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Of Centipedes, Snails, Candle Wax and Locks

Once again, Scald found himself sitting at his work bench in the window, not for his studies or planting, but for that secretive journal bound in black. Why always did it seem dreams of such dark intent that drew him to record them down?

Journal, in my dreams I found myself in a very dark place once again last night. It was such a large house I didn’t recognize, full of winding corridors and doors behind which I did not know what lay. The hallways were illuminated barely by candles and the occassional gas lamp on the wall. Though for some reason I found myself carrying a torch, partially of which was coated with green candlewax.

As I wandered this strange and looming house, I became aware of something dreadful following close behind me. Without looking, I broke into a run, making my way towards the front of the house and right up to the front door before I wheeled around to face my pursuer. It was a small thing, just under my own height, twisted and shriveled with sunken eyes and malice in it’s rumpled smile, shadowed by a dilapidated brown top hat pulled over it’s bald head and hunched under a shabby coat. I knew it meant to harm me and I dared not touch it, but a ritual came to my mind and with a wave of my torch I was able to herd it around the foyer and towards the front door that had been behind me.

I drove it out by fire and with it screeching and banging at the other side of the door I began to seal the door’s edges with the green candlewax that coated my torch. After long, stretching minutes that seemed to drag into an hour of doing this work, all seemed to fall quiet and I dropped back on the floor exhausted from not just the physical energy spent in the task.

It was then that dear Miss Maggie walked up beside me from some depth of the house. But she didn’t seem herself. She seemed lost as if in a daze, and her mind almost laid low and simple by some dark spell that robbed her of herself. But it was she who spied a corner near the door where a mouse was chewing a hole into the house from. She cooed to it and called it  to come inside. I feared it was the monster without having taken a new form as things so twist in dreams. But as she picked up the small grey and brown mouse, I felt no worry of it and even patted it softly myself. Miss Maggie, however, didn’t seem to understand my fears of what was outside and as we shooed the mouse back into it’s hole, she began to reach for the door to let the monster in.

I moved into her way and shook my head and she stepped back, wondering what on earth was the matter with me, saying it was just her dear friend Pip out there.

I’ve heard Father say things about a Pip.. “Poor Pip” he says… I didn’t think this monster was anything to pity… But all seemed quiet out and the morning light was beginning to filter in through the windows on either side of the large door.

Maggie, by now, had seemed to have just faded into the background of the dream as I turned to ease open the door a crack.. I saw no sign of the horrible little monster at first and cautiously eased bare feet out onto the stoop, pausing as I saw earthy things about on the steps. A large brown snail, a black centipede, an orange red toad, and a great big worm squirming. I carefully avoided them, fearing poison for some reason and looked up to see the monster frantically trying to take apart the lamp hanging from the eaves of the porch.

I found a voice of my own to speak with and called out to him. “I know you’re seeking to harm me. You’ve placed these crawling creatures of the earth here for a reason. And even now any moment that glass globe of the lamp will…” And it came smashing down, scattering glass over me as I shielded my eyes. “And there it goes.” But he seemed to pay me no mind. He seemed hell bent on something else as he played with the hatch and surrounding frame from some iron stove, ripped off by his own hands in frustration as he couldn’t seem to get the hatch itself open and even now tried to pry it from every angle but the latch.

I realize too late even as he finally had a look of success and realization as he opened the latch. My green wax charm had only driven him back because it had made him forget how to open latches and now he knew how to get in! He dropped the hatch and lunged at me just as I retreated back in and slammed the door in his face. Though now he tore at it with a fury unlike anything I’ve seen! I screamed in fear with a voice I haven’t known in waking even as he took a blade to the edge of the door in an attempt to break the latch as the entire door of oak seemed to heave and bow towards me as if it would splinter into a million pieces! And I screamed at it, trying to banish him. “In the name of the owner, the Father of this house! I cast you out!” His fury was undiminised as he tore at the lock! “In the name of his wife, the Mother of this house! I cast you out!” Still he tore and it seemed as if the latch didn’t break, the door itself would! “In the name of all this household, the Children of this house! I cast you out! THRICE I CAST YOU OUT!”

I thought it had all failed and the door would burst in on me in a shower of oak when the chime of the nearby clocktower on Brunel Hall startled me awake from the dreaded nightmare. I tried to cry out, but the strong voice of command within the dream had only been a dream and my throat was still just a silent whisper of air.

Scald placed his pen down and blotted the pages just as he heard a call from his father by the front doors of the shop. “Scald? Why is there green candlewax all over the bottom edge of these doors?”

((Once again, I know no true relevance of this to current events as it was an actual dream I had. But should anyone wish to use it in any way for goings on in town, feel free. And feel free to comment, just recall this is a private journal no one has access to ICily)) 

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6 Comments

  1. Nathaniel Lorefield Nathaniel Lorefield June 3, 2011

     shudders at the thought of such a dream.

  2. Caspian Moonstone Caspian Moonstone June 3, 2011

    Sclad?! Why did it have to be my pricy organic soy wax candles!?

    • Booger Sonnerstein Booger Sonnerstein June 3, 2011

      Scribbles on his slate and holds it up for Caspian ‘It was the right shade of forest green.’

  3. Tepic Harlequin Tepic Harlequin June 3, 2011

    Ah dreams! Sometines they can be so real as to be more real than reality itself!

    Once troubled by such dreams i too wasm but took some wise advice from a friend, and knowing i was in my dreams, i accepted i could turn them the direction i wanted – not easy, and not swifty, as my dreams were sometimes sneaky and pretended they were not dreams, but eventually, i could take control when i wanted. 

    Since then, my dreams have subsided, and no longer trouble me…. except when certain people are “horsing” around! hehehhe

    • Heliotrope Lionheart Heliotrope Lionheart June 3, 2011

      Now, now, that was only those five times so far.  And the giant vole butter monster.  Six times.  Seven if you count both nightmares that night as one each.

      Eleven times tops.

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