Dreamweaver - Chapter 11

Leo was in a terrible mood.

It was partially due to the fact that he'd had to get up early this morning — he'd been up at dawn every day of Anankos's War start to end, and he was still not a morning person, and had a ferocious temper during this time of the day. The kind of temper that made plants wither and the help dive for cover to avoid being smited.

It was due to this mood that passerby neglected to point out the fact that his collar was inside out — Niles was the only one brave enough to mention the fact, and that was probably because the retainer was sadistic enough to find being berated by his liege oddly thrilling.

But the main cause of Leo's dangerous mood was Bryhildr — or the missing thereof.

His number one suspect? His bratty, teenage son, of course.

Of all the days to exact revenge! A group of Dark Knights-in-training had asked for a demonstration of a proper magical attack the previous day, and Leo had agreed, but had threatened the salaries of anyone late to the demonstration. And yet, the way things were going, it looked as though he was the one who was going to be late. He hated eating his own words.

The second he found Forrest, he was going to put that conniving sneak over his knee.

And he had no doubt that Forrest was the culprit — he'd probably thought that borrowing Brynhildr was sufficient revenge for making him sit through the battle tactics seminar yesterday, and its accompanying strategy assignments. The nerve!

Leo's irritation only grew when he didn't find his son in his room. He asked Felicia, the most airheaded of the castle chambermaids, of his whereabouts in passing, and she recalled seeing him heading towards Siegbert's room the previous night. This irked Leo even more, as Siegbert's room was on the opposite side of the castle.

Scratch that — I'm not going to put him over my knee. I'm going to put him in the stocks!

When he finally reached Siegbert's room, he pounded on the door — sunlight was beginning to stream through the castle windows, reminding him that he was half an hour late to the demonstration now and, believe it or not, was not in the mood for knocking politely.

"Forrest! I know you're in there. Open this door immediately!"

Amazingly, no reply — amazing because Leo was used to people leaping to his command, an aspect that Xander, who had a similar temperament, also happened to enjoy.

"Forrest? Forrest!"

Still no reply — incredulous, Leo placed an ear on the door, listening for movement. He heard the scratching of feet against the floor. Was that the sound of sneaking?

"Forrest!" he roared. "If you try to escape over that balcony, I will have your head, young man! Now open this door at once! Immediately!"

No answer. Enraged, Leo grasped the doorknob...

...and with a jolt, realized that the warden of the castle dungeon was supposed to be releasing a pair of brigands this morning. And he had not yet been informed of Xander's decision to let their heels cool for three days more.

Blast it! If those prisoners are released and Xander finds out, I'm a dead man!

Leo spun on his heels and ran in a very un-princely manner down the hall. Forrest's beating would have to wait.

--

"You'll live." Siegbert released Forrest's eye, which he'd had to pry open with two fingers. "It must've been a very tiny piece of shrapnel, because it doesn't look like it did anything but give you a good sting."

"Are you sure?" Forrest asked, rubbing at his swollen eyelid — this coaxed another flood of tears from between his throbbing lids. "There wasn't any...blood, or anything?"

"None. Just a lot of tears." Siegbert sat back. "Here, wash it out again."

After the arduous climb to the surface of the island, Siegbert, Forrest, and Brynhildr had found themselves on a wide plain, one that undulated in small hillocks and yielded to a cluster of woodland far in the distance. A small stream cut down through one of the little valleys between hills, and it was here that they had crouched while Siegbert had inspected Forrest's eye. But, indeed, it looked as though his cousin had gotten off lucky, and had had gotten stung by one of the smaller pieces of flying debris from the spider island's disintegration.

Siegbert stared at his reflection in the stream, which twisted over a bed of smooth stones, as Forrest cupped some of the water in his hands and splashed at his eye. What in the Gods' name had that been? Since waking up in Forrest's arms, he'd had to absorb...a lot fairly quickly, but the explosion...that had been the worst of the bunch. Mostly because it had been so, well, incredible. Like something out of a fairy tale or a poorly written adventure story.

Things like that were not supposed to happen. Not in the real world...

Siegbert turned towards Brynhildr, who was sitting nearby, claws digging into the creek bank and eyes trained skyward, as if looking out for danger. But since we're not in Nohr or Hoshido...maybe things like this can happen here. Wherever "here" is.

