Baldur's Gate : The Sword Coast Chronicles : NWN2 Persistent World

Amidst the dark broth of the crucible of shadow, there resides a name. Behind that name is a choice. Behind that choice is a memory. Informing that memory is a past. This past is replete with deeds, each compelled by another choice, which in turn was consequential to an action before it and so on. For the consequences my actions have already had, and for those yet to come, the answers may lie here.

The events of my life are huddled together at the edge of memory; a modest concert silhouetted against a vast plane of emptiness. Yet as I reflect dispassionately on these events, I can see the cogent chain of causation that glares tauntingly at me. As I look on, my past leers back and winks knowingly. Every unwitting footfall down this path of shadow inevitably provoked the next. This fact is so damningly obvious in retrospect that the progression of events really is as natural as walking. We are all grains tumbling haplessly through the Hourglass. For the choice I made, I entered that critical nexus as one person, a slave, and came out another, a free woman.

There is little I value more than freedom. And yet as the vast chasm of fate yawns before me, I wonder if such a paradoxical thing can even exist. The choices of my past are circling restlessly, and as each falls under my scrutinising gaze, I begin to wonder if I ever really owned any of them. This is not to deny that every deed was imbued with agency; the dark, the light, and the shades of silver in between. I shed responsibility for nothing. I have killed for love, and loved for murder. Yet in every case, in every scene of every act, each choice followed seamlessly from the one before it. An inflexible narrative where the means justifies the means, and there is no end in sight.

It began with that which created me: The Order. They who so carelessly toppled the first domino in the fateful chain that made me what I am. Their first act created me. Before the escape that haunts my dreams, before the target that stayed my hand, before the years of indoctrination and training and shaping of the killer into which they would mould me, they gave me a name. They named me Aikura. Love of Shadow. How unfair.

This name is not the one of which I speak. I have walked the Coast under many names, given to me by those who have had the memorable displeasure of meeting me. Some are unkind, others fearful, and a small few are even endearing. But all are ascribed; crude descriptors given in lieu of actual knowledge. It is a curious thing, to name the eyes that watch in the dark. Muted lights and footfalls, and augural feelings. It is like naming the tingling on the back of your neck. Some names dispel anxiety, while others give effect to the thing they fear and inspire paranoia. Almost all betray an uncompromising dearth of imagination. Despite this, many are accurate and there are a few I have even grown to like.

Yet none, however fitting, are truly mine. Of the multitude of names I wear, there is only one that I chose for myself...

...I am Silver. The shades in between. That which straddles light and dark, absorbs neither and reflects both. She who steps lightly, fights flawlessly, and loves fiercely. The ice amidst the ashes, the shadow of the stars, the whispers that pitch above the wind. It is the name given to my wilful dive through the Hourglass, and to everything that followed, terrible and wonderful alike. It is emblematic of the freedom I so desperately cling to, and the current of fate I stubbornly swim against.

From this name sprang the choice. From this choice distilled the memory. Within that memory is preserved the past. Giving substance to that past is the multitude of deeds, and every deed therein the result of another choice, and so on. Until here, amidst the dark broth of the crucible of shadow, dwells all that I am.

At least this time, I have chosen my path.

“Well well well.” The agenda-laden whisper floated softly to my ear as I entered the dimly lit room of the Blade and Stars, the warm flicker of the hearth fire illuminating my antagonist as he stepped from the shadows. A familiar picture; slender build, dark tunic, ensnaring green eyes. After all that hopeless waiting, the rain had returned, and at the worst possible time.

He glanced down at my clenched fist and the weathered sheet of parchment that was clutched therein. “Is that what I think it is?” He asked nonchalantly, doing well to disguise the underwriting note of concern in his voice. I met his question with an all-too-confirming glare. His eyes darted from the parchment, to the silk-wrapped hilts at my waist, and back to the cold expression on my face. After a long, guarded look, he decided to test the water: “I know there is a part of you that is unsure if you can collect on that bounty, Aikura.”

A spiteful scoff escaped my lips. “You know me better than that. I would not even be here if I did not have a plan.” A conceding spark of uncertainty flared in his eyes. “What do you intend to do then?” I looked at him, the tempest of indecision whirling in my mind. Part of me really wanted to kill him. Deep down however, I knew that such anger was merely pain in a weak disguise. I had been hurt. With a heavy sigh, I threw the crumpled bounty notice at his feet.

“You left without a word.” I said, opting for honesty; a rare change of tact. “Why did you not say goodbye?” His expression softened so swiftly and unexpectedly that I was momentarily taken aback. His guilt was apparent. “I am sorry, Aik. I...did not think you cared that much.”

I gave him a long, challenging stare. “If I ever did, it was fleeting, and now long forgotten. However, we did have an agreement, remember? Despite your fine promises, when it counted you were nowhere to be found.” I paused briefly, never breaking eye contact, letting the accusation sink its teeth in. “For someone who ascribes so much importance to loyalty...you certainly have a curious way of showing it.”

He averted his eyes, hanging his head slightly and gazing at the floor. “I am sorry I was not there Aik...but I am loyal to you.” He looked back at me, his eyes sad, a picture of sincere regret. “More than you know...”

I scoffed again. “Despite all evidence to the contrary? It seems you are no longer fit to be my ally, let alone anything more.” I was about ready to walk out, to abandon this bitter chapter and confine it to the dark corner of my mind reserved for memories best forgotten.
He sighed heavily and turned away, his shoulders hunched. “You are stubborn, and arrogant.” He said. I narrowed my eyes at him. “The only traits we have in common.” I retorted. He turned back to me, his gaze level and focused, and I tensed as he reached slowly into his tunic. However, it was an entirely different weapon he produced; his own piece of parchment, formal in appearance, covered in a flowing script. I recognised the distinctive features all too well, unique to this kind of piece. It included a client...and a target. It was his trump card; an assassination contract with my name on it. He had carried it with him all this time. I was struck breathless.

Now, I am the first to admit that refraining from killing someone is not the most romantic gesture of all time. One must remember though, it was this very act that set me free from the Order all those years ago; my first moment. There is no greater symbol of the freedom I cherish than to make the choice not to kill, even though everything that you are, everything you have been made to be unyieldingly dictates that you are supposed to. His choice mirrored my own. And it resonated with me, deeply.

