Nighty Nightmare Part 1

Nighty Nightmare Part 1- The Waste Lands

“Pour away the ocean and sweep up the wood.
For nothing now can ever come to any good.” –W.H. Auden

The disquieting hum of Other World had entered into Seraph’s ears like ethereal arsenic. It would simply be a matter of time before the good fight would end. Before she would be consumed. Then she too would finally Become. As Seraph waited for her fate, she allowed her mind to wander. Her skilled hands knew the epee well; her body would fight these fiends as long as possible. But staving off the demons inside? Seraph was inept, and her mind was an unwilling vassal to their calling.

Two pryons ago, today, Seraph lost Nai. Seraph had known Nai since childhood, although their meeting was most unusual. Nai had stolen Seraph’s family carriage and rode it through town to proclaim that he will become a great prahl slayer. Nai became her North, her South, her East and West. He showed her the ancient art of prahl slaying. She could remember when Nai showed her the Wu Myang way of slaughtering a beast with only two fingers. And, there was the smell pine needles as he took her.

But, as the years passed, she forgot the smell of pine. Seraph’s heart had become hollow, and she was vunerable to seduction by Ouraf-the shape shifter prahl. Ouraf had taken on the form of Nai, and tricked her into revealing Nai’s secret name. Ouraf spoke the name, and Nai Became. Seraph entered Unreal City to avenge her lover and assuage her guilt. No creature’s fury could match the nightmare of her deeds.

But now, Seraph began to tire, and the harpies and the prahls laid claim to their spoil of victory with a chorus of howls and screeches. She laid down her weapon and closed her eyes. The hum was deafening but for the first time in two years, she could smell pine. The Becoming had started.