Account of a Chrysalis, Parts One through Five

Account of a ChrysalisBy Heather Rigby.
(* * * indicates the beginning of a new part.)

I look into your eyes, two shadowed wells 
of raven light that gaze into my soul,
and in my heart, my love, a sea, swells
as reaching I touch hair colored coal.

A Hunter, Seeker, seeking precious gold, 
so-lion strong, a Man of worlds unknown, 
a form, perfect made, the Broken Mould,
a word and seeds of Love in him I sow.

I do not know your past, nor do I care
to know in fulsome detail what drove you 
to seek a solitary, hidden lair.
I only know the love I bear for you.

And then I wake to find it fantasy
Beloved Mistral Wind is lost to me.

* * * * * * * * * * * * *
She awoke and sat up in bed with one startled, fluid motion. After a
moment she realized that she was awake and flopped back on her pillow with
a sigh. She had been dreaming of him again.

There were times she almost hated the dreams, for however much she loved
seeing him, he ruined her for anyone else. How could a fallible man
of flesh and blood ever hope to compare to the impossible perfection of a
dream? Not that her phantasm didn't have faults, but they were the sort of
faults that only served to make him more perfect.

She looked over at the clock and decided that it was high time she got
up anyway. She rolled out of bed with a sigh. Of all the people in the
world, why did she have to have dreams about a man who could not
exist? If there were the possibility that he could be real, and out there
looking for her... Naw, dreams simply did not come true. The strange, pale,
dark man of her dreams was nothing more than something born of her own
subconscious, a creation of her own sleeping imagination.

Somehow she made it to class, the morning rituals lost themselves in
familiarity, and unfortunately, for all that she tried otherwise, her mind
would not stop turning the dream over again and again, trying to remember
the shape of his face, the way he moved, the way he touched her to help her
climb higher on the rocks to escape the ones they ran from... Oh, this was
not helping matters any.

"Chrysta!" a voice shouted behind her. She turned and saw Daniel
catching up with her. Daniel Michaels was the game master of the
role-playing group she sometimes spent weekends with, if schoolwork didn't
get too much in the way, as it seemed to be doing more and more. "We missed
you Friday night. What happened?"

"Same old, same old. I had a paper I had to work on, it's due today, and
I really didn't want to spend all Sunday night typing it out when I also
had a test coming up." Chrysta appreciated his concern, though Daniel
tended to be concerned when things got in the way of anyone making
it to a game. He was a nice guy, a trifle eccentric, but nice all the same.
She might have felt something more than simple friendship, if her dreams
didn't keep getting in the way. Not that she'd ever told Daniel about the
dreams, she'd never told anyone about her dreams about him.

For a moment Daniel seemed to change. There almost seemed to be sparkles
around him, and he almost seemed.. well, taller, and.. blue. Chrysta felt
dizzy and stumbled a moment as she tried to take a step. Daniel was right
there helping her get her balance, and he seemed back to normal, but all
around her things seemed to be going crazy. Colors got brighter, and then
dimmed again, creatures appeared out of nowhere, and then were gone again.
She got the strongest feeling that she just did not want to go to
class today, that it just wasn't worth all the worry, that she just wanted
to go to a park somewhere and sit, and talk, and do nothing. Oh her parents
would be horrified at the thought of skipping school, but everything just
seemed to betoo much. Daniel must have seen something because suddenly he
was helping her out of the hallways, dodging teachers and other students to
get to the door, and into the open air. All the while he was talking,
calmly talking, but she couldn't hear what he was saying. The rhythm of his
voice soothed her, though. She was so confused. He held her shoulders and
kept her from falling when she stumbled a moment as they exited the
building.

Chrysta looked at the trees with some relief. The high school had never
seemed so.. forboding before, and looked over at Daniel. He was definately
blue now, and much taller, and he had horns. "Daniel.. you..." she
couldn't finish what she had been trying to say, because she suddenly
realized that she felt different. She looked down at herself and
realized that she was wearing, of all things, armor, and a sword... She
knew, sort of, what to do with a sword, but she'd never really used one,
sure she'd hung out with those SCAers that one summer... What was
happening?!

Daniel looked at her with a mixture of suprise and pity on his face, and
then she saw the resolve harden. "Come on. I'll take you to some friends of
mine."