This was the second moment of what I now call my life. He would be my first real love, and my first for many other things.

After a long drought, the rain is sweetest.

The Amnian rain beat ceaselessly against the murky window pain, doing little to loosen the densely caked city grime that had accumulated and weatherised over many years. I stood with my face inches from the glass, a patch of misty breath forming on its surface, the watery impressions of the rain casting swirling shadows running in mimetic streams down my face. It was the middle of the day, and yet this storm was such that my humble room in a side-street Athkatlan Inn lay dark. Holding back the premature night was the dim silvery light from the single window, and the pale luminescent globe of the thin-burning candle on the table, by which I had written the letter.

Hypnotised by the rain on the window, my thoughts drifted to the path that had led me here, and those I had left behind. It had been so cruel. After everything that had happened, it was just another dramatic twist to dash my shot at happiness. Following in the wake of the whirlwind of revelations, I had left in a hurry, telling no one of my destination. Not my lover, not my sister, and certainly not the Guild. Gods, if they knew where I was, and my reasons for being here...they would see that it was all my fault. Every blow against us, every ill turn of fate, everything that had happened since the Heart Attack contract. My fault.

How could I not have known that he was once a Shadow Thief? I had done my homework, unearthed every secret, delved into every dark corner of his past, and yet somehow I had missed this most critical detail. I did not want to believe it. We were both a lot better than that. Even in love, we were never so clumsy. And yet...the timing of it all. It was surely too perfect to all be a coincidence. They could have been following him all this time. He led them to me, and I led them to the Guild. It all lined up like a tauntingly obvious formation of dominos, ready to fall.

I was not here to run away. That might have been the obvious thing to do, but I would not give up on him. I was here to find out the truth. I would make sure, beyond any doubt, that his tail was clear. If this image stayed with me, it would be for his love, not for my guilt.

I looked away from the window, to the letter that lay on the table, the still-wet ink lending a subtle sheen to the curves of the calligraphy.
I strode over and sat down, reading back through the letter with a weary eye. It was a quirky poem, though not poetry by any stretch. It was the style in which I had become accustomed to writing; filled with off-rhymes, misnomers and other Cantish features intended to frustrate accidental readers. The meaning of this one though, would be relatively clear, at least to him. It was our story, what had happened, and what I would have happen. It was imbued with the last of my hope.

Arriving at this point in the letter, I paused for a moment. There were some things I still could not say. I pressed my hand to the parchment and carefully tore away the bottom piece containing a final stanza, tucking it away in my dress, close to my heart. It was a verse I would keep for myself alone, a hope I dared not share. Whatever happened here, whatever truth I uncovered, I would not give up on him. I could no longer deny that I was utterly, irrevocably, tragically, in love.

My burden feels lighter by the minute. Even now the warm lightness grows in the wake of the retreating fear and apprehension. Calmness washes over me in slow, satisfying waves. Each one strips me of another clinging layer of malignant doubt, dragging it away kicking and screaming with the waning tide. I find myself in this place out of time, hidden snugly away from the caveats of my tenuous existence. Silver, Guildmaster, Whisperer; these faces all turn away, politely averting their eyes, allowing me this moment to simply be Aikura, a woman free of responsibility.

For once, it had been naught but an unfortunate coincidence. He could not have been the link. It could not have been my fault. Okay, so I admit I had not looked that hard. The dominos had aligned all too well, so I had defiantly kicked over the table and scattered them everywhere. Can I really be blamed for clinging to a world I had only just discovered, even if it was revealed to be nothing but a fiction? A tauntingly beautiful fiction. If I cling desperately enough, perhaps I can yet imagine it into existence. His...no, our world. Our sanctuary out of time. A world dressed in lilacs.

I cannot believe I am here, now, in this place, at this moment. All my fears fleeing, fading, evaporating into nothingness. The softness of the rug beneath me. The silhouette of his body against the flickering glow of the hearth fire at his back. The warmth of the fire caressing my naked skin. The warmer caress of his fingers tracing the tattoo on my back.

This must be what happiness feels like.

The world around us twisted and warped into discolouring maelstroms, tugging and tearing at the fabric of reality. The fire and smoke began to fade away, the ash cleared and ceased to choke our lungs. The overwhelming stench of brimstone eased and the temperature cooled to tolerability. We stood there, gasping for air, surveying the room that was now transformed by the misty grey haze of the Shadow Plane.

Looking around at my company, I conducted a quick head-count. One, two, three, four, five... My heart sank. “Where is Gold?” I asked, attempting to mask my more-than-ordinary concern. My enquiry was met with worried glances and shrugs. “He was right behind us...” A hooded and masked man answered. “How in the hells did we get separated?” I looked at each of my companions in turn, some shuffled awkwardly under my gaze, others averted their eyes. This trip had been more than any of us had bargained for. “I am going back for him.”

I had marched half-way back across the room toward the shadowy ripples of the portal when my ears—no longer deafened by the roar of flames—caught a familiar curse muffled through the dense but porous stonework. I turned toward the source, an ornate, layered stone door, and took a couple of cautious steps toward it. “Gold?” I called out hesitantly. “Silver.” The reply came calmly from the other side. I approached the door and pressed my hands to it, tracing the joints in the stonework, feeling its solid construction. I glanced down to find my mentor-turned-friend at my side. “Diamond, can you open it?” She shook her head quickly. “Never seen locks like these before.” She replied simply. Shadow in hell, how did this happen? I looked over the door, my mind racing, searching for a solution.
“Aik-...I mean, Silver. I’m not going to make it.” It might have been his characteristic bravado, but there was no fear in his voice. “I’m going to try for the surface. I’ll...see you when you get back.” Perhaps it was the resignation of his words, or perhaps the thought of losing him, but it stirred something in me I thought I had long ago moved past and wisely forgotten.

I love all of my Guild members, each in their own way, and my apprentices in particular. He had always been different though. It had been a mistake to train him myself; I could have just as easily assigned someone else to do it. However, confident in my ability to manage my emotions, I took him under my wing, and we grew closer than teacher and student ought to. He took the alias “Gold”, no doubt believing it to be a flirtatious—if not witty—retort. That was a long time ago though. Now the rain had returned, and I was in love with someone else.

