A Last Duty, A New Hunt

[Sorcha'Rei]

((After the end of Into the Dark, before anything else.))

Sorcha stood at the door to her room with her hand on the knob. She took a deep breath and forced herself to pull the door open. As luck would have it, she stepped into the hallway just in time to see Johnson turn the corner and head in her direction. The slight stiffening in his back when he noticed her told her he still considered her to be a self-aggrandizing upstart who needed to be put in her place. Knowing he couldn't do anything about it made her smile inside for the first time in days.

Taking another deep breath, she shifted to Cat and walked past the majordomo and towards the back exit from the Halls. She took some small satisfaction in the additional stiffening of his back when she did so, and flicked her tail at him as she passed out of his sight.

So much had happened so quickly that she wasn't sure she had yet made sense of it herself, but she could not put off for one single second this last duty she owed their fallen Lord. As she made her way through the no-longer confusing halls, she felt her mind drawn back once again to that horrible day. She remembered it all so clearly, up until she threw her last seed and song at the body of the fallen Lord of the Defenders and stepped through the portal.

She had known immediately that it wasn't going to work. Whatever his destiny was, Elune was not going to let her divert him from it, and that knowledge had made breathing hard, as she wept for their losses. She wept for the world, that it harbored such evil as would try to unBalance it and destroy everything good and growing. She wept for the fallen Defenders, the ones who had died to try to buy them the time they needed so D'ana'no could do whatever it was he did that had ultimately thwarted the plans of the demon. More than their losses, though, she had known she was weeping for herself, for all the mistakes she had made, and the ways in which she had fallen short of what she meant to do and who she meant to be.

As she wept, a cool hand had come down on the back of her neck, and a voice said, "Weep if you must, Sorcha, but never think you failed."

"Rheyna?" She looked up through her tears at the whole and hearty little priestess, covered in grime, who stood next to her, looking more tired than Sorcha had ever seen her. "How did you get here? You were dead, and there was no one to call you back."

"You did it. When you sang the song of Rebirth at the High Lord's body, your song was refused. He could not be saved, love. But your moon goddess does not waste the songs of those She loves, either, and the seed landed on me." A dimple appeared on the woman's face for a moment. "I have never seen a goddess face to face before, and I am not sure I want to repeat the experience. But I am grateful to both you and to Her for pulling me back to the world before the portal collapsed completely."

Rheyna had knelt then, and taken Sorcha in her arms, as if the druid were a small child who needed comforting. "Cry, love. It will help."

So she did.

Even now, her breathing thickened as she remembered again watching the corrupted body of the Lord of Defenders being buried in the falling stones of the crumbling building. And the worst part of it all was yet to come. She twitched an eyebrow at a passing maid who scratched her behind the ears and headed for the Cat door at the back of the Beast section of the Halls. Oh, how Johnson had objected to that -- the look on his face when she had worked with the carpenters to install a doorway that could be pushed open with the nose of a Cat or a Bear, one that allowed druids to come and go even when they couldn't operate door handles -- well the look on his face had been almost as much reward as the door itself. Nudging it now with her nose, she passed out of the Halls and into the yards.

The sun shone lazily through the late afternoon haze and it warmed her fur as she made her way through the open areas behind the buildings and entered the woods. She remembered the last time she had been here, and the memory thickened her throat. He had spoken truly, and so had she. No promises had been broken. The pack had returned, and so had she. But they had returned without D'ana'no, and it was up to her to break the news to his cub.

It was cool beneath the canopy of the trees, and as always when wandering in Cat form, she felt her heart relax a bit. Still, she stayed at a high level of alertness, not knowing precisely where she would find the young cat. Ah, there, ahead of her, dozing in a shaft of sunlight. She looked at him fondly, wondering again at his rapid growth. She wondered, not for the first time, why Elune had sent him to the High Lord, knowing as She must have done how it would end: with the destruction of the world or with the destruction of the High Lord.

