Solara was talking in her sleep again. A bead of sweat had been making its way down her brow since the nightmare had started. Her voice was harsh and in a terrified whisper. She was screaming inside of her tormented dream world. Her body twitched and her feet kicked as the plot unfolded. She watch the world ravaged by flames, but they were as dark as night itself. The fire had no beauty, no comforting warmth. Instead, they were cold and heartless. The licking tendrils consumed those she knew without pause. Buildings were caught in the dark cloud of destruction, made only darker by the thick black smoke that was choking her lungs. A creature emerged before her from the chaos, a horse wrapped in a mane of purple fire. Its eye sockets were without eyes, and smoke poured forth from the holes. Its mouth dribbled a dark liquid that caught the ground aflame with each droplet. It screamed the horror of thousands of the dying and charged at Solara. Then she saw Jarreth, clad in the purest gold. He jumped between the gruesome horse and her. The horse did not acknowledge Jarreth's presence and continued to stampede. With a mighty blow, Jarreth swung a heroic sword, and the horse did not falter. Jarreth too was consumed in a petrifying scream that was only quieted by the gurgling of his firey death.

Solara screamed.

Her eyes were wide and dripping with tears. They hid the lone bead of sweat that had marked the beginning of her terrors. She had screamed out loud as she sat up from the bed and looked at the room wildly. It had only been a dream. She wiped her eyes with her arms as she caught her breath.

There was loud pounding at the door. There was a voice calling in to her.

Solara looked at herself momentarily to realize that she was not exposed. Her sleep-wear was hardly less than what she normally wore. She stood, still shaken, and started to approach the door to her room.

Jarreth's eyes grew wide after being startled from his sleep. The room was in order, there was no immediate danger, but something had made him feel wary. His gaze moved back and forth across the room, his hand clutching a knife that had been under his pillow. With each sweep he assured himself that it was just his nerves, but his heart would not slow down. A forboding feeling was pressing on him, urging him to get up. So he did, not being one to ignore his instincts when his eyes were apparently failing him. He rose and slipped his tunic on over his head, all the while wonderding what had gotten into him. He wondered if it was Aina'Fae. His belt fought with him but was eventually around his waist, and he slid his dagger behind the leather strap before opening his door. The hallway was dark and quiet, as it usually was in the dorms of the Academy of Magic at the latest hours of the night. The only people awake were many walls of thick stone beneath them, likely practicing those magics that only worked under the chill of darkness. The door closed with a slight creak as he walked away, toward the doors that would eventually lead to the stables.

There was a horrifying scream as Jarreth walked past one of the indistinguishable rooms.

Jarreth turned, forgetting about the stables, and slammed his fist into the door. He knocked and pounded, hearing himself scream, "Are you okay?"

He was filled with an inner urgency that made him hit harder and harder with every strike. There was something driving him, something that pushed him to that door at just the right time. He could not guess at the reason for this series of events, but he did know that he was going to break the door down if he did not get a response soon.

Her breath was still quick when she reached the rattling door. Her hand felt the chill of the metal doorknob as she regained her balance. She was still tired, and her normal grace had yet to get out of bed. She let her voice out loud enough to be heard beyond the wooden block.

"I'm fine," she assured, "I'm opening the door."

There was a light click as she slid the locking bolt open. The door was still creaky. She was suprised to see Jarreth waiting for her on the other side. For some reason she had not expected to see a familiar face. Moreover, it was shocking to see him alive and well so soon after her wretched dream. He seemed panicked, or at least worried. She noticed a small glow of sweat on his skin by the torchlight of the hallway.

Solara forgot what had spurred his late visit, "Jarreth, what are you doing here?"

She had hit the question on the nose: why had he been just in front of her door when she screamed. Was it a coincidence? It was the most likely explanation he could think about at the time.

"I could not sleep, so I wanted to check on my horse. I was walking through the halls when I heard a scream. I did not know it was you," Jarreth explained, hinting at his own confusion as he walked through his reasoning along with Solara.

It was entirely true. Jarreth had not even known exactly where Solara was staying in the Academy of Magic. The dorms ranged long and wide, enough to house a thriving batch of new magicians. When training took most of an entire childhood, beds filled up extremely fast. There was hardly any turnaround, except after the occassional accident. As far as he knew, Solara could have been assigned in the opposite wing on a different floor. Instead, here she was, only a stone's throw away from his own room. Jarreth had not inquired about his housing arrangements, so he felt it was reasonable to assume that more temporary housing was combined into a section of the Academy. After all, he had been planning to stay for only a fortnight at most. From what he had gathered from Solara, she too had no intention of spending the next several years of her life digging through the library.

Collecting his thoughts more completely, he remembered to ask one of his own pointed questions, "Why were you screaming?"

Solara blushed a little and turned her head away from Jarreth. She took a step back before responding to him.

"I had a nightmare," she admitted in a humble voice. "I saw terrible things."

Her mind flashed still frames of the horrors that danced inside of her head. She was not used to scenes of intense violence. She was suprised that she could even come up with evil thoughts as those were. Solara shivered, partly out of the night chill, but also by consequence of her situation. She did not know why she had been so loud in her emotions only moments prior, but now she was acting like a child in front of Jarreth. She did know why, but she did not want to be scared where his eyes could spot her. Thinking back through yesterday and her childhood, she knew fear consumed a good portion of her waking moments. Perhaps not intense, nor so strong that it caused her to quiver in the dark, but enough to keep her mind on edge. In all that time, she could not think of anyone she would actively hide that from besides her mother, and now, Jarreth.

Solara looked up at Jarreth and apologized, "I am sorry to have worried you, Jarreth. I can leave you to your task at the stable if you would like."