I breathed out slowly and placed a hand on the cold stone door, imagining his to be pressed longingly to the same spot. Now we were not just a wall apart, but worlds in between. Maybe my heart was really torn, or maybe, like him, I merely wanted something I could never have. Now though, I was crippled by the debilitating fear of never seeing him again.

I became suddenly aware that everyone’s eyes were upon me. I subtly swallowed the lump in my throat. “Be careful.” I said with as steady a voice as I could conjure. I turned slowly, my hand lingering hesitantly on the stone, before looking resolvedly back to the others. “Let’s go.”

As we began to walk away, I could not shake the image of him from my mind. Waiting at the door until he was sure I was gone. Turning and walking down the dark corridor toward the flickering orange glow. Disappearing back into the shadow and fire and smoke, his cloak smoldering behind him.

Beautiful rock spirals built high into the air, curving, stretching and straining against common sense, adorned in dazzling blush-violet lights. The gigantic cavern and the similarly proportioned city therein, the latter seemingly carved from the former’s walls and stalagmites, gave one a new perspective on the concept of ‘space’. The lights bestowed an unnatural glow to everything I laid my eyes upon, making even the mundane seem ghostly and surreal.

The street level was densely populated with shops and stalls flogging bizarre and exotic wares, and catering to an even stranger clientele of subterranean life. More than once I was seconds away from slaying a hideous, blathering monster, before I realised it was trying to sell me something. At the time that seemed like cause to stay my blades, something I am grateful for in retrospect.

So this is Sshamath. I had to admit, the city itself was awe-inspiringly vast, and hauntingly beautiful. I indulged in wandering the streets gawping at everything with unashamedly child-like fascination, enjoying it all the more knowing that it infuriated the locals. All this shopping, exploring, and antagonising was exactly what I needed to forget about a certain charming thief we had left behind in the planar maze.

The antagonising was particularly gratifying. Diamond had cautioned me to be on my best behaviour; in the Underdark you play by Underdark Rules. Do not call the Charnags “weaklings” to their faces. Do not greet every drow you meet with “Vendui, impotent little pointy-eared bat”. So much to remember. She worried unnecessarily, and surely exaggerated my lapses in manners.

I found it easy to hate the drow. I had been enamoured of the stories told to me by the Night Hunters in discreet encounters during my early days on the Coast. They spoke of the terror of the drow and proudly displayed the notches on their blades; blood tallies in tribute to their god. The drow were a thing to be feared. But now that I was in their midst, all I saw were pathetic, sniveling whelps who were exceptional if they cleared my shoulder height. Even the relatively muscular ones looked like I could effortlessly break them with my bare hands. I strutted around like a conquering outsider, sneering triumphantly at them. We were the first surfacers to visit here in a very long time, and it showed. Most of the locals shrunk away at our approach, some even outright fled. Shameful. I delighted in their displays of cowardice.

It turned out to be a frustratingly fruitless journey. We had come down to connect with some drow mercenary group that Toybox had allegedly had dealings with. However, they proved to be as lacking and incompetent as everyone else we encountered. What an astonishing waste of time. At least the scenery was nice.
Much later, I would return to this place, and learn to fear it as others did.

It began with a vision. Not mine, hers. And not like the others either. This one was not vague and blurry and easily dismissed as a mere feeling; it was specific and vivid and detailed, and ominous in the extremity of its predictions. She did not tell me all of it. I often wish she had, but I understand why she kept some things from me. Some things I really did have to see for myself.

Her vision was the prologue to my nightmare, and my subsequent fall from grace (broadly defined). A confluence of familiar elements, game pieces moving and cutting through the time-stream, generating violent ripples along the way. The Blood Gold changes hands, providing the spark; the long-dormant Plan sets the End in motion; the journey back to the Dark gives effect to the Alliance; the Turncoat murders his co-conspirators and becomes the avatar of Vengeance; the Battle shakes the Coast and changes everything; the Bloodbow meets his fate, killed by Love in the end; the Elven Village burns; the Traitor falls and the Nightbringer shimmers in her fading reflection; the Alliance is broken; the Children are torn from their Mother and executed before her very eyes; the reluctant Queen claims the Throne of Shadows; the Inamorato survives unfulfilled; the Phoenix rises from the ashes and surprises everyone; the End immolates much that was; the Star shines on, and saves all that remains. The Kiss awakens that which might have been.

I have never pretended to understand our connection. It is not unusual for two people so close to have shades of their thoughts and feelings, and even their dreams in common, but to actually share them is quite a different story. It started with her vision, and it was not long until the images she saw began haunting my nights. So began the Dreams, my fall, my darkest chapter.

Before it ends, I will die.

It started the same as it did every other night. I emerged into the cavernous chamber surreally filled with that flooding crimson light, intermittently divided by imposing spinous pillars. I looked to the familiar corpses strewed across the cold stone floor, and to the same blood blamefully staining my hands. All the right elements were here, the scars of my past chasing me in my sleep, snapping vengefully at the heels of my waking conscience.

Tonight however, something was different, and I felt it immediately. Glancing down, I realised I was not wearing the characteristic blacks and greys of the Order, but was instead adorned in Silver’s armour. It was a distant recognition however; the ghostly silver-white hue obscured and lost beneath the blackening stains of soot and smoke, and layered blood beneath that. There was a familiar feeling of exertion in my muscles, the stench of burnt flesh in my nostrils, and the taste of dry blood cracking on my lips. As I looked between the embattled state of my armour, and the familiar scene around me, my mind raced in a futile attempt to reconcile the two. What I was witnessing, though I did not yet know it, was my past and my future messily colliding. The scene from my past—my escape from the Order—meshed inexplicably and nonsensically with this visage of a battle-wearied Silver from my future. Though the familiar scene dominated my thoughts, other memories began creeping in and momentarily edging it aside; inevitable whispers of a fate already written.

A rush of images clouds my already-convoluted thoughts. I sit at a cluttered desk in a long-abandoned hideout. The armoured man stands at my side, and the wearied elf sits across from me. His mouth moves and he gestures to the impressive wagon behind him, piled with incomprehensible wealth. He lays his request on the table alongside his amassed fortune, and his madness. We listen. We accept.

The Blood Gold changes hands, providing the spark...

