All was calm and quiet in the serene place that was eternal summer within the dragon's den. Upon a warm boulder, the red-headed studious boy sat reading yet another flight of fantasy novel. This one was about how a monstrously large and evil snake terrorized a peaceful town until a brave and strong knight came to fight it and save the kingdom.
The book had just gotten to the big battle scene between hero and beast when he heard his name being called sweetly. Lifting his gaze from his reading to the entrance of the cave, he beamed at seeing his mother. "Coming, mother!" Flaive called and slipped down off the rock, dropping his book to the grass in the process and trotting over to her.
The woman smiled a warm and caring smile, wrapping her arms around him when he was within distance, "You're going to be late, sweetheart." She murmured and stroked his hair, running her familiar fingers through the strands lovingly.
The teen's eyebrows pulled together a bit in the middle in confusion at her words, had he forgotten to do something today' He turned his curious grey eyes up to his adoring mother's face and posed the question, "Late for what?"
Without a falter in the caring smile she rested her soft hand on his cheek and brushed her thumb against it, "For the funeral, silly." She murmured and right before his eyes his mother rapidly grew old, frail and decrypted then decayed to a rotting corpse. Horrid ghastly flesh hung from her bones, her once clear and loving eyes turned clouded and sunken. Though this state too didn't last, in another few hard hammering heartbeats of the wide-eyed boy, his mother's form decayed further into that of a skeleton before becoming a pile of bones and dust on the grass before him.
Horrified, Flaive stumbled back, falling hard onto his backside in the grass. All the sunlight was sucked from the once comforting sanctuary around him. Where the remains of his mother had fallen on the grass quickly grew rotted and dead, spreading out to consume the surrounding area and turn the small clear pond into a sickly dark spawning pit of ooze. The ooze began to burble and writhe, hissing and snarling words he couldn't understand save one: his name.
"Flaive" it called in a haunting voice as it rose from the former pond and began to surge towards him in a roiling hulking mass of sludge.
Terror that had numbed his legs then fueled them immediately and the teen ran. His legs pumped hard to carry him away from the tainted sanctuary and the nightmare that had sprung to life right before his eyes. "Icer! Art! Anyone!" His terrified cries seemed to echo off the cavern walls as he sprinted as fast as his legs would carry him. The halls that were usually filled with ones he'd come to love in his short time on Rhy'din were empty; no voices called that they were coming to his aid. The only sounds other than his ragged terrified breathes and rapid foot falls was the frightening sound of his name being hissed and burbled by the ooze creature that was quickly pursuing him.
"Someone! Please! Help me!!" Flaive cried as he raced through the caverns that had begun growing darker and more narrow; Soon the familiar twists and turns morphed into one straight line as he continued to bolt down them.
The teen chanced a glance behind him and saw that the ooze was right behind him and had begun to take on distinguishable shapes within. Several writhing and horrifying familiar masses took shape in the roiling ooze blob. Faces of relatives he'd left behind on Earth; his father, his brothers and his sister. They all groaned and hissed his name, calling out to him in haunting tones that made his skin crawl and shook his core.
While checking over his shoulder to see the nightmare behind, he tripped over something in his path and went sprawling, skinning his palms and knees, bumping his chin. The boy quickly scrambled onto his back and kicked himself backwards in a crab crawl away from the ooze that would surely be on top of him in an instant"but that instant never came. The sludge was gone.
In fact there was nothing. No cavern walls, no sanctuary of any sort, no horrible masses"just a dark abyss of nothing. Alone with his hammering heart and panting breaths, Flaive quickly got to his feet and looked about in every direction in a hyper vigilant manner; The teen expecting a horror of some sort of another to lash out of the darkness and strike him down.
Through the sudden disturbing silence the horrible hissing of his name began once more, though this time it held a different tone.
The large snake from his novel came slithering out of the nothing, heading towards him. It was the source of the hisses of his name with its forked tongue. Its large blood red eyes pinned him in place, paralyzing the young man with fear.
The beast wriggled closer to him then rose up, the rippling muscles of its serpentine body contracting to allow it to remain upright and towering over him.
"P-please. Please, don't." Flaive heard himself whimper as he stared into the bloody eyes of the snake. It seemed to smirk a cruel amused smirk down at him before it lashed out and attached itself to his shoulder. Hot white pain lanced through his arm, spraying blood onto him and the beast, blinding his vision.
Flaive sat bolt upright in his bed with a terrified scream, clutching at his freshly healed shoulder. Items that he'd begun decorating his room with clattered to the floor en masse, having strangely been hovering in the air just a few inches.
