The return of the Dreamwalker

Pain. It was all he felt at first. Then a blinding light. Something was pulling away from him, some outer protective shell.

He was in the Dreamworld. Above him stood the Shadow Mother, distracted by something. Not a great sign, given her role was first and foremost to hold back the Nightmare. They were in the middle of a battle, again, in front of the Nightmare Gate itself. There were several guild agents fighting something around him, but he had little time for introductions. There was a much more familiar presence below him.

His dark self. His opposite. The one who had called himself Whisper. If he wanted that name reclaimed, he would have to deal with this…parasite. It was currently pinned to the floor by a Little Warrior, a brown-furred minotaur. He kept a careful eye on the dark one, preparing to counter any spell cast, but for the moment it seemed too stunned to offer much resistance.

“You can’t kill him any more than he could kill me,” he advised the minotaur. “Grab him. Bind him. Shut his mouth, and bring him to the gate.”

With that, he began carefully stepping away towards the Nightmare Gate, as the Shadow Mother regathered herself and focused on keeping the gate closed once more. The dark one was mentally thrashing in his grip, but he smothered any attempt it made to cast any spell.

Then he felt the air grow still, and his efforts got substantially easier as the dream fell silent. Ah, so his old apprentice Breac Sunfist was here! He turned and gave the dwarf an approving nod, and together they staggered recasting Silence zones to escort this minotaur, step by step, towards the gate, allowing his dark self no options but to be pulled along.

As the battle fell quiet and the Little Warriors stood victorious, they finally reached the gate. Whisper grabbed his dark self by the collar, pulling him face-to-face. He couldn’t resist one last taunt before he took this thing that had tormented him on one final journey, back to the hell that had spawned it.

“What?” he asked it. “What? What did you think was going to happen? Did you think Nathrael was the only one who could rewrite fate? That’s always been the weakness of your kind, Abyrrus. A lack of imagination!”

And with that, he rocked back on his heels and spun, pulling both of them through the Nightmare Gate.

This, Whisper admitted, may have been a terrible mistake.

His other half no longer writhed in his grasp. It held him back, laughing maniacally in triumph, as the energies of the Abyss lashed at his mind and threatened to tear it asunder. And behind that grin, behind the insanity of those piercing blue eyes, he saw his old friend, his old foe. Nathrael was laughing at him out of his own twin. And as he laughed, the Nightmare twisted into vision, showing him the timelines that awaited everyone he loved.

He saw the guild fall. He saw Gus and Boon thrown out into the multiverse. He saw Jaspier, and Noxala and Jade, and who could tell how many others grasped by ribbons of ink, tendrils of Nathrael’s will, and crushed within them. He saw Abal fall to madness within the nightmare. He saw the Vultures return triumphant. He saw the blight spreading, and the war…

…and it’s possibilities. The Conclave ascendant. And the Little Warriors ascendant. And they all led to the same end.

“Don’t you see, old friend?” Nathrael mocked him. “I’ve already won. It doesn’t matter how the war turns out. That’s the point – NOW THEY KNOW HOW. The blight will show them how to create a world without conflict. Once they see a glimpse, they won’t be able to resist building it, they cannot help themselves in their desire to control every outcome. Because in their heart of hearts, they all know they’re already just like me.”

Wait…was this it? Was this hollow old argument all Nathrael had to show him?

Whisper saw the ends of the roads through time converge. Sooner or later, the blight would be set loose in the multiverse, saving everything, controlling everything. All will be one, and one will be all. But the dream was false. He could see that so clearly now, it was a wonder his former self had ever been taken in by Nathrael’s lies. Once again, it seemed the Sin Writer was insistent that the only paths through time that existed were the ones of his own creation. It was…pathetic.

“Do you know what I think?” Whisper replied. “I think Rhillaine saw my downfall. And she saw I’d return to learn from my mistakes. So she’s let the Blight War happen to highlight exactly what that mistake was – not that I tried to save everyone. But that I insisted on doing so on my terms, my way, no consultation, not even asking anyone what ‘saving’ them really meant. I had to be the hero. No one else. And now that I see my mistake for what it was, your downfall is assured. Because if some poor, dumb fool like me can see it, it is inevitable that the likes of Ruby Wintergreen and Miko Tanner will see it also. They probably already do.”

