Dreamweaver - Chapter 6

Forrest woke up bone tired — his limbs were leaden, barely able to support his weight as he somehow or another clambered out of bed and stumbled towards the vanity. Blinding sunlight filled the room; some fool, probably one of the chambermaids, had inconsiderately left the drapes open, filling the bedroom with a staggering amount of morning light.

Grumbling, Forrest splashed some water on his face from a bowl on the vanity before picking his way over to the curtains, intending on yanking them shut. With some surprise, he noticed that they were thick and fluffy, obviously made from some sort of animal hide. Forrest didn't have such a display of barbarism in his room. He glanced up. In fact...his room wasn't this sparsely furnished: the only thing in this chamber to break up the monotony of castle cobblestone was a standard bed, a desk, and a wardrobe. Whose room was he in?

He spotted the short sword in the cranny between the bed and desk.

Oh. Siegbert! He must've fallen asleep in his room last night, just as he had when they'd been children. But the chamber was empty now, save for him. Where had his cousin gone?

"Siegbert?" he called, opening the door into the hallway. "Siegbert?" He glanced up and down the stone corridor in both directions, but didn't see his friend in any of the receding shadows. In fact...he didn't see anyone at all. Which was incredibly odd, seeing as the hallways were usually bustling with activity during this time of the day. Maids, attendants, royal staff, carrying equipment, delivering messages, taking care of many of the tasks necessary for running Castle Krakenburg... But today, the hall was empty from one end to the other, and the only sound to be heard was the echo of Forrest's own voice, calling for Siegbert.

Forrest retreated back into Siegbert's room, for some reason feeling chilled. Where was everybody? The horrid notion of an emergency evacuation during the night and being left behind swelled in his throat, but he shook his head. If there had been an evacuation of any kind, he would have heard it. He wasn't that deep of a sleeper! And even if he was, Siegbert would've woken him, alert soldier that he was. No, something else was going on. But what?

Forrest hurried back to the window, pulling the curtains apart fully and thrusting the doors open onto the balcony. Maybe he could spot someone to help him down in the courtyard—

He froze as he stepped out onto the chamber balcony. "Great Gods," he gasped.

A bright, nearly abnormally blue sky hung over Castle Krakenburg, laden with the soft, white heaps of clouds. That in itself was not odd, if you ignored the enormous slabs of rock floating in between them, drifting in the same direction as the cloudbanks, seemingly on the breeze. There were dozens of them, some small as carriages, others large enough to be small nations. Some drifted along on their sides, and others floated upside down, the trees and twisted vegetation growing from the surfaces pointing down towards Forrest like daggers. Their bulky forms drew jagged shadows across Castle Krakenburg's eerie, empty bailey.

Any self-respecting Nohrian knew that this was not what Castle Krakenburg looked like on any other day of the week.

Forrest began to tremble, overwhelmed by what he was seeing. Floating islands. Floating islands! Gods, what's going on?  This was not what the castle had looked like when he'd gone to sleep.

When I went to sleep...

A sparkle in the corner of Forrest's eye suddenly caught his attention. The courtyard of Castle Krakenburg, not usually exposed to this much blatant sunlight, was not as empty as Forrest had originally thought. A mass of glowing pink mist crouched near the gates, beneath the stunted, knotted tree that was said to have been planted before even King Garon had occupied the Nohrian throne. Forrest was too far away to be sure, but he thought he could barely see what looked like a silhouette within the depths of the fuchsia-colored fog.

"Hello!" Forrest called. "Hello! Is...is someone there?"

No reply, but the mist-shrouded silhouette shifted ever so slightly, as though it had heard Forrest's cry.

The young noble spun around, pushing past the bed and through the door of Siegbert's bedroom. A small part of him wondered if he should stop by his room and change out of his fluffy pink pajamas, but a greater part of him had no intention of staying in this strange, eerie, empty version of Castle Krakenburg a second more than was necessary.

And eerie and empty it was. The halls, chambers, and corridors, usually so loud, busy, and vibrant for such a gloomy castle, were completely empty, pulling longer shadows across the floor and making the ceilings seem higher and the innocent tap of Forrest's bare feet against the stone floor louder than normal. The paintings in the Grand Hall, of Nohrian leadership long past, seemed more oppressive than before, and the suits of general's armor that stood in the shadows seemed to glare silently at Forrest as he hurried past.