The boy was covered in sweat and panting hard before he curled up into a ball in his comfortable bed in the safety of the Shimmerscale home and cried; feeling terribly confused and frightened.
The book had just gotten to the big battle scene between hero and beast when he heard his name being called sweetly. Lifting his gaze from his reading to the entrance of the cave, he beamed at seeing his mother. "Coming, mother!" Flaive called and slipped down off the rock, dropping his book to the grass in the process and trotting over to her.
The woman smiled a warm and caring smile, wrapping her arms around him when he was within distance, "You're going to be late, sweetheart." She murmured and stroked his hair, running her familiar fingers through the strands lovingly.
The teen's eyebrows pulled together a bit in the middle in confusion at her words, had he forgotten to do something today' He turned his curious grey eyes up to his adoring mother's face and posed the question, "Late for what?"
Without a falter in the caring smile she rested her soft hand on his cheek and brushed her thumb against it, "For the funeral, silly." She murmured and right before his eyes his mother rapidly grew old, frail and decrypted then decayed to a rotting corpse. Horrid ghastly flesh hung from her bones, her once clear and loving eyes turned clouded and sunken. Though this state too didn't last, in another few hard hammering heartbeats of the wide-eyed boy, his mother's form decayed further into that of a skeleton before becoming a pile of bones and dust on the grass before him.
Horrified, Flaive stumbled back, falling hard onto his backside in the grass. All the sunlight was sucked from the once comforting sanctuary around him. Where the remains of his mother had fallen on the grass quickly grew rotted and dead, spreading out to consume the surrounding area and turn the small clear pond into a sickly dark spawning pit of ooze. The ooze began to burble and writhe, hissing and snarling words he couldn't understand save one: his name.
"Flaive" it called in a haunting voice as it rose from the former pond and began to surge towards him in a roiling hulking mass of sludge.
Terror that had numbed his legs then fueled them immediately and the teen ran. His legs pumped hard to carry him away from the tainted sanctuary and the nightmare that had sprung to life right before his eyes. "Icer! Art! Anyone!" His terrified cries seemed to echo off the cavern walls as he sprinted as fast as his legs would carry him. The halls that were usually filled with ones he'd come to love in his short time on Rhy'din were empty; no voices called that they were coming to his aid. The only sounds other than his ragged terrified breathes and rapid foot falls was the frightening sound of his name being hissed and burbled by the ooze creature that was quickly pursuing him.
"Someone! Please! Help me!!" Flaive cried as he raced through the caverns that had begun growing darker and more narrow; Soon the familiar twists and turns morphed into one straight line as he continued to bolt down them.
The teen chanced a glance behind him and saw that the ooze was right behind him and had begun to take on distinguishable shapes within. Several writhing and horrifying familiar masses took shape in the roiling ooze blob. Faces of relatives he'd left behind on Earth; his father, his brothers and his sister. They all groaned and hissed his name, calling out to him in haunting tones that made his skin crawl and shook his core.
While checking over his shoulder to see the nightmare behind, he tripped over something in his path and went sprawling, skinning his palms and knees, bumping his chin. The boy quickly scrambled onto his back and kicked himself backwards in a crab crawl away from the ooze that would surely be on top of him in an instant"but that instant never came. The sludge was gone.
In fact there was nothing. No cavern walls, no sanctuary of any sort, no horrible masses"just a dark abyss of nothing. Alone with his hammering heart and panting breaths, Flaive quickly got to his feet and looked about in every direction in a hyper vigilant manner; The teen expecting a horror of some sort of another to lash out of the darkness and strike him down.
Through the sudden disturbing silence the horrible hissing of his name began once more, though this time it held a different tone.
The large snake from his novel came slithering out of the nothing, heading towards him. It was the source of the hisses of his name with its forked tongue. Its large blood red eyes pinned him in place, paralyzing the young man with fear.
The beast wriggled closer to him then rose up, the rippling muscles of its serpentine body contracting to allow it to remain upright and towering over him.
"P-please. Please, don't." Flaive heard himself whimper as he stared into the bloody eyes of the snake. It seemed to smirk a cruel amused smirk down at him before it lashed out and attached itself to his shoulder. Hot white pain lanced through his arm, spraying blood onto him and the beast, blinding his vision.
Flaive sat bolt upright in his bed with a terrified scream, clutching at his freshly healed shoulder. Items that he'd begun decorating his room with clattered to the floor en masse, having strangely been hovering in the air just a few inches.
The boy was covered in sweat and panting hard before he curled up into a ball in his comfortable bed in the safety of the Shimmerscale home and cried; feeling terribly confused and frightened.