"What is happening to me?" She was so absolutely confused. What was
going on here?

Somehow they made it to his car, and somehow he fit into it, given that
he's grown about two feet taller since she had started going haywire. He
started explaining things to her, about the Kithain, and something called a
Chrysalis, and, of all things, fairies. She toyed with the idea that he was
completely off his rocker, but that didn't seem to really be the case, he'd
always been rather stable, and if he was crazy, then so was she, because
she was the one seeing things. She let him talk all he wanted.

Then they were downtown, at an old coffeeshop/diner/bookstore that she
and the others in the gaming group liked to hang out at, but is was
different, it glowed, and pulsed with a life that she wondered how she had
ever missed before. Daniel pulled her in, still supporting her shoulders,
and the man behind the coffeshop counter saw them and was over in a moment,
helping him take her into a back room, that wasn't anything she had
seen before. It was like a throneroom, or maybe a ballroom, she got the
impression that it could be used either way. There were a bunch of other
people there, and they were all very strange. Men in silken scarves, women
with animal tails and others in gowns the likes of which she only dreamed.
There were some who were tall and beautiful, and one in particular, a man
only a few years older than herself, dressed in blue and silver, came over
to them.

"What is it, Sir Knight?" he asked Daniel, with a small smile at the
title. She wondered where Daniel had gotten a title, was this some sort of
strange SCA meeting?

"My Lord Baron, this is Chrysta, she's one of my friends. Her Chrysalis
just started about fifteen minutes ago. I hope she's coming out of it."
Daniel seemed rather worried.

"Baron?" she asked in confusion, "where am I?"

The beautiful man smiled at her. "You are in a Freehold, a special place
where dreams are real, and you, my Lady, are a dream given form, I know
that this must all be terribly confusing, and I'll try to explain things as
best I can..."

Chrysta didn't hear a word he said after that, for in the corner she
spied someone standing, leaning against the wall, watching her intently,
and she felt her heart squeeze. "where dreams are real" he had said, and
she knew, at that moment, that there was no other explanation, for the man
watching her could not be real any other way.

He was tall, and well-muscled, and pale as milk next to the black
clothing he wore, with his midnight black hair and his coal black eyes. He
was standing there, looking at her with something in his eyes, she
could see pain, and wondered why her face should bring him pain, but there
was something else. She felt herself start to move towards him, but
Daniel's hands still held her. She looked at him a moment, andthen when
she looked back, the man was gone.

* * *

Mistral Wind paced back and forth in his room below the freehold, in
part because he did not know what else to do. Watching him from a stool in
the corner was his one real friend, a boggan maid named Kerrie Andaras, or
so she claimed. He'd never bothered to question the name she used, goodness
knew he had enough secrets of his own that hers shouldn't be a problem. At
the moment he knew that she was absoultly bursting at the seams to know
what had him so worked up, but she would die before saying word one to ease
her curiosity. Well, such loyalty had to be rewarded, gods only knew she
was the only one he could trust.

"It was her."

Kerrie was caught by suprise by his unexpected whisper. "Who?"

"Her. The one I've been dreaming about since I was old enough to know
what a woman looked like. She stood there, not even fully out of her
Chrysalis and she looked at me and she knew me. I'm sure she knew me."

Kerrie's mind worked furiously. "The Lady that Sir Daniel brought in
this morning? That one?"

"Who else would I be talking about?"

Kerrie was suprised to say the least, but she did him the honor of
trying not to show it and not saying the obvious. "Well, why didn't you go
talk to her? Why are you hiding away in here? If she knows you, don't you
think that she'd be looking for you the same way you've been looking for
her?"

Mistral stopped pacing. "Are you crazy, Boggan? She is nobility, she
always has been and always will be, and I... I am nothing compared to her.
My very touch would cause her pain..."

Kerrie was about fed up with his continual self-bashing, but she knew
enough to know that her words weren't going to have any effect. Something
had happened to throw him into this attitude, and only something of similar
emotional impact was going to throw him out, if the opportunity ever came
up. He never did fully explain why he blames himself so much. It took her
months just to get him to say anything to her at all, and she wasn't going
to blow his trust at this point.

"Well, Sluagh, something has been giving you dreams of her for so
long, and that same something has probably been giving her the same
dreams, did you ever consider that? Perhaps this is Dàn."

