A dank mist swirled around him, and even though he had brought a lantern, he could barely make out the faint path which was difficult to find even in the bright sunlight. He did not know where Zabar was; the man had been lost sometime before when a mist seemed to swallow him up. Esarhaddon cursed and held up the lamp, still hoping that its feeble beams would aid him in discerning the path. He was certain that the woman's abductors had brought her this way, and surely they could not be too far ahead of him. He must find her before they harmed her. Though he was no hero and the whole affair was really none of his business, he had felt pity when she had called out to him, and he would save her if he could.

He thought he heard a voice, but the heavy fog muffled sounds, and he was unsure of the direction. He stopped and listened, and he was certain that he had seen a shadowy movement down the path. Someone must be coming! Perhaps they would help, and together they could cut their way through to the woman. He saw a light in the distance, and as he watched, the light grew brighter and stronger. Someone was walking slowly towards him on the path. As the figure drew closer and closer, he could make out the form of a woman. She had escaped! He rejoiced as he hurried to meet her. Though the vapors and mists swirled about her, he could make out her face and her incredible smile. She beckoned towards him, and as he reached out to touch her, the features of her face began to ooze and melt, revealing a stark-white skull with pale orbs glowing from the empty sockets.

Esarhaddon screamed, and when he woke up, he was covered with sweat, his body shaking. "Just a bad dream," he snapped at Yar, who had rushed in to see if he was all right.

He was embarrassed to discover that he was still on the divan in the Room of the Willows instead of in the bed in his own chambers. His clothes were wrinkled from being slept in all night and smelled of sweat. As his valet helped him undress, he looked down at his arms and saw that the flesh was bruised and angry as though a wrenching hand had torn down to his wrist.

"Master," Yar gasped, "your arms... Let me summon Mistress Me'arya to inspect them… Or perhaps I should ride to the village and fetch the healer… or better yet, travel to Turkûrzgoi and summon Tushratta! The city is no more than an hour's journey away. I can be there and back on a fast horse."

"There is no need," Esarhaddon growled like a wounded lion. "Mistress Me'arya will be busy preparing for her classes at the school, and you know full well I despise the healer in Blûgund. Tushratta would laugh at me for calling him to treat a mild rash. Besides, since we returned from the journey North, he has been busy at the hospital."

After Esarhaddon had bathed, he returned to his room to have his breakfast. He had no appetite, though, and ate sparsely, not relishing the taste of the meal. There was a harsh, metallic taste which lingered in his mouth, and food had little savor for him. The skin under his right eye had developed an irritating twitch, and he brought a finger up to still the unpleasant sensation. He had called for his two sons to eat breakfast with him, but not even the happy giggles of Abaru and Kabtu could brighten his dismal mood. Though he put on a pleasant face and smiled indulgently at his sons, he was not in the mood for their childish shenanigans, and dismissed them to their studies once they had finished eating.

A wistful, melancholic sort of mood had come over Esarhaddon, and instead of attending to matters of business, he remained in his chambers. For a moment, he thought he felt the presence of someone else in the room, but when he looked around, he saw only the sunlight streaming through a window. The sunbeams shone down upon a large urn of lilies, turning them golden in the light. The flowers captured his attention and he walked over and ran his fingertips over one of the petals. "So lovely," he thought, yearning for the sight of the blossoms of white and gold which streamed down over the many artificial waterfalls in his gardens, trailing their delicate leaves in the water.

He looked out the latticed window and inhaled deeply, savoring the fragrance that had been caught by the breeze and tossed into the room. How strange the bright and beautiful morning seemed after the terrors of two nights before. There was no point in thinking about that now. The misadventure was over, and he and Zabar had come through with only minor injuries. He decided to think only pleasant thoughts, and his mind turned to his women – the sultry Shumeeren, the gentle Anúrnissa, and Goldwyn, the cold, remote lady of the North. As his mind wandered, he began to daydream about the comfort that they could bring him.

"Such comfort," he mused, and wondered why thoughts of them did not stir his passions. Perhaps the nightmare had made a greater impression on him than he realized.

