IABD 23: The Blood Swamp and the Meadow

The hulking beast stared at Matthias, its red eyes piercing the dark.  

The barest remnants of his brother’s features lay in the monster’s face; Bregindoure’s familiar golden beard hung below a bear-like snout, crowned by an eagle’s sharp beak. Fangs like a tiger’s gleamed between parted jaws. 

The monster’s hulking body was the size of a large boulder, covered in a coat of needle-tipped, iron wire. Paws, like a tiger’s, ended with curved talons, hooking into heaps of skulls littering the island’s surface. 

Bregindoure—or the beast he’d become—wore the stink of blood and hate; the Rune of the Berserker burned on the back of his front, right paw. 

He growled, turning his bloody snout away from the corpses of their family. Even their father was there, his carcass was so mutilated it was in tatters, only recognisable from the Dramagnus family crest stamped on a ring on his finger.  

But Bregindoure’s attention was no longer on the dream-corpses, his eyes were fixing on Matthias. 

“Oh…by all the deities,” Matthias murmured. 

Bregindoure rose up on his hind legs—like some great tree sprouting from the ground—then looked down at his brother, thunder rumbling in his chest. 

Red steam escaped his jaws. 

An iron tongue—serrated on all sides—slid from his mouth to lick his lips.  

“Breg…” Matthias said softly. “Breg, it’s me.” 

Red steam billowed from Bregindoure’s mouth in a great cloud, and the Rune of the Berserker burned on his paw. 

The island shook as he took a step. 

“Bregindoure, it’s me! It’s Matthie!” Matthias cried. “You have to find yourself! Please!” 

The beast stared, pausing in place. 

Then, shot forward. 

Matthias screamed, leaping back as a gargantuan paw swung. Hooked talons caught his chainmail, ripping through the metal, flinging him end over end through the air. 

He landed in the bloody bog, plunging beneath its red surface, arms flailing. 

The Beast watched him get up, escaping the ichor—coughing and sputtering. He roared, charging with supernatural speed. Matthias turned and fled, wading toward the nearest island of skulls and as Bregindoure crashed down in the bloody bog—a torrential splash followed. He rushed after his younger brother. The young greatfolk’s tendril shot from his shadow, pulling him onto the bank. 

He turned toward Bregindoure, seeking to learn his form…but there was no form to be learned. 

There was only bestial instinct and an overwhelming drive to kill. 

Matthias stumbled backward across the uneven surface, raising his weapons. “Bregindoure! Bregindoure, you have to hear me—” 

The monster came at him in a storm of slashing claws and snapping fangs. 

Matthias lost footing on the skulls, landing on his back. 

“Shit!” he spat out a curse, expelling the breath from his chest. 

He kept his lungs empty; he needed to get out of this dream fast. 

The monster leapt, pinning his right arm. 

Matthias nearly screamed, but kept his teeth clenched and his breath held though talons pierced his chainmail, already tearing into his arm.  

His spiritual body shook, consciousness rapidly fraying. 

The Beast, that was his brother, licked his slavering lips. 

His jaws parted, coming down. 

Closing in on Matthias’ face… 

…he suddenly awoke, gasping in his bed. 

“Matt!” Beggahasta was gripping him. “Matt! By the Ascended, keep working on him, Altaizar!” 

“It’s alright, the wounds aren’t deep.” Altaizar’s voice came from the side. 

From elsewhere in the room, his sister was praying. 

Matthias groaned, looking at his right arm. Blood stained the sheets beneath it. Altaizar was already bandaging it. 

“What happened, Matt?” Beggahasta demanded. 

He grimaced. “Bregindoure’s dream was…well it was an actual nightmare.” 

He described his brother’s dream-world—emphasising the large amount of blood, skulls and darkness—telling them what Bregindoure had become, what he’d been feasting on, about their brief fight and the four bodies on the gallows. 

Beggahasta grew paler with each word, hugging him when he finished. “Thank the Ascended you’re alright!” 

Dagma had come toward the bed during his story; Matthias was so out of sorts he hadn’t thought to edit what he was saying. She stared at him with enormous eyes. “Why…why was he eating us?” 

“Because that’s how he sees himself,” Altaizar suggested, wrapping the last bandage. “As a beast destroying his family in a world of utter destruction. I am no dream-teller, but it seems obvious to me.” He placed a hand on the gauze. “Heal better.” 

“Well, that explains why he attacked me.” Matthias grunted, laying his head back on the pillow. “Alright, I’ll need you all to stay quiet so I can get back to sleep.” 

“Wait, why?” his mother asked. 

“It’ll be easier for me to get back to sleep if it’s quiet.” 

“You’re not thinking about going back into his dream, are you?” 

“As fast as I can.” 

“Have you lost your mind?” Beggahasta looked at him as though he was planning to run barefoot through the flaming hells. “That’s out of the question.” 

“I’m Breg’s only hope.” Matthias gripped his sheets. The ache was already fading from his arm. “I’m already feeling better: my body’s so much stronger now and I plan on being a lot more careful this time, but I need to go back.” 

“Perhaps tonight would not be the best night,” Altaizar suggested. “He might have a more pleasant dream tomorrow, making it a far easier task for you.” 

“Or he might have an even more deadly one,” Matthias pointed out. “What if he dreams about fire? No skulls. No blood. Just fire everywhere. Then what? I can’t walk through an inferno, but at least I can go into the dream he’s having now. I have to try again while I still can, but just be more careful.” 

Beggahasta looked down at Matthias. “How will you be ‘more careful’? Be specific.” 

“Um,” Matthias paused. “I’ll scout out the dream, keeping my distance. See what I can learn about him.” 

She thought for a moment, then nodded. “Alright, but you are going to try and take me with you again, alright? I’ll see if I can dream about our family.” 