The young cat stretched and rolled over, not really waking up. Sorcha studied him with her own Cat eyes, able to see things she could not see when in elf form. He was not really a stormsaber, was he? Nor was he a mistsaber. Instead, his coloring was somewhere in between, a smoky darkness that still gleamed silver where the sun hit it. His eyes, too, were changeable, showing his moods. When he was happy, they glowed purple, but sadness turned them a deep green. She'd seen him with clear blue eyes when he felt playful, and deep yellow ones when he was hunting seriously.

Sorcha padded over to where Ventus lay stretched out now with the sun shining warmly down on his belly, which looked quite full. She wondered for a second where he had gotten his last meal, but curiosity passed quickly. She noticed that the cub was quite a bit larger now than she was in Cat form, and she remembered how he had fit in her arms the day she brought him back from the Dream.

She nudged him with her nose as she unstealthed. A brief purr rumbled in his chest and he rolled over again in the patch of sunlight.

Wake up, Ventus.

He slept on, and she felt the temptation to curl up next to him and sleep as well, but she knew herself to be well-rested, knew she was simply wanting to delay the inevitable. She nudged him again, this time a little harder.

Sorcha! You are home!

The joy in his voice tore at her heart, and she shifted back to elf, kneeling beside him and scratching the spot just under his chin where he liked to be touched.

Ventus, the pack has returned. We come leaderless, without the High Lord.

The snarl began in his throat and she reached out with her mind to soothe him. Her song, a bare whisper, floated above the clearing and soothed them both.

He died, Ventus. He died, as he lived, to save the pack, to save you, to save us all.

No.

She gazed at him with eyes that were both pitiless and full of compassion.

I am his. Without him, what am I?

She wrapped her arms around him, tears falling down her own face again.

I don't know, Ventus. I don't know why any of it had to happen. But I do know his spirit is content. I have seen it from afar in the Dream. It shines now, without the corruption that burdened him so badly.

What do I do now?

What do you want to do?

He pulled away from her and stared at her. His eyes glowed silver. As she watched, she saw him consider that question, as if it had never been asked before.

Can we hunt his killers?

They are dead, Ventus. They came from elsewhere and he died to keep them from destroying our world.

I am from elsewhere, too.

I know.

Can I go back to the Dream, where I came from? Can I go be his companion?

As he asked, the answer came unbidden to her lips.

You cannot. You are here, at the direct bidding of the Goddess. You must find your way in this world. Find what you were meant to do.

Show me.

Oh, Ventus, I cannot. I can hardly find my own way.

The cat stared at her, eyes glowing more brightly until they were almost turquise in their intensity.

Hunt with me, Sorcha.

What are we hunting, beloved?

Our destiny.

She shifted to Cat.

[Windfoot]

((wonderful! Thank you Sorsha))

[Sorcha'Rei]

Sorcha stood before the older druid, dressed in full battle armor, gleaming dagger at her side. Their eyes held one another, each implaccable, both waiting.

He sighed at last. "What you ask is impossible. It is . . . unBalanced. You are forbidden."

She scowled at him. "It is nowhere written that I may not take a companion into the Dream."

"Just because you can do something that should not be possible, Sorcha, does not mean that you should do it."

She sighed. "I know. But there is pain. Pain I cannot reach. Pain I cannot help. The only help is in the Dream. I know this to be true. I have Dreamed it."

The man looked back at her. "What you have wrought, no one knew could be done. To bring back to this world a living, breathing creature, held in your arms, as a gift for another. . . " He looked away for a moment then returned his eyes to her face. "You are greatly gifted by the Lady of the Moon, Sorcha. Do not forget gratitude."

She closed her eyes, and breathed carefully one breath, two.

"I am not ungrateful, Dendrite. You may walk the paths of my mind and know this to be true. I am, often, uncertain, but never ungrateful."

She felt tears welling behind her eyes and willed them to stay there. "He is but a kitten, made in the Dream by Her hand, to be companion of one who was then taken from us all. And I, druid, priestess, dreamer and fool that I am, I am embarked on a path that leaves him alone and lonely too often."

