Dragonworld: The Will For Power

Part 11: Dreamland

Dreamland

The prairie tribes of the Forever Grass believe that with your mind, you can access other realms. Your dreams are just as real as what you experience in everyday life. They connect you to higher planes of existence.

Time for them is not a line going from the past into the future. Rather, it is cyclical, but also unshapen. All points of time are linked to all other points in time, but also space.

With dreams, you are accessing these hidden realms. You are talking to the past, and the future. The actual and the possible are both equal in this sphere.

For the people living on the plains, each landmark they passed tied them not only to the place, but also to different points of time. If centuries ago, one of their ancestors hid behind a particular rock while escaping from enemies, that rock became an embodiment of that act.

If a person passed this rock on their way somewhere, they immediately got connected to the people of long ago. And in a way, they left their own mark, which then connected them to their descendants in the future.

It is within dreams that this communication between the people and places happens. In their inner visions, individuals can access knowledge from long ago, but also from times that haven't happened yet. It also ties them to different possibilities, since these are as real as actual events on their own timeline.

Guardian of the Eagles felt these connections stronger than most other members of his tribe. Each trip on the Forever Grass filled him with emotions and visions. Of things that happened, and that could happen.

Seeing that decrepit foreigner walking deliriously, but defiantly in the grass, even as warriors surrounded him, gave him a special foreboding sense. He still couldn't put his finger on it, but there was a connection.

This man somehow tied himself to his future. Guardian of the Eagles knew that the arrival of this man was not something arbitrary. It was significant, even defining for the tribe. He wasn't the same as all those who had passed before. He was different.

He had seen him in his dreams. Guardian of the Eagles grew up in a family filled with shamans and other individuals who had a special bond to the higher realms. They could see, not in the traditional sense of the word, as in with their eyes.

Rather, they could see with their mind. Dreams spoke to them, and gave them direction. Guardian was sure. He had seen this man in his dreams. It was not by chance that he was here.

--

The demon inside

Pafe didn't remember much of the ride to the camp. The band of warriors went quick, their horses galloping at full speed. It took about half a day for them to get back home.

The camp itself consisted of a number of teepee tents strewn haphazardly across the grass. In the middle, a large open space was pierced only by a large pole. Rising up, it was taller than three grown men stacked on top of each other, and decorated with various patterns.

Groups of men and women were all doing different tasks, skinning game, washing clothes, or preparing the evening meal. All of them were dressed in colorful clothes, with some of the men sporting headdresses made of feathers.

It all seemed so alien to the young man who had only known life between castle walls. The smells, the sounds, the sights, were all something he could have hardly even imagined a few months ago.

He could experience all this only though the open slit of the large tent he was lying in. He still wasn't feeling very well. Despite being covered by blankets, his body was shivering.