I get out of bed. It's still dark. I've gotten up because my alarm went off. It's early, about 3:30 A.M. and I have to get ready for work . I haven't gotten much sleep, and I am so tired that my head feels heavy. However, I have to get up, or I will be late for work.
Coffee!
I just need my coffee, and then I'll be okay.
I grab my glasses and my phone and head out of the bedroom to go downstairs and get ready for the day. I walk around the end of the bed and reach for the door handle in the dark, but instead my hand hits a wall. I hear my husband's breathing change, but he doesn't wake up.
I move along the wall, looking for the door handle. The room isn't that big, so I should be right next to it, but I can't seem to find it. Finally, I give up and open my phone to use the light it puts out. It's not very bright, but since I've been asleep, it should be enough for me to see. Oddly, somehow I've gotten into a corner. I see the door, and I head that way as my phone goes out. I reach for the handle, and boom! I run into the wall again. Opening my phone, I see that I have gotten turned around and run back into the corner.
What the heck? How did I get here? I put my hand on the wall, and start moving to the right, toward the door just two feet away from me. My phone light goes out again, and I am again in the dark. After a few seconds, my shoulder bangs into the wall. Turning on my phone light, I see that I am now facing as if I'd turned to my left. My fingers are in the corner, my shoulder is against the wall, and the door is behind me!
Now, I am really frustrated. I must be very sleepy, to keep doing this. How did I get all the way around the room and not realize it? I figure maybe I am sleepwalking.
I reach behind me. I am touching the door frame right now. With my fingers on it, I turn around. I can see the door. As I reach for it, my phone light goes off again. My fingers slam painfully into the corner, and I hear my husband's "half awake" breathing again. This time, I have not moved, and I know I did not go back to sleep. I turn on my phone light, and sure enough, I am back in the corner.
Now, I am a little bit scared. I say my husband's name. He sounds like he is almost awake, but he doesn't answer me. In a panic, I call his name again. He does not wake up. I put my fingers in the corner, and stretch to reach the door with my other hand. I can't quite get to the door handle, only the middle of the door... but I can feel the frame against my arm. With that to guide me, I slide along the wall, reaching for the edge of the door... and bang my fingers into the corner.
Now, it's no longer dark in the room. The sun is coming up, and I know I've been doing this for a couple of hours. I am all ready late for work. My phone rings, and my husband wakes up. He asks why I'm still home, and I start to move toward him so I can explain, but instead I run face first into the corner.
The impact of the corner on my face has awakened me. I have dozed in front of the computer. I woke early this morning and came downstairs before my husband left for work. I've been off work for a month, as my company has been dragging its feet with regard to getting me back on the job after a minor injury. I've been really frustrated with the process, and yesterday they sent me another item of paperwork to fill out that isn't even related to my injury. They had a whole month to send me that page, but they held it until a full work week after the last item was turned in for evaluation, and I am starting to think they are deliberately delaying my return as a means of retaliating against me for filing worker's compensation. Why else would they send me paperwork requiring a doctor to evaluate physical capabilities that were never in question, and why else (if this paperwork is so necessary) would they have waited until just now to make it available to me?
I think this dream is a function of my frustration and feelings of helplessness due to that process, and my feeling that I'm not contributing to the household because I'm not bringing in any income. I really do feel like my employer has stuffed me into a corner, and I can't get out. I think the part about slamming my fingers, though, had more to do with the fact that they are sore this morning, and my slamming face first may have been because I slumped down and hit my head on the desk . I'm fine, but the spot where my face impacted the desk is right where it hit the wall in my dream. (Don't feel bad if you laugh at this. I am!)
Through the Woods
I am leading 4 of my real-life friends through the woods. I'm not myself. Instead, I'm a guy. The friends I'm leading through the woods are all women who are close to me.
We're all dressed kind of odd. I'm wearing pants that feel like thick leather, but it feels like I've worn them a lot. They're not worn out, but they've been worn to a malleability that makes them comfortable. They are also lined with a soft fabric. I have on a shirt that is long enough to be more of a nightshirt. It's also normally very soft, but it has been wet with dirty water, so the parts that don't rest against my skin have stiffened up as if starched. Over that, I've got a hard leather vest, and several straps and belts. I'm carrying a bunch of small pouches full of dried herbs, stones, feathers, and other odd things, weapons (a bow and a sword,) and a backpack. I also have a wide-brimmed hat strapped to the backpack. My hair is in several braids, all tied together in the back using a thin piece of leather. I have on leather boots with leather soles. They feel soft, but my feet feel protected anyway. The outsides of the boots are wet, but my feet are dry.
My friends are dressed as oddly. They are all wearing pants, but not as well used. One friend's pants are of leather that has been beaten between stones so that it is softer. The other two seem to be wearing canvas that is somewhat well worn but not a lot. None of them fit, so they all have belts on to hold the pants up, and the legs have all been rolled up too. I have the impression that the pants are borrowed. All of them have long, well cared-for hair tied back with a series of metal rings.
The girls are all wearing shirts similar to mine, and vests or jackets of leather. Each has another belt over the shirt, and each has a dagger and several little pouches like mine, and all are wearing leather boots, though theirs appear to be in much newer than mine. Their boots do not seem to be holding up as well. I am worried about the condition of their feet, but the situation cannot be helped. The women have backpacks, but their backpacks are not as full as mine. They have discarded items that they thought necessary before leaving, but which they didn't want to carry after lugging them over the first mile or so.
We aren't exactly running away from something, but we still kind of are. It is more that there is somewhere we need to travel to, and we know that we are going to be pursued by someone who doesn't want us to get there, just as soon as it is discovered that we have gone. We have a head start, and I feel a sense of urgency to put as much distance behind us as possible in the short time that we have. I expect whoever it is to start coming after us when day breaks. I am pushing the girls to move faster than they like. They are mad at me about that, too. I realize that they don't understand the danger.
We are not on an actual path, but moving through dense underbrush. I am using landmarks to tell where we are and where we need to go. My charges are not liking the route. I've just explained that we're not going where they think we are, and they are really upset with me for several reasons, including my having been dishonest with them in about the direction of our travels.
I know that our followers will be bringing dogs, and we need to throw them off the scent. There are two potential directions they will suspect, and I've taken the "wrong" one to get us where we need to go. The "wrong" one leads directly where I told the girls yesterday that we'd be headed this evening. I made sure to leave our scent all over that path. I spat on the ground and dropped crumbs as we walked. I made sure we did not stray far from the path for "personal" breaks, as the women called them. They had been annoyed at the lack of privacy, but when I reminded them that bears live in the woods, they had decided to not get too far away from the guy with the bow and sword.
After about three hours on the path, we had started across an old and somewhat treacherous rope bridge, then tied ourselves to it on one side of the middle. Then, I cut the bridge until it couldn't hold our weight. When it broke, we slammed into the side of the cliff, just above a rock ledge that looked solid from above, but actually had a huge crack in it that led to a cave. My hope was that because there had been previous discussion about the bridge needing repairs, those chasing us would think that we'd broken it under our weight.
From the ledge with the crack, we'd gone into the cave, traveled downward, and come out into the stream below. After traveling "sideways" in the water across the distance between where we made it look like we were going to where we actually are going, we are now walking through somewhat dense underbrush that includes plants we don't want to touch with our skin. The girls tell me why they are so angry with me for deceiving them about the direction we are taking. Each of them has told a close, personal friend or loved one that we are going to the other place.
I remind them that I had told them not to tell anyone where we are going. They have put their loved ones in danger with that knowledge. When asked, they will think they know, and that belief will betray them under interrogation. They will be tortured until they give up that information. The person who wants us stopped would have been able to easily discern if they did not know anything, but not if they've been given the wrong information. I realize that three of the people I am told have been given the wrong information aren't going to hold up under much adversity, and I figure that there won't be much of a delay. I am sure that even though they'll take time to extract information from the girls' loved ones, those who will come after us will still leave shortly after sunrise.
The sun is going down and the woods are getting dark, but it's a full moon, and I can see well enough to navigate. It sounds like the night time animals are waking. I know of a few which might be dangerous, and I am watching for them. I know ways to handle them, but would rather not be taken by surprise.
At this point, we are actually headed for a safe spot which is between our current location and our intended destination. It's a small cabin which is built mostly into the side of a big hill. There is a tunnel from the back of the cabin through the hill to the other side, to be used in case of discovery. The front of the cabin actually looks like a huge evergreen tree, and the hill mostly covers the rest of the building. There are windows, but from the outside they look like deposits of some kind of mineral, and no one can see into them. There is a chimney (the back of the fireplace is the exit to the tunnel) but from the outside, it just looks like a pile of rocks. The design of the chimney causes smoke to be dispersed as it comes out, so that there has to be a really big fire for it to be visible from beyond a few hundred feet, and from that distance, the woods hide it. The location is in a space where there is nearly always a light breeze, and that helps with the effect. The size of the hill is deceptively small. Much of the actual building is underground.
The whole thing was built by members of my father's side of my family, and has been used for generations as a hideout during times of political upheaval. The area is surrounded by brambles and poisonous plants, but there is also magic surrounding it designed both to make the area unattractive to others, and cause it to be hard to remember for any visitor but us. Any unwanted visitor approaching the place would at first feel uneasy, then very nervous. There would be an undefined aversion to being there, with a sense of being watched and a sense of dread. If the intruder remained or continued to approach the area, he or she would eventually feel distinct fear and might even imagine a specific person or animal previously encountered being nearby and waiting to strike. In those susceptible to magic, that fear would grow into a sense of panic that would send the person fleeing at top speed until he or she was totally outside the range of the spell. After that, the aversion to going that direction would be increased, but at the same time, the individual would not be able to consciously remember or describe where he or she had been. As a result, most travelers and predatory animals just subconsciously avoided the area, and no one seeking it had ever been able to locate our hide-out.
I lead the girls through a few miles of underbrush, until we come to a thick hedge with a short, but very thick tree in the middle of it. The hedge is not too thick to go through, but we can't see the other side, where I know that the ground ends in a high cliff. The tree, short from our side, is actually over 80 feet tall, and we're near the top of it.
I rope us all together, and instruct the girls to begin climbing with me down the tree. They are appalled. They do not want to rip the pants they borrowed, mess up their hair, scratch their skin, and so on. I ask them if they want to be ripped apart by the frenzied hunting dogs that will surely be pursuing us soon, and point out that though all of the measures we've taken will delay the men who will be after us, but there is one tracker among them who will eventually find our path. I have a mental image of this man. He is a few inches taller than me, with a bulkier build than me (and I know that though I am more agile and have more endurance, but he can lift more and hit harder) with light colored hair and a nose that is crooked from having been broken in a fight with me. There is an aspect of that fight that is one reason why this man hates me personally, but it doesn't come to mind. I only know I don't want to have to fight him up close again, because I don't want to have to kill him, and if I don't, he'll kill me. The thought must do something to the expression on my face, because the girls quiet down enough to hear me repeat "just do as I am telling you, for your own safety."
We start down the tree. It isn't easy going, but there are enough branches to get us most of the way down unharmed. At one point along the way, one of the girls loses her footing and falls, but the rope holds and I am able to pull her back to the tree. We are still a good 20 feet off of the ground when we run out of branches. However, at this point, rocks jut out from the side of the cliff, and we are able to get a grip on them. We can climb down most of the rest of the way before we have to let go and fall a few feet to the ground. The girls are now scratched and dirty, irritable and scared, and out of breath. I have to get them to the cabin before they poop out on me. I have to admit to myself that I didn't expect these pampered ladies to make it this far, so I can't be annoyed with them for their attitude. I'm a little scared myself, anyway. I know it's too soon, but I keep thinking that the wind is carrying the sound of dogs barking. After letting them rest a moment and settle down, I tell the girls to come on, we have to keep moving. I have a bad feeling that he has me figured out.
To the dismay of the girls, I walk us up the middle of another stream before we cross to the other side, where I spot wolf tracks. I can hear a low growl. We pause there for a moment, and I pull a flower from one of my packs. I eat it, and it makes my throat feel scratchy and tight, but it lets me hear differently. A deep voice from the direction of the growling asks who we think we are, trespassing on his land. I answer in a voice that sounds different to my ears than to my mind. I know what I am saying, but I sound like a dog. I say that I am the high walker (a name I know has been given to me by a wolf who marvels that I walk on my back feet and fight only with the front ones) and I am here to ask the return of a favor. I remember treating a whole litter of cubs for a potentially deadly illness, saving their lives. The wolf steps forward, and I see that it is in fact my friend Long Scar (so named because of the bald area along his side where a bear's claw had sliced him.) Two of the girls gasp and grab my shoulders. It occurs to me that it's a good thing I don't have to defend them right now, as Long Scar jumps up and slams his shoulder into my chest, nearly knocking me down. He is happy to see me. He sits and grins, wagging his tail. The girls seem to think he is going to bite because he's showing his teeth, and they hear him barking. I tell them to be quiet, then realize they can't understand me. I must sound angry, though, because they all shut up and take a step back.
He asks me who they are and why I have brought them here. I explain that they are part of a pack that is on friendly terms with my pack. They are relatives of the pack's leader. Another pack has pretended to be friendly with that pack, and has taken over their lair under false pretenses. Since humans cannot smell deceit, the deed was done before anyone could detect it. The bad pack is after something that has protected my pack for a long time, back through the generations on my mother's side of the family. It has the power to do great good, and great harm. Though my family can use it naturally, the object cannot be used by everyone. It is important to us because it is an integral part of our relationship with the Creator, and the rites and rituals that we perform to celebrate that relationship. We feed, protect, and love it, and it feeds, protects, and heals us. We cannot use it to cause harm, because we do not have a connection to that part of its power.
The bad pack wants to use the object as a weapon. That power can only be understood by blood members of the pack from which the girls come, on their father's side. The girls are not blood members of my pack, or the bad pack, just of a race that is distantly related to the two. That race cannot connect with the object in the way that we do, but they can "find" the power that the bad pack seeks, tap into it, and draw from it to fuel magic. They normally don't, because no good comes of that. Only in times of great need is that side of the object's power ever touched, and then it is used sparingly to avoid "darkening" the object.
These girls are special, because their mother was a blood member of our pack. That makes them uniquely able to connect with the object and tap all of its powers. Instead of just drawing energy for magic, they can actually use the object's destructive power directly. Of this, they are only partly aware. They know they are fleeing someone who wants to use their ability for evil, but not to what extent.
It is my job to get them to a safe place so that the bad pack cannot capture them and force them to call upon that power. We are traveling to where the object is kept, so that they can use it to stop the bad pack from causing a war. My people are hoping that this can be accomplished without tapping the object's dark side, but are willing to use it if necessary.
I tell Long Scar about the fighting that will happen in the woods, in his lands, if I cannot stop the war. He asks me what he can do. I tell him to gather his pack, and mark the ground all around the stream, up to the tallest tree by the cliff, and back down the other side. I want to hide our scent from the dogs. He asks if I want him to kill the dogs, and I tell him no. They are just dogs. They are not guilty of anything. I tell him to watch out for the man with the sunny hair, that he is mean and strong and devious. He is scarier than a bear because he can attack from a distance, like me, but unlike me he is willing to kill without reason. I tell my friend to just hide the scent, and then hide his pack. He wishes me the blessings of the Creator, and I wish the same to him.
I drink from a flask at my hip. It tastes like whiskey, but does not burn. My throat feels normal again, and I tell the girls we have to move now. We can hear Long Scar howling, and his pack howling in return. In my mind's eye I see several others, and know their names. I hope they will be safe. To me, these are beloved and cherished friends, and I would not call upon them for help if I had any other choice. I know they are glad for the chance to protect their lands, and that they would be in danger if we did not try to stop the impending war, but I feel guilty for bringing this danger to their doorstep. I silently pray for their protection as we trudge through more mud and brush.
More time passes as we travel. There are areas where I make us turn and move a different direction after spotting a landmark (rocks, dips in the land, and so on) that reminds me of dangerous pitfalls nearby. There are other cliffs that are hard to spot, and there are areas where caverns under the ground have thin cover which will not hold our weight. There is a grizzly bear's territory near us, and she will have cubs right now. Even though I can communicate with her, she'll be grouchy and hungry, and may decide our friendship is not worth more than our combined calories. She is not as understanding of human affairs as the wolves, and will be angry with me for bringing visitors to her woods, especially since we are being followed by hunters. It is best to avoid her. I also decide it is best to not tell the girls why we keep zigzagging. I let them think it is to confuse the people following us.
We finally come to the first landmark on the border of the spell that protects the hideout. The girls are complaining of nervous tension and slight digestive unease. I insist that they all take my hands for a moment, explaining that I need to exempt them from the spell. I verbally welcome them into my home and take them under my protection. I invite them in, and I take a step back across the outer border of the spell, drawing them in with me. Immediately, all of them visibly relax, and breathe a sigh of relief. One looks at me and asks what that was, and I explain the effects of the spell. I tell them that even with the invitation, they still won't later be able to remember the location of the hideout, but while they are with me, they won't be subject to the spell's other effects.
We travel for nearly another mile before coming to the tree. Again, we have to climb to get to the door, a large knot-hole in the side, hidden from outside view by branches. This climb is a bit harder, but the girls are able to make it. By the time we get inside, they seem really wiped out. I show them a room with a creek running through it. There is a deep dip in the side of the floor. The water from the creek flows into that dip, stirs around, and flows back out again through a second opening near the first, back into the creek. A spell makes the water in that small pool warm. They will find the heat and the minerals in the water very soothing and healing. While they use the room, I exit and begin preparations to activate our wartime protections, measures which do not extend far beyond the hill, but which are much more aggressive than the aversion spell. Intruders will find themselves pursued by invisible assailants, set on fire, set upon by hoards of biting insects, and if they persist, trapped as the ground beneath their feet suddenly becomes soft and boggy and the plants become thorny and thick. Within the keep, an alarm will sound in my room if anyone enters the first border, and another will sound throughout the building if anyone crosses the second.
By the time I have finished activating our protection magic, the girls have vacated the bath, and I take a turn, entering the water with my shirt and undergarments still on, then stripping down and wringing them out, and laying them on a hot rock to dry. This is how I do my laundry, at least when I get the opportunity to do it at all.
From there, I go into another room where there is a bed, a chair, and a desk. I know that at some point, I showed the girls to other rooms like this so that they could sleep, and told them to sleep light (ready to travel) with their weapons at their sides. I have replaced what they were carrying with weapons that have some magic to them that makes the blades poisonous to anyone intending to harm their wielders.
