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A Glimpse of the Demonic Reality of the Draur-Tom
Introduction and Conclusion by Lady Emily
Hello folks! This little tale began on a rainy An Maad afternoon, when I was sitting in Illumination Cafe, our shoppe in the River District. As many of you know, we serve pastries and teas, sometimes hot chocolate, and as you sip or nibble you can peruse any of the growing number of treatises or tomes we have published.
As a rule, our treatises are decided upon when we meet every moon and assign the new projects we’re going to research and write about. But sometimes something sneaks in, unplanned. This is just that sort of treatise, for on that An Maad afternoon Tavaan came rushing in, quite disheveled. He had just woken up (after, obviously, a much-too-late-night), and he breathlessly explained to me that he had received the oddest of dreams. I think I’ll let his description do the talking.
Alright. I must have been really deeply asleep – I was drifting in that state where you have no concept of any reality besides the one you’re in. I was in a carriage, going down Palace Way in Aranor. The walls that surround the Inner City were rising up to meet me, and they were very, very high. Much higher than the real ones. Anyway, I looked over, and beside me was this girl – a strange sort of girl, pale of skin, with haunted, black eyes. She was blonde, and a bit skinny, and though she wasn’t what I’d call beautiful, she had that sort of look that you’ll never forget, even when you’re an old man.
I smiled, and she smiled back, and reached out to touch my hand. Her skin was very soft and smooth. She told me that Aranor was very old now, and that our carriage was going to stop.
I didn’t understand. I smiled weakly, and patted her hand reassuringly. It was a gothic sort of feel – for a moment I thought that she had seemed distressed, but her expression hadn’t changed, and now I was thinking that she seemed perhaps a bit malevolent, or teasing in an unfriendly sort of way.
Then behind her I saw it, and I found myself totally disoriented, just as if what I was seeing was real. You know how usually you dream the most preposterous things and they fit right in? Well, this didn’t. The reality of it collapsed upon me so that I felt suffocated, tight, closed. The building outside was not as it should be. It was tumbled, stricken with age. Moss and vines climbed over crumbled walls, and most of the wood was long rotted. At the very same moment our carriage came to a halt with an odd sort of lurch.
The girl grasped my hand, and led me out of the carriage. I could only stare. Cobblestones buckled under the roots of trees. Buildings lay in ruins about me. And the carriage was broken and rotted. No one drove it, and the horses that had led us a moment before lay in a heap of dried flesh and exposed bone.
I was almost overwhelmed with sadness, and when I looked to the girl, there were tears in her eyes, as well.
She led me into what had once been a home. From pitted, sagging shelves we took artifacts of a life long passed – old letters whose parchment had become brittle and yellow, a locket with a painting of someone inside, a pair of lady’s gloves, tied together with a faded ribbon.
Each object had a feeling to it, a longing and a loneliness. I remember picking up a child’s journal, and opening it. Pressed, fragile leaves tumbled out, fluttering down to the floor in a mockery of autumn. I could almost recall little fingers carefully laying the leaves between the pages.
We walked through the empty city, and she spoke to me of how often she came here, of how quiet it was. And on the beach, with old skeletons of ships littered as far as I could see, she kissed me with those dark, soft lips, and there was such sweetness in the touch.
When I awoke, I felt only longing. An awful, horrific longing, like the feeling when you’re depressed and only want to sink deeper. I missed her, and I missed the empty streets, and when I looked outside my window all I saw was teeming life, people everywhere, moving in their busy-ness. There was no comfort in the sight, but only chaos.
And then! Then I saw her. I swear I did, though it was only from the back. She was walking down the street, walking in that way she does, almost like her feet don’t need the ground.
By the time I was outside, she was gone, though I searched where she had walked. The entire episode left me shaking – it was so real!
I, of course, comforted Tavaan as best I could, gave him a cup of chocolate, and told him to watch the shoppe. Before long I had returned, on my arm a gentleman by the name of Larus. Larus is a sage that researches dreams, and what lies behind them.
He listened as Tavaan once again described his experience, and then, over tea, Larus explained what he thought had happened to our man.
"What I think Tavaan has experienced is a visitation by a Draur-Tom. (Pronounced something like ‘Drawer-Tome’). This, of course, is a variant of Demonkin, a resident of Lorenai. They choose a victim and enter their dreams. While most of us go to the Dream Realm and sort of float about, buffeted by the whims of that strange land, the Draur-Tom can control their surroundings to a remarkable extent. They will choose a companion to take with them there, someone to create things for, someone to explore with.
"Reported experiences with Draur-Tom vary widely in the content of the dreams, because demons, just like ourselves, are individuals, and there is remarkable variation between each separate personality. Tavaan’s Draur-Tom obviously has a taste for the dark and melancholy.
"Although other explanations are possible, such as a visitation by a spirit or ghost, or Tavaan being the victim of spells, his experience is characteristically Draur-Tom initiated, based on the presence of the overwhelming sense of longing left in the wake of the dream. The demon will create such desire in the victim that the person doesn’t want to be cured.
"At any rate, there is little that can be done about it. The demon will haunt him until she tires of him or until he has grown so weary (for his sleep will no longer grant him rest) that he cannot even be present in the dream state. Even then, some Draur-Tom will revisit favorite victims moons or even years later.
"The only real solution is to attempt to kill the demon. However, not only will the victim usually be opposed to this, but the Draur-Tom will often abandon a victim if they sense they are being hunted. Tavaan has some tortuous nights ahead of him, to be sure."
I escorted Larus home and returned to make Tavaan up one more cup of chocolate. He deserved it, I suppose. His sentence had been set upon him, and just as Larus said, I found him making excuses to avoid any harm being done to the girl in his dreams. He insisted that he go through the entire experience "for the sake of Illumination’s mission".
In the end, though, all we received from him were a few more reports of equally haunting dreams, and some very surly moods due to lack of any good sleep. She stayed with him for four nights, and then left as mysteriously as she had appeared. In Tavaan we have seen a pronounced change – he broods and his temper is sharp, even though he has had more than a passage of rest since she left him. I’m sure he’ll rebound, but even so, we’ve sent him on a mission to write a review on "Belly and Silk", the new dancing stage that has opened up in the Merchant District this spring. The sight of undulating female forms will no doubt speed his recovery, and we’ll soon have him back to his usual, happy self.
