Well, this was weird. Half Truth had no desire to be profound about this. Some dreams meant something; they were echoes of worry or brief glimpses of the future. But this dream? This was weird. If it was prophecy, she was stubbornly ignoring it; this was a vision of something so cryptic and enigmatic that it was meaningless. She wasn’t going to see anything in this. Instead, she was going to ignore the thing. Snorting and flattening her ears, she began to walk away from it, placing each hoof in front of the other with a conviction that almost surprised her.
Her hoofbeats didn’t echo; they were flat, isolated, hollow. That disturbed her more than anything else, for it whispered to her that this was dead space, a space in which she should not be. It was funny, the little things that told you something was wrong. She’d once heard that there was a bird in the swamp somewhere with a call that didn’t echo; it was said that catching this bird would bring fortune or fame or something out of the folk legends. She didn’t believe it; catching any bird would only bring you dinner. There were no birds here; she was sure of it. She was alone here, and lately alone was a feeling she was beginning to forget.
She looked up from the ground; how long had she been staring at the stones? She felt almost blind from visual fatigue; there was nothing to look at, no movement, no color. As she raised her head, she saw to her dismay that she hadn’t gone anywhere. The obelisk loomed in front of her, taunting her.
Carefully, she extended a hoof to tap the strange thing. How could it glow like that? What was it? She’d never seen anything like it in life, which was part of how she knew she was dreaming. (The other part, of course, was that she’d gone to sleep and clearly did not recall waking; if you’re not awake and you’re walking around, you’re obviously dreaming. So simple.) A quick flick of the hoof, just to see if it was real. She needed to know, even though it couldn’t be real- this was a dream, after all. But
A feeling like cold rushed through her, seeping like fog into her nostrils and throat, choking her, drowning her. She couldn’t scream, couldn’t fight; all she could do was fall, down down down down down-
and suddenly, she was home.
But home was wrong. Her hackles bristled; for a moment, her mind went rabid, a slathering dog, bucking and snarling at the innate wrongness. The moment of panic was over as soon as it set in, but she couldn’t shake the knowledge that something was horribly off. She turned slowly, not wanting to see what she knew she was going to see. The object of her hate rose before her, grabbing her eyes and sinking into them with locking jaws. She couldn’t look away from the thing; as much as she hated it, she couldn’t look away. Something awful blossomed within her chest, a deep, slimy feeling. It was hard to put name to; it felt like anger, but had a different grip. Anger could be worked through; a few hours of kicking trees or hunting could calm her down. This feeling, though- it wasn’t the heat of anger. It was cold and thick and made her feel as though she was losing herself. Life seeped out of her, bubbling out of her jaws, dripping like drool down onto her hide. She saw herself rotting, all that was her leaking out of a bloated body fallen to its knees in front of the obelisk, the acid buzz of flies clustering around her nose, her eyes, her ears… the rush of whispers past her ears, a litany of sins and sorrows, a screeching call for a cry of contrition.
And then as soon as it began, it was over. She awoke with a yelp, her heart hammering in her chest. Eyes wide, she craned her head around; mercifully, the thing was gone. It was dark- the moon had gone behind the clouds- and while the swamp’s midnight choir sang their paeans to the warm night winds, she couldn’t find joy or comfort in any of it. Being awake didn’t make her feel safe, but she couldn’t go back to sleep. She didn’t trust her dreams. Miserably, she curled up, staring out at the black water in the distance, waiting for the sun to rise.