Heaven and Hell (Part 3)

[Qit'ria]

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Qit’ria clutched at her busted ribs, as she looked back over her shoulder, glad that they were past otter territory. Their lily pad was in tatters, with just enough to keep it seaworthy, but just barely. She’d lost the fire and electric javelins along the way, and was keeping a shaky grip on the icy one. They’d been stuck in this Nightmare for what felt like a full trial.

Looking up at the sky, she could see they were nearing the border of the darkness, but every inch was hard fought for. The lily pad began to rock, as the waters became choppier, and Qit’ria crouched low to maintain her balance. She felt at her malorite empowered shirt, gingerly touching the ribs underneath. She’d been in the jaws of one of those giant otters, and had it not been for Zipper’s magic, she’d have been chewed in half. Instead, she just had a couple broken ribs and a sore tentrial ahead. If they got out of this.

The water didn’t grow choppy due to rapids or waterfall, but rather because it was growing shallower and shallower until their lilypad came to a full stop against wet, slick stones. For several hundred meters ahead of them, the river grew broad instead of deep. The lilypad couldn’t support their weight in this little water. It never ended. Qit kicked a tatter of the plant, before hopping off into the knee high water.

And as she landed, the sky cracked loudly above them.

Qit’ria looked up to see shimmering way up above her, before instinct kicked in. She dove forward, just as a rain drop the size of her entire body splashed down where she’d stood. The collision in the water sent her tumbling over the submerged stones, and sent the lilypad lightly bouncing away with Zipper on it, able to move a bit more freely now with one less passenger.

Qit’ria pulled herself upright with the aid of the javelin, wincing through the busted ribs, knowing she didn’t need to give Zipper any commands. The two had found a bit of a rhythm together in the journey so far, and words only slowed that down. So Qit began the slog through the water and stones, forward, focusing on listening for the drops above. She watched one up ahead crash down, sending a shockwave of water surging toward her. It swelled up to her waist, making it that much more difficult to press forward.

She could pick out a loud whistling, and immediately dove forward, though this time getting her hands beneath her. The drop exploded behind her feet, and propelled her forward, bouncing her over stones hard. She took in a heavy gulp of the river water, choking and sputtering and flailing before she finally came to a stop. Standing wearily once more, hacking up a lung, she kept moving, looking back at Zipper, seeing how her partner in this madness was handling the light drizzle to normal sized beings that felt like a deluge to the dynamic duo.

[Zip]

A monster she could deal with; every prior Nightmare she had been a part of followed the same general formula: an otherworldly beast would crash through the foliage of one of her dreams, jerking her back from whatever dreamland persona she was shackled in and returning her to Zipper, and begin its assault. Sometimes it took the form of an animal way beyond its Idalosian proportions, sometimes a chimera of multiple beasts, and sometimes the forms they took defied the physically possible in such a way that they dove deep into the sea of the horrifyingly eldritch.

But never before had she faced one that had taken the form of an entire dreamscape.

A singular large, toothy monster she could deal with.

The slow attrition of the hostile forest environment and its many hazards? Another thing entirely.

Even with a 2 arc stint as an Etzori regular who found herself going into the jungles of Rhakros more than once, the idea of suffering the rigours of nature was something that was beyond her. She supposed she, unlike the average soldier, never really needed to learn many of the core essentials of jungle survival: she didn’t need to eat or drink, she could fashion nearly any tool or weapon, and the Qualities embedded in her soul meant she had a solution for any problem: heat for a campfire, wool for a cold night, steel to give power to a wooden stick. She was utility itself; a walking field pack on a whim.

Additionally, the her vital role in her Wing as maintenance, reconnaissance, and, should one of the Wing Defiers prove unavailable, Artillery meant that the others put up with a lot from her in exchange for coveted magical support.

She never needed to learn. She never wanted to learn; her place was in the urban and desk, and venturing out into the woods was reserved solely for the hunting and mapping of valuable Fractures, with a seasoned guide to handle most of the grunt work.

Something like this Nightmare.

