The Dark Dream

Esmiralda and her companions, the Optimist Monk Broo Fang Tane and the odd, loutish warrior Seymurh, have paused to rest in a tavern outside of Veral Ski, one of the largest cities in all of Korin. Here they wash the blood, gore and dirt of their recent adventure from their bodies but Mira finds the memory of their lost comrade Merrick is as restless as the living dead that claimed his life...


The cold stench of the cavern returned to me, clogging my nostrils and prickling the skin on the back of my neck. I felt cold, wet and small. Everything was silent and I was alone in the dark--a dark so complete that I could have poked my eye before I saw my finger.

I stood, filled with the certainty that the smallest move in any direction would send me tumbling into a deep pit and I would fall and fall and fall until my body was dashed open at the bottom. I strained both eyes and ears, listening for something that would guide me to some form of safety. At first I could not tell if my eyes were open or closed and the only thing I heard--or, perhaps I only felt--was the beating of my heart, steady and strong.

Gradually I heard something, so faint at first that I thought it was a trick of my own mind: a whisper, long and low and hoarse with pain. It was my name. I licked my lips and leaned forward, trying to catch a firmer grasp of the sound and slowly, painfully slowly, inched forward my right foot to test the surface ahead. It was solid. There was no pit--at least not directly in front of me.

Whimpering and hating myself for the sound of weakness, I moved in that direction. I slid my foot forward and only rested my weight on it when I felt solid ground. Tears leaked from my eyes and I couldn't stop shaking. I could not tell how far I moved, or how long it took me. I only know that my knees were weak and my whole body shaking before I saw the faintest glimmer of light ahead.

I fought the urge to run toward it. the cavern floor was still pocked and treacherous covered with protruding rocks or damp dimples that would surely turn an ankle or worse if I let my concentration lapse. The whisper grew louder, more urgent and more pained. I felt things moving in the air around me, imagined shadows flitted in the scant gloom at the corners of my vision and I clamped my mouth shut to keep from crying out in fear.

Where were my companions? Why was I alone? Sweat formed in my hand and made my knife slippery.

Slowly, I began to see more clearly and I felt confident enough to move a bit faster. I wiped my hand on my trousers and looked around me, hoping to see the shape of either Seymuhr, Tane or Merrick. Perhaps they were that close, and laboring in silence beside me.

They were not. I was still alone. I rounded a corner and saw why: Tane and Seymuhr were dead, their insides dripping and hanging from iron manacles attached to the damp walls of the cavern. Their eyes had been eaten out and their lips were gone; their teeth showed, crooked and yellow. Merrick was on the floor beneath them, a grievous wound at his center. He reached toward me, groaning my name.

I rushed forward, my stomach lurching, looking wildly about me as I bent down toward him.

"Don't talk," I urged him. "I will set you free; let us escape this place."

"I am free," he wheezed. "You...you are bound. You must help. Find him! Find him soon!"

"Find who?" I felt something moving in the shadows behind me, a cold air preceded it. It curled around my neck and dripped down my spine. "Bound to what?"

He pressed something cold into my hand. "Bound to him," he gasped. "You are bound to all."

The presence was right behind me, so large and terrible and cold that it left like my bones had turned to ice and my blood boiled to my skin. I looked up into a darkness so black it hurt my eyes and saw dancing red globes--eyes filled with a malevolent mirth. They grew closer and the cold started to surround me...

I woke with a start, covered in sweat, panting alone in my room. My fingers were clumsy as I reached toward my knife. My left hand ached and blood dribbled from my clenched fist. I slowly pried my fingers open and saw the symbol of the Ministry of Human Preservation; in my sleep I had clenched it so tightly that it bit into my skin.

I sat back against the wall, holding the knife in one hand while staring at the wound on the other. Merrick's dream words floated back. Bound, I thought. The meaning was obvious. But who was...him? Or was it just a dream, after all? The answers were as elusive as sleep.