It was almost a relief when he reached entryway of the inner keep, which hung ajar, as if someone had accidentally left it open — normally, his father would have been livid at such a breach in security, but now that the door hung open seemed unimportant, as there was no one there to reprimand or do the reprimanding. Forrest squeezed through almost desperately, flopping down onto his knees as he popped out onto the other side.

It was colder down in the courtyard than it had been up on the balcony — overhead, a colossal island had passed before the sun, cooling the air as it drifted by. The island was upside down, and close enough that Forrest could see the large lake spanning across its surface. He imagined that it reflected his own terrified image back at him.

Struggling to focus, Forrest picked himself off the ground and scrambled across the bailey, which seemed impossibly larger in the absence of horses, attendants, retainers, and servants. The sand was smooth and unblemished, bearing no evidence that there had ever been anyone at the castle other than Forrest — his bare feet left a single trail of footprints behind him. The notion was chilling, because for some reason, he could not remember whether or not that was true. Had there actually ever been anyone else here, other than him? The memories in his head, of his cousin, his father, the castle, Windmire, bustling with activity...were they real? Or figments of a dream?

Stop it! he thought to himself as he kept running. And open your eyes! There is someone here other than you!

Or something, as Forrest came to find — he reached the pink cloud sparkling near the castle gates and skidded to a hard stop when he realized that the silhouette he had seen from the balcony of the castle was not human.

A winged beast lay beneath the knotted tree, its body lithe, reptilian, and coated by a fine layer of glittering crimson scales. A long, pointed tail rested neatly over leathery claws, each bearing three lethally sharp, curved talons. As Forrest approached, the creature lifted its neck, long and graceful, and two pale green eyes studied him from either side of a pointed snout. The mist coalescing around the beast seemed to expand out towards Forrest, enfolding him in the strong scent of sky and mountain lilies.

The creature exuded no hostility, yet the urge to turn his back and flee warmed his blood. Those claws looked as though they could shred skin like rice paper, and the tip of the creature's tail was wicked sharp, probably capable of impaling a human like a ballistae missile.

Yet, Forrest knew that turning and running was unwise and impractical. He was unarmed, for pity's sake — if this beast wanted to eat him, there wasn't much that he would be able to do about it, except request a quick death and that the creature be mindful of his hair.

A horrible thought suddenly occurred to Forrest: this beast...did it eat everyone? Is it responsible for the empty castle? Was that why it was out here waiting patiently for him? Him, the last survivor...dessert, in other words.

The winged creature's mouth parted, displaying rows of thorn-like teeth, and Forrest, for a fleeting second, was certain that his life was at an end. But the beast hadn't opened its mouth to eat him, it had opened it to speak:

"Do not fear, human. I am not here to harm you."

Its voice was feminine and kind, and that in and of itself was more stunning than the fact that it could talk at all; its tone seemed to be at odds with the fangs in its mouth.

"I...I-is that so?" Forrest said, still taking a cautionary step back.

"Yes," the creature said, wings rippling. "You need not fear me."

Easier said than done. "What are you?" Forrest asked. "Why are you here, and...how is it that you can speak in human tongue?"

"I am versed in such things, as I am a tome dragon," the creature replied, inclining her head towards Forrest. "I am an old friend of your father's, here to guide you and assist you, and to defend you from harm."

And old friend of his father's? Forrest thought back as far as he could, but for the life of him could not recall his father ever being friends with a dragon, or a tome dragon, one other than Queen Kamui.

But suddenly, a more pertinent question arose: "Where is my father?" he asked, not sure of why he thought the tome dragon would know. "And King Xander? And Siegbert and Dwyer and Felicia...Jakob and Aunt Camilla and Selena and Beruka... Where is anyone? The castle is empty. Where have they all gone?"

The pink tome dragon rose to all fours, making Forrest flinch. But she did not attack, as a small part of him had feared: she rose into the air, swooping overhead. Forrest stared as she hovered above. Her wings weren't moving. How was it that she was flying?

