Inkitt Link, for those interested.

Author Warning: It's 5 AM here. I haven't been in bed yet, and this chapter probably has 8,314 simply typos or little grammar mistakes in it. I'll clean it up later this evening sometime, but I'm off to bed for now. If you want to wait for a cleaner version, feel free to do so before reading it. If you do read it, and see anything terribly out to place, feel free to drop me a note and it'll save me some looking for it later.

Night all. I hope you guys are enjoying reading the tale, as much as I am writing/telling it. :)

It was well past noon, according to the brightness of the lightstone in our small room, when I finally began to stretch and look around. Crystal was still sleeping soundly, snuggled up tightly against my side, with one of her legs draped casually over mine. Grinning slightly to myself, remembering the passionate night before, I gently leaned and began to nibble on the corner of her ear and neck. One of my arms and hands was trapped underneath her head as she used it for a pillow, but my other was free to move down and stroke intimately between her legs. After several indulgent moments on my part, she began to moan lightly, while stretching and gently opening her eyes.

“You’ve got me, My Lord,” she whispered quietly between moans.

Laughing lightly, I rolled on top of her and whispered back, “Not yet, but I will be in just a few more moments.”

Laughing lightly, she lifted her head to free my trapped arm, and then lazily crossed her arms under her head and opened her legs invitingly. “Do with me what you will, My Lord,” she invited.

So, I did.

Once we had finished, I created a little water and we washed the sweat and smell of wild passion from ourselves. For simplicity’s sake, I wrapped my robe around myself, while Crystal simply pulled a small skirt up and fastened it around her waist. Without even bothering to put on a top, she grabbed up Heartblade and led the way out to the common area where the others were. Leaving our lightstone at the opening between the rooms, I followed after her.

“Good morning, all!” Crystal greeted cheerfully.

“What’s so good about it?” Dino grumped. “Except it’s already passed and gone. You two missed morning completely.”

“Well la de da!” I couldn’t help but laugh. “Did I have an appointment to do anything special today? I thought the schedule was simply, ‘sit on ass, don’t get eat, let Jess heal the girls’. Did I miss my fitting at the tailor’s this morning or something?”

“Ha! If’n ya did din ah did too!” Skeet laughed. “All I’ze did is sit on me ass, not get et, and watched Jess heal ta girls.”

I couldn’t help but laugh and nod in Skeet’s direction. Him and Mongo both seem like more than decent enough roommates to me. “So besides Dino, did everyone else have a good morning?”

“Aye,” Skeet answered, “but why ta ‘eck do ya call Mif, Dino?”

“Mif?” I asked, trying not to laugh.

“M. F.” Dino emphasized each letter uniquely. “I told them once that those would be the abbreviation to MageFlame, and Skeet remembered it. When I was trying to teach him the basics of reading, that’s what he came up with when you put them together. Mif is something I’ve been trying to get rid of ever since.”

“No wonder he’s always in such a miff,” I joked, as Crystal walked over and handed me a few pieces of jerky to chew on this morning. Finding a nice spot near the wall, we went over and sat down together. “Dino is just a nickname. I honestly don’t know why I called him that, but when it annoyed him, it stuck.” I certainly couldn’t tell them the truth; that DINO was the Dangerous Idiot, Number One on my list of initial people that I wanted to avoid having anything to do with at the school originally.

“Wanna talk about that nightmare?” Mongo asked slowly, but suddenly. He had one of those deep voices that dragged out slow, but clear usually, and made it seem like he wasn’t one who got excited often.

“It’s nothing special,” I shrugged. “I guess being down here, I just have death on my mind. I dreamed about dying, being buried, and having my soul trapped inside my body as it slowly decayed and fell apart over a few centuries. It was quite terrible, honestly.”

“Sounds it,” was all Mongo said in return, as he stared off into space.

“Sounds like what David dreamt ‘bout, afore ‘e went batty,” Skeet muttered, darkly.

“David? What happened to David?” I asked, worried a little.

“He claimed he was dreaming about death, dying, and decay every night,” Mongo told us. “Then one morning I woke up for my watch, and he was gone. So was Ghost. It was right after that, that all the dead started moving and woke. David had the map we’d drawn, so we didn’t even know which way to go to get up out of this maze. We barely made it in here to safety, and managed to bar the door behind us. It was after that, that the girls started to get sick, and everything fell to hell as we ran out of food, water, and medicine trying to tend to them. Neither Skeet or I are healers, and once Tiffany passed out, I figured we were all goners.