"Then Dàn has a sadistic sense of humor." he muttered in his
strange whisper. "I would never seek one such as her..." He started pacing
again, and Kerrie could see that he was trying to decide whether or not to
say more. "I dreamed of her again last night. We were climbing rock walls
within strangely lit tunnels. I helped her rise another level, and then I
woke up."

This suprised Kerrie. He almost never described the dreams to her, only
sometimes mentioning them at all. This had shaken him up, big time. It
looked like it was going to be a long day for her if he was this
talkative already...

* * *

"Let me see if I have this right. We're really the fairies of story and
legend hiding out in human form. This is because five hundred years ago,
give or take a century or two depending on the House and the individual,
the Age of Reason knocked the Sidhe, us specifically, back into a
paradisical fairieland called Arcadia, while the 'commoner' Kiths, led by
the Trolls, were forced to find a way to survive without the nobility."
Chrysta was standing in Leonine's study/library within the Freehold,
another room she'd never known existed before her Chrysalis, pacing out of
habit as she tried to get the history of the Kithain straight in her head.
This was one of her lessons, as Leonine called it, and she wanted to make
sure she understood all the crazy stuff he was telling her.

"So far, so good, I suppose." A smile was quirking the corners of
Leonine's mouth and Chrysta supposed he found her humorous for some reason,
though she couldn't see why.

"Now, while we were romping away in Arcadia, the Trolls, the Boggans,
the Sluaghs, the Pookas, the Satyrs, the Nockers, the Redcaps, and the Eshu
were forging a society that adapted with the changing times. The fighting
between the Seelie and the Unseelie ended for all intents and puposes and
the more democratic ideals of human society sort of filtered into the
commoner makeup.

"Now it's 1969 and man lands on the moon and all the people seeing the
impossible made possible blasts open the Moon Trods to Arcadia and the Five
Houses, us, get kicked back to Earth on our collective butts."

Leonine nods slowly, that smile quirking the corners of his mouth even
more. What in the world did he find so funny about this?

"Okay, the commoners are 20th Century, but we're still living in the
Dark Ages because none of us remember anything of Arcadia after we
abandoned the commoners to their fate. So as soon as we're back on our feet
we start a War for supremacy and manage to win no less, and that was the
Accordance War and it made David Ardry High King over the US, Canada, and
Mexico, what he calls Concordia.

"So now we're back where we were, in the Dark Ages, except we have a
world rushing headlong into the total destruction of imagination, Trolls
who have proven leadership in the crucible of the Interregnum, and
widespread discontent among the democratic commoners against the
totalitarian, feudal, 'Divine Right to Rule' Sidhe nobility to whom we have
the awsome honor and responsibility of belonging."

The smile Leonine had been trying to resist had finally burst out into a
full-grown grin. "Well, it's not exactly how the history books will record
it..."

"History is written by the winners."

He nodded. "...but I suppose it's accurate enough."

This time she grinned, "Finally. Well, at least I understand
something now. What do I get to learn next?"

"That will have to wait, Fledgeling. Why don't you go have some fun or
something? Daniel tells me that you've been very studious for too many
years to not want some fun." There was that grin again. What in the world
did he find so humorous about her? She looked up into his eyes and her
heart squeezed. No, she did not need that right now. Not with her
dreams the way they were, and that mysterious man simply watching her, and
never talking. She gave Leonine a farewell hug and took off to find the
underground caverns the childlings said were under the Freehold. Chrysta
had a feeling that she might find something down there.

As she walked her mind wandered, as it was prone to do now, and she
allowed herself some time to fret about her parents. She'd been skipping
classes every so often, not often enough to do some damage to her grades,
but enough that her parents were worried. Add that to her strange new
friends, they were never really comfortable with Daniel, and the
parties she spent her weekends at, and they were verging on desperation.
Chrysta was certain they thought she was into drugs or something similarly
stupid. As if she would ever be so idiotic to do permanent damage to her
body. Though if they got any more protective and stifling she just might
crack and do something extremely stupid just to spite them and she didn't
want to see that happen. Gods, she'd been the Dutiful Daughter for
seventeen years, her parents could deal with the Hellion for a little
while. She deserved a little rebellion in her life. She
wasn't a three-year-old at Death's door anymore.

