19th Vhalar, 717
He was walking alone through the streets of Rharne, his treasured hat on his head and his hands dropped deep into his pockets. It wasn't the Rharne he knew to be however, but the one he'd known as a child. A busy, colorful city that from a young boy's perspective, must have been all there was of Idalos. A place where ordinary buildings stretched up to the sky and where the massive walls and gates could hold back dragons that Arlo knew to be real. The spires of the Lightening Cathedral reached even higher than the sky, into another world, and Lake Lovalus wasn't a lake at all, but a vast and bottomless sea.
He was going somewhere. He didn't know where or why, but he thought that it was important he got there on time. When he looked to the side and caught a glimpse of his reflection in a shop window, Arlo stopped and frowned at what he saw. It was him without question, but he couldn't have been more than six, seven arcs old. His brown mop of curls was in bad need of a trim and the black suit he was wearing was much too large. The familiar hat was on his head, but the size suited the adult he was, and not the boy looking back at him.
It was a dream, and in his slumbering state Arlo knew it. But nonetheless there was a sense of urgency to get to the place he was meant to be. And as important as that, to appear just as he did. He looked away from his reflection and hurried along. And before long, found himself at the edge of the wide ribbon of sand looking over Lake Lovalus.
There was a small group of people gathered there, most of them clustered at the edge of the water watching a small boat that had been pushed away from the shore. The thing appeared to be filled with rushes and tinder, and as a man fired an arrow glowing orange at the tip, Arlo realized what it was. He could just make out the shape of a figure reclined in the boat as the rushes caught fire.
Just as he realized what they were doing, that it was a funeral, and that this particular trespass of another's dream was better undone than continued, Arlo spotted a small figure apart from the rest of them. A small girl seated alone on a chair, her tiny feet in black patent leather dangling a good foot above the ground.
She was a pretty child who looked to be six, seven arcs old. Tiny for her age though, with reddish brown hair and eyes a curious shade of blue. Her long lashes were spiky as if soaked then dried by salty tears and her eyes were rimmed in red. But there were no tears spilling out them or streaming down her face. It was if she was all cried out and was left numb in the process. She was wearing around her neck a loop made of leather, with a carved wooden charm dangling off it. A crescent moon, with a little man seated in the curve at the bottom. He was wearing a hat that resembled Arlo's own. She wasn't paying any attention to him, or the group of adults gathered at the shoreline. Instead, her eyes were fixed on the boat as the flames consumed its contents. Something told him, he didn't know what, that he was supposed to be here after all. Or at least he should be.