He nodded as if he already knew what she would say next.

"It is out of Balance, Dendrite. He was made to be the companion of D'ana'no, who was grievously injured in spirit. With great patience, the cat waited for that spirit to heal, but it never did, before Elune called him home. Those of us who have our own paths to walk, we mourn his loss, but we go on."

Her eyes brightened with tears now, despite her best efforts. "But Ventus, Dendrite, he has no path to walk. He was made to partner D'ana'no. I am but a poor substitute, and the priestesses of the Moon are hard mistresses. It will be long before I can offer him even my poor self as salve to his soul wound."

His own eyes clouded. "Mighty regal creature though he is, he is not a person. His soul is not the concern of the Circle. It is the concern of Elune, perhaps, but not ours."

"How can you say so? The Circle taught me to Dream, taught D'ana'no to Dream, formed us into what we became. Between us, we have done a great ill. And now the Circle denies us the ability to right this wrong. Why?"

She fought for control and almost won. "Dendrite, walk his mind and tell me true that he is a beast, to be minded by the Powers that care for the beasts. If you do this, I will simply sing him songs of soothing every day of my life and charge the Circle to continue doing that for him should I fall. But do not ask this of me without being sure."

"You ask much for a druid so young," he snapped.

"I ask only what I owe him. Please. Do not fail me or yourself in this matter. Walk his mind."

And so she sat on the edge of one of Moonglade's moonwells, dragging her fingertips through the sacred waters, weaving patterns of light in her mind, being both druid and priest in an unguarded moment, waiting as it so often seemed she always did, for another to move.

Eventually a shadow moved between her and the late afternoon sun. "I have done your bidding, Sorcha. Reluctant though I am to encourgage your upstart ways and singular lack of respect for Circle authority, I am forced to agree. He is neither beast nor person, but a being made by Elune with a purpose now thwarted. He requires healing. You are required by the Circle to find this healing."

He paused. "Sorcha. You glow more brightly every day with the mark of the Goddess. Do not lower your vigilence for a moment. The enemies of Balance must see you as a beacon, too. You would be a great loss to the Circle should you fall."

He reached out a hand. "Come, sister. Let us find your great Cat. I will myself sit guard over you while you take him on his journey."

She smiled at him, a sad smile, but a smile nonetheless, and took his hand. Together, they headed for the part of forest where the Great Cat Spirit roamed, knowing they were most likely to find Ventus there.

[Sorcha'Rei]

Sorcha smiled to herself as she stepped out of the cover of the trees into the glade where the Great Cat Spirit roamed. In the middle of the glade, rolled over on his back, like a kitten sleeping with no worries at all, was Ventus. She felt Dendrite's amusement as well.

Stepping forward, she placed a hand on the great head, which looked darkly furred in the shade of the great trees around the glade's edge. The cat rolled over and got to his feet in one fluid motion.

Sorcha!

She bowed her head. Greetings, friend.

Do we ride? Do we hunt? Will you be here long?

I will be here as long as you need me, beloved. She paused. I have come to take you on a journey, Ventus. Will you come with me?

The cat looked at the two elves standing before him, both clearly so pleased to see him, and yet serious, too. He tilted his head and met Sorcha's eyes. His own eyes shone green, then shifted to a ddep purple glow.

I will go with my friend wherever she needs me.

Sorcha knelt beside the cat and wrapped her arms around him.

I have missed you so much, Ventus, as I follow the road Elune has laid out for me. But I have also known that you are lonely, that you miss me, and worse, that you have unfinished business with D'ana'no.

I learn to live with the emptiness, Sorcha.

I know, Ventus. But is is not right. I cannot take you to him, to speak with him or live with him. But it comes to me that your heart might be eased some to see him in the Dream, to know that he has found what he needed, and is at peace. These things I would show you, if you will come with me there.

His eyes brightened, shining violet and then lightening to an almost blinding gold.

My heart would be eased, yes. And I would follow you anywhere. You know that.

Sorcha turned then, and introduced her companion.

