The Stele!
He saw it clearly now—the beauty of the walls: Smooth, lustrous, with inklings of steam laced across its surface. He felt for them—the mist, its moisture warm across his fingertips. He rolled them, smiled.
This was the room that housed me?
The room that saved me. Protected me. Taught me.
Savior!
The grin widened as he edged towards the stele, tracing imaginary lines over its veneer. Much newer—more words, he noted, though none reared an inkling in his immediate awareness. There was always the small words—Yoid.
He froze.
Yoid….Merrin frowned. Does he still live?
He hoped not.
Or was the attack by Auwale enough for his demise?
A hope for the latter burned, yet caster mentation couldn't halt the swirling procession of alternative possibilities. Yoid was powerful…An expert in the cast. A wealth of experience locked within an agless body, at least, Merrin believed so. The man himself had hinted at such potentialities. Question then, would such a man…Truly die?
He sighed, shoving the thought into the deeper collective of constant cognition. That was the way of the caster's mind. Always thinking. Always pondering. Always considering. With, of course, the exception of Impression formation.
For a moment, he sensed a possibility of madness in the exertion of that trait.
A sound:
Someone stepped into the room. He turned. And there stood the curtly woman—Este.
She wore a frown like the new dress. A grey garment, sharp-edged on the shoulders, sleeveless, her red scarf worn around the neck. Some determination was locked in that wear. "So this is your room." More of a statement than a question.
"It would seem so." The inner dream awareness told of it. "I like it."
"Ah." She scoffed. "Simply extravagant for the wrong reasons."
Extravagant? He scooped the room. "You mean the room or the castle?"
She regarded him with a scowl. "You are strange...Why? Why did you give up the creation of the Aelmiren?" She asked. "That would have made you a scientist of the Highest Fa'n. No longer would you require a master…Attendants would be at your call."
She has forgiven me? He thought and said, "I doubt I possess the skills or…Symbols necessary for that."
"Bah!" She exclaimed, rather barbarically. "And you suppose I do? My symbols, dear, are two: Experimentation and Hacking. How does that, I ask you, relate to the creation of a species?"
"Neither do they relate to an Armor," Merrin said, stunned at the insouciant manner by which she revealed things…Her symbols. He recalled: Experimentation and Hacking. Were these symbols also passed onto Orvane? Is it by that means that she was able to hijack the dream?
A chill came over him.
By that logic…Could the Grayworld also be hacked?
He trembled, fear screaming for the instantaneous termination of the dream. That was likely the adequate course of action. However…The seal remained unlearned. Ending the dream would be but moments wasted. And that, he knew, could not be allowed.
I need to accelerate the events.
Este frowned. "Not even paying attention."
"Was woolgathering."
"Liar." She said, passing a glance at the stele behind him. "You did this to me. These thoughts that are now in my head. All of them are a result of your actions."
Hmm? He reflected the internal confusion with the adequate expression.
She continued. "The Flaw of all creators is…"
"The love for their creation." Merrin completed—knew then the changes that underwent underneath the simple woman.
She winced, a knit pinching in her brow. Seemed almost rigid in its formation. "I hate what they make me into."
"What is that?"
Her eyes focused, locking into his…How confused they were to him. She said, "I fear I'm beginning to hate the wrong people."
The Orvalen…Merrin thought, sighed…She saw it. "They made them into weapons."
"They were always meant to be weapons."
"Against the humans."
She laughed, self-deprecating. "And yet those same humans are now Lords of Territories. Valeshin Noctis, Eidan, Gereld the Silver…All of them. The Highlords accept them despite the chaos they caused with their scattering."
Merrin felt a pang of guilt—he was leading this woman into rage. "They made you build a weapon. Your children, and yet they brought peace to the humans…They had violated the law of the Shaedoran—"
"HYPOCRITES!" She screamed. "Break a law…One can only break it all the way."
Merrin said, "What happens now?"
"Something"
Merrin sighed within: And that brings chaos....He said. "What about your children? They would be killed over and over without any means to repai--protect themselves."
She glanced at him--A knowing look. "I.." She caressed the scarf around her neck. "This was my sister, you know....She left Elmaran before I did...A scientist of the Highest Fa'n. But...the humans. They took that. And now...The Highlords take this from me."
The flames have been kindled. Merrin said, "Every child needs their mother."
----------
There was a suffocating silence in his thoughts, no pondering, no mentation. Not even the passive churning of data collected from casting. Just nothing. It shivered him, raying within a sense of absolute foreboding. Something was coming. Someone was coming. Was it Este? He wondered.
Her actions, as he could guess, would lead inevitably to the creation of the whiteMother: Orvane. Or? Who knew, perhaps the creation had already occurred, and the dream had again jumped years or months ahead. He sighed, still unsure of the time frame with which the dream functioned. Annoying. But if he did, a chance existed that these events could be allied to a moment in history. Too bad.
The learner within piqued at that. But there was nothing to be done. Anything outside ending the dream, that is. He took a step down—below was a large sprawl of steps, each golden, each having more than 2 meters in length and width. Somehow, he sensed a giant could have walked on them. Perhaps one did…Who knew what creatures these Orvalen had ever created?
And Ah... how familiar they were to his awareness.
Merrin smiled, entertaining a delusion.
What if this were the past? The dream. His immediate moment was but the occurrence of a long-distant history, and in the future. Someday, he would stand here, bloody, stabbing a stone through his skin. And for what?
For them.
He smiled.
Future me... do find a sharper stone... A pierce stone if possible. The round one was hard and painful.
The chuckle escaped his lips, sounding and drowning in the utter vastness of the space. For now, beside him, floated an orb: a radiant spear that screened his shadows across the golden earth. It reminded of the sun. The real sun. It's golden, bright, warm color—not the buzzing whiteness of the lamps. He hungered for it—to stand and bathe eternally in that radiance.
A shame that the dream will soon end.
He had ordained it so.
I suppose I play expertly now the role I had told the sunWitnesses about... The Lord of Dreams?
He laughed, relishing the internal quip alien to the external things. He enjoyed it indeed, both arms crossed behind as he wandered down. Odd, he noted—almost corruptive that he had adopted numerous traits innate to these people, especially when there was no reason to. But he did. What would Orvane care if he sauntered, dressed in rags, amongst the elegant but uncomfortable wears of the attendants? Would the dream end in that regard? Likely not... And even if it did... He would but have to read her memory for the desired data.
He hoped against that outcome.
Many people had already suffered for the reasons of the Undermines... No more! None should ever have to suffer such.
Suddenly.
The world trembled, his legs quivering for a moment. Both knees meeting the earth in the chaos. Then he stopped—silent, as though the sudden occurrence was but an echo in imagined memory.
It wasn't.
Orvane!
The dream was becoming more unstable.
Sooner or later... an inevitability was sure to happen: the end of the dream. That could not be allowed—not before the desired information was acquired—anything but that. Yet... the trembling resounded with a certain notion: Este was doing something.
What that was, he assumed, was the creation of the whiteMother.
Perhaps this was also a sign of the acceleration of the dream's time frame.
According to Enavro, the creation of the whiteMother had ended with a conflict between Este and the Highlords. How then would that play out in the dream? The same... or not? Internally, he hoped for amity—but was that realistic? Likely not... And if it were to indeed happen, would the dream be slowed? Would the whiteMother no longer be birthed? Would the seal no longer be revealed?
Questions within questions.
He perked... Good! The mental juices were stirring again.