Dashyl's Journey: The Awakening

"Dashyl, you must eat. You lost much weight during your saffira sleep. Eat." Dashyl was having a tough time doing just that. The stranger was feeding him a bitter, bluish paste that tasted of dirt. "This is mashed kalo root. It will give you energy, absorb toxins and is easy to digest."

"You know my name, what is yours?" Dashyl managed to ask between two sticky mouthfuls of the gruel.

"Alerial of the Stone House."

Dashyl studied his caretaker, white hair framed his blue face, black eyes gleamed back at him, he wore pelts that looked like the coats of the slow-moving creatures from Fog Rend. "How do yo know my name?" the boy asked, choking down another spoonful.

"I heard your father calling out to you, telling you to run."

"Where is my father? What happened?"

"I did not see, I heard it through the trees from some distance. By the time I reached you both, you were lying on the ground near each other. You both had been stung by the creature your father referred to as the starskin Carapid."

"What?!?" Dashyl spat as he tried to stand up but instantly felt dizzy and his legs buckled.

"Settle yourself, youngster," Alerial said as he put down the empty bowl and spoon and gently nudged the boy back into a prone position. "You are not strong enough to stand."


Dashyl closed his eyes and after a moment said, "So, he did find it."

"Yes, but it was his end," Alerial admonished. "And it could have been yours, too, if I had not found you so quickly. The carapid would have made a meal of one of you and injected the both of you with a toxin to preserve your flesh so it could devour you when it got hungry again days later. I chased off the beast and dragged both of you back here to my house."

Alerial picked up the bowl and walked out of the room. He soon returned with a stone cup full of cool water and put it to the boy's lips to drink. Dashyl drained the cup and asked, "why were you able to save me and not my father?"


"Because he had already tried to heal himself with unrefined saffira. His body soaked up the negative radia waves which prevented the positive radia waves from my saffira stones to cure him of the carapid's poison. Your body, however, was able to absorb the positive radia waves and counteract the poison. If the poison had reached your brain or heart, my efforts to heal you would have failed, but I found you soon enough." Alerial smiled at the boy and patted his head.

"Thank you, Alerial. I don't know how I can repay you."

Alerial extinguished the glowing stone on the end of his staff and in the darkness said, "Rest now."

Dashyl’s Journey: The Awakening

When the boy woke up, at first everything was white. His eyes were wide open but he saw nothing. His fears of being blind faded as the whiteness faded to blue. A soft, calming blue that seemed to flow into him and fill his head with a static that made his thoughts form slow and far away. His next thought was of his father, and though he knew this thought should cause concern, he couldn't quite be bothered to get up and look for him. He felt like he had just seen his father, but Dashyl wasn't sure if that was something he simply dreamed.

After a few minutes, the blue glow slowly expanded into dimensions and revealed forms. Certain shapes grew darker and certain areas grew lighter until he could see he was in a room carved out of stone. He turned his head and saw a blue-skinned Akrasa sitting near him reading a book. The light came from a blue stone on the end of a staff the reader held. Seeing him move, the Akrasa spoke.

"Ah, you have awoken, finally," he said, with a gravelly voice. Dashyl couldn't respond, no words formed in his head. Again, the stranger spoke, "you most likely will still feel the effects of the saffira stones I have used to heal you."

"Heal?" the word filled his head with a fuzzy warmth. He didn't feel hurt or sick.  He didn't remember getting injured. What was he talking about?

"I can imagine you have many questions, young one. Rest for now. As the saffira's influence over you wanes, you will become hungry and you will eat. Just let the fog clear from your head and I will explain how you came to be in my care and what happened to your father."

Dashyl’s Dream Journal

I am flying. In blackness. Or am I…swimming? Ha, this is kind of fun. Watery, but I can breathe and go in any direction.  Wait.

There is a blue light now above me. As I move closer to it, it opens up to envelope me. But I see myself flying in a ring of blackness surrounded by blue. Sky blue. I am a grackyl. I am watching my own reflection in another grackyl’s eye in flight.

I pull back to see the other grackyl. It looks like my mother. Next to her is another grackyl flying. This one looks like my father. We are flying higher and higher into the sky. I don’t even know if land exists beneath us. My father is ahead of us and rising in circles. My mother glides between us. She is a dark brown. My father and I are black with a purple sheen to our feathers.

In a flash, a streak of red slices my vision. The sky turns a deep maroon. A bird holds onto a branch with one claw. A green bird. It’s head is covered in a red hood leaving only its eyes visible. I understand this is a bird of prey. My mother’s feathered body dangles, lifeless, from the bird’s other claw. It’s talons grasp tightly around my mother’s bird neck.

