Darkest Dreams

Chapter 1

Sighing, Arya glanced over at the fern leaf sticking to her skirt and tugged it so that it was free. It had been too many weeks since she had set out from Vabbi and decided to travel to Istan in hopes of finding someone who could help her. But so far she was unsuccessful. Very unsuccessful. She had managed to ask a couple of villagers where the local Sunspear base was but few had given her straight answers. But she had noticed a growing un-rest hanging around each village and whenever she asked they would stare at her and say two words; corsair and the village of Chahbek.

She didn't know exactly what that meant but she did know that wherever there were corsairs a team of Sunspears were not far behind. So she set out to Chahbek without knowing exactly what she had gotten herself into when she left the relative safety of civilization. The place she was looking for wasn't on any map that she possessed or bought but she was sure that it was near the coast, since there was pirates involved, so she figured as long as she was traveling along the beach she was sure to find signs of human life. What she hadn't counted on was the fact that the landscape around the beach did not consist of white sand and perfect waves; no it was full of green and prickly plant life, cliffs jutting out to heights she wasn't even sure were natural, and waves that stood almost as tall as her-not that she was tall-but she wasn't used to the sea since she had grown up in a country mainly landlocked.

Sure she knew how to swim since she lived relatively close to the Elon River but she wasn't sure she could handle the ferocity of the dark water to her right. So she had climbed back up to the land above the cliff using a rough trail etched into the side of a smaller cliff and had found a used merchant path she assumed led to the town in question. She glanced down at her skirt again and glared at another leaf that had somehow attached itself to the edge of the fabric. She switched her glare to the surrounding greenery that enclosed her and wished it would disappear.

Closing her eyes at the sight she lifted her foot and continued to walk towards her unknown destination.

~..~..~..~

It wasn't until the sun was high in the sky when she noticed that there were no longer sounds or signs of any animal life in front of her and behind her. Arya squinted her eyes to see if she could make out any shapes on the path in front of her, but was rewarded with nothing. Worried a little at that, she pulled the white hood of her cloak further down across her face and slowly proceeded to follow the path cautiously. She slowed when she began to hear the sound of battle not far off from where she was standing and inched her way further into the foliage on her left and continued towards the clearing up ahead.

She stopped as she heard quiet rustling behind her and slowly moved her hand to the small dagger she carried in a pocket of her cloak. When she heard the sound again she twirled to confront the person or thing but wasn't prepared for the sting of a blow to the back of her neck from her left. Agonizingly slow Arya's legs buckled and her eyelids closed before she felt the hot liquid trailing a warm line from where she was hit. Sighing at her unfortunate circumstances she had no choice but let the velvet blackness wrap around her failing consciousness.

~.~.~

Alec shifted his sword in his hand before putting it back into its scabbard at his waist. The fighting was finished and the corsairs were all but eliminated from the town, the only thing left was to clear the debris from the sunken corsair ships, look at the prisoners, and allow the villagers to come back since it was safe. He looked towards the water and noticed a particularly tall and jagged piece of wood sticking out from the surface of the sea. He figured he would have to work on that particular problem before the villagers were allowed into their homes. Signaling to the newest sun spear recruit he ordered two groups to begin disassembling the remains of both ships.

He watched as the recruit nearly hopped to his feet to carry out the orders of his superior, and shook his head. Maybe he was their superior but he happened to be one of the youngest generals in the sun spear ranks, though he would never show that it mattered to him. Out of the corner of his eye he saw that Koss, his friend and comrade, was walking towards him with a disgruntled soldier following at his heels. Alec sighed before turning around to greet the Istanian and gave Koss an eyebrow in question. "Found this soldier running along the path that outskirts the village. When I asked what he was doing, he said that he needed to talk to you at once, that it was rather urgent. That's as far as I know." Koss followed this speech with a lighthearted glare at the soldier before shrugging his shoulders.

Again Alec raised his eyebrow in question and waited for the man to explain his presence in front of the general. The man straightened before pointing towards the furthest path away from the city and explained that he heard a few corsairs running away from the town. "I didn't think it was that important since I figured they wouldn't get that far without you noticing but then the leader said something about being able to use a bargaining chip against us so that they could leave safely. I was intrigued so I moved closer to the scoundrels and saw that on the back of one of them was a body in a white cloak. After I saw it I turned and fled towards the village so that I could get to you and warn you that they had captured a prisoner of their own."

