Gannayev of Dreams lay on the ground in the grasslands he had created. It was fairly simple for him to do that – because all of it was in his dreams, both unreal and real at the same time, but he preferred to think that it was as real as anything he saw and felt when he was awake. So he paid no attention to the blurry edges and annoyingly bright colors. Here he could be anything he wanted to be and the wine didn't make hum drunk as it would do in real life. He had been...thinking in the last few days – always changing thoughts in a whirlwind of ideas and memories – not quite sure when one idea passed and another took its place. Gann wasn't sure what was so disturbing to him either but it provoked powerful feelings inside him, making him shiver with every gust of wind and every snowflake on his shoulders. It was rather...unpleasant, though he fancied the idea that another side to him had awoken, because depth meant power and...oh, the things he could do with that power...
And then he felt another presence inside his dreams. Someone alive, someone so alive and filled with energy that the sheer power of his or her power was making Gann's skin tingle. He had no idea how he or she had gotten into his dreams, but his curiosity left no place for fear or doubts.
Someone female, he hoped. Or maybe male. It didn't matter much to him. He searched for beauty, no matter what form it took.
"Oh, radiant creature, welcome to my heaven." He had a smug look and a smirk on his face. "Here I can give you anything you desire, you can be everything you want! Welcome, oh bright one, I hope that you will grace me with..." he started talking to the creature that was probably right behind his back – Gann could feel the soft breath on his hair.
"Shut up before I kill you." The voice told him, exhaling the words so slowly that the warm air between his hairs made the shaman's skin tingle. That was, until he realized that the voice belonged to a man.
"Oh, excuse me, I though you were..." he couldn't finish as the creature interrupted him. Gann wasn't so sure what it was, because the voice echoed all over his haven and he was too fascinated with the idea of someone so powerful here that he didn't even turn around to see who was standing behind him.
"Listen, I really don't have time for this. I'm going to count to three. If you don't make some chairs and a table appear, I'm going to kick you where it hurts the most. One..."
"Alright, alright, just calm down, whoever you are. Here they are." He sighed and seated himself in one of the comfortable chairs only to see that his interlocutor was two meters high, not counting the horns.
"Well...you do seem familiar" Wrinkling his forehead, his eyes started roaming around the face of the unknown man. "Ah, yes, I saw you back the haven of the giant...tentacled..." he gulped here, face paling.
"I know. I wanted to speak with you, spawn of hags."
"Giant...tentacles...err...excuse me. But you haven't even introduced yourself, stranger."
"Whatever. My name is Malvor. And I have a proposition for you."
"Ah, and what might that be, oh handsome one?"
"What?"
"Are you denying that you are, in fact, handsome? In my lifetime, I have rarely seen anyone so charming. It's probably the horns, their perfect shape..." Trying to drag a finger on the horns, Gann found his wrist to be incapable of moving any more. He got pushed back by the fiend.
"First of all, yeah, I am denying it. And second...I had no idea you swayed that way. Uh...I'm going to back away a little now..." There was a moment of awkward silence, while the fiend got up from the comfortable chair and took a few steps back.
"So, my dashing friend of curt words, what are you going to propose? If it is what I think it is..."
"Nope. It has to do something to do with Cayla." Seeing how the eyebrows of the shaman rose(and if they had risen any more, they would've just flown away in mid-space), he continued to explain. "See...when you entered the world of the Many, Cayla said that you could go bother a tentacled monster, for all she cares. And...you did." Malvor paused here for a while, just to add some dramatic tension.
"I have a theory. Cayla is very powerful, as we can all see. But where are the limits of her power? In a place like Rashemen, where beliefs shape life, she could be...a god!"
"I fail to see your point here, handsome." Gann turned the chair into a sofa, putting his foot on the elbow-rest, all that while trying to look seductive.
"I think that Cayla imagined the god of many tentacles. I know that I have always known there is such a god in the Many...but what is "always"? Maybe she imagined that it has always been here. She has strong beliefs and an utter lack of any logical thinking – for her, beliefs shape the world around her. And it seems...it seems this way she can shape the world of others as well."
"So?"
"I want to see how powerful she is and if she really can do all these things with the world around her. And I want you to find out."
"Me? Oh, my dearest friend, how could I find out about this if you can't? Or do you admit that you find me superior to yourself?"
"I can grant you permission into her dreams. Then you enter it. You are an adept when it comes to dreams and you can see what is hidden in them. You can...control them. Most of them, actually. See if you can control her dreams, that is all I ask.
"And in return I get...?"
"The opportunity to explore Cayla's dreams, of course."
"I'm going to...think about this. I'll let you know when I make my decision. What do you say?"
