The Dream Quest

[Jetamio]

Her brow furrowed in concern as he shifted restlessly and muttered in his sleep. She was tempted to wake him but didn't know if that would be a good idea or not. She half wished she could enter his dream to help him but she remember what happened the last time she had tried that. Doing so had almost killed herself and Tajer and she had no wish to risk that on Stormfollower.
Instead she stayed lying next to him though refusing to sleep, watching him almost protectively.

[Alsurin]

Will shifted his weight between feet restlessly as dread made writhing nest in his stomach. The menagerie of birds around them seemed to be waiting with equal impatience, and the druid was quite certain that most did not anticipate a reawakening.

"Stop this..."

The Feir'dal muttered a prayer under his breath and strode over to sit with a heavy sigh upon a log that lay rotting a few paces from his friend's unconscious form. Snapping a sharp reprimand to the avian vigil in the toungue of beasts, he gazed at the shaman's tormented features, letting the falling snow make wet patterns on his face. It had become obvious with heart force that their guide had fallen into the clutches of that same darkness that he had tried so hard to shelter them from. Bitter irony, the man who had saved them from goddess knew how many dead fates lay within the prison of inner perdition...and they were not able to do anything but stare like concerned midwives! Helplessness flowed through him in a bitter draught, moving Will to growl in a troubled mating of fear and frustration.

"Part of himself is holding him under the water..and I....I believe he is drowning."

[Jetamio]

She was startled to hear Will behind them, having not heard him approach being so intent on Stormfollower.

"Drowning?" Her voice sounded stricken. She touched his face with her gentle hands, caressing his cheeks, kissed his eyelids, then lay across his chest with her arms around him, doing all she could to keep him warm. She buried her face into his neck, whispering in his ear so no one else could hear. "Wake up my love, come back to us...to me. Return, awake..." She continued this soft whisper over and over again.

[Stormfollower]

Within the dream Stormfollower pondered heavily his fate until suddely the dream Jetamio woke and walked over to him.

"Wake up my love, come back to us...to me. Return, awake..." she wispered into his ear. He looked long into her beautifull eyes. Lost in the depth of them he swooned at her touch. Reeling with her beauty he held her close in a hug.

"How is it I shall return to thee Jetamio? What hath become of my spirit to be unable to return from a peacefull dream?" He spoke to himself almost as his mind lingered vacously in the depths of Jets beauty.

Suddenly over the crest of a nearby hill Willowen raced toward the embracing couple.
"Part of himself is holding him under the water!..and I!....I believe he is drowning!" He yelled and stabbed his finger back in the direction he had com from. "Hurry Storm, while there is still time to save him!"

Sencing the urgency of the situation in Willowens voice Stromfollower flew into action. He raced at breakneck spead with the spirit of the Chetah as his guide.
"Hang on! Aid is on its way!"

Overhead a condor scanned the landscape searching for something that lay beyond the view of the captivated dreamer.

[Stormfollower]

Coming over the hill the shaman could see a pond at the base of its other side and a man thrashing about near its center clearly near drowning. He rushed down to help. Wasting no time he threw off most of his clothes and dove into the frigid waters of the gacial pond. The cold water was invigorating and Strormfollower swam like he was born in the water, not coming up for air until he was within spellshot of the man. Then pulling out the scales of the fish he had eaten for lunch he threw the spirit of underwater breathing into the dying man. Apperently ralizing he was safe the exhausted man stopped his struggle and sank towards the bottom. Stormfollower dove down to grab him and by the time he reached the man they were very deep and the water was nearly so dark he missed him. But He managed to grab on to a waving collar and drag the man towrds the shore. With great one handed strokes he muscled thier way back through the frigid pond.

In the waking world Stormfollower shuffled suddenly in his sleep and drew in a great deep breath.

[Stormfollower]

For many long moments his breath remained held. Until finally at the extent of a normal dives breath he breathed in many gasping breaths. Coughing and sputtering, he settled back down onto his chest still in a deep dream. All around the birds began to leave one by one they abandoned thier perches untill only the condor remained wich, once it let out a parting caw turned toward the sea and walked its way out of the sacred grove by the one path that left it...


In his dream Stormfollower flipped the exhausted man over onto his broad back. To both his amazement and horror he looked into the amazed and horrified face of himself.

Instantly he awoke.

[Stormfollower]

And so it was that Stormfollower first met the witch and knew it to "be", it was not face to face as he should have liked it. But clearly it existed and had tried to trap him in the realm of spirits. He would from that day on be gurded against its influence. At least as it pertained to his dream questing.
Somehow somewhere this witch saw him as a threat or those that did had hired its services. Strangly he felt honoured by the attention even though it had just very nearly cost him his life.
For the remainder of the day he talked with his friends about thier dreams and related with excitement the revelations from his own. Not once did he mention his innability to leave the dreaming and only remarked on how good it had been to dream for so long.

[Stormfollower]

It was not until many years had past that the influence of this dream stretched out to greet him again.

He found himself once more on the shore of the lake looking into his own eyes, or were they his own?

"Remis, my son!" He clasped the boy in a huge hug. "What dost thou here?"

"I have come to play with you father." The boy smiled as his bright red hair dripped water down his pale blue robes. He had the stature of a human from Qeynos and slightly pointed ears doubtless from the elven influence of his mother Jetamio. Yet Stormfollower often commented on how much he reminded him of his own father.

"Well, I guess it is a long time overdue. How hast thow been? I trust thy studies go well?" Stormfollower smiled. Last time they had been together Remis had just entered his dream questing in induction to his study of shamanism. He had left him under the wise tutelage of his own uncle Oxbalm.

