Note: Yes, summary and title are deceiving, it's not the kind of story you may think it was originally. There will probably be more edited versions after this too.

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By: Inkspilled

Dreaming a Lie

Chapter 1
Death’s Smile

"You can't possibly expect me to follow you? Into that!? It's a giant rock!" The voice was distant, but clearly ringing through the air.

He had already started to walk in. With a grunt she followed. They entered to see a long dark tunnel, on the other end you could see a light, partly blocked out by the silhouettes of trees. Silently they made their way through the tunnel. Having reached the end, he led her down a small set of old stairs carved into the smooth sediment.

Taking slow cautious steps she made her way down. Looking out around her, she saw a small clearing. The sun was slowly disappearing and cast shadows upon the tombstones lined up all around her. The man had stayed back, watching her walk up to a tombstone.

She knelt down and murmured something while she dug a small hole at the side of the tombstone and put in the flowers that she had been holding. The man stood watching patiently and on closer look had noticed her place something with a dull shine to it into the hole along with the flowers.

Turning around slowly, to face the man she wiped her hands off onto her plain dress. The man had noticed that she had been crying while planting the flowers, yet she had a smile on her face, as selfish and greedy as one could imagine evil.

She started to leave, the man, slightly addled, followed. The girl walked into the tunnel again, but stopped when she failed to hear the man following her. She turned around and the man was merely standing there. He smiled and said something, but there was only a deafening silence. Or was it just a buzzing noise, too loud to be heard? She looked around her, the world spinning noiselessly adrift, she felt dizzy. She was falling. There were trees around her, a tall valley of cliffs visible. She was drifting endlessly through being and nothing. Then darkness, it was a calm quiet, the same silence of watching children sleep peacefully through the beginning of their lives.

Then it stopped, she was lying on an uncomfortable cushion, it was cold. Elle slowly opened her eyes; darkness was all that she could see. She went to rub the sleep out of her eyes; and had noticed that they were wet. Had she been crying? A terrible thought came to her. Blood? No, there wouldn’t be anything wrong with her, she sighed somewhat relieved.

“Elle! Where are you?” said a sharp voice, piercing the dark silence.

“Ummm…In here?” she answered, still not sure where she really was.

A door opened several metres underneath her and light slowly drifted in through the cracks of the tall doors. A thin figure was seen standing near the bottom of the door, peeking into the room, checking if there was anyone there.

“Elle? Why are you here?” asked the figure as she looked up and saw her now sitting upright with her leg’s crossed. Hair messy and the light still too bright to see clearly through, Elle had almost forgotten her dream. She focused, rubbed the tears away, and stuttered an unsure response.

“I think that I may have fallen asleep while in here last night.” The soon to be lady of the house had had a party last night and help was gratefully needed. She had come up there to get some rest; no one would look for her here. They were ordered around like servants until it was almost dawn. It had annoyed her so much just thinking back on it that she was now more mad than sleepy. Elle scrambled up onto her feet and carefully climbed down the ladder, straw falling onto the ground as she wiped some off carelessly. She slipped through the door and walked on. She was glad that the rain had stopped several weeks ago for she now didn’t have to worry about getting muddy as she walked on the soft grass. It was still morning and the sun shone brightly through the hazy, clouded sky. The girl didn’t answer, too busy watching Elle as she stumbled on, talking. They were now walking almost side by side, on the thin dirt path that led to the main house.

“Why didn’t you wake me earlier, Lyna? It’s almost noon now,” Elle asked, hardly expecting any answer that she didn’t already know.

“Father had told us not to go looking for you until Lady Arielle had come back from the village,” Arielle, the second lady that her father had married, or at least was about to. The first was the mother of Lyna and Arielle was Elle’s mother. Elle was told that she had received her name from her mother’s, the thought seemed so unmatched that she hadn’t let herself believe it until she could ignore it no longer. Lady Arielle had almost nothing in common with her daughter. The resemblance was surprising enough, Arielle had golden chestnut hair while Elle had a very dark brown, almost black, shade in her hair. Many people wondered at her hair colour, not many children had had black hair in the village.

She slightly increased her pace as she walked by the building’s holding the animals, she had to get back soon or else Arielle would be annoyed with her for leaving her with all the work. Although they had several maids in the house, they were almost never in. They had a tendency to call in sick, whenever a particularly large party was to be held. She also wanted to fire the maids for such lack of the work they were supposed to be doing. They were so very close to rich, yet had to work as maids did; this was horribly annoying for Elle and Lyna. Never having been used to hard labour, they lagged in their share of work. They were definitely going to get new maids. Elle neared the door, her mind switching between her mother and the maids’, by the time she was in the house, she had forgotten what she was about to speak of. Frustrated and now feeling tired she decided it best to sit down and think things through, passing the cherry-wood arch; she let herself fall onto the over-cushioned couch. Carefully pulling off the little bits of straw still entangled into her hair, she called a maid to come and help her clean up. Lyna sat down on the couch and called their dog to her; it walked up, tail wagging and playfully ran around her. After less than a minute of sitting a maid had come and led Elle upstairs to her room to clean up.

The sky swirled in dark colours of violet and blue, wisps of white drifting about. Standing on her balcony she looked out across the wide forest that led out from her backyard. She thought about the dream, trying to remember every little bit of it. She hadn’t had them since a child, and they had always been common throughout the village. But this time, it was different. Nobody had ever dreamt about something as unusual as that. She had always had a lot in common with the other village girls…..how come this was so much more different? She ran it over in her head over and over again. Nothing, she couldn’t bring her memory to the exact same place as her dream had. She decided to go out for a bit, it was only a little near noon.