Spires - The Paladin's Redoubt

[Thall]

Saw B*tch Nightmares

"Ich weiss nicht." Haar answered, his dark eyes looking towards his invisible inquisitor. A sharp slap struck across the face, leaving a cool, stinging sensation on his cheek. A bit of blood trickled down his chin and onto the floor in front of him. It was not really until this point that he realized he was suspended over a seething pool of acid by four ropes, each tied around his ankles and wrists. The slap was with the bladed edge of a tortue implement, and another question came...

"Wo sind die andere Mitgleider von deinem Ordnung, Ritter?" the harsh voice barked. Haar shook his head vigorously, "I antworte, Ich weiss nicht. Ich weiss keine Ahnung." He honestly had no idea, who or what was inquisiting him and why. He was in pain and it only intensified as a sharp pike jabbed into his side -- not deeply, but enough to leave a bleeding hole that dripped more blood into the horrid pool of bile. He screamed in anger, pain and despair -- closing his eyes and telling himself that none of this was real...

And he awoke, again -- in the dark corner of a pitch room. He could hear the breathing, the nightmarish catcalls of a dying animal -- the thumping heart of a dying man. There was a definite sense of wrongness about this entire situation. He looked below him and saw that the floor was not wholly solid, but had fallen away in parts -- revealing a swirling yellow and red abyss far below him. A brick of the ground fell away and was stretched and torn apart by the maelstrom of Pandemonium. He could hear the howling wind and the illuminating light of the accretion disk cast eerie shadows across the veiny walls of the room. It was like he was in the hulk of some giant beast -- he walked, even through the air and saw the corpsules of blood pump and shudder as they forced their dark energies through his psyche.

He clutched his forehead and screamed in agony as a loud ringing permeated his brain. He had no idea what was going on inside his head, but it was painful -- soul-rending. A cold sweat formed upon his forehead and dripped onto the floor, sizzling away into evaporate mere seconds later. He feel to his knees -- though his sweat was disappearing in gas, the floor was cold as ice. It was the paradox of fear -- frightening and chilly, yet exhilirating and hot.

He closed his eyes once again and opened them to simply see two disembodied glowing red eyes staring at him, a low -- ancient and archaic tongue uttering unmentionable horrors to him, further driving his mind into madness. He clawed at the eyes with his hands, only to have them evaporate like so much mist -- leaving him alone, quivering in the shadows of his own paranoia.

Haar then woke up with a loud scream in the pre-dawn light of the forest -- hearing the early morning catcalls of the resident lemurs outside. He was drenched in sweat, his head throbbing with the memory of the nightmares. They were bad, but something deep within his soul told him far worse were coming in the near future -- dreams that would be unimaginable and drive all but the most stalwart individual insane with fear and paranoia.

It would be a long battle, but the paladin knew he would be able to defeat this -- it was another test, a dark test -- but he would do it. Perhaps his affliction could provide a vital piece to this puzzle... of the Influence.