There is a flash and another image presents itself. My sister and I sit by an open fire while our mentor tells a story. She presents it with all the theatrical simplicity of a bedtime tale. Its content however, is sinister and devious. It is the plan that will change everything. The enthusiasm on her face and in her tone contrasts sharply with the vengeful darkness in her eyes. We are captivated by her vision of a just murder.

...the long-dormant Plan sets the End in motion...

I shook these images from mind and forcibly returned my focus to the chamber and the puzzle of Silver’s armour. A conspicuously missing element chose that moment to show herself. I heard a loud click as she opened the heavy doors and let light into the chamber, and looked up to see my sister silhouetted in the open doorway; an elegant shadow against the blinding light at her back. Her sharp eyes found me quickly, and she strode purposely toward me, devoid of the expected hesitation. She produced her water pouch and washed the blood from my hands in a nonchalant fashion that bordered on routine. Then my armour caught her attention.

She gave me a questioning look. “Something is different tonight.” I said, stating the obvious. “This is Silver’s armour. I do not think I am dreaming my escape from the Order.” She looked around at the familiar scene before returning her still-quizzing eyes to me. I glanced over her shoulder toward the beckoning door and felt the sudden pull of a memory that I was sure was not mine. The door stood still, motionless, innocuous. Yet somewhere in the back of my mind echoed the screams of the wounded, amidst the ring of metal and the roar of flames.

She followed my glance and dutifully misinterpreted it. Taking my hand, she began leading me toward the door, but was stopped abruptly by my tug of hesitation. “What is the matter?” She asked. “Do not go out that door.” I replied. She shook her head dismissively. “Come on, you need to see the night sky. You dream us some stars, and a meadow, and it will make all this disappear.” Her words were potently reassuring, but I could not shake the surging feeling that I knew exactly what lay beyond that door, and it was no starlit meadow.

Defying my hesitation, my sister marched confidently toward the door. I followed cautiously, drawing my blades from their sheathes. She pushed open the heavy doors and we emerged out onto a burning alien landscape under a smoke-filled sky. Even amidst the screams and roar of flames I heard my sister gasp as her eyes unwillingly drank in the horror of the battle aftermath.
...the Battle shakes the Coast and changes everything...

A sea of corpses lay before us, adjoined by rivers of blood. They were mostly elves adorned for battle, the proud ornamentation of their armour mocked and humiliated by the awkward, broken repose of their dismembered bodies. Victorious drow walked among the fallen, utilising their necromantic magics to amuse themselves in various ways. A company of armoured drow occupied the corpse-littered path just ahead of us, and our presence immediately caught their attention. One of their number—an obviously ranking individual—stepped forward, a dangerous grin on his face.

...the journey back to the Dark gives effect to the Alliance...

As he approached, my dream consciousness took over. My mouth opened and the words came to me automatically. “Where is Cazna?” I demanded, an assumed authority permeating my tone. The confused voice of my waking conscience, now relegated to in the back of my mind, asked: Who? However the scene continued apace, giving no regard to my mental disjuncture. The drow captain virtually beamed at my demand. “You have played it well, but your part is finished. We no longer have any use for you.” He said with a relishing tone.

...the Alliance is broken...

The words once more came automatically and unthinkingly, albeit distorted by the sneer that crossed my face. “Double-crossing, pointy-eared bats. We had a deal.” The drow captain simply laughed and gave the signal to his archers. In a flash I raised my blades to strike him down, but before I could even aim my first blow I was violently punctured by a dozen burnished-black shafts. My vision bloomed red, and blinding pain and shock coursed through my body. My feet left the ground, and the world fell away beneath me...

I awoke sharply and sat up in bed, clutching at sweat-soaked sheets and gasping for breath as I felt around for the arrows, finding nothing. My sister awoke next to me, almost simultaneously, with a scream as she too violently patted herself down.

It took some time for us to calm each other. After that, it was certainly a night of revelations. We had shared a dream. A dream of the future. A future that my sister had seen before, in a vision. A vision she had had not a day earlier. The wreckage of that vision now filled my mind with its disordered and nonsensical debris. It was all frightening and unusual, but even so we were oblivious to the terror to come.

In the wake of the dream reorient, those sweat-soaked sheets would come to rule my nights. And it would not be the last time I felt drow metal pierce my flesh, in either the dreaming world, or the waking one.

Tonight, it started differently again. Distortion and change was becoming the norm, though the battle remained constant; the insidious heart of this dream tumult. Sometimes the battle was imminent, sometimes it was in full-swing, and at other times it was the agonising aftermath. But it was always there, looming, polluting, haunting my dream conscience with choking smoke and the echoes of dying screams.

This time my sister and I found ourselves in the drow advance position, amidst the sea of corpses and carnage; the battle’s final throws. We were surrounded by rank upon rank of armoured drow, wearing the blood- and smoke-stains that were the predominant badges of warfare on this ashen field. They paid us little heed, their attention focused on the fortified hill up the road, and the embattled elven survivors who tenuously held it.

The scorched, ruined path from the wood to the hill mapped the battle in frightening detail. The drow host had initiated the siege. Their mages burned a path through the wood, clearing the way for their shock-troops and simultaneously lending a smokescreen to cover their approach. Its lingering columns now blotted out the sun and cast the whole world in dreary greys. The host had arrived to find naught but tinder and rubble where the main elven fortifications had been; courtesy of the Thieves’ Guild explosives. With those walls collapsed the elves’ only hope of a viable defence against the advancing black horde. The gating of the balor merely hastened the inevitable.

...the Battle shakes the Coast and changes everything...

I felt a tumultuous feeling of unease building inside me. My sister and I negotiated the ranks of jeering drow warriors, their murderous eyes affixed on the hill. The balor eyed us hungrily as we passed, obviously annoyed at being bound, but nevertheless indulgently drinking in the chaos and death permeating the scene. Outside of the throws of combat, I saw the beast in new detail, every flame-issuing crevice stark and manifest in its shadowy hide.
As we came to the front of the line, an austere figure stepped forward, a female drow cackling triumphantly. “Come to join the slaughter?” She said. I felt the dream conscience surface strongly and take over, answering automatically: “Enough of your insipid prattling, Cazna. Where is my team?” The expression in Cazna’s eyes was pure, wretched delight. “All dead, I’m afraid. They played their part well, but the elves took their vengeance.” Rage and denial welled within me simultaneously, each fighting for control. “Liar!” I snapped at her. “See for yourself my dear. It seems your friends now form part of the decor.” She replied, gesturing up the hill to a line of heads impaled on pikes. As my eyes unwillingly absorbed the cast of this morbid display, waves of recognition washed over me. Each face was familiar, and yet elusive and nameless in the dreamy haze of my mind, until my gaze fell on one in particular. It was Sano; favoured among my apprentices.