This is Dendrite, a druid of immense power and wisdom, and one who gives of himself to see that student druids learn to wield the power of the Dream with care and certitude. He will anchor us here, as we wander together in my Dream. We will look for the spirit of your missing companion. We will not disturb him, should he choose not to be disturbed. But I would ease your heart, beloved. Come with me?

His purr, filling the glade and making the plants tremble, was all the answer she needed.

Behind her, she could feel the approval of the Great Cat Spirit, and sent a word of thanks for her blessing.

[Sorcha'Rei]

Sorcha placed one hand on the back of Ventus' neck. Stay still for a moment, Ventus, while I bring the Dream to us.

He made one short nod with his head and then stood entirely still, quiet and immobile enough that the small animals he would normally hunt began to emerge again from their dens and burrows and look around. The more cautious ones noticed him and scampered back to safety.

Sorcha sighed deeply and reached for the Dream. Behind her, the Great Cat Spirit sat, watchful. And before her, Dendrite sat with his back against a tree, prepared to sit watch over the two travelers until they returned.

Can you see it, Ventus?

Through your eyes, yes, Sorcha. It feels like home and yet like a place I may only visit.

Yes. It is the Dream. It will one day be my destiny, but not, apparently, yours.

A flash of light, a wisp of shadow, and they stood on the threshhold of elsewhere. As always, many paths appeared at her feet.

Think of D'ana'no, Ventus. I will keep my mind clear. When your path is made obvious to me, I will step upon it. You come with me, all right?

The cat beside her rumbled a purr of agreement, then was silent again. As she watched, her hand still buried in the thick fur of his neck, one path began to beckon her. The beckoning felt somewhat different that any she had experienced before, a difference that let her believe it was indeed Ventus' path that she had found.

After a moment, she lifted one Dream foot and stepped onto the path.

Suddenly, the fur beneath her hand was gone. She looked down at her fingers, startled, and saw below them, on the path at her feet, the kitten she had brought from the Dream so many months ago.

Ventus?

Yes. I seem to be a kitten again.

Indeed you do. Do you recall all that has passed since last we were here?

Yes. We come to seek a view of D'ana'no's spirit, your gift to me, to try to ease my mind.

Very well, then. We walk on.

[Windfoot]

The Dream consumed him. The shifting essence of the Dream, an infinite fluid of possibilities, expanded and contracted like around him like the breath of Ysera herself. The dance of balance played about him: inhale of life, exhale of death; inhale of light, exhale of darkness; inhale of substance, exhale of nothingness…

And still he remained himself, remained apart from it and not lost in the beauty of the Dream.

It had been so long that he had stopped asking why. Time had ceased to matter, and with its death the wondering also had slipped away. Now, he simply watched and learned as things came to be within the world of time, within the world of his old companions, like a flower’s petals opening slowly before him. He was and yet was not in control of his travels, drawn to watch where the Dream took him. And all the time his consciousness expanded as the multiple possibilities within the worlds of time dazzled him consciousness. His movements through the Dream grew stronger, faster, like a child learning to swim. Once, he had concentrated to shift and slide across the world. Now, he blinked. Faster and faster, drawn by the massive currents that formed the Dream he travelled, he watched, and he became more. More and other. Other, and of the Dream, and unfathomable.

But still his self was not lost. D’ana’no. Intact. Self. Apart.

[Sorcha'Rei]

She could sense the serious purpose of the small bundle of fur who walked at her side. Most unkittenlike, he did not twine himself around her ankles or pounce on her feet. Instead, he marched forward, nose slightly uplifted as if he sought the scent of prey, and despite the undeniable cuteness of his kitten's body, he was all business and focus on this walk.

She let her mind wander a bit, content to follow where the cat lead, knowing that his instincts would take them where they needed to go, whether it was where they intended to go or not. She drifted into a semi-trance, the kind that often overtook her in the Dream, when she wandered not at her own behest, but at the need of the Powers that fueled the Dream itself.