“To be honest,” Mongo admitted quietly, “I’d considered taking my sword to everyone and just putting us all out of our misery, while Skeet and the girls slept, but I never could do. Each breath I took though, the determination got stronger. I don’t think we’d be alive now, if you guys wouldn’t found us when you did.

“Sorry, Skeet.” Mongo apologized and hung his head low.

“What fer? In ta shape we wuz getting in, it would’ve been a relief. I woulda kicked ta ass off ya spirit fer doing it, but I’d forgive ya afer.” Skeet laughed. Slowly, I was beginning to understand him a little bit better over time.

“So did you guys get into anything?” I asked, changing the subject so the two wouldn’t feel guilty over a past that never even happened. Mongo may have thought about it, but in the end, he never actually did anything. “Find anything? Anything odd happen to explain why David started having nightmares? I might have an idea why I had one, but I’d love to find out what started all this mess.”

“Nothing that I know of.” Mongo looked over at Skeet, who shook his head from side to side in return. “Nuttin I knows of either.”

“That’s not very helpful,” I griped, while trying not to sound like Dino. “What about David. What type of guy was he?”

“Mama’s boy,” Mongo answered.

“Pussy,” was Skeet’s colorful assessment.

For a few moments, I sat in silence and tried to assemble everything I knew about people, magic, curses, corruption, and anything else that crossed my mind, looking for an answer. Coming up blank, I was relieved when Mongo finally asked, “So why’d you have a nightmare? You said you had an idea.”

“I think it’s because I exposed myself to the corruption once,” I told them all, honestly. “I’m a specialist in Earth magic, and not long after we crossed into the graveyard area, I tried to shape and use the earth to attack one of the dead walking. The taint followed back and tried to consume me, consume my magic. It simply wanted to warp or control us anyway it could. I thought I managed to drive it off, but now I don’t think so.”

“Let me take a look at you,” Jess demanded, as she walked over and worked her magic on me.

“I think my body’s fine,” I told her. “I think it corrupted my spirit, or my magic somehow. It was the taint rooting itself into my dreams last night, that caused me to have nightmares.”

“I don’t sense anything wrong with your body,” Jess proclaimed, while frowning. “But, I’m not an expert on anything which might damage your magic or your soul. You’d probably need a master wizard to check the first, and someone specialized in Death for the second. Neither is something that we usually have to train for as healers,” she said defensively.

“It’s OK, Jess.” Reaching out, I patted her cheek lightly. “No one expects you to have all the answers. If it’s my magic, I know my own energy well enough that I can sort it out and deal with it. If it’s my soul…” All I could do was shrug slightly. Damned if I had a clue what to do in the case of it corrupting my soul either.

Chewing the corner of her hair, Jess looked worried but slowly nodded before walking over and sitting back down next to Dino.

“And what makes you think you’re corrupted anyway, My Lord?” Crystal asked, trying to keep Jess from feeling guilty over something she had no control over; much as I’d changed the subject earlier for Mongo’s sake. I couldn’t help but smile and squeeze her knee gently in thanks. I’m happy she’s one who can read the mood as well.

“Actually, it was the way my dream ended last night.” Laughing, I pulled Crystal over and ruffled her hair slightly. “This one things I might be a Child of Chaos because I woke up yelling last night,” I informed everyone.

“Are you?” Jess asked, cocking one eye-brow slightly.

“Not at all,” I told her honestly. “The whole thing is a misconception. After I dreamed about rotting and decaying for a while last night, I got angry and cussed anyone and everything I’d ever met. By coincidence, I once managed to meet a Child of Chaos before in my life. As I was cussing them in my dream, they showed up and became a nascence. They didn’t like the darkness all around in my dream, so they painted everything in rainbows and colors.

“All except one small section that remained cloaked in darkness,” I clarified.

“When they bounced over to check it out, they touched it and then ran around yelling ‘EWWW! EWWW! EWWW! They were the ones screaming, ‘I’m telling! I’m telling!’ It was their shouts and screams that woke me up. I’m not a Child of Chaos,” I told Crystal, looking her in the eyes. “I just had one mucking around in my dreams last night.”

“Ya jist shut ya trap! Any more an’ ya gonna give me nightmares!” Skeet growled. Wrapping his arms around himself, he half shivered. “Ah can’t imagine how terrible it’d be ta have one ah dem in me head!”

“Not a Child of Chaos,” Crystal clarified. “Just Touched by Chaos. If that child felt something so terrible that they needed to tell, the taint around here has to be something awful. You may have just given me nightmares as well,” she pouted.

“Sorry.” It wasn’t much, but it was the best and only thing I could say as I saw the worried looks on everyone else’s faces.