I lay down fully dressed, with my pack, my bow, and my quiver on the chair next to the bed, within arms reach. My room is closest to the entrance, with only the kitchen between me and the door. The girls are in the rooms adjacent to mine. Behind those are other rooms, and then there is the living room with the big fireplace and my favorite escape tunnel. There are others, but I like that one best because of where it opens out.
I sleep momentarily, dreaming about a loved one who I really, really miss. The dream makes me happy and sad, because I haven't seen her face in a long time, and I have the sense that it will be another long time before I see her again. Because I can see and touch her, I know that I am dreaming. She senses my heartache, and tells me not to be sad, that in this place I will always be able to find her. Then, she warns me that I am being hunted in ways I have not considered. I ask if my charges are in danger, and she tells me, only from each other. She giggles. The sound is musical and joyful, but it also is the end of the dream, as I awaken to hear footsteps outside my door.
My first thought is that someone from my clan has come to the keep, but the steps sound hesitant and kind of sneaky. I wonder if it is an enemy who has found a way to bypass the alarms. Fearing the worst, I sneak from my bed toward the door with my sword ready. Just as I am about to try the handle, the door slowly opens, and the oldest girl's head pokes in. I barely restrain myself from striking her, then tell her off about the danger she has put herself in by sneaking into my room. Had I been just a bit less aware, she might have been killed before I fully awakened. The entire time I'm telling her off, I can't help but be distracted by the sight of her hair. She has taken it down, and it lays around her shoulders like a regal cloak. In the soft light from the candle she carries, it shines like strands of solid gold.
She looks worried, but not about my lecture. I ask what has brought her to my room in the middle of the night, and she tells me she fears for the person she thought she told where we were going. She asks if I know what will happen, and I know she is looking for reassurance, but I don't have any. I tell her what I know of our enemy's methods. He is an inept torturer, but he is cruel. He will inflict pain, but if that doesn't work, he will humiliate, and then he will dominate. The truth is, if the handmaid she spoke to does not give her up quickly, the torturer will soon turn to violation of her person. I ask the girl how loyal her handmade is, and she hangs her head. When I ask how tough the lady is, my charge tells me that she won't give up the information for minor pain, but if he breaks bones, she will. I know that after the information is extracted, our enemy will turn the lady loose because she is female. He doesn't understand that women are more dangerous than men.
The girl is heartbroken to know that she has caused her confidant such pain, but relieved to know that her actions have not led to the woman's death. She looks dejected, and for a moment she tears up, but then she regains her composure. Somehow, this makes her look even more beautiful to me.
I tell her that What's done is done, and she must remember that no permanent harm will come to her maid. For now, she must get some rest. We have a long road to travel tomorrow, just as far as we did today, with more danger than we have faced so far. She nods, turns, and leaves, and I lay back down. I do not feel bad about being honest with her. It is vital that my charges learn to follow my instructions. Any one of them, by not doing so, could get us all killed. Still, I wish I could have offered her something more comforting than I did.
I am almost back to sleep when there is a soft knocking at my door. Grumbling, I get up and cautiously answer, ready for an attack . Instead, I find another of the girls standing outside my door. I am not really surprised. Thinking that she has come to ask about her loved one, I start to tell her it is too late to get worried now, but she interrupts me. She all ready knows what she has gotten her bodyguard into. Instead of leaving him to hang around, she had sent him on ahead to the village she thought was our destination. She has a way of communicating with him, sending messages through small birds that she can get to come to her. However, she cannot do that from indoors, and she could not do it while traveling. She wants to try it now, but tells me that the birds will not come to her here in the keep, even when she stepped out onto the tree.
I am shocked. I can't believe that after all we've been through, she went outside without me. What if we were followed? The moment I utter, "Dammit, woman!" the same thought begins to dawn upon her. She could easily have been shot while standing on the branch before the door. Her bodyguard is a smart man. He will not give himself away by traveling in the open. He'll go a distance, and then go into hiding, just as we have. He will not go directly to the location where she told him to meet her, but will first check it out from a distance, and approach with caution. Chasing him would cause the enemy needless delay. I know their leader well enough to be sure that no time will be wasted following the bodyguard. Moreover, if anyone else at home knows she can communicate by bird, they will be watching for that, and anything she sends may lead them straight to us, or to him. I trace a symbol upon my door, then tell her that I cannot allow her to do that again, and that if she attempts to open any more doors or windows, an alarm will go off in my room and I will know. I can see that she is heartbroken by this news, but she does not argue with me. She simply endures my short outburst, nods, and apologizes for not thinking.
I realize that her bodyguard may be more to her than an employee. I make a note to discuss that with her later. There may be a way to bring him into the city of my people once we're there.
At that moment, I notice that her dark hair, long until we arrived here, is now nearly as short as a baby's hair. I point it out, and ask if she is injured. She tells me she cut it for ease of travel, because it kept getting caught and pulled in the underbrush. Unlike my first visitor, she has also kept on her boots. I commend her on the wisdom of her choices, and say that she is learning. I remind her that her bodyguard, another friend of mine, is very wise and very experienced, and that he will find his way to her. Reassurance is not what she sought from me, but it is all I can give her. With that, she leaves me to return to sleep.
I doze off again, and again begin to dream of the loved one I am missing. It feels like she is a family member, and she does look like me, though she is shorter and much less serious. She is someone I turn to for advice, and also for reassurance, but she is not my mother.
Before I can even be glad to see her again, she points, and tells me to look behind me. I turn, and awaken as another of the girls I'm protecting approaches my bed. Before I fully waken, I have her on her back on the floor with the tip of my sword pressed against her throat.
The feeling of her soft body beneath my knee jolts me into the waking world, and I finally see who I have tackled. She looks terrified, eyes wide and wet, mouth agape as the breath she is holding in wavers between an asthma attack and a scream. I jump backward and land on my butt. I am embarrassed without cause, then angry. I didn't do anything wrong! This is MY room. Why is she even in here? I voice the question, showing my irritation, as I move into a kneeling position to help her up. She won't take my hand.
She sits up, drawing her knees to her chest. She apologizes for intruding, then buries her face in her pants and sobs. Now what am I supposed to do? I didn't mean to make her cry. Every swear I know comes to mind, and I'm inclined to say them all, but I don't because I'm sure that will make this worse. I pat her on the back, and tell her to cut it out. This isn't any way to get an answer to whatever it is that got her up in the middle of the night. I just want to know what it is that she needs.
She struggles to gain control of her emotions. I notice that her tears have stuck her long eyelashes together. When she looks at me, I notice how long her eyelashes are, and how deep her eyes are. They look golden in the candlelight, with iridescent streams of silver flowing down her cheeks. She looks beautiful, vulnerable, and enchanting. For the moment, all I want is to see a happier expression on her face, because the one she wears now is tearing at my heart. Before I realize it, I have reached out and wiped the tears away with my fingers. Having done that, I'm even more uncomfortable with the situation, and have no idea what to say to her to explain my committing such an act of familiarity. My face feels like it is on fire. I quickly wipe the tears on my shirt. I mean to ask her the purpose of her visit, but at first, nothing comes out except for nonsense syllables. Finally, I ask if she is here because she's worried about the person she told where she thought she was going. She tells me no, she hadn't spoken directly to anyone. She had felt the need to deceive, so she had left a fake note for her tutor, claiming that she was going to visit her family's summer home. There is no one from whom to extract information. There isn't even anyone at that residence. She isn't here over that.
I ask why she has come to my room, and she tells me she has been feeling awful about complaining and generally being a wimp throughout the trip. She has been thinking of the situation, and has realized that I've risked my life to get them where they are going. She wants to apologize for making the trip so difficult. This seems odd to me, because out of the group, she's been the toughest. She is the only one who did not complain about the climbing or even just about having to wear men's clothes, and only once mentioned that her boots weren't keeping out the water when we waded to throw off the dogs. She didn't seem quite as scared of Long Scar, either, and now that I think of it, when the others all jumped, I am pretty sure I heard her cuss mildly, instead. I tell her that she hasn't done so bad, that I'm pretty confident in her ability to finish the trip. I'm glad she has some understanding of the danger, but I tell her how important tonight's rest is, because of the road ahead. She looks disappointed, which confuses me. If all that was all she was worried about, shouldn't she feel better about it now?
She leans forward like she is going to stand up, and I can see right down the front of her shirt. She didn't tie it when she put it back on, and it's open down to the middle of cleavage it wasn't made to hold. Hoping she hasn't noticed the angle of my eyes, I look away. I know I am red faced again, and I feel as guilty as if I had groped her like a drunken lout. Dammit, why did she do that? I can't even think now. I hesitate, thinking I'll let her stand before I do. My only hope is that she doesn't look me in the face before she leaves. If she does, I won't be able to not look guilty.
Instead, she leans over and kisses me. I just about jump out of my skin. What on earth has possessed this woman?
I am left completely speechless for a moment. She watches me, and I can see that she's nervous. She wears the face of one who has thrown the dice and is only afterward wondering if he has the coins to cover the bet if he loses. I think that she is on the verge of another crying fit if my response is not what she had intended, but this is not right. I am supposed to be a protector. What is wrong with these women, coming to my room in the middle of... well, it isn't night... but coming here instead of taking the few hours we have to rest?
Before I can say anything, there is yet another knock on the door. It swings open, and there stands my fourth charge. Her gaze darts back and forth between me and her friend. She stutters for a moment, and then runs away down the hall. My confused look is lost upon the lady in my room, who jumps up and runs after her friend, calling her name.
Great. Now they're both upset, and I don't even know why. I rise to go find out what the problem is, when the first alarm goes off. I gather my weapons and glance down the hallway. The girls are both entering one of the rooms. Good. If I know where they are, it'll be easier to protect them. I wait in silence, thinking that maybe the second alarm won't go off, but it does. Then, there is noise from outside. The defenses have been activated.
Looking out the front window, I can see that there are men on the ground. Because of the way the windows are made, I can see out, but all they see is a deposit of rocks. Several of the men are on fire. Three have arrows through their chests. The plants around our assailants are weaving upward around their legs, growing long thorns, and pulling the men down. Other men are fighting invisible opponents whose attacks they cannot predict. The battle eliminates nearly all of the warriors. All that is left is the one with the vendetta against me, and he is investigating our tree. He seems frightened, but he's staying anyway. It feels like if I just work at it, I can enhance the power of the magic of this place enough to break his willpower, and he will run.
Set into the wall is a huge wooden horn. The mouthpiece faces inside the keep. The bell faces the outdoors, but is covered over by grass. Putting my lips to the mouthpiece, I blow into the horn. I can feel it vibrating. My assailant stops what he is doing. A look of sheer terror crosses his face, but it is paired with grim determination. I can hear those on the ground screaming, but many of them cannot get up. I have to pause for breath, then I blow the horn again. This time, a dark stain appears on the front of his pants. He takes a few steps back, but does not run. The third time I blow the horn, he can't take it any more. I'm sure he knows it's my doing, and not real danger, but at this point the terror will have painful physical effects on his body. He stumbles away from the hill, running off into the woods. I know that he will continue running away for at least a mile, and then he will not remember how to get back . I think that eventually, he'll find his way back here, but we for now, we actually do have some time to rest. After continuing to blow the horn for a few moments just in case, I turn to let the women know that we are safe. There they are, behind me. Two of them look worried. The other two appear to be angry, but their emotions seem to be directed at each other. I start to speak to them, but the room fades away.
At this point, I wake up. I've had variations on this dream before, all with the same set of friends. Sometimes I get past the keep. Sometimes the attack on the keep ends with me outside fighting against the people chasing us. I've never dreamed about getting to the place where we are ultimately headed.
On a side note, the friend who cut her hair in the dream is the only one with short hair in real life, and thought that isn't a recent development, it wasn't a long time ago, either.
We're all dressed kind of odd. I'm wearing pants that feel like thick leather, but it feels like I've worn them a lot. They're not worn out, but they've been worn to a malleability that makes them comfortable. They are also lined with a soft fabric. I have on a shirt that is long enough to be more of a nightshirt. It's also normally very soft, but it has been wet with dirty water, so the parts that don't rest against my skin have stiffened up as if starched. Over that, I've got a hard leather vest, and several straps and belts. I'm carrying a bunch of small pouches full of dried herbs, stones, feathers, and other odd things, weapons (a bow and a sword,) and a backpack. I also have a wide-brimmed hat strapped to the backpack. My hair is in several braids, all tied together in the back using a thin piece of leather. I have on leather boots with leather soles. They feel soft, but my feet feel protected anyway. The outsides of the boots are wet, but my feet are dry.
My friends are dressed as oddly. They are all wearing pants, but not as well used. One friend's pants are of leather that has been beaten between stones so that it is softer. The other two seem to be wearing canvas that is somewhat well worn but not a lot. None of them fit, so they all have belts on to hold the pants up, and the legs have all been rolled up too. I have the impression that the pants are borrowed. All of them have long, well cared-for hair tied back with a series of metal rings.
The girls are all wearing shirts similar to mine, and vests or jackets of leather. Each has another belt over the shirt, and each has a dagger and several little pouches like mine, and all are wearing leather boots, though theirs appear to be in much newer than mine. Their boots do not seem to be holding up as well. I am worried about the condition of their feet, but the situation cannot be helped. The women have backpacks, but their backpacks are not as full as mine. They have discarded items that they thought necessary before leaving, but which they didn't want to carry after lugging them over the first mile or so.
We aren't exactly running away from something, but we still kind of are. It is more that there is somewhere we need to travel to, and we know that we are going to be pursued by someone who doesn't want us to get there, just as soon as it is discovered that we have gone. We have a head start, and I feel a sense of urgency to put as much distance behind us as possible in the short time that we have. I expect whoever it is to start coming after us when day breaks. I am pushing the girls to move faster than they like. They are mad at me about that, too. I realize that they don't understand the danger.
We are not on an actual path, but moving through dense underbrush. I am using landmarks to tell where we are and where we need to go. My charges are not liking the route. I've just explained that we're not going where they think we are, and they are really upset with me for several reasons, including my having been dishonest with them in about the direction of our travels.
I know that our followers will be bringing dogs, and we need to throw them off the scent. There are two potential directions they will suspect, and I've taken the "wrong" one to get us where we need to go. The "wrong" one leads directly where I told the girls yesterday that we'd be headed this evening. I made sure to leave our scent all over that path. I spat on the ground and dropped crumbs as we walked. I made sure we did not stray far from the path for "personal" breaks, as the women called them. They had been annoyed at the lack of privacy, but when I reminded them that bears live in the woods, they had decided to not get too far away from the guy with the bow and sword.
After about three hours on the path, we had started across an old and somewhat treacherous rope bridge, then tied ourselves to it on one side of the middle. Then, I cut the bridge until it couldn't hold our weight. When it broke, we slammed into the side of the cliff, just above a rock ledge that looked solid from above, but actually had a huge crack in it that led to a cave. My hope was that because there had been previous discussion about the bridge needing repairs, those chasing us would think that we'd broken it under our weight.
From the ledge with the crack, we'd gone into the cave, traveled downward, and come out into the stream below. After traveling "sideways" in the water across the distance between where we made it look like we were going to where we actually are going, we are now walking through somewhat dense underbrush that includes plants we don't want to touch with our skin. The girls tell me why they are so angry with me for deceiving them about the direction we are taking. Each of them has told a close, personal friend or loved one that we are going to the other place.
I remind them that I had told them not to tell anyone where we are going. They have put their loved ones in danger with that knowledge. When asked, they will think they know, and that belief will betray them under interrogation. They will be tortured until they give up that information. The person who wants us stopped would have been able to easily discern if they did not know anything, but not if they've been given the wrong information. I realize that three of the people I am told have been given the wrong information aren't going to hold up under much adversity, and I figure that there won't be much of a delay. I am sure that even though they'll take time to extract information from the girls' loved ones, those who will come after us will still leave shortly after sunrise.
The sun is going down and the woods are getting dark, but it's a full moon, and I can see well enough to navigate. It sounds like the night time animals are waking. I know of a few which might be dangerous, and I am watching for them. I know ways to handle them, but would rather not be taken by surprise.
At this point, we are actually headed for a safe spot which is between our current location and our intended destination. It's a small cabin which is built mostly into the side of a big hill. There is a tunnel from the back of the cabin through the hill to the other side, to be used in case of discovery. The front of the cabin actually looks like a huge evergreen tree, and the hill mostly covers the rest of the building. There are windows, but from the outside they look like deposits of some kind of mineral, and no one can see into them. There is a chimney (the back of the fireplace is the exit to the tunnel) but from the outside, it just looks like a pile of rocks. The design of the chimney causes smoke to be dispersed as it comes out, so that there has to be a really big fire for it to be visible from beyond a few hundred feet, and from that distance, the woods hide it. The location is in a space where there is nearly always a light breeze, and that helps with the effect. The size of the hill is deceptively small. Much of the actual building is underground.
The whole thing was built by members of my father's side of my family, and has been used for generations as a hideout during times of political upheaval. The area is surrounded by brambles and poisonous plants, but there is also magic surrounding it designed both to make the area unattractive to others, and cause it to be hard to remember for any visitor but us. Any unwanted visitor approaching the place would at first feel uneasy, then very nervous. There would be an undefined aversion to being there, with a sense of being watched and a sense of dread. If the intruder remained or continued to approach the area, he or she would eventually feel distinct fear and might even imagine a specific person or animal previously encountered being nearby and waiting to strike. In those susceptible to magic, that fear would grow into a sense of panic that would send the person fleeing at top speed until he or she was totally outside the range of the spell. After that, the aversion to going that direction would be increased, but at the same time, the individual would not be able to consciously remember or describe where he or she had been. As a result, most travelers and predatory animals just subconsciously avoided the area, and no one seeking it had ever been able to locate our hide-out.
I lead the girls through a few miles of underbrush, until we come to a thick hedge with a short, but very thick tree in the middle of it. The hedge is not too thick to go through, but we can't see the other side, where I know that the ground ends in a high cliff. The tree, short from our side, is actually over 80 feet tall, and we're near the top of it.