A vengeful scream cut the air. Some part of me registered that the scream was my own. I drew my blades and advanced purposefully to the front of the line, my sister half-jogging to keep up with me. I glanced back toward the gloating drow matron. “Cazna! I’m coming back for you!” I declared, every word imbued with the hot hatred that now simmered in my heart. The drow laughed. “Please do, my dear, please do.”

Without further thought or hesitation, I turned back to the besieged elves, and charged. My sister, weapons now in hand, followed close behind with matching resolve. The elves gawped disbelievingly as we two, wreathed in shadows and with blades trailing behind us, closed the distance in seconds. Before their archer line could even blink, we were among them, blades whirling, butchering elves left and right. We were relentless tempests of rage and anger and hate and adrenaline. Even as I felt elven swords pierce my flesh, I pushed forward and cut faster, mercilessly rending everyone in my path. The stabbing pains multiplied and intensified, I felt the strength draining from my limbs as both blade and arrow found their mark, but I did not stop. I cried and elves died, even as my injuries accrued and wore me down. Crimson enveloped my vision as my world filled with blood, and death closed in on me. Finally, I sank to my knees, my final thrashes impotent. Somewhere far to my right, I felt my sister fall. Blackness set in. In the back of my mind, Cazna’s laughter resonated.

I awoke sharply and sat up in bed, clutching at sweat-soaked sheets and gasping for breath as I struggled against my imagined assailants. My sister awoke next to me, almost simultaneously, with a scream as she too violently fought back against the ghosts of our shared nightmare.

Every night, it ends the same. The dreams are slowly taking me.

The certainty of descent is hitting the bottom. Each night I tried to steel myself, prepare for the worst, harden my heart against the inevitable horror. Each night the Dream found a new way to obliterate my defences and drag me kicking and screaming into the suffocating pit of despair.

Tonight we stood in an open field under an ashen-grey sky, the landscape darkened with the aftermath of the battle. On the hill far behind us, the flames roared with such intensity that it warmed our backs with its sinister caress. Amidst the concert of embers, the broken silhouettes of sighing buildings were remotely visible.

...the Elven Village burns...

My sister and I had watched as our friends stealthily penetrated the elven perimeter to plant the explosives. Watched only, because we two were as ghosts to them, invisible and ethereal, able to follow and observe but not interact. They had done well, taken all the right measures, planned and executed their infiltration with precision, and escaped undetected once their objective had been accomplished. All the while, we followed and watched as they blindly walked the path to destruction, unable to warn them or turn them away. Unable to intervene at all. The chosen weapon of this dream was obvious: powerlessness.

Rysdan was among them. Seeing him now was intoxicating. I desperately desired to warn him away. To touch him, kiss him, protect him from what was to come. But my hands passed through him, and his eyes passed through me. I knew I was going to watch him die.

...the Bloodbow meets his fate, killed by Love in the end...

My sister had cautioned me not to follow, not to watch, persistently reminding me of the fate we knew awaited them. She had seen this future. We knew they did not survive. But they are doing so well... I could not suppress the thought, the recalcitrant hope that grew despite myself, with every successful step they took. Now we all stood in that ashen field with the victorious drow army assembled around us, watching the final gasps of Doron Amar, brutally rejoicing in the slaughter. For a fleeting moment, I actually thought it might end here, and I might be able to wake up. That was the real danger here. Hope.

It shattered with two simple words. “Seize them.” Cazna ordered. A pair of heavy-set drow captains immediately grabbed the two hin females before anyone could move. The men moved quickly to defend them but were seized and swiftly immobilised by the balor, sweeping them up with surprising speed, if not surprising force. Diamond was the only one to escape, slipping away into the nearby cornfield. I screamed pointlessly after her. “Coward! Do something!” My words were non-existent in this world.

As my eyes helplessly followed her retreat, I heard a sound that turned my stomach. The captains had drawn rugged blades and begun sawing the girls’ heads off. I looked on in horror as the blades severed vocal chords and their screams for mercy turned to bubbling gurgles, blood frothing and gushing from their open necks. I sank to my knees, nausea and panic rising in me and blurring my vision. My sister lunged at Cazna, flailing and screaming, but she simply laughed, oblivious. “As for the male human...” She said, inclining her head toward Sano, “...have his mind broken. Completely.” The balor tossed him to one side like a rag-doll, whereupon a drow necromancer slammed his hand upon Sano’s forehead and began chanting. “I cannot watch this...” I stammered amidst the tears that were now flowing freely. I tried to close my mind, block out his screams and frantic begging, but it only seemed to grow louder in my mind. His limp body was soon dragged away.

... the Children are torn from their Mother and executed before her very eyes...

Cazna turned her attention to Rysdan last. “Ahhh, darthiir.” She said with a pronounced sneer. He did not wince as she forcefully drew her hand down his cheek, cutting his face open with her fingernails. She looked up and nodded sharply to the balor holding him in place, who began tightening his grip on Rysdan’s arms like a giant vice, crushing and burning them, causing him to thrash around and cry out in pain.

I could not bear it anymore. The suffering overwhelmed me, turned my vision white-hot. Endless streams of tears burning my cheeks. I would give anything for it to end. I barely recognised the whimper that was my own voice, dampened with uncontrollable sobbing. “I...want to...wake up...w-wake up...” My sister, finally giving up her fruitless attack, collapsed exhausted in front of me, her own tears joining mine. She held me tightly as they tortured my lover, her reassuring whispers doing little to drown out his screams.

