The Realm Protectors - Chapter 50: Chapter 50

I'm swimming in darkness.
It's thick and oily, running over my skin with a slippery chill. Blackness clouds my vision as if my eyes are closed, but I feel my eyes open. My mind is blank, completely thoughtless. I look down, trying to discern where I am, but I only see black. The air is chilled, stinging the inside of my nose. Shadows dance around me, vicious shapes and dull stars spinning in a lazy stupor. Everything feels both real and not.
"Hello?" I call into the darkness, my voice echoing as if spoken through a tube. Whispers echo back to me in a chorus, sending a chill down my spine. This place is so empty that the vacuum is beginning to have a voice.
I close my eyes, light streaking behind my eyelids. I open them again to a night sky, crows streaking overhead. Air whips my hair and clothes, trying to tear me apart. Feathers flutter against my skin, and I realize I'm being carried on the back of a massive ebony crow. Its head is cocked to the side, one eye staring at me eerily. A screeching caw comes from it's beak, calling to the other crows flying around us. I don't even have time to scream before I'm swallowed in a pit of feathers. I cover my face with my arms, doing my best to shield myself from the onslaught. Light streaks across my vision again, and I'm transported to somewhere else.
Dark wood floors creak under my feet, light streaming in through high glass windows. I look up to see puffy white clouds floating lazily across the ceiling, spinning lowly as if to start forming a hurricane.
"I wondered if you'd show up," Someone chuckles. I spin around to see a desk floating a few inches off the ground, a chair facing the opposite direction in front of it. The voice is familiar, but my mind is too sluggish to place it.
"Who are you?"
"Come closer, Ciana, and see for yourself."
Doubt and fear flicker in my mind like the shadow of emotion. My body moves before my mind does, bounding softly across the room. I'm propelled into the air slightly as if the wood panels of the floor were actually trampolines. There's another chair across from the mysterious desk, and I bounce up to take a seat. The chair spins around by itself, turning me to face the mysterious voice.
I don't believe my eyes.
"Professor Grantwood?"
Grantwood smiles, the corner of her eyes crinkling slightly with premature wrinkles. "I suppose it's more appropriate for you to call me Cira, now."
My jaw is embarrassingly slack, and my brain refuses to accept the image in front of me.
"How are you– where am I?" I ask. "How are you here?"
"This is your dreamscape, Ciana." Grantwood says, voice lilting and soft. "You are unconscious and have been for quite a while."
"Unconscious?"
"What is the last thing you remember, child?"
I pause, searching my brain for the right answer. "We... we were in Vesi. Outside the capital, Saari. Guarding the gateway."
"Good," Grantwood nods. "What else?"
My brain feels like smoke – memories appearing and then fading in my hands. "I... I don't remember."
Grantwood hums, a pleasant but thoughtfully worried expression on her face. "You took quite the blow to the head. I'm not surprised you don't remember."
"Professor, what happened?"
Grantwood stands from her chair, falling slowly to the floor. Her feet seem to sink into the wood as she raises a hand to me.
"I will show you,"
I take her hand, letting myself sink back to the floor. She seems smaller in this... this dreamworld in my head. Grantwood nods when I reach the floor, pulling my hand gently towards the tunnel of clouds forming in the corner. She stops right in front of it.
"After I reveal this to you, you will wake up back in your body," Grantwood says softly. She turns to face me. "You have been comatose long enough."
"Comatose?" I ask, shock pounding in my skull like a nail. "I'm in a coma?"
"You have been asleep for weeks, Ciana." Grantwood hums. "Your friends are beginning to get worried."
"Then let's go!" I tell her. I start to step towards the tunnel when she steps in front of me, cutting off my path.
"There are things you must know, first," Grantwood says. "Things that I cannot communicate with you once you leave this place."
I close my mouth and wait for her to begin. She starts with a sigh.
"History is my passion, as you know. But one thing about history that fascinates me to no extent actually has nothing to do with the past." Grantwood pauses. "The future. I grew up in a family of mixed elements. My father and brothers were all time elementals, and they had the ability to see the future – a gift that I quickly became jealous of. The future is a fragile thing, a glass orb teeming with possibilities. Just one small shift and the entire image could change. It fascinated me, and soon, I began to notice strange things about my own abilities.
"As a light elemental, I have no power to see the future. However, it seems that I may have inherited an affinity from my father's element: a minute ability to sense things about the future. I could not see what would happen, or transport myself into a future period of time, but I would sometimes come across objects or people, and get an image in my head of what they would become. It is how I knew that you eight were to become our descendants." She pauses, smiling sadly. "And how I knew I would not live long enough to truly train you."
"Let me get this straight," I hold up my hands, pausing her. "You have an affinity that lets you sense the future, and you didn't tell us that you were all going to die?"