Ahead of them, the path descended into a valley. As they emerged from the cover of the wood where they had been walking, and started down into the more open area ahead, Sorcha felt the flicker of a presence against her check, gone almost before it was there, as if someone had passed a little too close, and very quickly indeed. Before she could mention it, the cat at her feet halted suddenly, his movement stopping almost with a flinch. And then he froze in a watchful waiting position.

Looking at him, Sorcha could see the barest hint of his breathing and no other movement at all. He was the epitome of someone waiting to see what happens next.

[Windfoot]

He became the watcher. The infinity of the Dream flowered around him; and infinity of paths, universes, times, all swelling and contracting like a great breathing thing. His consciousness expanded to understand the Dream, but even though he knew his growing knowledge dwarfed anything that he was before, still the knowledge pressed upon him that he was only able to see a small fraction of what was the Dream, a teaspoon’s knowledge of a great mystic Sea. It’s beauty dazzled and confounded him and he could only watch and learn as he was swept along in the eddies of its vast currents. Not only the Dream caught his eye. He watched his friends, strangers, even other travellers of the Dream, travelling sluggishly slow to him now, anchored as they were by their mortal forms. He caught glimpse of the true Dream travellers; Ysera and her retinue, still almost too fast for even him to contemplate. He saw the echoes of their passing, vapour trails as they ordered and reordered the Dream.

He watched and was calm. There was so much beauty. But still, sometimes, the idea flickered back quietly: is this why I remain? No answer. There could be none. ‘Why does not matter,’ the Dream whispered. ‘You are. It is enough.’

Ventus eyes grew small. His eyes darted as if watching a point of light skim and dart. His tiny body crouched and tensed once, twice. And then…he was simply gone. One moment pounced and ready; then nothing more than a shadow fading where he had stood.

D’ana’no travelled. He watched. He was content.

And then something unexpected happened.

At first it was like a feather’s touch upon him. He travelled and something other touched him, something that was of the Dream but was not the Dream. This was not like other travellers. D’ana’no danced around mortal Dream-walkers and he could not swim the currents with the dragons. But this other was like a shadow, if a shadow could be made from pure light. And for the first time in an eternity D’ana’no…felt…something he had not felt since…

D’ana’no stopped travelling and became still. Before him was something shimmering, almost laughing. There was joy in the light, and comfort, and beckoning.

D’ana’no had forgotten he had a voice. When he tried to communicate with the shimmering presence, he felt rough and clumsy. But the thought was torn from him, nonetheless.

“Ursa?”

The light took shape before him. It congealed into a familiar form, sparkling with a thousand points of light, and two sparking eyes. Not that of a great bear, but that of an elf. And as D’ana’no watched in dawning awareness, he realized that he was looking at a copy of himself, though made entirely out of white light.

Standing before him, it spoke, kindly, “Also Ursa.”

D’ana’no was confused. The thing before him laughed, a shimmering laugh that rippled the Dream around them. D’ana’no was awed by its power.

“I don’t understand.”

“Yes. You never have. But when you do understand, you will be free. Come…”

The doppelganger travelled, slowly, as if enjoying the leisurely pace. A mounting curiosity filled D’ana’no as he followed. He allowed himself to be led, and before them someone came into view. At first D’ana’no did not recognize who it was, but as the distance closed she came into view, almost as if she were coming into focus.

“Sorcha’Rei?”

[Sorcha'Rei]

He was the epitome of someone waiting to see what happens next, and then he was . . . gone. Sorcha, long accustomed to the vagaries of the Dream, nevertheless gasped aloud as the kitten she had escorted to this place vanished. She looked around.

Ahead of her, she saw only the path, but still she felt compelled to stare at it, unblinking. It still looked like a path descending from a wooded, hilly area into a more open valley. She could hear the myriad sounds of life all around her, the insects burrowing and buzzing, the grasses sighing in the slight breeze. The path looked well-kept and yet hardly used. She did not know if this was something that she had brought to the Dream or something that the Dream had brought to her.

