Heroes 4
The Dream
I had a dream last night for the first time in over eight hundred years, and I am afraid my dream might be true…
In a dark tower, floating in the nothingness at the end of time, Fate lives. She is an enigma. She has the eyes of an elder who has seen too much, the voluptuous body of a woman grown, and the innocent smile of a happy child. She is alone. No man, elf, demon or god survived whatever calamity brought about the end of everything.
Fate gets up from the dinner table where there is only a single chair, and ascends a small staircase that will take her to the top of the tower. Her feet are bare against the cold stone, and I shiver, for unforgiving rock is all that her flesh has ever known.
She is stunningly beautiful, I decide, although I cannot determine what she is wearing because her image shimmers before me.
Finally, she reaches her destination – a simple room with a huge, glass loom and a stool. She stares at the loom solemnly. She hesitates. But Fate knows she cannot wait forever and sits at the chair.
Methodically, she chooses a ball of black yarn from a bag at her feet and she frowns. She threads it into the loom, and then selects another ball. This one is purple, and her frown deepens. A tear forms in one eye as she threads it into the loom as well.
One by one, she chooses more yarn and attaches it to the loom. Next blue, then red, then green, and finally orange.
Then her hands work furiously, pulling and twisting and spinning, as she begins weaving a tapestry. I desperately want to see the images formed by her craft, but my vision blurs every time I try. So I look at her face instead, and notice her single tear has become many.
Fate doesn’t want to weave this pattern, but she continues anyway. It is her destiny – her purpose…
And that is how it ends.
I am not a genie prone to premonitions, but I find it difficult to believe this was only a dream. Please, pray that I am wrong!
– Solymr ibn Wali Barad
