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Darkness was supreme. He floated within complete nothingness and was content. The opaque void caressed, effortlessly embracing him to its soothing calm -- a blanket, a balm, to his tormented other self.
While within the void he renewed, becoming once again more than his frail outer form could endure.
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He dreamed, and his visions disturbed him. He fought to return to the calming nothingness of the void but was denied. Slowly, as if his mind refused to comply, he pulled himself to the other place -- to the land of the living. It was a battle hard fought, his sleep had not run its full cycle.
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What could pry so deeply, press so hard, that he was awakened? Something walked within his realm. Something dared to raise him before he was completely restored.
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But what?
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He shed the last dregs of slumber from his mind and scowled. His face, unaccustomed to reaction, cracked its dry skin in reluctant obedience. Stalking his small confines, he prepared his mind for the scanning of his domain. Gathering his thoughts about him, he knotted them tight. He would need them sharp and focused. Mumbling the incantation, he sent his inner eye in search of the disquiet.
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Outward his searching aura went, flowing effortlessly across his watery domain, spreading out, scanning wide, but all probes coming back empty...he could find nothing amiss.
Furious, he retraced his long memory, trying to pinpoint the exact moment he felt the discomfort, back to the time his mind alerted him to the danger. It was elusive, but the knowledge was still a part of his subconscious. He concentrated, demanding it to the fore.
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The sensation was vague, and he was sure he had felt it before...but where? It would come to him as all things eventually did. He would nurture it and see what fruit it bore.
He walked about his chamber, looking at artifacts from other lives -- other times -- and sneered, “Less important times it would seem.”
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The nagging continued. He paced. Whatever hounded him sent his ancient pulse racing.
Suddenly, it surfaced. He knew the emotions, and he recognized the presence that had rudely interrupted his sleep. Strolling angrily to his tower window, he looked absently out upon the world that he alone controlled.
“I have felt this presence before...and thought to never have to suffer it again,” he shouted, pounding a balled fist against the window sill. “You should be fodder for worms,” he sneered. “But if by some miracle you have survived the many phasings, then I shall finally be given the revenge I deserve. Your cowardly exit thwarted me, sent my blood to boiling. I will have your head this time.”
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He threw back his own head and howled, the sound echoing within the chamber, resembling a thousand souls locked in perpetual torment.
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Taking one last look upon the waters of Sol, he whispered, “I look forward to seeing the distant, frightened stares of the dwindling bloodline. That shall be most entertaining, at least for me.”
He drifted away from the window, busy now with his plans.
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He turned and left his chamber, his thoughts imbued with demented plots, reviewing all the ploys he would use to welcome his long, lost brother’s offspring into his kingdom...a kingdom that he ruled.
“Will this not be the climax to my dreams?” At last, the total ruin of his brother’s bloodline was near.
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“Soon I shall snap the last thread that reminds me of your accursed self!” He laughed viciously, rubbing his bony hands in anticipation, “But first, I must prepare!...”
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