaths to regain her composure.

"It was just... a bad dream..." she said, smiling warily. "I... I'm sorry... I... I didn't mean to... I didn't mean to worry you..."

[Willowen]

Will frowned slightly with concern, her attempts to dissuade worry sounding hollow, despite the Feir'dal's usual inability to discern lies. He was alive? Apparently he had met some sort of sticky end within her dream, though...why would? He shrugged inwardly, Sanjah was an emotional person perhaps simply seeing him die within the dream produced such terror. Hadn't his blood rushed with primal fear at the sound of her agonized voice and the sight of her face contorted painfully? Perception produced always produced reaction, the variety simply varied. The druid sighed at his own lack of affinity for the situation. He was much better with flora, fauna, and elemental forces then he would ever be with people it seemed.

"It is fine melamin," Will smiled slightly, "it seems the winds have brought everyone troubling dreams of late."

[Stormfollower]

In his dream the waves began to slowly roll against the shore and Stormfollower returned his gaze to the sea. The mastodon herd continued their final swim into the distance as the birds of the ocean sang their epitaph to them. In his heart he longed to swim after them, to bring them back to the shore and show them that things would be alright. The grasses they so loved could be re-sown and their predators could be quelled for a time to allow them to grow in numbers. Yet in his mind he knew this was folly, Natures laws were immutable, her yea was a yea and her nay a nay. There was no week mercy in her, cause and consequence were inseparable and inevitable.

With a sigh he turned his head to the sky threw open his arms and breathed a prayer for the passing of these great and gentle giants "Once they were not, then they were, now they are not again. Happy, the virtuous and just they from their sins and labors rest, their holy works do follow them to the brightest castles of the blessed. Love be now thy spirits in the sun. Strength is thy legacy left. Life is their essence never gone. When spirits from their crumbling coil ascend to the beyonds bight shore...Our hoping hearts in triumph say, not lost but gone before." Bowing his head he walks into the dream waves and stands there for long moments in silence.

Above a condor soared high upon the thermals and sent a call to those below as if to say "carry on!" Stormfollower turned and looked up, his familiar broad smile back on his face. "Come my friends there is more to see, below the sea" Then turning with a leap he dove head first into the rolling wave before him.

One by one his friends followed, all but for the baby mastodon who instead walked up the shore alone in search of plants. The group of friends swam after Stormfollower and soon caught up to him. he had swam quite deep and all around the colorful fish of the tropical climes they now seemed to swim in swirled around them in patterns as intricate as tapestries. Symbols of hammers wove between sacred Dal pictographs of Tunares followers underpinned by the shapes of epic dragons blue and green. The schools of multicolored fish swam in a great vortex around them all and drove them deeper into the warm sea depths. Circular mendallas grew and spun, then were consumed by bright forms of purple trees and silver coral. The suns light still shone into these depths illuminating the fish both large and small. Still deeper they swam their curtain of colors still surrounding them creating a whirl of images in their intertwining until at last the group of friends reached the sandy bottom.

In a flash the sea creatures scattered in all directions leaving them alone in an underwater landscape of sandy hills and sparse, waving plants. They lowered themselves slowly into a circle and sat upon the sea bed. Sanjah smiled brightly as she drew out a tea pot from her pack and several cups. She poured some tea into each cup, tiny bubbles rising from the corner of her mouth. Each companion in turn took up a cup and began to sip. Sanjah reached into her sack, a look of disgust flashed over her face as she withdrew a stack of soggy dough, what once must have been her cookies. All the rest looked highly disappointed until she withdrew a great stack of peanut brittle to share. Willowen opened his mouth to speak but a garbles mass of bubbles blew forth and no comprehensible words could be discerned. He shrugged and smiled. Licinia then waved her arms for attention until all were looking at her. Then she began the task of teaching them the silent language of hand signs used by the rouges. But without the ability to make sounds the pantomime took longer than it should have. Jetamio seamed to already be fluent in the intricacies of this language and was able to help in the tutelage of the rest.

Once the language was learned by all the conversations sprang up again between them all. the tea flowed freely into the cups and they all were happy. Stormfollower smiled across the circle of his friends at Delsari and he noticed with fond amusement how the sun sent shards of light around her head like a giant, glowing crown of fiery spikes. She smiled back and then swam off to the surface and towards the shore the light playing off her like radiant wings. Then Willowen rose from his seat and spoke with the language of the hands movements" Goodnight friends, may Tunare shape us to her will. “He swam up and shoreward also. Sanjah smiled and with a wave followed after him. Shrugging and then bowing Licinia made the sign for ""Goodnight and be well" before she too swam off.

Just him and Jetamio remained on the sea floor. Stormfollower wanted to reach over and draw her close to him but before he could she spoke...Not in the sign language but in his mind telepathically speaking to him as clearly as if she spoke in air. "Stormfollower my love" (my love? he thought) " Why have you drawn us here, what lesson do you seek to teach?"