"Brynhildr," he said to the tome dragon, "it's time you told us what's going on."

Beside him, Forrest stopped washing. Brynhildr slowly turned from the sky and appraised Siegbert with neutral green eyes.

"Forrest," she said, nodding to Siegbert's cousin, "why don't you tell him what you know?"

Siegbert glanced back at him expectantly and, with a dry throat, Forrest said, "Right. A ways back, when we faced the spider... Long story," he said to Siegbert, whose eyebrow had gone up in surprise. "Anyway, Brynhildr told me that none of this is real." He gestured vaguely. "That this is all a dream."

"A dream?" It was the answer that Siegbert had been hoping for, and yet, he felt himself laughing at it. "All of this? A dream? It can't be."

"What makes you say that?" Brynhildr asked.

"Because it's...it's too real! Irrational perhaps. Improbable, likely. But real? Definitely." They both fell silent, and with some incredulity, Siegbert realized that his cousin really and truly believed that they were in a dream. "How can any of this be fake?" he demanded. "The darkness, the tower...your eye, Forrest? Did we imagine all of that? Or did none of it really happen?"

"I was uncertain about this too," Forrest protested. "When we faced the spider...it attacked me. It wrapped me in this flaming spider silk and tried to burn me alive. I felt all of that, Siegbert, I know I did. But the first time Brynhildr told me that this was all a dream, I tried really hard to believe it. I told myself that the flames were fake, and they disappeared. I told myself that the spider was not there, that I just thought it was there, and it went away. My injuries disappeared. I emerged from that fight as though I'd never gone in."

Siegbert glanced, wide-eyed, at Brynhildr, who nodded. "Here is the truth, Siegbert," she said. "You, indeed, are in a dream, one where the laws of reality count for nothing, but it feels real because it is not your dream — at least in the sense that it originated from your unconscious mind. This dream was built into your consciousness by another, a malevolent party who desires your deaths. The both of you."

"Our deaths?" Siegbert cried. When Brynhildr nodded, he said, mind reeling, "I...I don't understand. How can someone kill us...with a dream?"

"Your sleep is unnatural," Brynhildr explained. "It has been induced by a powerful spell — it is known by humans as a dreamweave. This type of magic gives an outside party dominion over the victim's sleep, enabling them to morph and twist the victim's dream to suit their needs. A gentle dream, on one hand, can allow the outside party to pull the sleeper out of a vegetative state, such as a coma, whereas a nightmare can induce enough duress to cause organ failure and cardiac arrest."

Siegbert swallowed, now not feeling so skeptical. "Duress," he repeated. "Duress like...the tower? The explosion? Duress like the spider Forrest faced?"

Brynhildr nodded gravely. "Forrest has already experienced such stress when he was nearly burned alive by the spider. It was only his realization that he was in a dream that prevented his heart from stopping."

Forrest nodded, unable to speak about the agony he'd experienced within the confines of the spider's fiery silk before Brynhildr had told him that it was only a dream.

"So what're you saying?" Siegbert asked. "That if we think we're dead...we...are? In the real world?"

"It is not so simplistic," the tome dragon replied. "In the case of many dangers in this dream world, yes, your belief that you are only dreaming and therefore cannot be harmed will save your heart from trauma. But I'm afraid that other things in this realm are more concrete."

"Like the darkness," Forrest murmured.

"Yes. That is one of the many things that will kill you in sleep and in life."

Siegbert shivered a little, remembering the cold chill that had iced through him when the darkness had brushed against his foot, and the images of death that had flashed behind his eyes. He needed no more evidence that that vile blackness was a true taste of the abyss itself. Even now, he was still trying to coax the feeling back into his afflicted foot.

Forrest scooted closer to Siegbert, taking his cousin's hand, before saying, "What exactly is that stuff?"

"Magic," Brynhildr replied.

"Magic?" Forrest repeated, incredulous.

"Yes, of the vilest kind. It is a deathstroke spell, a staple of black magic that causes immediate death to all it afflicts. The one who desires your lives has inserted it into the dreamweave for this very purpose."

Forrest stared down into the stream as it bubbled by, disturbed but also jolted. Deathstroke...that word sounded familiar. "Where have I heard that before?" he murmured to himself.

"From the mouth of the one who struck you with it," Brynhildr replied.

Forrest went rigid. "W-what?"