“Now...cast him into the Abyss!” A distorting roar followed Cazna’s order as the balor shaped and wove the portal into existence. A single, powerful kick sent Rysdan sprawling into it.
“NOOO!” With a final defiant cry I broke through my sister’s restraint and lunged at Cazna, passing harmlessly through her and tumbling into the portal after Rysdan. My world erupted into flames as I fell with him, the distance between us closing, hands outstretched toward one another. There was a fleeting, glorious moment as our fingers connected and entwined, before the fires licked all around us and blackness enveloped my vision.

I awoke from the nightmare and sat sharply up in bed, clutching at sweat-soaked sheets and furiously patting out the flames that reached beyond my mind. The fires would fade, but the echoes of those screams would persist.

The certainty of descent is hitting the bottom. I wish I could tell you this was it.

Long arcs of blood decorated the walls, the spatter criss-crossing and composing itself in accidental artisms. Bodies lay strewn about the tiled floor, all but one adorned in dark garb and still loosely clutching sinister-looking daggers, their grip not yet firmed by rigor mortis. The odd-corpse-out wore the once fine clothes of a nobleman, now punctured, ripped and soiled by his many open wounds. The downward turn of his luck had gone from bad to worse tonight. Bad in that he was forced to treat with our enemies. Worse in that we had caught up with him in the process. In the kitchen of the manor around which was built this small border town, he and his Shadow Thief conspirators had met their long-deserved fates.

I stood in the kitchen-turned-butchery with my Guild gathered around me. They were weary from battle, their armour scarred, their breathing heavy and laboured. Yet each was alert, their eyes hawkishly scanning the exits, prepared to face any reinforcements that may have been waiting in the wings and meet them with meticulous death. It was times like this that the training really paid dividends. I had taught them to retain their focus and neither rush nor relax when victory was within their grasp. Pride shot through me as I glanced at each in turn. They follow me even now.

I had hoped that the hood and mask of Silver’s garb would not overemphasise my tired, bloodshot eyes. If it did, no one said anything. No one commented on my tapered armour betraying the weight I had shed these past weeks. Neither did anyone remark on my being unusually quiet on the journey here. When we arrived, they had gathered around and listened to my plan with undiluted confidence. If anyone noticed that I was slow to pick the weak spots along the outer wall, or that it required unusual effort for me to scale it, they did not show it. As we made our way through the compound to the manor undetected, my companions consistently overlooked my hesitations and indecisions. They knew I was not myself, yet they still trusted their Whisperer utterly. Damn I love them.

Other than the incident with Soprano, which had been awful, it had gone relatively smoothly. We had made considerable progress and infiltrated the manor before we were finally detected. We fought our way from room to room, clearing each swiftly, searching thoroughly and then moving on. I was grateful we had not lost anyone. Grateful to end this threat to the Guild. Grateful to be here, working again. Grateful to be anywhere but my nightmares really. For me, it had all been a perfectly legitimate diversion. Soon, we would go back to Baldur’s Gate and I would return to the crushing prison of my dreams that kept me from sleep and robbed me of my appetite. Before that however, I would savour the completion of this mission and take back what we came here for.
I wiped my blades clean on the late nobleman’s clothes and sheathed them, before kneeling at his side and casting my exhausted eyes over his person. I did not have to search him to locate our objective. The documents were desperately clutched in his hand much like the weapons of his dead conspirators. I carefully removed and inspected them, finding them to contain everything insinuated by our lead. The names of the executors, the details of Heart Attack, it was all here, if not entirely readable due to the blood blotches. I carefully removed the designated pages according to the numbers we had been tipped, and slipped in our fabrications. The blood stains spread and seamlessly assimilated the new additions. I tucked the documents back into the unfortunate nobleman’s tunic and stood, exhaling slowly. A simple nod told my companions we were done here.

Our exfiltration was smooth, even as the town was waking to alarms and more guards rushed to the manor. The silence of our long journey home was one of triumph, celebrations unspoken either because there was no need, or because our tired company simply had no breath to spare.

For the Guild, it was a sublime victory. For me, it was the last desperate lantern on a boat headed up the river of darkness.

“I need to ask you a question.” My voice cracked as I spoke, my hitherto suppressed emotions unwillingly bleeding through the wounds of my strain and weariness. I stood before him, a mess. Tired, emaciated, bloodshot eyes wide with growing psychosis. The best part of my sanity was lost to the Dreams, and the part that remained was weighed down by my immanent guilt. Despite everything, it would taste a lie to say I did not know exactly what I was doing. “It’s an unfair question. And whatever happens next, irrespective of how you answer, well...that will probably be unfair too.”

The light of the fire lent a golden sheen to his dark clothing, and the darker inking on his face. The tattoo seemed to subtly shift and shimmer in time as the flames danced in the hearth. He looked at me, care and concern permeating his gaze, and forced a characteristic grin of bravado. “I’m used to my life being unfair. Ask your question.”

I looked into him, trying to tame the burning behind my eyes, and asked. “Do you love me?” The tiniest flicker of surprise crossed his face, but he remained focused on me. “I can’t see how I feel anything for you but love. I take...” He paused for the briefest moment of introspection, and then answered with resolve and certainty. “Yes. I love you.”

...the Inamorato survives unfulfilled...

I had known already. Of course I had known. Would I have asked otherwise? Did it even make a difference to me? Perhaps I just wanted to be certain of how much damage I would now do. I nodded slowly, averting my eyes from his and looking sadly away. “Then I’m sorry...this will be all the more unfair.”

I had barely registered the confusion on his face at my words, before my arms were around him and I was kissing him passionately. The spell of surprise was fleeting, his lips returning the kiss almost immediately with passion to match my own, his hands running through my hair, down my back, grasping at the folds of my robe. I gave everything to that kiss, every tension of the last few weeks. Every bit of fear, pain, weariness and heartbreak now found a vent.

I finally broke the kiss, gasping. He looked at me, his face imbued with a thousand emotions, each vying for expression. With trembling hands, I removed one of my gloves and placed it on the mantle above the fire. I reached out and touched it to his face, tracing the detail of the tattoo, watching its form shift at my touch. He smiled very slightly. “Close your eyes. Don’t look at the tattoo, but feel my face underneath. That’s my face...without the mask.” I did as he said, trying to picture what he would look like in another life, without the mark of the Lord of Shadows.

