Sleepless

Incessant drums beat outside the fortress walls. Lightning flashes asailed the outer Ga'tharai barriers yet Darren Cane had only concern for the solitary figure standing on the precipitous stone. He approached cautiously traversing the wet walkway with wonder at her perfect balance. If only such balance were internal as well.   "You need rest Jenna. They'll be here soon." Darren urged. "You can't go without sleep every night. Not even Dusklight will last forever."   "It's fine," Jenna Darkwing replied through gritted teeth. The wind threatened to remove her white hood. "You aren't sleeping either."   The drums intensified outside the city.   "How could I when I have such fine local entertainment to liven my spirits?" He commented sarcastically.   "Even if they weren't there," Jenna muttered darkly. "I would still hear them, the horns too."   Even as she spoke, the horns that had been silent two minutes before began playing once again for what must be the fiftieth time this night. Either the players had paused to catch their breath, Darren mused, or it was taking longer than average to rotate who was using the horns.   As they watched the enemy camp in the distance, Jenna couldn't help but shiver. And not just from the cold.   "You going to be alright?" Darren asked.   Blast, she thought. She'd hoped he wouldn't have noticed. There was nothing that could be done about it after all.   "It's nothing," Jenna told him a bit too quickly.   "Jenna," he said as he took a few steps closer to her. "I know you're thinking on it. And you don't have to anymore."   As he finished speaking, the wind intensified just enough to blow back her hood, revealing her beautiful shoulder-length indigo hair. And her glowing fluorescent green eyes. She quickly replaced the hood even though she knew he'd seen it.   "It's just the cold," she said defensively, turning away. "Leave it be."   "It's Dusklight fever," he said. "I know what I saw. You're overtaxing your powers."   "I said leave it be, Darren!" She snapped, glaring menacingly at him, a rift dagger suddenly appearing in the hand she didn't remember raising.   Realizing what she had just done, Jenna gasped and turned away briefly, letting the dagger melt away into nothingness before looking at him again with her normal fluorescent red eyes.   He could tell that she was struggling but wisely abstained from speaking until she was ready.   "No, you're right. It is Dusklight. Each day it’s getting worse. I'm sorry for reacting so badly," Jenna apologized quietly.   "You should try to rest," Darren said in the same tone. "Even if you can't sleep, you should try to relax somehow; take it easy. They won't attack until morning anyway."   Jenna smiled grimly. That was indeed the pattern. Some sort of psychological or ceremonial inhibition. However, something was nagging on her mind. It suddenly clicked.   "He's back, Darren," She said, urgently pointing to her right as a pool of water on the wall began to take shape. "Captain Kalrik."   Darren didn't seem to notice as the water took the form of the two-legged eight-armed dreaded pirate. His blue eyes filled with ire at the sight of Jenna, his tricorn hat bubbling with steam till its built-in geyser erupted.   "Of cyan sky and things gone by," Kalrik's rumbling voice began the all too familiar poem, biting out each word.   "Stop!" Jenna shouted, grabbing her face as her eyes flashed between red and green.   "Over hill and dale and thrice to die," the pirate Captain continued unhindered as he took step by methodical step closer.   "No!"   "Came traveling man with elder tale," Kalrik vehemently spat the words. "Of bloodthirst knight in dragon's mail."   Jenna fell to the ground and curled into a ball, trying to shut out the words and the memories associated with them.   "Resistant to death and of hardy stock was she," Kalrik said, now only three steps away. "She set upon her quest to slay beyond the sea."   "Under oath to prevail and winds beyond measure," Another step. "She forced her crew to remember the treasure."   "For they would not go with her without promise of loot," just one more to go now. "To travel past monsters grim and death traps to boot,"   "Troublesome beasts with their minions a plenty," Kalrik's last metallic footstep deliberately stopped with its metal spike just an inch from her terrified face, and then he leaned down and whispered, his voice full of blame, "By the end their lives weren't worth a single penny!"   She lashed out with Rift Shol straight through his heart, and as he disappeared again, he taunted, "You cannot escape your fate. Once a Darkwing, always a Darkwing. You will pay for what you did. Mark my words!"   And with that, he let out a haunting laugh that faded back to the endless drums. Jenna crawled closer to the front of the wall and just huddled there with green eyes crying profusely as Darren's voice called for the Ta'Falia acolytes. In just a few minutes, they assembled and administered the necessary vitality viruses that would force her into a temporary state of peace and restfulness in a matter of moments.   Darren knew she wouldn't truly sleep, but the Dusklight fever would leave for a while and the Kalrik hallucinations that came with it. There was nothing more to be done but to settle in and wait for daylight.   ***   The piano drifted back into Jenna's eyesight. The ghostly skeleton of a girl played the same tune as she always did.   "River's Dying Breath," Jenna said to no one in particular.   The girl ignored her. Every few seconds, the girl disappeared, and the piano continued the melody as if nothing had happened. As the girl played, the boat became more visible than in the past. She performed wilder and wilder movements as the boat crashed up and down. Eventually, the piano was performing a duet with her as lightning flashed over the stern. The music took a darker turn as cannon fire smashed into the deck. The enemy ship made of pure darkness unleashed its grappling hooks as it lurched closer. Soon Captain Kalrik's crew hurled themselves across the distance, cutting a swath through the piano player's defenders. Still no reaction. The song kept playing. The storm grew stronger. As Kalrik drew beside the piano and raised his sword, it was halted mid-stroke as the girl began to sing.   "Ka'Thiem elder rhyme shatterer of modern time. Wake again come what may awaken here this I pray. Heroes of the past save what has come last. Villains meet your death at River's Dying Breath. Dark horizon glimmer as the great depths begin to shimmer. Champions of old let your arms not be weak nor your legs feeble. Descend to the peak fall up to the steeple.”   Fragments of the sword the boat and the people on the ship began to drift apart and slam together then the entire scene faded to black and Jenna for once thought the vision might be over. She floated through the darkness and reached out for the faintest light glittering invitingly in the distance. Jenna seized it with all her might embracing the warmth and then she saw them. A room with bloody corpses a young woman playing a grand piano in the corner as body after body after lifeless body hit the ground. A single word echoed in her mind.   “Betrayer”   “No. I had no choice.” Jenna pleaded. “It wasn’t me!”   The young woman continued to play until finally the voice in Jenna’s head grew too loud to hear the peaceful piano. Jenna fell to her knees sobbing as the woman got up from the piano and brought a small bottle with a ship inside. The ship was on fire and it burst from the bottle destroying the scene around them and enveloping them in a new memory. Lightning pealed from clouds striking the sails the mast and the prow. The helmsman yelling threats and boasts as they sailed into the rift upon a cloud the young woman played as peals of thunder echoed from her piano and torrents of lightning struck the ship. Jenna pleaded again as the boat began to crack and the young woman became a little girl again and drifted down to touch Jenna’s eyes and ears.   “Wake betrayer.” She said. “I lend you my strength once more. Dusk lights the coming dawn.”   Green light filled Jenna and she woke to the terrified stares of the Ta'Falia Acolytes. In the distance the thunder faded back to the drums. Cries of alarm reached her ears from the walls. Eyes alight with green fire Jenna tossed back her hood and charged up the stairs two at a time. Golden transparent soldiers streamed to the base of the wall and began climbing over the top of their fallen comrades. Darren was engaged with five enemy Shatterborn knights that had made it to the top. With an enormous smile Jenna dove in among them with twin rift daggers and swung to the beat of the ever present ever growing sound of drums. Dawn had arrived, at last.