For what seemed forever, she stared at the path, and then in front of her, two forms. One, a light-made being that looked remarkably like the High Lord. The other, a mere Shadow of a presence that felt remarkably like the High Lord.

As if from a very great distance, she heard someone speak her name, slowly, hesitantly. And quietly she answered.

I am here, as I am always here.

[Sorcha'Rei]

((*poof* went Ventus. *poof* went my ability to write this. *poof* it came back. Sorry it took so long to right itself.))

[Windfoot]

…it was Sorcha. And yet...not the Kaldorei that he knew. There was something about her, or possibly about his way of seeing, that was strange and new. Or perhaps, rather, he was so changed that he did not know her the same was, could not know her as he once did. It was as if she were floating in water; the edges of her spirit shifted and moved before him.

Windfoot had been so long adrift and alone, watching but not conversing, that his voice barely carried from him. There was a long silence as she stared at him. Had she not heard him? He spoke again, but again his voice was nothing but the quiet sound of the wind. Windfoot shifted beside her, to try a third time, and she did not immediately respond. In fact she remained staring forward intently, without blinking. She appeared ready to speak, but still she waited. He waited, and at last her voice came to him, but slowly, drawn out and strange. It was then that he noticed that everything about her was slower. Just as her shape slowly shifted before him so too her voice came to him like a slow wave of meaning.

With a shock, Windfoot remembered the glimpses of the Dream-dwellers, with their vapour trails and unfathomable speeds. With a shock he realized that he had begun to grow into the Dream himself. Sorcha remained firmly affixed to the mortal world of Azeroth. He had been lost in the Dream so long that he had begun to join its currents. Perhaps, he realized, perhaps the long waiting he had felt was only the beginning of some greater existence he could not yet know. He had sometimes wondered what Ysera intended for him, why she had left him to wander lost and alone. Perhaps it was not like that at all. He had not been singled out for torment or abandoned. He had, rather, not yet grown into something that was yet to come. Could this be a normal part of passage over from mortality to the Dream?

“We could not come sooner.” Windfoot had almost forgotten his strange doppelganger. He looked back and saw his companion look back at him, sharp and clear.

“How…how is it that you speak…that you can travel with me? Who…?” Windfoot fell silent, unsure of what words to use.

The being before him smiled playfully and then turned back to Sorcha’Rei. “Let me show you…” it whispered, and then…changed.

[Sorcha'Rei]

The two D'ana'nos exchanged words she could not quite hear. Sorcha felt herself still even further, knew herself to be achieving a deeper stillness than her druid self could attain, knew she was relying on her new priestly capabilities to still herself so far. Later, perhaps, she would wonder and consider, try to work out what it meant that in this most druidic of places, she was still a priestess of the Moon.

For now, however, she simply stood silent and watched. And as she did, the being that looked like D'ana'no, but surely was not, spoke to her, and then . . . shifted. In front of her now, the immaterial one who felt so much like D'ana'no, and an elf child, a small boy, no more than 50 or 60 years old, still small and new to the world.

She knelt to put their heads at the same level, and smiled at him. "Do I know you?" she asked.

He smiled back, wisdom such as no child could possess shining out of his eyes, and he turned to his companion on the path.

"See yourself, hunter, druid, high lord, demon fighter. See yourself before any of your long years marked your body or your soul. See yourself when you were only potential, and no achievements. See yourself, young and hopeful again."

The one beside him stilled, too, although he did not seem to be able to hold himself completely quiet. As if from a great distance, came the words, almost a plea, "I don't understand . . . "

The wise child before her shifted again, this time to become a young elven hunter, bow in hand, silver hair pulled back into the braided fashion of several hundred years ago. Such pride and beauty as he possessed, so full of youthful certainty and sureness in his assumptions about who he was. He shone with the light of Elune, although he seemed utterly unaware of it.

"Thus you were, when you followed the sound of the hunter's horn instead of the path of Emerald Dream. Before you then, all the love and loss and despair that you could not even imagine. Was it worth it, to follow the path of the hunter? To step aside from that path, and learn to walk anew? Were you ever sorry you did not simply stay home and live your life quietly? How many battles, how many deaths, how many tears?"

