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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Urko" data-source="post: 2763084" data-attributes="member: 30822">Interlude - Matilda dreamsAs in so many of her dreams, Matilda is in motion.  She is aboard the lightning rail, the countryside whizzing past her through the window.  Around the bend ahead she can see the high pitched, gaily covered roof of Passage Station, grander even than Sharn's depot.  The train whispers to a stop and Matilda can see that the platform is packed with cheering throngs.  The mulititudes go wild at the sight of her, filling the air with fistfuls of flower petals and proudly waving aloft hand painted banners and signs with her name.Somehow she is no longer in her seat, but is being bourn by the crowd from the Station.  But outside, instead of the close packed buildings of passage, she sees a wide, open lawn, shrouded with mist at it's edges.  Ugly gaping craters, oozing smoke, dot the grounds.  At the far end lies the ruins of a once stately mansion.  Matilda realizes with shock that it is Kolbek's.  Only the veranda is intact and there is a sumptuous feast spread on the table there.  The crowd bears Matilda inexorably towards it.  The table is crowded with guests, who stand and applaud as Matilda is installed at the place of honor.  She recognizes Kolbek, and Nollis, and the little halfling girl and many of the other inhabitants of Steadfast Reach.  And she realizes that all of them are quite dead - many months gone, by the looks of them.  Kolbek raises his goblet high, tatters of flesh hanging from his upraised arm.  The other decomposed guests do the same as the applause goes on and on and on...Matilda awakens to the steady drip, drip, drip of drops of water striking an enormous bowl-shaped leaf just above her head.  Sitting up disturbs the balance and its contents, nearly a gallon of water, pour over her.</blockquote>

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