Vulture by Rhiannon Paille

Author:Rhiannon Paille [Paille, Rhiannon]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: juvenile fiction, Legends; Myths; Fables, Norse
Publisher: WordFire Press
Published: 2013-05-25T04:00:00+00:00

22 - Nightmares

The dreams about Morgana never stopped. Kaliel slept some nights with the blankets pulled over her head, hoping the little girl permeating her senses wouldn’t be there. But Morgana came, covered in blood, talking about death, laughing like the wind.

One night Morgana showed Krishani to her.

That was the only reason Kaliel suffered the dreams. Sometimes a boy with a hooded face on a white stallion raced across lands she could only see in her dreams. Seeing him made her heart soar and ache like there was no tomorrow. Krishani had been after the Horsemen for weeks. She felt it when he was far away and when he was near again, and she wished he would come home to her.

But he never did.

It hurt every day, doing menial chores to help the villagers, learning things about the land from Klavotesi. He listened to Talina about the strength training, and she was forced to run alongside the walls of the village until she hit the dead end of trees and had to run back again. She was always out of breath and panting when she returned, clothes sticking to her body awkwardly, hair damp with sweat.

Kaliel rolled over and hugged a crunchy pillow to her chest. She wanted to blot out the searing, grinding pain in her heart that was making waiting for him so much harder. Tears pricked the corners of her eyes as her hand trailed along the side of the bed where his warm body should have been. She let tears overflow. This life wasn’t the life she wanted to live.

And yet it was the only one she had.

She squeezed her eyes shut and slipped into sleep. Morgana held her hand and they flew through the clouds. “I want to show you something pretty,” the little girl whispered.

Kaliel didn’t say anything. Morgana always had a sticky grip, her palm wet with blood. They flew over green fields with shadows cast by clouds and rose over mountain peaks and careened into valleys. Wet rain stung them as they ambled through a storm, and when the clouds parted there was a series of little mounds and ant-like figures looking like squashed bugs. The mounds were scorched black and dirt left trails of blood.

“My Horsemen make pretty pictures, don’t they?” Morgana asked as she circled, spiraling down and down, closer and closer to the tarred ground. Kaliel tried to close her eyes but realized they were already closed. This was a dream, and she was powerless to stop it. Her eyes flashed open and she caught sight of the piebald horse on its side, black hoof prints speckled across its white sheet of fur. She almost choked as she recognized it. Her stomach plummeted, and all of a sudden she was falling, the ground moving at her like a spear, ready to split her into pieces. She held her hands out and cringed, waiting for the impact. Her landing was soft. Her hands splayed out at her sides, fingers brushing against fingers as she mirrored the span of someone else’s arms, then her arms.

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