Section Author: 'Yui-chan'

The child was suddenly not where he'd been, and it frightened him. Eyes wide, he turned from a view of a strange place - wavy grasses covering the landscape, interspersed by tall trees and shrubs here and there - to face a person. A man not like the old man with the kind eyes and the fuzzy beard. The man looked as puzzled as he did, and Graeson whimpered, a tiny sound in the back of his throat. It echoed eerily in the dreamscape, tightening his child's nerves even further.

"I do not know you." The man spoke gently, his frown one of confusion and not anger, as he crouched beside the frightened child in his dream. It was a moment of very strange clarity, one without the usual fleeting impressions and vague emotions.

The boy blinked and swallowed, fighting back tears. "Where is my Mommy? I want to go back! I'll never touch the loom again, I swear!" The fight was lost, and the trails of salty water that formed down his ruddy cheeks burned cold in the soft breeze of the dream-meadow. Graeson sobbed and covered his face, muffling his cries. "Please take me back! Please! Mommy!!"

The Slave had wrapped his arms gently around the dream child before he even realized that he was moving, the need to comfort him a living thing within his chest. Rocking slowly, he crooned tiny words of comfort in the boy's ears, words that he dimly recalled hearing from his Mother's lips once so very long ago. "Sssss... Sssss... Daizyobu, tisaii kodomo. Daizyobu..." (8)

The strange language startled him as it flowed over his lips, as natural as a heartbeat to him. Mother's language. The image of grey-green eyes filled with love and a warm, comforting embrace flashed through his thoughts, and the Slave shivered. Mother.

Graeson's sniffles brought the man back from wherever his mind had gone, and the meadow flicked back into solidarity from the swirling mass of mist it had become. The little boy squirmed until he was released, then stepped back to stare through misty eyes at the kind man. It didn't matter that he hadn't understand the words used, the comforting tone was enough to make clear their meaning. "You're the white strand. I like you. My Mommy calls me Graeson, but it's my Father's name. Do you have a name?"

The question brought the Slave up short. Of course he had a name... a name... What was it?

A new Dream swam up around the boy and the man and carried them both along in its wake...

*******

He is young, again. He stands beside father, as always, gazing up at the man with eyes full of love. Father is his light, strong and kind and loving and magnificent. When he grows, he will be just like father, and he will love someone just like mother, and he will love his son just as much. Father speaks, and he laughs happily, dancing away as the man reaches out to tickle him.

The storm interrupts, rumbling in the distance, the wind rising around them both until father's cloak whips like a silver-stitched shadow behind him. Mother's voice reaches him across the wind, and he turns to see her standing nearby, all golden hair and warmth as she crouches and holds her arms open to him. Happiness beckons, and he turns back to father to take his hand.

The charred remains give him a skeletal smile and reach towards him with blackened arms, and the child screams in fear and pain, frozen to the rainswept ground. He knows that he will be lost when the fingers brush him, but there is only weak emptiness where there should be strength to run and hide. Feet. Inches. Now a hair's breadth separates him from his fate...

The light that flares is blinding, and the child he is cowers. Sounds assault his ears, but the world is shadow. The storm lashes him with its fury, stinging his flesh, flaying it, but he cannot move. At last, silence, and the light fades, the storm eases. The child he once was opens his eyes to stare into his Mother's loving face, her eyes bright as she whispers to him that he is safe, that she loves him.

The Slave bolted from his bed with a gasp, his ears ringing as the last image from his dream danced before his eyes. That face... that face... The lines of age in that warm expression cannot cover her identity from his newly-opened eyes, and the young man shudders in dread. He saw again the unmistakable beauty of the woman in his Master's clutches, and his stomach knotted. He knew her, now, this latest victim... his mother...

Gulping air as if he'd just broken free from the clutches of some soul-deep waters, the Slave tucked this new knowledge into the deepest pocket of his mind. The time would come to do something, he knew, but it was not here yet. Instead, he calmed his breathing and glanced for the first time around his poor, rat-infested room, his eyes coming to rest on the child standing tensely in the corner. Strangely, he felt no surprise to see the dream child in his reality, and he heard himself whisper the answer little Graeson was seeking.

"Ayden. My name is Ayden..."