Not a Dreamer, Just a Nightmare (Henry)

[Henry Renold]

With a choice array of curse words, Henry doubled over in pain- tears forming in his eyes.
What an obvious attack! How could he possibly have left himself open like that? He decided quickly to train harder but to also bear this move in mind.

Before Henry had even recovered from his groin injury, Dreamer flicked his legs around his ankle and brought him down to the ground. Henry could hardly believed what was happening, he was supposed to be the assassin and trained fighter here!

Drops of blood dripped onto Henry's face as Dreamer appeared above him, clearly mad with rage, and Henry who was powerless in his position was subject to a brutal beating.
Most men would have yelled out, even cried tears but not Henry Renold. In his new form he felt no pain, and he merely laughed.
It was a shrill cackle, almost demonic but he just lay there accepting the punches one after another until Dreamer could punch no more.

Then with a deft kick of both legs he shook Dreamer off, jumped to his feet and stood over the other boy his bruised and bleeding eye sockets terrifying in his shadowed face.

And all the while still he laughed.

[Jasen "Dreamer" Masters]

Dreamer pounded away until his knuckles bled. Below him was a bloodied mess, a man who should have been knocked out or even dead. Instead he was laughing his head off, a true mad man. As Dreamer stopped, The assassin caught him in an odd kick that sent him flying off. As if he never felt it, the boy picked himself up and walked over to wear Dreamer landed. Looming over him, the boy was still laughing hysterically.

His Mistake

"Only a madman with no morals,
Draws a mage into his quorals,
Feel my wrath, feel the pain
As your attempts all shatter in vain"

Dreamer screamed the words as he drew in the shadows around him to focus into a singular point. In an instant he directed the blast towards the boys chest, pushing him back with a earth shattering force. Fueled by his anger, Dreamer had directed the shadows to act as a sort of energy blast. Seeing the effects, it seemed the spell worked all to well.

[Henry Renold]

Despite the pain in his eyes, despite the blood trickling down his face- Henry still laughed.
He made no move to hurt the boy further, he was merely content with scaring him a little. In truth Henry didn't know exactly where to strike yet, he was debating whether to stamp the mage's head into the ground or use a blade to cut his throat. The thought of each one excited Henry in different ways, and he felt like a child with two sweets. Unable to make a decision through greed.
His inability to decide served deadly though, for Henry had forgotten that the mage didn't need a weapon to hurt him. Before he had even noticed, Dreamer began to speak and by then, it was too late.

Henry's head smashed into the cobbles with all the force of a charging stallion. He was knocked out instantly, blood erupting from his shattered skull like water and spreading out over the stony ground. The last thing he remembered was blackness. Total blackness. And then he was gone.

[Jasen "Dreamer" Masters]

Dreamer picked himself up from the floor and dusted himself off. Looking over at the assassin, who had yet to stir, Dreamer contemplated his next course of action. For an instant, Dreamer considered killing the assassin. He had every right to do so, the assassin had been sent to kill him, he had a right to retaliate.

The idea disappeared though, he wouldn't kill a man in cold blood. The thought sickened him, he then thought about issueing a warning. Dreamer knew a tavern when talk was that the brotherhood visited from time to time. Dreamer could take the assassin to the tavern and warn all members never to venture near him again.

Then again, there was the flip side where he was walking into a possible brotherhood den unprepared. Just as the last idea, this one was quickly discarded. Dreamer finally decided on simply taking the boy to the Castle dungeons, there the assassin would be locked away. Then Dreamer could find the answers his curiosity craved, such answers as whom had sent him.

That question above all decided for him. Dreamer wanted to know who had put the money for his head, and why.

Dreamer walked over to the boy to first check if he was alive. Using his white magic, Dreamer was able to determine the boy was still alive, although damaged. That wouldn't due, after first casting a spell to paralyze the assassin, Dreamer decided to heal his serious wounds. Like those to his face and the back of his head, plus the broken bones from the impact of his spell.

That alone took some work.

Dreamer decided to leave a few scraps here and there, and even one broken rib. Dreamer didn't want the boy feeling that Dreamer was a push over and was simply going to let him go unpunished for his crime. The boy had his chance, he didn't take it, too bad for him.

Grabbing the boy by the shirt, Dreamer began the process of dragging the boy down the street. Inch by Inch, it didn't take long for Dreamer to begin praying that he would find a patrol along the way. That, and started to wonder if he would be allowed to play with the Castle shields, to see if he could allow himself in by magic.

Cause the whole physical labor thing wasn't working too well for him.

[Henry Renold]

Henry would later find he remembered nothing of what happened after hitting his head on the cobbles and before waking up in a cell.
He truly was out cold, and while Dreamer laboured over dragging him to the dungeons the assassin was having not-so-sweet dreams of Gill, Dante and Evie.

In this dream, Dante was alive and he was angry at Henry for something that he had forgotten. He struggled to remember what it was, but every time he tried he had a shooting pain in his brain. Then Dante was gone and Gill appeared. She was angry too, but just as before, Henry couldn't work out what it was he had supposedly done.
"Think! Think!" She was screaming at him but Henry could do nothing because of the overwhelming pain in his head.

The next thing, everything went dark. Evie's voice now echoed in his mind, but the pain in his head had vanished.
"Hello?" He called out, reaching his arms out in front of him but finding nothing but air and an overwhelming sense of cold.
Suddenly a pair of dark eyes materialized in the darkness. Angry eyes that had no face in which they should belong. A sharp stabbing pain in his chest made his own eyes water and after he blinked away the tears, everything was dark once more.

When Henry awoke, everything was dark, just like in his dream. At first he wasn't sure where he was, but the smell of urine, straw and general filth was so overbearing that he instantly remembered it from the few times he had 'visited' the castle dungeons before.
There was a distinct pain in his ribs, one of them was probably broken and he could feel some sort of scrape on his back. He vaguely remembered smashing his head on the stones in an alley somewhere, but ironically his head felt fine.

Henry would never know what the dream meant, but the anger that he saw in his former friends faces had touched something inside him.

Would it change him? Who knew...