#despite my Fen fascination rn

[steel-and-fire]

I kept falling in the abyss, the same dreams of darkness surrounding me. Voices, images, suffocating me, paralyzing me...Until i hit the ground, and my bones crush under the impact, chains wrap around my limbs, pulling me to my knees.

I see all i can only helplessly witness, a memory lost to the world, no matter how hard i pull the chains, or i scream. Blood spills, smiles ruined, suffering spreads. Tears run down my cheeks, gritted teeth till i bleed, agony that can shatter one's mind...Like every night.

But then, something changes the ordinary course of it all...

A ray of light, shining from above, bright like sunlight, illuminates me, and then pushes away the darkness around me, melting the chains that held me. The light encompasses all, and everything i can see is its blinding radiance.

I feel hands on my shoulders, both delicate and soft, barely able to hold them, and as wide and immesurable as the entire light all around me.

"Oh, Igris'Ir, my beautiful champion...The darkness will reach you no more...Fret not..."

"It was...you...", i speak, feeling my body slump, the tension leaving me, the anger, the despair, the tear inside me. "Why...? i never prayed to you..i even came to loath the gods? Why..?"

"It matters not whether you worshipped me or not, Igris'Ir, the Fireborn...Every day that you gazed at the Sun, and you felt gratitude that it rose to the sky once more, and you smiled...It reached me, for it was me you were smiling at.."

But i still felt troubled, i had so many questions.

"I...Was blessed by another before...I left his teachings.....I was bitter..Why you...?"

A soft chuckle echoes from everywhere at the same time, deafening yet not.

"It was not easy to reach you...Many of us made our claim...But i could not allow another to have you..Not this time..Not anymore...Forgive me for making you wait in that sea of magma..it was not an easy claim to win..."

Her words reached in me, and i leaned back, as if exhausted, and something held me. My eyes were closed, having lost the power to hold themselves.

"What is happening to me....I can't heal..I can't spread your light..."

"The Sun is more than healing light, my champion....I have others, that carry my blessing, that heal and protect..

But you....You carry my Fire. You are clad in my Flames, and your purpose is to scorch and to burn, to cleanse, to incinerate!...All the wicked, the vile, the unrepentant..

You carry the biggest burden of all....You are the Blaze that will cleanse the world."

I was so sleepy now...so tired...the words came out difficult...barely able to speak them...

"I'm not sure if i can carry your name...If i can live for you..."

"That, is why i chose you, Igris'Ir...because the fire inside you burns brighter than any...untamed and wild...Never fear it...Never let it be smothered....embrace it...You do not serve me...My guidance only gives your insticts purpose..."

My words fail me...i drift away, in an embrace that i feel so completely....

My eyes open, and im in my bed, in the tavern. There are tears in my eyes, but not the usual ones, not from pain..

There is a lot to think of.