Minus the part where Qit’ria wasn’t hand holding her or the giant animals. The huntress, like in the prior Nightmare, had taken the brunt of the damage, but she didn’t go unscathed: an Otter’s claws found the back of her leg and dug deep paws into it before she blasted it off, and a Dragonfly had lifted her up before dropping her off.

Into the lake.

All that effort spent staying dry…

And in response to their successes against the earlier volleys of enemies, the Nightmare seemed to be cooking up something more overwhelming against them.

It was raining.

It was raining in the giant forest and, with it, giant raindrops falling from the sky to the whistling tune of “fuck you, that’s why.” She threw herself forward with neither the grace or the technique of Qit’ria, barely dodging the first raindrop that splattered against the place where she was standing, the rush of water re-drenching the back of her entire blouse anew and sending her staggering face first into the earth.

Monster she could slay, she thought again, the attrition of nature she could only survive.

“You’re the expert in the grand wilds,” she said in accented common, her irritation bared like a dog’s snarl. She tried to wipe the dirt off her face, gave up, and pushed herself up quickly from the ground, quickly finding her steps again away and ahead of the droplets that seemed to be slowly increasing in rate and intensity. “What do we do next?”

[Qit'ria]

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Qit’ria heard Zipper’s call for a solution, as she herself continued to run, dodge, duck, dip, dive, and dodge. She was racing through her mind, finding a proper solution to beating the rain. Normally, when it rained, you simply retreated to shelter, waited it out. All through the previous annoyances of the Nightmare, there’d been beasts of some sort on the banks of the river, waiting for them to go to ground, to take them, rip them to shreds.

And yet, now, in a point that a ground assault would’ve ended them in these shallows, there weren’t any to be found. Why? It made no sense, this was the most advantageous moment for the beast to strike them down. Unless… unless they were actually doing better than Qit’ria had thought. Wearing down the “beast”. She was no expert in magics, nor knowledge of Nightmare beasts, but she assumed they had to expend their energy to maintain this entire mobile realm of influence. And the longer they lasted, the more energy of it they expended.

And she assumed that it functioned similar to her own Becoming. The cost came with the change itself, not maintaining the form. She had no way of knowing for sure or testing this, but it gave her an idea. Force it to change forms, force it to play the game on their terms, not try and beat it while it has the front foot.

“To shore Zeepa!”

Qit’ria quickly changed direction, sending her leaping charge over the stones toward the foul mouthed, sopping wet woman. She heard the whistle of another close drop, and she dove forward, seeing a particularly tall stone ahead of her, just barely cresting out of the water. Qit’ria got her hands beneath as she dove, and used the stone to vault her forward. And so, the explosion of water, propelled Qit in her own motions rather than sending her flying askew. She was smiling, a feline grin of a predator beginning to toy with its prey. Her run changed from the two legs to the half and half of four limbs and two, with a fair bit of diving and vaulting of stones between.

Leap, slide. Jump, dodge. Run, dip.

Then a howl of pain. With her ribs slowing her down a bit, along with just exhaustion from this whole ordeal, on top of being in high (to them) water, a drop caught her foot on a stone, before blasting her right next to Zip. Qit’ria drew her javelin, using it as a walking stick, dragging her burning foot. She let herself cast a lingering gaze at it, and felt relief. It was still there. She could move her toes, in agony, but could move them.

Qit’ria limped, staggered, sputtering “cunt”s left and right, until she was finally able to pull herself from the muck and onto the shoreline, finding shelter from the rain. She reached it a bit before Zipper did, and she cast her eyes to the woman, and then upward. She saw the drop heading for where Zip was about to be, and didn’t think twice. She stomped forward, planting her good left foot, and launching her javelin outward.

Qit’ria howled in pain as she landed on her injured foot in the follow through, but her javelin flew a bit too low to strike the drop. And yet, the drop struck the shaft of the weapon, bulged around it, and exploded overhead Zipper, raining down mist and spray and smaller drops upon her instead of smashing every bone in her body.

Qit had the adamantite javelin left, and two knives. Her ice javelin was laying splintered in the river, the icy tip freezing a bit of the stones and water around it. She slumped against a massive tree, taking a moment’s reprieve to catch her breath.