Sorcha felt tears well up inside her at his words, though they were not directed at her. And the being shifted again.

Now she looked again at the old elf she had known, the druid who led the Defenders, whose wisdom and care saw them safe from many a battle, and whose mistakes destroyed so many of them in the end. He stood there, looking as if the world had defeated him, when she knew him to be victorious in every way that mattered.

A slight sound behind her, and Sorcha abandoned stillness, spun around. Down the path from the woods came a bear, a great bear, not a shape shifted druid, but a true bear, a bear born in the woods of Kalimdor, and soul bound to a hunter, a bear who allowed that bond to be severed to let the hunter follow his own path, whose reward for faithful service had been a place in the Emerald Dream of her very own.

Without knowing how, she knew this to be Ursa, the real Ursa, not the one who had betrayed them that horrid night in Stratholme.

Ursa walked past Sorcha as if she were not there, and past the shifting being who was now looking like the old High Lord, and up to the immaterial, shifting one, the one who was and always would be, D'ana'no.

She growled low in her throat, not a manacing sound, but a reassuring one.

For a moment, the four of them were frozen in time and space: the shifting one, the loyal companion, the elf who lived in the dream, and the druid who would be a priest.

[Windfoot]

For Windfoot, all else faded. The strange moment that had arrived upon him, the way that he was able to see into Sorcha’s Dream reality, the visitor who could change, even mirror his essence, all of it faded. When Ursa came forward, it was a flood of emotion to be together again.

“Ursa,” he whispered. It was a whispered breath, but his voice conveyed ages of heartbreak, stunned disbelief, and all of his desperate longing.

“Sin’dorei,” she answered. Blood borne. Hearing her rough voice, feeling her earthy presence, the ache within him broke its bounds. Windfoot felt his hands running through her rough coat, felt the warmth of her skin upon his palms. He did not feel himself falling on his knees. Without thinking, he buried his face in her great neck like a child, unbidden words breaking from his lips, “My heart was lost…”

In response, Ursa’s massive paw encircled him, communicating her own desperate need to love and protect. She said nothing, but deep soft rumblings resonated from her, conveying all of her fierce protectiveness.

Sorcha watched in silence, drawn in to the moment herself. The old bond between herself and Windfoot pulsed to life, and a the strength of his emotion washed over her.

Having completed his task, Ventus had once again transformed into the form of a great cat, again neither storm nor mistsaber. A deep awareness flashed from his eyes, something that had not been there when he and Sorcha’Rei had entered the Dream together. Something had happened. It was as if the moment of transformation had been a coming of age for him, here in the Dream, the place of his birth.

Eventually, Windfoot pushed Ursa away and stood again. Tears glistened in his eyes, but he was smiling and it was as if a spark of colour played beneath his skin and his eyes flashed with dancing white. Anchored by Sorcha and Ursa’s presence, his body stilled, and he looked around, taking in his surrounding as if for the first time. They stood in a lush valley, near to a grove of trees. All about them life was if full bloom, and the land sang with a voice and sweetness Windfoot had not heard before; a new song, formed out of Sorcha’s expression of the Dream, but also filled with something other. Windfoot was amazed by the beauty, and by the sudden awareness that Sorcha had somehow drawn him into her Dream. Normally, each Dream-walker saw the Dream in her own way. For Windfoot, the Dream had always been a curious contrast of blur and clarity, with sometimes muted, sometimes exaggerated colours. Now, however, the Dream was like Felwood, long before corruption touched it; a land whole, pure and vibrant.

“Sorcha…how?” he asked.

This is my land, D’ana’no. Sorcha allows us both to walk this path. Ventus answered, quietly.

Sorcha agreed. “I allowed Ventus to guide us. You have been gone a long time, and he was unhappy without you.” There was a whiff of criticism in her voice, though she smiled kindly.

