If you are interested in the previous nightmares experienced by the players - see here.
Milo
finds himself on a desolate mountainside, all alone with a cave mouth
looming ahead of him. Deep snow covers the ground and he feels cold
and starts to shiver. A figure bursts from the cave, and his heart
beats faster as he sees Ceely running towards him, her feet brushing
against the surface of the snow and barely sinking into it at all.
A larger figure suddenly erupts from the snow ahead of her - a long
hook armed creature that catches her as she tries to dodge past, twisting
her around and jerking her close. Its beak bends down and bites at
her throat, ripping it apart in a spray of blood even as Milo tries
to run close to help, hindered by the heavy snow trapping his legs.
(In his sleep, Milo's legs twitch under the heavy blankets on the
bed.) As he gets closer, the hook horror drops Ceely's corpse to stand
tall and look at him, transforming before him into a tall muscled
man, Ceely's blood still running down his face. Milo's eyes widen
in horror as he realises the man is Lucretia - complete with the red
moving sigils down his forearms. Before he can say anything, Lucretia
transforms again, this time going through the change to a werewolf.
He howls at the moon then picks up Ceely's body and disappears into
the cave. A huge shadow passes across the moon and the distraught
Milo looks up to see the silhouette of a huge dragon passing over
the mountain peak. Fear grips Milo and he freezes, trapped again in
his body as he can't move, despite an irresistible need to run to
the cave after Ceely. Finally, he awakes, sweating and tangled in
his blankets, his heart hammering.
Ceely's
dreams start off pleasant, dreaming of Milo and her sailing a small
boat just off the coast of Neverwinter in sunshine. Choosing a small
island, they stop to picnic. The weather is warm and sunny, and things
are just getting pleasant when she notices that there are other boats
pulled up on the shore that hadn't been there earlier. She and Milo
hear footsteps, and look around, but see nobody there. Turning back,
she sees a group of four people standing there who look familiar -
the four dragon cultists that had attacked them after they had met
with Manshoon! The two oriental warriors fan out either side, shuriken
held ready to throw as Ceely fumbles for her harpoon. The priest whirls
his staff and lunges forward, blurting the command word as he strikes
Milo's arm, which withers away to a feeble stick like arm, the Painbearer
crying out in agony. Consumed with anger, Ceely lunges forward to
disembowel the priest, deftly ducking and dodging the thrown missiles
from the oriental warriors. The woman, Karana Tharr, simply laughs,
casting a spell that causes vines to grow up around Ceely's feet,
trapping her. The rest of the Dragon Cultists also start to laugh
at her, pulling back their sleeves to show Ceely their own sigils
on their arms. The swirling tattoos seem to grow before her, until
with panic, she realises she is becoming a tattoo herself, experiencing
the strange sensation of feeling two dimensional and twisted into
a thin shape on Karana Tharr's forearm. She wakes up, her heart hammering.
Cleo's
initial sleep is undisturbed, apart from when she awakes to find Merrell
sitting at the edge of her room. The thought of how he had managed
to get there without waking her, followed closely by the realisation
that she must have gone to sleep without bolting the door flashes
through her mind, but dismissed by the pleasure of seeing him. An
hour later, and the pair of them are sleep, cuddled close together
on the single bed. Cleo's sleep is far from serene however, as she
slips into a nightmare. In it, she finds herself walking towards a
large cave mouth, knowing she needs to go in to find something lost
- though she's not sure what - her old kitten Stormy? The young dog
named Dodge she had started to become closely attached to for the
short month or so before he had been stolen away by spiders? Or was
it even the new brightly burning flame in her life - her half-elven
lover Merrell? All she knew was that she needed to go in. Moving into
the cave mouth, the darkness seems to loom oppresively, and her claustrophobia
kicks in, the light of the entrance suddenly seemed a pin prick behind
her, and the walls were closing in around her, trapping her closer
and closer. Panic sets in and she turns to flee, only to find that
the entrance has disappeared behind her, leaving her in total darkness.
Heavy breathing sounds in the darkness, something large and ponderous
drawing nearer. As she cowers, frozen, something clutches at her,
and with a start, she awakes, her heart hammering to find Merrell's
fingers gripped tight on her shoulder. His eyes are wide open, staring
blindly into the darkened room, some faint remnant of moonlight or
early dawn light glimmering in at the shutters to illuminate his face.
He too seems caught in the middle of some nightmare.
Shortly
after snuggling up to Cleo, Merrell falls asleep. During the first
part of the night, his dreams are pleasant, peaceful thoughts - memories
from his childhood mixed with his joy at mastering his first spells.