Sighing, he moved away from the window. As he passed by his full-length dressing mirror, he saw his face, and was alarmed by the tired, troubled look which pulled at his features. For a moment, he thought he caught the vague reflection of a woman standing behind him, condemning him with a reproachful stare. He quickly turned and glanced behind him, but saw no one. For a moment, he wondered if one of his women had entered the room on quiet slippered feet. But that was impossible; no one gained entry to his chambers unless he allowed it. The reflection must have been some trick of the light, an illusion in the mind caused by the shifting sunbeams.

His arms had begun to itch with a maddening fury. Pulling back his sleeves, he looked down at the strange rashes which resembled two clawed handprints. If it were possible, they looked even worse than they had when he was getting dressed. Perhaps his wives and servants were right, and he should send a messenger to the hospital in Turkûrzgoi to request the assistance of Tushratta. That prospect troubled Esarhaddon, however, for he knew that the physician would start asking questions about how he had gotten the strange rashes. Would Tushratta believe his tale of the death-worshipping cult priestess who had attacked him in a kapurdri-fueled rage? Perhaps he should embellish the story a bit more, and claim that the woman's fingernails had been dipped in poison. Shumeeren had already theorized that this could be a possibility, and perhaps he could use her fears for inspiration.

Esarhaddon did not want to think about the mysterious rash right now. His gaze wandered through the window and into the garden, and he saw the flower-bedecked paths verdant with their greenery; the arbors with their trellises, grape vines providing an awning with their lush clusters of fruit hanging down; splashing fountains and gleaming pools. He thought of the quiet evening meals which he took there with his women and children, and heard their happy laughter, rippling like the bright strains of the dulcimer, in his mind. He contemplated the future, and imagined other wives and concubines, their faces and forms still unknown to him, lovingly holding happy children and infants in their arms. He would breed a great house that someday would rise in power and prominence, if not in Nurn, then in Harad. He would protect them all, nourishing them, loving them but never telling them of his love. He considered it weakness to reveal his deepest feelings to anyone, and so he hid them.

He thought of Shumeeren, her dark brown eyes haughty and proud. Five years ago they had wed, their union solidifying an alliance between the House of Huzziya and one of the most influential salt merchants in all of Nurn. Esarhaddon sometimes wondered if he would have married Shumeeren had it not been for his desire to entrench himself more deeply amongst the merchants of Nurn and extend his influence beyond the acquisition and distribution of slaves for the Tower. While her beauty was magnificent and her passion was beyond compare, she was far too devoted to the Dark Lord for his liking. Not being a religious man himself, zealots always made him feel uncomfortable. Sometimes his lovely wife became so enraptured by thoughts of the Dark Lord that she began moaning and writhing in the throes of ecstasy, and Esarhaddon could not help but feel the sensation that he was being cuckolded by Sauron Himself.

His thoughts turned to Anúrnissa, and he saw her standing before him, cradling Mindin in her arms. She had been his wife for a little over a year, and he lamented that his duties to Mordor had taken him away from her most of that spring and summer. He had not yet made her acquaintance when he had agreed to wed her, but her father, the chieftain of a league of merchants from the Far Haradric kingdom of Kha'savay, had promised that his daughter was a woman of the utmost quality. Esarhaddon remembered waiting for months in heady anticipation for Anúrnissa's caravan to arrive from Far Harad. He had an idea of what she looked like from the portrait that her father had given him, but sometimes artists took creative liberties, portraying their subjects as being far more comely than was true, or failing to capture their true beauty upon the canvas. All of his fears were cast aside when the caravan at last arrived, for his new bride was lovely in all aspects, from her exquisite body to her gentle temperament and kind heart.

Esarhaddon's mind shifted to thoughts of Goldwyn, and smiled when he thought of the way her yellow hair felt as it slid through his fingers, shimmering like spun gold. He had desired her from the first moment he had seen her in Osgiliath. The initial thing he had noticed about her was her striking beauty: her golden tresses and her eyes of turquoise, and her shapely bosom, so full and round. But it was not just her comely appearance which made him want her, however. She was a woman of integrity who carried herself with dignity and confidence even after all the hardships she had endured, and those were traits he admired in a wife or concubine. When he had seen the affectionate way she regarded her sons and witnessed how protective the boys were of her, he knew that she was a devoted mother who was adored by her children. He was reminded of Ninashme, Tiranna and Kulianna, his late wives who had been taken from him by misadventure, the ravages of disease, and the rigors of childbirth. Although this headstrong Northern woman would never replace them, he often entertained fantasies of Goldwyn guiding Abaru and Kabtu with her motherly wisdom. At one time, he had even imagined Fródwine, Frumgár, and Fritha becoming boon companions of his sons; alas, this was not to be, for the three boys had managed to escape, and all searches for them had been in vain.