“We wear it down. Make it change again. See no bugs? Lots bugs before. Take rest. No rain, we move.”

[Zip]

If Qit’ria took to the repeated onset of giant water drops like a dog, Zipper took to it like an indignant cat.

The javelin, the near-miss, and the final watery damnation of her clothes all happened too fast for her to properly process, but the aftermath left her hugging her very damp self as she hurried after the huntress into the dubious cover of the trees, finding her footing on the slippery ground as she scurried along, Seemingly more concerned with the fact with her current state of comfort and presentation rather than the fact that she had just narrowly escaped being crushed by a droplet from the Nightmare-derived heavens above.

She really, really, really, really, really needed to kill this Nightmare

Then… then she would take a bath.

Then she would make a serious, serious effort to find a way to never end up in one of these so-called Nightmares again.

Zipper’s slump was a twin to Qit’ria’s: same tree, opposite side of the trunk, similar expression of horrible, panic-stricken fatigue. Yet despite that, no one with any working eyes would have doubted who was taking this whole ordeal better. The rain only intensified even as they tried to hide and catch their breath, as if the Nightmare itself was sensing some kind of ineffectiveness with its current assault and was doubling down to make sure it would stick. Even the trees wouldn’t protect them forever; one of those lethal drops, even if but a fraction, would find their way through sooner.

Until Zipper pressed a hand to the ground and the earth rose from several places around them, converging upwards and at the centre to form a true, sturdy shelter beyond the shelter of the giant trees. A tiny little glitch escaped that magical effort, a little glimmer of wrong that sent her fuzzy and distorted for a moment, but taking from the Nightmare meant she wasn’t using enough ether output to trigger her witchbrand.

“I hope you choked on that one, you oversized fuckcunt!” she shouted up at the trees she could no longer see thanks to the shelter. Turning back to Qit’ria, she said, “We really ought to stop meeting like this.”

[Qit'ria]

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Qit’ria relaxed as she watched the earth envelop them, forming a strange “mud hut” around the base of the tree. She chuckled lightly at Zipper’s words, “Maybe next one be big feast with big fire, under stars.” Wishful thinking.

She pulled her injured foot in toward her groin, poking and prodding at it. It didn’t feel broken anywhere, as best she could tell. Heavily bruised, maybe a bit twisted, but just very painful. Yet another reason to go visit Faith when they got out of this hell.

Qit’ria scooted around the tree, putting herself closer to Zip so as to not be echoing off the mud walls as much, “Why think we keep find each other? I no know you. Two nightmare. Both with you.”

As the adrenaline began to wear off, it began to grow cold in the shelter, especially since the pair were both soaking wet. Qit’ria looked down at the bracelet on her left wrist, carved and fashioned herself from the hide and bones of an Aye-Aye Mouse. Her first animal totem. She reached out toward it with her soul, feeling for it, pushing into it like she’d done before. But felt nothing. Her piece of soul she’d stored in the totem was not there. There was no magic stored in the item.

And that made her more sad than she would’ve thought. It wasn’t real. It was a fake item. Because this was a dream. At least that meant it couldn’t be destroyed. It seemed her own magic was useless in this nightmarescape. Couldn’t bring totems in. And so far, there was no time to make another while here. Not with being hounded so vigilantly.

“Where from, Zeepa?”

But since she’d asked, she decided to answer to, only seemed right. No need to be demanding of someone she was partnered with, who was more than pulling her own weight.

“I in Scalv-whore-us. Come from Desnind, many arc past.”

A chunk of time passed as the two got to rest a bit, Qit’ria leaning against the trunk, her eyes closed, shivering from time to time. And then the air began to grow warmer. Or was it that Qit was getting more used to the chill? A fog seeped into the shelter, bringing more warmth with it. The huntress opened her eyes, suspicion arising immediately. And as the fog reached her nostrils, she realized it was no fog at all.

It was smoke.

She immediately scrambled up, favoring her good leg, and poked her head out of the structure, hissing at the sight. A ring of fire was burning its way around their location, making it impossible to flee further into the forest. She watched the flames, orange, crackling, consuming the massive trees quickly. Too quickly.