He reached out and grabbed his dark opposite by either sides of its head, and locked its gaze with his own.

“Don’t you see, old friend? You say you’ve won, but you’ve already lost. Yes – there will be Little Warriors who fall to greed, and fear, and mere pride, who abandon Damien’s vision. But for every one of them, there are hundreds of children ready to learn from them to take their place. Those are the timelines you refuse to see. Behind this guild is another generation. And another, and another, and on distant worlds, in distant cities, young folk dream of taking up arms – but never to join you. They all dream of beating you. Not to take your place, but to make you irrelevant. One day, they will beat you so badly you will be forgotten forever.

Because they’re nothing like you. And now, thanks to Rhillaine, neither am I.”

His dark opposite screamed with rage and morphed into a horned, goat-like face, vast beyond imagining, and that black flaming crown blazed and pulled at his very soul. But Whisper ignored it. It was a desperate bluff from a creature out of other options. Whisper saw the terror in his twin’s eyes as it realized what was about to happen.

“I’ve served you long enough,” Whisper grated through clenched teeth. “It is time you served me in turn.” He braced his mind, pulling from every mental reserve he knew he had, and cast the strongest enchantment he had ever cast.

His twin screamed, this time in agony and despair. And now it was Whisper who laughed…

And he woke, to utter darkness.

He had created it instinctively. Someone familiar had called him back. The only voices he could hear were unfamiliar, though. Shouts of mad panic, the thuds of heavy crossbows being unleashed, the pressure of destructive magic that felt mentally like a high-pitch scream of the air. The smell of soot and fire – always it had to be fire. And was that a gunpowder-driven pistol? What kind of maniac would use one of them here?

He looked about himself. Back in the old Dingaford theatre. Of course, he had died here as his dark opposite, he could even vaguely recall the memory. He quickly rose to his feet, darting about the battle. He couldn’t yet tell friend from foe, so he refrained from interfering with it and climbed one of the old palisades on the walls to get a better view, but it seemed one side had got the upper hand. Some woman twisted with what looked like dark druidic mutations had been beaten into the stone floor and decapitated, and with her defeat the rest of her forces seemed to lose focus.

He let the darkness dissipate. The victors looked about in confusion before one of their member, a red-haired elf who’s mind seemed oddly familiar, pointed up at him. Was that Breac Sunfist? Why was his old apprentice in the form of a wood elf? He looked ridiculous.

“Who are you?” a Tabaxi asked. She held a rapier and carried a pistol at her hip. He pulled a name from her head - Jinx Velvetpaw, she called herself. “Are you William? Or are you Whisper?”

He knew the answer. He was Whisper. But it was just a name. Her better question was her first one. Who, exactly, was he now?

“That,” he replied as honestly as he could, “I think, remains to be seen.”

And with that, he grasped his cloak. It did nothing. The guild members who had killed him had taken his Cloak of the Mountebank, and Breac had buried him in a plain one. Bother. He loved that cloak. So he grasped their minds instead, clouded them, and in their eyes he disappeared. In reality, he simply walked away.

There was little point talking to them further until he had a better answer for Jinx.

Epilogue - A gift of time

Amber Mills was too tired to cry anymore.

The survivors of the destruction of Neverwinter had run as far as they could. They had made impossible choices. They had sent half their soldiers as a diversion to lead their pursuers away to Helm’s Hold. They had left behind the elderly, the sick and the injured, anyone who slowed them down more than a child would. Then everyone able to fight had tried desperately to open an escape south through Leilon, to no avail. With Valindra’s undead horde closing in, and with nowhere else to go and no energy left to run, they had sheltered in Wave Echo Cave.

And here they were, late at night, not having slept for 3 days. Waiting for their end.

Amber held her last sending stone in her fingers, barely refraining from letting it tumble to the ground. She felt there was little point in making one last message, but she took her duties seriously, and fought away her despair.

“My name…no one cares what my name is. There’s no one listening. That’s clear now. Valindra’s about to kill us all. The slavery of her undeath is all that awaits. We would end our own lives if we thought it would do any good, but it won’t. And we owe it to the children to continue as far as we can…But this. This is as far as we can go. If anyone ever finds this, just know we…we tried. We tried our very best to save them. But it wasn’t enough.