"The witches, Forrest," Brynhildr said. She narrowed her eyes at the two young nobles who sat before her, thunderstruck, and after a beat, said, "Do you not remember?"

Witches... Witches hit me with a deathstroke spell? For some reason, the image of a withered old woman with pin-straight silver hair came to mind, vivid as though she were standing there before him, her smile pert and cruel. He could practically hear the sharp lilt of her voice, the cold amusement in her words...

...as he bent over Siegbert, dead and unresponsive in his own bed.

"Forget it, lass. None can survive my deathstroke magic. Case in point."

Then...she fired a bolt of black magic into his back.

Forrest pitched forward, wheezing, as though he truly had been struck from behind — Siegbert leapt to him, hands grabbing his shoulders.

"Forrest!" he cried. "What the devil was that?" he asked Brynhildr.

"He's remembering." The tome dragon's voice was tight with anxiety.

Images flashed before Forrest's eyes, clearly as though they were happening before him and he was standing to the side, watching: the creak of the bed as Siegbert awoke in the middle of the night, searching for flint. The curtains pulled back by a long-nailed hand, revealing the room filled with vengeful witches. Siegbert calling for help. Siegbert shoving Forrest from the bed, taking a bolt of deathstroke magic that should have been for Forrest. Forrest succumbing to another blast of black magic...

"Oh," he gasped, standing. "Oh."

"Forrest?" Siegbert stood beside him, but his voice was blunted, indistinct — other sounds overlapped it, echo-y and amplified.

"Has he left?"

"Yes, mistress — the repulsion magic coating the doorknob drove him away."

"He may be back, though, milady — he did not sound very happy. If I didn't know any better...I'd say that he was the boy's father."

The voices were so close, so very close, it was as though whoever was speaking stood next to him — or above him. Yes, above him. Because Forrest no longer felt as though he were sitting at the edge of a stream — strange tingles reverberated through his arms and legs, and he had the strangest sensation that he was lying down, his cheek pressed against a warm chest, steadily rising and falling beneath him.

"Let him come back. He will soon turn away, just as he was just now."

"But how many times will he return? He may begin to grow suspicious."

Forrest, feeling foggy and light-headed, glanced skyward, and saw the image of a wizened old crone etched into the clouds — or were the clouds even there? He couldn't be sure. But the crone was there, and the words were coming from her and from another, a woman that stood behind her, wringing her hands.

The witches. They're the witches! The ones who tried to kill me and Siegbert...

Siegbert stepped back in alarm as a gentle white light began to surround his cousin, leaping up from his feet and spreading in a wave up his body until he was cocooned in a gentle white glow. All at once, Forrest's feet left the ground, and he began to drift up towards the sky.

"What's happening?" Siegbert demanded.

"He's beginning to wake up!" Brynhildr yelled. "Stop him!"

Her fierce cry surprised him. "Wait, why?" he asked as he jogged towards Forrest — his cousin, still glowing and staring, transfixed, at the sky, was beginning to drift away, seemingly carried by the wind. "Isn't that a good thing? At least out there, the deathstroke spell can't get him!"

"Fool! The deathstroke spell is in here and in reality! It will strike him down the second Forrest opens his eyes!"

Siegbert blanched. Oh no! Pushing into a run, he scaled a boulder sunken into the creek bed and launched himself upward, grabbing for Forrest's ankle.

His hand passed right through it.

What? Siegbert crashed to the ground, jarring his elbow. Snarling in pain, he looked up and saw Forrest drift through the canopy of a twisted magnolia, passing through it like a ghost. The glow around his cousin had intensified, and he could see clouds through his torso as though he were made of glass.

What was going on? Was Forrest fading?

Scrambling to his feet, Siegbert ran after his drifting cousin, as fast as his legs would allow. "Forrest!" he screamed. "Forrest! Stop! Don't wake up!"

His cousin didn't appear to hear him — he continued to drift skyward, eyes drooping as though he were, rather than waking up, falling asleep.

Brynhildr shot past Siegbert, sailing up towards Forrest.

"Forrest," she said as she reached him, her voice deep and commanding, "listen to my voice."

He didn't appear to hear her — he ghosted through her, drifting towards the endless blue horizon, and she hurried after him.

"Forrest!" she tried again. "Forrest, can you hear me? Can you hear my voice?"

