Chapter 7: Shadows of Dreams
The rift's pull was like the cold grip of a phantom hand, clawing at Kael's chest and yanking him into the void. There was no warning—just an instant of profound, disturbing stillness, and then instant chaos. Colors bled into each other, streaks of violet and gray smearing across his vision like ink in disturbed water. He spiraled, weightless and choking, as the known world dissolved around him.
There was no ground. There was no sky. Only the sickening rush of chaotic motion and the crushing pressure of something ancient and vast, its consciousness curling around the edges of his mind like cold smoke.
The shard at his chest blazed, its violet glow intensifying as if rebelling against the descent. Kael gritted his teeth and pressed his hand to it, willing it to function. Anchor me. Please. The command was the only clarity left in the storm of psychic madness.
And then—impact.
Kael slammed into the ground hard enough to rattle his bones, air exploding from his lungs. He rolled, coughing, then forced himself upright. What lay beneath him wasn't stone or soil. It was woven. A floor of tightly knotted threads, pulsing faintly, like veins beneath translucent skin.
The space stretched infinitely in every direction, a vast cavern with no true edges. The walls shimmered like oil on water, colors shifting and blurring with each breath he took. The ceiling above churned with roiling violet clouds. Lightning flickered constantly behind them, flashing sharp, broken shadows across the dreamscape.
Kael rose to his feet, unsteady. His breath came fast and shallow. The shard pulsed against his chest, a desperate, fading heartbeat of light. The weight of the place settled on him—heavy and suffocating, like walking into a room already thick with centuries of grief.
He turned in place, eyes scanning the impossible space.
"This isn't just one mind," he muttered, the air thick and difficult to move through. "This is all of them. The entire archive of misery."
And there they were.
Suspended above the floor like broken marionettes were the villagers—Jessa, Korrin, Torm, and a dozen others. Thick black threads wrapped around their limbs and torsos, coiling like heavy serpents. Each strand tightened slowly, steadily. Their faces hung slack, eyes rolled back, mouths half-open as if they had tried to scream but never managed the sound.
Kael's stomach twisted into a painful knot of useless anger.
"Kael…"
The whisper crept in—cold and wet, like the touch of something crawling across his brain. It wasn't a sound. It was a hostile presence. A thought entirely not his own. A painful, aggressive intrusion.
Kael clenched the shard tighter. Its glow brightened instantly, casting slicing beams of violet light against the swirling walls.
"SHOW YOURSELF!" he shouted, his voice ringing like steel through the deep dream-space.
Silence answered him.
And then the threads shivered across the floor.
They rippled like muscles under skin, and from the floor, shadows began to rise.
Shapes born of nightmares. Not his own—but theirs.
The first was a titan of molten steel. Its skin bubbled with internal heat, claws dripping slow, heavy lava, its face blank with consuming rage. Steam hissed from its joints.
"Toren's nightmares," Kael whispered, realizing the cruel trick. "His worst memories of war. Warped and armed."
Next came a figure in blinding golden armor, radiant and divine, holding a blazing sword. It hovered above the ground, angelic yet impossibly cold. Kael's heart sank with recognition.
"Jessa's guardian," he said bitterly. "Now turned into judgment incarnate. This is cheap."
One by one, more horrors emerged—wraiths with whispering, eyeless faces. Their voices slithered over his skin, direct into his mind.
"Failure… Weak… You ran…"
Kael barely dodged the molten steel behemoth's swipe. One molten claw smashed the woven ground where he stood, sending waves of force that cracked the thread-floor and flung thread shards into the air like shattered glass.
He rolled, came up crouching.
"I don't have time for your cheap parlor tricks," he snarled, pushing through the intense pain.
With a swift motion, he thrust the shard like a blade. A gleam of light lanced out, a thread of pure energy striking the steel beast's leg. It stumbled, groaning loudly.
But the golden guardian descended in an instant, flaming sword sweeping down. Kael leapt aside, the blade scorching the air, cutting a thick, molten gash across the floor.
The wraiths closed in, their whispers growing louder, more venomous.
"You can't save them… You're too late… Abandoned…"
Kael pressed a hand to his head, the invasive voices gnawing at the edge of his clarity. He stumbled, shaking from the psychic assault, but gritted his teeth.
"SHUT. UP!" he roared, slicing outward with the shard. A glowing strand whipped out and bound the guardian's arm mid-swing. It froze—but only briefly. The steel beast bellowed and surged forward again.
Kael ducked beneath it, sprinting across the chamber toward the suspended villagers. His eyes locked on the epicenter of it all—a massive knot of thread, throbbing with sickly, dark light, covered in pulsing, forbidden runes.
The anchor. The focus of the curse.
The shard tugged fiercely toward it.
But pain blossomed across his back as a wraith tore at him with icy claws. He gasped, falling to one knee. Then a blast of searing, hateful light from the guardian slammed him across the room. He hit the floor hard and lay momentarily stunned.
Around him, the whispers crescendoed.
"Kael… weak… broken… surrender…"
He raised his head, blinking through sweat and blood. The suspended villagers were convulsing violently. The black threads squeezed tighter. Jessa's lips moved. A soft moan escaped her, barely audible.