I rope us all together, and instruct the girls to begin climbing with me down the tree. They are appalled. They do not want to rip the pants they borrowed, mess up their hair, scratch their skin, and so on. I ask them if they want to be ripped apart by the frenzied hunting dogs that will surely be pursuing us soon, and point out that though all of the measures we've taken will delay the men who will be after us, but there is one tracker among them who will eventually find our path. I have a mental image of this man. He is a few inches taller than me, with a bulkier build than me (and I know that though I am more agile and have more endurance, but he can lift more and hit harder) with light colored hair and a nose that is crooked from having been broken in a fight with me. There is an aspect of that fight that is one reason why this man hates me personally, but it doesn't come to mind. I only know I don't want to have to fight him up close again, because I don't want to have to kill him, and if I don't, he'll kill me. The thought must do something to the expression on my face, because the girls quiet down enough to hear me repeat "just do as I am telling you, for your own safety."
We start down the tree. It isn't easy going, but there are enough branches to get us most of the way down unharmed. At one point along the way, one of the girls loses her footing and falls, but the rope holds and I am able to pull her back to the tree. We are still a good 20 feet off of the ground when we run out of branches. However, at this point, rocks jut out from the side of the cliff, and we are able to get a grip on them. We can climb down most of the rest of the way before we have to let go and fall a few feet to the ground. The girls are now scratched and dirty, irritable and scared, and out of breath. I have to get them to the cabin before they poop out on me. I have to admit to myself that I didn't expect these pampered ladies to make it this far, so I can't be annoyed with them for their attitude. I'm a little scared myself, anyway. I know it's too soon, but I keep thinking that the wind is carrying the sound of dogs barking. After letting them rest a moment and settle down, I tell the girls to come on, we have to keep moving. I have a bad feeling that he has me figured out.
To the dismay of the girls, I walk us up the middle of another stream before we cross to the other side, where I spot wolf tracks. I can hear a low growl. We pause there for a moment, and I pull a flower from one of my packs. I eat it, and it makes my throat feel scratchy and tight, but it lets me hear differently. A deep voice from the direction of the growling asks who we think we are, trespassing on his land. I answer in a voice that sounds different to my ears than to my mind. I know what I am saying, but I sound like a dog. I say that I am the high walker (a name I know has been given to me by a wolf who marvels that I walk on my back feet and fight only with the front ones) and I am here to ask the return of a favor. I remember treating a whole litter of cubs for a potentially deadly illness, saving their lives. The wolf steps forward, and I see that it is in fact my friend Long Scar (so named because of the bald area along his side where a bear's claw had sliced him.) Two of the girls gasp and grab my shoulders. It occurs to me that it's a good thing I don't have to defend them right now, as Long Scar jumps up and slams his shoulder into my chest, nearly knocking me down. He is happy to see me. He sits and grins, wagging his tail. The girls seem to think he is going to bite because he's showing his teeth, and they hear him barking. I tell them to be quiet, then realize they can't understand me. I must sound angry, though, because they all shut up and take a step back.
He asks me who they are and why I have brought them here. I explain that they are part of a pack that is on friendly terms with my pack. They are relatives of the pack's leader. Another pack has pretended to be friendly with that pack, and has taken over their lair under false pretenses. Since humans cannot smell deceit, the deed was done before anyone could detect it. The bad pack is after something that has protected my pack for a long time, back through the generations on my mother's side of the family. It has the power to do great good, and great harm. Though my family can use it naturally, the object cannot be used by everyone. It is important to us because it is an integral part of our relationship with the Creator, and the rites and rituals that we perform to celebrate that relationship. We feed, protect, and love it, and it feeds, protects, and heals us. We cannot use it to cause harm, because we do not have a connection to that part of its power.
The bad pack wants to use the object as a weapon. That power can only be understood by blood members of the pack from which the girls come, on their father's side. The girls are not blood members of my pack, or the bad pack, just of a race that is distantly related to the two. That race cannot connect with the object in the way that we do, but they can "find" the power that the bad pack seeks, tap into it, and draw from it to fuel magic. They normally don't, because no good comes of that. Only in times of great need is that side of the object's power ever touched, and then it is used sparingly to avoid "darkening" the object.
These girls are special, because their mother was a blood member of our pack. That makes them uniquely able to connect with the object and tap all of its powers. Instead of just drawing energy for magic, they can actually use the object's destructive power directly. Of this, they are only partly aware. They know they are fleeing someone who wants to use their ability for evil, but not to what extent.
It is my job to get them to a safe place so that the bad pack cannot capture them and force them to call upon that power. We are traveling to where the object is kept, so that they can use it to stop the bad pack from causing a war. My people are hoping that this can be accomplished without tapping the object's dark side, but are willing to use it if necessary.
I tell Long Scar about the fighting that will happen in the woods, in his lands, if I cannot stop the war. He asks me what he can do. I tell him to gather his pack, and mark the ground all around the stream, up to the tallest tree by the cliff, and back down the other side. I want to hide our scent from the dogs. He asks if I want him to kill the dogs, and I tell him no. They are just dogs. They are not guilty of anything. I tell him to watch out for the man with the sunny hair, that he is mean and strong and devious. He is scarier than a bear because he can attack from a distance, like me, but unlike me he is willing to kill without reason. I tell my friend to just hide the scent, and then hide his pack. He wishes me the blessings of the Creator, and I wish the same to him.
I drink from a flask at my hip. It tastes like whiskey, but does not burn. My throat feels normal again, and I tell the girls we have to move now. We can hear Long Scar howling, and his pack howling in return. In my mind's eye I see several others, and know their names. I hope they will be safe. To me, these are beloved and cherished friends, and I would not call upon them for help if I had any other choice. I know they are glad for the chance to protect their lands, and that they would be in danger if we did not try to stop the impending war, but I feel guilty for bringing this danger to their doorstep. I silently pray for their protection as we trudge through more mud and brush.
More time passes as we travel. There are areas where I make us turn and move a different direction after spotting a landmark (rocks, dips in the land, and so on) that reminds me of dangerous pitfalls nearby. There are other cliffs that are hard to spot, and there are areas where caverns under the ground have thin cover which will not hold our weight. There is a grizzly bear's territory near us, and she will have cubs right now. Even though I can communicate with her, she'll be grouchy and hungry, and may decide our friendship is not worth more than our combined calories. She is not as understanding of human affairs as the wolves, and will be angry with me for bringing visitors to her woods, especially since we are being followed by hunters. It is best to avoid her. I also decide it is best to not tell the girls why we keep zigzagging. I let them think it is to confuse the people following us.
We finally come to the first landmark on the border of the spell that protects the hideout. The girls are complaining of nervous tension and slight digestive unease. I insist that they all take my hands for a moment, explaining that I need to exempt them from the spell. I verbally welcome them into my home and take them under my protection. I invite them in, and I take a step back across the outer border of the spell, drawing them in with me. Immediately, all of them visibly relax, and breathe a sigh of relief. One looks at me and asks what that was, and I explain the effects of the spell. I tell them that even with the invitation, they still won't later be able to remember the location of the hideout, but while they are with me, they won't be subject to the spell's other effects.
We travel for nearly another mile before coming to the tree. Again, we have to climb to get to the door, a large knot-hole in the side, hidden from outside view by branches. This climb is a bit harder, but the girls are able to make it. By the time we get inside, they seem really wiped out. I show them a room with a creek running through it. There is a deep dip in the side of the floor. The water from the creek flows into that dip, stirs around, and flows back out again through a second opening near the first, back into the creek. A spell makes the water in that small pool warm. They will find the heat and the minerals in the water very soothing and healing. While they use the room, I exit and begin preparations to activate our wartime protections, measures which do not extend far beyond the hill, but which are much more aggressive than the aversion spell. Intruders will find themselves pursued by invisible assailants, set on fire, set upon by hoards of biting insects, and if they persist, trapped as the ground beneath their feet suddenly becomes soft and boggy and the plants become thorny and thick. Within the keep, an alarm will sound in my room if anyone enters the first border, and another will sound throughout the building if anyone crosses the second.
By the time I have finished activating our protection magic, the girls have vacated the bath, and I take a turn, entering the water with my shirt and undergarments still on, then stripping down and wringing them out, and laying them on a hot rock to dry. This is how I do my laundry, at least when I get the opportunity to do it at all.
From there, I go into another room where there is a bed, a chair, and a desk. I know that at some point, I showed the girls to other rooms like this so that they could sleep, and told them to sleep light (ready to travel) with their weapons at their sides. I have replaced what they were carrying with weapons that have some magic to them that makes the blades poisonous to anyone intending to harm their wielders.
I lay down fully dressed, with my pack, my bow, and my quiver on the chair next to the bed, within arms reach. My room is closest to the entrance, with only the kitchen between me and the door. The girls are in the rooms adjacent to mine. Behind those are other rooms, and then there is the living room with the big fireplace and my favorite escape tunnel. There are others, but I like that one best because of where it opens out.
I sleep momentarily, dreaming about a loved one who I really, really miss. The dream makes me happy and sad, because I haven't seen her face in a long time, and I have the sense that it will be another long time before I see her again. Because I can see and touch her, I know that I am dreaming. She senses my heartache, and tells me not to be sad, that in this place I will always be able to find her. Then, she warns me that I am being hunted in ways I have not considered. I ask if my charges are in danger, and she tells me, only from each other. She giggles. The sound is musical and joyful, but it also is the end of the dream, as I awaken to hear footsteps outside my door.
My first thought is that someone from my clan has come to the keep, but the steps sound hesitant and kind of sneaky. I wonder if it is an enemy who has found a way to bypass the alarms. Fearing the worst, I sneak from my bed toward the door with my sword ready. Just as I am about to try the handle, the door slowly opens, and the oldest girl's head pokes in. I barely restrain myself from striking her, then tell her off about the danger she has put herself in by sneaking into my room. Had I been just a bit less aware, she might have been killed before I fully awakened. The entire time I'm telling her off, I can't help but be distracted by the sight of her hair. She has taken it down, and it lays around her shoulders like a regal cloak. In the soft light from the candle she carries, it shines like strands of solid gold.
She looks worried, but not about my lecture. I ask what has brought her to my room in the middle of the night, and she tells me she fears for the person she thought she told where we were going. She asks if I know what will happen, and I know she is looking for reassurance, but I don't have any. I tell her what I know of our enemy's methods. He is an inept torturer, but he is cruel. He will inflict pain, but if that doesn't work, he will humiliate, and then he will dominate. The truth is, if the handmaid she spoke to does not give her up quickly, the torturer will soon turn to violation of her person. I ask the girl how loyal her handmade is, and she hangs her head. When I ask how tough the lady is, my charge tells me that she won't give up the information for minor pain, but if he breaks bones, she will. I know that after the information is extracted, our enemy will turn the lady loose because she is female. He doesn't understand that women are more dangerous than men.
The girl is heartbroken to know that she has caused her confidant such pain, but relieved to know that her actions have not led to the woman's death. She looks dejected, and for a moment she tears up, but then she regains her composure. Somehow, this makes her look even more beautiful to me.
I tell her that What's done is done, and she must remember that no permanent harm will come to her maid. For now, she must get some rest. We have a long road to travel tomorrow, just as far as we did today, with more danger than we have faced so far. She nods, turns, and leaves, and I lay back down. I do not feel bad about being honest with her. It is vital that my charges learn to follow my instructions. Any one of them, by not doing so, could get us all killed. Still, I wish I could have offered her something more comforting than I did.
I am almost back to sleep when there is a soft knocking at my door. Grumbling, I get up and cautiously answer, ready for an attack . Instead, I find another of the girls standing outside my door. I am not really surprised. Thinking that she has come to ask about her loved one, I start to tell her it is too late to get worried now, but she interrupts me. She all ready knows what she has gotten her bodyguard into. Instead of leaving him to hang around, she had sent him on ahead to the village she thought was our destination. She has a way of communicating with him, sending messages through small birds that she can get to come to her. However, she cannot do that from indoors, and she could not do it while traveling. She wants to try it now, but tells me that the birds will not come to her here in the keep, even when she stepped out onto the tree.
I am shocked. I can't believe that after all we've been through, she went outside without me. What if we were followed? The moment I utter, "Dammit, woman!" the same thought begins to dawn upon her. She could easily have been shot while standing on the branch before the door. Her bodyguard is a smart man. He will not give himself away by traveling in the open. He'll go a distance, and then go into hiding, just as we have. He will not go directly to the location where she told him to meet her, but will first check it out from a distance, and approach with caution. Chasing him would cause the enemy needless delay. I know their leader well enough to be sure that no time will be wasted following the bodyguard. Moreover, if anyone else at home knows she can communicate by bird, they will be watching for that, and anything she sends may lead them straight to us, or to him. I trace a symbol upon my door, then tell her that I cannot allow her to do that again, and that if she attempts to open any more doors or windows, an alarm will go off in my room and I will know. I can see that she is heartbroken by this news, but she does not argue with me. She simply endures my short outburst, nods, and apologizes for not thinking.
I realize that her bodyguard may be more to her than an employee. I make a note to discuss that with her later. There may be a way to bring him into the city of my people once we're there.
At that moment, I notice that her dark hair, long until we arrived here, is now nearly as short as a baby's hair. I point it out, and ask if she is injured. She tells me she cut it for ease of travel, because it kept getting caught and pulled in the underbrush. Unlike my first visitor, she has also kept on her boots. I commend her on the wisdom of her choices, and say that she is learning. I remind her that her bodyguard, another friend of mine, is very wise and very experienced, and that he will find his way to her. Reassurance is not what she sought from me, but it is all I can give her. With that, she leaves me to return to sleep.
I doze off again, and again begin to dream of the loved one I am missing. It feels like she is a family member, and she does look like me, though she is shorter and much less serious. She is someone I turn to for advice, and also for reassurance, but she is not my mother.
Before I can even be glad to see her again, she points, and tells me to look behind me. I turn, and awaken as another of the girls I'm protecting approaches my bed. Before I fully waken, I have her on her back on the floor with the tip of my sword pressed against her throat.
The feeling of her soft body beneath my knee jolts me into the waking world, and I finally see who I have tackled. She looks terrified, eyes wide and wet, mouth agape as the breath she is holding in wavers between an asthma attack and a scream. I jump backward and land on my butt. I am embarrassed without cause, then angry. I didn't do anything wrong! This is MY room. Why is she even in here? I voice the question, showing my irritation, as I move into a kneeling position to help her up. She won't take my hand.
She sits up, drawing her knees to her chest. She apologizes for intruding, then buries her face in her pants and sobs. Now what am I supposed to do? I didn't mean to make her cry. Every swear I know comes to mind, and I'm inclined to say them all, but I don't because I'm sure that will make this worse. I pat her on the back, and tell her to cut it out. This isn't any way to get an answer to whatever it is that got her up in the middle of the night. I just want to know what it is that she needs.
She struggles to gain control of her emotions. I notice that her tears have stuck her long eyelashes together. When she looks at me, I notice how long her eyelashes are, and how deep her eyes are. They look golden in the candlelight, with iridescent streams of silver flowing down her cheeks. She looks beautiful, vulnerable, and enchanting. For the moment, all I want is to see a happier expression on her face, because the one she wears now is tearing at my heart. Before I realize it, I have reached out and wiped the tears away with my fingers. Having done that, I'm even more uncomfortable with the situation, and have no idea what to say to her to explain my committing such an act of familiarity. My face feels like it is on fire. I quickly wipe the tears on my shirt. I mean to ask her the purpose of her visit, but at first, nothing comes out except for nonsense syllables. Finally, I ask if she is here because she's worried about the person she told where she thought she was going. She tells me no, she hadn't spoken directly to anyone. She had felt the need to deceive, so she had left a fake note for her tutor, claiming that she was going to visit her family's summer home. There is no one from whom to extract information. There isn't even anyone at that residence. She isn't here over that.
I ask why she has come to my room, and she tells me she has been feeling awful about complaining and generally being a wimp throughout the trip. She has been thinking of the situation, and has realized that I've risked my life to get them where they are going. She wants to apologize for making the trip so difficult. This seems odd to me, because out of the group, she's been the toughest. She is the only one who did not complain about the climbing or even just about having to wear men's clothes, and only once mentioned that her boots weren't keeping out the water when we waded to throw off the dogs. She didn't seem quite as scared of Long Scar, either, and now that I think of it, when the others all jumped, I am pretty sure I heard her cuss mildly, instead. I tell her that she hasn't done so bad, that I'm pretty confident in her ability to finish the trip. I'm glad she has some understanding of the danger, but I tell her how important tonight's rest is, because of the road ahead. She looks disappointed, which confuses me. If all that was all she was worried about, shouldn't she feel better about it now?
She leans forward like she is going to stand up, and I can see right down the front of her shirt. She didn't tie it when she put it back on, and it's open down to the middle of cleavage it wasn't made to hold. Hoping she hasn't noticed the angle of my eyes, I look away. I know I am red faced again, and I feel as guilty as if I had groped her like a drunken lout. Dammit, why did she do that? I can't even think now. I hesitate, thinking I'll let her stand before I do. My only hope is that she doesn't look me in the face before she leaves. If she does, I won't be able to not look guilty.
Instead, she leans over and kisses me. I just about jump out of my skin. What on earth has possessed this woman?
I am left completely speechless for a moment. She watches me, and I can see that she's nervous. She wears the face of one who has thrown the dice and is only afterward wondering if he has the coins to cover the bet if he loses. I think that she is on the verge of another crying fit if my response is not what she had intended, but this is not right. I am supposed to be a protector. What is wrong with these women, coming to my room in the middle of... well, it isn't night... but coming here instead of taking the few hours we have to rest?
Before I can say anything, there is yet another knock on the door. It swings open, and there stands my fourth charge. Her gaze darts back and forth between me and her friend. She stutters for a moment, and then runs away down the hall. My confused look is lost upon the lady in my room, who jumps up and runs after her friend, calling her name.
Great. Now they're both upset, and I don't even know why. I rise to go find out what the problem is, when the first alarm goes off. I gather my weapons and glance down the hallway. The girls are both entering one of the rooms. Good. If I know where they are, it'll be easier to protect them. I wait in silence, thinking that maybe the second alarm won't go off, but it does. Then, there is noise from outside. The defenses have been activated.
Looking out the front window, I can see that there are men on the ground. Because of the way the windows are made, I can see out, but all they see is a deposit of rocks. Several of the men are on fire. Three have arrows through their chests. The plants around our assailants are weaving upward around their legs, growing long thorns, and pulling the men down. Other men are fighting invisible opponents whose attacks they cannot predict. The battle eliminates nearly all of the warriors. All that is left is the one with the vendetta against me, and he is investigating our tree. He seems frightened, but he's staying anyway. It feels like if I just work at it, I can enhance the power of the magic of this place enough to break his willpower, and he will run.
