"Dragon´s Legacy Excerpt" by Robyn Wren

Gabriel’s eyes shot open. Red and black hues filled his vision in a rush of color. High pitched screams sliced through his mind like a knife. The smell of smoke and sulfur engulfed his senses, his stomach churning in disgust. Try as he might Gabriel couldn’t place where he was, nothing around him looked familiar. His memory felt blank, as if wiped clean of all he knew, yet the one thing that kept filling his vision was the sight of a wheel turning backwards. It made no sense but the vision wouldn’t go away. There was an ominous feel to the turning of the wood. Suspended in time he felt like it called to him, warned him of something. Still, he found no answers in its movement, no words to tell him where he was or why, just a black void that surrounded his mind. He tried to step forward but his body felt heavy, his muscles unwilling to listen to his commands. Cries of frustration ripped from his throat as he continued to try and force movement throughout his limbs. Gabriel closed his eyes, forcing his body to comply, determined to make some progression.

The moment his foot moved forward, shadows crossed his mind; a roar of thunder filling his ears. Gabriel’s eyelids closed in protest. The wave of pain eased and he cracked his lids open once more, his mind determined to find out where he was. What he saw shocked him to his core. Broken trees and mist covered mountains surrounded the area; the ground appeared ashen as if scorched by flames. It didn’t feel as if there was wind in the area, though he could hear the remaining leaves in the trees rustle in movement. Something was near him, a presence he couldn’t place, yet no matter where he looked he found nothing. Scents of sulfur and charred wood filled his nostrils. Gabriel turned to his left. There had to be a reason for why he was here. This was not his home that much he knew. There was nothing familiar about this place, not to mention all life appeared to have been removed long ago. How had he gotten here? Each step he took shook the ground as he walked, crumbling the earth into dust. It was as if the whole area had been burnt to a crisp. Had there been a wildfire that had ravaged the lands? Gabriel found the notion hard to grasp, not with the magnitude of the destruction he saw. If such a thing had occurred he would have remembered, the history books would have recorded it he was sure of it. No there had to be something more to this. His skin prickled with uneasiness. His surroundings felt strange, even the air had a sense of unease. There was an unnatural feel about where he was.

With every step he took the air swirled around him in a thick cocoon of dust. His body felt like lead, and his head pounded with the echoes of a thousand sounds all going off at once. He couldn’t tell if they were voices of those he knew or not. He felt distracted, his concentration not what it should be. The heaviness that moved through is body bothered him, his mind a haze of chaotic thoughts that made no sense. His mind raced for answers while his pulse hammered with hunger. It felt as if he’d not eaten for years, his stomach convulsing in protest. Every part of his body felt as if he’d been through a battle, his muscles burning as if on fire. Gabriel shook his head to clear the cobwebs that covered his mind. He needed to focus and figure out what was going on, to find out where he was at and how to get out of it. Gabriel searched his memory for anything, desperate to remember what had happened last. Nothing but that persistent black void stared back. He tried to push past the blackness and came into contact with a hard wall. Had he been killed? No… pain rushed through him with every movement he made. It was a clear indication he was very much alive.

“This isn’t natural.” His voice felt hoarse as the words ripped from his throat. Waves of nausea washed through him. “This place can’t be real.” Nothing felt real about where he was.

“It is natural, or was at one time, it’s just not what you are used to or what you expected to see.” An unfamiliar voice stopped Gabriel in his tracks, his body twisted around to locate the source. His gaze came to rest on an older woman, her jet black hair twisted up on top of her head in an intricate design. “This land used to be quite beautiful long ago.”

Gabriel’s eyes drifted across the area, the remnants of the lands littered with dead trees and withered fields. “I’ll have to take your word for it. From what I can tell there is no life left here.” He couldn’t even tell what the place might have looked like when it had been alive; the shell of what remained slowly fading into the past. “What happened here anyway?”

“Ah, that is a long story.” The sadness in her voice drew his attention. Her large dove eyes held knowledge and pain he couldn’t fathom. “There is much you do not know Gabriel, many things that have been awoken that have lain dormant for far too long. There is a time of change coming, one which has long been foretold. This is but the beginning.”

“I don’t understand. What has been woken?” None of it made sense to him.

The woman’s hand rose to hush his words, her body ethereal as she moved about the area. “You will find the truth as you fully wake to who you are.” He could hear her voice echo both around him and inside his mind, reverberating with every syllable she uttered. There was a shift in the area with each step she took, the ground welcoming her touch. “There is great deception and evil on the road before you, be wary of those you will see. The past you’ve left is only the beginning; your true path still lies before you.”