"No," Kael croaked. "No, no, no."
He reached—crawled—toward the shard that had slipped from his grasp.
Above him, the steel beast raised its massive claw for a killing blow.
He rolled.
The blow missed by inches, splitting the floor with a sound like tearing fabric. With a raw cry of pure will, Kael grasped the shard and drove it toward the massive knot. A blazing thread of violet shot out—and violently pierced the dark, pulsating mass.
The knot recoiled, convulsing.
The nightmares froze instantly.
A scream echoed. Not from any human throat. Not from the pain-filled memory of the villagers.
Something ancient. Something utterly furious.
"You… dare… Intruder…"
The air thickened to a viscous fluid. Violet lightning split the ceiling as a figure emerged—woven from shadow, draped in thread, intensely regal and terrifying. Its body was humanoid, but its eyes burned with cold, intelligent violet fire.
Kael staggered back, confirming the terrible truth.
"The Sleeping Tyrant," he breathed.
It was not fully awake. But it was present.
"These threads," it rasped, its voice like a blade dragged through stone, "are mine. The potential is mine. Cut them… and I rise. Leave them… and they fade. Choose, Unshackled."
Kael's grip on the shard faltered. His hands trembled. He was caught in a perfect paradox.
And then—
"KAEL!"
Lirien's voice—distant but clear, a pure, sharp note of hope piercing the suffocating despair.
Then: "We've got you!" Toren's roar echoed, immediately followed by the distinct CRASH of his hammer connecting with stone.
They were still fighting. Still holding the gate open.
Kael's heart surged, answering the external anchor with a powerful rush of will. He refused to be the end of them.
The shard pulsed, answering that surge.
"I'm not choosing," Kael growled, blood running down his chin from a deep cut. "I'm TAKING THEM BACK!"
With a defiant, visceral scream, he shoved the shard upward.
A torrent of threads burst from it—wild, chaotic, slicing toward the knot with blinding speed.
They struck.
The knot violently unraveled.
The Tyrant recoiled, shrieking in absolute agony. The shadows of the nightmares faltered and staggered.
Kael ignored the pain, slashing and severing thread by thread.
Jessa—cut free. She fell gasping into the void.
Korrin—down next.
Torm—released, eyes fluttering open.
Each soul freed cracked the dream a little more. The chamber trembled. The walls bled violet light.
A wraith tore across Kael's leg. He screamed—but didn't stop.
The last villager dropped.
The knot burst entirely, dissolving into painful static.
A shockwave of white light swallowed everything.
The Tyrant shrieked—splintering into chaotic shadow and static.
"Not… done… I will weave you…"
And then—
Everything shattered.
Kael gasped awake, sprawled across the floor of the vault chamber. His body screamed in agony, every muscle aflame from the phantom wounds. He blinked.
The small Rift—its aggressive violet glow was fading, shrinking to a harmless shimmer.
The villagers lay around him, stirring, groaning, waking from the horrible, shared dream. Jessa sobbed weakly. Korrin coughed violently. Torm opened his eyes wide and stared at the dark ceiling in disbelief.
Nearby, Toren stood over the broken, rapidly dissolving body of a defeated rift-beast, his hammer bloodied and heavy. His chest heaved with brutal exertion.
He turned. His eyes found Kael.
"You did it," he breathed, relief washing over his grim features. "By the roots—you did it! They're awake. All of 'em!"
He strode over, hauled Kael up with one strong arm, and clapped him roughly on the back.
Kael winced sharply. "Careful. Still bleeding from… well, everywhere."
Toren immediately looked concerned. "Seriously though. Are you alright?"
Kael nodded weakly, holding up the shard. It pulsed faintly, nearly exhausted.
"Not all," he said, shaking his head. "The Tyrant's still there. I severed the threads, but it wasn't gone. Just its shadow-form. I only cut the net, not the fisherman."
Mara limped toward them, one arm wrapped and useless, her face drawn. Her eyes held profound understanding—and a deeper fear.
"You weakened it profoundly," she said softly. "But that wasn't it, Kael. That was just the surface. The dream-form it uses to feed."
Kael's gaze sharpened, the pain forgotten in the necessity of the next step. "Then we go deeper."
He rose, staggering slightly. But the fire in his eyes burned steady and resolute. Behind him, the villagers gathered. Alive. Whole. Lirien clung to Toren's leg. Jessa stared at Kael with something approaching awe.
"We're with you," Toren said simply, placing a strong hand on Kael's shoulder. "Whatever comes next. We aren't leaving you."
Kael turned to Mara.
"No more secrets."
She hesitated only a beat. Then nodded, accepting the new terms. "None."
A hush fell.
And then, from beyond the pedestal, the cold stone wall shifted.
A passage opened.
A staircase, carved from black rock, descended sharply into deeper blackness.
The small rift pulsed once, like a final, fading heartbeat.
"Kael… soon…"
Kael stepped forward. The shard flared in his hand, gathering its last remaining light, casting a defiant beam onto the steps ahead.
The true battle had not yet begun.
But he would be ready.