Her plan seemed to have worked a bit. The Nightmare had changed forms, and was fueling the fire more than it would happen on its own. She cast her eyes out toward the river. The rain had stopped. It seemed that the beast was growing more weary, and more desperate. Back to watching the flames, she saw that they were growing upwards faster than in any other direction. So that was good, she thought.

“Time move Zeepa.”

But what Qit’ria hadn’t seen, for it was too far above them was that the canopy of the forest was already ablaze. It was all above them, surrounding them without their knowledge. Until the first branch fell, slamming into the ground between them and the river, exploding in an inferno of splinters, coals, and flames.

No rest for the wicked, it seemed.

[Zip]

“The feast will be sewage, the fire will rise to swallow us, and the star will align wrong and a great beastie fuck will waddle out of a cesspool and eat us all,” Zipper said bitterly. With her luck, it wouldn’t even be a jest. “I’ve no idea why these Nightmares keep happening to me. Or us. I’ve had these things with other people and, well, you’ve been the most useful one so far. I got this blonde parasite once and he was just absolutely useless. Bred from nel and comfort, that one - and he says he hunts mages.” Zipper chuckled mirthlessly. “He probably couldn’t tie his own bootlaces and he says he hunt things like us.”

A testament to how tired, how fatigued she was feeling right now could be clearly seen when she didn’t make a noise of protest when Qit’ria inched closer. She wouldn’t let the savage come within visual distance in Idalos - and the terrifying idea that this was some kind of sick, twisted game where some emean deity was pairing her off with everyone she would have despised in real life: wealthy noble, nubile savage, enthusiastic skyrider, crazed-

No. Blighted as the Gods were, surely they had better idiocies to spend their time on.

She hoped.

“I’m from Etzos,” she said. Scavo- the isle of pirates. The name struck a vague chord, but little more. Desnind a little bit more; Niv had mentioned the place once or twice, the land where the doomed Magani had once stood tall - would have still stood tall if the Tunawa had anything resembling an instinct for basic survival beyond ‘act small and get enslaved’. She liked Niv -as much as she could like anyone anyway- but those who chose not to prepare chose nothing at all.

She looked out at the forest from one of the gaps her shelter; she should really take a basic fieldcraft lesson these days if this was going to be a trend.

“Scalv-whore-us.” she favored the syllables. “What do you do that?” She suspected she knew the answer: Qit’ria really didn’t seem like she knew more than the admittedly formidable expertise she had displayed; she was bound to be a huntress or gatherer of a sort. “I’m a-” She struggled to find a word for what exactly her current profession was. What started as the job scope of an etherist hunting for fractures had soon ballooned under various responsibilities both wanted and unwanted. She was police, spymaster, fixer, and most inexplicably, a glorified clerk for a man with a giant moustache. “They paid me for being a mage in Etzos.” she said simply. Qit’ria didn’t seem the type to care for digressions.

But for now, they rested.

But the Nightmare beast didn’t seem content with even ‘for now’. In a time too short for rest, in a time when she closed her eyes and was seemingly jerked awake either a bit or a break later by Qit’ria’s voice, she smelled smoke.

With water failing it, the beast seemed to be going for the opposite solution.

“No,” Zipper said to the huntress. “Time to end this.”

She had no power over water; she was no Defier. She had no traditional power over fire either. Again, that was a Defier’s purview - but the little flame she had stolen all those arcs ago still burned within her as a Quality, giving her some small resistance to the heat of the blaze.

Which meant she could touch it a bit before she got burned.

She reached out with her Ether sense and found the crux of the Nightmare’s power vested into this growing inferno, feeding off the landscape to fuel its fiery tempest. She took in the source of its being, foul and hot, and she gave it shape. Gave it definition to something that had none.

She took the measure of its Ether.

And, as an etherist, she just took it.

She pressed her palm to the oncoming blaze and triggered her Absorption - and perhaps the Nightmare has threw too much of itself into this investment, or perhaps Absorption’s power was Doubled by the mechanics of how magic worked within a Nightmare, but the flames noticeably wilted even as they struggled to surge forth. A whole section of the burning canopy extinguished itself, leaving behind branches and leaves strangely unburned as the Nightmare focused its Ether inward, concentrating on rushing across to end the two women

Just as the Nightmare deemed her edible, so too would she consume it whole.