Over the past month, Goldwyn seemed as though she were finally warming to him. Perhaps she had come to her senses and realized what a prize he was among the men of Mordor. Although she still disapproved of his profession, considering the business of buying and selling slaves to be one of the most abhorrent trades in existence, perhaps she had come to understand that his high standing with the Tower allowed him to provide his family with comforts and luxuries that were denied to commoners. Many women would see a union with a wealthy and well-respected merchant such as he as a fortuitous one, especially a slave from a foreign land, for it would bestow upon her many privileges and elevate her rank within Nurnian society. Perhaps that was one of the reasons why he desired Goldwyn so… because she had not wanted to be his concubine, at least not at first. A lack of guile was a rare and valuable quality, especially in Mordor.

Esarhaddon was glad that Goldwyn no longer suffered from the illness which had plagued her for so long. When he had ordered the slave caravan camp at Osgiliath, he had not known how perilous the ruins could be, or that disease festered in the stagnant waters trapped within the ancient Gondorian crypts. Fleeing from the guards in an ill-conceived escape attempt, Goldwyn had taken shelter in an old tomb, where she fell into a deep swoon from breathing in the mephitic air. Long did she suffer after that, languishing from a malady which baffled both healers whom Esarhaddon had employed to tend to the captives and caravan laborers on the journey to Nurn. In the early days of the illness, she was often seized by convulsions, her mind succumbing to a terrible delirium which deprived her of her sense and reason. Time brought healing, but the recovery was slow, and her body had been left severely weakened by her ordeal.

A troubling thought struck Esarhaddon like a surprise blow from an assassin's hand. What if Goldwyn's illness returned to torment her? His pleasant fantasies of lying abed after a night of vigorous lovemaking were replaced by a grim vision of Goldwyn lying upon her sickbed in a death-like slumber, the life slowly fading from her body as she slipped deeper and deeper into the realm of nightmares. The woman whom he desired with an all-consuming passion might slip from his hands like dust and ashes caught in a cold and bitter wind, and there would be naught that he could do to hold her to this mortal plane. It was only a matter of time ere she joined Ninashme, Tiranna and Kulianna in death. Perhaps Shumeeren and Anúrnissa would soon follow her into the dark unknown, and then he would be haunted by a harem of ghosts.

Esarhaddon's thoughts had become sinister intruders who taunted him with endless dire probabilities, each one more terrible than the last. He suddenly remembered the harrowing night he spent staggering through the mist-enshrouded forest, and the woman who lay in wait within the circle of green flame. He felt sick to his stomach when he recalled that Goldwyn had passed by the Thraqum Wood just hours before his ill-advised shortcut through the forest. Even though her party had traveled upon the main road, they were still close to the shadowy wood. What if they had been ambushed by cultists, and Goldwyn was dragged into the forest to be tortured and sacrificed in some dark ritual? It could have been her screams for help that he heard echoing through the night…

Clutching his temples, Esarhaddon shook his head from side to side, attempting to drive away these morbid fantasies. It was unlike him to think such thoughts, and he wondered at the strange mood which had come over him. Desiring a change of scenery, he turned from the window and strode to the door. He paused there, running his fingers over the rich, polished wood, tracing the designs of a great mûmak fitted with a war houdah, a canopied battle platform railing about its sides. A fight raged as the great beast crushed down the bodies of the enemy.

A sudden pain shot through his head, and he felt as though his skull were being torn in twain. A great wave of dizziness encompassed him, and his legs wavered, threatening to give under him. A black veil was drawn over his eyes and through it he beheld a fire-rimmed circle glowing in the misty darkness. He heard the scream of a woman intermingled with the cackling of the old shaman. He reached out to catch his balance on the door frame, but his hand slipped down and he fell crashing to the floor.

