Written Wonderland

Mizu pulled her long hair out of the bun it had been in all day and lightly scratched her scalp with both hands. It was dark in the large tent that served as both her personal accommodations and the strategy tent. She enjoyed sleeping the same room as the map of Asphodel, finding strange comfort in the little colored pins placed there. It was as if she were convinced her vigilance on this piece of parchment might actually prevent a sudden attack.

Though the woman sitting alone in the tent was beautiful when her features weren't made even more severe by her tight bun, very few would dare to call her that, more out of respect than fear. And though she was a woman, she rarely registered that way to anyone, including herself. It seemed unimportant in comparison to the great weight of duty and honor she held heavy with every step.

"It's not going well. The men are restless, and I can't shake the superstition from them." Mizu said aloud to the direction of a flat-topped trunk. At this, she let one hand fall and used the other to rub the front of her forehead. It had been a long month, having moved the camp from the southwestern lands of Asphodel to the edge of the territory on the east, miles upon miles upon miles from visibility of the castle.

"You're in the lands of legend now. They have every right to be nervous," replied a disembodied voice. Mizu rolled and narrowed her eyes simultaneously, grateful that Phantom could not see her.

"Superstitious men are not going to survive this. They'll run at the first suggestion of demons."

"Rallying the forces and gathering allies will help their morale. There is a lot of unrest here at the castle, and the time of our next attack is approaching. Keep your eyes open for any advantage we can take. I have a strong feeling the worst has yet to come, but we will be prepared." Mizu let her gaze and features soften slightly. Had one of her knight captains walked in at that moment, they might not have recognized her. She had always appreciated Phantom's confidence.

"It's been a long year," Mizu said.

"We all do what we must." Mizu nodded and walked over to the trunk to collect the palm-sized device Phantom had given her in the castle years ago for remote communication. She did not know how it worked and only took it after Phantom's long insistence that she have it. Though she kept it on her person at all times, the thing made her uneasy.

Truly alone now, Mizu began taking off her thick but unadorned leather armor, unbuckling belts and untying laces until she was clothed in her thick wool undergarments she only took off for washing. She was prepared at any moment to spring up and seize her foreign-made katana, sharper than any blade made by a blacksmith in Asphodel, that had been in her family for generations. Mizu blew out the three remaining candles in the tent, remembering her grandmother's prayer as she did so, less out of respect for the gods than respect for her own ancestors, and laid her narrow, nimble body onto the standard-issue cot.

Moments later, a man's terrified, murderous scream rang out into the air.

Evan laid on his back, his eyes gazing up at the fabric of his tent, one hand resting behind his head and the other on his stomach. He knew he should sleep, but thinking that and making it happen were different things entirely. He was tired, to be sure, but quieting his mind had never exactly been a strong point of his.

He swam through thoughts of worry, at how low morale was looking and how far they were from where he'd imagined they'd be by now. Frustration also pulsed though him, at the men who seemed to be giving up, or were simply unable to handle the circumstances. Anger, of course, though he'd slept with those thoughts plenty before. The tipping point, though he wouldn't admit it, was probably a flicker of fear, of the sight of the men who had lost it and the thought of Evan among them. But he was still keeping it together - still determined despite everything, and sure that if they just kept pushing they could do this. Or, at the very least, that it was worth carrying on til the end. So surely mere bad dreams wouldn't phase him... and even if it was more than that, surely he was still stronger. There was no point believing otherwise.

With a soft sigh, Evan rolled over onto his side and pulled his eyes shut, now almost determined to get to sleep out of spite. Still perhaps not the most effective strategy, but it was better than trying to 'should' himself into it, at least. It might've worked, too, if not for another goddamn scream in the night.

The black-haired captain was outside with his sword in an instant, eyes vigilant for signs of struggle or attack as he moved quickly and quietly in the direction of the sound. Gods, he practically yearned for a fight, if only because the alternative was something he couldn't do a damn thing about.

((OOC: I noticed myself starting to get caught up on what protocol for night attacks would be, especially considering that Evan's station might come with duties that don't necessarily involve running straight towards potential danger. But then again, even if Evan's actions here aren't technically what he should do... I realized that that's totally in character regardless lol.))

((OOC: It works either way. I'm totally fine with making the protocol up as we go as well.))

Mizu heard the scream and leaped out of her cot immediately, loosely throwing on her armor, grabbing her katana, and putting her hair up as she moved quickly out of her tent. Though something in her knew that there would be more than one man screaming if they were really under attack or someone would have been smart enough to raise the alarm, it never hurt to be prepared. Mizu barely registered the fact that she had not gotten to sleep.