Windfoot turned and regarded the great cat with new eyes. Ventus, I am glad you have come. You are grown, and not only in stature. But I am confused. How have you come to know the Dream so well? And how did you find me? How did you…change?

I hardly know. When I came to this place, I felt you near. You were lost, but I smelled you near. I thought of finding you, and suddenly I was…different. I think I was supposed to come to this place. I think we all were. Ursa was here. Sorcha had found the way. And when I thought to chase you, I felt myself become like you, and then…you came. Are you angry, D’ana’no?

Angry? Windfoot laughed then. The first time he had laughed in ages. A great belly laugh, infectious and warm, and the glade waround them seemed to dance with the sound. No, I have a feeling that anger is a feeling I may have just left behind…

[Sorcha'Rei]

Time both slowed and sped, all at once. Sorcha, long used to the Dream and its vagaries, did not complain or pause to wonder. On the speedy river of time, tumbling over the four of them, she saw it all happen so fast. Ursa came out of the woods and down the hill. D'ana'no wept to see her, and as Sorcha watched him, his incorporeal form began to solidify, enough so that he had knees to fall to, and arms to embrace the great ursine companion of his youth and middle years.

And on the slow, lethargic river of time, she could see Ventus waiting, knew him to be both wholly himself and also something more. Her own perceptions slowed, she hardly noticed when the channel between the old elf and herself opened once more, she was so intent on studying the cat before her.

He was right, of course, this was not her Dream, not any of the Dreams she had wandered in her life as a druid, not any of the Dreams she would wander again. It was not the somewhat altered Dream in which she had fought Adumbro's demon, that Dream which had been different because Adumbro was there, because the demon was there, because two goddesses graced her with their watchful presences as she fought.

In the slow river of time, her thoughts came fast and furious, the questions she could not ask, the answers she did not want. Before her, the one who had been the high lord and the one who had been his cat conversed, on what topic she did not know.

She herself was in the center of her own swirling thoughts, was aware of the other elf as he came back to himself, knew, too, that he was unaware of that yet. She reached out to him with all her senses, saw the places where he had been stained by the demonic possession, saw that they were healing. She sighed, for she had not known that that sort of stain could be washed away, and then chided herself for a fool. The Dream can do what the Dream must do.

She looked again at him and saw that he was gradually creating himself again, this time without the things he had outgrown, and yet with something new, too. She followed the tendril of the newness and was surprised not to be surprised by it. For of course, it led to Ventus.

And then she realized she could speak to him even while he spoke to the other elf. D'ana'no knelt on the path still embracing Ursa, and speaking to Ventus of anger and transcendence. Sorcha listened with half an ear, but it was unnecessary: the channel between them, built by Elune to save his life so long ago pulsed with the power of his conversation with the cat.

So she gazed at the cat, watched his eyes change color, as they always had, in response to the conversation with D'ana'no. She looked at his fur, thick and soft and utterly original in color. And without volition, she said to him, "Your destiny is not in the Dream. This I know and have known these many months. Yet, this is your Dream. What are you in this place, that you are not in the mundane world? And why is this not your place, this place you have brought us all?"

As she spoke, D'ana'no looked up, seemed to see her again. He stopped talking, and hugged Ursa once more. Then he stood and as he did, she could see his insubstantial form becoming more corporeal. She wondered if this was a Dream form, or if, like Ventus, he could be taken out of the Dream into the world.

The scent of jasmine tickled her nose, and she looked around for it, but saw it no where. Her hands felt suddenly empty, so she jammed them in her pockets and was surprised when her right hand found something in a pocket she knew to be empty. She withdrew her hand, and looked at what she held. It was a tiny statue of Ventus, not as he was now, but as he had been the day she brought him from the Dream to the glade, and placed him in D'ana'no's arms.

The great cat had not yet answered her question, and she, young as she still was, found herself impatient. Wrapping her fingers around the stone carving she held, she said, "What did we create that day we came out of the Dream together, Ventus?"

[Celera]

(Wow. It's very poetic and really beautiful. Sometimes these things take time to be ready -- well worth the wait.)