“I too have a tattoo.” I said, opening my eyes and withdrawing my touch from his face. I turned away from him, my trembling hands momentarily fumbling with my belt buckle. I dropped the hooded edge of my robe down, laying bare my back and shoulders, and felt his eyes drink in the sight. “Beautiful.” He said unspecifically. I exhaled slowly, quivering as he touched the inking on my shoulder blade, softly tracing its design, sending me tingles with each new stroke. I turned my head slightly and spoke, my voice now diminished to something less than a whisper. “Del...”

“Yes?” He whispered back, his eyes unmoving, apparently awed. “For tomorrow, I promise nothing. But for tonight...” At that his eyes met mine in a calm look of understanding. “Tonight.” He said with peaceful resolve. I turned back to him, letting my robe fall away, and kissed him again.

A sure way to ruin two men’s hearts? Sleep with the one you’re not in love with.

He recoiled sharply as I struck his chest, his face ridden with surprise, turning to confusion, giving way to dawning guilt. And pain. He looked hurt at being yelled at, hurt at being struck, hurt at the anger and accusation that broiled in my bloodshot eyes and relentlessly bore into him. He averted his gaze and stared impotently at the floor, feebly trying to explain himself. “I’m sorry Aik. I really am. I just knew you had plenty of other things to worry about.”

His words served only to rekindle the storm in my head. I glared at him with renewed anger. “Are you kidding me?!” I yelled, causing him to flinch as though being struck a second time. He hung his head and his eyes fell weightily back to the floor. “Aik...I’m sorry. I won’t make excuses. I messed up. I should’ve told you.” He continued his feigned fascination with my feet. I took a deep breath, struggling to tame my thoughts, searching for the elusive words that could express how I felt. I spoke slowly, unsteadily. “I thought you were dead. Every night I am forced to watch while you are brutally executed, and every morning I wake to nothing but the promise of another nightmare. Every day that passed convinced me that I was not only losing you in the dream. I am losing you...” I paused, my voice cracking as I completed the thought, “...and you are losing me.”

At that, his eyes shot back to mine, desperation creeping into his voice. “Aik...I don’t want to lose you. I love you and I’m sorry.” He stammered. I shook my head at him disbelievingly. “My world is falling apart at the seams...I don’t even remember what it looks like through rested eyes...and you are nowhere to be found. You have dragged me through a waking nightmare to compound my sleeping one.” The impact of my words was apparent, his expression breaking further, sincere regret permeating his every feature. He stepped closer to me, placing his hands imploringly on my hips and looking into my eyes. “Aik...I promise I won’t do anything like that again. I want us to do everything together. I’m sorry I’ve let this stupid vendetta come between us. I won’t do it again. I want to be a source of solace for you...not stress. Please forgive me Aik.”

I sighed heavily, wanting to give in, wanting to believe. The image of the balor hovered tauntingly in the back of my mind, burning his arms, torturing him, casting him into the gaping abyss. I looked at him hard. I want to believe you. “You have made this promise before. Twice. Every time you leave, I must steel myself that it is permanent. And this time...this time I had to watch it happen over and over. Do you know how many different ways I have seen you die? No matter what I do...I still lose you...”

His hands tightened on my hips, almost shaking me as he spoke, his words becoming more desperate and his voice more strained. “Aik...don’t you see what’s happening? These dreams have become your barrier to me, like my vendetta against my father has become mine to you.” I shoved him away. “No! You have become the barrier to us.” I said, my expression icing over.

His posture slackened in defeat. “Do you want me to leave?” He asked calmly. A smirk flashed across my face. “That seems to be your natural recourse.” I retorted. He took a deep breath and straightened his cloak on his shoulders. “I deserved that. Love is forgiving you know Aik?” I tilted my head, looking at him, knowing what was coming, wanting to hurt him. “How forgiving do you think it is?” I asked with a faint sneer. He looked at me, sincere, unsuspecting. “I think it can overcome even the greatest of crimes between those who share it.”

I looked at him flatly. “I slept with someone.”

My words hit him in the face like a warhammer. He turned his whole body toward the fire, away from me, his hood shadowing and obscuring his expression, but failing utterly to hide the tears that ran freely down his face. “...Who? Why?” He stammered. I felt the rage suddenly drain away, leaving a vacuum that was immediately filled with drowning guilt. I suddenly realised what half of this was about; I was at least as angry with myself, as I was with him. My own tears began to flow, as though I deserved to shed them. “Because I was alone...and I had nothing...nothing but nightmares.” He nodded very slightly, but was unable to look at me as he spoke. “Did it make you feel better?” He asked. “Yes...and no.” I answered honestly. “Who was it?” He asked, clearing his throat and trying to steady his voice. “A Guild member. Gold. The predictable one I guess. I’m sorry...I had nothing...you were never coming back...”

“Do you want to be with him?” He asked. “I don’t know what I want anymore, Rys. I cannot tell what is real from what is fake. You are a ghost in my life...beautiful...but ethereal and fleeting...” He finally brought himself to look at me. The pain in his eyes remained, but he seemed resolved and sure of himself as he spoke, wiping tears away with his sleeve. “You need to tell me what you want. If it’s me...then I’ll stand by your side until the day I die. But if it’s not me...then tell me. Tell me what you want. I love you Aikura, more than I’ve ever loved anyone. I want to be with you. That is my decision, now you have to make yours.”

“I love you Rysdan...” I replied weakly. I wanted so badly to add “that is my decision” and throw my arms around him. But the words choked in my throat with insincerity, and my arms stayed. I could not go through it again. I could not lose him a fourth time. I looked at him, my heart breaking in my chest. “But I do not believe your words anymore. You should have this back.”

I produced a small black box, within which was contained the jewelled lilac flower; the heirloom he had gifted me along with his heart. He stared dejectedly at it for a long moment, before nodding sadly and taking it. He looked back in my eyes, his face wet with emotion, but his voice firm. “My arms will always be your home...should you ever decide to return. I love you...Aikura...” He leaned in and kissed me for the last time.
My tears ran as silent rivers down my cheeks as I watched him turn toward the door. He had been my first real love, and my first for many other things. Later that night, he would open the box and find the final stanza of the poem I had written to him from Athkatla, the stanza I had withheld. The one I had never found the courage to share:
It was the end of the rain; the last cloud. As I watched him disappear from my life once more, other words echoed in my mind:

...the Bloodbow meets his fate, killed by Love in the end...

