Musty, smoky air in a room lit by wavering candles and incensed fires, and amid a circle of pillows a blue veil begins to rise as a mystical beat blossoms in the heavy atmosphere. From the black ceiling, a glint of silver, as a delicate cage floats to the ground and inside it, a pile of beautiful cloth.
The silver cage comes to rest and the audience seated on soft pale pillows begins to stir questioningly. The beat ends abruptly and a soft shimmering pipe takes over. From the pile of cloth a woman emerges as a phoenix from her ash of blue. A death-still hush befalls the crowd as they watch, mesmerized. This is a crowd of men, all mirror images of each other, dressed in black with black masks hiding their entire head.
The lady began to rise and every eye followed; entranced. Clad in a belt of robin blue, a mist-like skirt adorned from hip to thigh in an intricate silver belt of a Celtic style. Her feet were bare and her chest was crisscrossed with silver-blue ribbons of varying widths. From her back flowed a cloak of blue gauze held on my silver circlets appearing at her upper arm, elbow, wrist and ending with a ring placed on each middle finger. Her silver gold-flecked hair was heaped up in curls and detailed braids massed about her head and held in place by an array of ornaments, most prominent of all were five long simple pins, each ending in a perfect pearl and thrust in a star forming halo framing her soft features. Pale porcelain skin with delicate lips, but most startling and riveting of all were the intensity of her eyes. Silver rimmed, midnight blue extending from cornflower blue to jet black of her pupil. Eyes of the ocean . . . eyes of ice.
Slowly she began a dance she didn't know how to do and yet she performed it. In a place she had never seen and in a gown she had never worn yet her body flowed forth. Her mind panicked and struggled but the tranquility sedated her and inflamed her natural curiosity.
Soon she was flanked by two other feminine forms clad less intricately in white. Both had hair black as night, one with eyes of striking violet and the other, deep intriguing green. The others mimicked her movements for a while, then each broke off as the drums began to beat separately. Each step was perfectly executed. Violet eyes began furiously twisting and turning, dabbing each man's forehead with a piece of soaked silk before any of them could blink. Golden green eyes wrote shimmering runes in the air with her dance, and all the while muttering half-crazed to herself.
The lady in blue leaped and twisted and stepped in a delicate tune all her own. All three suddenly broke off and raced to the center of the room where three red vials appeared. The girls downed the vials in one fluid motion and then collapsed, music dying. Slowly each man began to waver and then disappear along with his pillow in a quiet 'pop'.
Many 'pops' later, only six men in black remained. Hidden beneath, now pure white masks, they rose up and walked toward the trio. The lady in blue floated to her feet, eyes shot white and pulsating with raw energy. Closing her eyes, she allowed this energy to flow into the two other girls, rather forcing it into them. They slowly rose, eyes mirroring hers. The beat furiously returned and each girl began her dance anew, with two male partners. Bending and gliding, twisting and flowing. Raw energy sizzled around the room, once in while sending of a streak of lightening to damage the walls.
Slowly another three men vanished, along with each remaining mask and cloak. This left one blonde man wearing an outfit of true black and the two other men in outfits of wispy grey. The couples stopped dancing and began to circle their opposites, communicating challenges, answering, defeating and winning in an exhausting pace. More vials, this time green, appeared.
Drinking these, the pace slowed, then stopped all together. The other couples sank to the ground, eyes showing relief, pride and love. They were almost done. All but one. Her partner stared in dawning horror and she meekly smiled, releasing a tear . . . a single blood red tear. Then, as if a dam collapsed, a flow of blood from every available opening; eyes, nose, mouth, ears and nail beds. The lady in blue, now stained red, wasted away before their very eyes. They were so shocked, unable to move or help. If there was any help to be had. The lady collapsed into her bond's arms. A scream of raging grief stole into the night and the dream shattered into a million diamond sharp pieces.