Chapter 1 – The Minstrel
1-1: The Dream
The world was all black and darkness, as though nothing had ever existed. Yet then existence came into being, and she realized that she was within a dream, except this wasn't like any dream she had had before. Those dreams of before had held images of places, of people, and of things to come. This darkened vision held absolutely nothing for her to behold, leaving her feeling isolated and alone. For that reason alone, this new dream frightened her.
The view before her changed slightly, and out of nowhere there appeared an archway. It felt like she should have recognized it, as though it felt familiar to her, almost close to her. Close more so in the physical sense than in the spiritual, and yet both remained true. As her mind processed this new visage, she realized that it was the Shinto archway that led into the Tsukimine Shrine, a place she often visited. It was also the location that one of her dreams from before had used.
It was at this moment that she came into a full lucidity within her dream, and she knew that she was seeing a potential future.
A faint pulse of light shot through the darkness from behind her, stealing away her attention. Instinctively, she spun about to face that pulse, and so found herself looking at a familiar pink book floating there in midair before her. She reached out carefully to pull it back to her, wishing to claim her book back from whatever force had taken control of it. Her arm moving ever so slowly forward, she was just inches from the book when she swiftly snatched out at it. And yet, rather of finding the physical contact of the leather-bound covers that she had expected, she instead stumbled forward awkwardly as her hand passed right through the book, followed by her entire self as she attempted to correct her balance.
Catching herself from falling over, she spun back about to keep the book within eyesight. She noted that its front cover was somehow facing her again, but then noted that it was also no longer her book. It was glowing softly with a yellow light, and the cover had exchanged its normal pink for a familiar reddish hue. She stepped closer, examining the front cover more carefully, and noticed that it had a gold-worked symbol of a winged beast gilded atop of the book's leather bindings. A thought then came to her that this symbol was meant to represent Kerberos, the Guardian Beast of the Seal. She stepped back slightly in confusion, now very much unsure of what was going on.
The book continued to glow with its soft, radiant light, and meanwhile began to spin around slowly to reveal the figure of the winged moon worked onto the back cover. The book's original magic circle was also inscribed above that moon, with the sun and offset moon matching perfectly to the old powers that she was so familiar with. Even the engraved metal plate set below the winged moon had changed to take on its old English name. Though, in the end, none of these facts really helped to reveal why her book had so mysteriously returned to its original form as the Book of the Clow.
She stood there with a cautious sense of curiosity as the book continued to glow and hover, still turning about slowly of its own volition. As the front cover once again came around to face her, it slowed its pace, then eventually discontinued its pace altogether. When the book was done displaying itself, the soft light that had been emanating from it seemed to simply recede away into the book, absorbed by it even. Just like that, it had once again become the pink, star-covered book that she was so familiar with. Out of reflex, she attempted to once again grab the book away from where it still floated, yet her hand still refused to touch it. It easily passed its way through the cover and pages., just like it had before.
Footsteps began to sound out, the tapping of feet growing louder and closer for each moment that they approached. She spun her head in multiple directions, attempting to spy out against the darkness whoever or whatever it was that was closing in on her, though she could only sight the book and the shrine's archway as her companions. Her worry of being discovered with a magical, floating book overtook the awareness of a lack of spectators, causing her to embrace the illusionary object in order to shield it from unseen eyes. As the steps continued their approach, she was more easily able to discern their location, until she noticed them coming from behind the shrine's archway. She stepped towards the archway, passing her way right through the book – an act that made her feel just a little more than slightly disconcerted – to face the approaching figure.
As the figure made itself visible against the darkness of her world, the image of the cherry tree that resided within the real shrine appeared from behind both that figure and the archway that it had left behind. She squinted her eyes to try to see further ahead in the dark, although it then occurred to her that she was able to see just fine. Despite that everything around her was pitch black, not a single detail of the figure had been shadowed away from view.
It was a robed figure, the person who neared her. They were perhaps a head-and-a-half taller than her, and they seemed to walk with an air of grace that would come with a long and experienced life. Her eyes widened as she noticed the half-symbols of the sun and moon weaved into the front of the man's overcoat, and she immediately knew who it was.
Clow Reed made his way slowly, quietly, across the black expanse that stretched between the archway and herself, until he stood only a few meters away from her. Without a word, he raised a hand out toward her, palm up, and with a beckoning motion pulled the illusionary book out from behind her and closer to himself. As it hovered to a stop just before him, it began to spin once again, though this time it spun itself almost wildly out of control, much to the point that it was soon just a blurred representation of a cylindrical object.
The questions in her mind continued to increase, but none of them were answered when he finally spoke.
"The stars exist as a balance to themselves, with the sun and moon as guardians of the land. Unite with the sun and the moon, for only then will the ancient skies overcome an ancient adversary."
