Time to Shine

by Easysnuggler

52. Nightmares

“They have no empathy. They feel no guilt from killing, rather they feel powerful. They only feel fear when they have lost control.”

—George Partridge, Sociopathic Behavior in Griffons: Nine Cases

52. Nightmares

Gerald IV tossed and turned in his sleep in his dim room. The prince never slept well these days.

The head of the physician stated at him from the floor in his dreams accusingly. The two boys were often there too, watching through windows or open doors with bloody beaks in his dreams. It had been worse and was growing worse still. He often dreamt of the king, his father becoming cold and distant. Withdrawing from his eldest son, doting on his daughters.

The prince had been only 5 years younger than the King’s new bride Gyges. She was much younger than the King. Queen Gyges was beautiful. Very beautiful, and quite fecund. The prince remembered his quiet mother’s soft gold feathers, love, and warmth. The King made him so angry. His father had remarried with a year. Everyone agreed Gyges was young and pretty, someone the king had married for love, not power. It made him so angry. So very angry. How could his father rut her and keep her producing more and more of her ugly offspring?

He himself was attracted to his stepmother. That made everything so much worse somehow. He felt so unnatural. So angry, all the time, at everything. Was it any wonder he’d tried to hurt her?

He dreamed of his brothers again. He’d been twenty-one, his half-brothers eight and ten. He dreamt of the two boys, turning blue. He stared at them with a very interested look from behind a wooden screen as they struggled. They were trying to draw breath. They were so scared. So stiff. He found it fascinating. The way their bodies were jerking and spasming. Feverish. Screams high and growing shriller as they struggled to breathe. Arousing. He could see the two brother’s dark urine staining each of their sheets. First one died then the other. The physician running from room to room, trying all sorts of things. The rage of the king.

And then a bloody dawn. They dropped the doctor with his wings bound and too long a rope. Not quite so interesting, but the way the head had popped off had been hilarious. The prince had struggled not to laugh.

It wasn’t as funny now.

He had fantasized about seeing the heads pop off everyone who annoyed him. Or making them go away in other interesting ways. He’d been enrolled at the Pinnacle academy, but after that incident he had remained there in unofficial exile, just never invited to spend any time with Gyges or his father, but Griffonstone was a small place. Gyges and the king were unavoidable. His half-sisters too. Somedays it was all he could think about.

“He knows,” said a voice. A powerful dark black griffon walked from the shadow of his castle bedroom. It looked so real.

“Who knows? What? Who?” yelled Gerald suddenly standing without rising from his bed, grey claws reaching for the wall, or a nightstand, a support, anything. The griffon loomed above him. Black eyes, not even a hint of white stared down at him. Perspective was strange as it often was in dreams.

“The king knows. You murdered his sons! Your brothers!”

“He killed the doctor! He blames the doctor. At most he only suspects!” Gerald screamed up at the Black Griffon.

It looked down at him piteously. “He killed the doctor in your place. To try and teach you responsibility and empathy. To spare you. To limit the tragedy, and out of love for his dead first wife.”

“He knows nothing. There is no proof!” Gerald yelled, shaking his grey talons at the giant.

The Black Griffon smiled. “He knows. I showed him.”

“WHAT? WHO?”

“I showed him your dreams. I’ve been showing him. I’ve been showing him more and more. He knows what you are... and still… he still loves you. Fool.” The Black Griffon continued to smile, seeming to draw closer, to come nearer. They were the same size, the distance shrinking becoming more intimate, becoming close enough to feel its breath stirring the feathers of his wings. “He’ll still love you even when he orders you to be killed,” it whispered breathily into his ear. It became close and then closer to Gerald, invading his personal space, head right next to his, black eye staring into gold eye.

“You could be king” it whispered to him. His ear tufts twitched at its breath.

It whispered again “If I don’t have you killed first.”

Gerald backed away.

“WHY?‽!”

“You have what I need. Power, authority, force, ruthlessness. You’re not afraid to do the right thing. To take power for yourself. To crush those who stand in your way. To kill to get what you want. What you need. You could be great. I can help you. But I need to motivate you. You need to act. The time has come for you to eliminate your rivals for the throne. To destroy them. To seize the future and secure you place in Griffonstone. To become the great emperor griffons… need. To usher in a legacy that will last a thousand years.”

“Why would I listen to you?”

“You are not the only Griffon I can use. You are just the easiest. You have rivals. Enemies. I can point them out. I can see their dreams. I can deliver them into your claws and paws. You can have everything you ever dreamed of. Do everything you ever thought of. I can show you how. I just need a few small favors from you. Trivialities really. Small obstacles that are standing in your way too, even if you do not see them. Help me eliminate them, and I can give you power no griffon has ever had.

“If I refuse?”

“I will share the dreams you have with your stepmother. Do you think she’ll be as slow to act as your father? Do you think she will hold back when I show her you poisoning the medicine bottles? Fantasizing about doing that to her other children. Doing that to her husband? Making her watch… Doing that to her? Doing… other things to her…”

“What are you?”

“I am your future. Embrace me. Swear yourself to me. Or die by her claws.”

He was scared, so scared. “I, I need, I need to think.” He was trapped.

“Let me think on it.”

“Fine Prince Gerald. You think on it. It’s midnight. You have three days. If you haven’t joined me by then, I’ll find a better tool.”

“What must I do?”

“All you have to do to swear yourself to me is say four simple words: My life for you.”

Gerald awoke in a cold sweat, wet and tangled in damp bedding. He had peed himself.
He stumbled out of bed in the dark room that smelled of fear and old blood.

Clouds covered the sky of the one small window to his room. His room was pitch black.

He stumbled about and struck a match and lit a lamp. His gold pocket clock sat next to the lamp. He checked it. Midnight. The chimes of the castle began to play followed by twelve loud ringing tones. He was still awake when dawn came, and the tones had grown one by one to seven and beyond.

He did not fall asleep the next night either.