Mark Del Franco - Unquiet Dreams

A silence fell, a thick heavy pause as though for breath, while the light around Meryl grew even brighter. She threw back her head and screamed. Wind roared as essence cycloned out of her, tearing up everything in its path. A thick, rushing wave of it tore through the fighters, knocking them away like specks of insignificance.

Bolts of essence leaped from her hands, raking across the ground, while above her it fanned into a blaze of flaming emerald. With methodical precision, the lines of Power sought out the taint from Gerin’s spell. Incandescent flashes burst out everywhere as Meryl’s attack burned through the green veining. It gave way before her, retreating into the glowing dome of light. And then she stopped, her voice cutting off abruptly.

In the unnerving quiet of the aftermath, Meryl stood alone facing us from the top of the slope, a fierce white light still glowing in her eyes. My chest ached with astonishment at what she had done. Wherever her essence wave touched, it purged Gerin’s spell until the entire clearing was devoid of his Power.

As I got to my feet, the sword felt awkward in my hand. Granite from the tombstone had flowed over my skin. I could see the troll residue clearly now, an azure haze over my body. With pain stabbing in my head, I forced my essence to push the stone off me. It crumbled into dust.

Murdock stood next to me, his gun clenched in his hand, breathing heavily. He didn’t say a word but nodded at me.

Behind us, the dome rumbled and groaned. In a tumult of color, it expanded with a deep shudder. A wave of dizziness came over me as I felt a pull at my chest. Essence flowed under my feet like the undertow of surf. It streamed into the dome, leaving nothing but dead earth behind it. Truly dead, without a spark of life or essence in it. The dome pulsed and bulged, lightning crackling on its surface. We backed up the slope away from it.

“A harrowing,” Joe said, his voice thick with horror.

I didn’t realize he was still with us. He hovered behind me, his face white with fear. For a moment, I thought a trick of the light made him appear transparent. Then I realized it was no trick. Joe was fading.

“Get out, Joe. Get out before it kills you!” I shouted. He brought his hands in front of his face. I could see through them, saw his eyes widen. The dome was pulling his essence out of him, sucking up his life force with frightening speed. Without another word, he winked out.

Essence coursed past us in ribbons of color. Murdock and I backed away as the dome ground closer. A new wind came up, and we pressed against it to the top of the ridge. Meryl stood alone now, still glowing with enormous Power. Everyone else had fled.

“What the hell is a harrowing?” he asked.

“An essence storm.” It was Meryl’s voice, but unlike the way I had ever heard her. She had came down from the spire of rock and stood next to us. “It sucks up everything in its path. I’ve never heard of one getting this big. I could only force back Gerin’s spell, but he’s unleashed more Power than I can stop. It’s over. We’ve lost.”

Before I could say anything to her, Murdock gasped and staggered away from me. He grabbed his chest and crumpled to the ground. I crouched by him. He was unconscious, his essence caught in the flow of the harrowing. It leached off him in rivulets, merging with the streams rushing down into the dome.

Meryl looked over at us, her face uncomfortably calm with the power of the drys still within her. “Lay him on stone. It will protect him for a brief time.” As quickly as I could, I dragged Murdock past her and lifted him onto the stone vault of an exposed grave. Above the vault, its monument read AS THE BONES OF MAN JOIN THE BONES OF EARTH, THE CIRCLE IS COMPLETE.

I hoped Murdock wouldn’t take it as a bad omen when he woke up. If he woke up. Standing on the granite soothed the pain in my head. My own essence was trying to release, but the mass in my head kept it in check. For once I was grateful for it.

I looked over my shoulder to Meryl, who was facing away from me. “Are you okay, Meryl?”

She didn’t look at me. When she spoke, she sounded almost like herself again, only with a note of despair that tore at me. “I tried to save the drys, Grey, but we’ll never get out of here in time. There’s no anchor to the harrowing. It’s out of control.”

“The drys are inside you, aren’t they? That’s what Hala meant by vessel.”

She just nodded, staring into the dome. Except for the dome, darkness surrounded us. From my vantage point, I could see off into the cemetery toward the city, everything dead and devoid of essence. The darkness spread as I watched, an ugly black stain moving faster and faster as more essence drained into the harrowing.

A discharge went off like thunder. The dome moved closer, covering several acres now. It pulled at my essence, but the mass of darkness in my head resisted, not letting any leave my body. Just like it did when I tried to use essence, it resisted and pulled it back. I started to laugh. I’d been wishing the darkness in my head would go away, and now it was the one thing saving what little ability I had left.

“It’s going to explode. I can feel it,” Meryl said.

We didn’t speak, watching it all end. A cold sensation came up my legs. The granite from the tomb was trying to bond with the troll essence on me. Standing next to Meryl was enhancing it. I shook the stone off. As I did, I felt the pull of the harrowing even more strongly. The granite flowed up again. I was about to shake it off, but paused as my eye caught the epitaph again.

I looked down at it for a long moment, then back at the glowing heart of the dome. Stone acted as an anchor for essence. It’s what made ward stones do what they do. The thing in my head resisted the dome. It fought the pull of the harrowing.

I looked at the epitaph again and thought of Virgil’s cryptic comments about bones and circles. “Dammit, Virgil, I hope like hell you didn’t mean hide inside a tomb,” I muttered under my breath.

I stopped fighting against the troll essence. The remains of Moke’s spell still clung to me. All the ambient essence seemed to have stabilized it instead of letting it dissipate like Moke said it would. As soon as I relaxed my body shield, the spell began to bond with my body essence. It catalyzed the spell even more, drawing the stone around me like it had done at Carnage. The granite softened under my feet, then flowed like water, sliding over my body. It ran up my legs, spreading up my back. I shuddered at the cold sensation of stone oozing around my chest, encasing my torso, seeping over my groin. Tendrils crept up my neck, curled over the back of my head and down over my face. I could feel it even in my eyes. I held my hands up as the last of my skin vanished beneath the stone.

I was completely encased now. “Meryl?”

She looked back at me and gaped, the color draining from her face. “What the hell have you done, Grey?”

“I think I can stop it,” I said.

She made as if to touch my arm but then drew her hand back. “How?”

I smiled, feeling the oddness of the stone forming the familiar expression. “Turn myself into a living ward stone. I’m going to try and anchor it.”

She looked doubtful. “It’ll suck the essence out of you before you even reach the barrier. You saw what was happening to Joe.”

I shrugged. “I have to try. We’re going to die anyway. You can give me some breathing space, though. Charge me with everything you’ve got.”

Her face set with resistance. “That could kill you.”

I shook my head. “I’m hoping not. Not with this thing inside my head. It won’t let me tap my own essence, but it’s not bothering with the troll essence. I just need a boost to get me through the barrier.”