Nothing ruins a day more than waking in sweat drenched blankets, knowing you better review your dreams to see what exactly the Parcae tipped their hands at coming your way. Not even cold tea or lack of bakeries nearby proves so effective.
Tossing off my bedroll, I gazed around the room, seeking some focus for the dreamwalk I knew to be ahead of me. The curse of my so-called doni, the gifted powers bound to one of my people at birth, is something I'd normally avoid. But lately, those gifts were proving more useful, almost under my guidance, despite my eschewing training to control them.
In the end, I lifted up the only piece of my gear that spoke of power to aid me, the acinias my father crafted for me. Despite being a tool more suited to my chosen profession of Custos, rider of the borders. Specula often answered the call, when other items hid from use in scrying.
Gathering my will, a single push into the mental forests, hands firm around the hilt of my blade, granted access a bit too easily. When those wanton wenches desire my remembering, things tended to turn far to interesting. And, often, denied my morning visit to the bakery just outside the walls around the campii. Traveling across cobble stones sheated by layers of freezing rain feels easier, to give some perspective on the effort required. Not walking in reality is the trickiest part. Tends to leave one with busted noses, either from walls or fists of offended people whose room you entered unwittingly smashing those protrusions.
The ease this morning, still enough to leave me exhausted, disturbed me. Right as I entered that forest, the beacons of danger lit the way. The dream tree I sought the final one. Not a good omen, even to one untrained as a haruspex. Fires, real or imagined, are something I dislike, other than for cooking. Too often, I see flames in dreams, with vague hints of bad things coming from those blazes.
Spending sevaral fingers of dream sand falling down the ethereal glasses that house them studying this fiery tree, I noted several things. It burned from witihin, a sign of betrayal to come. The bark was smooth with spines or needles, indicating the trouble lay amid the shifting sands across the Radix. Every leaf lay cupped, holding ashes falling from above, which I never'd seen before. And, the bloody thing grew daggers instead of nuts or seed pods.
There is a pain that comes to my face with certain expressions, despite a lack of injuries there to explain it. One fortune-teller in the bazaar once told me it spoke of an injury to come. Mother always claimed the pain reminded one your face could freeze forever looking that way. Left lip lowered and parted, while right remains tightly pressed together invokes it the most, this time a tad more than ever before.
Releasing Specula's hilt, my right hand reached to touch this fantasy plant, seeking to find the details mentally bound to this form. One touch, feather's brush really, answered that request, and left me tearing the veils of prophecy and wakefulness apart in pain.
***
Coming to your senses in the barracks hall, holding a bare blade before you is disconcerting. More to your comrades, than yourself. Even given most knowing the doni I am cursed with, enough of the turmae sharing that hall kept hands on their own hilts until I sheepishly sheathed Specula.
"Sorry. Dream walk went a bit off there." My mumble drew grumbled responses, and a few foul looks. It left my list of those convinced I am insane a bit longer. Only two here in the officer's quarters looking relieved. But still concerned for my well-being.
"You really need to seek more training, Varus." That snide comment from Custos Cilixia, despite being of the Jai' clans, let me know this apparently happened too often lately.
"When I find a mentor I can trust, I will. The flamenis only wish to lock me into a temple." I whispered.
The bad thing about her, Cilixia Carbona's gift allows her to hear exceptionally well, at distances bordering upon true clairaudience. "Keeps happening, it might be the only option, Varus." Her loose hair of copper-red danced across her shoulders, reminding me of her cousin Nonia's own long locks. "Third time this moon. At least you came out of it know what happened this time around."
I chose silence over pride, nodding in agreement. The last time, half a moon ago, I damned near spitted a fellow rider of the borders in my sleep.
Easing back into my room, glad the other occupant rode his circuit this hebdoma, the shakes started. Keeping from the others that I had no clue when Specula left her scabbard, let alone why I felt the need for bare steel, hurt. Admitting it, though wiser, would get me locked up in some monastary, as I feared.
Closing my eyes, but only after resheathing my acinacis and stowing it in my locker, I grasped my chair's back, searching memories for what triggered that blind response of near-violence. It took a bit of effort, but at last some details of the dream emerged. One standing out clear, the rest darting about in that shadow. The Shadow. Athalan's Shadow, set to plunge Andramakas into darkness for a hand of hebdomae, the fourteen day weeks we Elves use to mark the passage of time. A shadow known for the evils it sent, stirred up from hiding and ignited in the souls of all living beings.
Five lesser things moved in that darkness. And where there are five things of evil, others move about under their disturbance, sneaking about to do more evil.
Getting dressed for my daily duty as the Dux's orderly took a bit longer than usual. Shaking hands tend to foul up doing fastener strings properly. The room's disorder from my angered attacks in it hardly helped, as nothing lay in correct places. Nor was the damage isolated this time to my part of the chamber. Decimus Cato Drinius best be a bit late returning tonight, or I'd catch hell for it, not having time to clean up before reporting to duty.
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