╔══════════════════【❖】══════════════════╗
╚══════════════════【❖】══════════════════╝
Amelina walked around the empty house, spending time to herself, working on her botanical garden or picking up things that had managed to fall over in the messy office she had. She spent most of her day there, working on new edicts and slowly perfecting things as the hours passed. Soon the sun was setting and her anxiety set in. Normally Amelina would work herself to the point of passing out, making it much easier to fall asleep, but this time was different-she wasn't nearly as tired, but with how high the moon was in the sky she knew she needed to sleep or else pay for it the next day.
She made her way up to the bedroom, staring at the large empty bed with a deep sigh. Rodrigo was away for a few days for emergency family business in Daendroque and Amelina was unable to go with due to her work. Ever since Rodrigo's accident, Amelina had been left with terrible nightmares, some of them so bad to leave her paralyzed in her bed. When these would happen, Rodrigo would easily wake up and soothe her, calming her back down to the point where she could sleep again, but he was not here and so her fear of these terrors set in as she changed and pulled back the covers on the plush bed.
She pulled one of the curtains closed on the canopy, blocking her sight just in case as she settled into her spot on the bed, getting herself comfortable as the covers were pulled up to her neck. Slowly but surely her eyelids fluttered and sleep overtook her. Hours passed with no thought of a bad dream until she was suddenly tossed into the wilderness, ripping her from dreams of her childhood home to a cold and damp forest that she had never seen before. Her eyes darted around, trying to take in the sights as she began calling out for her husband first and then her family. The only sounds that came back were the echoes of her yelling, slamming back at her in an even harsher tone than she had yelled out. Her heart began racing as she stepped forward through the forest. As she began running through the branches and the trees she noticed horses running in the opposite direction of her, only a few men to be exact, all of them wearing armor, seeming as if they were moving in slow motion. As she focused on the horses, a twig grew from nowhere and tripped her, causing her to land with a thud against the cold leaves. Pulling herself up she inspected herself to find the front of her dress and hands were covered in blood. Horrified she felt all over to see if it was coming from her but to her luck it wasn't. She spotted a clearing and moved for it, following the trail of blood towards some bushes as she reached through the thorns and pulled them apart to get through.
As soon as Amelina tore through the brush she was ripped from her dream, her eyes wide as she felt paralyzed against her sheets. Her heart raced and sweat formed on her forehead as she couldn't move herself from her spot in the bed. Her eyes darted around until she focused on a figure in the corner, unable to make out what it could possibly be. With a heavy thud to her ears it began slowly stepping forward towards her. In the darkness her eyes finally focused on the mangled body of her husband, slowly walking towards her with a spear through his chest and his right arm gone. Amelina never saw his body when it all happened, but she was seeing a month of injuries right now. She clutched tightly onto the sheets, trying to make a noise, but it was as if her lips were glued shut. The image of Rodrigo's corpse continued towards the bed before it went to open its mouth, blood pouring from it's lips. Tears began pouring from Amelina's eyes as she tried her hardest to wake herself up, but she knew she couldn't do it on her own, she never had been able to. She silently cried as she watched the body try to speak until an unnatural screech of her own name came from his mouth, deafening her as she laid there. As soon as the figure screeched, Amelina was able to gain her own awareness and gasped, sitting herself up as she blinked a few times. She looked around the room and it was empty.
She reached over to light a candle, noticing that the room was empty, no sign of a body and no sign of any blood. She wiped at her cheeks to stop the tears, but to no avail as they continued to pour out. She moved with the candle towards the couch in the room, pulling back the windows to let the moon pour through the large window. Laying herself down she pulled the robes she wore tighter, beginning to fully cry then. She knew she couldn't sleep until the sun came up-or she just wouldn't sleep at all. Surely the next day her eyes would be bloodshot and the bags under her eyes would need makeup to cover them. She cried until she couldn't any longer, simply just staring out of the window and up to the sky, motionless for what seemed like an eternity. The sun began to rise and she put out her candle, sitting there for a few more minutes as she decided to move and get dressed. She would go through the same routine, focusing on her garden, focusing on her work, anything that would stop her from ever seeing the terrors again.
(Hi, I just say pretty often that Amelina experiences night terrors and wanted to actually write about what she might see.)