A muscle in Forrest's eye twitched — her words cut into his thrall, disorienting him.

"Listen to me, Forrest," the tome dragon continued, circling around the floating boy. "Listen to what I am telling you. Listen to what I'm saying. Focus on the sound of me. ME, Forrest. ME."

Forrest's face scrunched up — Brynhildr's voice continued to slice through his trance, like a hot poker through a block of ice. The witches were still talking, but he couldn't ignore Byrnhildr's voice — it was too sharp, too commanding. The words of the witches became garbled, indistinct. Their images, a second ago so clear-cut in the sky, became vague, jumbled — the images of the clouds, in comparison, became sharper, less abstract.

"Focus on my voice, Forrest," Brynhildr continued. "Only my voice. On where I am. On who I am. Focus, Forrest."

Forrest did, and all at once came out of his daze — his surroundings tripled in clarity, as though they'd been yanked into focus, and he groaned, "Brynhildr?"

It didn't take long after that for him to realize that he was floating a hundred feet in the air.

It was at that instant that the glow from around Forrest's body faded in a flash, and his weight seemed to triple in a matter of seconds. Gravity jerked him with a violent downward tug.

As Forrest careened down towards the earth, he though, frantically, If you think it can't hurt you...it won't. The ground won't hurt me. This is a dream. I'll hit it, but it'll feel nice and fluffy, like a pile of pillows. It can't hurt me. It won't.

Whether or not Forrest's belief would have saved him remained to be seen, however, as Siegbert appeared beneath him, diving forward the last few feet in a desperate attempt to break Forrest's fall.

That hurt — Forrest collided with Siegbert back, which didn't feel like a pile of pillows as much as did a slab of conglomerate, and his cousin crumpled under him, breath squashed out of him with an "OOOF!"

It took a full minute to recover from the landing — when Forrest finally rolled from atop Siegbert, his back felt seconds away from snapping in two, dream or no dream.

"Gods," he groaned. "I think I would've preferred the ground."

"What?" Siegbert snarled as he fought his way to his elbows — his face was flushed and crinkled with pain, and Forrest instantly felt guilty. After all, his cousin had broken his fall.

"Nothing," he said, rubbing at his back. "Thank you for...trying to catch me."

"I'm just glad that you're solid enough to threaten the integrity of my spinal cord." Siegbert's eyes softened. "Are you all right? I was truly worried there for a second — you floated right up into the sky like a ghost."

"Yes, I'm fine," Forrest said. "I-I'm not sure what happened, but I'm all right now."

"That was you waking up." The boys glanced up to see Brynhildr floating above. "A few seconds more, and you would have emerged from the dream and fallen to the witches waiting for you in reality."

"Yes..." Forrest glanced down at his hands, at his dirty feet, focusing on how solid they were, how real. But part of his mind was still thinking about the witches, about what had happened...up there, and a shiver ran up his back as his body fought to stay corporeal — he could still hear their voices in the depths of his ears, and even imagined that the clouds above moved oddly, trying to shift into their images.

I'm here, he thought to himself. And here only. I will not wake up. I will not.

Instinctively, he moved closer to Siegbert and took his cousin's hand, twining their fingers together. He instantly felt grounded, focused. There was nothing more solid than Siegbert, more warm or reassuring. He wouldn't drift away, not now — not so long as Siegbert was down here with him.

"What now?" his cousin was asking Brynhildr. "If we can't wake up, what are we supposed to do? Is there a way out of this nightmare that doesn't involve our deaths?"

"I cannot be sure."

"Splendid," Siegbert growled.

"I did not say that I did not know, just that I was not sure," Brynhildr said sharply. "There may yet be a way out of this place, but I will need your help in order to find it."

Forrest squeezed Siegbert's hand. "Do we have a heading?" he asked. "Any idea of what to look for?"

"Not quite." The tome dragon cast the horizon a pensive glance. "I have...a feeling."

"That's it?" Siegbert asked. "A feeling?"

"Sometimes, that's all there is," Brynhildr said. "A feeling. A direction."

"Your feelings have kept us alive so far," Forrest pointed out. "I trust them, Brynhildr." And he did. He didn't know why, but he did. He had no doubts that the tome dragon would lead them in the right direction. He was certain of it.

The tome dragon dipped her head. "Very well," she said gravely. "Follow me."