Coincidentally, all druids of Regisfall have begun to dream the same dream.
Not an ordinary dream, nor one easily forgotten upon waking, but a vivid vision painted in colors too bright for waking eyes.
They see the Grove flourishing beyond recognition. Ancient roots split stone and twist through the earth like great veins. Enormous trees rise where none once stood, their crowns disappearing into a brilliant green canopy far overhead. Flowers bloom in impossible hues, opening and closing with the passing of unseen winds, while streams of crystal water wind through forests that seem to stretch forever.
The air itself feels alive.
Some dream of new creatures emerging cautiously from the undergrowth, strange but unmistakably natural things that seem as though they have always belonged there. Others wander paths they know well, only to find them changed, overgrown, or leading somewhere they have never seen before.
And with every passing night, the Grove seems a little larger.
A little older.
A little stranger.
It is as though nature itself is awakening from some ancient slumber, stretching roots long buried and preparing for something the druids cannot yet understand. Some awaken with feelings of wonder. Others with an inexplicable sense of anticipation, as though they have glimpsed something long foretold but forgotten by mortal memory.
Yet beneath all that beauty, there is something else.
A shadow at the edge of the dream.
It is never seen clearly. Sometimes it seems to move between distant trees. Sometimes there is only the impression that something stands just beyond the light, watching from where the forest grows too thick to see.
But its presence can always be felt. The birds fall silent when it approaches.
The flowers close and wither beneath its unseen gaze. Creatures vanish into their burrows, and even the oldest trees seem to tremble as though remembering something they had hoped never to encounter again.
No druid has yet seen its face.
None can say what it wants.
But each awakens carrying the same strange mixture of wonder and dread, and the same lingering certainty:
The Grove is changing.
And a dark stalker lurks at its borders.
Dreams Beneath the Boughs
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storyteller
- Posts: 7
Not all Dreams are Kind
He remembered being very small.
Not where he had been, exactly. Memory had long since taken those details from him. There was warmth nearby, perhaps a fire, and the faint sound of rain against something overhead.
But he remembered the voice.
Patient. Gentle.
"Nightmares are dreams too."
He had not understood.
Dreams were supposed to be beautiful things. Everyone said so.
Green fields beneath a warm sun. Flowers opening in spring. Birds singing from the branches. Clear water running between smooth stones.
Those were the dreams the others spoke about.
He had tried to explain that his were different.
In his dreams, the forest was quiet.
There were no birds.
The trees were enormous and ancient, their roots twisting over broken stone and disappearing into earth darker than any soil he had ever seen. Strange flowers grew beneath their branches, pale things that folded themselves closed whenever he passed.
Sometimes there were animals.
They watched him from the undergrowth.
They never came closer.
He remembered asking why.
The voice had hesitated before answering.
"Sometimes dreams show us things that frighten us."
That had confused him even more.
Because he wasn't frightened.
He liked the quiet.
He liked the old trees.
He liked walking where the forest became so thick that daylight could no longer follow.
And when the creatures fled before him, he had never wondered what they were running from.
Not then.
He had been only a child.
So the voice had given him a word for dreams like his.
Nightmares.
For years afterward, he believed that was what nightmares were.
Only much later did he understand that the word had never described what he felt inside the dream.
It described what everyone else would have felt had they been there with him.
Not where he had been, exactly. Memory had long since taken those details from him. There was warmth nearby, perhaps a fire, and the faint sound of rain against something overhead.
But he remembered the voice.
Patient. Gentle.
"Nightmares are dreams too."
He had not understood.
Dreams were supposed to be beautiful things. Everyone said so.
Green fields beneath a warm sun. Flowers opening in spring. Birds singing from the branches. Clear water running between smooth stones.
Those were the dreams the others spoke about.
He had tried to explain that his were different.
In his dreams, the forest was quiet.
There were no birds.
The trees were enormous and ancient, their roots twisting over broken stone and disappearing into earth darker than any soil he had ever seen. Strange flowers grew beneath their branches, pale things that folded themselves closed whenever he passed.
Sometimes there were animals.
They watched him from the undergrowth.
They never came closer.
He remembered asking why.
The voice had hesitated before answering.
"Sometimes dreams show us things that frighten us."
That had confused him even more.
Because he wasn't frightened.
He liked the quiet.
He liked the old trees.
He liked walking where the forest became so thick that daylight could no longer follow.
And when the creatures fled before him, he had never wondered what they were running from.
Not then.
He had been only a child.
So the voice had given him a word for dreams like his.
Nightmares.
For years afterward, he believed that was what nightmares were.
Only much later did he understand that the word had never described what he felt inside the dream.
It described what everyone else would have felt had they been there with him.
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storyteller
- Posts: 7
Re: Dreams Beneath the Boughs
For three nights, the druids of Regisfall dreamed the same dream.
