• Soft footsteps dance across the floor. At first glance, it would seem the room is empty. All but for the snoring figure of a man, tucked under his covers. But the tiny footsteps continue and little voices break the silence.

    "Oh, this is gonna be a good one, I can smell it." One of the voices said.

    "It won't be if you wake him, Dumble."

    "I'm not the one thundering around like an ogre, Delves."

    "Shhh...." The voices silence as the six tiny figures peek their heads through the cracked door. Out of the corner of the eye they would seem like tiny little bugs, but on closer inspection they are proved to be six tiny little men. Tiny little men, no taller then two inches, with leaves strapped to their backs like wings. One head peaks through the door, then two, three, four, six heads. Suddenly the group tiptoes into full view.

    "Would you take a whiff of that dream." Dumble said, bright green eyes sparkling. You see, these were fae. And every fae has the ability to smell a good dream. But this group was more then just a group of fae. They were dream-thiefs. So it was that they tiptoed to the edge of the bed and started climbing, with the full intent of stealing this man's dream. It wouldn't be the first time they'd stolen a dream from him either. For you see, this man's name was Jonathon Hart, and he was a writer. And for nearly a month now these fae had been stealing his dreams. His wonderfully creative, magical dreams.

    "This has to be the best dream he's had yet." Delves said.

    "It's a right shame we're gonna take it from him." Pockets said from the bottom of the group, each of them climbing up the side of the covers.

    "Shhh..." They were cut off from their laughter as the one at the front peeked his head over the top of the bed and stared down at them.

    "What is it, boss?" Dumble said.

    "Yeah, what's wrong Caelum?" Thimble asked, his voice now nothing more then a whisper. Each of the fae grew incredibly silent, straining their ears to hear. Caelum slowly let out his held breath.

    "Be quick." Caelum said, pulling each of them onto the bed, one at a time. Then with quickness they danced over and across the bed, up onto the covers. "Quickly now, the Grappler." Caelum said, licking his lips. The smell was unbelievable now. It was practically intoxicating. It used to be that the greatest wines in all of Kingdom were made from human dreams. But that was before dreams had become so rare. It was hard to find a good dream now and it was obvious by the intensity in Caelum's gaze as one of the fae, Thatchels, handed him a small little device.

    It was full of strange little corkscrews, pincers and gears and he held it right to the ear of the sleeping Mr. Hart. A tiny bead of sweat dripped off Caelum's brow as he cranked the lever on the side of the Grappler. Moments later he snapped one of the levers and the entire device shut up, closing into a small tube, a tiny light glowing on the inside. The light of this man's dreams. Caelum turned to look at the others, a smile on his face.

    The smile instantly faded.

    Staring right at him from the edge of the bed were two large, monstrous yellow eyes. Caelum's heart was pumping. He unconsciously touched the side of his cheek where a thin scar was. A token of his last encounter with one of these most monstrous of all monsters. The creature's whiskers twitched, its terrible fangs revealing themselves.

    "CAT!" Caelum dived to the side as the cat pounced towards him. The two leaves on his back suddenly sprung into life and he flew down to the ground with the others. But though the cat had missed Caelum, it had succeeded in waking up the sleeping man.

    Jonathon Hart sprung up, pushing the cat off him. "What?!" He looked from side to side, searching for whatever thing had woken him from his dreams. That's when he spotted them. Six little men standing on the floor. He looked at the object in the hands of one of them and touched the side of his ear. In an instant he knew just what had happened.

    "YOU!" Jonathon fell out of the bed, the blanket twisting around his legs as he reached for the tiny little men.

    "Flee!" Caelum yelled. All six of the dream-thiefs sprung into the air, evading the monstrous cat as it pounced towards them once more. Jonathon stumbled to his feet, rushing after them and flinging open the door to his room.

    "Get back here!" His voice boomed as he chased them through his house.

    "To the chimney!" Caelum yelled as the cat flew right past him, knocking over the cupboard of Jonathon's favorite coffee mugs. All at once they flew straight through to the chimney. The fire burst up all on its own and Jonathon leaped forwards, hand reaching for Caelum as all six of the tiny fae flew straight into the flame. And in one sudden moment the flame consumed Jonathon and he felt himself falling, falling further down the rabbit hole...

    [End of Part I]