Author's Ramblings: This idea came to me in the morning, but I was too tired to write it then. Let's hope I haven't lost too much of the concept.
I don't own anything except the strange woman.
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He had always believed that, for the most part, dreams were unreliable. They often made no logical sense, and everything could change faster than you could blink. Sometimes a dream would run into another dream, creating even more confusion for the poor soul trapped within it.
This dream had plenty of sense - he could still tell which way was up, after all - but everything went unexplained, as it often did. The ever-shifting terrain didn't help, either. One moment, he was standing barefooted on frost-touched grass, and the next, a bed of soft sand was beneath his feet.
There was also someone behind him. He knew this, because they were standing back-to-back, and they had his hands in theirs. The other person was taller than he was, and he had no idea what they looked like or who they were. But they had the familiar scent about them, a smell that he had only been able to describe as "petals and stardust." Evidently, they were some sort of spirit.
"Do you fear me, Gannayev-of-Dreams?" The voice was that of a young woman, echoing pleasantly off the rock and stone that had just formed under them. She sounded faintly amused, as if she were playing some sort of game with him.
"No," he answered, for he knew he could wake from this dream any time he wanted. He would stick around while this dream was still interesting, and perhaps he'd meet her again someday.
She seemed pleased with his answer, though she had another question. "Then, what do you fear?"
His reply came like a reflex, almost immediately after she'd spoken the last word. "I fear nothing."
The spirit chuckled gently, and her next question was nearly drowned out by the rushing of the ankle-deep river they stood in. "Gannayev, do you mean to say that you are never frightened, or do you imply that you are afraid of nothing? That, one day, you or the world may fade into nothing and cease to exist?"
A chill ran up his spine, and he almost let go of her. To not exist, not anywhere, would be a terrible thing indeed. Even if he could not exist in life, allow him to exist in dream... in the mind... so long as he existed somehow. To not only be gone from every plane, but to be forgotten along with it...
"Ah, I see," the spirit said, apparently satisfied with his wordless response. "Tell me, Gannayev, if you fear nothing, do you only fear nothing, or would you fear her as well?"
A trace of a smirk appeared on his face. "It would help if I knew who she was."
Her reply was hesitant, as if she were trying to hedge words and be cryptic, as if she were bound not to reveal too much. "She is... she has many names, many titles. None you are familiar with. She has been called kalach-cha, the Butcher of Ember, Knight-Captain of Crossroads Keep..."
"You are correct," he stated nonchalantly. "I am not familiar with those titles. Please, continue."
"Very well. She will meet you in the near future, and you will be surrounded by stone and magic, magic you cannot break. She will be the one to free you."
"Stone and magic? Do you talk of rune circles?" He wondered how he could possibly be imprisoned in any way... and for what crime? Surely none had heard of his exploits over the years, at least none who he hadn't affected...
"In a way," she said, seeming amused once again. "She will commit a great crime, though the fault will not be entirely hers... in the end, the magnitude of this crime depends on her own self-control."
"And what is this crime?"
"Ah... that I cannot say. But I will say, that in committing this crime, she will lose herself... and you must find her, Gannayev."
This prompted a curious raise of his eyebrows. "And how am I to do that?"
"Oh, come now." She relaxed her grip on his hands, and for the first time he realized how cold she was. "You can't expect me to tell you everything. It wouldn't be fun anymore."
She was a playful one. Was she withholding information because she had to, or because she was tricking him in an elaborate mind game? "Very well - though I do not understand how I would fear her."
The spirit seemed to take great pleasure in explaining this. "You will fear her because she will look past your mask, Gannayev. She will see that you are hurt... see you for who you really are."
He scoffed. "Tell me, spirit - is she you? You seem to know much about me already."
"No," she laughed, "I am but a cryptic messenger. She is very different from I."
The 'cryptic' part he had to agree with. "Will I know her when I see her?"
"You will probably have forgotten this conversation by the time she frees you."
"That long, hm? Well, then, answer me this, spirit: who do you answer to?"
She let go of his hands, a breeze stirring the air. "I answer to only myself."
He heard the crunching of footsteps upon the fallen leaves, and the scent of petals and stardust gradually faded. "Are you leaving?"
"I am," she called from somewhere distant, voice still echoing. "Awaken, Gannayev-of-Dreams!"
-x-
Gann woke to the sound of the wind and rolling clouds overhead. He lay cradled between two large tree roots, a flat landscape of soft grass and flowers sitting under the horizon. It was most probably dawn, and it was very cold.
Shivering, he sat up against the tree, trying to grasp the fragments of last night's dream. He tended to remember his dreams better than other folk, but this one was slipping out of his mind so fast...