"Oh yes father, I am well on my way to understanding the mysteries of the spirit realms."

"Good Good! Let us go then and see how we may enjoy each others company in what time we may have together! The big man clutched his son close to him by his side. Oblivious now to the fact that he dreamed.

"Well father I have a new game I have learned. It is called spirit wrestling. It is great fun. Would you like to try it" He spoke with a wry smile and nudged his father with his elbow.

"Sounds like fun, how dost the game proceed?"

"Some playful spirits have shown me how father, watch as I bring them forth to play" Remis stood up from his rescued position. and moved his hands in a way Stormfollower had never seen in his years of being a shaman.

"Oxbalm has revised some methods." He thought to himself as he watched swirling mists form around his young sons hands and coalesce into humanoid forms.

"I have found this is a good way to keep up my martial training father. Go ahead you try them."

Stormfollower nodded with a smile and flew at the shapes with all his might but he found them not so insubstancial.
They met him with some resistance and this angered him greatly for some reason. He shifted into his werewolf form. Instantly he felt at ease and quickly ripped the shades to pieces, all but for one which managed to scurry away in a panic.

All the while Remis watched and laughed with great pleasure to see his father preform so well. "Well done father! See wasn't that fun?"

"Yes Indeed my son can we do another?"

"No father we must go now." He looked a bit distracted and his forehead bore beads of sweat and lines of worry. "What say we have a game of chase like we used to? And he ran off up a hill. Stormfollower grinned wide a toothy wolven smile ignoring the signs on his sons face and set off after the young man overjoyed to be together with him again. They ran and ran, over rocks and around trees until they were back at the same lake they had started at. Remis dove in.

With his great wolven smile frozen on his face Stormfollower followed.

[Stormfollower]

All the while in the conscious world Remis grinned evilly to himself as he had his father do his bidding. You see, Remis had not followed as closely in his fathers footsteps as the great shaman had thought. For he had found through his mastery of the dream quests that he had a unique gift. He could meet others in there dreams and guide them to his liking all the while in complete lucidity, fully aware that he dreamed while his hapless"victims" were unaware they even slept.

At first he floundered in his new found gift and used it to spy on his friends and family gleaning from their night visions what they "truly" thought of him. and it became apparent to him that no one thought well of him. Little did he know that it was his own misgivings and insecurities that brought this out in their dreams. His victims would often awake from these dream bewildered by the strange occurrence that had caused ill will to Remis. He kept up appearances alright but as the years passed and he became ready to begin his first cycle as a full fledged shaman he asked his great Uncle and mentor Oxbalm to give him leave for a week so he may visit the city of his grandfathers birth, Qeynos.

He came to see if perhaps the humans of the city would be more receptive to his friendship, and at first he thought they were. Yet again he used his powers of dream control to bent and warp the nightly walks in the realm of the insubstantial. One night he chose a man who he had just met to explore into his mind, but this was a grave mistake for it turned out the man was a powerful Necromancer. His great power seized upon Remis' mind and discovered him in his dream. Instantly Remis dropped the dream and fled back to the camp of his great uncle. Yet before he could get there the Necromancer had tracked him down. He tortured the poor boy mercilessly for two days. Intrigued by his gift he convinced Remis that there was much of the dark art in this craft and controlling dreams was the first step to animating bones. Finally the poor boys mind was broken and thus began his tutelage in his real profession, that of the necromancer.

That very same week he was inducted into the craft by the evil man, aware that this boys talent could be honed in a way that could most useful. Remis returned home and delayed the induction into shamanism, asking for more time to perfect his dream questing. Oxbalm agreed that there was no rush for the tribe to have any more shamans. All the while, in secret Remis returned to the sewers of Qeynos to seek out his true master and learn more of his dream control potential.

Slowly over the course of many tortuous "lessons" his evil master drew forth from him the anger and hatred needed to turn the boys guided visualizations into much more. Remis began to see what it was he was capable of. As his skill at necromancy grew so did the potential of his birth-gift. One day the breakthrough came, washing over him like a wave from some primordial ocean of instinct. He knew now that nothing, no necromancy nor shamanic learning could compare to this power the instant he saw its result...

Through a dream he had caused a rival student to take his own life... willingly and without hesitation. Through the actions he had caused in the other boys dream he had brought about actions in the real world. The boy had stood, he had opened his eyes and he had began to react to the dream as if he saw it in reality. Remis had formed the scene and set the boundaries and it all had been so easy. The boy lay dead by his own hand, guided by the will of Remis.

His master was overjoyed at the results and quickly began to formulate his plans for his new secret weapon with which he would now have unlimited access to the cities banks and government. But this plan would never reach fruition as he was found shortly thereafter dead in his study an apparent victim of his own skill at torture. No one could explain how he was able to administer so much suffering upon himself before he died but the whole underground world was rocked by the implications.

Remis continued on with his new teachers unsuspected for no one who lived knew about his gift. He continued to return home and make excuses to stall his investiture into the shamanic path of the Wolf Cult. Biding his time until he could make his move.

And so it was he found himself back in the Qeynos catacombs now with his dreaming father in tow. He had just used him to eliminate three of his most hated foes he had met in Qeynos and his plan was now fully underway. His father had rent them asunder shape shifted as a werewolf fully believing it to be a game he played with his long absent son while the dream unfolded. Now they fed leading a merry chase to any trakers who might try to follow them.

With his fathers influence and power he would now be able to take control of the cult and steer it in the true direction it needed to go.

They slinked their way through the waterways and passages until the came to the main outflow tunnel. Once more Remis led his father to dive beneath the water within his dream and thus controlled his actions in the real world.

(Continued In Stirrings in the North) viewtopic.php?f=5&t=17&start=75