Atlantic Roleplay Community Boards

[Cezanne Abella]

---

For all the world, she’d never felt so tiny. Cezanne sat quiet and contended on the boat’s plank, feet swinging, toes trailing lightly through the warm water of the southern seas. Her long dark tresses still clung damp and laden with salt and seawater as warm tradewinds ruffled the fabric of her violet skirt and raised goosebumps on her skin.

The moons overhead raced one another to the pinnacle of the sky, one a waxing crescent, and one all but blotted out as the tiny sliver neared its new and darkened phase. The pale blue light of Trammel painted the waves with a master’s touch, completing the night so perfectly that Cezanne’s heart ached. Behind her were the sounds of maps furling and unfurling, and sails being prepared. This night belonged to her, and she’d not trade one moment of it for the wide world.

Curiously, the sounds of rustling maps and sails behind her grew steadily louder, and Cezanne turned to look behind her. The tillerman was gone, and she was quite alone on the boat. Still the rustling grew louder. Her brow furrowed as panic crept into her heart. She scrambled up onto the plank and raced onto the boat, calling frantically, but she found not a soul aboard. She ran to the back of the boat and scanned the dark water behind, but she found no movement there.

Dark water…Cezanne’s throat tightened as she realized that the light from the moons had been blocked out, and the sea no longer flitted silver and blue in their wake. She looked to the heavens, but they were bereft of their stars and moons. She could make out no depth at all between her and the sky, indeed the mast of the tiny ship seemed to disappear into nothingness as it furled in on her and threatened to swallow her whole. Two eyes in the nothingness glowed faintly of arcane magick as they swooped past her face so close that she could have touched them. There was no place to go. Trapped in the middle of the ocean, she tried to scream, but could not. The cold darkness enfolded and devoured her with sullen and silent wings.

[Cezanne Abella]

---

Cezanne jolted awake with a silent scream lodged somewhere inside her. Entangled as she was in blankets and bedding, she carefully unwound herself and silently crept to the door, peering out and down the stairs. She had never felt a dream more real, and still she felt the eyes watching her from every shadow. No movement or sound broke the morning’s silence. Only the call of a mockingbird crying for dawn in the roof garden shattered the quietude and made glad the world for the blessing of the sun.

She’d heard of visions and dreams crossing over into one another. Sleep scrying, some called it. But never had so threatening an image crossed the surface of her scrying bowl. This was too much. It was too real. She would have to go to the library in the Lycaeum and see what she could find on dreams and visions that could explain or assuage her fears. She crept down the stairs, past the hearth, whose fire was all but gone and left lone embers pulsing in the darkness of morning. She laced the bodice of her deep violet dress, smoothed her tousled hair into a ponytail, then hastened to Covenant, mounting up. As quickly as she had awakened, she burst out of the gate, full-tilt for Moonglow.