With that the man slumped as if the telling of his story was too much and was finally relieved of his burden. Alec took one look at the man in front of him before motioning that he should go find some food and rest. He watched as the soldier thankfully bowed his head and took off towards the mess tent. Turning back to Koss, Alec asked the first thing that came to mind. "How many do you think there are?" Grinning Koss looked at the fleeing man before turning back to his general and replied "I think there are about 3…maybe 4 by the sounds of it. Not anything a warrior in the prime of his youth couldn't take out easily…"

Matching the grin of his friend, Alec nodded once and then motioned to another recruit. Without taking his eyes off from the other warrior he said in light tones "Commander Koss is in charge of the village until I come back. I'm going on a little reconnaissance mission, and it won't take me more than an hour or so." If it was possible, Koss's grin became slightly wider before he turned to the same young man and began to bark out orders. Alec, still smiling, adjusted his rune blade's handle so that it rested comfortably on his hip before tossing his soft green cloak over his shoulders and pulled the hood up. Turning towards the path the soldier had indicated he began to jog rhythmically in the direction of the group of corsairs for some fun.

~.~.~

Blinking her eyes, Arya could feel a huge migraine start pushing its way in between her eyebrows so that it thrummed in pressure. It didn't help that she realized she was flung carelessly across a rough shoulder…a shoulder belonging to someone who cared nothing for its burden. Squinting her eyes at the sudden burst of light, she looked around and surmised that they had walked onto some sort of beach and into a type of camp nestled in front of a dark cave.

She thought for a clue to how long she had been out but failed to come up with an estimation of how long except to say that it hadn't been long enough for her captures who had just noticed she was awake. She pulled a particularly fierce glare on her face as she tilted her head up to stare at the back side of the one holding her. She was rewarded with a jostle and a dump on the sands near their feet. Arya grunted at the impact and tried to shift in order to find a more comfortable position on her back, only to feel a sharp twist of pain near her foot.

Shifting a little more cautiously as if testing her strength, she realized with a sharp intake of breath that she must have broken her ankle sometime during her capture. But when? She thought back to when she had first noticed someone following her and then winced in sympathy for her past self when the memory of the blow to her head came back to her. That must have been it; when she toppled forward she must have wrenched her foot in the process. Arya cursed as she realized her chance of escape had just narrowed considerably; she couldn't get away from these thugs nursing a broken ankle.

She sighed again and twisted around to peer at her captors. Two of them had begun to argue back and forth in a language she didn't know and the other two were seated on a log nearby chewing on some…jerky by the looks of it. She looked at the two sitting down and debated her chances of letting loose a good firestorm spell before the other two would notice their friends' charred remains. Sizing the arguing pair up she let the idea go since she figured they would be able to force her into submission by sheer strength alone. Sighing for the third time since she had woken, Arya felt her eyelids drag themselves over her tired eyes. She drifted off to sleep listening to the faint hissings of her disgruntled captors.

Arya peeked over her shoulder in surprise when she realized that the sounds of snoring her captors had made during most of the night had turned into strangled cries of shock and rage. Narrowing her eyes she tried to make out who or what was the cause of such golden misery-according to her any way-but only succeeded in giving her migraine another burst of pain.

Closing her eyes she figured she should take advantage of this un-looked for but helpful opportunity and focused her thoughts on the cords that bound her wrists and legs. Muttering a small and controlled fire spell directed towards her restraints, she felt the twine un-twist and her appendages were freed. Arya slowly sat up without moving her injured leg too much and took measure of her whereabouts.

She was in a small cave, the flames of the torches flickering off of the inky black of the walls. Underneath her she felt the sand shift with her weight and then immediately shot a quick look at the reason for her well timed escape. Not that she had thought much of how she was going to get out of the cave before her "rescuer" realized she was missing and came after her. In the glimmer of torch light she could make out a large figure and a slightly taller and leaner shadow fighting in the corner of the narrow cave. Since Arya could only see one of her captors up and about, she looked for the other three.

She found two still in their bed rolls with their throat effectively slit and another who had such a grotesque look on his dead face she was forced to look away in repugnance. She decided that she would be better off looking for a means to allow her to walk (or run) whichever one was the one to get her out of the mess she found herself in. Twisting to her side she noticed a conveniently placed stick about her size that should hold the majority of her weight. Grabbing it in her hands, she hauled herself up and experimentally moved her hurting foot from side to side. Wincing she realized that she must have hurt it worse than she had originally thought. Arya again looked over to the corner to watch the two men locked in combat and shook her head.

Grimacing she began to inch her way to the mouth of the cave before she pulled her hood back onto her face. She was already nearing the little log camp that the thugs must have stopped at when she awoke before she noticed that she no longer heard the echo of swords clanging against each other in the cave behind her and stopped to look back. Sure enough there was a silhouette of a man standing in the light of the entrance of the cave. She didn't spare another look at the cave and began to move as fast as her injured leg would allow her to. She didn't get far when she heard footfall behind her and realized that they were moving in her direction.

She couldn't afford to wonder who had won that fight and she wasn't sure she was willing to take the consequences in order to find out. She wasn't paying attention to the terrain she was currently crossing and didn't realize what was happening to her when she felt her leg give out from beneath her and the ground became closer and closer. Arya closed her eyes in fear of the pain she knew would be coming once her foot hit the ground but she was surprised when seconds later the spasm she expected never hit. In fact she never reached the ground; she was currently suspended in the air a few inches above the sandy soil and an arm was currently supporting her abdomen from behind.

