Ancient of Dunaya Chapter 1: The Well of Life

The deceptively calm surface of the well represents the power of desire. A human can want something so that he weeps at night, and no one would guess to look at him in the day.---Wesley of Dunaya

The light was life, and she struggled against the tempest in the darkness to reach it. Limp shadows rose and fell in the maelstrom, silhouetted against the circle of light so far above. Particles of light sparkled through the energy of the well, dark and light swirling against each other until at the bottom was darkness.

A shadow kicked her shoulder. She clung to its legs, climbed, then grabbed its arms. It pushed her away, and she kicked its face. It kicked her face harder, and she fell. The light embraced the shadow figure, and the shadow disappeared into the circle of light.

Weary of the struggle, she continued to fall. The light shrank to a vague shimmer.

A force inside her pulsed; with concentration, she pushed this energy to her fingers, her toes. They twitched. She told her feet and hands to move, to fight. They kicked and swung, and she rose the pillar again amidst the galaxies of bodies.

Someone touched her. It was male, different from her but the same. He shoved her aside and swam above; she caught his heel. He jolted. She hung on and climbed his legs, which were as thick as her waist. His strength intimidated her, his ferocity matched hers.

But it was her turn to live.

Struggling, they neared the surface. Light brought details and color to her awareness and sharpened the shadows of determination on his face. The light was all that mattered, the way to freedom, the way to rest. Reach. Only kick and reach through torrents of weightless, dizzying energy.

Reach.
Kick, push the other. Must be first.
Life waited at the surface.

Stretch, grasp the light. Droplets of light glistened around her head. The current's ferocity increased as she fought upwards. Closer. Chest heaving. Legs kicking. Grappling. Violence. Faces of the others struggling below her: frightening, gaping mouths, angry eyes.

Weary. If she let go, she could drift down to the bottom and rest.
Rest, and never live.
Scowling, the male thrust her away. She kicked his chin and he fell, down, down the dark pillar, agony emblazoning his face, the same agony she'd felt.

Almost to the top. The light covered the darkness, and she twisted. Rest. Touch the light and find rest.
The light mirrored in her chest with happiness and success.

The surface. Reach through. All became brightness when she grasped the surface. She clutched the light like it was solid, and tugged, fingers touching nothing... but that nothing pulled her out. The light, sunlight, bathed her face and she took a first gagging breath. Torrents of delight swirled in her heart. Her legs struggled. Almost out.

Hands grabbed her ankle under the surface, she kicked and heaved herself onto rocks at the edge of water.

Sounds filtered to her, pleasant, restful: breeze through grass and leaves, birds chirping happily in this new place of color and light. Green, blue, yellow, red, no longer only black and white. She crawled, forces still tugging at her ankles. And then her feet reached the silence also. Cool, green grass tickled her fingers. Stones jabbed her chest; she didn't like the feeling so she rose on hands and knees, crawled toward the grass, and collapsed onto her back.

Sunlight, so desired in the darkness, hurt her eyes, which she closed. Its warmth bathed her cold weakness, calmed her limbs. Air, sweet in the energy it gave her, rasped in her chest. Lifting an arm was a new sensation, movement without a current to seize her. She covered her face and opened her eyes in the shadow.

The arm changed both color and shape, from yellow, to swirls of purple and green, to brown, to pale pink, the colors swirling together and fading. The limb grew and shrank, rounded and lengthened, fingers appearing and disappearing, hair covering and dissipating, change with nearly every breath. Her trembling relaxed, dizziness settled.

So this is what it was to be alive. Change.

She found strength and sat up, setting her back against a hot boulder. The pool she'd crawled from glistened, its surface lying smooth in a frame of stones and multicolored flowers, all belying its treachery beneath. She shivered again, but the sun warmed her.

Grass surrounded the pool, and trees surrounded the grass, with a white-swirled blue sky overhead. Energy dripped from her hair, and trickled into pools beneath her. Time, a new sensation, tugged at her skin, and compelled her breath. She had sat long enough for a spider to crawl across a rock, its spindly legs glistening in sunlight.

"I am Kareth," she said, the realization as clear as the sunshine glinting on the pool.

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