- It waits, patiently, in the woods, scales gleaming in the eternal twilight. It is a predator, it's life one of waiting and patience and sudden, violent ferocity. It is patient. It knows what it waits for.
It stalked her through a wood, it's steps thunderous, though she could neither hear nor see them. She knew them, though, with the certainty that came with dreams. She knew she was dreaming. She knew she wasn't going to wake. She knew she had to run.
So she ran, her every step bruising plants that oozed blood red sap. No path led through this darkened wood, no hope shone in the shadows around her, only darkness and shadows and despair.
Despair... was that what stalked her, with it's teeth so bright and cruel? No. Something else did, something worse...
It has no ears, but it listens all the same. Footsteps in it's wood... an intruder, chasing them. The footsteps should not be there, but they were a part of this place all the same. The intruder... was alien. Wrong.
It rises, proud, noble, and powerful. It is... unfinished, but the footsteps will one day finish it. But it needs the footsteps to be complete. It cannot let the intruder catch them. It is not supposed to act, not yet, not while unfinished, but with sudden speed it races into the woods, chasing the footsteps, though they are not it's prey...
*
Laesara's fever worsens. The hired healers try everything, but still it worsens. All they can do – all Aestival can do – is keep her alive. They give her water. They give her magic. They feed her as best they can, though it is a gamble whether, in her delirium, she will fear them too and struggle against them. They do what they can to keep her alive, to keep her going, and they pray that she can fight this off herself...
*
- She knew she could not escape it. There was no refuge from the predator that stalked her, and the plants sliced impassively into her feet. She could run – ignoring the pain and the weight of exhaustion on her limbs, she could run forever. But it would find her – the monster that chased her. She ran anyway, not out of desperation but out of resolve: she would not give her pursuer an easy race. She would not give up. She would push and thrash and fight, even if it was hopeless.
There was a flickering light in the darkness. It used it as an anchor. It was not yet meant to run in these woods, not yet meant to be, but the light was real. It was an intruder too... But it would help. The light gave it direction, ferocity, and resolve. It gave it a direction. It knew where to go.
*
Laesara was too weak to fight the people who cared for her anymore. Her skin was just shy of scalding, far too hot to the touch. Water magic cooled her, as did an old-fashioned, time honored wet cloth, but there were fears that her own body would damage her. Aestival's ability to heal progressed with practice, the bonded caring for her at all hours. He had a word for what he did – love.
*
- She was afraid. She knew that this was untenable. The darkness pursuing her would catch up, unless she found a way to turn the tables. It was close at her heels now, she could feel it – doom, or worse. She would not wake from this nightmare – waking only granted a reprieve, and the dark predator only laughed. Soon, waking would not be safe, either.
”You do not have to run.”
*
Laesara's fever plateaued, to the relief of her caretakers. There was some suspicion that the fever was a curse, magical in origin, but Aestival refused to allow anyone near her to test out this theory... perhaps he feared the answer. A disease was alive, something he could slay. A curse... he was not strong enough to defeat it. Only Andorynn, who Aestival trusted, was permitted even enough of an inspection to affirm that the fever was suspicious. But even if he had been able to recognize it for what it was, it would have proved too powerful for either he or Aestival to dispell...
*
- Gleaming eyes in the darkness – something new. No. She did not have to run, but running had been the only option she'd thought she'd had.
But there was another.
”We fight.”
She stopped running, turning back towards the encroaching, terrifying darkness. It became ever more tangible as she watched it, a nothingness so sickening in it's invisibility that she had to flee, to flee at all costs.
”We fight.”
Hope lit her like a lantern. Her hands balled into fists... or were they claws? Did she have claws and fangs? Was she a beast? No, she was a girl. She was a girl who was a beast.
”We fight.”
No more running.
”We fight.”
She leapt at the nothingness with a scream of defiance. It would not find her easy prey to subdue. She would fight it, fight it to her last ounce of strength, and it would never have her.
”WE FIGHT!”
*
In the middle of the night, Laesara's caretakers witnessed her fever begin to break. Bit by bit, it receded, health and strength returning to her now pale, frail form. Soon, true sleep overtook the nightmares, and the shadows that haunted her faded away. She had defeated the sickness, and would soon be free. **
*