[Qit'ria]

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Qit’ria shurked back from the fiery branch, snarling at it, as though it were the actual attacker. Her instinct at the presence of fire matched that of all animals. Flee. Panic and flee. But it seemed Zipper had different plans. She wanted to fight. But fight what? There was nothing there! Just fire.

And yet, she watched as Zipper’s arms outstretched and saw the look of determination on the woman’s face. Qit’ria couldn’t tell what exactly she was doing, and that must mean it is part of her magic. Looking back around them, she saw some of the fires beginning to snuff out. No. Not snuff. They dwindled down, as if out of material to burn, despite the wood being heavily present.

The flames were the beast! Or part of it. It didn’t just make them, like Merces did, it became them. But Qit’ria wasn’t about to stand idly by as Zipper took all the glory of the hunt. There was something to kill now, in a sense. She stepped out of the hut, spear in hand, not that it would do much good against a fire. She took a quick read of the nearest flames, determining that Zipper was not in immediate danger.

And she hobbled her way around the dying flames of the branch, making her way to the river. She’d seen the power of ice against fire. When she was on Immortal’s Tongue with Tio, Pash, Kali, and Kura, those snowcrystals had more than done the trick. And she knew where the tip of her ice spear was.

Reaching the water, she could see the dark sky now, with large cracks of light streaming through. The beast was losing its hold over the area, it was evident everywhere. And in one of those streams of light, was the growing island of ice. Qit’ria limped her way through the mud, wondering how she was going to get through the ice.

She considered grabbing a large rock and bashing her way through, but that would be slow, so very slow. Then, realizing what was in her hand, she realized she had a metal stronger than any other she’d worked with. She stepped onto the ice, testing her weight, ignoring the biting cold beneath her feet, and crept closer to the center of it. Then she stabbed down with a powerful thrust of her javelin. It sunk deep into the ice, and Qit’ria pulled on it, further cracking the growing glacier. Chunks fell away. She repeated it over and over until she could see the spear head within.

Pulling her blouse off, she used it to cover her hand as she reached down, pulling the stubborn spear head out of the ice, leaving the adamant spear momentarily wedged. She then quickly tied the spear head to the butt of the javelin, wrapping her top around it tight, letting the icy power of it freeze it in place. She yanked her double sided javelin out, and marched her way back to Zip, who seemed to still be snuffing fires left and right.

But one fire was not shrinking, but rather growing and moving. It had a humanoid form, though it didn’t seem to quite grasp how to move in it. It wobbled slowly from the branch fire, absorbing those flames, and growing a bit larger, reaching out toward Zipper, still a stone’s throw away from the transmutater.

Qit’ria knew her javelin wasn’t the straightest on the icy end, so throwing with that one would be inaccurate at best. But being double ended, and with what seemed to be a creature not understanding the form it was in, she had an idea. She heaved the javelin forward, adamant end first, and watched as it sailed through the fiery creature with only mild effect as the frozen end just briefly made contact.

But she’d arced it intentionally, and it struck into the ground in front of the creature, wobbling heavily up and down as it did. The seemingly incorporeal fire creature continued to walk forward, until it pierced itself on the icy point once more. And with as slow as it was moving, the ice began to force more and more energy to be spent to maintain the form, so the fires all around continued to decrease.

And the creature seemed to be pinned in place, confused as it was continually assaulted by the drain of power to maintain the fiery form and from Zip’s consumption of its ether. But it was not dead. Not yet.

“Zeepa! Now! Kill!”

[Zip]

‘Zeepa’ heard her loud and clear.

Bit by bit, the fires raging through the trees died. Through her Ether sense, she felt every tree abandoned, every branch discarded, every lead tossed aside as the Nightmare found itself forced to concentrate more of its power into breaking through to them. The firestorm soon shrunk into an inferno, the inferno gave way to a blaze, and that Blaze seemed to draw in all the power in the universe itself and roared, surging forward to meet her-

And then faltered.

