It was an all night ordeal to recover that portion of the dream hidden by fright. I would step into the memory, get side tracked, scream bloody murder then start over again. And all along the way, I would fall into other dreams when I lost my focus and/or my lucidity. I had to resolve them to get back to business.
Of the many sidetracks, two dreams in particular stand out as important in their own rights. An adventurer was held captive by a jokester lich, who would not release him until it was told the most perfect joke in the world. I snuck into the lair just in time to hear the adventurer begging the lich to kill him since the lich had forced the adventurer to do so many terrible things already. Unwilling to play the lich’s game, I entered and started undoing the shackles while saying what is perhaps the worst joke.
“How is a raven like a writing desk?”
The shackles fell off and I took the adventurer’s hand.
“Neither the desk nor I give a shit what you write.”
The lich was so angered at the disrespect, it could only shake with rage as I flew the adventurer to safety.
Another distracting dream found me sitting in the Sybil’s chair. All the seers were supposed to take turns as the titled Sybil but a politically powerful group of women had taken it over. They had no prognostication skills whatsoever and were using the position as a source of social power while ignoring (or corrupting) the powers they were supposed to be using.
I wasn’t supposed to be in the chair in the first place, but one woman abandoned her duty leaving the chair open to whoever felt called to sit there. When I became lucid, I was being confronted by a representative of that group, who was questioning why I wasn’t wearing the approved fashion of the week.
I was wearing the traditional hooded cloak of the office, upon which was sewn thousands and thousands of opals and moonstones, giving the wearer the appearance of not quite really being there.
She wanted me to wear a teal and green sequined dress with a push up bra and a headdress so obnoxiously large, it required two assistants with support rods to keep it upright.
I questioned the representative, asking her if her group were yielding to the spirit of prophecy ruling the chair or trying to rule those who came for help instead. The representative tried to shut down the floor and bar access to me, but the seekers stood their ground and demanded she answer my question.
“This is why we’re going to destroy that chair and rebuild the works in a more controlled venue. Not everyone that asks for help, deserves the help.”
The spirit gripped me and I gripped the chair. “Only the ignorant marks the boundary of spirit by flesh. Destroy the chair and I will find others to speak through who need no chair to sit. Bar the needy and I will come to the needy instead. Set yourself as greater than [love] and greater will be your fall. The same fork you use to serve your greed will be the same that rips out your tongue!”
The representative gasped and covered her fashionably hued mouth with her fashionably ringed hand. Her shoes, built for looks and not for use, broke under her clumsy steps and she fell. No one helped her until the spirit moved my hand to gesture to her. Once upright, she scrambled to get out of the grotto as quickly possible.
The spirit continued speaking, though I don’t think it was to the audience in front of me. “There are other ways. There are always other ways. Some have grave costs and some have exorbitant costs. Some come in shadows and some come in light. Some give sweet succor and some give bitter regret. But there are other ways. There are always other ways.”
The spirit left me. I remembered my primary purpose for setting out. I stood down from the Sybil’s chair, removed the heavy cloak and left it folded on the seat. Before I had turned around, the next seer was reaching for it.
I left that dream and realized what all of my sidetracks had in common. Once I made the decision to accept what came instead of trying to force the most desirable response, I once again stepped into the memory of Malphas, determined to recover what fright had hidden.