Story dreams can inspire writers to write entire books. These can be vivid tales that we don’t want to let go when we wake up. We have to continue the story to its fitting end.

Mine are usually in the scifi/fantasy genre, although on occasion I’ll have one in the mystery or suspense arena. Circle of Light, my first published book and winner of the HOLT Medallion Award, began with a dream. It was so exciting that I didn’t want the dream to end. I had to finish it, and I did. This led to two more books in my Light-Years series. Scenes in Silver Serenade also were inspired in this way.

Now there’s this one. It could easily be adapted to my Drift Lords series, which still needs the final three installments. I left it as a trilogy but with more to come. My attention turned to mysteries, but obviously this genre is still on my mind. So here is the dream. Let me know if you’d want the story to continue.

Enter the Dream

I watched this dream as though it was a movie. I am in it and yet I am not. A man is strapped to a table and about to be stabbed through the heart with a dagger. He is inside a temple where he’d attempted to steal/recover an ancient relic. The temple’s keepers have captured this Indiana Jones-type hero. He figures he’s a goner, but at the last minute, someone stays his assassin’s arm.

This person says he’ll save the hero but only under one condition. The hero must marry his daughter. Heck, why not? the hero thinks. He can figure a way out of it later. He agrees, and the rescuer asks for his word. Our hero has a stalwart reputation for integrity. He offers his promise to comply.

His rescuers whisk him aboard the savior’s ship. Before he can think of a way to escape his pledge of honor, the wedding commences. He stands beside the presiding authority at the far end of a gallery filled with seated guests. While presenting an outwardly calm appearance, he wonders why the father must force a man to wed his daughter. The woman must be truly ugly. As though to confirm his theory, she appears in her bridal gown fully veiled. He can’t see through the thick gauze. The veil remains on during the ceremony until its conclusion when he is told he may kiss the bride.

This is the moment of truth. He steels himself to face her and not betray his emotion.  But as the slender woman raises her veil, his mouth gapes in astonishment. She is the most beautiful creature he’s ever seen! She has long wavy blond hair and features that could have been carved by angels. He kisses her soft lips and is smitten by her beauty.

They stride down the aisle to booming applause. What’s the catch? Does she turn into a werewolf at night? Is she a vampire who will use him as her next victim? Or is this beauty itself a glamour spell, and she’s hideous in her true form?

After the wedding feast, they retire to their cabin. The girl is shy about disrobing. Maybe she has horrible scarring from some childhood event. But no, her skin is smooth as silk and her body as desirable as his ultimate dreams.

She seems ashamed of an insignificant birthmark and claims it is the mark of a demon’s spawn. According to her people’s legends, at the age of thirty, she’ll turn into a monster that devours its young. Her parent’s story reinforces this belief. Her mother was said to have been visited by the devil because her husband was away at war when she allegedly conceived. The baby’s birthmark confirmed the superstitions.

Yet the heroine doesn’t fully believe this tale. She’s heard rumors of a ship in the harbor around the time the conception would have taken place. Could it be her mother knew of a secret exit from the castle and she’d met with a man from this vessel? How else could she have gotten pregnant when she’d been barren in the ten years she had been married? Had she been the one to spread rumors about a demon conception to allay suspicion about her infidelity?

The heroine means to discover if she is another man’s child. If the hero helps her with this goal, she will aid him in finding the coveted Jewel of the Eye. He needs this treasure’s power to right a terrible wrong that was done years ago. And so their quest begins. It turns out that the Jewel in the Eye is the hero’s new bride. She has a power….

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So what do you think? Write the story or let it go? Have you ever been inspired by a dream?

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