Picturing himself in the home of his original tutor in Arabel, Cormyr, he sees
himself casting a spell. As the spell completes, he transforms into a powerful
lion. Padding around the small room, he sees his old tutor, a look of pride
on his face. But a crossbow bolt streaks through the window, striking his old
tutor down, and he whirls around, bounding out of the window to chase a fleet
footed man. The man drops to all fours, transforming to a werewolf, bounding
away from him. With rage in his heart, he races after him, chasing through oppresive
forests, leaping gorges and small rivers, but never quite catching the werewolf
up - who frequently seems to look back over its shoulder at him, sometimes with
a human face, laughing. Entering a gorge, he finally corners the werewolf, who
turns back to a man with red sigyls all down his arms. There is a noise behind
him, and he turns to see the entrance of the gorge has transformed into a cave
mouth instead. A huge red dragon slowly stalks out of the cave towards him.
He tries to cast a spell, but can't in lion form, and rips instead at his face
to pull the mask off. Backing away from the dragon, he bumps into the Malarite,
who breathes foul breath into his face making him gag. He grabs at the man,
trying to push him away, but the man keeps leaning towards him. Blinking, he
realises the man has transformed into Blondung. "I'll get you back for
zapping me in Kheizar Dalan!" he spits, his face inches away from Merrell's
staring him eyeball to eyeball. They continue to struggle...
OOC: Assume either Cleo wakes you at this point or she leaves you to get over your nightmare and you wake in the morning.
Lucretia
follows Vaslin up to her room, almost not believeing his luck. A guilty
thought flashes through his mind as he recalls Serena, but the sight
of Vaslin's derriere on the stairs immediately banishes it.
Later, when he finally falls asleep, he finds himself in a dream more real than his normal dreams. In it, he is the middle of a battle, swinging his swords around him with abandon, a fierce joy of life running through his veins. A horde of orcs surround him, and he can see embattled dwarves, as well as many of his companions nearby, also fighting the almost unending supply of orcs that seem to be streaming in through a gate some way away. As he fights, he feels the occasional nick and cut from the orcs weapons, even as he mows them down, but he can also feel the warmth from the broach on his chest and can see the wounds heal over as quick as they appear. With a feeling of almost invulnerability, he redoubles his efforts, his weapons weightless in his hands as he surges forward, pushing the orcs back till at last he reaches the gate and blocks more orcs from entering. From behind him, he hears the faint calls of his companions.
After what seems like ages, during which the orcs are replaced by trolls and he lives up to his nickname, hacking and mowing them down almost just as quickly (despite their own regenerative powers - odd limbs and body parts crawling on the ground away from him), there is at last a lull in the fighting, and he looks around in satisfaction. But behind him, he sees a battlefield strewn with corpses of his allies, the nearest one being that of Serena, with all the other members of the unknowns scattered further back amongst dwarven corpses, their bodies cut and mutilated, lying awkwardly in death.
In horror, he turns to yell obscenities towards the enemy, only to see a demonic looking huge figure, complete with lava red skin, curling horns, large leathery wings and even a pitchfork in one hand standing at the head of the troll-orc army. Almost as soon as he sees it, it seems to grin at him, then simply disappears, leaving the horde charging again. This time, his weapons seem increasingly heavy in his hands, and he struggles to lift them to fend off the mass of enemy. Suddenly, he finds himself buried in trolls, their claws and teeth nipping at him, eating him alive even as the magic of the broach regenerates him and he struggles to free himself...
Having
secured her room, Vaslin prepares for bed, very concious of the large
warrior Lucretia in the room. When she first met him, nearly a month
and a half ago, he had sort of been with Serena, though it was clear
he had an eye for all women. Serena's subsequent death had affected
him she was sure, though she wasn't perhaps quite so sure of her own
motives now, whether she was feeling sorry for him, or if she was
truly attracted to the muscle-bound hunk.
An hour later, with his warm body curled up behind her on the narrow bed, she finally falls asleep, slipping into a dream. In it, she is walking along a street in Silverymoon when a glint of light catches her eye on the floor ahead of her. She bends to pick a silver coin up and hears a whoosh as something flashes over her head before a crossbow bolt thunks into the wall of the nearby house. Glancing back in the direction where the crossbow must have been fired from, she catches a glimpse of a figure disappearing around the corner of an alley way. She chases, but the person is soon lost in the crowd. Looking at the coin, she realises it is the holy symbol of Tymora and that had she not bent to pick it up, she'd have been probably hit by the bolt.
