Nightmares (a Writing Prompt Response)

The prompt of the week in my writing group was Nightmares. So I created this in response. Enjoy.


I can see the delirium in your face. You arrived so courageous and confident, but you could not withstand the bombardment. I want to be merciful. You are a victim of fate, countless empires and figures that came before you, ushering you to where you now kneel. Better people have come before you and fallen all the same. Chieftains, inquisitors and assassins have tread the very ground you stand on, doing no better or worse.

I commend you for that, but I cannot forgive the trespass. I am willing to make it as quick as possible, but you need to want it. Can you feel the tips of my fingers hanging over your head? The sharp claws, ready to close in on you at any moment? I can end it for you. I can end this bad dream, this… nightmare. You simply have to ask.

But you won’t. I sense in you a will, brazen and foolhardy. I would say it’s most admirable if it wasn’t so misplaced. I will admit I have rarely seen a soul push past the confusion as well as you have. As you lift your glare toward me, I see a spark few possess. That said, be careful where your will leads you.

Your eyes don’t fool me. You stare at me with defiance, but I see your hand creeping toward that blade. Do you imagine you can strike me down? You think so much of yourself, someone of noble descent, a scion. You are mistaken. There is no nobility in you. You are a small twig, a weak sapling trembling under foot. You cannot resist the corruption around you.

Even if I were gone, faded away with the mist, what would you do? Would you think yourself victorious, relishing in the spoils falling around you? There are things in this world greater than the gods you have created in your mind and the tyrants born of the soil. You would know this if you truly opened your eyes to the world, a shattered mirror returning a dark reflection.

Stay your hand from that blade. I will leave you, lifting this fog and returning you to your familiar world. I will haunt you, but I will not return. Every adventure you delve into, every prophecy you fulfill, every betrayal you experience, spirits will lurk in your mind, laying seeds of doubt, a grove of your own fears you carry with you.

Sometime, far from now, you will desire to harvest them and come searching for me and I will ask you one question…

Still sane, exile?