"It was my path," Grantwood shakes her head. "You cannot change fate on purpose, Ciana. It only leads to pain and suffering. If fate wants to change, it will change. But not under the direction of any human hand. It is truly a fickle thing indeed."
"Why are you telling me this now?"
"Because my death has given me stronger sight," Grantwood's face and tone turn serious. "And fate has given me a message to pass on. Your futures are in jeopardy. Because of the events caused by the Nox, your futures are now directly tied to the future of the Realm. Everyone's is, but yours especially."
"What does that mean?"
"It means that the future of the Realm rests on your shoulders in more ways than one, Ciana." Grantwood places her hands on my shoulders squeezing tightly. "To save the people of the Realm, you must save the Realm itself. That much I'm sure is clear. But this struggle with the Nox will not be the final one. You will have many grave battles between you, and you must do everything in your power to win this fight."
"I thought fate already picked our endings?" I ask in confusion.
"Fate has not decided," Grantwood purses her lips. "Either you will defeat the Nox and save the Realm, the Otherworld, and everyone in them... or you will fall, and the Nox will take control, turning our world into a hideous monarchy where chaos and anarchy reign supreme."
"How do I make sure that doesn't happen?" I ask. "How do I make sure we end up on the right side of fate's decision?"
Grantwood's face shimmers, whorls of sun rays glimmering gold and slightly blue. "You must be wary of your past, and careful of your present. That is all I can say."
I nod, trying to memorize her words. Grantwood releases my shoulders whenever she is satisfied with what she sees in my face.
"I have no control over how much of this you remember, but if you remember only part, remember that." Grantwood finishes. She turns back towards the tunnel. "Now you must go."
I step towards the tunnel slowly, feeling the cold emanating from within. I turn around to see that Grantwood hasn't moved.
"You're not coming with?"
"Death has only granted me access to your comatose dream state," She says. "That tunnel leads to a memory that only belongs to you. None may enter except you."
I clench my jaw, turning back towards the tunnel.
"Hurry, Ciana," Grantwood says behind me. "Your friends are waiting."
I steel myself once more and step into the swirling black.
The sound of shouting voices reaches me first, filling my ears. The other senses return after, and I find myself crouching behind a row of trees.
"The camp," I realize, looking towards the rings of tents far to my right. I turn to find the source of the voices, realizing they're coming from the guards battling the Nox soldiers. They're falling quickly, barely able to put up a fight.
"They need help," I realize. I try to stand up but my body refuses, staying frozen in the memory.
I have no control here.
Leaves crunch behind me, but I only have time to turn my head before pain explodes in my chest. I look down to see the handle of a dagger, covered in swirling shadows. My legs give out from underneath me, and I find myself laying on the soft grass. My vision begins to blur, black spots dancing across it. A person cloaked in shadow laughs above me before running away, back towards the gateway. Metallic, sticky blood begins to seep into my shirt, filling the air with its iron scent. I cough, blood choking my throat.
Breath leaves me in a soft gasp, my eyes falling shut. The memory shivers, as if it's almost over. My eyes open again slightly, faintly, as pain erupts all over me again. I'm trapped, pressed under piles of wood and leaves. Tingles of pain race up from my leg, surely broken. My vision blurs again before my eyes close, and more time passes.
Voices reach my ears, scared and panicked voices that belong to my friends. Their blurred faces appear above me, Faris's clearer than the others. Pain and fear are clear on his face, and I feel him cradle me gently. The motion sends waves of pain across my body, but swirls of adoration through my mind.
My eyes close again, blackness engulfing me. The next thing I hear is beeping. It's a steady pace, matching what seems to be a heartbeat. My heartbeat.
I open my eyes again to light streaming in through an open window, a gentle breeze blowing at the white curtains. As I look around, I realize that this time I'm truly awake.
My body is sore everywhere. I take a breath and realize that I'm heavily wrapped in gauze. Looking down I confirm the fact and see my leg is wrapped in a cast as well. Hazy memories of what I saw in my dreamscape begin to return to me slowly, mostly tinged with red and pain. Oily black, crows and flying feathers, and bright light. Professor Grantwood's words.
You must be wary of your past, and careful of your present, I remember.
My brain finally settles down from the roar of thoughts and memories settling, and I'm able to truly see my surroundings. A white countertop on the wall opposite my bed is filled with baskets and stuffed animals tied to balloons of various colors. Get-well cards are scattered throughout the piles, some faded with a light sheen of dust. Presents wrapped in shiny paper are stacked on the floor too, each one with a little gift tag. Some are written in the elegant script of my teachers at Asavanra, some are scribbled in the hand of children.
A deep breath pulls at my chest, and I look down to see stitches where the knife was protruding. All the sensations returning to me are exhausting. I take a deep breath and settle back down, closing my eyes for another quick nap.