Wednesday, June 6, 2018

Dreaming of Braxia - Sample from "The Emerald Lights"



Dreaming of Braxia

            She had been there before, not entirely sure how but the memory was there and it was fresh and real.  There were dogs barking in the distance and a few stragglers walked here and there in the shadows.  It was a melancholy night and the streets were shining with reflecting water and a smell heaved in the fog like moist coal.  She could hear noises in the street, some were small like a rat running to a gutter and others sounded like a pail of water being dumped from a high window.  She wasn’t positive but she thought she had emerged in a dream here before and that this was not a new experience.  Behind her there was a blank grey wall, with no real character other than a basic empty perception of being abandoned.  If she touched it, she had the distinct impression it would take her life, spirit, soul and she would be gone from this place in an instant.  Her eyes stung thinking about leaving because if she was correct this was the one place that was the perfect fit, the one place that was somehow right in ways she didn’t understand.  There were details she could imagine that reached her deepest desires, worries and fantasies.  Here she was once again and now she was afraid to move.  Taking a deep breath, she filled her lungs with the icy air and turned her face toward the road on her left.  There was a fountain in the square, it had water spurting from a horse’s mouth and the rider was a man wearing a captain’s hat as he pointed his sword toward the sky.  The sword was lit up in a sapphire blue and the handle had the word Gladius engraved on it.  The stone that comprised the horse and rider was a large milky marble cut from a single mass.  Water shaped like tiny droplets soared downward as time seemed to slow down.  She got caught in a magical thought as she reached in her pocket to pull out a cigarette.  She remembered she didn’t have anything to light it with so back in her pocket it went.
            Quietly, she slipped down the silent road into the mysterious and wondrous night.  She passed a street sign, she could’ve sworn it said ‘Goodbye Street’, but it all seemed blurry and distant.  Her ears were ringing a bit and her mouth was dry.  Her body felt sore and overworked and possibly a tiny bit damp.  The chilled air didn’t move but it choked her in its deathly stillness.  She continued to walk.  Each step hummed a song in her mind that gave her life purpose.  It was a song that drove her to love life and to hope for a time when it could all be laughter instead of trepidation.  She missed the days of gentle living but this life also offered mystery that a boring life could never give her.
            The night sky was getting lighter and the stars were starting to slowly disappear.  Silhouettes of buildings and homes started to form on the fuzzy horizon.  Her heart beat a little hurried because it was real, it was here and she was too!  This could be the most exciting time in a girl’s life, being able to explore a foreign land and have total independence.
           Morning perpetually felt like a mystery, like she was stepping out of a book.  The pages were full of color and life, her breath was heavier and deep inside her body was waiting to burst forth.  You rarely have to look at your real life and wonder if you are dreaming but in dreams you invariably wonder if you are dreaming.  That is how Tempest felt but she was usually afraid to wake up.  The sound of a train in the distance made the baby hairs on the back of her neck stand up as she dodged briefly behind a large oak tree.  She ran her exposed fingers across the trunk and the bumpy bark created imaginative walk ways under her finger tips as they ran over them, almost reading them and she thought she could tell their story.  She was exhaling loudly and felt a grim shadow engulfing her mind.  She had to think, try to recall exactly why she was here again.  It was somewhat like a dream but it was too certain, too absolute and she could feel the moisture on her fingers as they tightened and trembled.  Slowly the sounds of the Annex were coming alive.

            It became hard to breathe as her heart swelled, she fixed her leather corset as it was digging into her sweaty shoulder blades and pushing her swollen chest into her throat.  Her long fur skirt was revealing her muscular legs on both sides and exposing two brass Storm Brakkers, strapped on each leg.  Her boots wrapped her legs like snakes, but flat metal looking snakes that had nuts and bolts holding them together.  There were brass buckles and chains holding the boots in place.  The color of the metal changed with each step and the gears twisted and tightened or loosened as it needed to so it was consistently tight enough but not ever too tight.  The fur skirt was fascinating because it was almost alive and holding on to her hips as they shook with each step.  Her waist was small and formed just like her corset and she filled in the bust like liquid.  She had nothing on her arms but they were glistening in the new sunlight with dusted sparkles and a tiny taste of shimmering powder.  On each hand was a black fingerless glove, stitched on her hand to stay forever.  Her nails were short and silver, perfectly manicured and yet those fingers could inflict a lot of pain if provoked.  Tempest’s hair was orange and wiry, at least in this place it was, just to her shoulders and on top of her head sat a fascinator, just tilted a tad to the left, with a tasteful feather and a leather strap much like the material on her corset.  On her neck was something that was hard for others to understand but it was common among Transcendents.  Tightened like a cuff, was a thick black choker laden with gears and chains that served to keep Tempest’s status known to all, she was a warrior and this is what warriors wore.  She didn’t realize how completely exclusive she was.  She didn’t know how unique she was.  After all, she was a Transcendent.  For that reason she was created and chosen to use her blood circle to converge the Legion of Ages in order to find the Emerald Lights.

            It was in that moment as she surveyed her curves and gear it dawned on her that she was actually in someone else’s body, because it appeared she wasn’t a Transcendent at all, but rather a Lingermancer.  At least in this incredibly convincing illusion she was a Transcendent warrior and there was no denying it.  This body, this being, was a different race all together.  She was now intrigued at where this was all going so she continued on.

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