“Of course, mother,” Matthias said. 

In The Realm in Dream, the halls of the Stonebreaker house appeared from the mist around Matthias. He stood in front of his mother’s bedroom staring at the door handle, finally reaching out and opening the door, he found the room empty. 

“She must not be asleep yet,” he presumed. 

For a time, he waited—eventually—the interior of the room shifted, becoming mist, swirling within a void. 

From the void came the sound of whispering. 

He pressed his hand to it. 

Once again, he was repelled by a force. 

“She must be dreaming of something else.” he said, beginning to turn away. “I’ll get to Breg’s—” 

The sound of her harp reached him and he turned back to her room. 

Inside, the void and mist boiled away. Warmth poured through the door as a sunny meadow, filled with wildflowers, replaced the vanishing darkness. Apple trees dotted the forest beside it where a babbling brook ran through the space. 

“What is this place?” he wondered, peering at the landscape. The air smelled fresh, like springtime. “I…I almost remember i—Is that mother over there?” 

A figure was emerging from the forest: a tall woman with long, golden hair hanging loose, falling down her back to the middle of her waist. She looked young in her bright blue and red dress. The colours were so vibrant, they seemed to dull the other colours around her by contrast. Around her neck were half a dozen necklaces of gold and platinum, each thick, heavy and beaten into various figures and designs. Her bearskin cloak was draped around her bare shoulders. 

She carried her massive harp as though it were no heavier than a willow twig, as she plucked its shining strings, humming while walking along. Three small figures were playing nearby. 

Matthias recognised the tiny form of Dagma first, looking just as she had when she was four years old. Her braided pigtails were short at that age, bouncing freely as she ran, chasing a blonde boy who looked quite familiar.  

His smile was mischievous, his energy rambunctious with every move he made.  

“Who is-Wait, that’s me!” Matthias cried. “Did I really look like that…and why do Dagma and I look the same age? Well, it is a dream after all…and if that’s the two of us, then that third small figure must be—” 

Another child—roughly the same age as the other two, but much bigger—sat crying, his broad hands pressed to his face. The Rune of the Berserker burned on the back of his right hand. 

“That’s Bregindoure,” Matthias murmured. 

“Ohhh, Breg, it’s okay.” Beggahasta rested her harp in the field, bending and picking up the weeping boy. She rocked him, humming a gentle tune. 

Matthias found himself reluctant to interrupt her dream; it almost felt like he was looking at an image of what their family could have been, if troubles hadn’t befallen them. 

“Maybe I should leave her be,” he considered. 

A moment later, he shook his head. “Bregindoure needs us, desperately. None of us can bask under a false sun while the real world plunges further into night.”  

Matthias stepped through the door and into his mother’s dream, feeling the warm wind on his skin. He approached cautiously as she soothed Bregindoure. 

‘Kari thought I was just another part of his dream,’ he remembered. ‘So how am I going to convince mother that I’m real?’ 

He stopped about twenty paces from his dream-family, then cleared his throat. “Mother?” 

Beggahasta whirled around, holding Bregindoure closer, immediately stepping between Matthias and her dream children. “Who are you?” 

“It’s me, it’s Matt.” He pressed a hand to his chest. “Your son.” 

“That can’t be.” She nodded at little dream-Matthias running around on his stumpy legs. “Matt is over there. You are a stranger to me…though you do look familiar.” Beggahasta looked up at him, her caution slowly fading. “We must have a blood relation of some sort. I can see a bit of Uncle Taimoor in your face. Are you one of my cousins?” 

“You did say I looked something like great uncle Taimoor,” Matthias said softly. “Try to remember. It’s me. It’s Matthias, your second son.” He paused, focusing his intent on emphasizing the truth in his words. 

She took a step toward him, squinting at his face. “You…you’re right, you can’t be my cousin. My cousin is not as big as you. Our family is large, but we haven’t had the giant blood run strong enough to produce true greatfolk in generations. Not until…my…children.” 

The dream-world shuddered under the weight of her realisation. “Oh by the Ascended, Matt, it is you!” 

A ripple swept through the world, even striking Beggahasta. Her colourful dress transformed, changing into her crimson armour. Tallis was slung across her back. Her face… 

…hadn’t aged. 

Matthias had been wrong: she hadn’t actually been younger earlier. His mother was a practitioner of Life-Enforcement, which slowed aging the deeper one’s mastery of the art went.  

At one time her face projected carefreeness, youthfulness…now, her expression was much different than her younger self’s, telling the truth of the pressure she’d lived under, for years. 

Her features were now harder. 

Looked far more tired. 

But also, stronger. 

“I remember everything,” Beggahasta said. “Let’s go save your brother.” 

“Wait, how did you do that?” he asked, gesturing to her armour and weapon. “Did you summon all of your equipment? I thought you’d be in your bedclothes.” 

“No.” She shook her head. “I went to sleep in my armour, sword in hand, just like old times on the battlefield.” 

“Clever.” Matthias said, looking at the small Bregindoure still cradled in her arms. “Shall we go?” 

“Yes.” She put down the dream version of his older brother. “Let’s go save my real son.”  

Matthias nodded, pointing at the doorway to his dream-realm. “Alright, come with me. The door’s that way.” 

She squinted, following his finger. “...what door?” 

“That one-Oh.” He froze. “Can you not see it?” 

She looked to where he was pointing, searching for the doorway that was supposed to be floating in space. “I only see more of the meadow.”  

###

Author's Note

Remember when I said there'd be some extra chapters coming out during the couple of weeks after launch? DOUBLE POST TODAY!

Also NGL, pretty much imagine Beast-Bregindoure as a Bloodborne boss, lmao.

Cya in 24 in like a second!