It was not the literal death of which I had dreamed. But it was no less true.

It had started with a vision. Not mine, hers. Tonight though, it would be different. Tonight I would try and take control.

She would not tell me all of it, and the Dreams seemed to be deliberately doctoring the images, feeding me the worst parts only, patently aiming for my deepest fears. They did not affect her like they affected me. She had seen something else; some hopeful light to temper the darkness. I was sure she was withholding it from me, though I could not fathom why when it seemed like the faintest hope right now could save my life. I needed, desperately needed to see what she had seen. Tonight was the night.

I sat across from her, nonchalantly nursing my tankard, while she similarly nursed hers and cast the occasional odd look in my direction. She was rightly disbelieving of my feigned high spirits. How long had it been since we had simply gone out for a light-hearted drink together? I broke the tension with an all-too-enthusiastic motion for a toast: “So what shall we drink to?” I asked, forcing my tired face into an attemptively reassuring grin. Shalinee managed a marginal smile herself. As suspicious as she was, she deeply wanted to believe that I was getting better; that I was on my way back to her. “I don’t know...” She said, somewhat pensively. I raised my tankard. “To sweet dreams, then.” I offered. She raised her own tankard and clanked it against mine, and we drank. I furtively watched her drain the tankard out of the corner of my eye, likewise tipping mine right back, but pacing my gulps.

Her moment of realisation was marked by the sudden widening of her eyes as they glimpsed the viscous, orange pulp mashed into the bottom of her tankard. She threw it back on the table, but it was too late. My sister looked at me, her mouth gaping in horror, betrayal sharp in her eyes. She almost immediately began to sway in her seat. “...Why?” She managed to slur as the drugs seeped swiftly through her system. I looked at her guiltily. “Because I have to know.” I said, and then finished off my own tankard, the orange pulp becoming visible as I drained the liquid completely. “I’m sorry sister...” I said, my words suddenly becoming staggered, “...I have...to know...” My vision narrowed and hazed, the world becoming blurry through the distorting narcotic lens, and abruptly falling away beneath me.

What happened next is hard to describe, and my memory of it is haphazard. I recall strongly the salience of dark shadows and distortions. Impenetrable black fog clung to hidden floors. Sinister shapes patrolled dead corridors. My home defiled, transformed into something else entirely. What had been a beacon of lively light in Baldur’s Gate was instead a fell sepulchre of darkness. It became quickly apparent that this was not the vision my sister had described. The future had changed.

A large, dimly lit room, blue-burning torches barely holding back the darkness. A macabre shrine centrally nestled amidst the viscid gloom, framed by hideous trophies and their petrified leers. A figure adorned in dusky chain, her long, curved blade drinking in the light around her and churning out shadows. The eyes of her adumbral mask glowing like recalcitrant embers in a dying fire. Like everything about this place, the figure was both eerily familiar and wantonly alien. My sister stood before her, her posture fixedly limp and defeated, confusion mixing with pain on her face.

As the vision twisted and pooled before me, sound crept into my perception and I could hear my sister speaking. “Who...who are you?” She asked, her tone not so much fearful as...hurt. The figure laughed derisively. “I am the Nightbringer, and this is my domain now. Do you not like what I have done with the place?” The figure asked with scathing rhetoric, her eyes narrowing on Shalinee, her lips curling into a slight, but wicked smile. “Do you not recognise me, sister?” She spoke the last word as almost a hiss, imbued with loathing. She reached up with a black-gloved hand and removed the mask, revealing long, dark hair, deathly black eyes. It was me, through the deepest mirror of evil.

...the Nightbringer shimmers in her fading reflection...
Shal seemed surprised. “What happened to you Aik?” She asked, obvious pain in her voice. The Nightbringer smirked at her. “You mean, what did you do to me?” She replied, her voice scathing and venomous. This obvious blow amplified the pain on Shal’s face, her head shaking slightly in disbelief. The Nightbringer sneered and raised her blade, pointing it challengingly at Shal. “You did this! It was your vision. You put the dreams in my head and stood idly by as they relentlessly bore into my sanity!”

My sister recoiled sharply at this, as though struck, tears pooling in her eyes. “What are you talking about? It was never my fault!” She said desperately. The smirk on the Nightbringer’s face seemed to broaden and grow more sinister. “I suppose in some perverse way I should actually thank you. Had your visions never taunted me, never bestowed upon me the strength of pain and loss, I might never have been led to the Night Mistress’ arms, and gratefully returned her dark embrace.” She said, her voice ringing with a baneful echo. Even twisted and distorted as it was, it was unmistakably my voice.

The Nightbringer raised her weapon a little higher, shadows dancing along the blade, the foreboding tip levelled at Shalinee’s throat. She sneered. “Now that you have come back, sister, allow me to finally repay your kindness. Draw your weapons!” She hissed. My sister shook her head disbelievingly, blinking away tears, and took a step back. “I would never hurt you…I love you.” She pleaded. The Nightbringer’s eyes seemed to flare with rage. “Love is a lie! Only…hate…endures!” She cried out and swiftly attacked, bringing the blade down in a long arc with sickeningly familiar grace. I watched in horror, my stomach turning in on itself, as my sister closed her eyes and made no effort to evade the blow. The blade cut cleanly down and across her torso in a single decisive stroke. She fell limp to the ground.

I screamed and lunged toward her, fighting through the dreamy fog, which seemed to contort into wrangling formations that restrained and resisted my every effort. I could see her bleeding out on the floor, her staggered breathing slowing, her eyes closing… I have to get to her! I fought harder, struggling with every breath left in me. As I strained my muscles to breaking point, I seemed to gain slow but meaningful ground. I clawed viciously at the wavering dream, progressing almost to her side and then—tearing away the last of the clinging haze—I found myself kneeling on wooden floorboards and cradling an unconscious Shalinee.

She opened her eyes and looked at me as the vision faded and the interior of the Blade & Stars materialised around us. We respired in terror-stricken gasps and held each other tightly, teary eyes meeting for a seemingly interminable moment, sharing our unspoken horror at what we had just witnessed, and felt.

It is jarring to see what you could become, were you pushed that little bit too far. Whenever I look into a mirror now, I am wary of the dream harbinger looking back.