Role

Chapter 7

Screams pierce the night. There is the stench of blood in the air. I awoke
to this in a cold sweat, quickly taking in my surroundings. My hut was oddly empty.
My wife and son were missing. Why hadn't their movements awoken me? I then recalled
the previous day, spent toiling on the mountain building a new home for a friend.
Suddenly the screams stopped. All was quiet. I quckly moved to the back of my hut
and picked up a pair of lumberjack axes and moved to the hut's canvas entrance.
I opened the flap and peered out onto the mountain road which was just steps from
our hut. It is there that I saw the things that would forever change the course of my life.

A dark-skinned woman stood there, emanating light. Yet it was not a holy light, or one from
a natural source. Waves of mana envelopped her, at least that is all I can say to describe
whatever magic protected her. This caused me to shudder in fear, until I saw my wife and son.
You see, my wife has been only able to bear one child, and my son has given me more joy than
a dozen children could have given me. And there he was, standing between my wife and the woman.
There was a sharp look of pain on his face, as his features contorted. The dwarven race takes
pride on masking any hardships, and so I knew he must be in real trouble. Behind him, my wife
was lying on the ground, motionless for now. This explained why the screams had stopped.

There was a hammer at my son's feet. It was his. He was to become a blacksmith one day, and
that was his true love. Fear had frozen my body in these few moments, and confusion washed
over me as I tried to understood what was going on. The dark-skinned woman, now seeing me
under the star-lit landscape, turned to my son and raised a long thin finger towards him.

"Die" was all she said. And he did. Crumpling in a heap beside my wife, his beard only beginning
to take shape. My only descendant was gone.

As this reality took shape in my mind, the grip on my axes tightened as I moved into action.
I tried to shatter the barrier of magic surrounding her, but instead, with a wave of her hand,
I could not resist the urge to sleep. As I slept, I could hear her voice inside my head,
torturing my mind.

"A worse fate awaits you dwarf. Worse, far worse than the fate of your family. You shall live,
and you shall live knowing that you are and ever will be a coward, sleeping while I take everything
that you care about, powerless against the likes of me. CURSED, cursed you are and ever shall be,
and all will know that are heirless and alone, all alone in this world."

Hours later, as the sun rose to a desolate day, I awoke. Alone.