WEEKS AND WEEKS LATER
Weeks passed before Fenn’s next dream of clarity. He stood in a blank, colorless vacuum.

By colorless, the puck meant colorless. If asked, he could no more describe its hue than he could describe how air tastes. There was evidently some surface that he was standing on. It was smooth against his bare feet, yet invisible to the eye. Already, he was unnerved. This was not a reassuring backdrop. All the same, his pulse quickened, ears twitching eagerly. He hadn’t seen Banrion since the nightmare. He was starting to feel… abandoned? It wouldn’t be the first time, but...

<Banri?> he called out tentatively into the void.

“I am not she, outsider child.”

A squeak of surprise strangled in Fenn’s throat. He rounded about to face the speaker. Standing with feline grace amid the grey was a proud, sinewy beast, decorated with bits of rope, beads, and bone. Under his featureless wooden mask, his doggish face was devoid of visible emotion. All five of his reddish eyes bored into the boy.

<Oh! You,> Fenn directed, his heart beating fast. <Chulainn, right?>

For a moment, he wondered if this was just his mind playing tricks on him again -- that it was making up things. But no, the dream had the same curious clarity it always gained when Banrion was paying him a visit. Chulainn was here for real.

“Ceannaire Chulainn,” the beast corrected in his deep voice.

<Right,> Fenn said, a bite to his words. <Why are you here? You’re not supposed to be in my dreams. Where’s Banrion?> Clenched hands, flattened ears, tight stance -- the little fae admitted that he was not happy to find another in her place.

Chulainn must have picked up on the boy’s hostility. The Chancellor’s adornments clattered as he shook his head, tail flicking in amusement. “Worry not, for your Ceannaire is perfectly fine. She merely left her malachite charm on her desk, which I found when attempting to find and speak with her in person.” He gave off a few sharp, barking chuckles. “She is always in motion these days. Doing, organizing, reading, thinking. Usurping our duties, even. It pleases Regent Morrighna little. In any case, may I leave you with my message for her?”

In a moment of thorny silence, Fenn considered it. Finally, he nodded. <Why not? She’s mad at me, so it might be a bit before she gets it.>

Chulainn arched his back and stretched, pacing around the fae child with a certain thoughtfulness glittering in his five eyes. “Perhaps not. I have a feeling that she needs you too much. Servants have a habit of doing our dirtiest deeds. Tell my younger Ceannaire that I have seen the rise and fall of many a ruler. If I am to understand her intentions, she is merely the next loop in the cycle, no different from Morrighna nor Saroe.”

Fenn frowned, crossing his arms together as if it would hide his nervousness. He wasn’t sure if Chulainn was making a threat or stating an inevitability. Neither seemed good. <Okay then… who’s Saroe though?>

The Chancellor stopped, and stared. “You do not know this name?”

An unease settled in Fenn’s gut. He shook his head. <Nope. Why should I?>

“I suppose I am not surprised that she neglected to tell you of Regent Saroe. Ceannaire Banrion is a private woman. What burdens she bears, she does so alone.” Chulainn blinked and tilted his head. “Saroe is her story to tell. Speak to her of it later, when you deliver her my message. My dreams hear thunder on the horizon. Thunder, and the cries of battle.”

The boy whipped around, his ears twitching, as the Chancellor slunk behind him. <What’re you saying? What’s your role in this? Why battle?>

“My role is nothing. I neither give nor take. I observe and wait. Others wiser than I have fallen to our petty squabbles. As for the battle cries, I do not know,” the houndish fae said enigmatically, “but your Ceannaire may. Merry part, young herald.”

The Chancellor flickered and vanished from the void.

Fenn held up a halting hand as soon as the anticipated dark cracks began to spread across the vacant dreamscape. The ground to a brief halt. For once, he managed to hold on to his lucidity a few moments. It was him alone with his thoughts. Time trickled past him as he thought about Chulainn’s words. Banrion, Saroe, battle, cycle… gah. All he was left with were more questions than he could remember to seek out the answers to. So, not too different from talking to Banrion herself.

Sigh. Fenn let go, and the dream shattered all at once.