My father does not see this. His wings are still pushing him farther into the sky. I race forward to try to reach him and tell him what I’ve seen. I find him in a thorn bush like ones we would find in the Tanglefern Thicket. He is agitated. His black bird body flies around the inside of the bush looking for a way out, but he only manages to pierce his skin with thorns. There is no way I can reach him. I watch as he loses energy and blood and eventually grows still.

I am flying again. In my own body. On the velvet cushion of a seat on a golden airship. Inside the airship, it is bright. I am the only passenger. I walk to the front to see who is navigating. Behind a wheel that glows like the sun, my father smiles as he pilots the airship. There is no floor beneath us and I can see my hometown of Katena sparkling below.

But we’re not going home. I am in my father’s arms and he is holding me as we are flying ever higher. He lets go of me and I soar above him. Once again I am in blackness. The sky is a small disk of blue below me. I know I must pass through this portal to see my father again. I descend into the blue circle and everything goes white. I close my eyes because it is so bright, but I want nothing more than to open them and wake up.

Entry from Kilkarak’s Expedition Journal Day 183

It is early morning. I know I must be getting sentimental, or afraid I won't survive this expedition, this being my third entry in as many days. Once the sun rises, we will approach the Carapid Ward and see what our fate may be. Before breaking camp and embarking, I wanted to write about my wife.

I don’t know how the experiment went wrong. I have gone over everything in my head more times than I can count. My preparations should have yielded a different result, not the death of my wife. During the same experiments I have run since that one, everything has gone according to plan. One day she was feeling fine and her pregnancy progressing normally, the next, her own cells started to mutate instead of just the twins'. It was a painful death, with the twins gestating inside her as her body broke down. I finally faced the truth and had to kill them all, mercifully.

I have never told Dashyl that his mother died because she wanted to be the first subject of the experiment that would turn my career around. Someday, I will tell him, when he’s old enough to better understand the situation. The fact that she wanted to be my first subject demonstrates her support of my career and the decisions I made. Dashyl must understand the sacrifice was for the betterment of our family.

If anything, I am sad that she has not seen Dashyl blossom into the capable and smart boy that he is. He is her legacy. Perhaps he gets some of my intelligence, but he definitely has her athleticism, hardiness and brazen personality. How I was lucky enough to end up with Sanesia, I will never know. She had moved to Katena as a young schoolgirl when her own Chemist father was transferred from Karmethia. She was the best lab assistant I had in my years at the Catalyst Foundation laboratories. Our attraction stemmed from mutual respect and drive to succeed. We clutched at the same dream with a singular devotion of purpose. 

That’s all gone now. My drive to succeed has killed my wife and I may have doomed my own as well as my only son’s on this crazy quest. Sanesia, guide me this day, my love. I hope to be with you soon.

Entry from Kilkarak’s Expedition Journal Day 182

I knew it, I do have something more to say before reaching the Carapid Ward.

I have told Dashyl of my new plan. We will make our way to Trader’s Haunt, the nearest skyhook location in this area. The lands to the southeast are a bit more populated and easier to travel than the return journey through the Tanglefern Thicket. It is closer. And if for some reason Dashyl and I should become separated, he can follow the flight of the airships to Trader’s Haunt. From Trader’s Haunt, we can secure passage on an airship back to Katena.

Katena, after everything that has happened, my rising fame, my disgrace and exile, my new discoveries that will lead me to other cities, I miss your streets, your parks, your institutions which encourage thought and innovation. Perhaps I will return to walk your streets again. I am not so certain now.

Entry from Kilkarak’s Expedition Journal Day 181

Everything is obscured by fog. The name Fog Rend is no misnomer. Most of the day, this steep valley in between two craggy peaks is socked in with a dense layer of fog impenetrable to the eye. If anywhere a legendary creature could exist and remain legend, it would be here. The air is close and damp and not seeing the sun presses heavily upon your mind. 

The plant life here has evolved to exist in low-light conditions, gaining nutrients more from the radia-enriched soil. The animals we have seen here move slowly, have thick fur upon which an algae grows, eat only plant matter and never seem to drink. There are no predators like vaygr and there are no birds here. The place, however, is teeming with a definite sub-species of carapid that don’t have eyes and instead use hyper-developed olfactory organs to navigate and survive. It follows that a starskin carapid would have a specially designed proboscis used for hunting in this environment.

On that note, we have had no luck finding our prize. Tomorrow we will come out of the northwest end of Fog Rend and we must make our way to the Carapid Ward at Hecatyn. Our supplies and our energies are low. We both need a bed, a satisfying meal, maybe some ale. Ah, I have not let myself think of these things on our expedition, but I have relaxed that restriction a little lately. This may be the last journal entry I write, depending on how we are received at the Ward.