The dancer came to him, twisting, twirling, her hips swaying and her abdomen undulating. She leaned towards him, beckoning, her hand just within reach... and now with a smile, she twisted away from him, rolling her hips as she cast a glance over her shoulder to see if his eyes burned with the same heat that was in her own. The drums throbbed faster – a pulsing rhythm, the beat of the heart – the lute and the delicate-bodied violin haunting, sensual, seductive. Through shimmering coins of gold and silver, wanton eyes had called to him, and then with a toss of her head, the dancer had arrogantly scoffed at him, dancing always ever out of reach.

Skirt caught low about the hips, an enticing navel showing, veils of green and gold and orange and red twirling round and round like a colorful dust djinn, tassels spinning as hips pounded out a never-ending rhythm... Desire fueled by the throbbing drums and the fire of her dance burnt at his mind, his heart, his reason, but still she twisted ever out of reach... a phantom and illusion caught in the poppy smoke wreathed about his head. The drums beat faster, and still she swayed and twirled, dancing to the pulsing rhythm, driving him to lust-rent passions, his loins aching with desire.

The dancer's tawny body glistened with a sheen of oil and sweat; a trail of musk surrounded her like a cloud and promised mysteries of endless nights of passion. Hips twisting, skirt riding low, she shimmied before him, her arms undulating like coiling snakes. Her spine arched backwards and she trailed her hands low over her shoulders, dropping to her knees and falling back upon the ground. Slowly she rose back up and then twirled to face him, passion flashing in her emerald eyes. She taunted him with another haughty turn of the head and a defiant twist of the hips. She danced nearer to him, her eyes and parted lips promising kisses of deep desire. He could smell her fragrance, the aroma infuriating, and he reached up, eager to take her, but she evaded his grasp, twisting away with a seductive sway of the hips.

Bells tinkled about slim ankles, and the music became even faster, the drums pounding out a frantic rhythm in his head. Doe-eyes with coyly lowered lashes smiled demurely, shyly flirting as the dancer twisted and swirled about, the hem of her skirt lightly brushing against his knees. Gracefully she bent down and brushed full red lips on his.

"Yes!" he gasped and reached for her, hoping for the fulfillment of the promise of the kiss. Laughing, she wriggled out of his grasp, and with a saucy shake of her hips, she dared him to follow her. Much to his dismay, suddenly he felt paralyzed, frozen in place on his couch, and he could not chase after the girl whom he so desired. She danced backwards, stretching out her undulating arms towards him, teasing him with the provocative swaying of her hips. Then in a cloud of musk, incense and the fragrance of flowers, she slowly vanished into the dancing flames of a circle of green flame. No longer was he lying on his couch; he stood in the dark and gloomy forest, staring at the ring of fire. In the center was a crouching figure draped in black. When he took a step closer, the figure stirred and he saw that it was the dancing girl. She was still alive! He could save her!

Rushing forward into the circle, Esarhaddon bent down and lifted the girl into his arms. If he hurried, he could take her from this unholy circle before her abductors returned. He gazed down into her eyes and saw only the reflection of the firelight, shimmering and dancing. His mind clouded with confusion, and all time seemed to stop. He could see her eyes clearly now. Such a lovely shade of green... He felt the urge to kiss her. As he gazed into her face, he saw in an instant all the lovely women who had been a part of his life. He shook his head to clear his mind, for he was looking into the face of his Rohirric concubine. Such clear blue eyes and hair of gold... Goldwyn! He looked down in disbelief. What was she doing here in the forest?

"We are coming for you, Esarhaddon uHuzziya... You will join us in the black transit..."

Then to his horror, Goldwyn's fair skin eroded away like desert sand blown by the wind. No longer did he see her lovely face, but rather a leering skull which stared up at him menacingly from cavernous eye sockets lit from within by a faint reddish glow. Her tangled hair, still golden in the firelight, hung limply from a scalp teeming with maggots. Esarhaddon's eyes darted around, searching for a way of escape, but he saw to his horror that he was surrounded by walking corpses in various states of decay. Shambling forward, they reached out their skeletal arms towards him and moaned his name, chanting it over and over again, the dirge of the damned.

"Goldwyn!" he awoke, her name upon his screaming lips.