Burn after dreaming

I taste ash on my tongue as the town burns around me, the heat near unbearable as the buildings that encompass me radiate with orange flames. The lights from the fire illuminate the path ahead and it's a good thing as the black smoke covers the sky, it could be midday or midnight and I wouldn't know the difference. "Quinara!?" I call out to the burning buildings not getting any answers, these fires had clearly been raging a while, it was likely anyone who didn't make it out by now had ran out of time.

The smoke stings my eyes blurring my vision as I cough and splutter walking through this town. I wonder if I had ever been here before, I didn't recognise my surroundings but I imagine the fire had more to do with that than anything else. I stumble through the wrecked streets avoiding debris "QUINARA!!" I yell into the inferno, "what is going on?" I think to myself, I begin to piece together that this is another of my strange dreams, I think back to the strangers advice "pay attention" I say to myself forcing my eyes wider.

Now that I was paying closer attention and focusing in, I could see figures through the burning building windows... Large figures, "HEY!" I shout at the figures but they simply fade, "the fuck?" I groan, as I continue I see more figures: in the distance, on the rooftops, even back the way I came but whenever I tried to find out who or what they were they would just fade. I didn't know what this meant but it certainly was creeping me out.

The figures remain an ever present element as I continue down this scorched path, I try to block them out but it's hard. "Why tonight?" I lament, I had enough on my mind after my emotional night I really didn't have time for another of these bizarre dreams. I try to decipher what the meaning of this is and for what the meaning of the previous dreams were. Was this a representation of my world burning down after Quinara cheated? Was the first dream a warning to not get attached? Was the second a warning against orcs? No that couldn't be right, these dreams weren't just to represent my biases and insecurities, there has to be more to this.

Even though my deciphering leads to a dead end, the road I'm travelling doesn't suffer the same fate as I arrive in what must have been a town square. I can see the burning is town wide as fire is in all directions, in the centre of town is Quinara on her knees slumped in front of a banner, a tattered black cloth with a red spiral drawn on it. "QUINARA!" I shout running towards her, I get no answer as I close the distance, as I get closer I can see she's shaking. "Quinara are you ok?" I ask gripping her shoulders and walking to her front, she looked pale, all the blood drained from her face. Her eyes were locked on the banner, "calm down Quinara I'm here" I say trying to reassure her, despite my bitterness I still cared for her. A lot. Seeing her like this hurt me, "what's the matter? What does this mean?" I ask her hoping for an answer, an explanation for any of this but instead she just lets out a scream of anguish.