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๐๐๐๐ ๐ ๐๐๐๐, ๐๐ข ๐๐๐๐๐, ๐๐ข ๐๐๐๐
๐๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐ ๐ธ ๐๐๐'๐ ๐๐๐๐
๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐ข ๐๐๐๐
๐๐๐๐ข ๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐ ๐๐ ๐๐
Kindred do not dream often.
This is an unfortunate truth of the condition. It is a price paid for what they are.
But Auspex -- Janey's favored skill -- allows for strange things.
And she dreams, in the hours between rest and waking.
She stands on a hill, peering out across a valley that is choked thick with a miasmic cloud. Sickness seeps into the land beneath her feet. Bodies and shapes twist. There are figures standing next to her, faces grim. They speak a language she knows but does not remember; she looks at them and tries to make them understand her, but they do not seem to see her. There are a half-dozen of them, and they are impossibly strong in aura and carriage both. Six white-furred wolves run into the miasma, and are met by wolves with shock-red pelts. None return.
๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐ ๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐
๐ฑ๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐ข ๐๐๐๐ ๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐๐๐
๐๐๐๐๐๐ ๐ธ'๐๐ ๐๐๐๐
Jane stands in a blizzard, now. The cold of it seizes to her bones; she can barely move. She twitches her fingers and opens her mouth to scream, but only icicles break from her lips, blood-soaked points jutting from between her teeth, from the walls of her throat. The air smells like flesh; blood steams the snowcoated earth.
"Willow Bark," murmurs someone, and their voice carries a sorrow so deep that Jane feels her limbs grow leaden. She collapses. First to her knees, then to her side. The storm grows.
Grows and
demands of her. There are faces in the storm. Some of the faces stare at her with disappointment and cold, searing hatred that threatens to skin flesh and bone. Others that Jane cannot face look at her with wide, horrified eyes. "Willow Bark," they say. "Willow Bark."
๐ฝ๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐ ๐๐ ๐๐ ๐๐๐ ๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐๐๐๐
๐ฐ๐๐ ๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐ ๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐๐๐๐๐
๐ฐ ๐๐๐๐๐๐๐๐๐ข ๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐๐๐ข ๐ ๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐๐๐๐
๐ฝ๐๐ ๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐๐๐
Beneath her body, the snow boils. The storm-snow begins to scream, a high, keening note, and it cuts her skin, catching her in its thrall and dragging her along again. She sees the white-coated wolves, blue-tinged and bitterly cold, standing against storms, standing against others with pelts of grey, with dark coats, with strange weapons that glow and shine with flame and lightning. She sees them ridden down by settlers with their thrill-killing; she screams when one falls, because she knows, she knows --
What does she know?
๐๐๐๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐ ๐๐ ๐๐๐ ๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐ ๐ ๐๐๐๐ ๐๐ ๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐ข ๐ ๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐
๐ฐ๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐ ๐๐ ๐ ๐๐๐๐ ๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐
๐บ๐๐๐ ๐๐ ๐๐ ๐ ๐ ๐๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐ ๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐ ๐๐ ๐๐๐๐ ๐๐ ๐๐ข ๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐๐๐
๐ฐ๐๐ ๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐ ๐๐๐๐. ๐ฐ๐๐ ๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐๐๐ ๐ข๐๐๐๐
๐๐๐๐๐๐๐, ๐๐๐๐๐๐, ๐๐๐๐ '๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐ข ๐๐๐๐๐๐ข ๐๐๐๐๐๐๐๐๐
She dreams of disease. Of suffering. She dreams of Big Don, her father, and the warning he gave her when she was just a little girl:
"You cannot trust those men. They'll offer you whatever they think will lure you away. They don't see you as a child."
๐ฐ๐๐ ๐๐๐๐ ๐ข๐๐ ๐๐๐๐ ๐๐ ๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐, ๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐ ๐๐๐ข ๐ข๐๐ ๐๐๐๐ ๐ข๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐
๐๐๐'๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐ ๐๐๐ ๐๐ ๐ ๐ ๐๐๐๐ ๐๐ ๐๐๐๐๐๐ข ๐๐๐๐๐๐
In her dream, she stands on a stretch of road that goes on forever, and the road is covered in the bones of dead women.