They stood beneath a moonless sky, in a land untouched by axe or flame. Before them lay a field of dark, fertile soil, and from its depths came countless tiny seeds.
Some seemed strangely familiar.
They were like those carried from the Sunken Ruins, entrusted to the druids by one who had walked their path in an age long past. Seeds they had carried back to the Grove and pressed carefully into its soil with their own hands.
One by one, they cracked open.
Roots descended into the earth.
Tender shoots reached toward the heavens.
And the seeds grew.
Some became ancient oaks, their trunks broad as towers and their roots spreading deep beneath the earth. Others blossomed into silver-barked trees, flowering plants, twisted roots, and luminous vines that glowed softly beneath the stars. Plants unseen for generations pushed through the soil beside familiar herbs and flowers, until the wilderness became something at once strange and deeply familiar.
As the Grove took shape, the druids heard whispers carried upon the wind.
At first they could make out no words. Only voices.
Old voices.
They belonged to those who had walked the path of the wild long before them.
The spirits of departed druids had returned.
They moved unseen among the growing trees, tending roots, guiding branches, clearing streams, and shaping the land according to some ancient design. Where their unseen hands passed, seedlings became saplings and saplings stretched into mighty trees. Water found courses forgotten beneath the earth. Roots broke through ancient stone.
Slowly, the druids began to understand.
What they witnessed was not the birth of something new.
It was restoration.
The Grove they knew was only part of something far older and more sacred, something diminished by the passing of ages and now stirring again. The seeds recovered from the Sunken Ruins had taken root, but they had not grown alone. The spirits of those who had tended the wild before them seemed to have answered.
Night after night, the dream carried the druids farther into the restored Grove.
Yet there was always somewhere they could not reach.
Beyond the oldest trees, where enormous roots intertwined and disappeared beneath the earth, something waited. The druids could feel it. Not the dreadful presence that had haunted their earlier dreams, but something ancient and inviting.
An opening where none yet existed.
A path not yet uncovered.
On the third night, the whispers finally became clear.
Come.
Then the dream ended.
Every druid awoke with the same strange certainty.
The Grove remembered what it had once been.
The seeds they planted had begun something that would not end with a handful of new trees.
And somewhere within the changing wilderness, an entrance would soon reveal itself.
When it did, they would step into a place that had been waiting for them for generations.
And somewhere beyond the edge of that certainty, beneath branches where even the spirits did not seem to wander, something else was waiting too.
They stood beneath a moonless sky, in a land untouched by axe or flame. Before them lay a field of dark, fertile soil, and from its depths came countless tiny seeds.
Some seemed strangely familiar.
They were like those carried from the Sunken Ruins, entrusted to the druids by one who had walked their path in an age long past. Seeds they had carried back to the Grove and pressed carefully into its soil with their own hands.
One by one, they cracked open.
Roots descended into the earth.
Tender shoots reached toward the heavens.
And the seeds grew.
Some became ancient oaks, their trunks broad as towers and their roots spreading deep beneath the earth. Others blossomed into silver-barked trees, flowering plants, twisted roots, and luminous vines that glowed softly beneath the stars. Plants unseen for generations pushed through the soil beside familiar herbs and flowers, until the wilderness became something at once strange and deeply familiar.
As the Grove took shape, the druids heard whispers carried upon the wind.
At first they could make out no words. Only voices.
Old voices.
They belonged to those who had walked the path of the wild long before them.
The spirits of departed druids had returned.
They moved unseen among the growing trees, tending roots, guiding branches, clearing streams, and shaping the land according to some ancient design. Where their unseen hands passed, seedlings became saplings and saplings stretched into mighty trees. Water found courses forgotten beneath the earth. Roots broke through ancient stone.
Slowly, the druids began to understand.
What they witnessed was not the birth of something new.
It was restoration.
The Grove they knew was only part of something far older and more sacred, something diminished by the passing of ages and now stirring again. The seeds recovered from the Sunken Ruins had taken root, but they had not grown alone. The spirits of those who had tended the wild before them seemed to have answered.
Night after night, the dream carried the druids farther into the restored Grove.
Yet there was always somewhere they could not reach.
Beyond the oldest trees, where enormous roots intertwined and disappeared beneath the earth, something waited. The druids could feel it. Not the dreadful presence that had haunted their earlier dreams, but something ancient and inviting.
An opening where none yet existed.
A path not yet uncovered.
On the third night, the whispers finally became clear.
Come.
Then the dream ended.
Every druid awoke with the same strange certainty.
The Grove remembered what it had once been.
The seeds they planted had begun something that would not end with a handful of new trees.
And somewhere within the changing wilderness, an entrance would soon reveal itself.
When it did, they would step into a place that had been waiting for them for generations.
And somewhere beyond the edge of that certainty, beneath branches where even the spirits did not seem to wander, something else was waiting too.