Set into the wall is a huge wooden horn. The mouthpiece faces inside the keep. The bell faces the outdoors, but is covered over by grass. Putting my lips to the mouthpiece, I blow into the horn. I can feel it vibrating. My assailant stops what he is doing. A look of sheer terror crosses his face, but it is paired with grim determination. I can hear those on the ground screaming, but many of them cannot get up. I have to pause for breath, then I blow the horn again. This time, a dark stain appears on the front of his pants. He takes a few steps back, but does not run. The third time I blow the horn, he can't take it any more. I'm sure he knows it's my doing, and not real danger, but at this point the terror will have painful physical effects on his body. He stumbles away from the hill, running off into the woods. I know that he will continue running away for at least a mile, and then he will not remember how to get back . I think that eventually, he'll find his way back here, but we for now, we actually do have some time to rest. After continuing to blow the horn for a few moments just in case, I turn to let the women know that we are safe. There they are, behind me. Two of them look worried. The other two appear to be angry, but their emotions seem to be directed at each other. I start to speak to them, but the room fades away.
At this point, I wake up. I've had variations on this dream before, all with the same set of friends. Sometimes I get past the keep. Sometimes the attack on the keep ends with me outside fighting against the people chasing us. I've never dreamed about getting to the place where we are ultimately headed.
On a side note, the friend who cut her hair in the dream is the only one with short hair in real life, and thought that isn't a recent development, it wasn't a long time ago, either.
Spiders!
I am at my parents' house with my mother. It looks the way it did before the last twenty years of renovations. We have just finished putting something heavy away in Mom and Dad's room, and are about to head back to the kitchen. We still have to cook something before the guys get home.
Mom mentions that there have been more spiders around than usual lately, and I should watch out for them. When I open the door to leave the room, there in the hallway is one as big as a cat. It looks like a fat black garden spider, except for its size.
I shut the door.
Mom asks what's wrong, and I tell her about the spider. She is highly allergic to spider bites anyway, and I am sure that one this big would kill her. She asks if I can step on it, and I tell her how big it is.
In the closet, there is a huge can of bug spray, as long as my arm. Instead of a button to press, there's a pump in the back of it, like the old fashioned kind people used to use in their gardens. I grab that, and make Mom move away from the door. She is theorizing that the spider must have come up from the basement, as if it's normal for a spider that big to be anywhere in our house.
I hold the handle in one hand, and open the door with the other. The spider, which is in the same position it was the last time, twitches but does not do anything else. I swing the can up into position with the one hand, and grab a handle on its side (that was not there before) to aim it at the spider.
The spider turns to face me, and I blast it with the spray. It backs away. I advance, and spray again. The spider curls up on its back with its feet turned in. I motion mom to come out into the hallway.
I carefully approach the spider. It looks acid-burned, but nothing else the spray has hit does. I kick it, and it goes bouncing down the hall, without responding in any way. It is dead.
I turn to tell Mom the spider is dead, and see another huge spider in the corner over the door to the bedroom. Quickly, I grab her arm and draw her around behind me. I spray that spider, and it falls to the floor. It has yellow stripes, like a tomato spider. Its front legs fly up in the air, and it raises itself into a defensive position.
I spray it again, and it backs into the corner. It seems to be trying to use its front legs to wipe off the spray.
Mom and I back up, until we are standing in front of the doorway to the hall to my room, where there seem to be more huge spiders of various kinds. They are all over. We realize we need to get out of the house. I have chills. I'm really creeped out by spiders, but I'm more afraid one of them is going to bite my Mom.
I give the giant tomato spider one more shot with the spray, then pull Mom down the hallway toward the kitchen. There aren't any spiders in this hallway, but as we pass the bathroom, we can see an enormous wood spider sitting in the bathtub. Its legs hang over the sides. It twitches as we move past. As we pass the living room door, I see that the room is full of webs. There are at least seven spiders in there, and one of them is all red. Another looks like it might be a black widow, but I can't see its underside. We move into the kitchen, and I spray the walls and floor behind me in hopes that it will keep them from following. Oddly, no matter how much I use, the can continues to feel heavy and liquid inside it keeps sloshing around, so I'm not worried about running out.
In the kitchen, there are just as many spiders as in the living room, but they are all off to one side. There is at least a six foot buffer between us and the nearest web. Just in case, I spritz a little of whatever is in the can in that direction, hoping to deter them from coming any closer to us. The nearest spider retreats to the far side of its web and puts its legs up. At the same time, I hear a scrabbling sound behind us.
The big wood spider has climbed out of the tub, and I recognize the markings. It's not a wood spider, it's a wolf spider! Huge, dripping fangs hang down in front of its face. This is a hunter, and it has heard, or felt, our footsteps. It has stepped in the spray, and is sliding around on injured legs, but that won't stop it from coming after us. I spray a bunch in its direction, and yell for Mom to go out the door. She steps into the family room with me on her heels. I look over and see three fat jumping spiders across the room from us. Grabbing the door, I throw it open. We're going to be ok . We can get outside and shut the door, and they won't be able to get us. We can call an exterminator from someone else's house. I spray again behind me as I hear the scrabbling noise get closer, and then one of the jumping spiders jumps across the room at us. I spray it, too, and it jumps sideways onto the wolf spider. The wolf spider bites it, and Mom goes out the door into the sunlit and fortunately empty back yard. I turn to follow her, and hear a sucking sound behind me. I realize that the wolf spider is eating the jumping spider. A second jumping spider leaps onto it and attacks it, then springs backward as it gets burned by the poison that is now covering it. I step out the door and pull it closed.
Mom and I run to the middle of the yard, look up, and see her renters standing on top of the family room roof. There is a spider between them and the only way down - the tall, narrow UHF antenna tower mounted into the sidewalk below. It's stalking them, circling around to try for an advantageous angle from which to strike. I yell for the mother, and throw her the spray. She catches it and sprays the spider, then tosses it back to me. She pulls her daughter onto her back, piggy-back style, and climbs down the antenna. The girl's leg is swollen, bruised, and bleeding.
I woke up before I could speak, and immediately felt like I had to go back and let them know what to do. I had thought I'd tell them to go get the girl to the hospital, and I'd wait in the yard with the spray for Dad and my brother, so they wouldn't go into the house. When they got there, we'd go to the neighbors' and call for help. At first, I felt worried because I wasn't there to help any more, but it only took moments to let go of the dream. I have some variation of the giant spider dream near the end of every summer, when the spiders start coming indoors because of the weather. My mother really is allergic to spider bites. Her allergy is severe and can be life-threatening. At Mom and Dad's house, spiders aren't allowed to be there. When we find them, we kill them. Mom even uses a repellent spray around the house and in the basement to cut down on the number of them that come in. Also, they don't have renters any more, and haven't since around 1982. The girl in the dream is my age, but in the dream I was an adult just as in real life, while she was about a 4th grader, the age she was when I last saw her before she and her mother moved away.
I am glad we live in a northern state, outside of the brown recluse area. I'm sure if we had those to worry about, this dream would be so much worse!
Mom mentions that there have been more spiders around than usual lately, and I should watch out for them. When I open the door to leave the room, there in the hallway is one as big as a cat. It looks like a fat black garden spider, except for its size.
I shut the door.
Mom asks what's wrong, and I tell her about the spider. She is highly allergic to spider bites anyway, and I am sure that one this big would kill her. She asks if I can step on it, and I tell her how big it is.
In the closet, there is a huge can of bug spray, as long as my arm. Instead of a button to press, there's a pump in the back of it, like the old fashioned kind people used to use in their gardens. I grab that, and make Mom move away from the door. She is theorizing that the spider must have come up from the basement, as if it's normal for a spider that big to be anywhere in our house.
I hold the handle in one hand, and open the door with the other. The spider, which is in the same position it was the last time, twitches but does not do anything else. I swing the can up into position with the one hand, and grab a handle on its side (that was not there before) to aim it at the spider.
The spider turns to face me, and I blast it with the spray. It backs away. I advance, and spray again. The spider curls up on its back with its feet turned in. I motion mom to come out into the hallway.
I carefully approach the spider. It looks acid-burned, but nothing else the spray has hit does. I kick it, and it goes bouncing down the hall, without responding in any way. It is dead.
I turn to tell Mom the spider is dead, and see another huge spider in the corner over the door to the bedroom. Quickly, I grab her arm and draw her around behind me. I spray that spider, and it falls to the floor. It has yellow stripes, like a tomato spider. Its front legs fly up in the air, and it raises itself into a defensive position.
I spray it again, and it backs into the corner. It seems to be trying to use its front legs to wipe off the spray.
Mom and I back up, until we are standing in front of the doorway to the hall to my room, where there seem to be more huge spiders of various kinds. They are all over. We realize we need to get out of the house. I have chills. I'm really creeped out by spiders, but I'm more afraid one of them is going to bite my Mom.
I give the giant tomato spider one more shot with the spray, then pull Mom down the hallway toward the kitchen. There aren't any spiders in this hallway, but as we pass the bathroom, we can see an enormous wood spider sitting in the bathtub. Its legs hang over the sides. It twitches as we move past. As we pass the living room door, I see that the room is full of webs. There are at least seven spiders in there, and one of them is all red. Another looks like it might be a black widow, but I can't see its underside. We move into the kitchen, and I spray the walls and floor behind me in hopes that it will keep them from following. Oddly, no matter how much I use, the can continues to feel heavy and liquid inside it keeps sloshing around, so I'm not worried about running out.
In the kitchen, there are just as many spiders as in the living room, but they are all off to one side. There is at least a six foot buffer between us and the nearest web. Just in case, I spritz a little of whatever is in the can in that direction, hoping to deter them from coming any closer to us. The nearest spider retreats to the far side of its web and puts its legs up. At the same time, I hear a scrabbling sound behind us.
The big wood spider has climbed out of the tub, and I recognize the markings. It's not a wood spider, it's a wolf spider! Huge, dripping fangs hang down in front of its face. This is a hunter, and it has heard, or felt, our footsteps. It has stepped in the spray, and is sliding around on injured legs, but that won't stop it from coming after us. I spray a bunch in its direction, and yell for Mom to go out the door. She steps into the family room with me on her heels. I look over and see three fat jumping spiders across the room from us. Grabbing the door, I throw it open. We're going to be ok . We can get outside and shut the door, and they won't be able to get us. We can call an exterminator from someone else's house. I spray again behind me as I hear the scrabbling noise get closer, and then one of the jumping spiders jumps across the room at us. I spray it, too, and it jumps sideways onto the wolf spider. The wolf spider bites it, and Mom goes out the door into the sunlit and fortunately empty back yard. I turn to follow her, and hear a sucking sound behind me. I realize that the wolf spider is eating the jumping spider. A second jumping spider leaps onto it and attacks it, then springs backward as it gets burned by the poison that is now covering it. I step out the door and pull it closed.
Mom and I run to the middle of the yard, look up, and see her renters standing on top of the family room roof. There is a spider between them and the only way down - the tall, narrow UHF antenna tower mounted into the sidewalk below. It's stalking them, circling around to try for an advantageous angle from which to strike. I yell for the mother, and throw her the spray. She catches it and sprays the spider, then tosses it back to me. She pulls her daughter onto her back, piggy-back style, and climbs down the antenna. The girl's leg is swollen, bruised, and bleeding.
I woke up before I could speak, and immediately felt like I had to go back and let them know what to do. I had thought I'd tell them to go get the girl to the hospital, and I'd wait in the yard with the spray for Dad and my brother, so they wouldn't go into the house. When they got there, we'd go to the neighbors' and call for help. At first, I felt worried because I wasn't there to help any more, but it only took moments to let go of the dream. I have some variation of the giant spider dream near the end of every summer, when the spiders start coming indoors because of the weather. My mother really is allergic to spider bites. Her allergy is severe and can be life-threatening. At Mom and Dad's house, spiders aren't allowed to be there. When we find them, we kill them. Mom even uses a repellent spray around the house and in the basement to cut down on the number of them that come in. Also, they don't have renters any more, and haven't since around 1982. The girl in the dream is my age, but in the dream I was an adult just as in real life, while she was about a 4th grader, the age she was when I last saw her before she and her mother moved away.
I am glad we live in a northern state, outside of the brown recluse area. I'm sure if we had those to worry about, this dream would be so much worse!
No Face
It's the middle of the night, and I hear a noise outside. It's not loud enough to identify, just loud enough to wake me. I sit up and look around, but my husband is still sleeping.
I get out of bed and peek out of the window. Nothing looks out of the ordinary.
I go out into the hallway and stand in front of my son's bedroom door.
Silence.
I carefully crack it open, not wanting to wake him in the middle of the night. He's sleeping soundly. He's thrown the covers off, and he's curled up for warmth, so I pull the blanket up over him. He relaxes. I look around the room, in the closet... nothing.
Maybe I didn't hear a noise. Maybe it was just a dream.
Just in case, I quietly sneak down the stairs, looking around the corner into the living room to see if anyone is there. The room is quiet and unoccupied. Even the air conditioner is not on.
I tiptoe into the kitchen, checking out the bathroom on the way by. No one is there in either room. Upon opening the door and looking, I also find the utility closet unoccupied.
I hear the floor pop quietly over my head, and realize I never looked in the upstairs bathroom.
Quickly but quietly, I rush up the stairs, turn, and reach around the door frame to turn on the bathroom light. The room is unoccupied.
I am now so creeped out that I look behind the door, even though there is not room for anyone to be there, and behind the shower curtain, even though it is translucent and if someone were there, the shape of a body would be visible through it.
Satisfied that there was no burglar waiting in the bathroom, I turn to head back to the bedroom.
Instead, I catch my reflection in the weirdly positioned mirrors over the sink. One is on one wall, and the other is on the perpendicular wall. There is about a 3 inch space between each mirror and the corner. This creates a strange effect between the mirrors, wherein if you are standing in the wrong place, just the outside of your head is reflected. The mirrors are just close enough together to make that appear really creepy, as if a faceless copy of yourself lurks behind the glass. I always move, so that I can see a normal reflection.
I move, and the reflection that moves with me is not normal. It has no eyebrows, eyes, nose, or mouth. There is just a forehead, and a chin, and blank flesh in between, framed by a long, stringy copy of my hair.
I get goosebumps on my arms. I just know this thing is going to come out of the mirror and get me.
I back toward the door. The reflection advances, instead. I bump into the door, and jump, startled, and my hands fly up in front of my chest. The thing in the mirror jumps, too, and its hands also fly up. They look just like my hands, even down to having my rings, except that my fingernails are short and clean, and these hands have long, ragged, claw-like fingernails with grime on them like it's been using it's hands to tunnel through dirt.
The faceless thing's hand reaches toward me. When it gets to the mirror, there is a scratching sound, like a tree branch scraping a window. The fingernails tap on the glass. I can barely breathe. Maybe it's trapped in there.
No such luck . The thing pushes lightly, and a hairline fracture crisscrosses the reflection side of the glass. The monster is going to break through.
Regaining my mind, I step out of the bathroom and slam the door shut, planning to wake my husband and grab a weapon to fight this thing. Instead, I immediately have to fight to keep the door from opening back up. There was nothing in the bathroom when I ran, but now something is pulling the door from that side. Each time it cracks open, I can see that the monster is further out of the mirror.
I need to grab something, now... but nothing is within reach. I try to scream for my husband. All I can manage is a squeak . I have to give up on the door. I pound open the bedroom door, intending to grab the first thing I find, but then the faceless monster comes out of the bathroom and heads for my son's room.
NO!
I'm terrified, but I can't let this thing hurt my baby. I grab at the back of the monster's head, and get a fistful of hair. Pulling, I slam it into the door behind me. It lets out a muffled squeal, and I momentarily wonder how it's doing that with no mouth or nose.
Oddly, I can still hear my husband snoring. The noise hasn't awakened him.
The thing lashes wildly back at me with one arm, hitting me right in the face and knocking me down. It's really strong. It jumps over me and heads for my son's room again. I grab at its copy of my shirt. The shirt rips and comes off, revealing a back as featureless as the face, unlike my freckled skin. You can hardly even tell where the shoulder blades are.
I grab at the shoulder, dig my fingers into the skin, and shove the creature down. It falls to the floor, facing away from the room. Its hand shoots forward and grabs my ankle, fingernails digging in like teeth. I raise my other foot and slam my heel down on its faceless head, and I hear another muffled squeal. It lets go of my ankle and claws the foot on top of its head, as I put my full weight on that foot to step over it.
I hear crunching noises and a muffled scream, and my foot sinks a bit as I transfer my weight to the thing's head, then I am on the other side of it. I turn and kick it in the ribs, only to find that it has none. My foot sinks into the soft flesh of its torso.
The creature scuttles away from me on all fours, heading back toward the bathroom. For a moment I think it's running away, but then it launches at me like a runner starting out of the blocks. I brace myself, for the impact, but it still manages to shove me against the frame of my son's bedroom door.
I shove back, pushing the monster away from me. It stumbles backwards and falls down the stairs. The motion is weird, like a beanbag flopping over and over until it reaches the bottom. At some point, even the pajama pants have disappeared, and I can see bruising all over the pasty, pale skin. Slowly, the creature begins to crawl back up the stairs on its hands and feet, with its body arched like a cat and it's un-face turned to me. There are big, splotchy bruises all over it, and areas on the head are cut and bleeding.
At this point, I realize the scariest thing about this creature is that it has no face. I mean, its claw-shaped fingernails are nasty, and it's pretty strong, but except for not having a face, it isn't any scarier than a burglar. Everything in my entire being wants to turn and run away because it's creepy, but I know if I don't fight, it's going to get my son, so instead I close his door behind me and brace myself for battle.
When the monster gets close to the top of the stairs, I kick it in the un-face. It grabs at my ankle, misses, and goes sliding back down the stairs. Slowly, it begins climbing again. I kick it again, and it falls again. This time, it takes a different tactic, and climbs up the wall. It begins ascending across the sloping ceiling above the stairs. Now, I can't reach it. I'm sure it's planning on crawling into my son's room that way, where it will drop on him from above.