The man's tent was in the middle of the camp, which also alleviated Mizu's fears that the king had sent troops to them already, so she did not bother raising the alarm herself for her troops to mobilize, although many of them had already blearily stumbled out of their tents in preparation. If this keeps happening, Mizu thought to herself, the men are going to stop staying so alert. These dreams need to end. Anger rushed up in her, especially because there was nothing she could do about the dreams that kept happening. They were completely out of her control, and everyone knew it. She gritted her teeth as she strode with less-than-obvious frustration toward the direction of the screaming man.

When she arrived at the tent, she pushed the other soldiers aside and looked at the screaming man. Her fury and fear welled up in her until it filled her body completely. She slapped the man across the face with a cold gesture of hardened control, but anyone watching could almost see the burn of her hand through the air.

At her slap, the man quieted down considerably, though he was still shouting incoherently.

"She... the tree and... DEVILS..." Mizu slapped him again. Harder.

"What did you see!" she demanded. The man continued sputtering. Mizu knew that the men behind her were startled by her brazen behavior, but she could not let this go on any longer. "What did you see!" she yelled in a hardened, controlled way before slapping him yet a third time, this time causing blood to start coming out of his nose.

In a moment of coherency the others had not had, the man looked directly at Mizu with horrified and somewhat guilt-ridden eyes and said, "She comes in the night. The woman. The dragon woman. She comes in the night and will pick us off one by one until we give her what she wants. I'm sorry. I let her in. I let her in."

"Who is she?" Mizu asked with a flat affect, but the man slipped back into his stupor, and Mizu had a feeling any further violence against the man would not yield results. "Take him to the infirmary tent with the others," Mizu said, doing a good job of reigning in how furious she was at the situation. Two of the nearest men picked up the mumbling man on the bed and walked off in the direction of the infirmary. Mizu followed them with her eyes narrowed, contemplating.

Mizu moved outside of the tent and saw that a cluster of her troops stood outside at the ready. She respected their tenacity but could see on their faces that they were weary and frightened. Before she could address them properly, a very short man interjected.

"I wasn't going to mention it, but now it seems... Well, my grandfather used to make charms to ward these sorts of dreams away. I made about a hundred of them, and I can give out what I have. I can teach others how to make them so the rest of us will be safe. We have the supplies readily at hand," the very short man said. Mizu looked at the young man, his light brown scruff betraying that he was barely old enough to have joined the army at all, even though he was decorated as a lieutenant.

"What's your name?" Mizu asked.

"Xavier."

As much as Mizu hated the idea of giving into this superstition, it might not be a bad idea to give the men some small comfort.

"I will find a way to end these attacks," Mizu stated loudly with more certainty than she actually felt. "In the meantime, guard yourselves. Use whatever tools you have available to you." Mizu turned and added almost as an afterthought, "Xavier will lead the charge in constructing more of the charms. I expect everyone to have one by tomorrow night."

As Mizu walked away in the direction of the infirmary tent, Xavier pulled out the charms he had apparently stuffed into his pocket, which were only a tuft of horse hair and bone sewn onto what appeared to be a piece of leather, and started handing them to the men and women standing around. The leather had a marking burned into it. It was a circle with two tangential lines symmetrically on either side.

"You have to keep it against your skin for it to work," Xavier warned.

Truth told, Evan's pace slowed when his brain put together just too much evidence that his sword wouldn't be good for shit here. There weren’t enough of the other sounds that should be accompanying a scuffle, the camp wasn't mobilizing in the right way to be responding to one, and the scream came from just about the least sensical of locations for an attack. His slowing down was a little bit just dread at dealing with the likely situation ahead, but it was also a little bit just objectively acknowledging that he wasn’t the best person to deal with it, and he knew it.

The captain came 'round the last tent blocking his view just in time to spot Mizu make her way into the tent in question. He paused momentarily, pleasantly surprised by the sound of a slap echoing from within. Frankly, Evan would be lying if he said he didn’t find some satisfaction in that, along with the tone of Mizu’s voice. It sounded like she was doing exactly what the more measured parts of Evan’s brain would do, and without the risk of getting carried away that he might’ve brought with him. This was good.

Comfortable that Mizu was handling the situation inside the tent, Evan turned his attention to the troops gathered outside.

At first glance he was struck with both sympathy and frustration. He understood why they were wary and afraid, but goddamnit, that wasn’t what they needed right now.

A younger Evan would’ve revealed his displeasure in some way or another, but he had managed to learn over the years that leadership involved expressing what people needed to see expressed, and not just whatever Evan felt like expressing. He didn’t always live up to that, but at the moment he was able to measure his response appropriately.

To that end, he calmly stepped up next to the tent facing the troops, and simply gave a firm nod, meeting a few of the more vulnerable-looking folks in the eye. Even though they were wary and scared, they were there, and they probably needed recognition for that more than they needed Evan disapproving of the expressions on their faces.

