Excerpt: Illusionary: In The Beginning

During her sleep, Luna dreamt. She saw a harsh barren landscape with no vegetation, simply dust, rocks, and never ending sun. Next to her, Luna realized, there was all the members of the Lightning Coven, Adam, Eloise, Connor, Matt and herself. Across the scape, across from the Lightning Coven, stood five other people, and as soon as she looked at them, she felt threads of fear cross her, and she felt insignificant and small and scared. Without realizing it, she realized that she knew who these people were: the Darkwings Coven. One of the Darkwings’ people, a tall slim woman with black hair and purple eyes raised a gun that had previously been hidden to her chest level and fired. The first shot hit Eloise, and she fell without a sound. The woman smiled evilly, then fired once, twice, three times again. The shots hit Adam first, and as he fell, so did Connor. With the shock of realizing that the coven was being killed, and then Matt fell as well, to leave Luna as the only one left. She watched, helplessly, as the black haired woman raised the gun and aimed one last time. Luna felt herself scream once, then the angry red pain spread through her body and she too fell to the ground, with the one scream the only memory of what was once.

Luna awoke, but she was still within the dream. She was lying on a cold floor, seemingly away from the barren landscape. She realized with shock: I am not dead. But the pain was too much to bear, and she felt herself slipping away from the real world and, with all of the will power that she could muster, she forced herself to open her eyes and live. As she opened her eyes, she wished that she had not, for the world was dark, stone, and damp. All she could see was the bars on the door, and realized that it was a prison, and she was a prisoner. As she realized this, the ground opened up and she fell, down into black nothingness, into the places where you can see and hear and smell and touch nothing.