Chrysta was so wrapped up in her thoughts that she didn't see the hole
in the ground before her, a hole that went about twenty feet down and
opened into a small cavern, with a corridor leading out. With a groan she
tried to stand and then fell back with a muttered oath as her ankle sent
sharp stabs of pain up her leg. She'd managed to hurt herself with her
daydreaming and she had no wish for the childlings to see her like
this. They'd never stop laughing.

From the shadows of the corridor Chrysta saw him approach. What a
time for him to show up! She could feel her heart start racing and she
silently berated herself for looking so out-of-place. He was looking at
her, with that same strange pain in his eyes, and she wanted to stand
against him and turn the pain into something else, and then she started
silently berating her body for dictating reactions to her mind like that.
The last thing she needed was to start remembering some of those
dreams.

"Hello." she said, a bit hesitantly. She couldn't think of anything else
to say.

He just stood there, a strange tension in his face.

"Umm, I've seen you around some. My name's Chrysta Richmond, you are..?"
It sounded so hokey she almost gagged, but she had to say something, since
he was so silent. Finally she sighed. "Okay, I understand, you're the
strong silent type. I can deal with that, it's just... I seem to have hurt
myself and I'm going to need some help getting back up to my rooms above.
Do you think..?" She left it hanging.

She could have sworn that she saw him smile. He walked forward and
knealt to pick her up in his arms. Chrysta almost fainted as her body
reacted for one electric moment to his touch. Oh, this was not going
to be easy...

He silently carried her up to her room and placed her on the divan, and
then got up to leave, and paused, then turned around, took her hand, and
kissed it, and then he was gone and Chrysta leaned back, trembling. How did
he do this to her? Why was she acting so juvenile about a man? She'd never
been like this before, but then she'd never seen a dream walking among
reality like this before. She tried to keep her mind calm, but all she
wanted was for him to return, to hold her, to kiss her... Oh, she was in
trouble, and she knew that very well indeed.

Mistral managed to get back to his chamber before his legs would carry
him no farther. It had been all he could do to keep from giving her more
than that one kiss, though he still didn't know why he did that to
begin with. His body wanted... well, he knew about physical reactions, and
that wasn't what threatened his self control, it was the way she had looked
so helpless, and yet still so regal. He had never been able to resist
helping someone in need, perhaps that was why he had grown so attached to
Kerrie, for she had the same problem, and she had asked so hesitantly, not
wanting to offend, when most Sidhe would simply have ordered him, and he
could resist orders. No, it was that simple pleading... He was having
problems, and that was the absolute truth.

* * *

Within shadows some distance away from the city of Mountainview, a Sidhe
stood gazing into his scrying pool. The mirror of the water's surface
showed him the scene within Chrysta's chambers and then followed Mistral to
his caverns down below. A slow smile spread across his face. "So... Mistral
Wind loves again. How... entertaining. I believe it is time I paid a visit
to Baron Leonine's court. Yes,... it has been a long time since I last saw
young Mistral Wind."

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Chrysta was able to get her ankle looked at relatively quickly, after
all, a lady couldn't have a turned ankle when she had dancing lessons and
swordfighting lessons and a ball in only a week. Oh, she could not
spend her time laid up nursing a sprain...

She wondered for a while if she hadn't gotten herself into a life as
stiflingly structured as the one she was trying to escape in her parent's
house, but then she got to thinking about all the fun... and she really did
enjoy the dancing lessons, and she did love the fact that she felt as if
she was at an SCA event every moment she was in the Freehold. Maybe things
wouldn't be as difficult after she got over this "Fledge" business.

That got her thinking about the various things she had to do for that,
however far in the future Leonine said it would be, and she just wished she
didn't have to wait so long. A feeling of terrible impatience washed over
her, there were things she needed to be doing... though what they were
escaped her at the moment.

The week passed quickly, and Chrysta continued to see him
watching her from corners, from shadows, as if he didn't want her to see
him. She wished she at least had a name to call him, it's not as if he
volunteered one for her to use. She wanted to just talk with him, though to
do that would be to admit that she has been having those dreams, and what
if he wasn't the one she'd been dreaming of, what if the one she'd
been dreaming of didn't really exist, and he was only someone who
looked very much like him... Chrysta quickly banished the thought,
she couldn't afford to doubt at this point, besides, she was convinced anew
every time their eyes met, and she wanted more than ever to know why he
avoided her.

