Edul wakes up to the sound of wind rushing
past his ears in total darkness. The black
is so pervading that Edul wasn't sure if his
eyes were opened or not. The whispers of
a female voice wafts on the cold breeze surrounding him. The scraggly twisted branches of a leafless forest on the horizon begins to come into focus.
Another indistinguishable whisper floats
past Edul's ears.
"Who's there?" he inquires nervously trying
to mask the fear hidden within his words.
"Zell?" the female voice finally asks clearly
enough for Edul to understand what is
being said.
"No, I'm Edul." the blonde boy whispers in response.
"Zell, I can't hear you." the female voice continues. Edul leans forward and realizes
he's laying on his back in a pool of black
liquid and sticky mud. Above him the
forest floats in the air meter inches above
his head. Edul jumps up from his back
through the illusory cloud forest and it
disappears from view, only blackness remains.
"Zell, help me", the female voice pleads
incessantly first from behind Edul then
from over his right shoulder and finally
from his left shoulder.
"Who are you?" Edul requested fearfully
but his words fall upon deaf ears. A tiny
flash of flame on the edge of Edul's
peripheral vision piqued his attention. The
female voice continued to wail
relentlessly about 'Zell' but Edul's focus was on the flickering of the ever
approaching flame. Its distance blaze lit
up what looked to be an extensive, vaulted
ceiling corridor lined with bookshelves
packed with books large and small,
colored and drab. The flame kept
increasing in size lighting more and more
book lined corridors then a massive
octagonal brick and mortar room with a
thirty feet in diameter grey colored
paneled machine penetrating the ceiling
and hanging down at least ten feet. The
machine seemed as if it was alive and
staring straight back at Edul. His
catatonic stare was only broken when the flame flashed out of existence. A furious
blast of icy air from the direction of the
flame made the hair on Edul's body stand
on end. He wasn't sure if it was because
of the cold air or the odd feeling the giant
octagonal room and its weird staring
machine gave him. Darkness again
pervaded. The woman keep at it, though,
louder and louder with every passing
second.
"Zell please help me! They're going to kill
me!" she cried again and again. Edul could
no longer stand it and he let out a
tremendous howl of his own. The female voice stopped. No more tortured
screaming rang out. Darkness and now
silence are all that Edul knew. This calmed
Edul at first but soon the void of
nothingness seemed to be encroaching
on him. The darkness squeezed his lungs
and burned his skin. He began to cough
and wheeze struggling to breath. He
wanted badly to scream out in terror and
pain and breath one last breathe of the
brisk air. He wanted it more than he had
ever wanted anything. Every single ounce
of his being wanted to breath but he
couldn't. A bright idea flies through Edul's
mind. The boy reaches into his pants
pocket retracting back a large emerald
hued translucent stone. He clasps it
tightly in both of his small pale hands and
wishes to breath. The darkness seems to
release him and he collapses flat to his
back again gasping for air. The darkness
begins to creep toward a state of twilight
and Edul is able to make out a few human
like figures standing over him. They seem
to be moving and merging together and
apart again and again. A minuscule
amount of light combined with nearly
choking to death made Edul see strange
patterns where there are none. Instead when a fraction more light slipped onto
the scene Edul realized there were not
four fluid like figures standing over him
but the monstrous snout of an enormous
black and gold four legged two winged
lizard like monster staring down at him.
The beast breathed a blast of warm air
down onto Edul as a dusting of snow
began to fall from the clouded grey skies
above and Edul realized the dragon meant
no harm.
"Where am I?" Edul inquired sitting up
from the mud puddle once again. His
head on swivel he observed every single
thing he could about this unfamiliar land.
The flat muddy earth covered in a fragile
layer of ice crystals and delicate
snowflakes. Bare bands of lanky leafless
trees masked a realm of rolling hills to
Edul's left and gave way to indomitable
penetrating peaks of burgundy and purple
surrounding the rest of the horizon. The
dragon did not respond but instead
snapped his mighty armored jaws at Edul.
He jumps back in a panic and gathers
himself on his feet after a few unbalanced
steps backward. Edul holds the bright
green stone in his hand with an
outstretched arm and bows his head enough for his platinum locks to to just
shade his eyes. A single clear tear rolls
down Edul's rosy right cheek and he tilts
his head back to a normal gaze as he let's
out a thunderous inhuman screech. The
dragon recoils its massive horned head
from Edul arms reach before his eyes
change from his normal translucent blue
to opaque gold. He is encased in a
swirling torrent of wind. The obsidian
dragon beat a hasty retreat into the
overcast skies above only after toppling a
fourteen feet tall grey stone wall onto
Edul. Lying ribs crushed and bleeding
heavily from a puncture wound to his right
kidney Edul loses consciousness once
again.
© Macabre Entendre