Now, it's scarier than a burglar again. It can defy gravity. It's some kind of a faceless, supernatural monster. I don't know what it will do to my son, but it feels like it's going to be something awful. I rush to his room before the thing can get there, but how am I going to stop this thing? Then, I remember my walking sticks. They're long and wooden. I can reach it with them, even if it is on the ceiling. They are at the bottom of the stairs. I have to hurry.
I run down the stairs, ducking as the monster takes a swipe at me as I pass. Right afterward, I wish I'd grabbed the hand instead, but it's too late. I reach the bottom, grab one of the sticks, and run back up until I reach the monster. It's right in front of my son's door, climbing down far enough to reach for the handle. I whack it in the head with my walking stick .
There's a mushy, cracking sound, and the stick opens a gash along the side of the head. The hair falls off like a wig. The monster falls with a muffled scream, and I stomp the hand nearest me. It tries to get up on its knees, and I bring the stick down on it again, knocking it back to the floor.
Over and over, the stick falls on that pasty, featureless skin with repeated sick, squishy thuds. As I continue battering the monster, I step over it to get between it and the door again, and begin kicking it toward the bathroom.
I know I've won when it covers its bleeding head with its hands. It crawls away from me, and I let it go, ready to strike again if it makes another attempt to get to my son.
I chase the monster into the bathroom, where it returns to the mirror, crawling back into it with pained, jerky movements. Once the last of it goes through the glass, I take my stick and break both panes. I'm not having this thing come back.
Turning to go get a broom, I hear laughter, and I notice that my reflection in the handle of the door has no face. I realize that it can come back any time.
The terror of knowing that strikes me right in the chest.
I have to admit, after dreaming this, I had to get up and go check on my son. On the way back, I had to check out the bathroom, and make sure the door was kept closed.
Ugh! Those mirrors totally creeps me out!
I get out of bed and peek out of the window. Nothing looks out of the ordinary.
I go out into the hallway and stand in front of my son's bedroom door.
Silence.
I carefully crack it open, not wanting to wake him in the middle of the night. He's sleeping soundly. He's thrown the covers off, and he's curled up for warmth, so I pull the blanket up over him. He relaxes. I look around the room, in the closet... nothing.
Maybe I didn't hear a noise. Maybe it was just a dream.
Just in case, I quietly sneak down the stairs, looking around the corner into the living room to see if anyone is there. The room is quiet and unoccupied. Even the air conditioner is not on.
I tiptoe into the kitchen, checking out the bathroom on the way by. No one is there in either room. Upon opening the door and looking, I also find the utility closet unoccupied.
I hear the floor pop quietly over my head, and realize I never looked in the upstairs bathroom.
Quickly but quietly, I rush up the stairs, turn, and reach around the door frame to turn on the bathroom light. The room is unoccupied.
I am now so creeped out that I look behind the door, even though there is not room for anyone to be there, and behind the shower curtain, even though it is translucent and if someone were there, the shape of a body would be visible through it.
Satisfied that there was no burglar waiting in the bathroom, I turn to head back to the bedroom.
Instead, I catch my reflection in the weirdly positioned mirrors over the sink. One is on one wall, and the other is on the perpendicular wall. There is about a 3 inch space between each mirror and the corner. This creates a strange effect between the mirrors, wherein if you are standing in the wrong place, just the outside of your head is reflected. The mirrors are just close enough together to make that appear really creepy, as if a faceless copy of yourself lurks behind the glass. I always move, so that I can see a normal reflection.
I move, and the reflection that moves with me is not normal. It has no eyebrows, eyes, nose, or mouth. There is just a forehead, and a chin, and blank flesh in between, framed by a long, stringy copy of my hair.
I get goosebumps on my arms. I just know this thing is going to come out of the mirror and get me.
I back toward the door. The reflection advances, instead. I bump into the door, and jump, startled, and my hands fly up in front of my chest. The thing in the mirror jumps, too, and its hands also fly up. They look just like my hands, even down to having my rings, except that my fingernails are short and clean, and these hands have long, ragged, claw-like fingernails with grime on them like it's been using it's hands to tunnel through dirt.
The faceless thing's hand reaches toward me. When it gets to the mirror, there is a scratching sound, like a tree branch scraping a window. The fingernails tap on the glass. I can barely breathe. Maybe it's trapped in there.
No such luck . The thing pushes lightly, and a hairline fracture crisscrosses the reflection side of the glass. The monster is going to break through.
Regaining my mind, I step out of the bathroom and slam the door shut, planning to wake my husband and grab a weapon to fight this thing. Instead, I immediately have to fight to keep the door from opening back up. There was nothing in the bathroom when I ran, but now something is pulling the door from that side. Each time it cracks open, I can see that the monster is further out of the mirror.
I need to grab something, now... but nothing is within reach. I try to scream for my husband. All I can manage is a squeak . I have to give up on the door. I pound open the bedroom door, intending to grab the first thing I find, but then the faceless monster comes out of the bathroom and heads for my son's room.
NO!
I'm terrified, but I can't let this thing hurt my baby. I grab at the back of the monster's head, and get a fistful of hair. Pulling, I slam it into the door behind me. It lets out a muffled squeal, and I momentarily wonder how it's doing that with no mouth or nose.
Oddly, I can still hear my husband snoring. The noise hasn't awakened him.
The thing lashes wildly back at me with one arm, hitting me right in the face and knocking me down. It's really strong. It jumps over me and heads for my son's room again. I grab at its copy of my shirt. The shirt rips and comes off, revealing a back as featureless as the face, unlike my freckled skin. You can hardly even tell where the shoulder blades are.
I grab at the shoulder, dig my fingers into the skin, and shove the creature down. It falls to the floor, facing away from the room. Its hand shoots forward and grabs my ankle, fingernails digging in like teeth. I raise my other foot and slam my heel down on its faceless head, and I hear another muffled squeal. It lets go of my ankle and claws the foot on top of its head, as I put my full weight on that foot to step over it.
I hear crunching noises and a muffled scream, and my foot sinks a bit as I transfer my weight to the thing's head, then I am on the other side of it. I turn and kick it in the ribs, only to find that it has none. My foot sinks into the soft flesh of its torso.
The creature scuttles away from me on all fours, heading back toward the bathroom. For a moment I think it's running away, but then it launches at me like a runner starting out of the blocks. I brace myself, for the impact, but it still manages to shove me against the frame of my son's bedroom door.
I shove back, pushing the monster away from me. It stumbles backwards and falls down the stairs. The motion is weird, like a beanbag flopping over and over until it reaches the bottom. At some point, even the pajama pants have disappeared, and I can see bruising all over the pasty, pale skin. Slowly, the creature begins to crawl back up the stairs on its hands and feet, with its body arched like a cat and it's un-face turned to me. There are big, splotchy bruises all over it, and areas on the head are cut and bleeding.
At this point, I realize the scariest thing about this creature is that it has no face. I mean, its claw-shaped fingernails are nasty, and it's pretty strong, but except for not having a face, it isn't any scarier than a burglar. Everything in my entire being wants to turn and run away because it's creepy, but I know if I don't fight, it's going to get my son, so instead I close his door behind me and brace myself for battle.
When the monster gets close to the top of the stairs, I kick it in the un-face. It grabs at my ankle, misses, and goes sliding back down the stairs. Slowly, it begins climbing again. I kick it again, and it falls again. This time, it takes a different tactic, and climbs up the wall. It begins ascending across the sloping ceiling above the stairs. Now, I can't reach it. I'm sure it's planning on crawling into my son's room that way, where it will drop on him from above.
Now, it's scarier than a burglar again. It can defy gravity. It's some kind of a faceless, supernatural monster. I don't know what it will do to my son, but it feels like it's going to be something awful. I rush to his room before the thing can get there, but how am I going to stop this thing? Then, I remember my walking sticks. They're long and wooden. I can reach it with them, even if it is on the ceiling. They are at the bottom of the stairs. I have to hurry.
I run down the stairs, ducking as the monster takes a swipe at me as I pass. Right afterward, I wish I'd grabbed the hand instead, but it's too late. I reach the bottom, grab one of the sticks, and run back up until I reach the monster. It's right in front of my son's door, climbing down far enough to reach for the handle. I whack it in the head with my walking stick .
There's a mushy, cracking sound, and the stick opens a gash along the side of the head. The hair falls off like a wig. The monster falls with a muffled scream, and I stomp the hand nearest me. It tries to get up on its knees, and I bring the stick down on it again, knocking it back to the floor.
Over and over, the stick falls on that pasty, featureless skin with repeated sick, squishy thuds. As I continue battering the monster, I step over it to get between it and the door again, and begin kicking it toward the bathroom.
I know I've won when it covers its bleeding head with its hands. It crawls away from me, and I let it go, ready to strike again if it makes another attempt to get to my son.
I chase the monster into the bathroom, where it returns to the mirror, crawling back into it with pained, jerky movements. Once the last of it goes through the glass, I take my stick and break both panes. I'm not having this thing come back.
Turning to go get a broom, I hear laughter, and I notice that my reflection in the handle of the door has no face. I realize that it can come back any time.
The terror of knowing that strikes me right in the chest.
I have to admit, after dreaming this, I had to get up and go check on my son. On the way back, I had to check out the bathroom, and make sure the door was kept closed.
Ugh! Those mirrors totally creeps me out!
Without a paddle
This one is from last night.
Its early morning. I have to get up for work. A noise has woken me up, a few minutes before my alarm should go off, and I am annoyed. I hate that. It always makes me feel sleep-deprived, even though I've only lost a few minutes.
I grab my phone, and start heading down the stairs. About the middle of the stairway, the carpet is sopping wet. Water squishes up through my socks and between my toes when I step on it.
What the heck? Why are the stairs wet? I reach to step down one more, thinking I'll turn on the light, but I actually step in water, clear up past my ankle. I run back up the stairs and use the light switch at the top. The lights come on, but they're flickering. I can see that there is a body of water in the living room of our apartment. It has risen to about halfway up the stairs. Now that I see it, I realize that I can hear it, too. The sound of water lapping up against the walls is what woke me.
I shut off the light before an electrical fire starts (wondering at the miracle that it is still working at all,) immediately wake my son, whose room is closest to me, and run with him back to my room. I wake my husband, and tell him that there is a flood, and say how high it has reached. We look out the window. The water is even higher there than inside. Somehow, the windows have not broken, and the water is only coming inside slowly.
I want to panic, but if I do, my son will, too, so I fight it and cling to the calming influences of logic and problem-solving.
I start trying to figure out how we can get to the roof. The building is just basically flat, with no roof access from inside. We could got to the attic, but we'd be trapped in there. We're going to have to climb up from the window, though there is really nothing to hold onto but bricks.
I am a good climber, so I think that I'll try. We can tie a bedsheet "rope" to me, and I will take it up and find something to fasten it to at the top. Then, I can help my family up. I outline my plan to my husband.
He tells me we don't have to do that, and reaches into the closet. I figure he is going to get a rope or something, but he pulls out a huge box. Out of that, he pulls a big vinyl object that looks a lot like the old air mattress we used to take camping with us, except that the vinyl looks much thicker and tougher. Looking at the picture on the box, I realize it is an inflatable life-boat.
He begins inflating the boat. Once it starts to take shape, he ties a makeshift sheet-rope to it and hangs it out the window. I am holding the sheet, in case he drops the boat, but he doesn't.
By the time the boat is finished inflating, the water is at the top of the stairs, and the boat is resting on water outside the window. I look around the room for something to take with us to paddle the boat, but I don't find anything flat enough to be effective at all, except for a few things that have sharp edges. The picture in the box shows paddles, but there aren't any inside it.
We can't risk puncturing the boat, so we don't take anything. We tie the sheet to the dresser, climb into the boat, and then yank the sheet loose. We'll take it with us.
The boat floats past the other buildings in the apartment complex. We can't control where it is going very well. There are handles on the sides, and we figure out that if we all lean slightly to one side or the other, we can steer around debris, but we can't get the boat to speed up or slow down. I realize that even if we had taken a paddle, the water is so choppy and moving so fast that it wouldn't have been very effective.
I start to get seasick from the motion of the boat on the water, but I am at least glad we got out safely. I can see that the water is rising above the second story windows of the buildings as we are propelled toward the church across the street. Behind the church, the trees are bending and swaying in the water. I think we will use the sheet to latch onto that building if we can, to keep from running into those. Its roof is still above the water. We may even be able to climb up there and wait. We can use my phone to call for help. Until we can get to that stability, however, both of my hands are occupied with helping to control the boat, and my phone sits useless in my pocket.
Unfortunately, the water has currents I don't know about, and we are propelled "up" the street to the east. There is a lot of debris where the current coming out of our lot meets the current moving along the street, and we barely manage to avoid most of it. I try to grab at what looks like a floating piece of a kid's toy desk, a red plastic flat item that is wide enough to actually work as a paddle, even in this mess. It is too smooth, and I can't get a grip on it. It slips from my fingers, and we float away.
We float east for a short time. I can see bits of buildings sticking up. Now the water is higher than the trees. My stomach is doing flip-flops, and I am using measured breathing and hard swallowing to keep from throwing up.
We come across another change in current. This one takes us in a big half-circle, then spits us out. I almost lose the nausea battle, but don't.
Now, I can't tell what direction we are moving, because there aren't a lot of landmarks, and I don't recognize anything I can see.
The sun is coming up, and upon seeing the edge of it, I am able to determine that we are heading in a northern direction. The sky is not excessively cloudy, and it's not raining. I begin to wonder where all of this water came from.
Seasickness has made me dizzy. I continue to fight to keep from throwing up, because I am needed to help encourage (we aren't really steering) the boat to avoid floating debris. I feel like if we just keep going, eventually we'll reach higher ground, which is on all sides of where we live. From there, we can find our way to family.
When I woke from this, I still felt seasick . I was laying on my back again. My stomach was sick, and I was dizzy. I rolled over on my side and went back to sleep. Later, when I got up, I felt fine.
I wonder if this dream is my subconscious reaction to the economic turmoil in my area. There have been major job losses, and I am off of work right now with an injury I suffered there. My husband is working, but his income is not enough to totally support our family, and we're going to have to do some careful financial maneuvering to avoid eviction while my employer gives me the runaround about coming back to work, and about my worker's compensation case. I am worried, but I have faith in my hubby, who always seems to come up with the most unexpected solutions when there is a problem. Just as in the dream, what he is doing doesn't seem like the best thing at the time, but in the end, things turn out better for it.
Its early morning. I have to get up for work. A noise has woken me up, a few minutes before my alarm should go off, and I am annoyed. I hate that. It always makes me feel sleep-deprived, even though I've only lost a few minutes.
I grab my phone, and start heading down the stairs. About the middle of the stairway, the carpet is sopping wet. Water squishes up through my socks and between my toes when I step on it.
What the heck? Why are the stairs wet? I reach to step down one more, thinking I'll turn on the light, but I actually step in water, clear up past my ankle. I run back up the stairs and use the light switch at the top. The lights come on, but they're flickering. I can see that there is a body of water in the living room of our apartment. It has risen to about halfway up the stairs. Now that I see it, I realize that I can hear it, too. The sound of water lapping up against the walls is what woke me.
I shut off the light before an electrical fire starts (wondering at the miracle that it is still working at all,) immediately wake my son, whose room is closest to me, and run with him back to my room. I wake my husband, and tell him that there is a flood, and say how high it has reached. We look out the window. The water is even higher there than inside. Somehow, the windows have not broken, and the water is only coming inside slowly.
I want to panic, but if I do, my son will, too, so I fight it and cling to the calming influences of logic and problem-solving.
I start trying to figure out how we can get to the roof. The building is just basically flat, with no roof access from inside. We could got to the attic, but we'd be trapped in there. We're going to have to climb up from the window, though there is really nothing to hold onto but bricks.
I am a good climber, so I think that I'll try. We can tie a bedsheet "rope" to me, and I will take it up and find something to fasten it to at the top. Then, I can help my family up. I outline my plan to my husband.
He tells me we don't have to do that, and reaches into the closet. I figure he is going to get a rope or something, but he pulls out a huge box. Out of that, he pulls a big vinyl object that looks a lot like the old air mattress we used to take camping with us, except that the vinyl looks much thicker and tougher. Looking at the picture on the box, I realize it is an inflatable life-boat.
He begins inflating the boat. Once it starts to take shape, he ties a makeshift sheet-rope to it and hangs it out the window. I am holding the sheet, in case he drops the boat, but he doesn't.
By the time the boat is finished inflating, the water is at the top of the stairs, and the boat is resting on water outside the window. I look around the room for something to take with us to paddle the boat, but I don't find anything flat enough to be effective at all, except for a few things that have sharp edges. The picture in the box shows paddles, but there aren't any inside it.
We can't risk puncturing the boat, so we don't take anything. We tie the sheet to the dresser, climb into the boat, and then yank the sheet loose. We'll take it with us.
The boat floats past the other buildings in the apartment complex. We can't control where it is going very well. There are handles on the sides, and we figure out that if we all lean slightly to one side or the other, we can steer around debris, but we can't get the boat to speed up or slow down. I realize that even if we had taken a paddle, the water is so choppy and moving so fast that it wouldn't have been very effective.
I start to get seasick from the motion of the boat on the water, but I am at least glad we got out safely. I can see that the water is rising above the second story windows of the buildings as we are propelled toward the church across the street. Behind the church, the trees are bending and swaying in the water. I think we will use the sheet to latch onto that building if we can, to keep from running into those. Its roof is still above the water. We may even be able to climb up there and wait. We can use my phone to call for help. Until we can get to that stability, however, both of my hands are occupied with helping to control the boat, and my phone sits useless in my pocket.
Unfortunately, the water has currents I don't know about, and we are propelled "up" the street to the east. There is a lot of debris where the current coming out of our lot meets the current moving along the street, and we barely manage to avoid most of it. I try to grab at what looks like a floating piece of a kid's toy desk, a red plastic flat item that is wide enough to actually work as a paddle, even in this mess. It is too smooth, and I can't get a grip on it. It slips from my fingers, and we float away.
We float east for a short time. I can see bits of buildings sticking up. Now the water is higher than the trees. My stomach is doing flip-flops, and I am using measured breathing and hard swallowing to keep from throwing up.
We come across another change in current. This one takes us in a big half-circle, then spits us out. I almost lose the nausea battle, but don't.
Now, I can't tell what direction we are moving, because there aren't a lot of landmarks, and I don't recognize anything I can see.