The ball was alot of fun, so far at least. Chrysta danced and enjoyed
herself immensely and was very glad to have a moment to talk to Leonine
while resting between songs. She was explaining something when the door
opened and another Sidhe walked in. He evidentally knew Leonine because he
promptly walked over to her guardian.

He was tall, as all Sidhe tend to be, and fair of hair and eyes as the
strange man of her dreams was dark, though his skin was not quite as pale,
being an appealing shade of tan. He practically radiated self-assurance and
Chrysta found her breath quickening as she looked at him. "Baron..." he
said, and his voice was deep and inviting.

"My Lord..."

"Would you care to introduce me...?" he indicated Chrysta, and Leonine
smiled a moment.

"This is my ward, Chrysta." Leonine turned to Chrysta. "Chrysta, this is
Lord Rhydian of House Gwydion..." Rhydian took her hand and kissed it in
greeting.

"It is my pleasure to make the acquaintance of so lovely a lady."

Chrysta found herself blushing a moment. "Why, thank you, milord, I must
say, I am unused to such compliments, I am very new to all this..."

As they talked, Mistral Wind stood in the shadows watching them, fear
squeezing his heart like it had not in so very long. Oh, Gods, he
thought, It's him.

* * *

Rhydian sat thinking about the evening from his favorite chair in his
library. All in all things had gone well. The girl was charmingly naive and
innocent, just what Mistral would fall in love with, and she was
breathtakingly beautiful as well. This would be enjoyable, very enjoyable,
and it looked as if Mistral was tormenting himself enough with his
"impossible" love that Rhydian could afford to take his time, yes, he would
take his time and maybe this time the girl wouldn't end up dead. That had
been so disappointing.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Time passed and the school year came to a close, finally, and Chrysta
was free, for three months at least, to spend her time as she pleased,
within reason of course. She eventually had it out with her parents when
she was getting dangerously close to the point when she couldn't take it
anymore, and they were giving her a little more slack, it was her mother
who suggested that she go away for the summer, and so she went to spend the
summer at the Freehold, though her parents thought she was staying at a
special camp for band students or some other such nonsense.

Rhydian became a frequent visitor to the Freehold over the months, and
he would occasionally take part in her lessons and it was quite a shock to
her the day she realized that he was flirting with her, and that she had
been flirting back. Well, why shouldn't she? That mysterious man of her
dreams certainly wasn't making amy moves and she figured it was about time
she had a suitor.

Chrysta enjoyed Rhydian's attentions, but as time went on she became
more and more confused. Her dreams were of the other man, but he never
spoke to her. Rhydian spoke ot her, laughed with her, danced with her, but
she never dreamed of him. She couldn't even talk to anyone about the
mystery man, and she was strangely reluctant to say anything about him to
Rhydian.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

She was fighting, sword in hand, and it was a losing battle. They were
being overrun and there was nothing she could do about it. Her beloved
pulled her aside from the fighting, just as an axe clove the empty air
where she had been standing. They fled, hand in hand, down the tunnels
below the castle to a place of safety he had been preparing for them.

Their enemies could not follow them once the protections were in place
and that gave the lovers some moments of peace, and the chance to simply
hold each other. "I will love you forever, my Lady, but you must leave me
for now. I will not risk losing you."

"I would rather die at your side than live without you, Beloved."

"You won't be forced to live without me, dearest. I consulted the Seers,
and our paths will cross again. We will love again. But now
you must go, I will hold this place safe for you." He took her in his arms
and kissed her tenderly and then, with tears in his eyes, he pushed her
through the Trod to Arcadia. As she fell through she saw a dagger in the
shadows, falling towards his unprotected back. She tried to scream, to warn
him, but her voice would not work, and he fell forward, just short of the
Trod opening, and someone else stood beside him, gloating over his
traitorous actions. The person entered the Trod with her and she backed
away from him, more in self-protection than in fear, though her heart was
shredded in her breast with her love's death.

"You will forget..."

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Chrysta woke up screaming from that one, and knew right then that she
had to go talk to the mysterious man, though she didn't know how to find
him. Wordlessly she reached for her dressing gown and took off silently
down the hallway towards the underground passages, hoping that Dan
would lead her feet, because she didn't know where she was going.