Stormfollower looked at her quizzically. Then he too spoke into her mind “I have come here through an impulse of my mind, tis but a dream and you all follow due to a further impulse of mine, I do not seek to teach thee tis but the dream which seeks to instruct me. To deny my own impulses is to deny the very thing that makes me human."

“So I am a figment of your imagination?" She seamed hurt

“Well here you are, yes. Here in my dream you are as I will you formed from my impressions of you, a simulacrum of my thoughts."

“I am not!" She rose to her feet and began to float upwards “Stormfollower! You are cruel to say so! How can you say this is but a dream?"

“Jetamio, I am a skilled dreamer. I know when things are real and when things are a dream. Even now my body lies prostrated upon a rock in the sacred aspen grove and the real you sleeps nearby with dreams of thy own construction instructing thee." He smiled up at her ascending form.

The sun beams now shone around her making her a silhouette above him." Have you ever had a dream Stormfollower, that you were so sure was real? What if you were unable to wake from that dream? How would you know the difference between the dream world and the real world?" She swam off after the others and he was left to contemplate this.

[Stormfollower]

The sun above began to sink and the shadows of the deep blue sea crept up from thier abysmal daytime haunts. Above all was calm. Below the surface Stormfolower sat alone.

How could he know this was "just a dream" It had all the trappings of real life. All the impulses of what he thought was real.

Suddenly it dawned on him. Here he could change things simply by thinking it so he could bring about whatever scenario he chose. Lucid dreaming, the masters had called it. With dicipline and practice anyone could do it the trick was to know that you are dreaming and yet still remain asleep. Of course this was a dream, and he had total control of what would happen in it.

Now Stormfollower did not like to alter his dreams, instead prefering to let the dream evolve from his subconciouse mind as it would with the non dream-trained. Yet as if to further dispell his doubt that this was a dream He effortlessly turned into water and merged with the sea.

Satisfied that all was well and he was firmly ensconced in a freeform dream his mind went out to the extents of the sea. Into deepening coves and under antcien cities, through dark caves and between shifting grains of sand. Then he let the dream "be".

He became instantly aware of a windblown coast...the moon pulled and the winds pushed. He was molded and churned into swells and waves and he sang out, his voice the very crash of the waves,

" As the waves crash in
On the western shore
The wind blows fierce from the east
Wavetops torn into flying spindrift

As the waves crash in
On the western shore
It makes me feel uneasy
The spray thats torn away
Is an image of the way I feel

What am I supposed to say?
Where are the words to answer you
When you talk that way?

As the sun goes down
On the western shore
The wind blows hard from the east
It wips the sand into flying spindrift

As the sun goes down
On the western shore
It makes me feel uneasy
In the hot dry rasp of the devil winds
Who cares what a fool beleives?

What am I supposed to say?
Where are the words to answer you
When you talk that way?
Words that fly against the wind and waves.

(A little closer to you)
Where is the wave that will carry me
A little closer to you?

What am I supposed to do
Where are the words that will make you see
What I believe is true?"

[Stormfollower]

And as the winds tore away the angst of each crashing wave of imploring maxim the full force of its undercurrents still wore away at the shore unnoticed. The spray falling apon the back of each wave a reminder of the resistance of air to water, sky pressed apon sea even as the sea breathed life into the sky. The monotony of this constant strugle drew Stromfollowers dream slowly away from the shore and out beyond the sand bars and coral reefs untill far from sight of shore he breached through the upper atmosphere of the sea as a huge grey whale. Landing with a crash against its surface he spun and dove back beneath its eternal hug. Down he dove to depths beyond the reach of most mammals far beyond the reach of the fading sun above. Down he dove with speed and direction of purpose untill he saw the very first and tallest spire of Alladuveanthal, the sinking city from the ancient epic of Redasurc, there to have audience with (he hoped) the submarine magician...

[Stormfollower]

In the real world Stormfollower still lay face down on the huge basalt slab that reasted on a slight angle out of the ground infront of the sweat lodge. Everyone else had awakened long ago and sat chatting idly, dineing apon what remained of the great feast that had been steaming for hours beneath the hot coals of the fire. No one had wished to wake the dreaming Shaman as he seamed to be doing fine. A gentle mist steamed off his back still, even though he had left the warmth of the steam hut almost half a day ago. His breaths were deep long and steady.
But the food that still remained would soon be too long cooked. It needed to be removed if there was to be any left for Stormfollower when he woke. They eyed the deeply tanned and weathered northman more frequently now and wondered how long they would need to wait for him to be done with his dreaming. Even the Old owl seamed to become impatient as it fluttered down to a lower branch somewhat early in the day for a nocturnal hunter. She whooted smokily towards the group and a breeze blew in the first tiny white embasador of snowfall.

[Stormfollower]

Alladuveanthal loomed up at him from the abysmal depths and Stormfollower became as one of the fabled race who were inhabitants of this city. A merefolk, with arms and torso but also tail and fins. Down he swam to hold audience with the great submarine magician in his sharkskin halls. The darkness all around was illuminated now from the cities eirie lights and he swam directly ito a window of its highest tower. Od that an owl had perched apon its spire underwater.
The hall was dark but for the light apon its throne at the far end of the chamber where sat the Magician himself. an ink black sillohette before the light that shone behind him.
"Welcome Stormfollower...Welcome to thy cage."