We had friends once. Angels. Heroes from a world beyond. They were called ‘Little Warriors’. But here, at the end, there’s no sign of them. I don’t know why. All I know is we’re alone now, and we’re beaten.”

The stone glowed green, flickered one final time to tell her the message had been stored and sent…where? To some uncaring god. It didn’t matter. She let the stone fall.

Thump. It hit the soft soil and stayed there.

The wind blew with a dread chill. Out there to the north, Amber could see an army assembling, the dull green and blue of its necromantic weapons spreading out into a long front to cut off any escape to the east or west. Maybe if she called out, she might tell them not to bother. Her people couldn’t go anywhere. They were pinned against the Sword Mountains. And even if they were to somehow cross them, what then? There had been no word from Waterdeep either, or anyone on the Sword Coast. She imagined the other cities facing much the same. Would they have any more hope of survival than Neverwinter did?

Thump. What? Had she dropped something else, or…

She was not alone. A man stood nearby. Her blood ran cold as his presence pulled at her attention, locking her gaze on his form. She could not look away. The man had shoulder-length white hair that almost glowed in the darkness. He wore plain black clothes and a black cloak, all with silvered trim. He held a black rod in his hand. Amber recognized it from legends of her city. The Dread Rail of Command.

So this was how damnation would find them. Part of her tried to steal herself to face the end bravely. Another part tried to scream and run, anywhere but here. But that sense of presence held her in place. She could not move. She could not look away.

“An act of great evil,” the man said, looking casually at the rod he held. “That’s how Breac described it. Even if used in the cause of good. Like the very act of binding someone beyond death against their will this way – that was in and of itself an unforgivable act. An unacceptable outcome. But Breac is a priest. He was trained to think in absolutes. Black and white.

What if the Rail was used against someone already bound? To someone else? I’d just be trading the set of shackles they currently wear for another. And what if I used it when I myself was already damned? Beyond anything the gods might call ‘grace’ or ‘salvation’. Normally I would say one could never justify piling additional evil upon evil…but if used under such conditions, for an undeniably necessary action?”

“Wha..what do you want?” Amber finally managed to stammer. “Why are you doing this?”

The man turned slowly to face her. His eyes were a brilliant blue, and she felt her muscles, her mind, stiffen even further as those eyes pinned her in place. “Amber Mills,” he said almost breathlessly. “Of course, you would be here. You misunderstand. I am here to save you.”

“She said the same thing.”

“Valindra? Yes. She is a twisted thing. Much like I was recently.” The man walked towards her. He was not even six foot tall, but Amber shrank back away from him, staring up at him as if he were a giant. “My name is Whisper. I am a Little Warrior. My guildmates, my…my friends…”

He choked on those words, and Amber realized with a start he was holding back tears. His face was hard and angular. Had it ever actually cried? But it was right on the cusp of breaking now.

“Breac and Ruby,” he continued. “They’ve assembled a new group of heroes. They would be here, if they could, but they’ve been held back by circumstance beyond their control. But I am here in their stead. And that means, for now at least, you and your people are safe.”

Safe. Amber wasn’t even sure what that meant anymore.

“How?” she asked. “Are you going to destroy an entire army…”

“Don’t worry about that,” Whisper assured her. “You just think of your people. I won’t be able to stay long. In the Guild’s absence, there is much I need to do on my own. To buy my friends time, you understand. So I will take care of Valindra. And her army – I’ll take some of that as my own. I will need their help. And then your people will need you. They will not be out of danger. Bandits, famine, disease – all of it will come for you as before, and your people will look to you to lead them through it, and I cannot stay to help with that. You understand this, yes?”

“Y…Yes.” She didn’t understand any of it, but it seemed the right thing to say at the time.

Whisper smiled wryly. “No one understands much when they start, my lady. You will learn.”

He turned and walked away to the north, towards the blue-green glow of the approaching army. He took five steps, then turned into a crow with a stark white crest, and flew away.

Several minutes passed. Then there was a series of dull flashes in the distance, and Amber winced. She had been dreading this moment, when the horde’s weapons would open fire, and its ranks would advance. But the globules of unholy fire did not fly towards the air towards her. They flew east and west. Across their own ranks.

For the rest of the night, Valindra’s army fought a desperate battle for survival against itself. By mid-morning, it had lost.