She wasn’t expecting Qit’ria to help in this one, truth be told, but the huntress was resourceful. Inexplicably naked all of the sudden, she noticed from the corner of her eye, but resourceful. Whatever she had done to the Nightmare had gave it pause. The ice javelin, she saw finally. She was lucky it had held out for that long; galvanize traded longevity for speed.

And it gave her an idea.

She could continue Absorbing the beast until it was naught but a mite in the sand.

She could go for the traditional Ether Missile to disperse it to the ungrateful winds.

But she had an audience here, enough of an advantage to press, and just enough of an edge today to want to make the last moments of the beast’s life spectacular; duality translating to physicality.

She kicked off a useless, soggy boot and stamped down on the ground hard, forging a Pathway…. All around the last remaining blaze. Every inch of earth around the living fire found access to her spark, found a channel for her Ether to flow through and warp, warp, warp.

But no Shapecraft took place here.

Instead, she dug deep into her Palette and found the coldest, most unpleasant thing she had ever seen fit to archive. She found it sitting there: a memory of a little girl who tried to find fire for her little brother in the season with no sun. She found it, grasped it hard, and let it loose.
She galvanized the entire area around the living flame into Cylus’ bitter chill.

The Fire shrieked. No, she didn’t imagine it; the fire flat-out shrieked. It fought both the sudden, colossal drain of its Ether on a spiritual level, while its body fought the cold. It grew smaller still, weaker, but its shrieks grew louder, until it detached completely from the foliage, a human-sized candleflame gasping for breath.

Not so long ago they were in its situation. Not so long ago they were the ones fatigued and deprived of a reprieve.

She-

The world swerved and she swooned a little.

Absorption took in Ether and let it out harmlessly through the body - but it was a craft meant primarily for rival Domain magics, not the raw emean chaos that seemed to comprise the Nightmares that assassiled them so. She would have needed time to acclimate to it, to take in so much at once-

And it was then that the Nightmare took the opportunity to flee. It raised two tendrils of flame to the sky and whatever that was animating the ‘fire’ erupted out of the blaze was a gray foggy mist that trailed up and away, beyond Qit’ria and Zipper.

[Oracle]

_________________________

The Nightmare fled as an amorphous cloud of gray mist that raced toward the sky. However before it could make its escape a bright flare of silver light erupted around it, a conflagration of energy that shredded it into ribbons. Bits of shredded Nightmare danced in the air like shreds of gray and black confetti as they cascaded around Qit’ria and Zipper.

The two women had been resourceful in defeating such a fearsome creature of Emea and their efforts had been noticed. Evidently something or someone had intervened on their behalf, ending the creature before it could infect another dream.

Qit’ria, ever the huntress had used her ice javelin to deal a heavy blow to the creature, and Zipper had employed the intricacies of her Transmutation magic to undo the fire’s very nature. They were both indeed impressive.

The flames had dissipated leaving the pair standing within a now soundless forest. A sense of calm descended upon them with the realization that they were no longer under threat. Reality seemed to waver in the space in front of the two women, rippling like a silvery pond that had been disturbed with a gentle touch. Radiance forged from what seemed like liquid moonlight spilled into the forest, originating from a single point a few yards in front of them. It was like a single palm sized star. The star glowed brightly before expanding into a recognizable shape: a door. The door was cobalt blue and appeared like something that might be seen on the front of any home bearing scratches and signs of wear. The brass doorknob suddenly turned, and the door creaked open, pure white light spilling out around a slender woman’s silhouette.

“Well done.” She spoke, her voice echoing strangely around them. Her words were tinged with exhaustion as if she had just woken up from a nap to find Qit’ria and Zipper standing at her bedside. The woman yawned, stretching as she stepped from the doorway, closing it behind her. She wore a simple but elegant white gown that dragged the floor, spilling around her feet. Her hair was a bright blonde, and cut to a sensibly short length.

“To thwart a creature of Nightmare is no small feat. You have both shown that you are ready to take the next step.” She said, sounding rather pleased with the pair.

