literature

Ylthorin's Dream, part 1

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Ylthorin watched from the ground, with steely eyes as the Orc and the Princess took flight. As he watched, tears began to swell in his eyes. It had been so many years since that fateful encounter, since his shame. And his chance for vengeance, ruined. He was dazed, but in the depths of his mind he knew what was going on.

Many hours passed before he gathered the strength to lift himself off the ground and move. His head still throbbed, hurting immensely from the blow. Ylthorin's survival training took over instinctively, trained for years to respond to pain merely by moving on to safety. Yet it was more than his soul wanted. The pain was deeper in his heart than his head, and while his body limped onward by compulsion, all he wanted to do was drop to the ground and cry.

They trained him to survive.

And then They shamed him when his enemies refused to take his life. It was a fate worse than death to be the sole survivor. The sole survivor took refuge while those around him were slaughtered. The sole survivor was the coward who wouldn't offer his life for the Elven Kingdom. The sole survivor was the ragged beast who crawled back into a camp to whine and beg for sympathy and compassion, of which he would receive none.

And that monster forced Ylthorin to take that shame. His own peers looked down on him after that. It could've killed Ylthorin like the rest, and allowed him to sacrifice himself as a hero, or at the very least given him the death of a poor sap. No. It gave him life, miserable life.

By all means, Ylthorin should've enjoyed the fact that he had a life at all. Many Elven military professionals, as he had once been, were very skeptical of the idea of a God or supernatural afterlife. There was nothing fantastic awaiting the dead on the other side, which was why Elves were superior. In the brief moment of existence all other races received to live on this planet, and then perish, Elves could live and live.

Yet Ylthorin was dissatisfied. If the end was an abyss, at least it would not torture him so. Nothing could ever end his suffering. Even killing the Orc was ultimately futile, it could not redeem him in the eyes of his superiors and peers. The act was symbolic, that with nothing left to lose, Ylthorin would hunt this beast merely because it was the only thing he had left to live for. It was pointless, but it kept him going.

He missed his shot. He could've killed it. But instead, he let something take over him. Doubt, sheer doubt, and he could not kill the Orc. How did he even know that human was a Princess? He let his guard down for her. The training they gave him to be "politically sensitive" as one of their ranks bogged him down. He thought too much like a Commando, instead of the savage he'd become.

Ylthorin limped into a rock formation along a jagged cliff. He made his way back to the cave he had slept in the night before. He walked into its shallow bowels, and made his way to the bedding he had made next to a small puddle in the cave. Ylthorin got to his knees and kneeled over the water, the faint moonlight illuminating his reflection.

His torn clothes, ragged hair, faced smeared in dirt. His combat uniform slashed, both by his commanders as a sign of dishonor, and by the elements as time went on. He could tell the difference between them too. The elements merely tore, with no regards to precision. The scars of his shame were clean cuts, by knives and sharp words.

He shut his eyes as the tears fell into the pool, and rolled onto the bedding. He knew, tonight he would have that dream. Each night, he always dreamed of his days of glory. A past that could never return. Back then, he was proud, clean, and confident. He dreamt of raids in which he killed orcs like insects, battles in which he helped hold the line, and fights where his life came down to a mere thread, a sliver away from death and he triumphed.

This dream was different. It wasn't focused around him. The story he dreamt of on his saddest nights was one he wasn't sure what to think about. There were so many things he saw, which he had not truly seen. He dreamed of things which seemed real. The events of the dream took place 13 years ago, a brief moment in time to Ylthorin's Elven lifespan. Yet it felt like it had been a thousand centuries since those times. There were things in these events which Ylthorin had not seen with his own eyes, yet he could not help but feel conflicted. Who knew if they were the truth?

Ylthorin perhaps would never know. He lay his weapons down next to him, placing them far enough away that if any creature would come in the night to claim him, it could do so with no struggle...
Alright, this is the resubmission of Ylthorin’s Dream with new formatting. This story is an offshoot of the Orc Knight, and does require the first 5 chapters to make sense. You can find them here:

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