Looking up, she sees herself standing in front of Fortune Hall - Shermata Chang standing on the top steps looking down at her with a benevolent expression on her face. As she looks up at her, the woman suddenly seems to age, her flesh withering and falling away, eyeballs shrinking and popping into mush before her body collapsing. Vines seem to grow up from the cracks in the stone steps, pushing their leavy tendrils through her corpse. All around her, undergrowth springs up and Vaslin realises she is now back on the island in the Moonwoods where they had first discovered the Luckpriestess's body. There is a roar from a lion, and she glances around, to see Merrell wearing his lion-faced mask - the Mask of Nabanion. He transforms into a lion and bounds away, disappearing into the undergrowth. Returning to Shermeta's body, she bends, knowing her faith is not yet strong enough to call upon Tymora for the power to bring Shermeta back from beyond death, yet feeling she needs to try anyway. Calling to Tymora, gripping her holy symbol in her hand, she summons the power, and amazingly, Shermata Chang's body stirs, then shimmers, returning healthy and whole. "You are truly blessed by Tymora's luck!" she says to Vaslin.
Happy at her success, Vaslin stands, only to find herself suddenly enveloped in a thick fog. The light dims and the sound of combat can be heard in the distance, muffled by the fog. Suddenly, a figure materialises out of the fog - its emaciated face embedded on her memory - Torus! Backing away, she stumbles into a wall, even as the undead figure lunges forward, plunging its hand directly through her chest and jerking out her heart. Somehow still alive, she watches numbly as it shoves the still beating heart into its mouth. "Just how many lives DO you have?" she hears some faceless voice asking. She looks down at her body, and her chest feels whole again, though she can't actually feel her heart beat. Some thoughts from when she had died before flit through her mind, intangible memories of a wide open featureless plain, an otherworldliness she can't quite recall properly. A cold shiver goes through her, and she has a feeling of floating in cold water with the dragon ghost from Kheizar Dalan appearing above her, bidding her to wreak its revenge. Something, one of those animated hands that had infested the pool, grabs at her, and something kicks at her. There is a sudden sensation of falling and she suddenly comes bruisingly awake as she falls out of bed. Hearing a moan, she looks up to see Lucretia is twitching in his sleep, tangled in the bedsheets and kicking out...
Yvandel
goes to sleep, feeling proud of his achievements that evening. The
memories of Kheizar Dalan were no longer as scary as they had been
- each retelling of their story building his confidence in himself
and his companions. As he drifts off to sleep, he starts to dream,
imagining how easily their quest will be completed. He pictures himself
casting increasingly complex spells, Blondung looking on and nodding
approvingly occasionally. In one spell, an image of a map of Faerun
appears in front of him, a route traced upon it of where they had
been and where they were due to go, to Daggerdale and beyond. He gets
the strange sensation of being both on the ground, in the map almost.
and also impossibly high up above the world as well - looking down
on it. Tenuous strings seem to stretch from the ends of his fingers,
disappearing down towards the distant group of adventurers, and as
he looks around, he realises they are attached almost invisibly to
the sigils on his and his companions arms. Again, he has this strange
dual view of the world - in the position of being the person holding
the strings, and yet also being on the other end, being tugged and
pulled about by them like gigantic live puppets.
The duality goes, leaving him on the ground, staring at the sigils squirming on his arms Even as he looks at them, they seem to form up and dance along his skin, moving to the beat of his heart. He hears a loud noise of enormous wings flapping overhead, and glances up to see a huge red dragon flying over him, its head is cocked as it appears to be eyeing him directly, expectantly almost. As it disappears, heading in the same direction he'd been facing, a cold chill settles over him, and he begins to shiver uncontrollably.
Awaking, he discovers that there is a strong draft through one of the windows, the shutter flapping loosely in the wind and banging against the wall.
Dorn
settles to sleep easily once in his room, enjoying the comfort of
a proper bed again. For most of the night, his sleep is undisturbed,
but in the early hours of the morning. a momentary feeling of doom
overcomes his dreams, and be begins to toss and turn in his sleep,
imagining large battle scenes, hordes of worg riding orcs led by boulder
tossing giants, attacking the walls of the citadel. As he stands on
the wall, his cousin Larz at his side, he looks across the foothills
and can barely see the ground for the solid mass of the enemy. But
another giant materialises just in front of the wall - one that Dorn
almost mistakes for a fire-giant, but Larz yells at his side "Clangeddin!"
The avatar marches across the field of battle, leading a charge of
dwarves even as Larz and Dorn run to catch up. The enemy, defeated,
turn tail and flee and the army retires to drink ale and sing songs
(i.e. ends a happy dream).
OOC: Herod, Blondung and Larz's dreams ommitted due to their being NPCs, and due to the fact that I was about to kill off Herod and Larz, so I couldn't be bothered to create some more dreams :-).