The sun is coming up, and upon seeing the edge of it, I am able to determine that we are heading in a northern direction. The sky is not excessively cloudy, and it's not raining. I begin to wonder where all of this water came from.
Seasickness has made me dizzy. I continue to fight to keep from throwing up, because I am needed to help encourage (we aren't really steering) the boat to avoid floating debris. I feel like if we just keep going, eventually we'll reach higher ground, which is on all sides of where we live. From there, we can find our way to family.
When I woke from this, I still felt seasick . I was laying on my back again. My stomach was sick, and I was dizzy. I rolled over on my side and went back to sleep. Later, when I got up, I felt fine.
I wonder if this dream is my subconscious reaction to the economic turmoil in my area. There have been major job losses, and I am off of work right now with an injury I suffered there. My husband is working, but his income is not enough to totally support our family, and we're going to have to do some careful financial maneuvering to avoid eviction while my employer gives me the runaround about coming back to work, and about my worker's compensation case. I am worried, but I have faith in my hubby, who always seems to come up with the most unexpected solutions when there is a problem. Just as in the dream, what he is doing doesn't seem like the best thing at the time, but in the end, things turn out better for it.
Creepy Dolls
I don't remember exactly how old I was when I had this one, but by the way my room was set up, I do know I was younger than ten. At ten, I was moved into a different bedroom. I was older than eight, though, because my brother was in school, and he didn't start until I was in the second grade. So, I must have had this dream at least thirty years ago, yet the memory of it still gives me chills.
I used to have two favorite dolls. Both had plastic molded heads, but soft bodies and clothes that could be changed. They were made to look like babies, with pouty lips, "button" noses, realistic ears, and wide, round painted eyes and "real" (nylon) hair and eyelashes. They were washable, a must at my house. I named them Audrey and Elizabeth, and I slept with both of them in my bed every night... until I had this dream.
I awaken to the sound of my bedroom door rattling. My little brother knocks that way. I guess he's afraid I'll get mad, so he's very gentle when he knocks. I sit up as he opens the door and tells me I'm late getting up for school.
I ask him what time it is, but he pulls the door closed again.
Crap! I grab my dolls, and rush to the door. I open it to go out into the hallway, where I see that one of my flexible fashion dolls is on the floor.
I wonder, how did that get out here? I pick it up to put it in my room, turn back, and then feel a sharp stinging sensation in the flesh between my thumb and my forefinger.
What? The doll has bitten me! I throw it into my room. It goes bouncing across the floor, landing next to my bed. Oddly, though I just got up, the bed is neatly made.
A jolt of shock and fear go through my chest as I notice one more detail. Audrey and Elizabeth are sitting on top of the covers!
If they are over there, what am I holding under my arm?
I look down to see to almost exact replicas of my beloved dolls. Almost, that is, except for their faces.
Instead of the cute, baby-faced dolls I know and love, I am holding a couple of evil looking little demon babies. Their eyebrows are as real as their eyelashes. Their faces are drawn down into horrible, teeth-baring grimaces. Their eyes, though, are the worst. Bulging and bloodshot, they glare at me from eye sockets that are stretched out of shape to reveal the flesh beneath the eyelids. It almost looks like someone took a finger and pulled each doll's bottom eyelids down to look, and they just stuck that way. In my shock and horror, I drop them on the floor, where they begin to move on their own. I back away quickly, screaming for my parents.
I remember that I woke up screaming, and threw my dolls across the room, where the hit the door with a loud bang. That brought in my Mom, who sat with me until I calmed down. After that, I never took those dolls to bed with me again, and I have been creeped out by dolls ever since.
I do remember sneaking out of my room when I was really young, and watching what my parents were watching on TV. I have a distinct memory of seeing the scene in the move Barbarella when she is tied to a pole, and little mechanical dolls are biting at her. It may be a campy and ridiculous scene now, but when I saw it I was young enough that I was climbing out of a crib. I know that all of my life, I've found dolls with moving eyes (like the kind that blink when you lay them down) to be scary. I have always suspected that seeing that was the cause of that aversion, and I think it was probably also the inspiration of this dream, even though about six years passed between the two incidents.
I used to have two favorite dolls. Both had plastic molded heads, but soft bodies and clothes that could be changed. They were made to look like babies, with pouty lips, "button" noses, realistic ears, and wide, round painted eyes and "real" (nylon) hair and eyelashes. They were washable, a must at my house. I named them Audrey and Elizabeth, and I slept with both of them in my bed every night... until I had this dream.
I awaken to the sound of my bedroom door rattling. My little brother knocks that way. I guess he's afraid I'll get mad, so he's very gentle when he knocks. I sit up as he opens the door and tells me I'm late getting up for school.
I ask him what time it is, but he pulls the door closed again.
Crap! I grab my dolls, and rush to the door. I open it to go out into the hallway, where I see that one of my flexible fashion dolls is on the floor.
I wonder, how did that get out here? I pick it up to put it in my room, turn back, and then feel a sharp stinging sensation in the flesh between my thumb and my forefinger.
What? The doll has bitten me! I throw it into my room. It goes bouncing across the floor, landing next to my bed. Oddly, though I just got up, the bed is neatly made.
A jolt of shock and fear go through my chest as I notice one more detail. Audrey and Elizabeth are sitting on top of the covers!
If they are over there, what am I holding under my arm?
I look down to see to almost exact replicas of my beloved dolls. Almost, that is, except for their faces.
Instead of the cute, baby-faced dolls I know and love, I am holding a couple of evil looking little demon babies. Their eyebrows are as real as their eyelashes. Their faces are drawn down into horrible, teeth-baring grimaces. Their eyes, though, are the worst. Bulging and bloodshot, they glare at me from eye sockets that are stretched out of shape to reveal the flesh beneath the eyelids. It almost looks like someone took a finger and pulled each doll's bottom eyelids down to look, and they just stuck that way. In my shock and horror, I drop them on the floor, where they begin to move on their own. I back away quickly, screaming for my parents.
I remember that I woke up screaming, and threw my dolls across the room, where the hit the door with a loud bang. That brought in my Mom, who sat with me until I calmed down. After that, I never took those dolls to bed with me again, and I have been creeped out by dolls ever since.
I do remember sneaking out of my room when I was really young, and watching what my parents were watching on TV. I have a distinct memory of seeing the scene in the move Barbarella when she is tied to a pole, and little mechanical dolls are biting at her. It may be a campy and ridiculous scene now, but when I saw it I was young enough that I was climbing out of a crib. I know that all of my life, I've found dolls with moving eyes (like the kind that blink when you lay them down) to be scary. I have always suspected that seeing that was the cause of that aversion, and I think it was probably also the inspiration of this dream, even though about six years passed between the two incidents.
Tentacle Monster
One of the denizens of my nightmare world, I believe, is my mind's response to my body's physical pain. I suffer from chronic, widespread, unexplained pain. I've been diagnosed with Fibromyalgia. There are things I am able to do to reduce that pain, but sometimes, in the depths of sleep, I end up letting my body fall into a position that makes it worse. If I roll onto my back, my lumbar area seizes up and the muscles across that area get sore. If I don't wake up right away, that moves around to my belly and lower ribs. Then, I dream about the tentacle monster.
I never seem to be able to see the monster itself. Its physical impression is more of a warping of the light that comes from sources on the other side of it. However, I do get a definite sense of how it looks. Its main body is a solid but soft, fleshy, slim core. It's almost kind of cylindrical, but it's rounded and puffy at the top and bottom, like a half-deflated souffle, or a jellyfish.
Like a jellyfish, it has a multitude of long, soft, fleshy tentacles. These seem to be attached to the top and bottom. Some of the ones on the bottom are shorter and more solid, though it's tough to say if there are bones. Those, it uses to propel itself about. The others seem to range from around a foot to around four feet long, at about an inch to two inches thick. These, it uses to prod and, I can only guess, feed. Its attack involves initially searching with those longer tentacles, until it finds something solid. Then, it pushes, wraps, and squeezes.
I can feel the tentacles wrapping around my waist and my ribs. Wherever it touches, it gives little jolts of electricity. This feels almost like being tickled, except that it is really, really painful.
It pulls me in toward that solid center. As bad as the pain is from the tentacles, I'm really afraid of what will happen if I can't escape.
I fight by grabbing at the tentacles, squeezing and pulling them apart. It hurts my hands to be zapped by them, but if I don't fight, this thing will devour me.
When I start hurting it, I am hit by the sensation of of something pushing against the top of my head, but it pushes beyond the skin and into the inside. It makes me feel drugged, with that heavy-headed sensation that happens as a side effect with some pain medicines. I know that is a defense of the monster's, and that I am injuring it, so I continue to attack the tentacles. I can feel them pressing into the flesh in my back, breaking through the skin. The pain is excruciating.
The battle continues this way, with more tentacles wrapping around me as I tear apart the ones that are all ready there. The longer we fight, the more covered in tentacles I become, until I can barely breathe. It is a losing battle every time, lasting until the pain becomes too severe for me to take.
When I awaken, I always feel like I lost, and something was taken from me, but the real pain is never as bad as the pain from the dream. I don't know if that last bit is because when awake, my brain masks pain I all ready know I have, so that I can pay attention to my surroundings and activity, or if it is because when asleep, my subconscious multiplies the pain in the dream because of the nightmare setting. Either way, a change of position alleviates some of it, and if I go back to sleep, it will fade further throughout the night. Only rarely do I ever have that dream a second time in the same night.
When I was a kid, though, I used to sleepwalk.. I would dream of fighting this thing in my room, and I'd hide under my desk to limit the directions from which tentacles could attack and the number that could get to me. I would bite, scratch, kick, grab, punch, anything. Every time I had that dream, when I woke up, I really would be under that desk.. I know that scientists say that sleepwalking does not take place during the dream state, but in my case, either it occurred in response to the dream, or the other way around, because the two went together more often than not.
I never seem to be able to see the monster itself. Its physical impression is more of a warping of the light that comes from sources on the other side of it. However, I do get a definite sense of how it looks. Its main body is a solid but soft, fleshy, slim core. It's almost kind of cylindrical, but it's rounded and puffy at the top and bottom, like a half-deflated souffle, or a jellyfish.
Like a jellyfish, it has a multitude of long, soft, fleshy tentacles. These seem to be attached to the top and bottom. Some of the ones on the bottom are shorter and more solid, though it's tough to say if there are bones. Those, it uses to propel itself about. The others seem to range from around a foot to around four feet long, at about an inch to two inches thick. These, it uses to prod and, I can only guess, feed. Its attack involves initially searching with those longer tentacles, until it finds something solid. Then, it pushes, wraps, and squeezes.
I can feel the tentacles wrapping around my waist and my ribs. Wherever it touches, it gives little jolts of electricity. This feels almost like being tickled, except that it is really, really painful.
It pulls me in toward that solid center. As bad as the pain is from the tentacles, I'm really afraid of what will happen if I can't escape.
I fight by grabbing at the tentacles, squeezing and pulling them apart. It hurts my hands to be zapped by them, but if I don't fight, this thing will devour me.
When I start hurting it, I am hit by the sensation of of something pushing against the top of my head, but it pushes beyond the skin and into the inside. It makes me feel drugged, with that heavy-headed sensation that happens as a side effect with some pain medicines. I know that is a defense of the monster's, and that I am injuring it, so I continue to attack the tentacles. I can feel them pressing into the flesh in my back, breaking through the skin. The pain is excruciating.
The battle continues this way, with more tentacles wrapping around me as I tear apart the ones that are all ready there. The longer we fight, the more covered in tentacles I become, until I can barely breathe. It is a losing battle every time, lasting until the pain becomes too severe for me to take.
When I awaken, I always feel like I lost, and something was taken from me, but the real pain is never as bad as the pain from the dream. I don't know if that last bit is because when awake, my brain masks pain I all ready know I have, so that I can pay attention to my surroundings and activity, or if it is because when asleep, my subconscious multiplies the pain in the dream because of the nightmare setting. Either way, a change of position alleviates some of it, and if I go back to sleep, it will fade further throughout the night. Only rarely do I ever have that dream a second time in the same night.
When I was a kid, though, I used to sleepwalk.. I would dream of fighting this thing in my room, and I'd hide under my desk to limit the directions from which tentacles could attack and the number that could get to me. I would bite, scratch, kick, grab, punch, anything. Every time I had that dream, when I woke up, I really would be under that desk.. I know that scientists say that sleepwalking does not take place during the dream state, but in my case, either it occurred in response to the dream, or the other way around, because the two went together more often than not.
Another World
Before last night, I hadn't had this one in a long time. I'd almost forgotten about it.
Growing up, I used to dream all the time that parts of my house were actually portals to another world. I would just walk through the wall like it was an illusion, and I'd be somewhere else. Sometimes, these were just good dreams about going somewhere nice. Other times, the other world was an escape from something that was chasing me.
There was one particular spot that was always the same. I had it again last night, and even though I haven't lived in that house for years, that was still the setting. Everything was as it had been when I was in school.
I am running from a monster that wants to hurt me. I can't see it, but I can hear it thumping and bumping through the house. I outsmart it by running down the hallway, and trying to circle back around to the living room so that I can go out the front door. Unfortunately, the path is blocked, and I cannot get out that way. I turn and go back down the hall, through the foyer, and up the stairs. The monster is falling behind. It can't find me, and it's still downstairs. I can hear it going the wrong way, getting further from where I stand. If I just stay still, it won't know where I am, but it's going to run out of places to look in the downstairs eventually, and then it will come up here anyway. I might as well make a run for it while I have a head start.
I can hear the monster banging around at the furthest part of the house from the stairs. It's right under the room where I'll be going when I run. I have a plan. Carefully, I set myself as if to start a race, and then bolt down the hallway to my parents room. As I near the door, I hear a crash and a series of thumping noises from downstairs as the monster tears through the house toward the stairway.
In my parents room, I jump over the bed and open the window. I quickly turn the lock to hold it open, so that the monster will think I went that way. Then, I run to the closet, enter, and shut the door. The door has a little push-button lock, which I engage. Then, I turn toward the back..
I walk through the wall.
Turning back, I see a screen-and-glass storm door, with a little hook-latch to secure it shut. I engage the latch.
Then, I turn away from that door. I am in kind of a tunnel. In front of me, about three running steps away, is a cheap, thin wooden door, the type you would put on a closet.
I push the door open and go through, turn, and lock it. It has a little twisty button in the middle of the knob.
I turn away from that door, and face the next one. It's another wooden door, but heavier and sturdier. It looks like it would be tough to break this one. Even the hinges are thicker and heavier. I push it open, and go through. On the other side, it has a deadbolt lock and one of those chains that attaches to the wall. I engage both, then turn and face the next door.
I can hear the monster in the bedroom. It's really noisy, pounding on the furniture and stomping around. It roars loudly. I hear it smash the window and the window frame. It steps out onto the roof of the family room, where I hear it thudding around. There, it will discover that there are only two ways down, climbing on the UHF antenna tower that someone put in years ago, or jump. The monster weighs too much to climb that. I don't, but I don't know if it's smart enough to figure that out. It may come back into the room. My heart is beating so loud, I'm sure it must be able to hear it.
I keep going, facing the next door. This one is metal. I think it's aluminum, but it's thick enough that I can feel some serious weight to it when I push on it. I go through, close the door, and turn around. This door has a push-button lock, a deadbolt, a chain, and a metal bar that swings down to block it. I engage them all. It goes well, until I move the bar. That makes a noise, and the monster is instantly quiet. I can't hear anything.
I am terrified. It knows where I am. I can only pray that it doesn't realize it can go through the back of the closet. There is no use trying to be quiet now. In a split second, all hell will break loose on the other side of those doors.
I bolt to the next door. It's much heavier than the last one, and sounds like it's made of steel. Even if I had not made a noise with the bar, the sound of the metal grating against the floor would have gotten the monster's attention. I slam it shut with a loud, echoing thump, turn the deadbolt, engage the extra large, heavy chain, draw the bar, and pull handle that is beside me on the floor. A slim steel panel in the ceiling opens, and a three inch thick, iron portcullis the height and width of the door falls to the floor, inches from my nose. I can't see the top of it. At that, the monster roars loudly enough that I can hear it through even the door I just closed.
I hear the first door crash open, then the second. As the monster begins pounding on the third, I turn away and run. There is a good twenty yard hallway in front of me. There is no discernible source of light, but I can see another door in the distance. I run.
I hear the monster crash through the third door. It slams into fourth with a resounding gong sound. That is not going to hold for very long. As I cross the short distance to the hallway, I can hear that the fourth door is beginning to warp under the pounding it is taking.
I don't go through this door. Here, there is a trap. On the other side is a weapon that will fire hot oil at whoever opens it.
I find a crack in the wall, stick my fingers in it, and pull open the front of one stone. There are two small levers. When I push the first one down, the base drops out from under the last fifteen feet of floor I just crossed. The floor is still there, but anything weighing more than a cat will fall through upon trying to cross. I push the second lever down.
A section of the wall opens. I close the stone. It looks just like the rest of the wall. If you didn't know what to look for, you would never find it.
I go through the opening. On the other side, there is another stone I can open. Inside, I push down another lever, and that closes the wall. It looks as if it had been undisturbed the whole time.
I hear the fourth door give way. The monster roars, almost a scream. The sound sends shards of ice up through my back.. I could begin to cry. Instead, I quietly pray that my tricks will slow it down.
I run down another long hallway toward yet another door. This one is smooth, and it's standing open. There is light on the other side. I hear the monster slam into the steel door with a thunderous crash. I only get one chance to do this. I can hear the door breaking free of the wall, and I can only hope that the portcullis buys me some time, but I have no such luck.. The sound of the portcullis giving way seems distant through the wall. Right after, I hear the surprised yelp of the monster as it falls through the floor, followed by grunts and groans as it hauls itself out of the hole.
I slip through the opening. The vault door is two feet thick, steel-reinforced stone, and is built into an equally strong steel door frame that runs along the wall for a couple of feet on either side. It is incredibly heavy, but the hinges are well oiled, and it's made to assist in closing it. It will be harder to open than it is to close.
Once it is closed, I face a huge wheel in the middle. Turning it counter-clockwise, I activate several rows of two inch thick metal bars which extend out of the middle of the door's thickness, and into the frame on either side, into the ceiling, and deep into the floor. I can hear the monster's angry bellow as it bashes open the last door, and is hit full on by the oil. I hope that in its flailing, it will fall back down into the hole, but instead, I hear it pounding on the walls. Soon, it discovers the secret door, and begins to bash its way through.