Perplexed, Arya twisted her head to stare into the two most intense and icy blue eyes she had ever seen in her life. Frowning she realized she didn't know who had helped her and was worried that it probably wasn't the most accommodating person she could meet at the moment. Jerking her body out of the arm holding her up, she fell into an ungraceful lump in the sand and gasped audibly when her foot reminded her of its grievance. "Now why did you go and do that?" Arya watched with wary eyes as the stranger knelt near her foot and took it into his hands. "Stop"

She wasn't happy when the man (she had no doubt that the figure in front of her was indeed a he) paid no heed to her order. "I told you to stop." She accented her order by wrenching her foot out of his grasp and onto the sand near her other leg. She was glad that she had annoyed the person in front of her when she saw him narrow his eyes towards her leg and swiftly glance towards her hooded face. Arya had to stifle another gasp but was too late since the man had smirked thinking she had hurt her foot again at her ignorance. It wasn't why she had gasped…not anywhere close to the reason.

The man those enticing blue eyes belonged to was unbelievably handsome, with strong, perfectly sculpted features that would melt any maiden's heart. But it wasn't what attracted her to the face, not that it didn't help, but the brief glance she had gotten of her rescuer's eyes did not give any justice in the beauty of that cold blue. She wondered briefly what those eyes would look like warmed by an eternal fire but shook the thought out of her head. Mustering what was left of her indigenous stance before she had seen his face she glared again at the man.

"I don't need your help, if it was indeed you who helped me in that cave then you have my gratitude but other than that I ask you to leave me alone." Arya said this in her best court drawl and hoped that the man took the hint that she was just another one of those dense court ladies out looking for adventure. One who wasn't worth the time he could or would spend on her. He didn't take the hint since he narrowed his eyes even further and said in a voice dripping with sarcasm,

"I don't care about your gratitude since it was an obvious mistake; I had thought you were one of my men. But regardless you are a lady, or I assume, and I am honor bound not to leave you out in the wild hurt and alone." Glaring again at the man in front of her, she picked up her stick and tried again to get up without help. Unfortunately it wasn't a task she was currently up to since she felt like all her energy had been drained in that short time she had walked out of that cave and flopped back down onto the ground. The man took another look at her figure on the ground and shook his head in disgust before turning around to walk over to the camp site near them and picked up some stray logs.

Turning around the man walked back to her and began to set up the logs in a way resembling a camp fire. Finally catching on to what he was working on, Arya mustered enough strength to mumble a low level spell of fire so that the logs burst into flames. She gave a satisfied smirk when the man jumped away from the fire so that he wouldn't get burnt. Slowly she shifted again on the ground but realized too late that she had expended too much energy on that little spell and she wouldn't be able to stay conscious any further. Looking at the man in front of her she gave him a shaky smile before closing her eyes and toppling to the side.

~.~.~

Alec jumped to catch the woman before she hit her head on the hard surface of the ground beneath her and gently lowered her onto the ground near him. Doing so he managed to have the hood fall away from her face and he sat up with slight shock. The women lying before him was about the same age as him, but she seemed smaller…more petit than other women he knew. But then he had to admit that most women he knew were in the Sunspear ranks and rather built, not counting the mages, but he usually avoided their kind when he had the chance so his experience didn't count.

Her face was small but its shape fit her body flawlessly and only added to the mystery in front of him. He could tell right away she was beautiful but he hadn't realized that he would personally find her attractive. He wasn't used to being attracted to women since very few were even allowed to be near him. But he had to admit, he had never seen someone at this caliber, and he was fairly sure he wasn't ever going to again. Since he couldn't see her eyes he had to say the most striking feature of the lady was her hair; when he had caught her and the hood fell away he was presented with thick lustrous caramel brown hair that fell in waves around his arm. He forced himself to pull his hand away from her head as his hand had begun to inch its way over to the lady.

Shrugging his own cloak off his shoulders he bundled it in his hands and lifted the woman's head to place it underneath as an extra cushion. Sighing he tore his eyes away from the beauty lying near him and looked at the fire now brightly glowing in the center of their makeshift camp. When she had muttered under her breath a few minutes before, he thought she was just complaining about something but when the fire was lit automatically it had surprised him more than he was willing to admit.

He had been around plenty of mages in battle, even commanded groups of them but he had avoided them otherwise. He wouldn't have guessed that his charge was a mage…he had just thought that she was another noble on a joyride through Istan-she had certainly given him that impression. Looking over to her face he was forced to reevaluate his first thoughts of this wisp of a woman. Puffing out his breath with an aggravated huff he put his arms underneath his head and immediately felt his eyes close in sleep.

~ That's the end of chapter 1…read and review please!