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[Cause - The Scales Part Three]
The world was dark. She could see nothing. She could feel nothing. Except—the heavy beat of her heart? Its pace seemed to slowly increase. Trepidation? Then a subtle vibration. All was the embrace of darkness: had she fallen asleep?Â
Verad looked worried: the expression on his face, the furrowed brow, lips pulled tight with concern. His eyes were tired and sullen, weary, perhaps exhausted. His white hair was long, unkempt.  How long had it been since she'd last talked to him? He looked right, and then left with a characteristic forlorn expectation. "Does he see me?" she wondered; aloud she thought. He looked back ahead at nothing in particular, eyes utterly unfocused and resigned. His gaze seemed to pass right over her shoulder, as if she were invisible. She felt another vibration: it seemed to well up beneath her feet before slowly working through the rest of her body.
"Verad!" she felt startled by a yell in the distance. "Verad!" it repeated. She looked to her left, Verad matching her curiosity. Both seemed to spy a familiar figure in the distance, it was Kiht and she was coming this way. "Hold on Verad!" she yelled again.
Soon came more voices from the opposite direction, "Hold on! We're coming for you!" more vibration. More voices. Now from above and below. She could see them all at once, somehow: Ser Crofte of the Sworn, Flame Sergeant Melkire, among others she recognized. Heroes of Ul'dah: Brass Blades, Sultansworn, and Immortal Flames approaching from every direction.
She watched as they worked closer, all seemed to struggle with all their might to fight their way to the pair with an expeditious hurry. Yet the more they struggled the further away they seemed to be. Their voices trailed off, growing fainter as they became more urgent. Suddenly the look of resignation in Verad's eyes became one of fear: an expression of his she could not remember seeing before. The steady vibration grew powerful.
Seconds must have passed in what seemed like long minutes. Her trepidation grew more potent, the steady crescendo of suspense rising to fear. Strands of sinewy silk began to glimmer around Verad, and then all about her. The web in which they had been caught became visible, the vibration the tell-tale approach of long, quick arachnid legs. She turned over her shoulder in the direction that held Verad's gaze affixed in terror: the imagined spider vanished. A large-winged drake swooped from above.
She whipped her head back toward her friend as quickly as she could: the entire city of Ishgard seemed to rise suddenly behind him, webbing suspended him to the sheer stonework of a high tower. In her peripheral she could just see the drake as it began to dive.  He screamed voicelessly; silently.Â
She shot up in bed, ripping the silk sleeping mask from her eyes. She threw it forcefully across the quiet little room. Her body glistened with sweat. It was cold. She caught her breath. She caught her breath.
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