The fiend didn't say anything in return. He just disappeared from Gannayev's haven, leaving the slightest scent of brimstone behind.
Truth to be told, Malvor didn't need Gann's help. It was just an experiment in order to be one hundred percent sure. He already knew how powerful the former Knight-Captain was. She could shape things – almost like an illusionist, the only thing different was that she could make those things real. And she was so naïve! The half-fiend could make her do anything, all he needed in order to do that was put words in her head, words that she would believe in. While she was indeed charismatic – it came with being a sorceress, probably – and with her charm she could make others do her biddings, her...shaping of the world around her didn't stop here.
One of Many had ambitions. They were yet to take shape - they were still just ambitions of control, but control of whom he did not know. He was certain he had them, though. He loved them. And because Cayla was the way of making those ambitions real, he fell in love with her one he realized this. It was a weird, twisted kind of love, not devoted to the flesh but to the idea – but it was love none the less.
Those funny bald men in red robes were fun to kill. They pretended to be masters of the arcane, but in the end, they all died a horribly funny dead. That is, if turning their bodies inside out could be considered funny. Or turning them into frogs. Pink frogs. Or destroying half of their academy with fireballs and watching how they burn, all that while Cayla laughed with an insane glint in her eyes.
"Why are you...laughing? Actually, what are you doing here? I left you in Rashemen." The bald lady in red robed seemed familiar...but all bald tattooed ladies look the same.
.:Pssst, this is Safiya, the red wizard you traveled with a long time ago!:. The Many whispered in her ear, though that was uncalled for – he could only speak to her in her thoughts.
'How long?'
.:It doesn't matter! Speak to her! Errr...two months, maybe two and a half.:.
'It wasn't that long ago... Why are you looking at me like that?' She gave up after half a minute of awkward staring at the Many.
"Ahahah! Ahahahah! Err...pay no attention to the cackle, it's a sorceress thing. What I mean to say was: hello, bald lady! I decided to pay you a visit, see how things are going on with you. So, how are? Anything interesting lately?" Cayla asked the wizard while devouring the soul of a nearby woman in red robes. She could turn her remains into butterflies later. Butterflies were nice.
"Aside from you destroying MY academy, nothing. Why...why are you doing this?" She wasn't surprised that the sorceress was happy when she was obliterating something, but she though her to be a friend.
"Oh...it's fun."
"What she meant to say" Kaelyn interrupted the sorceress "was that she is taking vengeance again those who unjustly slew your mother. And after that you could join us in our crusade against the Wall."
"WHAT?! Listen, don't get the wrong idea. Assassinations in the Thayan academies are something normal. We have several of them every week. It's just something you know it's going to happen and you expect it – kind of like an early birthday party, but without the hangover in the morning." Safiya sighed and took a step back, lest her former friend decides frying her would also be fun.
"Ah, my dear, so you are taking the death of your mother fine?" Asked Gann with his smooth and feminine voice, while trying to put out the magical fire. "Don't answer that, it wasn't a question." Spending months on end with Cayla made him add the last sentence – it was a form of evolution, communicating in a normal way with those who lacked brain cells.
.:This is a way of thinking the Many could admire. Can we keep her, Mistress? Can we? Can we?:.
"Uh...sure, One. Safiya, you're coming with us." Cayla smiled, as if taking hostages from the crime scene was something completely normal to do.
"Do I HAVE a choice?"
"Well, not really. So, coming?"
"I already said I was. Why do you have to ask twice?"
"I...er...oh, shut up or your soul will be next. I probably don't mean this, but you're supposed to be intimidated anyway." Cayla smiled again, nothing psychotic in her smile this time. It worked. It always worked. When you have an IQ of negative numbers, you have to be creative or one morning you wake up and you realize you're dead. Or something like that.
.:Being dead is not that bad, Mistress. You can even join the Many, if you want. Then we wouldn't have someone to control us and we will be free to spread agony and pain in this world.:.
'Don't you...already do that kind of things?' It was a real achievement for her, talking while walking in a straight line in that long, horribly painted corridor.
.:Yes, but it's not that fun when we know we are supposed to obey someone's orders of spreading agony and torment.:.
'If I pretend that my orders are to be good and pet random kittens, will you feel better?'
.:Well, yes.:. The Many were probably blushing right now, but she couldn't be sure because she couldn't see the face behind the hood.
'Good. Now go pet that cute little puppy that is right in front of us, my minion' She winked at him.
.:Err...that is a pit fiend.:.
'What's the difference?'
.:I...see. You were being metaphorical, Mistress.:.
'What's...meta-pa-horical?' Cayla had that weird clueless expression painted on her face.
