Though many of the soldiers in the vast encampment looked upon her with a mix of emotions ranging from raw hatred to lust, Stephen Fuller kept them at bay, barking orders for them to return to their posts.

Despite being told his presence was no longer needed, he stayed with her as she suffered the indignity of being searched. True to his word, her treatment was fair, if not entirely kind. Finally, as she was led away to join the other prisoners, he left her. She reached out and touched his hand before he walked away, earning a sad smile from him. By then, Midnite had made up her mind.

♦ ♦ ♦

She waited until the fall of darkness to act. It gave her time to observe, not only the forlorn faces of the others held prisoner, but also the new art of war that seemed to have blossomed while she and her siblings slept. Explosions rang out constantly – some from the ships at sea, others from giant metal carriages that moved on their own with no horses or oxen to pull them. She spied many more of those strange flying objects she had originally mistaken as a form of oni. They were impressive. No wonder she and the others were roused.

Finally, when she had observed her fill, she closed her eyes and summoned a small fragment of her power, allowing it to coalesce around her. She had marked Stephen Fuller with her touch and now was reaching out, past the guard towers into the camp beyond, searching for his essence.

There! She felt him, the troubles of the day seemingly gone from his spirit, a sense of temporary serenity about him. He was asleep.

Midnite slipped mostly unseen from the prison camp. A small, wide-eyed boy spied her as she gathered her power and turned translucent. She smiled at him but was otherwise unconcerned. Let the child have some hope that greater forces than himself were at play in this world.

Neither the barbed wire fence nor the many guards manning it proved to be an obstacle. Midnite moved past them all as if she were one with the very wind itself. A sharp-eyed human might have sensed her passing as a minor disturbance, but these men were all exhausted from days of battle.

She followed her senses while, at the same time, reaching out to the sea and drawing upon the cold waters within it.

As she neared where Stephen Fuller lay sleeping, she drew those energies around her, causing a thick ground fog to rise up. A few guards noted the odd change in weather but laughed it off, making comments about what a godforsaken land this was. They couldn’t have been more wrong.

There. She glided into the flimsy structure – a tent, if she recalled the human name for such things. It couldn’t have been more different from the celestial palace had they tried. Such a covering might keep out the rain, but that was all. A strong wind, a fierce predator, an enemy, the walls would stop none of it. She marveled at the humans’ ability to sleep in such a weak structure. Considering how frail they were, Midnite would have thought them incapable of rest knowing that only the barest of fabrics stood between them and the harsh world beyond.

She pushed that thought aside for now. It, along with nearly everything else the humans worried about, were of no matter to a being such as her.

The irony was not lost upon Midnite, that she found herself looking down upon the sleeping form of Stephen Fuller. He wasn’t alone. Many others shared this structure with him, all of them asleep on uncomfortable-looking cots, but she wasn’t worried about rousing them. She could make it so that he and he alone heard her voice. To the others, it would be nothing more than a whisper upon the wind.

Never before had a human intrigued her as he had. So different from the others, so ... handsome, too. Yes, she thought, he is indeed handsome. Considering the reason for her visit, it was foolish to deny such base thoughts. Her heart fluttered as she watched the peaceful look upon his face. After a few moments, she reached out and caressed his cheek.

He stirred, breathed deep, then opened his eyes wide as she allowed herself to become visible to him. He opened his mouth, seemingly to cry out in surprise, but she placed a finger against his lips to silence him. “Shhhh.”

She smiled down upon him, hoping to ease his alarm, although she could understand his confusion. There she was, standing in his tent, glowing in a cool divine light while fog rolled in through the opening and seemed to coalesce around them.

He turned and looked around, noting his sleeping fellows. “Is this a dream?” he whispered.

“The dreams of men are but another state of what you call reality.”

“I don’t understand.”

She smiled again and placed her hand upon his, gently taking it and guiding him to his feet. “You need not understand. Merely follow.”

“Follow?”

“I wish to show you something.”

“What?”

“Follow and learn.”

The mist from the ocean swallowed them up as they walked out. None were aware of their passage as she led him away from the camp. His eventual return might cause a stir among his fellows, but that was a concern for later.

The ground fog followed, growing thick a few steps before them, then thinning out following their passage. To anyone observing, it would have seemed as if a cloud had descended from the sky to take a leisurely stroll before assuming its proper place high in the heavens once again.

She led him away, to a place she used to know well. Once, tall grass had grown there. It would move with the wind as the crickets serenaded her, but now there was nothing but desolation. Blackened and pitted by the war that had descended upon this land, this place of peace was now a field of death.

For one such as Midnite, though, the ravages of both time and men were but minor inconveniences.

“It’s just an empty battlefield,” Stephen said once she stopped moving.

“Now. But once, it was so much more. Allow me to show you.”

“I don’t understand.”

“You will.”

Midnite gathered the energy of the ocean and added to it that of the earth and sky. It required an effort even from one such as she, but it was worth it.

The mist which had concealed them now spread out, encircling them in what looked to be a wall of fog fifty feet in diameter.

Midnite noted the incredulous stare from Stephen Fuller. If he thought this was impressive, he would certainly enjoy what happened next.

A light shone down upon them from above. He looked up and shielded his eyes, perhaps wary of an attack, but then he relaxed when he realized it was the clouds above parting to reveal the moon, full and strong. A shaft of light seemed to reach down from it, illuminating them and the area around.

Midnite willed the moonlight to show them not the present, but things as they once were, during the more peaceful times when she would visit these lands.

He let out a gasp as the light revealed not the dead earth they’d been standing upon, but tall green grass. The sound of crickets chirping suddenly filled the air. Where death once held sway, life again reigned supreme.

“This is how this place used to be in days past.”

“It’s beautiful.”

“It was,” she replied, a touch of sadness in her voice.

“It will be again.” He approached her from behind and put his hands upon her shoulders. “Once we win.”

She had to stifle a laugh. Special he might be, but he was still a warrior. Likewise, as much as she enjoyed peace and beauty, she also couldn’t deny what she was at her core.

Even so, now, in a place like this, one could be allowed their illusions. For a time, one could pretend to be someone or something else, a whole other life.

She turned and put her arms around him. “Let us speak no more of war. This is a place of life.”

“Life,” he repeated as if in a dream.

“Yes,” she said, drawing him down with her to the soft grass. “And we should celebrate that life in the short time we have.”

He made to say something in response, but it was lost as she pulled him into her embrace.