With those words spoken a great grey cloud began to billow forth from the shadowy figure encompassing the entire hall in only a few short moments. Caught unaware. Stromfollower stood in complete darkness unable to move.
"What?..Why?, Why hast thow done this?" His words were that of a friend wounded by a friends betrayal.
"I hath done naught Stormfollower, this trap is of thine own design, You thought to gain insight into thine own soul by this dreamquest Yet look now! thow hast forsaken the souls of thy compaitriots for whome this quest meant little but for a means to honour thee. Thy selfishness, Thy independant spirit shall therefore cause itself to spend eternity alone as is its want."
As the magician spoke Stormfollower chuckled to himself.."Oh, Of course, this is what I was meant to glean by this dream, how foolish I have been on this, the greatest of all my dream quests..the first I have had joined by friends, and I selfishly indulge in my own soul searching instead of plying the knowledge of a shaman to those who may need it..I shall wake now...
shall I not?" The dull grey silence answered him with mocking clarity

[Stormfollower]

In the real world the snow came on softly. A few flakes drifted lightly on the gently breaze. The day now wore on and the sun drifted across the sky. It climbed down towards the western horizon steadily drawing nearer to thier rendevous with each other. An eagle flew low over the treetops screatching its shrill cry it lighted heavily on a sturdy branch high in a giant pine. Still the shaman lay on his face. Nearly motionless but for the breathing out of great clouds of warm breath with each protracted exhalation. The owl looked up at the eagle and each seamed to bob a short bow to the other. Then from the forest behind the sweat hut a flurry of sparrows whipped in and took shelter in a bush near to Stormfollower. The owl hooted once again and a raven made its hidden presence known with a croak from the shadows of one of the dencer pines. Birds of all kinds began to gather in the hieghts of the trees and the smaller ones took to the clearing floor and underbrush. The last to arrive was a giant condor cicling downward to the rock, barely missing the outer branches of the clearing in its huge downward gyre. It landed only a few paces from the nearly naked northman.

[Stormfollower]

The giant condor paced back and forth before the basalt slabe that Stormfollower lay. It eyed him from head to foot. Cocking its head towards the others it led out a dull croak. It aproached Stormfollower cautiosly and with strong beak and the full strength of its neck and body it lifted one of the northmans great hands up off the rock and let it fall with a smack back down on the cold stone. There was no stir from the white haired dreamer. Again it croaked and repeated the hand lifting. Still the shaman dreamed.
All the other avians looked on silently, no sound escaped thier beaks no stirring did they make in thier branches.
The snow came on faster now, melting as it touched the shamans wet back. Stormfollowers meal had sat for far to long to be edible. The pile of wood he had set beside the fire was now used up by his friends and thier conversations had likewise run out of fuel.

[Jetamio]

Jetamio heard the condor and looked over. Stormfollower was still out for the count and she began to worry. The snow was getting heavier. Leaving the others and picking up one of the heavy skins they had brought with him, she went over to the slab of rock he lay upon. She knew she would never be able to lift him. She glanced again at the condor, then crawled up onto the slab and lay down close to the shaman, throwing the huge bearskin over them both. She huddled close to the shaman, using her own body heat to warm him up, the skin insulating them against the snow.

[Stormfollower]

The deep dreamwaters fully ingulfed him. Thier pressures and currents bore down with thier full weight and power. It was all The shaman could do to stand amid its angry force. The greyness swept around him in varied eddies of shades, from near white channels to torrents of nearly black. His vision obscurred he fought to move his body forward through the turbid liquid.
Amid this chaos and confusion Stormfollower thought of Jetamio. It happened suddenly and without trigger. Her beautiful figure just appeared before him, vibrant and alive. She eminated light and her long radiant hair writhed in suspention thrusting back the tendrils of retreating grey.
Stormfollower inhaled deeply realising suddenly that he awoke in the warm air of a sunny meadow. Jetamio sleeping peacefully at his side.
"Still a dream?" He thought to himself.
The words echoed back from the far off cliffs. booming in his own shocked voice.
"Still a dream."
He sat up Not bothering to wake the dream Jetamio that slept peacefully beside him. She would be a mere reflection of his own mind as he saw her.
"Wake up madman." He thought.
Again the echoe made mockery of his thoughts posing them back to him as a question
"Wake up madman?"
Dismay formed now in Stormfollowers mind"What hath become of me, my dreams turned into prisons? How am I to wake form this terrible nightmare?"
"Don`t ask me." The echoe laughed back.

In the waking world Stromfollower rustled under the warm furs.
"Stop this" He whispered breathlessly as he rolled onto his back. The birds grew suddenly restless at his motion. Some leapt into preflight before settling back to thier watchfull silence.