He only held it up until the man was carried out of the tent, though, when his expression couldn’t help but slip into just a tinge of frustration and disgust as he shifted his gaze to the muttering soldier. Another fallen warrior, defeated in his goddamn sleep.

Mizu emerged soon after, though, and the sight of her seemed to remind Evan to reel his expression in.

He turned his gaze somewhat curiously to Xavier when the lad spoke up. Generally speaking Evan tended to like the lieutenant's ideas, so he was intrigued to hear what Xavier had to offer here. He couldn’t say that charms to ward off the dreams was what he’d expected, though he also couldn’t say what else he was expecting to hear. He had to remind himself again that the troops were watching to keep himself from rolling his eyes as a reflex - it was just, charms felt so childish and silly in the face of everything, but then again… he looked again at the scared and wary faces of those who were there, and by golly, if a charm could get them to look a little braver, Evan would take it.

It sounded like Mizu was taking a similar approach. Evan certainly didn’t always see eye to eye with her, but tonight, at least, he was feeling fairly in sync with his commander, which was of some odd comfort.

He hung back a little when Mizu left and Xavier began passing out charms. He figured he’d let the crowd get theirs first, but as it thinned, Evan calmly approached his lieutenant, and held out his free hand for a charm, a slight smirk on his face.

“Full of surprises as always, I see."

Xavier reined in the intense compulsion to wink at Evan, realizing levity was not appropriate for the situation, but he could not help a small but wild grin from spreading over his face.

"Happy to serve, sir," Xavier said, lightly joking. Despite the grave nature of these supernatural attacks, Xavier was strangely unfazed, whether on account that he always carried his charm around and had since he was a small boy or whether that was just another quirk of his personality, it was difficult to tell. "I'm honestly surprised Mizu agreed. Hopefully, it will mean better sleep in the camp for the next few nights at least."

Xavier put a homemade charm, one of the few left now, in the palm of Evan's hand delicately, as if handing off a rare gem.

Evan accepted the charm and regarded it curiously, his smile softening a touch. He still wasn't entirely sure what he wanted to make of the thing, but the aesthetic wasn't bad, and that it was coming from one of the better-composed soldiers in camp wasn't nothing either. Frankly Evan really appreciated that Xavier wasn't someone he felt worried about succumbing to whatever this goddamn stupor was, and maybe - just maybe - these charms could help spread the kid's je ne sais quois to some of the folks Evan was worried about. Gods, fingers crossed, right?

"I'm glad she did agree to it." He said calmly after a moment, bringing his eyes back up to meet Xavier's with an approving nod. "We've dragged the men outside of familiar territory; we needed to think outside the box." Then, he let his smile curl into a bit of a smirk again. "I'm glad we can count on you to come up with creative ideas."

Maybe sometimes he spoiled Xavier with too much approval, but dangit, when Evan liked the kid he just liked him. There were times Xavier absolutely drove him up a wall too, though, and it wasn't like Evan held back in those moments either, so... this was fine, right?

Evan gently closed his hand around the charm, and reeled his smirk back in to a calm smile.

"Go ahead and finish passing out the rest, and then get some sleep. We'll see to it you have help making more tomorrow."

Xavier beamed at the praise and prevented himself from giving Evan a friendly shoulder check. Evan still was his superior, but gods, that was hard to remember sometimes. Instead, he nodded with the same wild smile and turned to walk toward one of the camp's many fires, where men and women who couldn't sleep stood warming themselves with stoic faces.

---

Mizu entered the infirmary tent and looked coldly at most recent bedridden arrival. His mumbling stupor matched that of the others, and only the timing of the movements the men made were different. The words they were saying, if indeed they were words, were just below what was audible, even for Mizu's shrewd hearing.

"Has there been any change?" Mizu asked the healers, not expecting anything.

"Not really. These two did seem to get louder and their movements became more seizure-like in the moment when the third man screamed, but beyond that, nothing." Mizu searched the healer's face and saw her fatigue.

"See to it you get some help tonight so you can get some rest," Mizu ordered. "I'll also stay in here until dawn." The healer did not bother protesting; she knew Mizu would not have it. The healer left the tent to wake one of her replacements and left Mizu alone with the three helpless men. It was almost eerie how similar they were all acting. Clearly, the same sort of attack had been used on each of them.

Mizu sighed inaudibly and laid down on one of the empty cots in the infirmary. She almost wished one of the dream attacks would come to her just so they would know what they were up against. Maybe the Shel'ti would know something about these dreams. The negotiations would happen two mornings from now. Mizu hoped this would be the last attack until then.

Though she did not expect it, sleep began to come over her, maybe because the mumbling mouths of the three men almost sounded like a tuneless lullaby. Just before she fully succumbed to the sleep that laid heavily down upon her, she heard one of the men say, "De... Dehal... Dehaljadrun," though her mind barely registered it as a name.