Holding up a slender hand to halt any questions, she continued. “I am Jesine, the caretaker of dreams, and I am here to Escort you.” She gestured toward the door hanging in the air that she had entered through. “If you follow me I can promise true liberation in dreams. You can walk where you will, but be warned, there are dangers that come in venturing further than most mortals.” Jesine smile, the corners of her lips creasing as she looked upon the huntress and the mage.

“You have both faced Nightmares; I have no doubt that you will face more perils in the future. This is your choice. “The last words echoed with a sense of finality, chiming in Zipper’s and Qit’ria’s minds like the clang of a bell.

Jesine nodded to both of them and returned to open the door. She stepped into the threshold, watching the two women and waiting to see if they would follow. If the women chose to follow then they would be embraced by a swathe of white radiance.

“This is the Veil.” Jesine’s voice would say, speaking somehow to them through the swirl of white. “It serves as the barrier between dreams, as well as the passageway between them. This is the path you must take if you are to walk into the dreams of others, but you must be wary, as it is easy to become lost in this place.”

The undulating white radiance would begin to fade and Qit’ria and Zipper would find themselves on the shore of an unfamiliar beach. A desert splayed out behind them, with rising and falling dunes that were ever shifting and moving in the background. A young boy, perhaps no older than twelve arcs stood on the shore, his ankles submerged a few inches in the surf. This was the dream of a child, his dream, that they had been brought into. They had passed through the Veil and been brought into the dream of another.

Jesine smiled warmly at the boy who would somehow seem to be unaware of them, her white dress rippling wildly in the brash sea wind. “This is where I leave you. I wish you both well.”

With that she vanished in a flash of silvery radiance, leaving the two dreamwalkers behind.

Off Topic

Was requested to step in and modbomb this thread. Hopefully this works for you both. Let me know if you would like me to grade this when you finish.

[Qit'ria]

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Qit watched with eager, albeit tired eyes as Zeepa did something with her magic, and further attacked the creature. But when it shifted, floating away upwards, Qit snarled angrily, thinking it cowardly. And then the... shiny stuff snuffed it out. Was that more of Zeepa's magic? Qit struggled to comprehend it, and really, had no more understanding now of trans-mutt-nation than when she didn't know it existed. It was kind of disappointing that it ended just like that. She expected... more.

A shiny... door opened in the middle of them, and Qit snarled too, dropping into a defensive posture, baring her fangs, and holding her hands up. But it was a woman. A pretty woman, who gave off an air of... something more. Qit relaxed and stood up straight, eyeballing this blonde woman. The woman spoke and Qit found her voice extremely pleasant, and relaxed further. It seemed it was over. But she had no idea who this woman was, but instantly liked her.

Jesine? Not a name she knew, but in her mind she was beginning to suspect this woman to be more than a mortal. Was she in the presence of an Immortal? And the woman's words, particularly one, rang in Qit's mind. A choice. And then she left through the door. And Qit didn't hesitate a moment, her feet carrying forward toward the blinding light. She stepped through and found herself encapsulated in the white glow.

It was surreal. It was terrifying. It was a world without form. She listened closely to Jesine, taking heed at everything she said, not even paying any mind to if Zeepa followed. It seemed Jesine was showing her how to walk through dreams, not just her own, but anyone's. And then the world changed. She was on a beach. Sand between her toes, salty air in her face. There was a boy there, wading in the surf. He was young. She looked around her, seeing desert far and vast. It reminded her of the Hotlands she traveled through when she was younger. A harsh land, but the coast was usually pleasant.

And then Jesine was gone, leaving them to watch this boy's dream. And inherently she could tell it was his, and not just because he was the only one here. Qit'ria sat down, finally resting after this brutal Nightmare, and watched. The boy just played and played, kicking at the water, splashing about, throwing stones. Once he tripped and splatted face first into the wet sand, and Qit'ria laughed. This was beautiful, just watching was nice. It was peaceful. And she laid there like that, until she drifted off to sleep herself, and slipped from Emea back to the waking world, snorting back awake, cutting off her snores.

She knew she could return now. And knew that she would. And maybe she'd run into Zeepa again. Learn some more words.