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To Dream of Darkness

A story by DoggyStyle57

Chapter 8, Written December 2011

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Chapter 8 - The price of survival - the Dark Winds of Nightmare

After napping for an hour or so, Dark Wind went to the nearby river and washed the blood from her fur. She shifted back to her wolf form, and was pleased to find that the minor problem of the singed fur vanished with the transformation. She was halfway back to her cave when she heard a summoning howl from the wolf pack's gathering clearing. She turned aside and darted down a faint trail, to join the pack.

When she got to the clearing, the wolves were in a circle, and one wolf lay in the middle of the pack, unconscious. It was Midnight, one of the elder wolves in the pack. Moonlight and Grey Shadow stood beside the black wolf, licking at his neck.

"What has happened?" Dark Wind asked.

"Midnight has been injured. He has a hole in his neck, and is bleeding. He barely made it here before he collapsed. It looks like one of the men has hurt him with their stick throwers. Can you help him?" Moonlight asked.

"I... I don't know. They shot at me with their crossbow bolts too. I was... lucky to not be killed by them," Dark Wind replied. She looked at the wound, and shuddered as she realized he had also been hit in the neck, dangerously close to the place where such an injury would cause massive blood loss. But he was still bleeding pretty fast. "It looks like it passed straight through, and didn't hit bone. Get soft moss, and... oh, I don't know what else you would have that might help! I'm going to try magic."

She changed to her Human form, held her hand over the wound, and recited the same incantation that had healed her an hour or two earlier. But the wolf's wound remained unchanged. Dark Wind felt a little more tired, but there was no healing effect for the wolf.

"I do not understand. I have used that spell before, to heal myself, and it was almost instantly effective. We'll try the moss, I guess," she said. She took the moss the wolves brought her, and pressed it tightly against the wound. The blood still flowed, but more slowly.

Two hours later, it was over. Midnight had never regained consciousness, and had bled to death. The wolves howled mournfully, and Dark Wind insisted on teleporting the remains far from the wolf's gathering area, where she buried it.

"They will pay for this," she swore, as she placed the last stone over the wolf's body. She transformed back into a wolf and angrily went back to her cave, and confronted Asha.

"Why did that healing spell not work for one of the wolves?" she asked.

"Because that spell only aids the caster. Sorry. That's just the way it is," Asha replied. "Why? Was one of them hurt?"

"Yes. The Humans must have decided to hunt for me. He was a black wolf. They might have mistaken him for me," Dark Wind said.

"I suppose that is possible," Asha agreed. "But tell me, was he injured in the same place that you were?"

"Yes, he was. In the neck, just like... I... was... Asha! Are you telling me that his injury and mine are connected?" Dark Wind asked.

"Well, I can't say for sure, Mistress," Asha replied evasively. "I told you that the spell that healed you was a combat spell. I've been reading more on it while you slept and while you were away. It's very clever, really. The warrior mage who gets injured has but to look at his attacker, or speak his true name, or designate some other opponent that is in sight of him, or who he knows by their true name, and the spell transfers the wound to his enemy! The book says that the mage who created the spell used it to make every arrow that struck him effectively impale the king that led the opposing army, and that he killed the king that way. Imagine what you could do with that, Mistress! If you learn the name, the true name, mind you, of that hated priest, or if you are attacked while you can see him, you can turn every attack that reaches you into an attack on him! His own mercenaries would kill him, instead of you. It is painful, of course. You feel the effects of every attack as they hit you. And they do affect you, until you transfer the wounds individually. So if a lot of arrows hit you at once, or any other attack that is fatal gets to you, you'll still perish. But any survivable injury can be turned back at the enemy."

"How does that connect what happened to me and what happened to Midnight? Tell me the truth, I command you!" Dark Wind screamed.

"Well, Mistress, please remember that you did command me to tell you how to do what was needed to heal yourself quickly," Asha said. "And I honestly did exactly what you asked. Casting the spell as I directed removed the wound as quickly as that spell possibly could. And since we were far from those that harmed you, and I doubted that you knew the true names of any of them, reciting the last three lines of the spell, which direct the wound to injure your foe, was pointless, and might even have made it fail if you didn't know their true name. But the spell still has to send the wound somewhere. That's just how it works. When it left you, without direction on who exactly it should go to, the spell would injure some other living creature, at random. It could have been anything, from a passing sparrow to a deer. Could even have been me, Mistress. It was just bad luck that it happened to be a wolf that you knew."

"So the price of my survival was the life of one of the wolves in my pack, is that it?" Dark Wind asked, dejectedly. "Was there any way to avoid that? Anything you didn't tell me?"

"Well, Mistress, your command to me definitely didn't say anything about sparing any other creatures, now did it? I can't serve your purposes if you don't clearly tell me what you expect of me," Asha stated. "There are two ways, Mistress, where harming nearby friends or allies could be avoided. You can craft the spell to exempt any individuals whose true name you know, or who are actively fighting on your side in a battle. You can also designate a sacrificial victim - a prisoner or staked out animal that will receive the injuries, until it dies. That is what the first three lines of the spell were for. Those lines exempt specific targets whose true names you mentally list, and your allies in battle, and designate a sacrifice whose true name you must know, or who you can see, if the intended foe is no longer in sight, or you failed to guess the foe's true name."

