Claramond's Sight

I can feel it. Something is there. Something is coming.

It had been so quiet before, so I ignored it. It was a beat, a thrum. It pulsed through me far softer than a heartbeat – but cold. Why did I not pay attention?

It is not of the land – it is separate, but within. Sealed?

No. Trapped. I taste the suffering loneliness. The bitter tang turns metallic: blood. Echoing screams fade, and return as laughter. Red life decorates a child's lip, a child's fangs.

I struggle with the sensations. They are not mine, but they resound through me and I can't escape. There is an illness, it has been spreading across the land unseen and unheard and unfelt by everyone except the most willing to listen.

Hunters. Killers. They are the only ones that listen.

The priests, the scholars – fools.

The sun still shines. The fields still grow. The livestock are fat and the trade is good. All is well to them but not to me.

I am no killer – I am no hunter. I have sent some to their deaths, by my word – so by that there is blood on my hands that I cannot see. So I see the sickness – or is it that I am the sickness?

An image suddenly sharpens before my blind eyes. A dead human male, wearing a long, white coat. His throat is crushed, neck broken, the major blood line punctured. His attacker is shrouded in shadow, as if darkness itself is attempting to coddle the small figure – to protect it from my gaze.

I reach out, but a growl stops me. A warning. It is a sound I have not heard in centuries. What would such a creature – a monster – be doing there? What has that human male done? What did he bring upon us?

I blink and the image scatters. I see nothing. My heart pumps cold - pumps dread. We are too late.

A child will be our ruin.

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