Caladar clutched his head in both hands and fought the urge to vomit.
It was in his best interest to let it out now, here alone in his field tent with no one to see, but he was at all times on guard against any loss of self-control. And besides, someone might be outside listening.
Never had he felt such dread before setting foot in these lands, these lands that seemed so fair, and yet oozed with a malevolence such as Caladar had never felt... and the nightmares...
The first night, after willing his already-frayed nerves through a lecture with the stonemasons, Caladar had tossed and turned worse than his worst night on the stormy sea. And when slumber did at last mercifully descend, his dreams were full of the shambling of a thousand rotting feet, and the screams of the walking dead.
He awoke to a Vozzessdor dancing with shadows, as if flames played behind every nook and corner, a city gone to madness. "Or is it I who've gone mad?" Caladar had wondered, and wondered again since.
With haste, he gathered his men and made for the road to someplace named Xerus, any place but where he was, but the shadows followed.
They spoke to him the second night...