"In the future, please assume that the wolves I have lived with and any allies in my cause must be exempted from harm, if at all possible," Dark Wind commanded. "Speak of this to no one. It was an accident. Regrettable, but it was just an accident. We will try to avoid it in the future."

"As you command, Mistress. What are your orders for me, then? What will you do next?" Asha asked.

Dark Wind went to the third chest, and got out a book. She leafed through it and pointed to one spell, saying, "The time has come to end this, one way, or another. Look through the fourth chest. See if you can find a more powerful version of this oneromantic spell. I want a nightmare spell that can kill multiple victims at once, but this one is too limited, because it requires that I know in advance the deepest fear of each victim. See if anything similar exists, that will be more effective than this spell, on people whose minds I don't know so well. And tell me the full effects and cautions about it this time!"

"I shall obey, Mistress," Asha replied.

They spent the next several nights examining the spells, and in time Asha did find what Dark Wind sought.

"This is the spell, Mistress," Asha said, as she showed the book to Dark Wind. "It is quite appropriate for your purposes. It creates a thick black cloud that spreads across a large area, and passes through any wall or non-magical barrier. Every soul that it touches will fall into a deep sleep. You control it by walking in the midst of the cloud, and entering the dreams or nightmares of each individual victim. The minds and memories of every affected soul will be fully open to you. If you deem them to be innocent, and choose to spare them, then you may let them sleep normally. If you see them as your enemy, and if you choose to slay them, it will cause their deepest fear to take form and substance in their nightmare, and will either kill them, or drive them quite insane. In all other regards, it is the same as the other spell that you showed me."

"It will harm only those I choose to harm?" Dark Wind asked.

"Yes, Mistress. No innocent victims will be harmed. If you choose not to enter the mind of one touched by this spell, they will sleep harmlessly until touched by sunlight," Asha stated.

"What if an intended victim proves to be fearless?" Dark Wind asked.

"Few sane creatures are truly without fear, Mistress. One who fears nothing is a fool, and usually kills themselves due to incaution or stupidity. Fear is a survival trait. Fear is what prevents a warrior from rushing to certain doom. Those who seem to be without fear merely have the ability to set aside their fear for the moment, to accomplish a higher purpose. But in this nightmare slumber, they will have no other tasks to attend to. It is almost impossible to escape from," Asha insisted.

"What price must I pay? What is the risk to me?" Dark Wind asked.

"You must go among them, in person. If any of them do have a magical barrier that can protect them, they may remain awake, and may see you, and be able to attack you. It may prove necessary to fight some of them. And as with the other spell, you need to compound a potion to protect you from the nightmare's effects, or otherwise have your own emotional responses nullified, so it will not affect you. This spell causes you to see and feel the deaths of each victim. Their punishment will not physically harm you, but seeing their torment could have an effect on your sanity. Can you truly say that you are ready and willing to see each of your enemies die, and in a terrifying manner?"

"I can. They must die. There is nothing else I should know? You are not conveniently omitting something, or making it sound easier than it is?" Dark Wind asked, cautiously.

"I have told you everything, honestly and completely, Mistress. This spell will slay those you choose to slay, in a most terrifying manner. It will spare those that you choose to spare, and harm no one who you do not choose to harm. The nightmares cannot harm you, physically. You only have to worry about being able to live with yourself, and the memories of what you did to them," Asha stated.

"Then teach me the spell, and I will do it. There will be an end to my enemies, before they slay anyone else that I care about, or cause me to draw harm to my pack," Dark Wind said.

That afternoon, Dark Wind made the emotion-numbing potion. She was missing only one ingredient - the herb that she had failed to steal from the priest. But in going through her supplies, she found another herb that had extremely similar effects. In her father's herbals, the two herbs could be used interchangeably in any potions that called for them. She made the substitution, and as the sun set, she drank the potion.

Dark Wind felt strangely numb, as the potion took effect on her mind. It was like she was watching someone else perform the actions, as her body teleported to the edge of the village, cast the nightmare spell and the dense cloud of nightmare fog swirled around her. With the fog swirling around her werewolf-like black body, all that could be seen of her were her eyes, glowing like pits of green fire. The fog spread, and she began to touch the minds of her enemies.

Those she spared slept, but those she attacked began screaming like they had been cast into hell. The villagers who had not yet been touched by the dark wind of nightmare stood frozen in terror, as the roiling black cloud swept through all in its path, and where it passed, they heard screams like the voices of the damned.

Dark Wind found the priest standing in the center of the church yards, babbling about the church having vanished, and a heathen shrine having appeared in its place. He believed his God had totally forsaken him, and that he saw the elders of his order performing bizarre sacrifices and copulating with demons.

Through it all, Dark Wind walked, laughing and listening to her screaming enemies, and satisfied that at last, she had her revenge, and that the villains who had caused the death of her family had received what they deserved. The nightmares she witnessed included terrors she had never imagined. She felt almost nothing though, other than the satisfaction that her enemies were being severely punished.

As dawn broke, the villagers awakened. The dark wind had passed, and dispersed. People began to cry out, as they found friends or neighbors dead where the cloud had caught them, their faces frozen in terrified grimaces, and in some cases, their bodies bleeding or torn asunder, as if slain by savage beasts. One third of the village was dead, and seven other people utterly insane, including the priest. Not one of the church-hired mercenaries had survived.

Dark Wind sat on the hill top overlooking the village, now in the form of a black wolf, and she howled in triumph, before returning to her cave, exhausted, yet jubilant.