.:Oh, never mind then. I don't want to know.:.
"Ah, my charming and dashingly brave leaver, are we going to stand here all day, staring at the spawn of the Abyss, or are we going to fight it?" She probably didn't notice the moment she had stopped – her brain probably got exhausted from doing two things at the same time – both thinking and walking - and decided on its own that it should probably stop doing one of the said things.
"Gann...?"
"Yes?"
"Did I ever give you permission to speak to me ever again?"
"No?"
"And what did I tell you about starting your sentences with 'ah'?
"That you're going to kill me, resurrect me, then drink my soul, reanimate my empty shell and use it as a table?"
"Mmm...yes. So shut up, I'm in a good mood – probably comes from killing bald tattooed funny people – so don't spoil it. Else I'll really do it."
He gulped, not answering that one. There wasn't much to answer anyway.
"Oh, Akachi, is that you? I knew you would come to me in the end!" The bald lady who looked just like Safiya – and any other woman in the academy – tried to hug Cayla and got pushed back by the Many.
"Err...what?"
"It is you, Akachi!"
"Lady, I'm not Akachi. I'm a woman. You're currently staring at my chest anyway, so I guess you can see that."
"Ah, and what a magnificent chest that is!" Gann exclaimed, trying to put a hand on her shoulder. It got pushed away by the Many. Luckily, Cayla didn't notice that he had said anything at all, otherwise she would've stopped paying attention to the old red-robed crone.
"What? You perverted shell of a woman! Don't you interrupt me while I'm speaking to my long lost love Akachi!" The red lady snapped back at her. The red wizard ladies were probably clones and they all looked exactly the same, Cayla decided.
"You have...named my chest Akachi? Well that is...oddly specific, I guess."
"No, no, no! In your wound from the shard, I have implanted Akachi's soul. You were powerful enough to handle the soul and you had a Destiny! You were the perfect person for me to use as a shell for my boyfriend." It seemed that the red wizard got angry, because she pouted at the sorceress and started looking as if she was expecting something.
"I...heeey, wait a minute? Where is Safiya anyway? I though she was supposed to be with us?"
Kaelyn calmly tried to explain and that was rather surprising for the motley cru - throughout their journey she barely spoke of anything except the Wall:
"You traded her to the pit fiends in order to get that soul of a friend you wanted. Though we didn't return to give that friend of yours his soul, remember? And...she looked as if she wanted to leave us...she started looking distressed ever since I tried talking to her about the holy mission we have."
"Oh...sure..." Cayla agreed with the Dove(lest she tries to give another Wall speech when she realizes someone is paying attention to her), though the sorceress didn't remember that at all - she didn't usually remember anything that she considered to be unimportant.
.:You should get whatever information you can from the Founder – she was the closest one to the thing that is now your spirit eater gift. Bluff her into doing it.:. And so she did, though before doing it she realized that One of Many was trying to hold her hand. Kinky.
"So...uh, can you remind me the details of how Aka...err, I became a spirit-eater?" That was the best persuasion she could do – she usually relied on the charming smile to do the persuading and she succeeded again in doing it.
3 hours later
"...and this is how I implanted you into the body of this girl. I couldn't find a man good enough for your soul, but I love you no matter how you look. So, wanna go to the movies? They probably have "The Beauty and the Spirit Eater" right now, we can catch it if we hurry!"
"Uh...I've got to go, sorry. I've got to tear down the Wall and get my soul out of it– I kind of liked it before you send it there."
Ignoring the fact how Kaelyn started cheering from behind her, Cayla gripped the hilt of her sword and prepared to get rid of the boring, pesky lady with the long-winded speeches. Before she could do it, One of Many placed a tentacle on hew shoulders and sent his thoughts to her:
.: Don't you think she deserves something worse? When you tear down the Wall and devour Kelemvor's soul she will be free anyway. :.
'What are you suggesting, hon?'
.:Will her out of existence. You can do that, you are powerful enough.:.
'Will her? What are you, nuts? My will score is abysmal, I can barely make myself to get out of bed in the morning! There is absolutely no way you can persuade me into doing this!'
She was wrong, of course. She was usually wrong in her assumptions – whenever she made them, anyway, and that didn't happen every day...or month... Surprisingly enough, The Many kissed her. His tentacles got wrapped around her limbs and she felt that odd feeling of having ghostly fudge in her mouth again. Then the words and thoughts started flooding in and after a couple of seconds she started to consider them her own – the few brain cells she had didn't resist them and after all, they were in her head – so they must've been her own all the time. In fact, she had always wanted to make the Founder suffer. The little bits of Akachi protested while she concentrated on the red wizard...
And the Founder was no more.