AN: Okay, really short chapter, mostly because all the fighting starts next chapter and I have all my little scenes written out in my head for *that* so, be patient children. I definitely haven't forgotten Minka (Mina) or Nepran (Nephrite) or Darius (Darien), but we gotta get some storlines converging before we can have some real fun! ;) Silence is golden, feedback is platinum... inspiredthoughts@hotmail.com *********************** Nightmares: Chapter Eight *************************** Leinta stared at the woman, the girl, her old lover had fathered with the woman, the Queen, she owed her allegiance to. Princess Serenais looked like her mother; Leinta knew this instinctively though she had never traveled close enough to Blanchant to see Queen Selenai in person. Serenais looked like a Princess though, with hair spun of light and gold, complexion pale and smooth like milk, and eyes a brilliant cornflower blue. There was an ethereal, delicate timeless grace in the proud carriage of Serenais’s shoulders and the decidedly upward tilt of her chin. But Leinta could see Valan within the Princess as well. There was an element of his brow, and in the shape of her even eyes that reminded the warrior of the man she had tried to love. She watched with hard, green eyes as Valan gently and differentially lead the Princess through the camp of the Defensive Mounts. Her long fingered hands tightened despite herself on Japta’s bridle. Her gelding flickered his ears in response and she soothed him instinctively. “Its all right beautiful. I don’t need a man’s love when I have you.” But her gaze followed Valan and Princess Serenais as they went into the tent that had been set up for the Princess and a sigh found its way past her full lips. ********************************************************************************** Zaite saluted the General Kunzath as he reported high atop a balcony of the palace that overlooked Rosha, Roshanna’s capital. The city was quiet, too quiet, and streams of people fled from its center as the common folk tried to escape from the nightmare that was coming. The Lords of Nightmares were coming. The Sleeping Ones had risen. “What was Spirit’s Woods like?” Zaite shrugged and tried not to stare as his commander shifted his cold stare to him. There was a remoteness in General Kunzath that Zaite knew as strength of will, steel, power reworked and shaped into a vessel of flesh and blood. Most the men feared him. Zaite did not but had less care for the worldly trappings of fear and hope that ensnared his fellows. He loved and lived while he could, the best he could. He respected the danger in his General’s fine blade and flexing hands. He knew that Kunzath had killed as carelessly as Zaite lived. Knew and was glad that for this battle Kunzath would stand on Roshanna’s side. “Like a graveyard,” Zaite finally answered softly. Kunzath’s silver stare pierced his green eyes and Zaite shivered despite himself, not because of the General’s regard but because memories of the forest rose to haunt him. He continued haltingly, “It was total destruction. Ash and shadows of death and the air, the air was heavy with magic that scoured the earth clean of life. “If, if we stand against that force, then I hesitate to predict an outcome that won’t, won’t,” Zaite swallowed, “that won’t result in our total destruction. The Sleeping Ones could build their empire on the dust of our bones with that kind of power.” General Kunzath growled softly. “We will not bow and fade at the feet of our conquerors before the first blood has been shed. The Sleeping Ones are myth. The only power myths have is what we give them!” Zaite’s lips curled into a twisted smile as he broke protocol to step forward and join his commander at the edge of the balcony. His green eyes fell to the fear filled city below. “Then we have given them great power indeed. People believed before our Nightmares awoke from their slumber. Now, faced with reality, what can we do but believe?” The General sighed and the sound, the sound held more vulnerability than Zaite would have guessed that Kunzath was able of. It worried him. Men were weak or strong, men who were both were those who broke the quickest. Now was hardly the time to discover the quality of General Kunzath’s valor. Roshanna needed heroes, not fools hiding behind masks of bravery. “I won’t accept our defeat before we raise out swords in battle,” the silver haired man replied stiffly, woodenly. Zaite looked up at his commander and dared to speak the words, “Then plan our victory.” General Kunzath laughed bitterly and smiled before sending Zaite on his way. ********************************************************************************** The Sleeping Ones swept the land that had defeated them so long ago. Monstrosities laughed and demons howled as their swords ran red with the blood of falling humanity. People cowered, women begged, and children cried before eternity found them in the complete destruction of life. The Lords of Nightmares, Kings of the Sleeping Ones, Frouth, Klarth, Tergan, and Gerith, rode the crest of war and waves of sorrow. Their armor gleamed obsidian until they blocked out the sun and the earth, the earth bled red for creatures that had walked its ground when it had been new and light was unknown. Verl watched and was pleased as vengeance fell his enemies and restored his court to its formal majesty of terror. On the wind though, he tasted the scent of five memories that should have been buried centuries past. The Five were dead but somehow, somewhere, some form of their audacity and arrogance still thrived. But it was no matter. His Kings would find the ones that had defeated them and obliterate their remnants and Verl, Verl would once again face Sandere. Only this time, dawn had slipped into night. The world was no longer new and strong. It was time for the rule of Nightmares. Verl laughed as the Sleeping Ones consumed Roshanna and Bleserd in a steady creep that took them to the two countries hearts. Rosha and Blanchant waited to be destroyed and for that, for that Verl would descend from his clouds to dance in the streets as they fell. They would fall soon.