Orin's nightmare

This is an extract from a chapter.

 

This is a passage taken from chapter 41.

The companions have passed through a dangerous and wide desolate plain. They are walking through many patches of grass called ‘the pale nightmare’. The reason for the vegetations name is because of the hidden balls of spores hiding between the grasses, waiting to be trod upon. They then release a deadly fog that induces a deep nightmare in whomever or whatever broke the hidden balls. The cleric who now guides the group has broken some of the dangerous globes and has breathed in spores.

 

Orin was now a prisoner of his own mind and his thoughts had been deceived into forming a jail. He stood on a deserted, dark-yellow path, and around him was a night he could not pierce. Also, he felt a tingling inside him, warning that the obscurity held only dread. The cleric had strengthened his mind through many days of mediation. Walls of his unconsciousness were aware in the thick, confusing fog of dreams.

As deeper thoughts awoke under the burden of memories, he knew he must now act. Walking to the left, he peered into the total blackness. Now, remaining still, he believed a gentle wind whistled from far below. Even if his thoughts had created this sound, he held onto the faith that to jump would be safe. A leap, would allow him to wake. Suddenly he remembered he had just breathed a musty smelling cloud. He knew caution would be wise and he decided not to jump. Looking behind, the path now carried far into the distance. As he continued floating across the narrow trail, Orin became aware of the distinct lack of colour around him. In a mind, always, contacting a host of new ideas, meetings and state’s, his dreaming should be full of different hues. Now a dark blanket had been thrown over his world.

As he trudged onwards, the path became steeper. Quickly, it sharply angled upwards then disappeared, and became part of a dense black cloud, deeper than the darkness. The silence of his enfolding companion was now consumed by a tangible sensation. All around him, Orin felt that the space had become solid and now he could no longer breathe. Knowing that while dreaming, air, should be of no bearing, he was not disturbed. Yet he was aware that his body still needed to breathe. Immediately he created a protective barrier. His sleeping form would be warded against any foul energy, he hoped. After a prayer of gratitude to Hariyiom, he felt breath rush into expanding lungs. Also, the darkness was starting to lift. Now, a small area before him was home to a myriad of tiny sickly looking, yellow lights. Suddenly, they began to spin and dart around each other. In one stream, they poured from the cloud in a single yellow tunnel. At its end, one pallid glow was formed.

The foe, Orin sometimes looked over his shoulder for, from fear of its return, was twisting into sight. During an abundant past, one that was filled with, wandering, and helping others, Orin had encountered a creature that challenged his privilege of life. The beast was the Erat and it came to him while he peacefully slept under overhanging branches of a great oak in the continent of Remus. The cleric now battled to save his essence from an emissary sent by the demon Slubar. This demon from the netherworld often sent powerful slaves into worlds, to harvest souls. An eight foot tall smooth, obsidian skinned, mostly male human-shaped being, with a wing span to match its height stood before Orin. Its head was of a giant, distorted fly, with a dog’s snout brutally pushing from the centre. This malicious creature now glided from behind the image of the holy shrine Orin had been travelling to. Rapidly Orin’s pleasant dream of a green rising and falling ground, disappeared as water is sucked into a drain.

Soon, all that was left in Orin’s dream was the Erat. As each moment turned into unknown time, the creature glided closer. The cleric suddenly heard many and different mournful wails of screams of anguish, as the trapped souls within the Erat vainly fought against their prison. This twisted creature would firstly kill its victim then trap the departing essence. Now the demon would return to Slubar and give the essences.

After an extensive battle of conflicting minds was fought, Orin eventually was the conqueror. In his current dream, he wondered if his drugged state would hold back his abilities. Orin held the belief that, as his protective magick was useful, so would his attacking force be. Now, the Erat stretched its wings to their full span of eight feet and rose into the void. Only, about four paces from Orin it pointed both curved talons and let forth a deep, black fire. Human eyes looking for this river would have seen nothing. Yet, the cleric’s magickal power overtook all senses and he did. An invisible barrier instantly exploded in front of the attack. Dark flame now slammed into a solid wall. Seeing and feeling its fire turned, the Erat raised its right hand to call upon Slubars aid. Dark blue flame now cut apart the void as the entity was covered with dim, azure light. A great flood, streaked with long gaps of darkness now poured into Orin’s wall. With channelling more energy into defence and combined with the ferocity of an ever growing assault, the cleric began to weaken. His legs buckled and he sank to his knees. His fall seemed to dwell deep inside for longer than it should have. Sensing victory the Erat rose higher into the void without flapping great wings. It arched a sinewy back, and once again threw forward long arms.

The companions now saw beads of glistening sweat form upon Orin’s furrowed brow.

Finally, his attacking spell finished forming and immediately was unleashed. A blessed hammer created from pure energy now tore into the Erat. Its small onyx eyes that reflected blue of flame pouring from outstretched arms suddenly rolled back. They now spun toward the gapping hole where its chest had once been and it dropped from the void. After briefly and rapidly spiralling, it landed on the thin strip in a crumpled heap of broken wings. Promptly the creature vanished and with its departure, the darkness lifted. Having defeated his nightmare, Orin then wondered, why he still had not woken. ‘Not everything I have just experienced was due to the pale nightmare. Others seem to be influencing my dream.

 

 

 

Author's Note

Please ignore grammar problems and comment on the writing.

Reviews

[TLK]

"Its small onyx eyes that reflected blue of flame pouring from outstretched arms suddenly rolled back."

1) Adjectives. Why?
2) 'reflective blue of flame' - clumsy.
3) what exactly is suddenly rolling back? You construct the sentence in a way that invites misinterpretation.