She frowned in confusion at his words, and opened her mouth to inquire about them. Yet when she spoke, not a single sound came away from her lips. She worked over her vocal cords with an increasing need to speak, and even screamed with the effort of making them sound out, but in the end stared helplessly at the ground, if it could be called that, when her voice had all but refused to come forth. She looked up in concern to Clow Reed as he stood before her, hoping to reach out and beckon him to say more, but she stopped herself short of her quest only to pull away from him with both awe and apprehension.
His body was visibly fluctuating, shifting in and out of place as multiple images of his form began to flicker into existence. At the same time, the once again stationary book floating before the both of them began to shimmer and shift in appearance as well. It was as though her field of vision was being distorted, making her see double, then triple, and then double and triple again. As the fluctuations continued, the split images continued to increase in distance, bouncing and flickering from side to side until they eventually stabilized themselves as three separate entities each.
She first examined the new objects that floated on each side her now-stilled book, but could not see through the darkness surrounding them to even try and identify them. She stepped forward towards the mystery image on the left to attempt a closer look, and yet the darkness did not recede. If anything, the darkness only seemed to thicken, condensing itself into a visible puff of black, misty clouds. She waved her hand in front of that image, trying to waft away the cloud of darkness, yet her efforts proved to be in vain. She looked up at the three images of Clow Reed in wanting for answers, confusion masking her every feature.
Except that there were now only two images of Clow Reed left to her company, and they glanced not at her but at something beyond her, objects that was on both sides of her. Alarmed, she spun around to glance behind, looking in both directions as she went, but saw no one and no thing. All that existed was the darkness stretching off before and all around her, her precious book, the two blackened objects that had spawned from that book, the Tsukimine Shrine, and the two images of Clow Reed.
She turned back to face those images, and found that the two Clows were speaking, though no words came away from their mouths. They were also not attempting to speak directly to her, but were instead addressing whatever had gained their collective attention, such beings or objects that were supposedly beside her. Again she looked to her sides, although she knew that there wouldn't be anything there this time either. She did take note, however, that the three ghost-like books from before – somehow, it just suddenly made sense that the two other objects were also books – had disappeared from view.
After a few seconds of voiceless words, the two Clows bowed their heads, that ever-present smile of confidence on their faces, and together they quickly faded away until only the darkness and the shrine remained. Soon replacing the two Clow Reeds, however, were glowing orbs of energy that sparkled their way into existence, as if to represent the spiritual essences of those two whom had just recently departed. She then also noticed something else.
At the same time as those two essences were continuing to form, the images of the shrine before her had also begun to fade. In the place of those images appeared four, darkened orbs, the direct opposites in color of what was being left in the place of the two Clow Reeds. Where the one set was of the purest white and was glowing with a soft, rainbow light, the four orbs from the shrine were practically pitch black. They almost seemed to be absorbing that very same rainbow light.
She thought to perhaps reach out for one of the glowing essences, to lay claim to it and inspect its purpose. But before she could even move a finger, let alone her arm, the two glowing spirits had both shot straight up and were soon racing each other far into the blackened sky above her. They continued their race farther and farther out of her reach, until they were just minute specks of light in the darkness. Two little stars in the night sky.
She looked back at the four darker orbs that had appeared in place of the Tsukimine Shrine, wondering if they would elect to give chase. Instead, they had rather begun to chase each other, following behind one another within a circular, wheel-like motion. Within the center of that wheel began to form a sort of vortex, a whirlpool of emptiness which had begun to draw upon the tangible darkness of the four orbs. Somehow, it seemed to be sucking in all of the non-existent light around her. She soon discovered the source of that light, when a little white bird fluttered its way into the scene, landing right in front of the vortex that those four orbs had created.
She attempted to cry out to the bird, wishing to scare it away before it could be harmed by whatever darkness was being formed from that swirling mist, but her voice still refused to respond to her commands. She tried to rush after it, to let it see her and be scared off by the approach of a figure ten times its size, but found that she no longer had control over her bodily functions. And yet the bird turned to look at her, staring into her eyes as though it had still heard her plea for it to escape. Gazing into and through its black, beady eyes, she believed that it had understood her. However, to her dismay, it just remained in place, choosing instead to turn back and stare at the black vortex nearby.
A fierce and almighty windstorm picked up all around her as the vortex began to pull all existing matter into itself, absorbing into its horizon literally anything that it could find. She fought the pull as best she could, what with the paralysis her body had taken to, but with nothing for her to take a hold of, she was losing ground fast. She squinted her eyes against the wind and watched helplessly as the little bird lost its control of its abilities of flight, spinning its way unwillingly into the dark mist and disappearing completely from view soon thereafter. The feelings of remorse at her loss were quickly washed away, however, as she too was suddenly lifted off of her feet to be pulled fast into the spinning emptiness.
Time itself seemed to slow to a crawl, despite the raging speed with which she approached. And as the vortex neared, a voice overcame her. Clow Reed's voice. It filled her ears, her mind, and indeed the very air around her.
"When the Seal on them is broken, a catastrophe will befall this world."
Her consciousness faded back into a deep and undisturbed sleep just before the horrors of the darkness could surround and consume her.
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