I have two final touches. The first, I activate right away. Pulling a lever mounted in the wall, I drop another iron portcullis across the door, and I hear an identical one fall on the other side. I wait. Beside the lever is a handle attached to a chain that hangs from the sloping ceiling. I take hold if that, but do not pull until I hear the monster's footsteps approaching the door. As soon as I hear the metal straining as the monster pulls on it, I give the chain a good hard yank, and sparks jump across the door as thousands of volts are fed through it. On the other side, the monster screams a terrible, thunderous shriek that would put the Bean Sidhe to shame. There are huge clangs and crashing noises as it thrashes around trying to break itself loose from the hold of that current.
I turn from the door and run again, this time into a great hall. There, waiting for me, is a band of knights in armor. They give me a welcoming look, as if I am returning to my home instead of fleeing it.
Each of them is armed with at least three weapons, and they tell me to suit up and arm myself, but to stay back.. Behind them, on the walls, are various medieval weapons.
I'm strong, but not incredibly so. I know I'm not going to be able to handle any of the bigger, heavier weapons enough to do any good. The bow is equally useless, because without having practiced with it, I have no way to predict my aim. I choose a shorter sword. It's still pretty heavy. Between the handle and the blade, it's as long as my arm. Next to that is a suit of armor, but I'm afraid if I put that on, I won't be able to move. Instead, I grab a silvery chain shirt. It's too long, the body reaching my knees, and the sleeves falling down over my hands. I wrap a belt around my waist, sliding a sheath for the sword into place.
On a table, there is what looks like a chain ski mask.. I put that on, as well. It feels weirdly cold against my skin, and I expect it to pull my hair, but I can feel that there is fabric underneath that part of it.
This is as ready as I am going to get. I stand behind my guardians, and listen to the creature bash its way through the door to our world.
The metal doesn't just give way. It explodes into the room, chunks of debris preceding the biggest, most bizarre looking thing I've seen on two legs. He stands twice as tall as the biggest knight in the room. I can feel my stomach drop to my knees, and I momentarily have to fight the urge to heave.
Atop his massive head is a scraggly mess of sporadic strands of hair jutting out in all directions from various points of origin. His upper face, nose included, looks like a Neanderthal man, but below that is more of a huge dog's mouth, including the teeth. His huge, glaring eyes are red, with tiny black irises and black veins that stand out. He has tusks like a warthog. His upper body has the shape of a gorilla, with a massive, hairy chest - much more hair that is on his head. In fact, the further down his body I look, the hairier he gets. His broad shoulders lead to long, muscular arms that end with huge, fuzzy, clawed hands. Below the waist, his legs are bent like those of a four-legged animal. His long, thin feet look catlike, with long, sharp claws sliding in and out under huge tufts of hair on his toes as he moves. A scaly tail snaps back and forth behind him. At the tip is another cat-claw-like appendage that I have a sneaking suspicion would inject poison if it hits anyone.
He leans forward in an aggressive stance, and his jaw unhinges, dropping nearly to his chest, as he shows all of his teeth and lets out a massive roar. He pulls his second pair of arms out from behind his back.. Each of those two hands holds a huge club. Next to his massive size, they look like bowling pins.
The monster rushes forward, and so do the knights, bellowing war-cries of their own. As much as I was afraid for myself moments ago, I now am desperately worried about them. How can they survive fighting such a terrible beast? Yet the first to reach him lands a resounding blow to the gut with a huge morning star, and the creature loses its breath and its momentum.
The second knight uses his shield to shove the monster back further, and then stabs at him with a sword not much longer than the one I chose. The monster swings one of his empty hands, and knocks both knights halfway across the room. They flounder, trying to get back on their feet in their heavy, ungainly armor. I flinch, watching the impact. This is terrible!
The whipping tail comes around and nearly hits another knight, who cannot get out of the way. The biggest knight saves him, slamming his claymore into the claw and knocking it back at the monster. With a howl of pain, the monster grabs at the sword, and swings a massive club at the knight. The knight slices off all of the fingers on the monster's one hand, and he lets out a high, angry shriek..
The battle continues, knights and monster exchanging blows, but it soon becomes clear that we need more knights. The monster is able to stand up to terrible damage, and though the knights are armored well, their armor is slowing them down. I am sobbing with fear and anger as he batters my friends. Soon, he will take one of them down who will not get back up. They are showing signs of fatigue and pain.
The only thing I can do is join the battle, and I'm not very confident that the addition of my hand is going to make much difference. The smallest of my knights is head, shoulders, and chest taller than me. All I have is a glorified dagger, and barely a hint of armor.
Then, there is a break in the action. The monster pounds his way through the line and charges at me. I brace myself, ready to slash at him with the short sword, but I know that there is no way this little toy is going to stop anything that big.
The knights attack from the side, and the monster twists and turns, shoving and throwing them aside with his hands. One knight manages to disarm the hand on his side that is holding a club. On the other side, three knights grab one arm. The monster stretches toward me with his free hands, and wraps that tail around one of the knights. They let go of his arm to help their comrade, and he lunges toward me. I am so startled that I drop the sword.
Thinking quickly, I grab two of the fingers on the hand closest to me and pull as hard as I can, leaning back and hauling his weight around to my left. The monster stumbles, staggers, and falls forward past me as I let go. I have to jump away to the side to avoid getting hit by his flailing legs and that tail, which has whipped its way loose from the knight. I grab the sword and bring it down as hard as I can, not on the monster's back, but on the back of its ankle, slicing through the tendon. The muscle above it immediately snaps up, and the monster screams. Before it can react more than to draw into almost a face-down fetal position, I slice the other ankle, too, and then slash the sword across both of its exposed butt-cheeks. Dark, thick blood oozes from the wounds. It looks like half set up black cherry gelatin.
The knights thrash forward pounce on the creature, bashing and stabbing, before it can get to its knees. That tail comes down into the crowd, but one gauntleted hand grabs it and with a jerk, breaks it off. Then, it's all over, and the pommel of that claymore is sticking out of the back of the beast.
At that moment more knights arrive, bursting in through two big wooden doors at the other end of the room. With them is a lady about my age, who is a little taller than me. She's kind of muscular for a woman, but not so much that she looks like a man. She runs over to me and grabs me by the arms. She looks me over like a mom checking out a kid who just missed getting hit by a car. Her face looks worried.
Her hair is really long, hanging down around her like a golden shawl. She is wearing something that looks like a simplistic but elegant prom dress, and she has jewelry all over. She seems both relieved and disappointed. She proclaims thanks to multiple deities that we are all uninjured, though with the knights that statement is slightly questionable. At least no one was hit by the poison tail, but the men are definitely beaten up.
When I look at her, I realize that I have to go back through that passageway. The longer I am here, the more this place feels like the place where I belong, but if I stay, there will be many more monsters, and many more battles, and they will get hurt. She does not want me to go, but she does not want me to stay, either.
I pull the mask off and lay it on that little table. The woman lays one hand on my cheek and opens her mouth to say something.
This morning, I woke before she could get the words out. I've had this dream periodically from shortly before my teen years. Back then, the lady was just a girl. She didn't have quite as much jewelry, and her hair was shorter.
The last thing she always does is ask me if I am going to stay this time. I can't remember ever having the dream without that happening, except when I am awakened before she speaks to me.
Often, the dream goes past that point. I tell her that I have to go back, until I learn what it is that draws "them" to me. Until I can solve that problem, I am a danger to everyone here. It isn't always the same monster as the one I dreamed of last night, but it is always something horrible and scary.
My friend always insists that I at least have some time, and she is right. I can stay there for a few hours without incident, especially since we've just defeated one. Another won't come along for days.
If I don't wake up before we are done talking, a dinner is laid out, and though the knights are banged up and bruised, we all sit down at this long table and eat. There is an amazing amount and variety of foods at this meal, every thing I've ever eaten and enjoyed. Needless to say, if I get to the dinner, I totally pig out. If I do not wake up before then, I always wake up at some point during that feast, but I can't feel too badly about it. I know they expect me to disappear.
It seems odd to me that in these dreams, I always run to this place, at first to escape, then to receive help, yet at the end, I always have to leave to avoid further endangering everyone there. It seems to me that I've ended up there that way many times, yet it doesn't make sense to me that I would go there when I'm being chased if I'm worried about the safety of those people. Once or twice, there's been some hint or inkling that there is a reason, something to do with having control over where the monster goes and who encounters it... but I've never come to any definitive conclusion, and I still run there whenever I have that dream.
Growing up, I used to dream all the time that parts of my house were actually portals to another world. I would just walk through the wall like it was an illusion, and I'd be somewhere else. Sometimes, these were just good dreams about going somewhere nice. Other times, the other world was an escape from something that was chasing me.
There was one particular spot that was always the same. I had it again last night, and even though I haven't lived in that house for years, that was still the setting. Everything was as it had been when I was in school.
I am running from a monster that wants to hurt me. I can't see it, but I can hear it thumping and bumping through the house. I outsmart it by running down the hallway, and trying to circle back around to the living room so that I can go out the front door. Unfortunately, the path is blocked, and I cannot get out that way. I turn and go back down the hall, through the foyer, and up the stairs. The monster is falling behind. It can't find me, and it's still downstairs. I can hear it going the wrong way, getting further from where I stand. If I just stay still, it won't know where I am, but it's going to run out of places to look in the downstairs eventually, and then it will come up here anyway. I might as well make a run for it while I have a head start.
I can hear the monster banging around at the furthest part of the house from the stairs. It's right under the room where I'll be going when I run. I have a plan. Carefully, I set myself as if to start a race, and then bolt down the hallway to my parents room. As I near the door, I hear a crash and a series of thumping noises from downstairs as the monster tears through the house toward the stairway.
In my parents room, I jump over the bed and open the window. I quickly turn the lock to hold it open, so that the monster will think I went that way. Then, I run to the closet, enter, and shut the door. The door has a little push-button lock, which I engage. Then, I turn toward the back..
I walk through the wall.
Turning back, I see a screen-and-glass storm door, with a little hook-latch to secure it shut. I engage the latch.
Then, I turn away from that door. I am in kind of a tunnel. In front of me, about three running steps away, is a cheap, thin wooden door, the type you would put on a closet.
I push the door open and go through, turn, and lock it. It has a little twisty button in the middle of the knob.
I turn away from that door, and face the next one. It's another wooden door, but heavier and sturdier. It looks like it would be tough to break this one. Even the hinges are thicker and heavier. I push it open, and go through. On the other side, it has a deadbolt lock and one of those chains that attaches to the wall. I engage both, then turn and face the next door.
I can hear the monster in the bedroom. It's really noisy, pounding on the furniture and stomping around. It roars loudly. I hear it smash the window and the window frame. It steps out onto the roof of the family room, where I hear it thudding around. There, it will discover that there are only two ways down, climbing on the UHF antenna tower that someone put in years ago, or jump. The monster weighs too much to climb that. I don't, but I don't know if it's smart enough to figure that out. It may come back into the room. My heart is beating so loud, I'm sure it must be able to hear it.
I keep going, facing the next door. This one is metal. I think it's aluminum, but it's thick enough that I can feel some serious weight to it when I push on it. I go through, close the door, and turn around. This door has a push-button lock, a deadbolt, a chain, and a metal bar that swings down to block it. I engage them all. It goes well, until I move the bar. That makes a noise, and the monster is instantly quiet. I can't hear anything.
I am terrified. It knows where I am. I can only pray that it doesn't realize it can go through the back of the closet. There is no use trying to be quiet now. In a split second, all hell will break loose on the other side of those doors.
I bolt to the next door. It's much heavier than the last one, and sounds like it's made of steel. Even if I had not made a noise with the bar, the sound of the metal grating against the floor would have gotten the monster's attention. I slam it shut with a loud, echoing thump, turn the deadbolt, engage the extra large, heavy chain, draw the bar, and pull handle that is beside me on the floor. A slim steel panel in the ceiling opens, and a three inch thick, iron portcullis the height and width of the door falls to the floor, inches from my nose. I can't see the top of it. At that, the monster roars loudly enough that I can hear it through even the door I just closed.
I hear the first door crash open, then the second. As the monster begins pounding on the third, I turn away and run. There is a good twenty yard hallway in front of me. There is no discernible source of light, but I can see another door in the distance. I run.
I hear the monster crash through the third door. It slams into fourth with a resounding gong sound. That is not going to hold for very long. As I cross the short distance to the hallway, I can hear that the fourth door is beginning to warp under the pounding it is taking.
I don't go through this door. Here, there is a trap. On the other side is a weapon that will fire hot oil at whoever opens it.
I find a crack in the wall, stick my fingers in it, and pull open the front of one stone. There are two small levers. When I push the first one down, the base drops out from under the last fifteen feet of floor I just crossed. The floor is still there, but anything weighing more than a cat will fall through upon trying to cross. I push the second lever down.
A section of the wall opens. I close the stone. It looks just like the rest of the wall. If you didn't know what to look for, you would never find it.
I go through the opening. On the other side, there is another stone I can open. Inside, I push down another lever, and that closes the wall. It looks as if it had been undisturbed the whole time.
I hear the fourth door give way. The monster roars, almost a scream. The sound sends shards of ice up through my back.. I could begin to cry. Instead, I quietly pray that my tricks will slow it down.
I run down another long hallway toward yet another door. This one is smooth, and it's standing open. There is light on the other side. I hear the monster slam into the steel door with a thunderous crash. I only get one chance to do this. I can hear the door breaking free of the wall, and I can only hope that the portcullis buys me some time, but I have no such luck.. The sound of the portcullis giving way seems distant through the wall. Right after, I hear the surprised yelp of the monster as it falls through the floor, followed by grunts and groans as it hauls itself out of the hole.
I slip through the opening. The vault door is two feet thick, steel-reinforced stone, and is built into an equally strong steel door frame that runs along the wall for a couple of feet on either side. It is incredibly heavy, but the hinges are well oiled, and it's made to assist in closing it. It will be harder to open than it is to close.
Once it is closed, I face a huge wheel in the middle. Turning it counter-clockwise, I activate several rows of two inch thick metal bars which extend out of the middle of the door's thickness, and into the frame on either side, into the ceiling, and deep into the floor. I can hear the monster's angry bellow as it bashes open the last door, and is hit full on by the oil. I hope that in its flailing, it will fall back down into the hole, but instead, I hear it pounding on the walls. Soon, it discovers the secret door, and begins to bash its way through.
I have two final touches. The first, I activate right away. Pulling a lever mounted in the wall, I drop another iron portcullis across the door, and I hear an identical one fall on the other side. I wait. Beside the lever is a handle attached to a chain that hangs from the sloping ceiling. I take hold if that, but do not pull until I hear the monster's footsteps approaching the door. As soon as I hear the metal straining as the monster pulls on it, I give the chain a good hard yank, and sparks jump across the door as thousands of volts are fed through it. On the other side, the monster screams a terrible, thunderous shriek that would put the Bean Sidhe to shame. There are huge clangs and crashing noises as it thrashes around trying to break itself loose from the hold of that current.
I turn from the door and run again, this time into a great hall. There, waiting for me, is a band of knights in armor. They give me a welcoming look, as if I am returning to my home instead of fleeing it.
Each of them is armed with at least three weapons, and they tell me to suit up and arm myself, but to stay back.. Behind them, on the walls, are various medieval weapons.
I'm strong, but not incredibly so. I know I'm not going to be able to handle any of the bigger, heavier weapons enough to do any good. The bow is equally useless, because without having practiced with it, I have no way to predict my aim. I choose a shorter sword. It's still pretty heavy. Between the handle and the blade, it's as long as my arm. Next to that is a suit of armor, but I'm afraid if I put that on, I won't be able to move. Instead, I grab a silvery chain shirt. It's too long, the body reaching my knees, and the sleeves falling down over my hands. I wrap a belt around my waist, sliding a sheath for the sword into place.
On a table, there is what looks like a chain ski mask.. I put that on, as well. It feels weirdly cold against my skin, and I expect it to pull my hair, but I can feel that there is fabric underneath that part of it.
This is as ready as I am going to get. I stand behind my guardians, and listen to the creature bash its way through the door to our world.
The metal doesn't just give way. It explodes into the room, chunks of debris preceding the biggest, most bizarre looking thing I've seen on two legs. He stands twice as tall as the biggest knight in the room. I can feel my stomach drop to my knees, and I momentarily have to fight the urge to heave.
Atop his massive head is a scraggly mess of sporadic strands of hair jutting out in all directions from various points of origin. His upper face, nose included, looks like a Neanderthal man, but below that is more of a huge dog's mouth, including the teeth. His huge, glaring eyes are red, with tiny black irises and black veins that stand out. He has tusks like a warthog. His upper body has the shape of a gorilla, with a massive, hairy chest - much more hair that is on his head. In fact, the further down his body I look, the hairier he gets. His broad shoulders lead to long, muscular arms that end with huge, fuzzy, clawed hands. Below the waist, his legs are bent like those of a four-legged animal. His long, thin feet look catlike, with long, sharp claws sliding in and out under huge tufts of hair on his toes as he moves. A scaly tail snaps back and forth behind him. At the tip is another cat-claw-like appendage that I have a sneaking suspicion would inject poison if it hits anyone.
He leans forward in an aggressive stance, and his jaw unhinges, dropping nearly to his chest, as he shows all of his teeth and lets out a massive roar. He pulls his second pair of arms out from behind his back.. Each of those two hands holds a huge club. Next to his massive size, they look like bowling pins.
The monster rushes forward, and so do the knights, bellowing war-cries of their own. As much as I was afraid for myself moments ago, I now am desperately worried about them. How can they survive fighting such a terrible beast? Yet the first to reach him lands a resounding blow to the gut with a huge morning star, and the creature loses its breath and its momentum.
The second knight uses his shield to shove the monster back further, and then stabs at him with a sword not much longer than the one I chose. The monster swings one of his empty hands, and knocks both knights halfway across the room. They flounder, trying to get back on their feet in their heavy, ungainly armor. I flinch, watching the impact. This is terrible!
The whipping tail comes around and nearly hits another knight, who cannot get out of the way. The biggest knight saves him, slamming his claymore into the claw and knocking it back at the monster. With a howl of pain, the monster grabs at the sword, and swings a massive club at the knight. The knight slices off all of the fingers on the monster's one hand, and he lets out a high, angry shriek..