"That does not matter right now, young lord," the tome dragon said. "You are here, and now we must hurry. Your friend's life hangs in the balance."

Without preamble, she darted away, swooping upward and sailing over the castle gates, elegant as a fish in water. She paused over one of the wall's crenels, glancing back at Forrest expectantly.

I suppose I don't have a choice. If he didn't follow this supposed tome dragon, his only other choice would be to return to the cold, empty castle, and just the thought of doing so and hearing his footsteps echo back at him in the halls made his stomach twist.

And so Forrest found himself following, pushing through the inner gates, which were also ajar, after the strange, pink dragon.

He was now in Castle Krakenburg's outermost bailey, at the top of a rippling hill of natural rock that tumbled down towards the compound's last set of gates far below. The tome dragon twisted through the air, gliding down towards the outer walls with ease, leaving a glittering trail of pink mist behind her. Forrest scrambled down after her, now seriously regretting not stopping to change out of his pajamas: sharp stones and pieces of rock bit into the sensitive underside of his bare feet, and anxiety had him tripping over himself more than usual — the resulting falls were not padded by the fluffy but thin material of his sleepwear.

But it was too late to turn back now — a few cuts and scrapes later, Forrest was at the outermost gate of the castle. The portcullis had not been dropped all the way, and there was enough space beneath the rounded teeth of the falling gate for a skinny teenage boy to scramble underneath.

Forrest flattened himself against the dirt, wriggling between the mooring teeth of the rusty gate. His wingspan was just narrow enough — if he'd been any bigger, his shoulders would've gotten caught.

When he finally got to his feet, dusting himself off, he found himself facing a thick stand of pines that seemed to grow to infinity to the east and west, the shadows in between them deep and dark. He frowned — if there need be any more evidence to substantiate the fact that he was not at the real Castle Krakenburg, then this was it. The royal castle of Nohr was sunk down into an ancient mineral mine in the heart of Windmire, nowhere near leafy green pines such as these.

Gods, what was going on? Where was he?

A rustling above made him jump. But it was just the tome dragon, who'd perched in the canopy of one of the trees, green eyes impatient.

"Quickly," she said, taking to the air again. "We must hurry."

"Wait!" Forrest cried, but she'd already swooped out of sight, flying high above the treeline. He hurried after her, plunging into the pines and trying to keep her in sight as he wove through the trees. The forest floor was dark, spotted with pockets of sunshine, but they didn't help much — Forrest found himself tripping over roots and through webs of tree branches as he strived to keep up with the snapshots of pink scales that he spotted through gaps in the trees.

Not soon enough, the woods finally thinned, and Forrest tumbled out onto a thick, grassy field, above which opened an impossibly vast blue sky. For a minute, Forrest's anxiety dissolved as he stood and stared up at the endless blue above him, high and wide and bright. Rocky islands floated within its wide embrace, their shadows drifting across him as they briefly eclipsed the sun. Forrest watched, mesmerized, as two smaller islands actually bumped into each other, colliding with a bone-rattling crunch that was louder than a pall of thunder.

The pink tome dragon suddenly dropped down beside him, making Forrest leap a foot in the air. "We must keep moving," she said. "Follow me."

"Wait!" Forrest cried before she could leap back into the air. "You said a friend of mine was in danger...who are you talking about?"

"The son of the king," the dragon replied, leaping upward again and swooping around to face him.

Forrest felt his heart drop to the soles of his feet. "You mean...Siegbert?" He suddenly didn't have the ability to wet his throat. "He's...he's in trouble?"

"He wavers at the precipice of death," the tome dragon replied. She turned and darted away, sweeping over the fingers of tall grass waving back and forth in the breeze. Forrest followed, panting as he struggled to keep up.

"But...how?" he gasped. "What happened to him?"

"Time is of the essence," the dragon snapped. "He could be wasting away as we speak."

Forrest shut his mouth, heart pounding with dread. Siegbert, how are you here, in this strange place, with me? he thought as the grass parted around him. How did we get here?

He answered his own question: It doesn't matter. He's hurt. We've got to save him!