Permafrost Hollows Que que na-to-ra

The raven had left her dreams.

Amka had suspected he would, given that their journey had ended. She was here, wherever here was; but still, she had wondered if the nightmares would return. 

She should have known the monsters were only waiting for a chance to creep out of the closet.

The nightmares were different now - broken into chunks. There were times Amka questioned if it was even real. The images seemed to flicker in her mind's eye like slides in an antiquated projector - distorted and fuzzy and surreal. The caves - that dark maw that had swallowed her up, pools of stagnant water and the musty, moldy stench of it. 

She can still taste that water. Can still feel weight on the back of her neck and feel the brackish water filling her lungs. 

She can hear the rats - their little squeaks of pain as she ripped them off her. They were drawn to the blood, her blood, drawn to feed on her flesh. Another image flickers by - black blood spilling across the floor, her teeth in someone's throat. 

Another image, not of the caves but of the hollows she had taken to, was enough to wake her. Distorted features, blank golden eyes, monstrous features that had been warped by the ice caverns - her own reflection, unrecognizable.

Disgusting. Filthy. Vile.

Monster.

Amka wakes with a gasp, lurching to her feet as her golden eyes fly open. Stumbling, she turns in a circle, panicked and searching for threats with heaving breaths.

She's alone. The wind is her only company, lonely and cold, speaking of winter. Amka's breaths slow, sunshine orbs scanning the entrance to the hollows which she slept by. It was warm enough here for the young woman to sleep beneath the stars and she didn't know this land well enough yet to wander too far from the caverns. 

The sun is setting, casting orange streaks of fire across the sky to collide with fluffy, pale pink clouds. Amka gazed at the sunset, wishing its heat and light could forever burn away her fears, forever keep the darkness at bay.