V. Darkness cradled him comfortingly buthe knew he could not stay and tarry. There were things he still needed to do, things that escaped his memory right now, but he's sure he'd remember them soon enough. He just needed to clear his mind. Away from this darkness.
An image of a pale-skinned pale-haired lady stood before him, her eyes deep pools. She looked at him with irritation upon her face. This lady enchanted him. He knew her...
Who is she? He tried hard to muster his thoughts, which seemed to ignore him.
Venris? Venris Dastonia? What is she doing in the Sograt?
"What do you think, thief?"
"Huh? You can't be here...."
"Obviously," she sniffed, one eyebrow arching higher than the other.
Hold on. This is all so confusing. He tried once more to focus, to remember. He was traveling through the Sograt, looking for the Temple. Somehow he had gotten lost...and then, what?
"Why did you leave? Is it not enough that you force my hand in marriage, you had to humiliate me further by standing me up on our wedding day!" She rounded upon him, breaking his line of thought.
"But Venris, I left because of you. I should have told you, but there was no time. The Shadows and the Black Circle pursued me. They are mad."
The vision turned her back upon him, shrugging her shoulders. "No, Fynn Elenium. You are the one who is mad. For once in your life, can't you do something right?"
Everything's so confusing.
When she turned back towards him, it wasn't Venris Dastonia anymore.
"Old Man Spinner?" It was him, looking like he did that night in Alberta, when he had died.
"Yes, Fynn. I died at your hands, kid. Murderer."
Fynn could see the festering stab wounds through the punctured leather cuirass of the man's armor.
"Why'd you have to develop that fool notion about retiring all of a sudden anyway?"
"But you should have let me go."
And without any noticeable transition, Uncle Abd was standing in front of him instead of Spinner. "All your decisions were wrong, Fynn. You kill the ones you love with your foolishness...." Uncle Abd faded into the distance.
No... "No!"
The darkness had been growing around him. Gone now was the comforting succor. It threatened to engulf him....
He fought and sat bolt upright. He was not in the desert anymore. As his eyes adjusted to the dim light, he realized he was in a cave. Sand peppered the floor. The whole room smelled of the desert heat, and yet, was cool.
He gave a start when a particularly large pile of sand suddenly swirled without the aid of any wind. It whirled about, an indoor dust devil. A dumpy humanoid caricature began to form, deep holes appeared on its rounded face, and glowing red gem surfaced where the forehead should be. The creature had no feet, its torso attached to the top of the sand pile. It slid towards him, flowing across the floor.
Fynn knew what it was: a sandman, a creature of living sand. They were residents of the Sograt, banding together in fierce hostile tribes. He scrambled away from the monster, looking wildly around for his gear.
"Do not be afraid, man-who-is-troubled-with-the-past," the sandman's voice was gravelly yet soothing. It rumbled across the room. "You are safe here. I am called Grist. Like you, my own folk have outcast me."
"Like me? How did you know that?"
The sandman rumbled with mirth. "I am different from my people. I can hear your thoughts. Even so, you mumble a lot of your secrets in your sleep."
"The last thing I remember was the desert...."
"I found you near this place a couple of days ago. I was afraid you were dead." Sand kept flowing down the sandman's body, yet he retained his semi-humanoid form.
"Good thing you found me. I am thankful."
The faint sound of flowing, sliding sand was the one thing that broke the sudden silence. Grist's deep eyes--if indeed the pair of dark holes served the same role they did in a human--regarded him appraisingly. Then the whispering sand rumbled as the sandman spoke, "It was not by chance that I found you. You bear something with you, something that called out to my mind. I would not have left this cave without the cover of darkness to hide me from my hunting tribes-kin." And the sandman pointed at him.
Grist wasn't making any sense.
"Your...pack. You carry it inside your pack."
Fynn looked around and found his leather backpack propped carefully against the wall of the cave. "Well, I'm out of water and nearly out of food, that's all I carried, along with another set of clothes and...." The Artifact. The strange cylinder he stole a couple of years ago from the Albertan Shadows. All through his travels, he carried it and he'd gotten used to its weight in his pack. He promised Spinner he would destroy it, but so far had found no way of doing so.
He took it out of his backpack, feeling the familiar throb of energy from the contact, seeing the pulsing glow that beat like some heart made of energy.
"Do you know what it is, Grist?"
The sand that composed Grist's body quickened, flowing faster than before. "Do you know what that is, man-of-many-sorrows?" Tremors shook the sandman's voice.
"I only know it must be destroyed."
Grist's answering gasp was like the grating of stone against rough stone. "What drew me to it was the sense of...life--pure life energy. Why do you seek its destruction?"
"Because, I promised an old friend." Fynn passed the artifact from one hand to the other, turning it over.
"I'm afraid you'd have to break your promise, man-of-many-sorrows. This container cannot be destroyed."