The battle continues, knights and monster exchanging blows, but it soon becomes clear that we need more knights. The monster is able to stand up to terrible damage, and though the knights are armored well, their armor is slowing them down. I am sobbing with fear and anger as he batters my friends. Soon, he will take one of them down who will not get back up. They are showing signs of fatigue and pain.
The only thing I can do is join the battle, and I'm not very confident that the addition of my hand is going to make much difference. The smallest of my knights is head, shoulders, and chest taller than me. All I have is a glorified dagger, and barely a hint of armor.
Then, there is a break in the action. The monster pounds his way through the line and charges at me. I brace myself, ready to slash at him with the short sword, but I know that there is no way this little toy is going to stop anything that big.
The knights attack from the side, and the monster twists and turns, shoving and throwing them aside with his hands. One knight manages to disarm the hand on his side that is holding a club. On the other side, three knights grab one arm. The monster stretches toward me with his free hands, and wraps that tail around one of the knights. They let go of his arm to help their comrade, and he lunges toward me. I am so startled that I drop the sword.
Thinking quickly, I grab two of the fingers on the hand closest to me and pull as hard as I can, leaning back and hauling his weight around to my left. The monster stumbles, staggers, and falls forward past me as I let go. I have to jump away to the side to avoid getting hit by his flailing legs and that tail, which has whipped its way loose from the knight. I grab the sword and bring it down as hard as I can, not on the monster's back, but on the back of its ankle, slicing through the tendon. The muscle above it immediately snaps up, and the monster screams. Before it can react more than to draw into almost a face-down fetal position, I slice the other ankle, too, and then slash the sword across both of its exposed butt-cheeks. Dark, thick blood oozes from the wounds. It looks like half set up black cherry gelatin.
The knights thrash forward pounce on the creature, bashing and stabbing, before it can get to its knees. That tail comes down into the crowd, but one gauntleted hand grabs it and with a jerk, breaks it off. Then, it's all over, and the pommel of that claymore is sticking out of the back of the beast.
At that moment more knights arrive, bursting in through two big wooden doors at the other end of the room. With them is a lady about my age, who is a little taller than me. She's kind of muscular for a woman, but not so much that she looks like a man. She runs over to me and grabs me by the arms. She looks me over like a mom checking out a kid who just missed getting hit by a car. Her face looks worried.
Her hair is really long, hanging down around her like a golden shawl. She is wearing something that looks like a simplistic but elegant prom dress, and she has jewelry all over. She seems both relieved and disappointed. She proclaims thanks to multiple deities that we are all uninjured, though with the knights that statement is slightly questionable. At least no one was hit by the poison tail, but the men are definitely beaten up.
When I look at her, I realize that I have to go back through that passageway. The longer I am here, the more this place feels like the place where I belong, but if I stay, there will be many more monsters, and many more battles, and they will get hurt. She does not want me to go, but she does not want me to stay, either.
I pull the mask off and lay it on that little table. The woman lays one hand on my cheek and opens her mouth to say something.
This morning, I woke before she could get the words out. I've had this dream periodically from shortly before my teen years. Back then, the lady was just a girl. She didn't have quite as much jewelry, and her hair was shorter.
The last thing she always does is ask me if I am going to stay this time. I can't remember ever having the dream without that happening, except when I am awakened before she speaks to me.
Often, the dream goes past that point. I tell her that I have to go back, until I learn what it is that draws "them" to me. Until I can solve that problem, I am a danger to everyone here. It isn't always the same monster as the one I dreamed of last night, but it is always something horrible and scary.
My friend always insists that I at least have some time, and she is right. I can stay there for a few hours without incident, especially since we've just defeated one. Another won't come along for days.
If I don't wake up before we are done talking, a dinner is laid out, and though the knights are banged up and bruised, we all sit down at this long table and eat. There is an amazing amount and variety of foods at this meal, every thing I've ever eaten and enjoyed. Needless to say, if I get to the dinner, I totally pig out. If I do not wake up before then, I always wake up at some point during that feast, but I can't feel too badly about it. I know they expect me to disappear.
It seems odd to me that in these dreams, I always run to this place, at first to escape, then to receive help, yet at the end, I always have to leave to avoid further endangering everyone there. It seems to me that I've ended up there that way many times, yet it doesn't make sense to me that I would go there when I'm being chased if I'm worried about the safety of those people. Once or twice, there's been some hint or inkling that there is a reason, something to do with having control over where the monster goes and who encounters it... but I've never come to any definitive conclusion, and I still run there whenever I have that dream.
Labyrinth from hell
Another recurring dream has me with a loved one, fleeing a terrible situation, and unable to get out. It is not always the same person, but it is always the same situation, the same pattern, and the same outcome. Though I have been able to use some lucid dreaming ability (I am not very skilled at that, try as I might) to overcome some dreams like this one by altering the scenery around me to allow success in the effort involved, I have yet to achieve any level of lucidity during this scenario. Instead, my mind takes it at face value, I am trapped in the scenery presented, and the story plays itself out as it will.
We are in a building that is on fire. At first, the only evidence of it is smoke along the ceiling, coming into the room through the building's ventilation system. We know from that sign that enough of the building is burning that we cannot extinguish it. Escape is imperative.
We are in a room. It's kind of like an office, with office furniture, but it feels like this is also a place where we live. I do not like leaving everything behind. I know that things I value are going to burn. It cannot be helped. We value our lives more than we value anything in that room, even though it pains us to know our possessions will be destroyed. We don't know yet how bad the fire is, and we can't take the chance that a moment's delay could cost us our ability to get out. My companion's face mirrors my sense of heartbreak..
We go out into a long, narrow hallway. There are doors along the walls. Most of them are unmarked. We know some are locked, and some just lead to other rooms. They are not the way out. There is less smoke in the hallway, where there are fewer vents. We run past the other rooms, down to the end of the hallway. I stop my companion from opening the door. First, we have to see if it is hot. If it is, we will know that route is unsafe, and we'll have to flee to the door at the other end of the hall. We only chose this one because it was closer.
I place my hand on the surface in front of me. It's smooth, and it's cooler than my skin. I touch the handle. It feels the same. We can go this way.
Opening the door, I lead us into a stairwell. We go down a flight, turn, and go down another. There are no more stairs. The door at the bottom is cool. Opening that, I lead us into another long hallway full of doors. All of the doors in this hallway are alike.
At this point, it feels like we are in an unfamiliar building, one that we've never navigated before. We don't know which door leads to the outside, or if any of them do. We go down the hallway, testing and opening each door. None of them open to the outside, or even to a room with windows to the outside.
It is hot in here. I am starting to fear that we are closer to the fire than before. My companion suggests that the heat is moving through the ventilation system, not coming from nearby. We can see smoke blowing in through the few vents along the wall.
At the other end of the hallway, we open the door, expecting to find an exit, stairwell, or lobby, but instead, it leads into another hallway running perpendicular to the one we are in. Now, we really don't know which way to go. I think that if we go back, the door at the other end of the hallway we left might lead to the way out. We turn, and there is a lot of smoke behind us. It is so much that we can't see more than halfway down the hall. We can't go back that way. Even if the fire is not there, we wouldn't be able to breathe.
We enter the perpendicular hallway, unsure which way to turn. Both ways look the same; long and narrow, with a few doors on either side and one at the end. My companion starts walking to the right, and I follow. We try side doors, but they are all locked. One has windows into the room, but all we can see is smoke. At the end of the hall, we feel the door, and it opens on its own into another hallway, perpendicular to this one. Exchanging a look, we run to the other end. The door at that end is locked, so we go back to the hallway.
Fearing that a right turn will lead us back to the fire, since we would be headed back in the direction we had come from, we head left. Again, the side doors are locked, but the hallway has doors at both ends. We are both terrified that we will not be able to find our way out of this building. There is smoke just along the ceiling of this hallway. The door at the end is ajar. Smoke is blowing out at the top. It doesn't lead directly outside.
We look, and see another stairway. This one only goes down from here. We realize that we don't know what floor we are on, and the stairway could lead to the basement. We look behind us, and notice that the other end of this hallway is so far we can't tell what is there. Something about that direction is scary. When I think about going back that way, I get a cold, compressed feeling in the pit of my gut, and I'm sure there is something bad there. My companion agrees, and we head down the stairs.
I feel responsible for my companion's safety. If I don't make the right decisions, and we die in the fire, this person's death will be my fault. I am sure of that, and it weighs heavily on my mind. I have to find a way for us to get out.
We go down the stairs. Opening the door, we find that another hallway stretches out in front of us. My heart sinks. The only way to go is forward, but that will be backtracking, taking us in the direction we came from, even though we are now on a different floor. We feel all of the doors along the hall, for fear that we are getting closer to the fire. Most of the doors are locked, but one in the middle opens to another hallway, again perpendicular to the one we are in. It is on the right, so it would backtrack us again, taking us right under the smoke-filled hallway we had come from before. We turn to continue in the direction we were going, but we can see actually see fire that way. There isn't a lot, just enough for the flickering light to reflect off of the walls.
We go through the door we've opened, running to the first door we find. It is locked. Now, I am starting to panic. I make my companion stand back, intending to kick the door, hard. I raise my knee up to my chest, and thrust my foot into the middle of the door with as much force as I can muster, hitting with my shoe flat against the wood. I feel the shock of the impact resonate up my leg and into my back, but the door cracks. I kick it again, and it breaks. It's not enough for us to get in. A third kick knocks out a section of wood, and we can at least see through that. Looking, we see that it just leads to a room. We don't even see any windows to the outside. We continue on to the next door. It's also locked, and now we're afraid enough that we just keep moving until we find an unlocked door.
We continue the pattern of finding hallways and stairwells, some going up, some going down. We can't seem to find anything that leads out, and each time we think about going back and looking for an alternate route, there is smoke, or there are flames. The smoke around us is increasing in thickness and volume, and we find ourselves hunching over to avoid breathing too much of it in. We pull our shirts over our mouths and noses to act as filters. We are now almost fully panicked, totally unaware of which direction we are going, and unable to retrace our steps. Every hallway or stairwell we encounter appears the same as the one before.
As we continue to move, the building gets hotter. It doesn't feel like we're moving closer to the fire. It feels like the fire is simply growing, consuming the building and becoming too big to escape.
Soon, we can see the walls smoldering around us. Blackening spots are forming in the paint as we run by.
Terror grips us, and we begin opening doors without checking for heat, running forward regardless of the futility with which we are repeatedly presented on the other side of each unlocked door we find.
Flames lick their way along parts of the walls and ceiling. If the door in front of us only leads to another hallway or stairwell, we are sure we aren't going to make it out of here alive. We are holding hands, and are alternately pulling each other toward the next door at the end of yet another impossibly long hallway. The air is so hot it makes our skin feel chapped.
I usually wake at some point between when the walls begin to smolder, and when the heat from the flames begins to feel painful. On waking, my first feeling is a sense of having abandoned my companion to the fire. I have escaped the dream, and in doing so, the danger, but I could not bring the other person with me. I am slammed with a sense of guilt, and a desperate need to return to the dream and rescue my loved one. I am overwhelmed by the conviction that this person is in immediate peril, terrified, alone, and feeling abandoned and doomed. It feels like it's my fault, because I woke up before finding us an escape route, and since I am awake, I am no longer there to help. I feel as though if I don't go back, that version of that person will burn to death. I am afraid for that person, desperate to help, guilty over the abandonment and how it must make him or her feel, and ashamed of what he or she must think of me for leaving. I am left having to convince myself that because it was just a dream, the experience was all in my head, and no one really is hurt. It sometimes takes hours, and the ability to contact the person and be assured of his or her safety in the real world, before I am able to overcome the feelings of foreboding, helplessness, urgency, regret, and shame.
We are in a building that is on fire. At first, the only evidence of it is smoke along the ceiling, coming into the room through the building's ventilation system. We know from that sign that enough of the building is burning that we cannot extinguish it. Escape is imperative.
We are in a room. It's kind of like an office, with office furniture, but it feels like this is also a place where we live. I do not like leaving everything behind. I know that things I value are going to burn. It cannot be helped. We value our lives more than we value anything in that room, even though it pains us to know our possessions will be destroyed. We don't know yet how bad the fire is, and we can't take the chance that a moment's delay could cost us our ability to get out. My companion's face mirrors my sense of heartbreak..
We go out into a long, narrow hallway. There are doors along the walls. Most of them are unmarked. We know some are locked, and some just lead to other rooms. They are not the way out. There is less smoke in the hallway, where there are fewer vents. We run past the other rooms, down to the end of the hallway. I stop my companion from opening the door. First, we have to see if it is hot. If it is, we will know that route is unsafe, and we'll have to flee to the door at the other end of the hall. We only chose this one because it was closer.
I place my hand on the surface in front of me. It's smooth, and it's cooler than my skin. I touch the handle. It feels the same. We can go this way.
Opening the door, I lead us into a stairwell. We go down a flight, turn, and go down another. There are no more stairs. The door at the bottom is cool. Opening that, I lead us into another long hallway full of doors. All of the doors in this hallway are alike.
At this point, it feels like we are in an unfamiliar building, one that we've never navigated before. We don't know which door leads to the outside, or if any of them do. We go down the hallway, testing and opening each door. None of them open to the outside, or even to a room with windows to the outside.
It is hot in here. I am starting to fear that we are closer to the fire than before. My companion suggests that the heat is moving through the ventilation system, not coming from nearby. We can see smoke blowing in through the few vents along the wall.
At the other end of the hallway, we open the door, expecting to find an exit, stairwell, or lobby, but instead, it leads into another hallway running perpendicular to the one we are in. Now, we really don't know which way to go. I think that if we go back, the door at the other end of the hallway we left might lead to the way out. We turn, and there is a lot of smoke behind us. It is so much that we can't see more than halfway down the hall. We can't go back that way. Even if the fire is not there, we wouldn't be able to breathe.
We enter the perpendicular hallway, unsure which way to turn. Both ways look the same; long and narrow, with a few doors on either side and one at the end. My companion starts walking to the right, and I follow. We try side doors, but they are all locked. One has windows into the room, but all we can see is smoke. At the end of the hall, we feel the door, and it opens on its own into another hallway, perpendicular to this one. Exchanging a look, we run to the other end. The door at that end is locked, so we go back to the hallway.
Fearing that a right turn will lead us back to the fire, since we would be headed back in the direction we had come from, we head left. Again, the side doors are locked, but the hallway has doors at both ends. We are both terrified that we will not be able to find our way out of this building. There is smoke just along the ceiling of this hallway. The door at the end is ajar. Smoke is blowing out at the top. It doesn't lead directly outside.
We look, and see another stairway. This one only goes down from here. We realize that we don't know what floor we are on, and the stairway could lead to the basement. We look behind us, and notice that the other end of this hallway is so far we can't tell what is there. Something about that direction is scary. When I think about going back that way, I get a cold, compressed feeling in the pit of my gut, and I'm sure there is something bad there. My companion agrees, and we head down the stairs.
I feel responsible for my companion's safety. If I don't make the right decisions, and we die in the fire, this person's death will be my fault. I am sure of that, and it weighs heavily on my mind. I have to find a way for us to get out.
We go down the stairs. Opening the door, we find that another hallway stretches out in front of us. My heart sinks. The only way to go is forward, but that will be backtracking, taking us in the direction we came from, even though we are now on a different floor. We feel all of the doors along the hall, for fear that we are getting closer to the fire. Most of the doors are locked, but one in the middle opens to another hallway, again perpendicular to the one we are in. It is on the right, so it would backtrack us again, taking us right under the smoke-filled hallway we had come from before. We turn to continue in the direction we were going, but we can see actually see fire that way. There isn't a lot, just enough for the flickering light to reflect off of the walls.
We go through the door we've opened, running to the first door we find. It is locked. Now, I am starting to panic. I make my companion stand back, intending to kick the door, hard. I raise my knee up to my chest, and thrust my foot into the middle of the door with as much force as I can muster, hitting with my shoe flat against the wood. I feel the shock of the impact resonate up my leg and into my back, but the door cracks. I kick it again, and it breaks. It's not enough for us to get in. A third kick knocks out a section of wood, and we can at least see through that. Looking, we see that it just leads to a room. We don't even see any windows to the outside. We continue on to the next door. It's also locked, and now we're afraid enough that we just keep moving until we find an unlocked door.
We continue the pattern of finding hallways and stairwells, some going up, some going down. We can't seem to find anything that leads out, and each time we think about going back and looking for an alternate route, there is smoke, or there are flames. The smoke around us is increasing in thickness and volume, and we find ourselves hunching over to avoid breathing too much of it in. We pull our shirts over our mouths and noses to act as filters. We are now almost fully panicked, totally unaware of which direction we are going, and unable to retrace our steps. Every hallway or stairwell we encounter appears the same as the one before.
As we continue to move, the building gets hotter. It doesn't feel like we're moving closer to the fire. It feels like the fire is simply growing, consuming the building and becoming too big to escape.
Soon, we can see the walls smoldering around us. Blackening spots are forming in the paint as we run by.
Terror grips us, and we begin opening doors without checking for heat, running forward regardless of the futility with which we are repeatedly presented on the other side of each unlocked door we find.
Flames lick their way along parts of the walls and ceiling. If the door in front of us only leads to another hallway or stairwell, we are sure we aren't going to make it out of here alive. We are holding hands, and are alternately pulling each other toward the next door at the end of yet another impossibly long hallway. The air is so hot it makes our skin feel chapped.
I usually wake at some point between when the walls begin to smolder, and when the heat from the flames begins to feel painful. On waking, my first feeling is a sense of having abandoned my companion to the fire. I have escaped the dream, and in doing so, the danger, but I could not bring the other person with me. I am slammed with a sense of guilt, and a desperate need to return to the dream and rescue my loved one. I am overwhelmed by the conviction that this person is in immediate peril, terrified, alone, and feeling abandoned and doomed. It feels like it's my fault, because I woke up before finding us an escape route, and since I am awake, I am no longer there to help. I feel as though if I don't go back, that version of that person will burn to death. I am afraid for that person, desperate to help, guilty over the abandonment and how it must make him or her feel, and ashamed of what he or she must think of me for leaving. I am left having to convince myself that because it was just a dream, the experience was all in my head, and no one really is hurt. It sometimes takes hours, and the ability to contact the person and be assured of his or her safety in the real world, before I am able to overcome the feelings of foreboding, helplessness, urgency, regret, and shame.
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