Evan watched after Xavier for a moment, and then cast his gaze about, now a little torn on what his next move should be. A curious and determined part of him wanted to follow Mizu to the infirmary tent to try to find out more, especially since he hadn't strictly caught everything from her little interrogation before. But a frustrated and disgusted part of him frankly didn't want to deal with it. He could go spend time among the troops who couldn't sleep, trying his best to put on the faces the men needed to see, give the pep talks they'd be receptive to this evening. That was definitely something he was better at some times than others, though, and right now it sounded like a fucking chore. The other option was to go try to get to sleep himself, but he still felt pretty damn wired, and the thought of boredly laying in his tent with his thoughts didn't really suit him either. Ugh...

With a heavy sigh, the captain reluctantly determined that facing the disgust and frustration in the infirmary tent was, grimly, probably the best use of his time. Here was hoping he and Mizu remained feeling in sync so at least that much would go smoothly.

Evan approached the tent firmly once he'd made his decision. His hand brushed up against the tent flap, preparing to lift it aside before heading in, when the barely-audible incoherent mumbling of one of the men inside rather suddenly shifted to a recognizable name. It gave Evan pause, and just enough startle to pull his hand a hair's breadth away from the fabric. Just, for split-second it felt like a remarkable coincidence, both for the eerie timing and the precise name that was said. But, he reasoned, it wasn't as though he was the only person to have grown up drinking in tales of the Demon Queen, and it wasn't like this was the strangest context someone might think of her in, much less a muttering fool who was almost certainly grasping for something - anything - to make sense of whatever the fuck it was that was going on inside his head. More curious parts of Evan wondered what stories were swimming through the man's mind; whether he was afraid of Dehaljadrun, or yearning for her... heh, maybe both.

Clicking his tongue lightly, the captain pushed the fabric aside, and let out a soft huff of frustration at himself as he moved on into the tent. Now was really not the time to be revisiting childish fantasies, and he was a little embarrassed that that of all places was where his mind had wandered here.

He was somewhat surprised to find Mizu asleep, or at least most of the way there. Then again, she was much better at finding serenity than Evan ever was; why should the creepy infirmary tent be any different? The captain cast his gaze back over to the patients, so to speak. Gods, there was just plain something eerie about them that made something unnameable dance uncomfortably deep in his gut. He supposed it was just the notion of going that crazy overnight, though the synchronicities between their incoherent muttering didn't really help either. Sighing softly, Evan moved over next to tonight's casualty, noticing evidence by his nose that Mizu hadn't held back on those slaps. Not faulting her in the slightest for it, he did still feel a small swell of sympathy for the guy, and just how royally his night must've sucked. ... be sucking, really. Evan set his sword down and opened his grasp on Xavier's charm, setting his eyes upon it again. His free hand somewhat sheepishly rubbed at his messy black hair, and he shifted his gaze back to the man.

"Gods willing..." he mumbled softly, grasping the man's hand and enclosing the charm in it, "Maybe this'll help."

The most recent man to be relegated to the infirmary showed no signs of improvement after Evan placed the charm in his hand, but a new voice did come out of his mouth, one that most certainly did not belong to him.

"Well isn't that precious," the voice said. While the man had been mumbling quietly, this new voice was clear and direct. It was assuredly a female voice, smooth and deep and reminiscent of a dark pool of water that reflects no light. This was a voice that not so much demanded compliance as forcefully invited it with thick compulsion. 

The instant the man's mumbling shifted to something different, Evan drew in a sharp breath and stepped back, his hands fairly unceremoniously dropping contact with the palm they'd gently shut a moment prior. He found himself paralyzed for half a moment, stuck between the instinct to grab his sword and the mental assertion that bringing a weapon into this was just as crazy as hearing the voice in the first place. In the end he kicked his sword behind him, his paranoia at least asserting that he should keep it out of anyone else's reach, just in case. But after that he was left with the reality that his gut had jumped into his throat over something that at least part of his brain told him he couldn't have heard.

Even so, Evan wasn't one to doubt his perceptions, or his instincts.

"All right then." he muttered, stepping back up next to the man and glaring down into his eyes. But... also doing his very darned best to look past them, cuz it sure as hell wasn't the man that he was actually trying to talk to.

"Hi." He drew out the word slightly, his tone gruff and defiant.

Likely that he'd get a reply that was remotely useful? Nah. Possible that Mizu would wake up and worry he was going crazy too? Sure. Did Evan give a shit? No, not really. Any remote possibility to get some answers sounded pretty fucking good right now. Hell, even just the slightest chance he could deliver a tiny sliver of a fuck you, he'd take.